Agenda and minutes

There were no apologies for absence.

To invite Councillors to declare any Disclosable Pecuniary Interests and / or Other Disclosable Interests they may have in items on the agenda, and to confirm the nature of those interests.

There were no declarations of interest.

The Leader highlighted that there had been an exempt minute recorded at the meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee held on 1^st February 2024, which had been attached for Members’ consideration.  Members were advised that the Leader wanted to remain in public session throughout the meeting, if possible, to avoid disruption to the proceedings for the public, but Members were asked to notify him if they wished to discuss any of the exempt information.  However, no reference was made to the content of the exempt minute and therefore the meeting remained in public session for the duration.

RESOLVED that

the minutes of the meeting of the Executive Committee held on 6^th February 2024 be approved as a true and correct record and signed by the Chair.

The Council Tax Resolutions 2024/25 were presented for the Executive Committee’s consideration. 

Members were asked to note a typographical error in the report, in respect of the total amount of Council Tax due to be paid cumulatively to precepting authorities in the 2024/25 financial year.  This should have been recorded as £57 million rather than as £56 million. 

Reference was made to the proposed 200 per cent increase to the precept for Feckenham Parish Council and Members questioned why this rise was so high.  The Committee was informed that the precept figure was increasing from £20,000 to £60,000 for Feckenham Parish Council.  The increase had been proposed by Feckenham Parish Council and Redditch Borough Council had no control over the level proposed by the Parish Council.  It was further noted that Parish Councils had an increasing range of responsibilities and Feckenham Parish Council had historically charged a relatively low precept.  The increase in this instance would enable Feckenham Parish Council to cover the costs of many of their additional duties.

RESOLVED to note that

at a meeting held on 9^th January 2024, the Executive Committee calculated the Council Tax Base 2024/25 as:

(a)    for the whole Council area as 26,317.10 [Item T in the formula in Section 31B of the Local Government Act 1992, as amended (the “Act”)]; and

(b)   for dwellings in those parts of its area to which a Parish precept relates; this being Feckenham Parish as 380.30.

RECOMMENDED

1)         The calculation for the Council Tax requirement for the Council’s own purposes for 2024/25 (excluding Parish precepts) as£7,094,467.10.

2)         That the following amounts be calculated for the year 2024/25 in accordance with sections 31 to 36 of the Act: 

(a)    £49,227,739.00 being the aggregate of the amounts which 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) (i.e., Gross expenditure)                     

(b)    £42,133,272.00 being the aggregate of the amounts which the Council estimates for the items set out in Section 31A (3) of the Act. (i.e., Gross income)                     

(c)    £7,094,467.10 being the amount by which the aggregate of 1.2.2(a) above exceeds the aggregate at 1.2.2(b) above, calculated by the Council, in accordance with Section 31A (4) of the Act, as its Council Tax requirement for the year. (Item R in the formula in Section 31B of the Act).  

(d)    £271.86 being the amount at 1.2.2 (c) above (Item R), all divided by Item T (1.1(a) above), calculated by the Council, in accordance with Section 31B of the Act, as the basic amount of its Council Tax for the year (including Parish precepts).       

(e)    £60,000 being the aggregate amount of all special items (Feckenham Parish precept) referred to in Section 34 (1) of the Act.

(f)     £269.58 being the amount at 1.2.2 (d) above less the result given by dividing the amount at 1.2.2 (e) above by Item T (1.1 (a) above), calculated by the Council, in accordance with  ...  view the full minutes text for item 99.

Members were advised that at a meeting of the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee held on 25th January 2024, Members had agreed the following recommendation for the Executive Committee’s consideration:

“In view of the lack of potential audit resources, can we invite the Executive to consider the implications of having at least one set of unaudited accounts at the end of this financial year.”

The recommendation was discussed by Members and in doing so it was noted that the end of the 2023/24 financial year was due to occur at the end of the following month and there would be no implications to not having submitted the Council’s accounts by this point.  It was noted that this applied to all of the Council’s accounts that had not yet been audited.

Reference was made to the consequences arising to the Council should audited accounts have not been submitted by the actual deadline in autumn 2024.  Officers advised that the consequences were likely to be clarified later in the year, following completion of a number of Government consultation processes.  However, Members were informed that approximately two thirds of Councils had at least two unaudited sets of accounts by the date of the meeting.  The Government would need to consider the potential consequences, in terms of reputational damage, that might arise from imposing sanctions on so many local authorities that did not have audited accounts submitted in time to meet national deadlines.  Furthermore, the Committee was asked to note that the main cause of the delays nationally were capacity issues within external audit, which were outside the control of local government.

Concerns were raised about the potential impact that failure to submit audited accounts to deadline might have on the Council’s credit rating.  Officers explained that this would not impact on the Council’s credit rating, as their credit rating reflected that of the national Government.  However, this could have a negative impact on the credit rating of local authority companies.

All Councils were due to change auditors in 2024.  Usually, external auditors undertook a much more extensive audit of a Council’s accounts in the first year that they operated as that authority’s auditor, to check that nothing had been missed by the previous auditors.  There were more and more local authorities that had issued Section 24 Notices and these also resulted in more detailed audits having to be undertaken.  Given the capacity issues within external audit already, it was anticipated that this could exacerbate existing issues and result in further delays to the auditing of local government accounts in the future.

RESOLVED that

the comments from the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee be noted.

To receive and consider any outstanding minutes or referrals from the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, Executive Panels etc. since the last meeting of the Executive Committee, other than as detailed in the items above.

There were no referrals from the Overview and Scrutiny Committee or any of the Executive Advisory Panels on this occasion.

Members considered the minutes of the meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee held on 1^st February 2024.  During the meeting, reference was made to the Overview and Scrutiny Annual Report and questions were raised about why the Committee had agreed a resolution in respect of the content of the report when the item was also due to be considered by Council.  Officers explained that, as the report detailed the achievements of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee and scrutiny working groups during the year, the content needed to be agreed by the Committee prior to presentation to Council.  Once approved by the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, the Annual Report was always presented for Members’ consideration at the last meeting of Council in the municipal year.

RESOLVED that

the minutes of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting held on 1^st February 2024 be noted.