Minutes:
The Executive Director of Finance and Corporate Resources delivered a presentation regarding the Council’s budget. During the delivery of this presentation she highlighted the following points for Members’ consideration:
· As of September 2015 it was anticipated that there would be a shortfall in the budget of £196,000 in 2016/17 and a shortfall of £718,000 in 2017/18.
· The figures did not take account of the government grant settlement which was unlikely to be announced until December 2015.
· An assumption was being made that fees and charges would increase by 3 per cent.
· There would be use of £1.979 million from balances on a number of projects including the new leisure centre.
· Savings achieved in any given year were returned to balances.
· Reserves were allocated to particular projects such as new infrastructure.
· There was the potential for Overview and Scrutiny to undertake short, sharp scrutiny reviews to investigate particular budgets in cases where Members had any concerns.
· Over the course of the next few months, until the Council’s budget was set in February 2016, scrutiny Members were also encouraged to speak to Heads of Service about any particular areas of the budget where they felt further information would be useful. Members did not need to wait until a Board meeting to raise any concerns.
· The Council’s external auditors, Grant Thornton, had recommended that the Council improve its monitoring process in order to enhance the accuracy of end of year projections.
· The external auditors had also recommended that the Council needed to make its budget setting and financial monitoring process more transparent.
· Overview and Scrutiny had a role to play in questioning why certain savings achieved in a given year had occurred in cases where these had not been planned for.
· Members also needed to consider, when scrutinising the budget, whether the Council’s strategic purposes continued to reflect customer concerns.
· A detailed schedule of the proposed budgets for the following three year period would be presented for the consideration of the Board in October.
· Officers were hoping to provide further information about the use of budgets to enable Members to assess the budget in context.
· There was the potential that an extra meeting of the Board would need to take place in January or February 2016 to consider the budget, depending on the outcome of the government grant settlement.
· There was the possibility that in 2017/18 the Council would need to take into account the potential impact of new housing developments on service delivery costs.
The costs of delivering enabling services were briefly discussed following the presentation. Members were advised that in the long-term the Council was aiming to change the balance of funding between frontline services and enabling services to place a greater emphasis on the operational level.
Members noted that there were a significant number of budget items due to be considered at the meeting of the Board in November alongside reports on other subjects. Concerns were expressed that the Board would not have sufficient time to review these items constructively and that further consideration of the Overview and Scrutiny Board’s Work Programme might, therefore, be desirable.
RESOLVED that the contents of the finance briefing presentation be noted.