One of the first major spending decisions that this Labour council made when they took over control of the council in May 2010, was to invest £5m in a new car park in Southall.
The formal decision was made in July 2010, and only last week, 19 months later, they published their business case. It is one page and to say publish, is probably an exageration.
We were presented with a one page document that showed us how much income would be generated by the new car park, what the expenses would be and what the profit would be.
The profit was estimated to be £25.64pm. That's just over £300 per annum. So if you divide the return into the original investment, it will tell you how long it takes to get your original investment back.
£300 into £5,000,000 is 16,666. So it will take 16,666 years to get the original investment back.
That's what happens when you put a trained economist in charge of running the coucil