Issue - meetings

The Cabinet Member for Finance, Revenues and Benefits presented the report on the Council’s revenue and capital position for 2010/11 as at the end of August 2010. 

The projected service overspends (not taking account of any in-year savings required) have reduced from £3.9m to £3.2m since July 2010, the main reason being a reduction in projected overspends in the Customer Services department.  The projected year-end deficit for the Housing Revenue Account (HRA) has increased to £417,000 and an action plan is in place to address the causes.

The Corporate Finance Controller also referred to a number of proposed allocations from the Contingency budget, one of which relates to an additional £750,000 to fund the one-off professional support relating to the joint venture that the Council has recently entered into with Agilisys.  In response to a question on this issue, the Cabinet Member for Customer Services and Human Resources confirmed that the original budget provision of £300,000 had not been properly developed at the time and that the new provision has been benchmarked against costs incurred by other local authorities who have undertaken similar projects and is broadly comparable. 

The Cabinet Member for Finance, Revenues and Benefits also responded to questions in relation to:

·  Budget pressures within the Legal Services division - It was noted that the main pressure related to safeguarding children cases which had created similar pressures within the Children’s Services department.  Steps have been taken to meet these additional costs and the Cabinet Member confirmed that a review of the Legal Service is being carried out which will include exploring the possibility of sharing services with other boroughs.

·  The £1m contingency previously allocated to Revenues and Benefits - It was noted that the next Budget Monitoring report will seek to formalise the return of £600,000 which has not been required.

With regard to the HRA, the Cabinet Member for Housing advised that he is to chair a Working Group which will look at rent collection issues and the recharging of services to the HRA.

Agreed, as a matter of good financial practice, to:

 (i)  Note the current projected outturn position for 2010/11 of the Council’s revenue and capital budgets, as detailed in paragraphs 3 and 5 and Appendices A and C of the report;

(ii)  Note the position for the HRA, as detailed in paragraph 4 and Appendix B of the report; and

(iii)  Approve the allocation from the Contingency budget, as detailed in paragraph 3.1.5 of the report, of the following:

a.  £220,000 to enable specific backlog maintenance projects to be undertaken;

b.  £750,000 to fund the one-off expert financial, legal and procurement costs for the set up of the Joint Venture;

c.  £684,000 to regularise the General Finance budgets which contains budgeted corporate savings which the service departments are achieving;

d.  £100,000 to meet the anticipated shortfall in income arising from not implementing the proposal to charge staff for parking in council owned sites.