The UK’s largest forester, Forest Enterprise (FE), moved to counter a claim this week that its net loss for the year to March 2000 stood at £103.7m net and not the £25.6m it had reported (TTJ June 30).
The claim was made by director of timber merchant and sawmiller Ransfords, Gordon Waugh. He wrote to his MP, Christopher Gill, asking him to look into the size of the deficit made on a turnover of £95.5m.
However, chief executive of FE, Bob McIntosh, told TTJ that the loss was the result of an accounting device rather than any deep-seated problems.
He said that £78.1m of the £103.7m deficit was the result of HM Treasury accounting methods that demand executive agencies deduct a notional charge of 6% off their net assets. This, he said, distorted the agency’s financial results.
‘The more accurate figure is the net loss of £25.6m that was quoted in the accounts and which does not take into account the 6% notional charge,’ he said.
