Agenda item

Report of the Cabinet Member Finance.

The Cabinet Member Finance introduced the report which highlighted the Council’s financial performance for the previous year which set out the General Fund and Housing Revenue Account (HRA) revenue and capital outturn position for 2017/18. The information contained within the report had been used to prepare the Council’s Statement of Accounts for 2017/18.

She explained that 2017/18 had been another challenging year for balancing the books due to continued Government funding arrangements and changes, together with the economic climate, which presented ongoing concern for the council’s budgets.

She highlighted the following :

·       An underspend of £403k had been achieved due to the hard work and sound financial management by officers and partners via savings, reducing costs and generating income where possible. This would be transferred to the budget strategy support reserve pending decisions for its use in 2018/19 and future years.

·         Waste and Recycling-exceptional, one-off  expenditure had been incurred due to the implementation of the new regime

·         Cemetery and Crematorium-there had been a loss of income due to problems with the current facility but the new build remained on track and within budget

·         There had been an increase in returns from investments

·         There was a proposal to support the Christmas lights with match funding from the Business Improvement District

·         One carry forward request supported by Cabinet and for Council approval was £7k to allow for identity cards and software to be integrated in the new sound system.

The Cabinet Member Housing wished to refer Members to section 12 of the report and the reduction in bad debt requirement due to the late roll out of universal credit. He highlighted that this would still be needed.

The Leader reiterated the thanks to officers and welcomed the contribution of the BID to host a Christmas lights switch on event.

RESOLVED THAT

Council be recommended to

1.    Receive the financial outturn performance position for the General Fund, summarised at Appendix 2, and note that services have been delivered within the revised budget for 2017/18 resulting in a saving (after carry forward requests) of £403,179.

2.    Approve £7,000 of carry forward requests (requiring member approval) at Appendix 5.

3.    Approve the use of the budget saving of £403,179 as detailed in Section 3.

4.    Approve a further allocation of £15k towards Contactless Donation Points, funded via a contribution from the Homelessness earmarked reserve, as detailed in para 8.2.

5.    Approve a 2018/19 contract fee adjustment of £200,000 to Ubico Ltd, funded from General Balances, as detailed in para 13.5.

6.    Note the annual treasury management report at Appendix 7 and approve the actual 2017/18 prudential and treasury indicators.

7.    Note the capital programme outturn position as detailed in Appendix 8 and approve the carry forward of unspent budgets into 2018/19 (section 7).

8.    Note the position in respect of Section 106 agreements and partnership funding agreements at Appendix 9 (section 9).

9.    Note the outturn position in respect of collection rates for council tax and non-domestic rates for 2017/18 in Appendix 10 (section 10).

10.  Notes the outturn position in respect of collection rates for sundry debts for 2017/18 in Appendix 11 (section 11).

11.  Receive the financial outturn performance position for the Housing Revenue Account for 2017/18 in Appendices 12 to 13 and approves the carry forward of unspent budgets into 2018/19 (section 12).

12.  Note the budget monitoring position to the end of June 2018 (section 13).