CCC runs at a deficit and is being required to make extensive budget cuts across the board-therefore to plough £14m into something other than public services suffering from such cuts is something that needs to be answered. Especially when a third party was offering to halve the cost.
All councils are cutting costs, in particular at the moment as a function of reduction in central funds from Government and the fact that they're not allowed to raise Council Tax by more than 2% to make up the deficit. There's nothing unique about CCC in that.
In terms of the £14m loan, if paid off as agreed this will actually make money for CCC.
The third-party offering to halve the cost at that point were presumably the ones doing everything possible to wreck ACL, right? To be clear here, if SISU had got control of the loan then all of the Council's investment up until that point is at massive risk. I can't quite see how that halves the cost to CCC.
Which is why CCC say they stepped in to secure it.
I'm not sure about an agreement, but if the way that SISU wanted to get control of the loan was by distressing ACL, then it's hardly any great surprise that the Council decided not to support the process after thinking it through. The staggering thing to me is that they might have even considered it.