Opinion: Why Are We Still Waiting for Answers on a £19m Housing Overspend?

Published on: 24 Mar, 2026
Updated on: 27 Mar, 2026

Cllr Bilal Akhtar

By Bilal Akhtar

Conservative borough councillor for Worplesdon

Why are Guildford residents still waiting for answers on a £19 million Housing overspend?

In May 2023, shortly after the local elections, Guildford residents learned that the Borough Council had overspent by around £19 million on housing maintenance contracts during 2022–23.

This overspend led to a police fraud enquiry and the dismissal of senior staff connected to the Housing Department. But one senior figure remained in post: the council’s lead member for housing, who is also the leader of the council.

Since then, an independent examination has been carried out to assess what work should have been completed on council-owned homes during that period.

That examination has finished and a report has been produced. However, the report has not been made public, raising questions about why residents are still unable to see the findings, particularly with local elections approaching.

Could it be that the Lib Dem Executive is trying to bury it until after the local elections this May?

What is known so far

Although little information has been shared publicly, several key facts have been confirmed:

• Spending on housing maintenance and repairs was around five times higher than expected, resulting in multi-million-pound excess costs and contributing to the police fraud enquiry.
• Around 8,000 individual work orders were not inspected, meaning the council does not know whether the work was done properly, or at all.

Because of these uncertainties, the Council’s Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) Committee asked for a detailed review. The Chair  Cllr Philip Brooker, Con, Worplesdon) proposed that a random sample of around 1,000 work orders be inspected, covering a range of job types and values.

The aim was to identify any patterns, assess whether value for money had been achieved, and decide whether further investigation was needed. Senior Officers agreed to respond with an alternative proposal by end of March 2025.

To date, the committee has not received this alternative proposal.

Delays and unanswered questions

Since the overspend came to light, the O&S Committee is still waiting for full answers. Reports have been promised, but the item has been deferred at short notice, with no satisfactory explanation. As a result, proper scrutiny of a major financial failure has repeatedly been delayed.

In October 2025, a document described as “Preliminary Advice” was shared confidentially with the Chair of O&S. He responded with a detailed 27-point critique, expecting those points to be addressed in the final report.

But when a report was eventually presented to the committee in November, it was substantially different, did not include the Chair’s recommendations, and appeared to bypass the O&S process entirely.

Who authorised this whitewash? And what were the motives if not to hide the truth from Guildford residents?

Why this still matters

One of the committee’s key objectives was to assess whether future housing budgets are realistic and justified. This is particularly important given that £19 million was overspent without proper inspection of the work carried out.

Despite this, a further £65 million has been approved for housing maintenance in the last six months, even though the true condition of the homes and the value of previous work remain unclear.

An Independent Assurance Panel reviewing the council’s improvement progress has raised similar concerns, asking how future budgets can be assessed without understanding what went wrong in 2022–23.

A question of transparency

Overview and Scrutiny committees exist to ensure openness and accountability.

In this case, residents are still waiting for clear answers more than three years after a major financial scandal emerged and 13 months after the O&S Committee requested an investigation.

For a council that regularly highlights its commitment to transparency, the continued absence of publicly available findings raises a simple question: when will Guildford’s taxpayers finally be told the full story?

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