Agenda item

This report presents the Resources and Public Realm Scrutiny Committee with with the 2022/23 Q3 Financial Forecast report that was presented to Cabinet in January 2023, which is part of the committee’s role in undertaking budget scrutiny throughout the year.

Councillor Conneely welcomed Minesh Patel, Corporate Director, Finance and Resources to present a report that updated the Committee on the 2022/23 Q3 Financial Forecast report which it was noted had been presented to Cabinet in January 2023. Having presented the report, the following key points were discussed:

·             The Committee felt that it would add value to the budget and scrutiny process if the timetable for the Committee to receive future financial updates was co-ordinated to allow time for scrutiny to consider them ahead of their presentation to Cabinet.

·             Officers acknowledged the issues raised, however due to the tight timescales the Finance team were required to work within, it would be difficult to adjust the schedule of the reports coming to the Committee. The Committee were advised that as the reports were provided quarterly, there were opportunities throughout the financial year for the Committee to comment and make suggestions with regard to any key concerns identified.

·             The Committee were advised that given the challenging economic climate, it was felt that the budget had been well managed and had incorporated key Budget Task Group recommendations to continue to provide services to support the most vulnerable residents.

·             It was noted that the Children & Young People (CYP) department continued to show an overspend as it had done in previous monitor updates. The statutory and responsive nature of services provided by CYP was, however, recognised in this respect along with the increasing demographic demand driven by the numbers of families and children presenting to the service coupled with increased complexity, high inflation of care costs and post Covid recovery in creating exceptional financial pressures within the service.

·             The Committee queried whether it was necessary to increase the CYP budget allocations to ensure that the vulnerable residents who required support services would not be detrimentally impacted due to spending concerns. In response the Committee were advised that increasing the CYP budget would create further budget deficits in other departments. It was felt that the service was given an appropriate budget allocation, however due to unprecedented external factors the service had faced increased financial challenges which plans were being developed to address.

·             In response to a Committee query in relation to whether the General Fund could be used to support the delivery of the decarbonisation of the Council’s housing stock, officers confirmed that this would not possible given the requirement for works to housing stock to be funded from within the Housing Revenue Account.

·             The Committee noted the statutory override in place to allow the Council to hold the High Needs Block of the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) deficit until 2025/26, however queried how the Council would address the deficit once the statutory override was removed. In response the Committee were advised of the plans to address the pressures in relation to managing the deficit on the DSG High Needs Block given the potential impact on the Council’s budgetary position.

At this stage in proceedings, the Committee agreed to waive apply the guillotine procedure under Standing Order 62(c) in order to extend the meeting for a period of 15 minutes to enable the remaining business on the agenda to be completed.

In summarising the discussion, the Chair thanked all those present for contributing to the scrutiny process on the Financial Monitoring Update and with no further issues raised the Committee RESOLVED to note the contents of the report and approve the following suggestion for improvement:

(1)        Continue to lobby central government for the long-awaited local government finance reforms.