Issue - meetings

This report is due to be pre-scrutinised at a meeting of the Budget Scrutiny Working Group scheduled to take place on 1^st September 2022.  Any recommendations arising from this meeting, subject to being endorsed at a meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee on 5^th September 2022, will be tabled at the Executive Committee meeting.

The Head of Finance and Customer Services presented the Budget Framework and Finance and Performance Quarter 1 Monitoring Report for Members’ consideration.

The Committee was informed that the finance and performance monitoring reports would be presented for the Executive Committee’s consideration on a quarterly basis.  Based on performance to date, by the end of the first quarter an underspend of £21,000 was anticipated in the revenue budget by the end of the 2022/23 financial year.  Actual spend in the first quarter of the 2022/23 financial year on the capital programme was valued at £3.1 million out of a total capital budget of £10.8 million.

Officers were proposing that the Council should consider increasing the Operational Bank Account limit to £2 million.  The Council had the discretion to set this figure and the change would reflect current operating practices.  Members were also being asked to consider adopting a new Asset Strategy.

Information had been included in the report in respect of the performance of Council services.  This included data for performance in relation to the Council’s strategic purposes as well as operational indicators.

Following the presentation of the report, Member discussed the content in detail.  Reference was made to the figures that had been recorded in the report for revenue expenditure in the Chief Executive’s department, which had been recorded as both an overspend and an underspend of £1,000.  Officers confirmed that there was a typographical error in the report and this should have been recorded as an underspend of £1,000 but noted that this was correctly reflected in the table on the previous page.

Consideration was given to the discussions that had been held between representatives of the Financial Services department and Heads of Service and questions were raised about when the outcomes of these discussions would be reported to Members.  Officers explained that further information would be reported to Members on this subject in October 2022.

Reference was made to the data that had been recorded for the take up of nursery places in the Borough.  Members commented that this had been recorded as 59 per cent, however, at recent meetings at Worcestershire County Council County Councillors had been informed that the rate was 81 per cent.  The Committee was informed that the figures provided in the report had been based on the latest data provided to Redditch Borough Council by Worcestershire County Council and related to performance in 2021.

RESOLVED that

1)          the current financial position in relation to Revenue and Capital Budgets for the period April to June 2022 be noted;

2)          the Quarter 1 Performance data for the Period April to June 2022 be noted;

RECOMMENDED that

1)          the Operational Bank Account limit is raised to £2 million; and

2)          the Asset Disposal Strategy is approved for implementation.