BASILDON Council is gambling £80million of taxpayers’ cash on the property market.

A council officer will be given the power to spend tens of millions of pounds at the same time as the Government has issued warnings against local authorities taking risks.

Tory councillors voted through a plan to delegate property purchases power to a single council officer, despite Labour members warning of a “dangerous precedent”.

The council’s chief financial officer will only have to consult one elected councillor before agreeing to spend millions of pounds on the investments.

These decisions will be based on advice given by a private investment firm in London, DTZ Investors.

The agreed budget for the investments is £80million and the council hopes the revenue will close the council’s budget gap, forecast to be £3.5million by 2021.

£40million has been spent on properties in Bath, Stevenage, Tunbridge Wells and Richmond already.

Labour Councillor David Burton-Sampson said: “Guidance issued by the Government said councils should not be borrowing for this so Basildon Council has made the decision to carry on but use their cash reserves. You are potentially throwing reserves away at a time when we don’t know what will happen in the future.

“It then gets worse when we hear about the delegation of approving these acquisitions to one officer in consultation with one councillor - that is not consultation, it is not making a joint decision.”

Council leader Andrew Baggott has backed the change, claiming the committee system stops the council from “being flexible”.

Deputy leader Kevin Blake said: “As our property portfolio grows and competitive opportunities become more common, a more reactive response is needed from the council to maximise income generation opportunities.

“The committee approved the creation of a dedicated commercial asset acquisition board, which will be chaired by the chief financial officer and vice-chaired by the assistant director for resources.”

Basildon is one of many local authorities purchasing commercial property. However, financial experts warned it is a risk. Councillor Stuart Sullivan, chairman of the resources committee, said: “The council had a total of £80million to invest in commercial assets and we will continue to prudently invest in the commercial property market in line with our strategy approved by council. We are committed to protecting services for our residents and commercial asset investment is just one of the ways we seek to generate income.”