Issue - meetings

That the following recommendations be made to the Full County Council on 10 February 2015:

On the revenue and capital budget:

1.         Note the Director of Finance’s statutory report on the robustness and sustainability of the budget and the adequacy of the proposed financial reserves (Annex 1 of the submitted report).

2.         Set the County Council precept for band D council tax at £1,219.68 which represents a 1.99% up-lift.

3.         Agree to maintain the council tax rate set above and delegate powers to the Leader and the Director of Finance to finalise detailed budget proposals following receipt of the Final Local Government Financial Settlement.

4.         Transfer £4.6m from the surplus on the Council Tax Collection Fund to the Economic Downturn Reserve.

5.         Approve the County Council budget for 2015/16.

6.         Agree the capital programme proposals specifically to:

·      fund essential schemes over the five year period (schools and non-schools) to the value of £695m including ring-fenced grants;

·      make adequate provision in the revenue budget to fund the revenue costs of the capital programme; and

·      enhance provision for Local Growth Deal and flood schemes, as set out in paragraph 114 of the submitted report, including making a £0.5m pa contribution to the River Thames Scheme.

7.         Agree for Cabinet to refresh the Medium Term Financial Plan for the financial years 2015-20 (MTFP 2015?20) revenue and capital budgets in summer 2015.

8.         Require the Chief Executive and Director of Finance to continue regularly to track and monitor progress on the further development and implementation of robust plans for achieving the efficiencies across the whole MTFP period.

9.         Require Strategic Directors, Heads of Service and Senior Officers to maintain robust in year (i.e. 2015/16) budget monitoring procedures that enable Cabinet to monitor the achievement of efficiencies and service reductions through:

·      the monthly budget monitoring Cabinet reports,

·      the quarterly Cabinet Member accountability meetings and

·      the monthly scrutiny at the Council’s Overview & Scrutiny Committee.

10.      Require a robust business case to be prepared (and taken to the Investment Panel for review) for each revenue ‘invest to save’ proposals and capital schemes before committing expenditure.

On treasury management and borrowing:

11.      Approve the Treasury Management Strategy for 2015-20 and approve that their provisions have immediate effect. This strategy includes:

·      the investment strategy for short term cash balances;

·      increasing the number of AAA-rated money market funds from five to seven (with the individual amount to a single fund increased from £20m to £25m);

·      the treasury management policy (Appendix 8 of the submitted report);

·      the prudential indicators (Appendix 9 of the submitted report);

·      the schedule of delegation (Appendix 11 of the submitted report);

·      the minimum revenue provision policy (Appendix 14 of the submitted report).

12.      That the Medium Term Financial Plan for the financial years 2015?20 be approved, which includes:

·      approval of the Total Schools Budget of £560.7m (paragraphs 53 to 59 of the submitted report);

·      supporting the 2015/16 budget by using £4.3m from earmarked reserves as set out in paragraph 99 of the submitted report;  ...  view the full decision text for item 10

The Leader of the Council began by taking Members through the amendments that had been made to this report since the Cabinet agenda had been published. This amendment sheet, including a revised Appendix 5 to the Budget report, was tabled at the meeting and is attached as Appendix 2 to these minutes.

Recommendations from the Council Overview and Scrutiny Committee’s Performance and Finance sub-group were also tabled at the meeting and are attached as Appendix 3 to these minutes.

The Leader of the Council thanked this group for their recommendations and said that he had discussed them with the Chairman of the Council Overview and Scrutiny Committee (who had sent his apologies because he was unable to attend this meeting to present them).

He said that the Cabinet would normally have provided a written response. However, due to the details contained within the recommendations, there had been insufficient time to provide a written response and therefore, he would note them and ask officers to consider them, either as part of the report on the Medium Term Financial Plan (MTFP) 2015 – 20, due to be submitted to Cabinet on 24 March 2015 or as part of its refresh, which would be considered by Cabinet in July 2015.

Turning to the Revenue and Capital Budget report for 2015/16, which included the Treasury Management Strategy, he said that the only recommendations that Cabinet would be approving today were recommendations (12) and (13), the others would be recommendations from Cabinet to the full County Council meeting on 10 February 2015, for their decision.

He said that the Administration would be proposing a council tax increase of 1.99% so that the Council could continue to provide the services that residents expected. He stressed the importance of budget planning which had been on-going throughout the year, which had contributed to the significant savings that had been achieved on the overall budget.

He also urged some caution, due to the General Election in May 2015, the uncertainty of the outcome and that there had been no Comprehensive Spending Review beyond 2015/16.

He also acknowledged the work of the Director of Finance and her officers, in compiling this Budget report and also the level of scrutiny that had taken place to ensure it was the right Budget for Surrey.

Finally, he said that he considered that the key messages concerning the Budget were:

·         The County Council was still facing huge challenges and responding to them well and was making significant savings each year

·         The ability to keep investing in what matters to residents

·         To provide full information about the Budget for the next five years in a transparent way

He asked the Cabinet Team to comment on these points. Their key points were:

·         Adult Social Care – the problem of estimating the number of older, vulnerable people that would require help in the future, the increased number of high cost packages, the importance of safeguarding, the full impact of the Care Act from 2016, delivery of savings  ...  view the full minutes text for item 10