Issue - meetings

Report of the Deputy Chief Executive (Place)

The Cabinet considered a report of the Deputy Chief Executive (Place), that would also be considered by the Council and the Audit and Procurement Committee at their meetings on 5^th and 11^th September 2017 respectively, that advised Members of the of the forecast outturn position for revenue and capital expenditure and the Council’s treasury management activity as at the end of June 2017 (Quarter 1). The headline revenue forecast for 2017/18 was an over spend of £4.6m. At the same point in 2016/17 there was a projected overspend of £6.4m.

The report also recommended a change to the Council’s Investment Strategy and Policy, reviewed every year as part of the Council’s Budget Setting process, to enable the Council to continue its current level of investment in Property based Collective Investment Schemes.

This position reflected areas that had reported overspends in recent previous years and ones where new budgetary issues were emerging. Although the initially reported overspend position was not as large as this time last year, the Senior Management Board was aware of the need to address the range of budgetary issues facing the Council. This included continued challenges in delivering savings targets set in previous Budgets and some local demand pressures, in particular in relation to looked after children and housing related costs. Even at this early stage it was likely that some of these pressures would need to be considered as part of the Council’s Budget Setting process for the 2018/19 Budget, although further work would continue to keep these to a minimum.

The Council’s Capital spending was projected to be £128m for the year, a net increase of £5m on the programme planned at the start of the year.

The Cabinet requested that a briefing note be circulated to them providing further detail of the planned savings for the Business Services element of the Customer Services and Transformation service area.

RESOLVED that the Cabinet:

1.  Notes the forecast revenue overspend at Quarter 1.

2.  Approves the revised capital estimated outturn position for the year of £128m incorporating: £2.5m net increase in spending relating to approved/technical changes (Appendix 2 of the report), £12.6m of expenditure rescheduled from 2016/17 into 2017/18 and £10.3m net rescheduling of expenditure into 2018/19 (Appendix 4 of the report).

3.  Requests that Council approves an adjustment to the Council’s Investment Strategy and Policy to increase the maximum investment limit with property based Collective Investment Schemes to £10m, up from £8m.