[H1]HITCHIN: North Herts Council has admitted it has lost around £280,000 in car parking income due to the Covid pandemic - while spending more than £180,000 on 'consultants'.[H1]

The coronavirus crisis has hit NHC's coffers hard with revenue from the Lairage multi-storey car park, St Mary's car park and Brand Street car parks falling substantially from pre-Covid levels.

A number of discussions have already taken place in a bid to find ways to plug the considerable gaps in council funding, including NHC debating plans to turn former town centre toilets into a cafe in a bid to raise money.

NHC have also been looking at ways to save cash by letting out Charnwood House - with £30,000 estimated to be the saving per annum while also aiming to boost revenues raised from Hitchin Town Hall and North Hertfordshire Museum by introducing 'An Evening With' events.

As Nub News reported last week the council are considering charging residents extra money for new bins. North Herts Council are deliberating whether to hike the cost of new bins by an extra £5 to £40 a per year. They are also set to charge taxpayers £40 for a new bin and £25 to refurbish damaged ones.

Ian Couper, Service Director for Resources, told Nub News: "At the end of September, we estimated that in this current financial year we would lose up to around £280k in car parking income in Hitchin alone due to the impact of Covid.

"The total for the whole of the district is even higher at almost £400k.

"Overall we were forecasting that we would have to fund over £1m of additional expenditure and lost income, even after contributions and funding from central government. All of that has been funded from council reserves, which affects how well we can deal with funding pressures in the future.

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"The ongoing effects of the pandemic, along with rising inflation, hikes to energy and general running costs, plus the expectation of impending cuts in funding from central government, all impact on how we manage the council's finances and use residents' council tax.

"We continue to work hard to balance the books to ensure that the essential services we provide are not affected in the coming months and years."

[H1]Consultants[H1]

However, Nub News also understands that in the tax year during the height of the pandemic (2020-21) NHC spent a whopping £180k on 'consultants - including estate agents.

Nub News asked NHC for clarification on this matter. This is what they told us.

"The council spent £180,493 on consultancy services in the last financial year available (2020/21) in return for impartial, specialist work.

"Most councils use them as a way to support major or one-off projects that will greatly benefit residents, directly through the delivery of a particular service or facility, or indirectly through reducing expenditure and/or increasing income and therefore positively impacting council tax.

"The risks of not employing consultants are that important work might not get completed because of limited in-house resources, time or specialist knowledge.

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'We use consultants to advise us on some commercial projects, to appraise and advise us on whether or not an opportunity is viable to pursue.

"The 2020/21 figure includes payments to specialist town planning and estate agents and Opinion Research Services which conduct our independent residents' surveys so we can canvass the thoughts of our residents.

"We ensure best value is obtained when employing consultants through our procurement process."