Issue - meetings

The Deputy Chief Executive and Section 151 Officerpresented the Quarter Three Revenue and Performance Monitoring 2024/25.

It was reported that overall, the Council was currently forecasting a full year revenue overspend of £138,000 at Quarter Three, an improvement of £161,000 from Quarter Two.

Several further changes were also reported from Quarter Two to Quarter Three. These were as follows:

·       An overspend in Environmental Services of £189,000 – this was largely due to an increase in Place Team spending.

·       An overspend in Financial Services of £187,000 due to agency staff costs.

·       An overspend in Planning, Regeneration and Leisure Services of £119,000 – this was mainly due to the variances on Planning Applications income compared to budget.

On 31st December 2024, the Council had £13.5m short term investments held and no short-term borrowing.

In terms of the Digital Manufacturing and Innovation Centre (DMIC) it was reported that the plans were now up and running and that a bid was underway to Birmingham City Council for the funding of £2.425m which had previously been allocated to Redditch Borough Council by the Greater Birmingham and Solihull Local Enterprise Partnership (GBSLEP) before being disbanded. This would help fund the DMIC project going forward.

Public Realm works were under construction and had been reported to Members previously, the Town Centre library would not now be relocated to the Town Hall Hub.

As at 31^st December 2024, the Council held £14.868m of Earmarked Reserves and £7.475m in the General Fund.

The Housing Revenue Account looked to break even for the financial year. The capital work programme would be accelerated this year as there had been some delays experienced due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Council’s Procurement Pipeline included details of contracts expected to be reprocured and new procurement projects expected to be undertaken in the future.  There were twenty-three contracts valued between £50,000 and £200,000, ten valued at over £200,000 and ten contracts procured by Redditch on behalf of Bromsgrove District Council. These ten contracts were all related to ICT.

The Policy Manager presented the Performance Measures data for Quarter Three for Members’ consideration. It was noted that this was a new way to present the data in a more user-friendly way. It would be used to assess performance and identify areas of improvement. The development of the Power BI dashboard was also underway, and Members would be able to access this via a dashboard in the future providing clear and accurate performance data.

Some measures included within the report were still under development, such as Private Housing and Freedom of Information and Subject Access Request measures due to projects currently underway in these areas. These would continue to be developed for future reports.

All measures were aligned with the Council Plan and linked into the priorities contained within it. Members were informed that the service measures had also been developed as part of the Service Business Planning Framework.

Following consideration of the report Members reported that they were pleased with the outcome of the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 98