Finance and Performance Scrutiny Sub-Committee

Finance and Performance Scrutiny Sub-Committee
Tuesday, 23rd January 2024 at 6:00pm

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Slide 1
Cllr Connor McConville

1 Apologies for absence

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Mr Jake Hamilton
Cllr Connor McConville

2 Declarations of interest

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Declarations of Interest

3 General Fund Revenue Budget Monitoring - 3rd Quarter (Q3) 2023/24

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GF Revenue Q3 - FPSC report

Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Alan Martin
Lydia Morrison
Cllr Alan Martin
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater

4 General Fund Capital Programme - Quarter Three (Q3) Budget Monitoring 2023/24

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Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Alan Martin
Lydia Morrison
Cllr Connor McConville

5 HRA Budget Monitoring Quarter 3 (Q3)

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Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Alan Martin
Lydia Morrison
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Lydia Morrison
Cllr Connor McConville

6 Draft General Fund Budget 2024/25

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Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Lydia Morrison
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Lydia Morrison
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Alan Martin
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Connor McConville

6 Draft General Fund Budget 2024/25

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Cllr Connor McConville

7 Draft Housing Revenue Account Revenue and Capital Original Budget 2024/25

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Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Alan Martin
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville

8 Update to the General Fund Medium Capital Programme

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Mr Ola Owolabi
Cllr Connor McConville
Lydia Morrison
Cllr Tim Prater
Cllr Connor McConville
Cllr Laura Davison
Cllr Connor McConville
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Disclaimer: This transcript was automatically generated, so it may contain errors. Please view the webcast to confirm whether the content is accurate.

Good evening. Everyone and welcome to this meeting of the Finance and

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:00:11

performance Scrutiny Sub-Committee. This meeting will be webcast live to the internet. For those who do not wish to be recorded or filmed, you will need to leave the Chamber for members officers and others speaking at the meeting. It is important that microphones or use of viewers on the webcast and others in the Room may hey, you would anyone with a mobile phone, please switch it to silent mode as they can be distracting. I'd like to remind members that, although we have strong opinions on matters under consideration, it is important to treat members officers and public speakers with respect

1 Apologies for absence

Good evening, everyone and welcome.

free, freakery, cosy, little meeting we have this evening, but no less important.

I, k items number 1, apologies for absence, please, thank you, Chair,

Mr Jake Hamilton - 0:00:56

we have apologies from Councillor James Fletcher Jonathan and.

Councillor Alan Martin is substituted for Councillor Godfrey.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:01:08

I lie and do any Members have any declarations that they wish to make with regards to any items on the agenda this evening?

2 Declarations of interest

3 General Fund Revenue Budget Monitoring - 3rd Quarter (Q3) 2023/24

OK, I'll take that as a no and then item number 3, our first item of business, the general fund revenue budget monitoring for the third quarter of this financial year and to introduce the report, thank you all.

thank you, sir, good evening everyone.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:01:30

the reporting fronts are few is the let's at Q3 General Fund monitoring?

May I start with a slight apology, something that we've picked up.

we stated in Daria posts saying finance and performance committee are asked to review and note the Cabinet report below that will be presented to the Cabinet on 31st.

of December 2024 does should be January 2024. Thank you, Councillor operator, so just a correction there, so, coming back to the report, what we are projecting at the end of Q3 wishes December is that the Council will be having an underspend of 5 of 4 5 8 k at the end of this financial year is looking at a projection of where we are going to be come. 31st of March 2024

on page 8, we have a table there detailing all the variances from looking at the end of services which is above the line and looking at below the line, and you will notice below the line as well in terms of the original budget we intend to use one point several million to fund the general fund budget. Our projection at the moment is that there will be 1.3 taken into consideration of the 458 k that might be anunderspend and again just to add to that this is a projection of where we have.

as at December, by the time we get to queue for which will be 31st of March, there is an expectation from me that that figure will be changing.

in terms of the reason for the variances that were fully covered on that section 3.5 looking at each department in terms of how we arrived at those variances covering economic development operations and other areas, section 4 of the report mainly look at the movement in reserves and the projection in terms of earmarked reserve it is going to be 12.1 7 6 at the end of 31st of March 2024.

the projection in terms of our general fund is going to be 5 point several million at the end of 31st of March 2024, I was taught there and I'm happy to take questions, thank you.

thank you a lot.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:04:21

Councillor Pritchard, anything you wish to add to mainly to thank

Cllr Tim Prater - 0:04:26

Colin for that.

as we've said before, is that when he gets to the end of each quarter, your prediction towards what this is, the prediction of where we're gonna get to at the end of the year, it's not that we banked 150,000 pounds that we're now predicting that at the end of the year is that at the end of the first quarter that's quite fluid by the end of the second quarter you're getting closer by the end of the third quarter because he you're hopeful but you're getting into quite close to the right answer by the end of the fourth quarter we're really very sure as how that is going to turn out.

so this is it's it's a prediction, but it's prediction with some reasonable certainty at this stage, I think it is clear it is important to say that the budget that we were left last year as Eleanor said, it included spending 1.9 million pounds from general reserves and therefore the fact that we're half a million pounds better than that means that we're only when I use the word only in as many brackets or as many a year.

qualification says you can only taking 1.4 million pounds from reserves in order to balance the budget this year, it is definitely an improvement, it definitely puts us in a much better position than we would have been if we were on the forecast budget that we were on, but it's it's not that we have half a million pounds in our hand that we get to go out and spend the next year is that we've got half a million pounds less.

half a million pounds less withdrawn from reserves than we would have otherwise had, but no otherwise the position is as their and take questions and come back, as people have commented upon.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:06:04

thank you Tim, I guess that the main one for me would be, you know, just looking at the figures and the view of the Court to variants Justin and the bottom line contribution from the General Reserve, as you are just saying that's slightly slightly reduced, which is good or are we expecting that to slightly reduce again by end of year and is there any indication as yet as to as to what that might look like if we're sort of getting on with the current trend from the from court through to Court Three?

I haven't got my Christopher with me at the moment, but my thinking is

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:06:36

that we should be expecting unimproved positions which are not putting a figure to it, thank you.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:06:43

and then I guess just now, if you wanted to say a little bit more about the the variants from from premium art reserves between quarter 2 and quarter 3 and the and the change there and and the rationale behind that.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:07:03

thank you Chair, I mean what we've got with Microsoft is that when we agreed the budgets in February 2023, the expectation is I will be supporting the budget with roughly 2.2 million.

those 2.2 million is to account for all the order expenditure above the line so earmarked reserve has been set aside to be able to deal with that, however, between Q2 and Q3 there has been movement in that amount reserve as a result of

ongoing consultation and transition period.

what does that mean we are going to use some of the transitional reserve?

the moment we've got 1.5 million within transitional reserve and that is mainly to be used for redundancies, pension fund, IT improvements and so on, so in between Q2 and Q3 there are a few officers who will be taking voluntary redundancies which we need to be funded through transitional reserves and that is the figure you've got in there in addition to that there are homelessness expenditure that would be funded through,

homelessness reserves, so that has not been taken care of as part of earmarked reserve and difficult you've got of six for three is the addition of the voluntary redundancies that is going to be funded through transition reserve and the homelessness homelessness reserve to be used in terms of supporting a poverty line expenditure.

thank you.

thank you for that very helpful to any other Members have any

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:08:55

questions or comments relating to the report, Councillor Dobson.

yeah, I mean, maybe just to ask Can whether or not any of the overall

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:09:02

underspend that where we're out with it with the position at the moment are causing you any particular concerns?

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:09:17

sorry, I'm not going to say I'm being caused and it would be good.

to have a balanced budget, it would be good to spend up to our budget realities that within 12 months, there will be up and down within the budget, but in terms of what we've got at the moment, we had a discussion with relevant Directors relevant budget holders to identify the reasons behind those variances, and I think the 1 5 1 is satisfied with the with the feedback that we've got which is currently being reported to you. But it's how we get to queue for my expectation is that that is going to change. Thank you

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:09:56

Councillor Montague yeah, thank you.

Cllr Alan Martin - 0:10:00

this is a less well formed questionnaire I just wonder if you can just add a bit of colour.

around what some of the key, I guess, changes of direction or decisions were that that have driven the underspend, I mean there's a wholesale of overspends and underspends and whatever, but if you look through that, what the sort of key areas where you've actually changed direction from from last year and,

where we're seeing those those underspend has come through.

Lydia Morrison - 0:10:36

I'll take that because, as you know, owner Joan does part way through the year the reason that the decisions that have been made in year around.

discretionary spend and vacancy savings were based on the fact that we wanted to reduce the balance of the transfer out of the General Reserve and to try and manage to reduce that and bring back the budget to a more realistic budget. And that has helped in our star chamber discussions yet and we've got, as you know, you've seen the budget papers so some those savings we are comfortable but they have been managed, they haven't impacted on the services to residents and they haven't impacted on around staffing levels, and that has enabled us to have a baseline as well for some of the restructure and some of the decisions that we've made around budget reductions in the Star Chamber as well. So I'm comfortable that they they've effectively set a a precedent going forward and enabled us to get to a balanced budget this year as well

it hasn't been easy, and you know it has meant that you know the staff had been incredibly and absorbing additional work or rethinking around prioritisation as well, but services haven't stopped.

and just for my own sort of understanding, so obviously you have

Cllr Alan Martin - 0:11:54

things like the star chamber and whatever, and you're debating potential savings that you would seek at what point do they get locked into here as projections, so is it only after a decisions being made on something that you would put them in the in the report?

the Star Chambers were to do with setting the 24 25 budgets.

in here what we we don't lock in any savings or any any figures until outturn and final year end. These are just forecasting to give you an understanding of where services of maybe have faced new pressures that were unforeseen, and we have seen some of those in year where renewals of contracts because they were based on RPI or CPI been higher than were originally forecast, so we've had some pressures there again that we were unforeseen. We've managed to deal with those as well, so so those the final figures do not get set until effectively outturn. OK, thank you

anything else on on this item until separately.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:13:01

yeah, I've just gonna speak to Laura's question on, are there any any

Cllr Tim Prater - 0:13:04

big ones that you look at and go, and I think the one on there, which is the projected overspend on Kinect 38 is one that makes you to your lip a bit, that's effectively an investment property and it is still making a return on investment but it's quite a low return on investment.

and

now that's a question, but we that the director is gonna come back, I'll have a look at it and look at the buildings how it was bought, it's being less than ever in Ashford, it's effectively an office block in Ashford, it's being let as an investment property we spend money on refurbishing it, it does make more than it costs at the moment, but less than any other investment would do. That said we borrowed the money and therefore, if it makes a return on paying itself back and on those refurbishments etc and it still makes a return even a very limited resume. It's more than you'd make by not having borrowed that money because you couldn't borrow that money and put it into the bank, so it wouldn't make that same return so but that that is one whereby you look at it and go that's 211,000 pounds that you didn't expect there

it's still a, it's still a reasonable news story, because he is still a return to the Council on that investment, but I think that's one whereby there will be papers coming back over the course of the next six months or so to look at it in its entirety, is it still the right thing to be doing?

if one wanted to get out of it, does one make a capital loss at which point you probably wouldn't or could one exit in a way that didn't lose the council money, is there a way of getting a better return on it, all of those questions so that at that one I think is one that I think the council should look at as to whether that's the right investment to be in?

thank you, Councillor McKenna.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:14:48

and we if there's no more questions or comments, will we be happy to receive a note the report OK, thank you.

we move on to Item number 4, so again quarter 3 monitoring at this time for error, our capital programme and Oliver will introduce the

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:15:13

item as well. Thank you, thank you, Chair, similar to the revenue Q3 that we looked at, this is the capital programme I mean it, as we know, capital programme is for a long term project rather than for 12 months like revenue

looking at where we are at the moment as at December, with only committed or spent only 9.6 million out of the 48 million, therefore showing a variance of 23.7 potential slip edges, and again I think the difference with songs and revenue is that,

the slippages or the variants that you've got on table 2.4 will be rolled forward into future years if we are unable to complete those projects, and some of the reason for the were due to delays in numbers of projects deliberately not projects is in its early stages where it's just picking up. However, it is suspected that the capital commitment will increase during the rest of the financial year, so by the time we get to the outturn report we expect significant proportion of this amount to have been committed and,

objects reports will be provided as part of cube queue for the rest of the report is mainly looking at how we have re-profiled the capital programme.

the impact of the capital programme on the funding of resources are one of the benefits is that where some of our capital programme has been projected to be financed through borrowing, and if we are not borrowing those money now, that will result in a potential savings which you saw earlier within two revenue but by the time we get to queue for there will be a clear state of play in terms of where we are with this capital programme but what I can assure you is that some of this programme their long term programme through three or four or five years,

so if those money are not committed to become committed now to be committed in future years, thank I'll stop there and three questions thank you.

you are.

quite a comprehensive report quite straightforward for myself.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:17:34

looking at or other variances.

obviously I mean the numbers themselves that are quite big and quite significant, but that I mean, obviously a lot of that is is quite reasonably explained in the report, and you know, we're going to we're going to borrow just over 14 million pounds less which which makes perfect sense but it's there as the capital grants.

million pounds less in capital grants, and nobody could say a bit more about that and.

you know we were, where are those grants coming from and is there a risk that, by re-profiling it or any of those capital grounds at risk is any of that is in any of that funding at risk, for any of these for any reason, the programmes?

thank you.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:18:22

in terms of the capsule ground, some of this relates to the levelling-up money that we have received, and the idea is that the completion date for most of the levy in Napa sic is 2025, so we are in line to implement all those projects because all this money are ring fenced.

so I just don't think that money would be available for something else, but it should be roped forward for future implementation, thank you.

Councillor Procter.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:18:54

Cllr Tim Prater - 0:18:56

I am going to slightly flex that answer from behind, so yet the capital grants are for levelling up fund and the theory of the funding that was given against the programme, which is there, is that the money had to be spent and drawn by the end of March 2025.

I think that those involved in the project think that is currently.

I think ambitious would be the timetable then and many other levelling up beds across the country, and whether the other bids have written to government, and I know which one it is, is it offload detail something deal up, Sir, who knew I think de CO is a Department that needs inventing if it doesn't exist it would have great windows.

but we have written to them and said We're not going to get this project complete by March 2025, can the funding be rolled another year so that, in order to complete the project, I think that that's likely to be the stage we'll win with the backstage is that the levelling-up fund bid,

we're not expect it, I think we're expecting work to commence practical work on the ground to commence in Autumn 2024 to think that it's all then going to be done, including moving bus stations and creating parks and things like that, and we will have a challenge. We're Chairman straight into two ways, all complete within six months, I think he is optimistic. Now capital budgets are designed to be optimistic, but then that's why there's always a roll over at the end of the year, so I think the expectation is that we are going to be writing and asking for an extension to that and therefore it is likely to roll into 25 26 the actual delivery of that phase. That's not anything that anyone wants to see. I'd like to see it done tomorrow

but it's the practical reality of how long it takes to those, including the fact that you got the consultation, et cetera, you know, if you can do meaningful consultation and listen to what people say and change those plans, then it takes longer than it would otherwise take if you just said here's the picture I'm going to build that so it's right that there is that that time in the process as well but,

just just for the clarity of I don't think actually will be fully fitted out by the end of March 25, and I don't think that if deal up turn round and say no, that is the deal, do it, do it by then or you don't get the money, I think there will be more bits of paper coming back for you to look at in the very near future.

other Members or any other questions or comments.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:21:28

Councillor Dawson.

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:21:34

yeah, just you were saying earlier that you anticipate the situation, will change between this report and the end of the financial year can can you just give a bit more detail around that what's actually likely to happen in that period to affect where we're at at the moment?

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:21:57

a good example is going to be to lock in terms of implementation of work or moving out, so there is ongoing discussion going on behind his same, and my understanding is that some of this will be finalised before that it was of much and with other projectors were there will be a commitment, a clear commitments, we didn't capture a programme between before 31st of March and that is why I'm saying the current figure of 23 million I can see that coming down rather than slipping every time a move in the whole of the 23 million insufficient yes, thank you

tennis prodigy.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:22:39

Cllr Tim Prater - 0:22:41

just gonna sound, 2.6 has some of the detail on that, so you can see in their begins Ward remediation works, we literally were waiting on the invoice to pay that things like that Mountfield Road and the I'll have capital lanes literally waiting for the invoices to pay so they are there other things that you can see there.

4 General Fund Capital Programme - Quarter Three (Q3) Budget Monitoring 2023/24

removing hoardings around a site on Princess Parade that is going to be done by the end of the financial year, if I need to buy a screwdriver so yeah, they're are in invoices at that stage, that there are bits of work there that we can see our should very clearly be done and out of the door by them.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:23:19

as it is OK to say that that was my question really so, some of it is

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:23:23

is stuff that's been done, but hasn't been paid for yet and Princess Parade Holdings is is another practical example, and you're saying on or in terms of levelling up there may be that that may also some things may happen by the end of the financial year in that respect to the conqueror thanks and thank you.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:23:43

councilman sorry, if I can leap leap on that, what's your sense

Cllr Alan Martin - 0:23:47

currently of what the variance will be at the end of the year, so there's some quite clear big items that.

we are expecting to sell through the accounts so.

where will we end up?

again, it is good to be very, very difficult, to be able to put a figure in terms of what are 23 million experience will be by 31st of March, definitely where we continue to have ongoing discussion with relevant Project, Champion champions to be able to identify commitments, what needs to be paid or what contracts will be signed. But I think he's going to be difficult for me to sit down here, and so there are 23,000 to 23 million, decided likely to be 10 million is going to be a difficult one, but what we need to understand what everybody variance as at 31st of March that will be rolled forward into future years effectively. There might be a project that will be starting in 2004 and 2003 24, which would be uncompleted or not paid for, but it will be rolled forward into future years from 24 25 going forward. So I would not be able to say here is going to be

15 million or 10 million, I hear Councillor Freitas.

yeah, I I understand you can't say definitively, but I guess I guess I'm just struggling to see a little bit so we've got a list here of what was at 12.00. Where are we 12 million of things on the shopping list that we're expecting to sort of come come through and then we've got some projects that are delayed a little bit in and others were consciously pushing them back into other years. I guess I was just trying to get a bit of a sense of the

of the numbers swinging around there.

the difficulty is to be able to say It's good to be added 10 or 15 million, but I think it will be around between 10 and 50 million, but I would not be able to confirm whether it's going to be a particular figure OK, thank you, thank you.

do you have something to add?

the capital programme is very different in the way they report it to

Lydia Morrison - 0:26:00

revenue with revenue. Obviously, if we don't spend it when we very rarely rolled over, it's literally we've not spent it with a capital programme, it tends to be funding that we know is going to be spent over a period of years and that could be significant timescales. So, for example, with multiple Bach, as you will know from the cabinet paper that we took in October November on services, so as you'll all be aware, article park has been going through a significant review of its funding, its phasing and its direction of travel. Therefore, the money that's been set aside or was forecast to be spent in this year

will definitely not be at them in the magnitude that we had forecast in the previous year and going forward again or on that direction of travel of looking at the alternative delivery models. You know we have re-profile that and that re-profiling is in your budget papers, that you will be able to consider at Council and have had an opportunity to look at already. But with capital, none of these projects that are stopping and on this isn't money that is being released for new projects. It just means that it's re-profiled and that has an impact on our interest payments and our M LP provisions, which they then impact back on your annual budget because that is treated as revenue. So it's really just to inform you that this is the point in at the moment we were expecting to have spent this. We don't be not particularly sophisticated around profiling, our capital spend, it's something that we wish to improve in next year around understanding in more detail around the profile of that capital spend we we generally just pop it in and

and say that's the cap, that's what's happened in the past, that spans capital amount that's been allocated to this project and we'll keep rolling it forward rather than trying to present a profile and will hopefully be, has then been a little bit more sophisticated having appointed a capital programme project accountant that's gonna help us over a fixed term of two years to deal with some of these significant projects in their reporting.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:28:21

postwar, Romania and the other on this item, sorry, are we happy to receive a note on the item?

5 HRA Budget Monitoring Quarter 3 (Q3)

yes, OK, thank you today, the last third quarter monitoring report on the agenda is for the HRA budget, so this is both for the revenue and capital budgets within the HRA account and again, although if you'd like to introduce, thank you sir.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:28:44

again, this is another Q3, looking at where we are looking at a projection in terms of where we are, where we might be on Saturday, 1st of March 2024, this related to the housing revenue account, looking at both to revenue and capital within this paper,

in terms of revenue, the projection at the moment is that DEL will be a projected decrease in net expenditure so the tune of 990 k at the end of the year again this is a projection in terms of where we are at the moment calm queue at the head of queue for I do expect a bit of variance of fluctuation relating to that figure in terms of the capital programme the projection in there is a forecast of 1.7 4 million lower than the latest approved budget.

again, because this is capital programme, that's 1.7 is something that will be rolled forward into future years to be able to deliver on most of the HRA capital programme.

the rest of the report is mainly looking at the risks involved and I'm happy to stop there and take questions, thank you.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:30:08

thank you very much other than this tunnel, open out to Members, register any questions or comments relating to this report.

Councillor Davidson,

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:30:18

yes, in the capital.

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:30:24

appendix 2.

it says several times that the top slice of the original budget might not be fully utilised due to time required to reprocure for additional spending.

could you just explain what that means in terms of top-slice, for example, and why that appears several times in what that relates to just for clarification, thank you.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:32:01

Sue does the top-slice just mean the bit that doesn't get used?

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:32:04

well again, I think I just want to make it simpler, rather than using that technical top slice, I think its content was the easiest way to

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:32:19

say we have ongoing project of 1 million pounds only 800,000 will be committed projection at the end of 31st of March and the rest will be slipped into future years thank you.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:32:31

although I didn't know, you could say something, perhaps about the the pension interest costs and obviously quite a large variance in there and and while that possibly couldn't be accounted for when when the budget was being set originally.

thank you, and I think, looking at the Esplanade show we put under

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:32:53

section 2.3, the increase in patient interest costs is mainly due to, because being based on previous year, which is the Upshaw for 22 23 whereas budgets were based on estimates before the triangle patient evaluation was completed, so I think is it is the fact that it was based on previous year rather than on the triangle revaluation figure that we have that was released after that, thank you and I guess just linking that so,

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:33:30

factoring in those those pressures into not only yet next year's budget, but obviously we've had a recently approved 30 year HRA business plan, so all of that now should I assume, filter through all of all of those other all those other documents and yes, thank you,

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:33:53

sir gets correct what we've done with the 30 year business plan which will be touched on later is actually to look at the projection from 2004 25 for the next 30 years which has taken into consideration all those variances touched on within Q3, thank you.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:34:14

and I guess just in terms of the that re-profiling of of capital.

what is is it I already in was have come to it, I guess, but at 1.00.7 is already sort of added on to whatever whatever was planned to be there for capital works for for the next financial year, will they be at the same amount of increase to ensure those works are undertaken?

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:34:50

Thank you a good question. That's 1.7 is the projection in terms of where we might be at the end of the financial year that has not been projected into the new budget, but it's how we get to

end of queue for Dow one point, several for one point several may not be 1.7 anymore, it might be more, it might be low, I might not be there and therefore, what will happen in 2004 25 is so carried over whatever is left into 2045, thank you.

Councillor Martin, thank you.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:35:28

I am interested in appendix 1, so under the repairs and maintenance, I

Cllr Alan Martin - 0:35:31

wonder if you can just help me better understand the 500 and 30 variants on the on that.

some of you, I didn't quite understand the comments, so it is a net increase due to the Mayor's non price per property, which is probably just as to to either a typo, or it's a term I'm not aware I'm not aware of.

but maybe you could run through how we get to that 5 30 sort of announcement before and after or before the increase.

non Dr, appropriate.

better.

exist and what we require is a.

13 so that.

yeah, an internal review of it is one yeah yeah plan is fine or arcane and mirrors O'Connor.

if the bit that the term non price per property yeah, what does that mean?

signposting was on this basis.

yeah, I just to give, so you know the contract that the council has with me, as you know it, it pays a certain price per for every unit that the council has and then, but there are, there could be things that come outside of that that sort of standard contract agreement so like large voids and things like that would would come out so you know make major repairs things like that that right is not so thank you.

I guess the follow up question on that, though, is it is unusual for.

so many of those sort of surprise repairs to appear on or I would I would imagine, from one year to the next, is always a few properties where more repairs are required and expected, but you would expect that kind of average out a little bit so is that an unusual year is that a much higher number than,

I believe there was also some new legislation that was brought in right post, the contract being awarded as well, I'm not, as I say, I'm not sure OK, but it was, it was to do me and I think it was carbon.

the detection of something up hand on heart. I'd I do know that there was some legislation that also required additional works. That would be too down that we could procure through the Mears contract under the inspections, since trying to change the move the goalposts a little bit the goalposts moved a little bit as well and I would add, the Council obviously has been on not long undertook a quite extensive stock condition survey of all of its housing stock so that could have thrown up things that the council wouldn't have been aware of

during budget setting time, perhaps Councillor, provided you had your head, yeah, just

it's one of those things that you're always gonna spend more on that than you plan to because it could, because you plan to do X amount of works, next pounds worth of works, and if somebody goes in and says what we're gonna, do the work that we plan to you're really gonna say, I'm not gonna do those you don't need that, but you're often gonna say 0, but then that needs doing. You know I will reflect this, but you're for floor, joists a shot. Therefore we've gotta do that first before we put a new floor down, et cetera, so that that number isn't going to average out very much, actually it's it's it's always and up, if you if you do the job, if you go in and you're gonna do a repair, and then you see that there are other things that you need to do around that job, it's pretty much always an upward pressure, as opposed to going in and saying 50% of the time, although we can do that much cheaper than we thought we were going to, because you don't budget on that basis, you don't budget on the basis that

of an average cost. You, you expect that you're gonna do 100 100 pieces of work, they're each going to cost a thousand pounds and you go in there and you find this extra, so it's always upward pressure on that particular thing, and it's probably right, because you should do those extra things at the same time because it's cheaper than going back and doing them again, and I am better than tenants and the same will be back next year when we've got new budget agreed yeah, I dare I

yeah, so I don't disagree with that, but if you, if you have a natural expectation that there will always be more expenditure, then you should be planning that and putting that in the budget as a contingency, surely I think, part of the issues that we've had, as well as on on-costs, we've had and you know an extraordinary uplifting

Lydia Morrison - 0:39:57

in in the LP and the cost of materials cost of labour, and you know that is all recoverable as well. So you know there were additional pressures that we have had to pick up because our sub-contractors are also picking them up, so you know it, it's it's been quite an unprecedented 18 months for the economy as you are aware so,

Councillor Dobson.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:40:22

yeah, thank you, I just wanted to ask a couple of things, one was

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:40:26

about the increase in disrepair claims, how does that compare?

where are we at in terms of that de, do we have a there's an increase here, but in general terms, what's the the level of these sorts of claims, and is that something we need to be concerned about?

and then in in 2.5, where it talks about the

heating and services contract, winning tender being significantly higher than was initially predicted, and ha where the overspend on that has been offset has that caused any issues in of itself thanks.

Lydia Morrison - 0:41:13

I think we're gonna have to take those questions away to the housing Head of Service, I was hoping that they would have been here today to to answer some of these questions, but if we could take those away and revert back to you,

anything else on this HA item.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:41:30

can I I would be happy to receive and note the monitoring report.

thank you

OK okay, item number 6.

the the main event of the evening.

the the draft General Fund Budget for next financial year 24 25

6 Draft General Fund Budget 2024/25

so we are obviously being asked to receive a note, so the report.

and to note that the budget estimates but also note the updated Medium Term financial Strategy, so be helpful if you could just highlight which which aspects of the of the strategy are or are updated, thank you, thank you Chair.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 0:42:16

reports in front of you is looking at the 24 25 budget, including the updated Medium Term financial plan, and again, if I needed, I need to take a step back to when we went to Cabinet on the 13th of December and in terms of what was reported then we were talking about this 4.5 billion gap and since then we've been working through the budget growth inflation going through savings and efficiencies so the deficit that was reported on the 13th was 3 was 6 138 k. How Haver

following that meeting on the 18th of December, the provisional settlements was released by the government and, as a result of doing that, I think the Council benefited in terms of additional fund coming from the government, and that is listed clearly on that paragraph 2.8 where we have in total roughly 820 k between that and now in terms of this budget, so section 2 point paragraph 2.9 that details what has changed between 13th of December to now what has changes that were reported 638 at that meeting?

there was.

to receive a provisional local government settlement, additional grant of 820 k, we have revisited and revamped the recharges to non general fund account, which is wary at 76, there is a slight change when we compare the business rates income that we've got within the budget and the medium term financial plan, so what the government actually published on the 18th of December.

that was that's had an impact of ET care and we have additional growth in terms of Waste of 47 k.

on corporate initiatives and other projects of 223.

the net impact of that is that this Council will be having a balanced budget, a draft balanced budget, at this stage, as already alluded, so this would be going to Cabinet on the 31st of January, I would be going to February Cabinet and Council for approval.

in terms of the professional

settlement as well, the expectation is that the final settlement will be released, probably first we can.

February.

that doesn't tend to change, but we can never say so what that has been released will be able to firm up all difficult in front of fear.

section 3, section page 42 to 1, detail the current financial year 23 24 original budget and the last column in showing the proposed 24 25 original budget and what is Claire in terms of the bottom line we compare, those two columns is that in the current financial year the budget is going to be supported through the use of General Fund reserve to the tune of 1.7 million.

however, in 2004 25 proposed budgets, will we not be calling on the General Fund to support the budget, so that is giving us a balanced budget? Section 4 of the report on page 43 actually covered the medium term financial plan, and that is done needs to be updated. What we've learned in terms of previous years reports is there because we did not update the medium term financial plan, which seems to be have started. The Budget sets in on your wrongfooting, try to chaise and resolve a bigger gap. So what we've done this time around, because we know we've got a balanced budget, is actually to provide an updated medium term financial plan. The table within 4.3 details, the current position in terms of medium term financial plan in 2004 25 were Avenue balanced budget, no surplus, no deficit

in 2005 26 were aspects in a deficit or a gap of 85 k in 2006 27, we are expecting a gap of several 1 7 k and in 27 and 28 a gap of 1.9

a torso we are talking about 2.7 8 3 million budget gap, we didn't nurse three four years and I think again we need to put that in perspective when we were looking at these six months ago we are talking about 15 16 million.

with all the effort from officers from members staff chambers, discussion that has been able to bring that down to roughly 2.7 8 3 million within the next three years and the ward of question there is the ideas with Ballance who will be able to balance the 2004 25. There is still more work to be done in the following two three years to be able to address that deficit predicted deficit of 2.7 million, section 5 actually looks at where we are. We do reserves. I touched on this during the Q3 3 discussion, so the projection in terms of here March reserve is 12.1

and the projection in terms of general fund reserve is 5.7 in total, we're talking about roughly 18 million pounds worth of reserve, adding both earmarked reserves and the and the General Fund together.

come February, when this budget is approved, this section 1 5 1 Lydia will be putting together, under section 25, a paper in terms of the robustness of the estimates and the adequacy of officers, and that is the statutory requirement, and following you wish there would be approval of the budget at the Council on the 28th of February I know you might have more questions so I'll start there and take your questions, thank you.

thank you, Councillor Pride, it is something you wanted to add before

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:49:28

we move to questions or comments.

Cllr Tim Prater - 0:49:31

yeah, I'm going to start start during the highlights package of the next six weeks.

so, as Obama has outlined in detail, we started in December 2022 with an empty efface that forecast that this in 24 25 we would be running a 4.5 million pound deficit budget, removing four and a half million pounds from reserves and that that would total somewhere along the line of 18 million pounds over four years.

we're now to the stage.

and we're only at this stage due to the transformation work which has been done, led by Susan, and the Director Team and officers across the board, or only there due to difficult decisions made in Star Chambers and through discussions there were only therein.

due to the work of Councillors, in terms of accepting that we needed to rebalance the budget and make sure that actually income equalled expenditure, and for the final chunk of that were already there, because the government was slightly nicer to us than we thought that they were gonna be,

but actually we are now forecasting a properly balanced budget, and a balanced budget for those in this administration is where income equals expenditure, not income equals or expenditure, plus a withdrawal from reserves.

which was the old administration's approach to a balanced budget, our balanced budget, so when it says that there will be 0 at surplus deficit to the general reserve, it literally means we're not going to take any money out of the General Reserve next year in order to fund their expenditure.

that's what I think balanced means in those terms, naming these reasonable site. As you can see here, it is predicated on a 2.99% Council increase, which is broadly what the government is mandating district councils to go forward. They wouldn't quite say we're forcing you to do it, but they would say that they are strongly recommending that councils take that, and that is what we are doing in line with pretty much every council in the country that isn't housing doesn't have social care. Social care councils will be going for 4.99% pretty much across the board.

and that budget has it has only been able to be made to work due to all of that work from all of those people and all of the staff who also engaged with the transformation process and the voluntary redundancy process and the personnel committee leading through them,

and then that feeds through, as other says.

to the medium term financial strategy.

which is a much more exciting grid of 12 or 15 squares than it was four years ago.

a year ago, as it says in that we're now not forecasting any deficit or a deficit in 24 25 and then in the same way that I was always said that the medium term financial strategy is guessing with style the longer it goes a lot longer. It is the second year 85,000 pounds deficit and a third year 717,000 the final year 278 sorry 2.783 million

in total, across those four years.

I would take those later the later the number, the bigger a pinch of salt, I would take with it. We have built in some capital money into those years and that's the revenue impact of our capital money, so there are some big projects built into that, for instance, so you'll see that in your budget papers next document, so you've got things like 10 million pounds put in place for Foca as a capital project, you've got in place 25 million pounds for a new leisure centre in the back few years of that MCFs. That's not to say that we know that those things will cost that yet, but they are broad numbers to put into a capital programme, so you've got, and I am at with some broad financing. That's why the capital programme always goes a bit wrong about stages that we've said, 10 million pounds for folk over a couple of years. We don't actually know where it's going, yet we don't actually want to go. We just know it's going to cost some money, so we put a fairly big amount of money in that so that there gives an idea of scale in terms of our costing going forward, and that's why those numbers will change because that total will change those that profiling will change in terms of where that spend is.

but the the big picture news on this is that almost all headline services, all service delivery across the Council, has been ring fenced within the budget we have moved from a position whereby we would run out of reserves within three years if we had followed the NTS's as it was written in December 2022.

to a position whereby the next four years is affordable within our existing strategy and beyond that, I would suspect it would continue to be so, so we are in a a much stronger place, we have a genuinely balanced budget whereby reserves the general reserve will not be falling.

in year.

and we are, we are protecting those services that we utmost.

in Bolton, one note to make on that in terms of services is that there was discussion at Cabinet etc about some savings, and it's been through this committee before some savings, for instance on street cleaning, central Folkestone, et cetera.

and on reducing the number of litter bins. There is no saving in these budgets for 24 25 from any of those cost trends, so those those projects have been agreed to go away and have a look at and to discuss with the earlier about what one could do in terms of that street cleaning and look at the the distribution of bins and the total number of them and have to start to have those discussion with them and parishes, etc about whether that is the right place. Whether we can do that better, whether we can reduce the total and or but there's no cost saving whatsoever in 24 25 in those numbers, so there's no imperative for us to save 100,000 pounds of those things in the next year.

I'd love to I'd love to be able to turn around to you as the first line of Quarter 1 or Quarter Two's projections over here and say actually we're gonna be better because this has been agreed and we'll do this and it's still gonna protect the we're still gonna clean the streets as well, but it's not predicated, we're not predicated it on that. Those projects will go ahead if, as a cost-saving great them were reported as we go through in year, but it's not a question of we've got to do that now we've got to stop doing that immediately in order to make these numbers, work is not in there

I'll take, we will take any detailed questions, we can and Laurie should definitely ask your detailed question.

Cllr Connor McConville - 0:56:36

on that note, over to you, Councillor Dobson, I wasn't going to start with it, I mean I was going to build up to it.

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:56:42

well, I mean my I suppose my my general question, looking at the the budget proposals is, is really around the staff savings, because if you look through multiple sections, it refers to to staff savings.

and you talked about protecting services, but you know clearly if, if we're losing people, then those people weren't sitting around doing no work, they were providing services.

and so I I wondered if you could comment on that, I mean a particularly noticed about customer services, the within Area officers, and in the Environmental Services section there are staff savings listed, so it would be helpful to understand anything you can say.

in terms of protections in those in those areas and what impact those services are likely, those reductions are likely to have.

she asked me the question now or come back to that will come back, OK.

Lydia Morrison - 0:57:55

obviously, the detailed report has been and will continue to be, going to the personnel committee.

because it is is his their remit to review and challenge that and agree that, and obviously the Chief Exec, but in general terms, we have protected those those officers who deal with frontline services, we did a detailed review of spans and layers and compared ourselves and benchmarked ourselves under,

peers and LGA guidance, and I think you will find that what we have done is. We have restructured around reductions, voluntary reductions, mostly and long standing vacancy savings, whereas vacancies have been there for more more than six months, some considerably longer than that. So when we're looking at spans and layers, you'll understand that it's the layers or the layers between the Chief Exec and under the lowest layer, and we reduce that by taking out a some tears of middle management that were effectively one to one and that one by restriction around that again mostly around vacancies that were in those we've no longer going to be having corporate case. Those have been brought back into services

we will be forming part of their original services, so it's been.

again around protecting those officers who deal with across our customers and delivering those frontline services by being more efficient in the way that we restructured our teams and our services.

your next year.

Cllr Laura Davison - 0:59:38

we've put bills up to it now, so the it's in the budget heading, it's under place, I think page 16 in my in my document, but I don't know if it is in everybody's.

and it relates to the grant funding for Folkestone Sports Centre.

we did review the proposed community grants at our finance and performance subcommittee meeting in December.

and I did look at those very carefully and I did note at that point that Folkestone sports centre was listed to have a 150,000.

Grant 4 4 this year replicated from the previous year, and so it was with some surprise that I read this and there's a column that says 100,000 and a reduction of 50,000, so I'd be grateful for any clarification around that, thank you.

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:00:39

in a document of this many numbers.

one of them is going to end up in the wrong place and will refund it.

on page 23 as it projects, it says that the SPL Folkestone Sports Centre, the sports centre budget of 150,000 this year was gonna reduce to 100,000 pounds next year.

when we were given advance notice of Laura's question this afternoon, we went, I remember that and we've been back and check, and not only did we not remember that it was not our intention and we're about to fix it.

on page.

23 of your budget, it does show you a line e 23, which reads Folkestone air, show that says I might have an original budget of 50,000 pounds and actually that projects into next financial year, as you'll know, the air show for a variety of reasons but at key amongst them being we can't have the Red Arrows at any useful time.

we that is not an area of expenditure in this year, so where it says that there is 50,000 pounds budgeted for that in this year, that number should read 0 and where it says that there is 100,000 pounds budgeted for Folkestone Sports Centre that should read 150,000, that is the budget that will be presented to Council on the 28th of February.

thank you for finding it Laura, because otherwise that would have caused all sorts of hell, I am very grateful for the clarification and I am sure the sports centre will be too.

Cllr Laura Davison - 1:02:15

any other, any other questions.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:02:20

okay, so just a few things from myself.

start with, so we're just discussing this before we are in the in the introduction, just looking at waste contracts and one and all that et cetera in 2.9, I mean there's there's an additional growth waste service of 47,000.

and then obviously when you when you get into the details, budget.

semi pages.

if we look at both household waste and recycling, we're looking at.

household waste collection, an increase of

281,000 on last year's budget and for recycling and waste are just shy of 100 and.

I can't even see that just shy of 200,000 increase on last year's budget for those, so there's no fruit, anyone could say anything about the she may have their inflationary pressures for contracts, etc. And.

you said that there's nothing being factored into to reducing those, but if it is that ashamed, that's still, that's still the aim I mean, that's that largely whereas, whereas increases were coming from, is that the conversation to start that idea of getting that reduction in the first place coming out of the conversations that pretty much said that?

the next year we're looking at between the two of them.

close to half a million pounds of additional spend.

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:04:11

I will give the general answer this and I'm sure the Ligier on a cup will come across with a much better detail one, the specific increases that you're looking at there are the inflationary contract invoices we're into the third year five-year contract and the contract has a contractual inflationary increase within that so that was built into a relatively early version of this budget if you could tell what the inflationary increases gonna be because we can see out and see what the contract said against the inflation.

I don't know if the inflation figure it probably didn't work, for it was probably for August and September, as opposed to the much better October November one which would have been much cheaper, however, then the brakes.

I am sorry that they are the inflationary figures for the amount of waste that they're taking away and the amount of work that they have to do in order to empty the bins on a regular basis, so backed those uplift figures the 47,000 pounds additional figure is another member of staff on the ground to him monitor and hopefully improve our performance in terms of street cleaning.

so it's a contribution to will, I don't think it's all of the budget, it's a contribution towards a member of staff to make make sure that we are doing what we say that we are doing in the area specifically are doing what they are charging us to do with that contract. The other areas that I was talking about where we haven't taken cost savings in this year, but we have discussed was for instance on the street cleaning in some very central roads in central Folkestone and probably it's some roads in central Folkestone and Hyde High Street with the road whereby we were looking at moving the standard of

the standard of cleanliness to which they should be held to the same standard as the rest of Folkestone and the rest of life in those instances, as opposed to those having higher standards than those and that was being suggested that that might have a full year cost saving if it came off if the only agreed negotiation value of about 200,000 pounds a year.

that conversation is being had, it is being progressed with Veolia, but due to the fact that there is an uncertainty on it, be you negotiate on the basis to see what you get when you come out of it. Also, you don't know when you could start taking any of that saving as well, it's unlikely to be on the first day of the year, so you wouldn't get a full year cost saving and the actually you want to know what the impact of that is going to be before you finally turn around and say Yes, let's do that, then let's go, we haven't put any of that saving in the budget for into this budget. For this year we haven't put any saving into the budget for the litter bin

I'd like to say a review programme as opposed to reduction programme, but Andrew Rush would definitely like to say reduction programme, but we've taken no cost saving them out.

because what we'd like to do is actually look rationally at where all of the litter bins are in the district and work out whether they are in the right places, some of them.

some of them, there are some areas without bins that need them, there are some areas with more bins than they need to be, there are some areas with bins that don't look like bins anymore, and there are some areas whereby the bins are clustered together in some variety of some variety of social event.

and it's a question of actually getting those all into the right places so that they actually fulfil the need that we're looking for, which is to make sure that whenever somebody needs a rubbish bin, that there is actually one nearby to put that rubbish in, but again we've taken none of that cost saving in the 24 25 financial year because it should, if we're going to do it right, it will take time to do. It will have a bold consultation with town and parishes. It will involve workforce moving bins from where they are to where they need to be for reducing those means France growing them for replacing some of the shocking examples that we know are out there as well. There will be some some money in that, so it seemed again prudent not to take any of that cost saving in this year. To give a thick of that wiggle room on that, like to say that in 2005 26 et cetera, there will be some cost-saving on that, but we'll say it's not built in, will take it if we get it,

thank you for that.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:08:18

so there's another specific, I've got some specific ones and some more general one.

if we look at.

Eddie 40 members' ward allowances are to be reduced from 90,000 to 75,000.

says approved budget strategy savings, I don't know who approved it, certainly not councillors as yet, I don't know if we could say a little bit about that.

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:08:48

BAM puts the money out of my hat shot.

this was a cut which

was discussed through Star Chambers and has been has been brought through the scrutiny process, but it's absolutely clear that no councillor likes it. Reduces councillors ward grants from 3,000 pounds to two and a half thousand pounds which felt like a in the context of the other savings of this budget and the sacrifice of staff and officers and other budget heads, et cetera felt like a reasonable amount of councillors, taking at least a small element of that pain in terms of that budget as well. I thought that was a reasonable thing to do in terms of balancing out that budget backside. I don't like it any more than anybody else does, and

councillors strongly value about 3,000 pounds ward grant and the organisation and, more specifically, the organisations that we support with that money to support that work from and although I we couldn't find a reasonable way of making that change to the base budget of putting that 15,000 pounds back in,

given the fact that the sacrifice has been made by those staff, it literally voluntary redundancies are still ongoing at this stage I will be moving a amendment to the

budget that's put to cabinet to add to that 15,000 pounds back in at 15,000 pounds will be directly funded by a reduction in the Leader and Deputy Leader's allowances for the 12 months from the 1st of April, both of those will take a Cabinet Member's salary for that 12 month period.

clearly all we can offer you, as the assurance that the current leader and deputy leader will do that and will come down to cabinet stroke committee chair levels of grant for the following 12 months. I can only offer you the commitment that I'd like to hope that whoever comes after will stick to that as well. That saves 14,810 something pounds, and we were about 130 quid shy of that funding, the full 15,000 pounds of that. That Oliver has told me I can have that 133 pounds for free and he'll round that somehow into the budget, so my amendment will put that 15,000 pounds back onto the ward grants. It will come directly as the sacrifice of the leader or the huge majority of this, it should be said, is the the Leader's sacrifice, a percentage of it is mine, but only a small percentage. He gets paid a lot more than me

so it's so it comes so proportionately, he's taken over the pain there, but it's something that he wanted to do, and I wanted to do to make sure that councillors and the organisations we support have that money back in their budgets so that we'll go back into the budget but we're funding it by a very clear route which is that the Councillors have taken the pain to put that back into the council's budget.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:11:58

thank you, Councillor Procter, yeah, for for myself on that, you know, I understand the the premise behind it, but the thought of you know, as you say, community groups sort of losing out because of.

where we're share it, we're sharing the pain so.

I am very glad that the solution has been found to rectify that, and I'd like to formally proposed from this committee that the we that we also recommend and

I would approve.

such as

so I'm I'm happy to willing to propose and and if everyone's in favour

Cllr Laura Davison - 1:12:35

of putting out putting this committee's weight behind Councillor

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:12:37

Prada's upcoming amendment, all in favour.

and against against Kasmin.

so Councillor Prada said he's going to put forward an amendment to cabinet to reinstate the 15,000 pounds via the Leader and the Deputy Leader's Issara, so I'll just ask him that we would formally in Dorset so that Cabinet would know that this committee would endorse that amendment also.

so so all in favour.

thank you, thank you, for that too, is before I keep going on, does anyone else have any other questions or comments they wish to come in on at this time, not okay, I'll keep carrying on more of a general

query, I guess, just looking at the overall the overall summary, just something that struck me a little bit.

just comparing, obviously, this year's budget and now and our draft budget for next year.

our interest payments are.

slightly coming down, which is obviously very kids from two and a half to.

just under 2.4.

but our them rpm minimum revenue provision payments seem to be going up by.

that?

04 7 700,000 so I didn't know why interest payments would come down but M and P would go up, so I don't know if someone could say a little bit of something about that and the rationale as to why that would be, thank you.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:14:22

thank you said we, what we did in other parts of this budget is to actually revisit all our Amartey calculations and all those changes in law that will impact the MFB from 24 25 going forward, as a result of that that has led to an increase in the marquee that will be charging from 24 25 going forward and again.

with a free profile, most of the borrowing that we are going to be, that will be taking place from 24 25 and some of them, if not all of them will be attacked in Murphy going forward, and that is where we are, however, the figure you've got wishes

them or pay of 2.3 million, that is our projection for 2004 25, if most of the borrowing did not happen, if some of the I said did not become operational, dot figure would be revisited and it would be amended as part of the quarterly budget monitoring report thank you.

OK.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:15:30

I guess just just on top of that, I mean do, is there is there a written report or or something that the committee might be able to see just in terms of what we're looking at in terms of next year's budget?

what items of borrowing are attracting milk and how much and just to sort of have a breakdown, I guess at that 2.3 million would be quite helpful.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:15:50

comments with it, and I'm sure we'd be able to share that and again another report that actually detail all that is our Treasury Management report, we should be going to Cabinet on the 31st of January, but I'm able to share the burden with you, thank you.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:16:10

something else of flagged up.

if we look at recharges.

there.

they're slightly up, and there's quite a few budget lines which relate to two or various Ullapool streams, Westoning at Castle, for example, I was just wondering why they don't.

gaps into the capital capital budgets for affordable park, etc and why they still remain on a general fund budget, it's enough to say a little bit about that.

we should put you tell you.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:16:45

and so, for example, in we look at.

she meets is at Ewan's in his budget, perhaps.

I am just just as a very high level, so the assets still remain our assets they have not transferred and therefore that's why we have to

Lydia Morrison - 1:17:08

account for them and until such time they transfer into another entity formally, they do sit on our balance sheet and we do have the responsibility to up to paper they haven't so that's why you will still see these assets, and that's why the them are p calculation on the land and things like that, so that's why until such time as they formally transfer out of our ownership, you will see that they remain within our budgets in minute and accounting statements

but there was a large part of

a report on expenditure you know it gets recharged capital, so I was just wondering I mean they're very small amounts, I mean 1 1 1 1,600, I think for West Newcastle or so I would just.

there are, and there are guidance on what you can capitalise on, what you can count, and I would like to reassure you that, wherever possible, we do capitalise that and we do regular review and because they like the recharges for officers and directors, time isn't currently reporting the project as well and we do do that better so do you have any idea of?

I assume it might be some sort of legal fees or something, but it is obviously not a lot of detail in there as to as to what that that money. So if it's something that legally we couldn't recharge capital, then that'd be fine, but it just be good to have an idea of of why that is. I can assure you that if it's in our revenue budget we have scrutinised it and if it then becomes available to be capitalised because an asset becomes changed or transfers or there's a different queues for it, I think we will capitalise, but what we have to do is base a decision at a point in time and based on what we know now the timescales, and that's why so, so there will be generally things that cannot be recharged or charged to capital at that point in time for that year,

thanks.

I guess the last one, more, a bit more of a concern, I guess, than it than a comment, just looking at the forecast for Kinect 38, which we which we mentioned earlier, because there is obviously increased pressure in this financial year, but they're looking at an estimated

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:19:14

110,000 pounds drop in in in revenue for for Kinect 38 so,

I just think that's raised as a concern, and I think that's something that this committee should seriously monitor through its quarterly reporting in the next financial year moving forward.

any other comments or questions from councillors, Councillor Martin.

thank you, I just this is far less sophisticated, but interest in

Cllr Alan Martin - 1:19:38

terms of the priority based budget savings, so we've got that 3.3 point 6 million and obviously that's there's a whole sea of numbers lower in the report that might make that up, I just wondered whether there is a high level summary of whether the nature of the savings that make up that 3.6 just to give a clear perspective on it.

definitely, that is something that I can come back to Members on at random at this meeting, yes, we have a breakdown in terms of what we've done, include some of those transition that is ongoing, but we've got a breakdown which we can share with members that'd be helpful, thank you like,

approximately half of it 2 million quid of any transformation, so

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:20:30

that's the voluntary redundancy process, slimming the management structures, et cetera.

under the other two millionaires, a variety of portfolio savings et cetera, yeah, but that's that's the very that's the very brief headline and I'll I'll come back with a much better one.

Councillor Dobson.

yeah thanks.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:20:51

Cllr Laura Davison - 1:20:54

the the section on housing.

it's page 44 on Ma a 40 online.

again, not sure on everyone else's.

obviously that's numbers and headings it is there, a kind of is it possible to get some more detail around what some of that means in word form, rather than in numbers form, just to be able to understand.

the proposals there is a lot of different headings covered under the different sections.

but I thought you might ask me that well I or I wasn't really, I was just looking at the whole section that comes under Housing Summary.

in their.

OK.

OK, that's helpful.

yet.

can we just take a high level?

so that would, if I went back to that, that would be reflected in these numbers, in terms of where the savings are and okay, that's

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:22:24

helpful, thank you, it's also part of the next item.

which is the HA items that have included the business plan, is but as part of that late item agenda agenda item that was circulated.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:22:41

if there is no more comments or queries on that then obviously received a note the report and then note to note the estimates, obviously nothing's agreed until it's it's fine, it's fully agreed on the 28th of 28th of February, I believe isn't it and then obviously to note the the updated MCFs numbers that were discussed as well, so we're happy to receive a note all of those.

great OK, thank you.

Cllr Laura Davison - 1:23:16

moving, yet do you mind if we have a two minute break 2 minute break, okay quickly?

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:23:22

well.

although.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:23:28

OK.

6 Draft General Fund Budget 2024/25

7 Draft Housing Revenue Account Revenue and Capital Original Budget 2024/25

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:23:44

come back everyone, so continuing moving on Item number 7, which was circulated late, but hopefully everyone's seen the agenda item one and the PAC for that, so that this is the the HA housing revenue account draft budget for 24 25 and, just as it was with the monitoring this is,

the revenue and capital budgets all included in this report, and other Fiona introduces for us thanks.

kisser again, this is the HR Ray.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:24:16

draft HRA revenue and capital budget for 2045 and again I think I need, so I don't want to start with an apology, because there was a typo on 2.1, we're looking at that, Szabó, where we have an original estimate of balance as at 31st of March that should be 24 and towards the end where we have 24 Dow will be 25 so effectively. What is saying is that the

bottom line the year end revenue reserve balances as at the 1st of March 2025 is expected to be 3.9 million, as shown in table 1, so that table 1 provided us with a breakdown of movements between the current financial year original budget and the new year original new provisional or draft budget, so we have increased in range and not as service charges of 1.9 million decrease in revenue contribution to capital of 7 5 6 decrease in launch charges interests of 1 forsakes and we have few pressures that has been taking care of increase in repairs and maintenance of 800 m k net increase in patient interest costs of 2 9 5 increase in general management of 2 6 7 2 prescription charges of 1 1 4 ordinate movement of CERA to one so the bottom line is that 3.9 m I will talk about earlier everything within the HR re.

revenue budget is a reflection of the HR re 30 years business plan which is attached today's report and in terms of rent, is good to know that was the result of a revised policy which was announced by the government in January 2024, this allows social landlords to increase rents by CPI at a September of 6.7 plus 1 which is 7.7% for 24 25.

in terms of the reserve balances that was HRA, reserves is shown on that 2.2 and tribute to again, that actually shows the trajectory in terms of where we are expected to be in 2003 24 for points 8 and 25 24 25 of 3.9 million.

the rest of the report focuses on the majority peer deserves the rent policies.

the service charge, which will be in place for 24 25.

and there are comments about new build, and most of all of these are the reconciliation to.

the HR 30 years business plan that was previously that has been previously approved.

there was a comment about the business plan as well, and an estimate of the business plan is attached for comment.

I'm happy to start their tenancy question, thank you.

thank you very much for that.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:27:52

open it up to two members, I suppose some of the key items.

we see that the level of the level of rent setting, and I guess just the

the the the the drop, I guess, in in in, in the overall reserves in the H array over the over the forecasted at budget period.

be helpful to know.

if, if the Council were minded not to were go with.

the 7.7 as as outlines how much how much is at them, which is a percentage roughly in terms of its benefit to the HA, so, for example, if we are, if we say, if we stayed at 7% as we did as we did in the in this current financial year,

what could you put a financial figure on on that additional point 7?

that might be something that needs to work out, but I haven't got Africa in front of me at the moment.

Councillor Procter.

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:29:02

I've had bouncy governments say about 100,000 pounds a year which, over the 30 year programme of the HRA's, about 3 million pounds.

that's an awful lot of capital, repairs and or new houses.

and that's essential, that's essentially why it's being sought as the H array the intention for the our council housing is that we make them better and that we build more of them, and we've got a relatively straight charity trade-off here.

we can charge less rent and then we can make less houses better and we can build less houses.

that's very much that the so that it's absolutely a choice.

but the choice that we are pursuing at the moment is that land that the HA strategy that came forward two months ago said is that what we want to do is get all of our homes to a decent standard and to be thermally firmly good.

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:30:07

soon, and we want a programme which is building new council houses because there aren't enough to support the current demand for them, and in order to do that you need to have a business case which can do that and the business case is predicated on the rents that you can charge straightforward, what do you make over the course of the 30 years of that owning that property so that that's the balance that we're looking at? You also have to look at that as the balance of what our council house rents are against private house rents as well.

because if one looks at that at the moment, clearly Council house rents are significantly underneath private husband's rents, and the less you mean it, if you don't increase your, you, don't increase, the council house rents at least a bit then the private house rents keep moving away and you end up with a bigger gap between those two and you end up with the people in the very few council houses that we own who are getting a great deal.

a large number of people who would dearly love to be in there who we can't build new houses for, because we're not charging the rent that we should be.

and that's the real difficulty that you've got in that question, that's why that extra, that's why about extra has been pursued is because we want better, we want our all of the council houses, we own to be better, we want to own more Council houses so that we can offer more people those rents and without that additional rent we can't achieve those things has to the scale that we want to matter.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:31:43

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:31:46

it is also for because of the increase in the NHS rent rates, it is important to say that those who are on you know who are on benefits and getting financial support through the benefit system will see an uplift to make toots to match that those who are fully supported by the benefit system are effectively fully supported in terms of that increase and obviously the papers and things on those so the most needed are given full support within that it won't cost them another penny.

OK, thank you for that, Councillor Dobson, thank you, can you just

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:32:18

talk through the shared ownership rents, because I wasn't quite clear from from reading it?

Cllr Laura Davison - 1:32:24

what the plan is in relation to that and then on the service charges I I seem to remember, we had this sorry, it's the heating charges we might have had this discussion previously.

where the wording talks about the charges should be set at actual cost or 10% increase, subject to the following limits I seem to recall we had a conversation about actual cost or 10% increase, whichever I'm sorry, Councillor Dave, so we do need.

asked for his details on that.

OK thanks.

that's fine.

yeah, I mean I know the conversation you know you're talking about, I

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:33:28

mean there was worthy narrative, whichever is, whichever is higher or something like that, so, but can I have a look at last year's budget and then just?

hopefully, repeat repeat, whatever the wording was but yeah.

thank you.

in the very, very brief thing or man obviously is is that you could

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:34:01

have a maximum didn't increase the power charges by what power charges went up by two years ago, because people would have seen their costs double or treble at that stage. So yes, they are going up, but they'll go, but they are no longer on cost recovery because it just jumped so much and we didn't increase that, so we've taken some loss in that we've smoothed somewhat hopefully as power prices. Coming back down again, that would be a bit, but there has been a period of time whereby that went away from cost recovery because nobody could have voted for those numbers being trebled for some people last year, but that's what you would have done if he'd dealt with a normal power building

Councillor Lamb.

I wonder if you can explain a little bit more.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:34:48

Cllr Alan Martin - 1:34:52

however, interest rates are reflected in the assumptions going going forward and how exposed we are to changes in assumptions around interest rates when we, when we think that forward planning.

again, what I could say about interest rates is that all this has been

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:35:13

projected within the HRA business plan for the next 30 years, however.

borrowing for Asia, they are definitely at huge advantage compared to where we are borrowing for the Council General Fund because they are tattooed, so I think is roughly 4 basis point reduction when borrowing for PWLB and therefore in terms of interest rates is going to be based on interest rate or projected interest rates will be getting from PWLB Ivan said most of the

the figure used within the HRA is what has been projected within the 30 year business plan, thank you.

anything else on on this item.

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:36:03

I guess for me, it's just trying to match up and obviously the draft for this year and.

obviously the longer term business plan, which we now have, so obviously the if you look at 24 25 in that business plan, obviously it's.

reasonable, and obviously you you accept forecasting and all of that, but.

you might not know, but it'd be interesting to know how often that that business plan will now.

b be updated and evolve just just based on the on on these new on these new figures. Obviously income is up, expenditure is slightly down on what was forecasted in that in that business plan, so I don't know if you could say anything about that or if we take that up with with housing colleagues, thank you. I would definitely take that up with the chief officer for housing. However, in terms of the business

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:36:58

plan, although this is a very new business plan for the next 30 years,

but it's just, we are no good to put it on the shelf, so gadget does for the next 30 years, every year it has to be revisited, some of those assumptions needs to be looked at, he is similar to the consumed medium term financial plan so every year we need to look at the assumptions to make sure they are still fit for purpose and if there is going to be any impact on the budget to take that into consideration. Thank you

yeah, what older said is that, as you know, on HRA business plan,

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:37:37

which is based on Asio, based on the situation as we see it, based on the projections that we have so far and interest rates, for instance, we get expert advice, are falling close and others about what they think. Interest rates do over the next 30 years and a series of educated guesses about what the climate will be in terms of borrowing in terms of interest rates, et cetera, and also in terms of government policy, but it might be the in 12 months' time something radically changes in terms of that that you know the government might start lending money for nothing for home-building. For instance, a progressive government would do very well to do that. High progressive governments rent out listening

and that would radically change the basis that your business case would be based on, so I think it's important that we're gonna make sure that there is an annual review, but obviously if something significantly changes in the environment, like interest rates, massively change or interest rates massively change or the government changes and changes policies have significantly enough but that radically changes one's business case which would allow us to fix things quicker and build more houses then we should absolutely be looking at as soon as that change has come through.

yeah

8 Update to the General Fund Medium Capital Programme

since there's nothing more on that, obviously, the recommendation is

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:38:55

only to receive a note or just mind that by receiving and noting you're not endorsing or not endorsing a a 7.7% increase, we're merely merely noting this report. There will be more debate on that at a further meeting, so happy that we are happy to receive a note that report. Thank you very much and then. The last item on this evening's agenda is the update to the General Fund Medium Term Capital programme. And once again, thank you all a last one. Thank you, sir

Mr Ola Owolabi - 1:39:27

again, the report in front of you is looking at the general fund medium term capital, for the next five years, I think he is good too.

we said that the main objective of the capital programme for the next five years is to maintain a 5 years programme that is affordable, is sustainable and is within the prudential limit, and we want to make sure that most of the capital programme resources are aligned with our strategic vision and corporate priorities.

on that section 2.5, you've got a taboo in there which are detail appendix 1, showing all the capital programme for the next five years we did this summer is, we've got a planned spend of 24 28 million for 2025 25 23 million for 25 26.

20 million for 26 27, 15 million for 27 28 and 22 million for 28 28 2008 29, in total, we are talking about roughly one already and 46.6 million for the next five years, which is a huge sum, however.

with every capital programme they have to be fully funded and what we are going to see within the within that table is whereas pretty significant amount from the government grant, which has got to be levelling up, there will be a contribution, mainly relating to 2004 25, we have the projection in terms of capital receipts to help us out there'd be revenue contribution as well.

based on the programme, at the moment we are anticipating or projecting significant borrowing between 25 26 26 27 27 and 28, and most one of the reason for the is detail in 3.3 what you've got within 3.3 that Cebu is actually showing all the capital growth.

that this Council intend to implement for the next five years, the biggest one there is going to be for cut to were expected to spend 5 million in 2005 26, another 5 million in 2006 27, a total of

familiar.

Leisure Services, Development.

a budget of 26 million m between 26 27 and 20 8 29 to trachea so that is going to be funded through a significant borrowing requirement, but I will say that there are expectations in terms of significant amount of capital receipts that to come in order to help to help with for ketchup and to help for delicious Leisure Centre developments the rest of the report focused on the areas in terms of capital programme, the impact on capital resources,

the expected capital.

receipts.

next year, and the resource implication to funding MTFS for the next five years, I'm happy to stop there and take questions, thank you.

OK, thank you, Allah.

and members, anyone have any questions or comments.

or shall I show our style, which might not be very good?

OK, so I mean I, I have a couple of things really with with with the report I mean, that the biggest one for me is obviously that the large

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:43:29

amount of funding earmarked for leisure centre development while while it's I imagine it an ambition for the Council I mean this there is no formal decision made by members to to to say that this money is going to be spent.

so the fact that it features quite prominently in this report, for me just just raises a few questions, I mean, there has been some limited decisions on Foca to, we know that about just over 2 million of funding is going to be used to to shore up the main building covered by levelling up funding and that there would be funding.

going forward, but I mean there is still no clear, definitive path as to what focus to is or or what what what that what what funding that will entail, so I appreciate they're there down the road, so you know what you do with with the other NCFA should take it perhaps with a pinch of salt but it's quite a large pinch of salt for me in this in this report.

so I, I think I'd like to see council.

make some more firmer decisions, and that's that at least sort of put this on them, but put this on the map before it sort of you know, it's in so much black and white in a report such as this.

yeah

these are just provisional sums, pending detailed business cases, and

Lydia Morrison - 1:44:53

your Cabinet wanted to us to highlight this for discussion to ensure that these were projects that they feel are significant and would require to be financially sustainable and funded, but you will be asked to review and approve this release of this funding based on a on a full business case, but there was that requirement because of the issues that we had around the empty F, P and affordability that whether these could continue to remain as affordable and that's why they've been included to give that reassurance that actually, based on the information that we've currently got in the projections that if Council should wish to take these formally through with these estimates based on a full business case, but they were currently affordable

Councillor Procter, thank you, yeah, to reiterate that these are not

Cllr Tim Prater - 1:45:48

things that we are saying are going to happen, these are things that they're saying, but if you wanted to make them happen, that sort of funding could be made available over that sort of timeframe to do so, so obviously the 24 25 act has some very specific things in there. We get a new stump grinder who knew

but for some of the more you know the lie, the more long-term things there, the financial management system for the council is.

not fit for purpose. It does not work in the way that it needs to work for a Council going forward. That said Lydia and I will be the two most shocked people in the room if it costs 500,000 pounds over the course of the next two years, that sounds very high to us, but on the other hand you make provision for something you make an agreement that you're gonna go, and don't you, you're going to go and do it you get the quotes for things and then you try and make those things happen for the year for the best value and one can get there

similarly, we focus, too, it has been to Cabinet that there is a aspiration for this Council to.

move into a percentage of Foca that has been but that there aren't there bar papers now, and therefore there will be some cost of doing that, there will also be some benefit to the capital receipts are doing that if we're not in this and we're over that we don't need this anymore.

but what that receipt is depends on market rates in the time, so it gives and what it cost 10 million pounds God knows don't know.

but it gives an envelope there to do so, similarly with the leisure centre development there has always been an aspiration for a new leisure centre full height, we fundamentally disagreed with the previous administration on whether they were trying to put it, but every time that that conversation was had we reframed it in terms of there being a new leisure centre somewhere else, it has always been the aspiration of this Council, but there should be that replacement swimming pool for high van to the Marsh area.

our only fundamental disagreement was where they were trying to put it, so where we've included there's an amount of money in there, which gives us the scope to say right, we haven't lost that aspiration that aspiration remains now, we've got to have the detail that the conversations about how we still with that principle as a Council,

where should it be, what should it look like, and that gives us some numbers to yeah some confidence that we don't just have that conversation in a vacuum and that we couldn't possibly afford it if we did, if we have a conversation which ends up with something that looks at round those numbers above all below them then you've got some confidence that actually the Council could deliver it in that sort of period of time if the Council decides that's what it wants to do when he gets there, so it's it gives you a shape.

but you're absolutely right corner until the decisions are made on those specific items, I keep coming back to the financial management system, nobody has voted for that yet and nobody has voted for any invoice and we don't have any quotes for it beyond speaking to some people and them going ill cost a lot.

then so yeah, it's there to give a shape to this, not for you to look at it and go 25 million quid for a swimming pool is that enough, the answer is probably probably no yeah, there'll be other money incoming into that there will be a capital receipts, there are other grant income etc don't get too hung on the numbers get hung on, the shake gives a shape in terms of projection not so.

is that?

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:49:22

I suppose my mother pointed a little bit more details for point 5, the tenant for point 5.

so revenue resources to fund the capital programme.

obviously I appreciate the capital programme is over a number of years, but if we look at our projected balances of some of our reserves, largely the EDI reserve, which is projected to have a balance of 660,000 as of March.

just where is, if you have any idea of of of where funding will go back into that reserve to then come back out of that reserve to to fund the medium term capital programme?

so so, yeah.

economic development,

OK, so that it's forecast that there'll be more grant money coming in that are going to that reserve, that will then come out of that reserve and fund the capital programme.

OK, thank you.

many other Members have any other questions or comments.

Councillor Dobson yeah, I just wanted to check in the

the table.

Cllr Laura Davison - 1:50:35

it has a good question which table thank you, and the appendix does not help yes appendix 1.

that table.

on the in the right-hand column, the comments, there are some projects that are expected to be completed in this financial year.

so with those come out of this

this programme, if that was the case.

because that it starts beyond this year, doesn't it?

have I misunderstood, the second column shows the latest projection 2003 24, so they're in this financial year, yes, exactly, but if we're looking ahead, then this gets revised, presumably in those things.

that are completed, they disappear, so they're appearing in here, but they're not part of the next five years, as it were, unless they get re-profiled.

yeah

obviously, when an employee, just because of that uncertainty that I get you, thank you.

OK, so there's nothing else and again once again, just to receive a

Cllr Connor McConville - 1:52:01

note, this report, yes or grids OK, thank you very much for your time, everyone.

quite lengthy meetings such as the three of us, so four of us, maybe, but thank you very much for your time and have a lovely evening.

Finance and Performance Scrutiny Sub-Committee - Tuesday 23 January 2024, 6:00pm - Folkestone & Hythe webcasting