The report of the Acting Corporate Director, Resources is attached.

The Council considered the report of the Acting Corporate Director, Resources on a proposed virement in connection with the Mayor’s Executive Decision to introduce a local scheme for free schools meals for all primary age pupils.

Councillor Alibor Choudhury moved, and Councillor Oliur Rahman seconded, the recommendation as set out in the report.

Councillor Carlo Gibbs moved, and Councillor Sirajul Islam seconded, a tabled amendment to the recommendation. Following debate the amendment was put to the vote and was agreed.  The substantive motion as amended was then put to the vote and was agreed.   

DECISION

This Council notes:

·         There were NO proposals for Free School Meals in the Mayor’s original 2014/15 Budget, in fact, in that Budget the Mayor removed the funding already allocated for Free School Meals.

·         The Labour Group’s Budget amendment was the only one which contained a pledge for Free School Meals.

·         Labour’s Budget amendment would have fully funded Free School Meals on a sustainable basis and Labour’s candidate for Mayor of Tower Hamlets, John Biggs, has pledged to ensure that Free School Meals for all primary school pupils is a priority of his administration.

·         After removing funding from his original Budget, the Mayor refused to accept Labour’s Free School Meals proposal and on 6th March his supporters voted to block it.

This Council Further notes:

·         The Mayor opposed Labour’s Free School Meals plan for purely political reasons.

·         The Mayor promised to bring a fully funded proposal back to Council for two full academic years.

·         The Mayor has broken his promise as the actual proposals before Council are not only for one year only, but are not funded at all.

·         The proposed virement is not only totally unfunded, but it raids the Council’s emergency reserves which will require over £2.5m in additional service cuts in future years.

This Council believes:

·         If the Mayor wanted to invest in Free School Meals he would have included it in his original Budget rather than cutting the already allocated funding.

·         Labour’s campaign for Free School Meals has attracted widespread support and the Mayor is now desperately trying to save face in light of his opposition to Labour’s plans.

·         Whilst we welcome the Mayor’s conversion to support Free School Meals, it is clear that he has absolutely no idea how to fund this and he is irresponsibly trying to buy his way out of the problem.

·         The Mayor’s plan to provide skills training for women to work in the healthcare sector could easily be achieved by using the power of the Mayor’s office to work with business, third sector and NHS partners to deliver the project on a sustainable basis and not just as a one off.

This Council further believes:

·         Budget setting is a matter for Full Council and that any attempts by the Executive to circumvent this process would be unlawful, including through cumulative virements below the £1m threshold;

·         This Mayor is endangering the long term financial health of this council with his desperate actions and that it is the responsibility of the council and its elected members to protect tax payers money from this abuse;

·         The financial virement protections in the constitution have been agreed by full council and it is full council that should provide clarity on their application;

This Council resolves to amend the report Recommendations to:

Delete the current bullet point and replace with:

·         In order to avoid the use of further reserves, which would result in further cuts to services in later years, we will reduce the need to call on reserves over the course of the scheme by granting the mayor the power to implement the following virements:

o   A virement of £1.3m from the Healthcare employment project

o   Virements of £296,000 and £30,000 from the budgets for mayoral advisors and the mayoral car respectively

o   A virement to ringfence £1,050,000 from the efficiencies and any additional funding resulting from the 2015/16 public health grant.

·         To instruct officers to bring a draft amendment to the constitution to the 2014 AGM meeting which would act to prevent the Executive from issuing cumulative smaller virements to one budget head which would otherwise exceed the £1m limit requiring approval by Council.

·         In the interim, to add a paragraph to the section of the Council’s constitution on virements reading:

“Virements for the same budget head, project or substantively similar purpose which are below the £1m threshold should not cumulatively (over a period of three months) exceed the £1m limit without the approval of Council.”

·         To highlight to all officers responsible for the interpretation and application of the Constitution that it is Council’s view that using cumulative virements which exceed the £1m marker for reporting to Council intentionally breaches the spirit of the Constitution and that from henceforth these should be prevented as is the explicit will of the council.

(Action by: Chris Holme, Acting Corporate Director, Resources; and

Meic Sullivan-Gould, Interim Monitoring Officer)

The Council considered the report of the Acting Corporate Director, Resources on a proposed virement in connection with the Mayor’s Executive Decision to introduce a local scheme for free schools meals for all primary age pupils.

Councillor Alibor Choudhury moved, and Councillor Oliur Rahman seconded, the recommendation as set out in the report.

Councillor Carlo Gibbs moved, and Councillor Sirajul Islam seconded, a tabled amendment to the recommendation. Following debate the amendment was put to the vote and was agreed.  The substantive motion as amended was then put to the vote and was agreed.  Accordingly it was:-

RESOLVED

This Council notes:

·         There were NO proposals for Free School Meals in the Mayor’s original 2014/15 Budget, in fact, in that Budget the Mayor removed the funding already allocated for Free School Meals.

·         The Labour Group’s Budget amendment was the only one which contained a pledge for Free School Meals.

·         Labour’s Budget amendment would have fully funded Free School Meals on a sustainable basis and Labour’s candidate for Mayor of Tower Hamlets, John Biggs, has pledged to ensure that Free School Meals for all primary school pupils is a priority of his administration.

·         After removing funding from his original Budget, the Mayor refused to accept Labour’s Free School Meals proposal and on 6th March his supporters voted to block it.

This Council Further notes:

·         The Mayor opposed Labour’s Free School Meals plan for purely political reasons.

·         The Mayor promised to bring a fully funded proposal back to Council for two full academic years.

·         The Mayor has broken his promise as the actual proposals before Council are not only for one year only, but are not funded at all.

·         The proposed virement is not only totally unfunded, but it raids the Council’s emergency reserves which will require over £2.5m in additional service cuts in future years.

This Council believes:

·         If the Mayor wanted to invest in Free School Meals he would have included it in his original Budget rather than cutting the already allocated funding.

·         Labour’s campaign for Free School Meals has attracted widespread support and the Mayor is now desperately trying to save face in light of his opposition to Labour’s plans.

·         Whilst we welcome the Mayor’s conversion to support Free School Meals, it is clear that he has absolutely no idea how to fund this and he is irresponsibly trying to buy his way out of the problem.

·         The Mayor’s plan to provide skills training for women to work in the healthcare sector could easily be achieved by using the power of the Mayor’s office to work with business, third sector and NHS partners to deliver the project on a sustainable basis and not just as a one off.

This Council further believes:

·         Budget setting is a matter for Full Council and that any attempts by the Executive to circumvent this process would be unlawful, including through cumulative virements below the £1m threshold;

·         This Mayor is endangering the long term financial health of this council with his desperate actions and that it is the responsibility of the council and its elected members to protect tax payers money from this abuse;

·         The financial virement protections in the constitution have been agreed by full council and it is full council that should provide clarity on their application;

This Council resolves to amend the report Recommendations to:

Delete the current bullet point and replace with:

·         In order to avoid the use of further reserves, which would result in further cuts to services in later years, we will reduce the need to call on reserves over the course of the scheme by granting the mayor the power to implement the following virements:

o   A virement of £1.3m from the Healthcare employment project

o   Virements of £296,000 and £30,000 from the budgets for mayoral advisors and the mayoral car respectively

o   A virement to ringfence £1,050,000 from the efficiencies and any additional funding resulting from the 2015/16 public health grant.

·         To instruct officers to bring a draft amendment to the constitution to the 2014 AGM meeting which would act to prevent the Executive from issuing cumulative smaller virements to one budget head which would otherwise exceed the £1m limit requiring approval by Council.

·         In the interim, to add a paragraph to the section of the Council’s constitution on virements reading:

“Virements for the same budget head, project or substantively similar purpose which are below the £1m threshold should not cumulatively (over a period of three months) exceed the £1m limit without the approval of Council.”

·         To highlight to all officers responsible for the interpretation and application of the Constitution that it is Council’s view that using cumulative virements which exceed the £1m marker for reporting to Council intentionally breaches the spirit of the Constitution and that from henceforth these should be prevented as is the explicit will of the council.

Procedural Motion

At this point Councillor Carlo Gibbs moved and Councillor Sirajul Islam seconded a procedural motion “that in accordance with Procedure Rule 15.11.7 the meeting be extended for a further 30 minutes”.  The procedural motion was put to the vote and was agreed.