Decision Maker: Cabinet
Decision status: Recommendations Approved
Is Key decision?: No
Is subject to call in?: No
Decisions:
The Cabinet had before it a
report * from the Deputy Chief Executive (S151) presenting the
Quarter 2 Budget Monitoring Report.
The Cabinet Member for
Governance, Finance and Risk outlined the contents of the report
with particular reference to the following:
- Cabinet were asked to
note that the improved projected Outturn position for the General
Fund was a £398k underspend. This was a significant
improvement on the budget and the financial position compared to
previous years.
- In regards to income,
as outlined in the quarter 1 report, there continued to be areas
where the Council had some large variances from budget, both under
and over.
- This mainly reflected
economic circumstances with Planning and Building Control income,
which was lower than forecast due to the stagnation of the housing
market. However, those were more than offset by areas that were
forecasted to be well ahead of budget in areas such as Waste and
Leisure, where recyclable prices were currently strong and Leisure
Centre membership where numbers had increased.
- Regarding the
expenditure, the key element was the salary budget. There were some
significant variances, with underspends through prudent management
of costs in services such as Finance, Human Resources (HR) or
Legal, or overspends in Information and Communications Technology
(ICT) or Environmental Enforcement.
- Although projected to
be significantly lower than previous years, the requirement for
agency staff was higher than expected. Areas of particular pressure
were Waste, Finance, Legal and Planning Enforcement. The main
Service variances were explained in Appendix B, with key income
forecast shown within Appendix C, and staffing variances within
Appendix D.
- The Housing Revenue
Account (HRA) also showed a healthy underspend of £315k. This
was largely due to staff savings and lower interest costs, but was
partially offset by a lower than budgeted investment yield and
increased costs of void properties.
- The capital programme
had been reviewed and a new deliverable Budget for projects
starting in 2024/25 was proposed, The budget was reduced by nearly
£5m, made up of over £3m from projects that were no
longer going ahead; £1.8m from projects that had been delayed
until a future year; £1m from projects reducing in scope;
£0.9m from projects being delivered ahead of schedule; and
£0.300m from a new project following a successful grant
bid.
- There was a sizable
variance (£14.6m) against that revised 2024/25 deliverable
Budget including £16.5m that would slip into future years,
slightly offset by £2m overspend. There were two main reasons
including movements in the HRA Development Programme and delays in
the Cullompton Town Centre Relief Road which had now reached
confirmation of funding being secured.
- Regarding 3Rivers, an
application had been submitted on 28 August 2024 to Companies House
for the company to be voluntarily struck off, the Council were in
the very final few days before it was fully closed. There had been
no issues.
- Work was in progress
with the conversion of St George’s Court into an over
60’s community through the HRA, with the first properties
included on the tenancy lists and occupation expected before
Christmas. The unsold units at Bampton continued to be marketed and
had recently generated meaningful interest but to date no offers
had been received and would be kept under review.
RESOLVED
that:
- The financial
monitoring information for the income and expenditure for the six
months to 30 September 2024 and the projected outturn position be
NOTED.
- The use of Waivers
for the Procurement of goods and services as included in Section 8
be NOTED.
- The update on the
soft closure of 3 Rivers Developments Ltd be noted.
- The revisions to the
2024/25 Deliverable Capital Programme total be APPROVED.
(Proposed by Cllr J Buczkowski
and seconded by Cllr S Clist)
Reason for the decision: As
stated in the report
Note: * Report previously
circulated.
Publication date: 22/11/2024
Date of decision: 12/11/2024
Decided at meeting: 12/11/2024 - Cabinet
Accompanying Documents: