Issue - meetings

The report is to be considered by the Cabinet at their July 2019 meeting. It presents the revenue and capital outturn for 2018/19.

The Head of Management Accounts introduced this item to the Panel. He explained that the report presents the revenue and capital outturn for 2018/19, highlighting a net revenue over budget position of £0.92m. He said that the position had vastly improved through actions including a recruitment freeze that had been implemented during the financial year.

He added that the improvement has continued since the last report, which forecast an over budget position of £3.21m based on monitoring for the year to December 2018, mainly due to improvements in income generation within Heritage Services, and a reduction in capital financing costs arising from the review of the capital programme and rephasing of capital projects.

He stated that the 2018/19 approved budget included the requirement for the delivery of £16.99m of savings. He explained that the final outturn position included achievement of £13.58m or 80% of the savings target compared to 82% delivered in 2017/18. He added that savings items that are no longer deliverable in 2018/19 have been reviewed alongside other recurring budget pressures and have been incorporated into the financial planning assumptions for the 2019/20 budget. He said that it is expected that delayed savings totalling £3.4m will be delivered in 2019/20.

He informed the Panel that the Overall Dedicated Schools Grant for 2018/19 was £135.60m, however of this sum £84.63m was returned to the DFE to be allocated to academies, £20.75m was allocated to schools through funding formula, with the remaining £30.23m retained by the LA to support Special Educational Needs, central expenditure and Early Years.

He stated that the final outturn position on the Council Tax Collection Fund was a surplus of £0.691m for the Council’s share, this represents a 0.8% variance against target income. He explained the reason for the surplus was mainly due to the number of chargeable dwellings being slightly higher than forecast. He said that the collection rate for Council Tax was 98.22% (98.12% 2017/18).

He said that the capital spend in 2018/19 was £88.043m (75%) against a budget of £117.185m giving a variance of £29.142m, primarily reflecting the delivery time to complete projects moving into future financial periods. He added that of this variance, £29.042m is requested for carry forward to 2019/20 to cover re-phased costs of capital projects.

Councillor Karen Warrington asked if the 20% of savings not achieved was mainly attributable to Children’s Services.

The Head of Management Accounts replied that the Home to School Transport budget was overspent in 2018-19 mainly due to the increasing demands of SEND pupils.

Councillor Richard Samuel, Cabinet Member for Resources commented that he recognised that it will be increasingly difficult for the Council to make savings. He added that in terms of the budget for next year, a longer timescale could be set with regard to savings. He said that more rigour was required in terms of savings and would appreciate Panel involvement in the process.

He stated that the Children’s Services budget had recently been rebased, but was currently showing a £1.6m overspend.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 8

This report presents the revenue and capital outturn for 2018/19, highlighting a net revenue over budget position of £0.92m.

Councillor Richard Samuel thanked the Finance Team for their work in setting out the financial position of the Council.

Councillor Samuel introduced the report by saying that the document described the revenue and capital outturn for 2018/19, highlighting net revenue over budget position of £0.92m. The position has vastly improved through actions including a recruitment freeze that have been implemented during the financial year. The improvement has continued since the last report, which forecasted an over budget position of £3.21m based on monitoring for the year to December 2018, mainly due to improvements in income generation within Heritage Services, and a reduction in capital financing costs arising from the review of the capital programme and re-phasing of capital projects.

The 2018/19 approved budget has included the requirement for the delivery of £16.99m of savings. The final outturn position has included achievement of £13.58m or 80% of the savings target compared to 82% delivered in 2017/18. Savings items that were no longer deliverable in 2018/19 have been reviewed alongside other recurring budget pressures and have been incorporated into the financial planning assumptions for the 2019/20 budget. It was expected that delayed savings totalling £3.4m would be delivered in 2019/20.

Councillor Samuel highlighted the main areas of over/under budget; Adult Care, Health & Wellbeing (£0.983m under budget), Children & Young People (£1.761m over budget), Economy & Community Regeneration (£1.050m under budget), Transport & Environment (£0.813m over budget) and Finance & Efficiency (£0.058m under budget).

Councillor Richard Samuel moved the recommendations.

Councillor Dine Romero seconded the motion by saying that it was important to recognise that the Council finances have been suffering from continuous cuts in funding from the government.

Councillor Paul Crossley used this opportunity to highlight contributions from some of the services within his portfolio, in particular bereavement services, crematorium, cemetery, parks, libraries and heritage services.

RESOLVED (unanimously) that the Cabinet agreed to:

2.1  Note the revenue budget outturn over budget position of £0.92m for 2018/19 and the use of Revenue Budget Contingency to fund the overall shortfall;

2.2  Note that no carry forward requests are being put forward for approval;

2.3  Approve that all over budgets are written-off as an exception to the Budget Management Rules for 2018/19.

2.4  Note the revenue virements for 2018/19 reported for information in Appendix 2(i)

2.5  Note the reserve positions and the use of flexible capital receipts shown in paragraphs 3.14-3.16;

2.6  Note the outturn position of the 2018/19 capital programme in paragraph 3.22, and the funding outlined in paragraph 3.24;

2.7  Approve the capital rephasing and write-off of net underspends as listed in Appendix 3. This reflects the outturn spend position on projects against final budgets as detailed in Appendix 4(ii).