Agenda item

The Cabinet Member for Finance, Performance and Core Services presented a report on the Council’s revenue and capital outturn position for 2019/20, which represented the expected final position for the year subject to external audit.

The Cabinet Member opened his presentation by paying tribute to Marcus Rashford of Manchester United Football Club who had successfully lobbied the Government over the provision of free school meals to children throughout the summer holiday period, in response to the Government’s initial stance of stopping provision at the end of the school summer term.  The Cabinet Member also welcomed the announcement by the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government that he would be leading the development of a comprehensive plan to ensure financial stability for local authorities for the remainder of the current financial year in the light of the COVID-19 situation.  The Cabinet Member called, however, for the Government to look beyond the current financial year and commented that the Fair Funding Review should properly reflect the extra costs borne by boroughs such as Barking and Dagenham that have high levels of deprivation.  He also called on the Government to fully fund social care services to the most vulnerable in society and to reinvigorate the New Homes Bonus scheme in order to support the Council’s ambitions to provide new homes that met the needs of all residents of the Borough.

In respect of the outturn position, the Cabinet Member advised that the General Fund revenue expenditure for the financial year was £157.931m and the final Corporate income position was £154.741m, against the budget of £148.820m.  Once transfers to reserves to reflect the carry forward of grants, income for specific purposes and monies held on behalf of partnership organisations had been taken into account, the net budget variance showed an overspend against the General Fund budget of £4.930m.  It was noted that the deficit would be funded from the specific Budget Support reserve account, leaving the overall General Fund reserve unaffected at £17.031m.  The Cabinet Member paid tribute to staff, Unions and the Council-owned companies for their efforts in helping to control expenditure during the year and particularly over the past few months, which had seen an improvement of £3.8m in the projected position for Care and Support services and an overall improvement on the month 10 position of £1.813m.

The Housing Revenue Account (HRA) showed a projected year-end overspend of £1.625m, reducing the HRA reserve to £9.674m.  The Dedicated Schools Grant showed an overspend of £1.474m against the revised funding forecast of £221.539m, primarily due to pressures within the High Needs Block.  The Cabinet Member for Educational Attainment and School Improvement also commented on the ongoing pressures within the DSG and took the opportunity to commend the Borough’s schools for continuing to provide schooling to children of key workers and other vulnerable children and encouraged parents to allow their children to return to school whenever it was safe to do so. 

With regard to the Capital Programme, the Cabinet Member advised that of the total revised budget for 2019/20 of £401.930m, only £220.692m had been spent at the year end.  Whilst he acknowledged that a level of slippage would inevitably occur in a programme of such size, he felt that the extent of the slippage was excessive and he would ensure that monitoring was strengthened to ensure that potential delays were identified at the earliest opportunity and steps taken to ensure that spend levels on the Capital Programme were maintained in the future.  

In response to a question regarding the overspend in the HRA in relation to outstanding Council Tax bills, the Cabinet Member for Finance, Performance and Core Services referred to the Council’s excellent collection record and support arrangements for those finding it difficult to pay all their bills.  He stressed, however, that the current COVID-19 pandemic was having a significant impact on many more people’s ability to pay their bills.  Current projections indicated a £13m shortfall in the collection of Council Tax and Business Rates and the first couple of months of the current financial year showed a £2m drop in income compared to the corresponding period last year.  Following on from that point, the Leader referred to the £320bn financial package given by the Government to the private sector to support them during the current pandemic, whereas local authorities had only been provided with between 1% - 2% of that amount to maintain vital services to the local community.

Cabinet resolved to:

(i)  Note the revenue outturn for the Council’s General Fund for 2019/20 as set out in section 2 and Appendix A and the details of the individual service variances as set out in section 3 of the report;

(ii)  Note the outturn for the Housing Revenue Account for 2019/20 as set out in section 4 of the report;

(iii)  Note the outturn on the 2019/20 Capital Programme as set out in section 5 and Appendices B and C of the report;

(iv)  Approve the carry forward of capital programme slippage from 2019/20 totalling £155.067m, giving a revised total programme for 2020/21 of £470.988m as detailed in Appendix C to the report;

(v)  Approve the transfers to and from reserves as set out as set out in section 6 and Appendix D of the report;

(vi)  Note the consequent position for the Council’s reserves as set out in Appendix E of the report; and

(vii)  Note the outturn on the Dedicated Schools Budget for 2019/20 as set out in section 7 of the report.