Decision details

To consider the month end budget report and make any recommendations as appropriate.

RESOLVED:

That the report be noted including the following:

1.         Forecast revenue budget outturn for 2017/18 were £19m overspend (Annex 1, paragraphs 1 and 8 to 38). This included:
£9m savings to be identified,
£16m savings considered unachievable in 2017/18,
£14m service demand and cost pressures
less
£20m underspends, additional savings and income.

2.         Significant risks to the revenue budget (Annex 1, paragraphs 39 to 44 of the submitted report) could add £11m to the forecast overspend, included: £8m in Children, Schools & Families and £2m in Adult Social Care.

3.         Forecast planned savings for 2017/18 totalled £79m against £95m agreed savings and £104m target (Annex 1, paragraph 45 of the submitted report).

4.         All services continued to take all reasonable action to keep costs down and optimise income (e.g. minimising spending, managing vacancies wherever possible etc.).

5.         The Section 151 Officer’s commentary and the Monitoring Officer’s Legal Implications commentary in paragraphs 16 to 19 of the submitted report stated that the council had a duty to ensure its expenditure did not exceed resources available and move towards a sustainable budget for future years.

That the following be approved:

6.         Draw down £23,000 from Community Buildings grant scheme for planned spend on school kitchen schemes in 2017/18 (Annex 1, paragraph 61 of the submitted report).

7.         £0.5m of the current £0.8m Adult Social Care Major Adaptations capital budget  be spent on items purchased from the community equipment store capitalised under the accounting policy for community equipment from 1 April 2017 (Annex 1, paragraph 62 of the submitted report).

Reason for Decisions:

This report is presented to comply with the agreed policy of providing a monthly budget monitoring report to Cabinet for approval and action as necessary.

[The decisions on this item can be called in by the Overview and Budget Scrutiny Committee]