I fully understand public concerns about Uttlesford s deposit in Landsbanki. This money was first placed there in 2006 before I and many other members where elected onto the council and I certainly wasn t aware of this until recently. At the time the co

I fully understand public concerns about Uttlesford's deposit in Landsbanki.

This money was first placed there in 2006 before I and many other members where elected onto the council and I certainly wasn't aware of this until recently.

At the time the council deposited the money, Landsbanki was considered a solid bank to invest in and it's the council's job to ensure taxpayers get as much out of the money as possible.

Fortunately due to the efforts of the administration to recover its financial position since May 2007 we are able to provide services as normal.

The money isn't entirely ours and because of this we are not allowed to spend the money deposited within the bank, so we use the money to earn interest and therefore get something back out of it.

Be it at a massive cost it's safe to say we have learned an important lesson. Now there is a new council in place we won't be putting any money in overseas banks in the future.

We originally had more money with Landsbanki but fortunately our Director of Central Services Adrian Webb had the foresight to move some of this money from Landsbanki and into various UK building societies.

We are still confident that the situation can be rectified and I can assure you that we are in fact doing everything in our power to retrieve the money.

Cllr David-James Sadler, member for Castle Ward, Uttlesford District Council