Issue - meetings
Corporate Revenue and Capital Budget Monitoring Q2 2015/16 (Month 6)
Meeting: 04/01/2016 - Overview & Scrutiny Committee (Item 7)
7 Corporate Revenue and Capital Budget Monitoring Q2 2015/16 (Month 6) PDF 87 KB
Additional documents:
- Corporate Budget Monitoring Q2 - CPAP, item 7
PDF 125 KB
- Appendix 1 - Control Budget 2015-16 Q2 v2, item 7
PDF 56 KB
- Appendix 2 - Summary by Service Area, item 7
PDF 64 KB
- Appendix 3 - HRA, item 7
PDF 20 KB
- Appendix 4 - Capital Q2, item 7
PDF 72 KB
Minutes:
The Committee received and noted the monitoring report that outlined the financial outturn position of the Council at the end of Quarter 2 for 2015/16 compared to budget, and service performance against targets. This included projected year-end position for the:
· General Fund Revenue, Housing Revenue Account and Capital Programme;
· Summary of the movement on Reserves
The discussions on this report may be summarised as follows:
The Committee:
· Heard that at present there are savings in Children’s Services of £1.489m which are yet to be allocated across the Directorate - £500k of these relate to the review of administration, which leaves £0.989m as savings which need to be delivered, mitigated, or a case made for additional corporate resources via a target adjustment due to slippage/non-deliverability, these savings are being reviewed by the Directorate DMT – the achievability of mitigating savings remain a high risk for the Directorate and will continue to be closely monitored. It was noted that these savings would be achieved through recommended reductions submitted from the directorates;
· Heard that the overall projected Housing Revenue Account underspend is the net result of a number of variances. The high number of Right to Buy sales means service charges are projected to be higher than budgeted, although offsetting this, dwelling rental income is forecast to be lower – in the first six months of 2015/16 there were 127 Right to Buy sales. Energy costs are forecast to be lower than budgeted, along with other utilities, although this is a volatile budget and will be closely monitored. The additional net income needs to be seen in the context of emerging pressures on future rents brought about by changes in government policy, and the need to support future investment in existing or new stock as part of a sustainable HRA business plan;
· Heard that whilst any ongoing revenue overspends during 2015/16 will have a negative impact on the Medium Term Financial Plan. At present a broadly break even position for Directorates is predicted for 2015/16, however there are cost pressures within social care that potentially require the use of earmarked reserves during the year;
· Heard that the capital budget for 2015/16 now totals £119.3m, decreased from the £211.1m reported to Cabinet in October 2015. The decrease primarily being due to the re-profiling of budgets into future years;
· Heard that there will be a report to a future meeting on the mechanism to replace Ward Forums;
· Stated that in future it would want to receive more information/narrative behind the rationale for each decision; and
· Asked to be provided with more details on the new locations mentioned in the Capital Control Budget (Housing Revenue Account, New Supply) to replace Christian Street; Brick Lane; Spelman Street and Mile End Road.