BOS/18/7 BABERGH AND MID SUFFOLK BUILDING SERVICES (BMBS) - A REVIEW OF FIRST YEAR TRADING AND NEXT STEPS
A 12 months review of Babergh and Mid Suffolk Building Services (BMBS)
Justin Wright-Newton, Corporate Manager BMBS
Additional documents:
Minutes:
NOTE: At the meeting 18 July 2018 the Committee Members and Officers agreed that the Confidential minute for BMBS – A Review of the First Year of Trading and next Steps be made public.
13.1 The Assistant Director – Housing, introduced the report and said the report and the updated Business Plan was an honest account of what had been achieved and the challenges ahead.
13.2 Councillor Barrett raised questions regarding the less than expected income for the BMBS case scenario for the year 2017/18 (page 64) and if it was possible that the figures could be updated in relation to the Housing Revenue Account (HRA). In reality the BMBS service did not lose money, as the BMBS budget was covered by the HRA was hence a loss on paper. Members wanted to know if the updated costs base was a more accurate cost base to work on and the officer responded that this was the case.
13.3 The Assistant Director – Housing reminded Members that the original Business Plan was flawed and that the inherited income and expenditure had affected the first six months of the implementation of BMBS. The Corporate Manager – BMBS had only joined the team last year and other factors such as the service becoming an in-house service had influenced the implementation stage in various ways, but now enabled BMBS to deliver a good service to the tenants. There were challenges ahead such as getting all the relevant paperwork into the Total Mobile Programme and it was detailed how significant efficiencies were to be undertaken to save resources.
13.4 Councillor Gasper was concerned with the lack of tracking of paper work and workloads between departments and that this was important if searching for efficiencies. It was considered necessary to have a clear route for processes both within the department and with other departments to enable an effective audit to take place.
13.5 The Assistant Director – Housing confirmed that auditing was on-going, and he referred to Appendix C, page 103, which showed the outturn figures up to 12 April 2018 compared with the original Business Plan. The total Expenditure was nearly the same figures, however, the income from Capital Maintenance had been unrealistic in the original Business Plan. The new figure of £276,239 was based on the outturn figures.
13.6 A process for internal accounting was being implemented to determine efficiencies, similar to the voids project. The team was working with the Accounting team to reflect the process and the outturn figures were robust based on this process.
13.7 Questions were raised regarding the Legal Implications of the report, Paragraph 11, page 65. Councillor Williams enquired if there were not legal implications if BMBS undertook work in houses belonging to the public and would include Health and Safety in properties which were being maintained. The officers responded that this kind of work was being undertaken with the Property Service Team and that the team worked with other services to ensure that the Health and Safety ... view the full minutes text for item 13