Agenda and minutes

There were no disclosable pecuniary interests.

(a)  To agree the minutes from the meeting of Cabinet on 11^th February 2025

(b)  Matters arising

The minutes of the meeting held on 11^th February 2025 were agreed and signed as a true record. There were no matters arising.

Report of the Director of Finance and Reources (Section 151 Officer)

Cabinet considered a report of the Director of Finance and Resources (Section 151 Officer), which would also be considered by Council at its meeting on 25^th February 2025, that calculated the Council Tax level for 2025/26 and made appropriate recommendations to Council, consistent with the Budget Report 2025/26.

The report recommends a 4.9% increase in the City’s Council Tax. Some figures and information, shaded grey in the report, were provisional due to precepts not having been confirmed at the time of publication. These figures were confirmed as final/amended at the meeting and confirmed as accurate. 

The report incorporated the impact of the Council's gross expenditure and the level of income it would receive through Business Rates, grants, and fees and charges. This resulted in a Council Tax requirement, as the amount that its expenditure exceeded all other sources of income.

The report included a calculation of the Band D Council Tax that would be needed to generate this Council Tax requirement, based on the City's approved Council Tax base. The 2025/26 Band D Council Tax that was calculated through this process had increased by £99.11 from the 2024/25 level.

Each year the Government determined the maximum Council Tax increases that local authorities could set without triggering a referendum. For 2025/26, Coventry City Council’s Council Tax must be below 5%, comprising a 2% precept for expenditure on adult social care and a maximum of 3% for other expenditure. The recommendations within the Budget Report 2025/26 were based on a proposed increase in Council Tax of 4.9%, incorporating a core Council Tax rise of 2.9% and a 2% Adult Social Care Precept.

Members noted that the recommendations followed the structure of resolutions drawn up by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, to ensure that legal requirements were fully adhered to in setting the tax. As a consequence, the wording of the proposed resolutions was necessarily complex.

RESOLVED that Cabinet recommended to Council the approval of recommendations (1) to (5) below, to:

(1)  To note the following Council Tax base amounts for the year 2025/26, as approved by Cabinet on 7 January 2025, in accordance with Regulations made under Section 31B of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 ("the Act"):

a)   90,062.6 being the amount calculated by the Council as its Council Tax base for the year for the whole Council area;

b)  Allesley    451.3

  Finham      1,585.7

Keresley    616.3

being the amounts calculated by the Council as its Council Tax base for the year for dwellings in those parts of its area to which one or more special items relate.

(2)  That the following amounts be now calculated by the Council for the year 2025/26 in accordance with Sections 31A, 31B and 34 to 36 of the Act:

(a) £961,854,567  being the aggregate of the amounts that the Council estimates for the items set out in Section 31A(2) of the Act taking into account all precepts issued to it by Parish Councils(Gross Expenditure  ...  view the full minutes text for item 69.

Report of the Director of Finance and Resources (Section 151 Officer)

Cabinet considered a report of the Director of Finance and Resources (Section 151 Officer), which would also be considered at the meeting of Council on 25^th February 2025, that followed on from the Pre-Budget Report approved by Cabinet on 10th December 2024 (minute 44/24 referred) which had since been subject to a period of public consultation. The proposals within the report would now form the basis of the Council's final revenue and capital budget for 2025/26 incorporating the following details:

•  Gross budgeted spend of £961.9m (£94.0m or 11% higher than 2024/25).

•  Net budgeted spend of £296.7m (£19.3m or 7% higher than 2024/25) funded from Council Tax and Business Rates less a tariff payment of £22.2m due to the Government.

•  A Council Tax Requirement of £189.5m (£13.6m or 8% higher than 2024/25), reflecting a City Council Tax increase of 4.9% detailed in the separate Council Tax Setting report on today’s agenda.

•  A number of new expenditure pressures, policy proposals and technical savings proposals.

•  A Capital Strategy including a Capital Programme of £171.6m including expenditure funded by Prudential Borrowing of £55.3m.

•  An updated Treasury Management Strategy, Capital Strategy, and a Commercial Investments Strategy.

The financial position in this Budget Report was based on the Final 2025/26 Local Government Finance Settlement published on 3rd February 2025. This settlement still only provided a one-year focus for 2025-26 with no detail for local government finances beyond this. However, in response to significant lobbying by Local Government, it was now being recognised that the current methodology and much of the data that fed into it was out of date and therefore, the Government have begun a consultation process into Local Authority Funding Reform, with the intention that a new system, intended to reflect need, could be implemented from 2026/27.

In advance of this reform the 2025/26 Local Government Finance Settlement had addressed some of the disparity in the current system with new grants including the new one-off Recovery Grant (£9.6m), targeted towards areas with greater need and demand for services, and the new Childrens Social Care Prevention Grant (£2.2m), distributed through a new children’s needs-based formula which estimated the need for Childrens Social Care Services. Coventry also received an additional £6.2m Social Care Grant. Compared to the assumptions within the pre-budget report, this represented an additional £10.5m of resources in the settlement.

With the promise of funding reform, it was difficult to provide a robust medium term financial forecast at this stage and the Council had instead made some planning estimates for future years. Initial assumptions recognise the likelihood that gaps would remain for the periods following 2025/26. The view of the Director of Finance and Resources (Section 151 Officer) was that the Council should be planning for such a position.

The Pre-Budget Report was based on an increase in Council Tax of 4.9% and this position had been maintained for the final proposals in this report. This incorporated an increase of 2.9%, which was within the Government’s limit  ...  view the full minutes text for item 70.

There are no outstanding issues

There were no outsanding issues.

There were no other items of public business.