To ask the Minister for Communities whether she will bring forward proposals to allow council’s to utilise capital borrowing powers and capitalisation schemes to assist with Voluntary Severance Schemes.

Section 19(5) of the Local Government Finance Act (NI) 2011 allows my Department to issue capitalisation directions to councils. This permits, in very limited circumstances, specified items of expenditure normally classified as revenue to be treated as capital expenditure.

Treasury currently has an overall capitalisation limit for here of £3.4m. My officials have prepared a business case seeking to give councils more flexibility by increasing their capitalisation threshold from the current £3.4m in order to deliver efficiencies. As a result of the business case prepared by my officials, DoF is currently preparing to approach Treasury with a proposal to increase the capitalisation threshold on my Department’s behalf.