The British economy grew by 0.3% in the first calendar quarter of 2013, which is good news, and a better than expected figure.
Certainly some sections of society seem to have been buoyed by this information.
The London Stock Market has continued to enjoy a bull run, as have other markets around the world. In some cases, they have reached year 2000 levels, a height that of course preceded the impact of the 9/11 events in the United States.
At a more basic level, rewards for conventional savings are not so good.
It is difficult to find a bank or building society account yielding more than a few percentage points which means that savings can fall in value relative to inflation. This is a challenge for people who had anticipated savings topping up their cost of living but at the same time it is good for people taking out mortgages.
Even people taking out home loans need to take some care of course.
For example, a mortgage rate of say four per cent can sound attractive but if that rose by just one per cent, the increase in the interest rate is actually 25 per cent.
That would be quite a jump for anyone’s budget.
Local authorities face a similar dilemma in terms of how they invest their money.
They have treasury management policies which are designed to manage savings effectively, both to support new capital spending and to provide an income stream to support the running of day-to-day services.
The guidance for the operation of treasury management policies is embedded in the acronym ‘SLY’ – Security, Liquidity, Yield – in that order of precedence. Taxpayers want their money to be safe.
A suitable proportion of the funds need to be available to be withdrawn at short notice to fund both regular and unforeseen activities. Yield is ranked third so a percentage return is sought only by reference to the previous two factors being satisfied.
A few years ago, Crawley Borough Council’s Treasury Management activity was rated top in an assessment of some 140 councils.
That was a great achievement and an endorsement of the expertise that our people apply to their roles.
It is just as well because not so long ago, our annual revenue budget was underpinned by a need to draw about £5 million in interest from our savings.
Then we had the recession and falling interest rates such that now our dependency on interest from savings is less than £2 million.
Had we not made efficiency savings of £7 million since 2006, the situation could for annual budgeting could have become quite serious. Proactive behaviour, not waiting for a recession, has meant front-line services being protected in Crawley.