Issue - meetings

This report presents the second monitoring information for the Authority as a whole for the financial year 2014/15 to the end of September 2014.  The report also includes a number of budget transfer requests for both revenue and capital

Councillor Charles Gerrish in an ad hoc statement referred to appendix 5(i) of the report and asked what the Property Acquisition Bath item was; he believed the amount on that line should be £8M, not £10M.  He also asked for an explanation of the item Bishop Sutton BN Feasibility.

Councillor David Bellotti proposed the recommendations.  He responded to the queries put by Councillor Gerrish by saying that the Acquisition in Bath was the Seven Dials; and the Bishop Sutton BN Study was the Basic Needs Study for the Primary School.

He observed that the Council continued to manage within budget while remaining on target in the delivery of services and projects.  He explained that Wellbeing had been challenging because it was a needs-led service and was therefore difficult to predict.  He was delighted to announce that it had been possible to increase spending on parks and libraries in order to improve and maintain the services.  Transport was well on budget despite the known difficulties of predicting parking behaviour and Park and Ride use.  He referred to the overspend in Children and Youth but emphasised that this was caused by one or two very special cases, which warranted the expenditure but which could not have been predicted.  In summary, he observed that in the 3 years of the administration the Council had maintained services while saving money.

Councillor Paul Crossley seconded the proposal.

On a motion from Councillor David Bellotti, seconded by Councillor Paul Crossley, it was

RESOLVED (unanimously)

(1) To ASK Strategic Directors should continue to work towards managing within budget in the current year for their respective service areas, and to manage below budget where possible by not committing unnecessary expenditure, through tight budgetary control;

(2) To NOTE this year’s revenue budget position;

(3) To NOTE the capital expenditure position for the Council in the financial year to the end of September and the year-end projections;

(4) To AGREE the revenue virements listed for approval; and

(5) To NOTE the changes in the capital programme.