Cabinet Member for Finance
In accordance with Council Procedure Rule 19.3, immediately after any vote is taken at a budget decision meeting of the Council the names of Councillors who cast a vote for the decision or against the decision or who abstained from voting shall be recorded in the Minutes of that meeting.
At its meeting on 11 February 2020, Cabinet considered Paper BCa/19/34, together with amendments to the General Fund Budget. Paper BC/19/35 now includes all the relevant updated information, together with the necessary recommendations.
Minutes:
211.1 The Chair invited Councillor Ward, the Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance to introduce Paper BC/19/35.
Note: The Tabled Papers included an updated Appendix C
211.2 Councillor Ward informed Members that the report contained the revenue and capital budgets and the Council’s strategic financial aim. The General Fund budget enabled the Council to agree the budget and to consider the medium-term financial position, ensuring it was sustainable.
211.3 He continued that the Government had deferred the Fair Funding Review, the Business Rate review and the Business Rate reset for twelve months.
211.4 The financial settlement for this coming year provided an additional £265k as indicated in paragraph 4.14 of the report. The Council had a sound financial strategy responding to the changing landscape of funding and he referred to section 6 in the report. Self-sufficiency and maximising of income streams continued, including finding new ways of working. Projection of future funding was on-going, and it was important to work on the projected Four-year Outlook, which was detailed in paragraphs 8.2 to 8.18. The current projection had produced a compelling case for the increase of Council Tax.
211.5 He then advised that Council tax increases would be implemented to the maximum level allowed of £5 per year or 3.1% for Band D properties and thereafter be increased by 2% for the following years. The increase of Council tax revenue would help to offset the ongoing cost the Council faced, as illustrated in the tabled Appendix C, and would generate an additional income of £308k for 2020/21.
211.6 There would be an increase in long term parking charges from £2 to £3 for 24 hours parking, though the first three hours would remain free.
211.7 Since 2011/12 the Council had saved a total of £17.4m through maximising shared services, better use of technology and maximising commercial opportunities. Further savings of £2.6m have been identified for the next year and beyond and details were in paragraph 8.18.
211.8 He then detailed the main budget entries for the General Fund Budget and added that £278k was earmarked from reserves to achieve a balanced budget. He remarked that it should be noted that the use of reserves of £278k was half of the amount for the current year. For 2020/21 the Council would be in a position to transfer a surplus of £711k to the Transformation Fund, details of which could be found in paragraphs 8.6 -8.10.
211.9 The Council would be using all of the New Homes Bonus and Section 31 Grant, which was a total of £4.11m. However, there would still be budget gap of £1.1m at the end of March 2024 as indicated in paragraphs 8.19 to 8.23.
211.10 Reserve levels were illustrated in paragraph 7.5 table 3. At the end of March 2021, it was expected that £994k would be in the Transformation Fund. However, the reserves level excluding CIL, had dropped by 6% during the period March 2019 to March 2021.
211.11 The Capital Programme was set out in Appendix B and the planned spend for 2020/21 was £11m. The main area of spend were just under £1m for Housing Grants, £8.7m invested in CIFCO and under £1m for further investment in the two leisure centres.
211.12 The major difference this year in the budget included that the Council was not expected to complete further investment into CIFCO until 2021/22, the Belle Vue capital investment had been delayed to 2021/22 and that the Council had not yet used any of the Strategic Property Investment Fund.
211.13 The Capital Investment Strategy had further details of the Council’s borrowing capacity and the impact on the Capital Programme.
211.14 Change to the Empty and Unfurnished Property discount was detailed in paragraphs 11.1 to 11.7, and the period for the 25% discount had been reduced from 3 months to 28 days, after which full council tax payment was required. The uninhabitable discount remained unchanged.
211.15 The Pay Policy Statement was a statutory requirement and was included in section 12 of the report.
211.16 Councillor Ward MOVED recommendations 3.1 to 3.5 in the report, which was SECONDED by Councillor Arthey.
211.17 In response to Councillor Maybury’s questions relating to the surplus of £711m for the New Homes Bonus, which was being transferred to the Transformation Fund, Councillor Ward confirmed that was the case.
211.18 Councillor Maybury then referred to page 47 with reference to continuing a discount of 12 months for unfurnished and empty properties and queried if this was reduced then properties could be brought back into use quicker.
211.19 Councillor Ward responded that this was the purpose of the Empty and Unfurnished Property discount of 28 days. However, the Uninhabitable Discount remained at 12 months, as it was recognised that this could be the length of time to bring a property back into use.
211.20 Councillor Ward clarified paragraph 11.10, and that if a property had been unoccupied for more than six weeks then application for the property being unfurnished could be applied for again.
211.21 Councillor Maybury referred to page 51, paragraph 12.21, and page 53 regarding gender pay gap. She asked why gender pay gap did not affect equality within the Council.
211.22 The Chief Executive explained how gender pay gap was calculated and was undertaken with Mid Suffolk District Council and the shared workforce.
211.23 Councillor Maybury queried if there were no pay gap details in the report, could there not be a possible claim for inequality.
211.24 The Chief Executive explained further how the gender pay gap was calculated and that the Council still had a gender pay gap due to the distribution of gender within the workforce. However, this did not have a relation to equality within the workforce. He offered to respond further to Councillor Maybury’s queries outside the meeting.
211.25 Councillor Hinton referred to the Transformation Fund (page 37) and asked what this fund was used for.
211.26 Councillor Ward responded that transformation was an ongoing process within the Council and that the transfer of £711m from the New Homes Bonus to the Transformation Fund would be used for projects such as the Climate Change Task Force and carbon reduction implementation, which all required funding.
211.27 The Assistant Director of Corporate Resources clarified that £22k was to go out of the fund in 2020 for the Town Vision work and that the transparency for the Transformation fund was included in the quarterly budget monitoring reports, as an appendix and could be found on the Website.
211.28 Councillor Hardacre inquired why there were no environmental aspects included in the report other than paragraph 19.1 on page 53, and how funding would be allocated for the environment within the budget.
211.29 Councillor Ward assured Members that the environmental impact was assessed in all projects and that the environment was a key factor in all the work undertaken by the Council. The Climate Change Task Force would be advising on specific environmental activities the Council would have to implement to mitigate the impact of Climate Change.
211.30 Councillor Hinton referred to page 87 and thought any future proposals for Climate Change mitigation should be included as budget entries and not just as part of the Transformation Fund. He asked for clarification of funds transferred to the Transformation Fund on page 87. He was concerned that the terminology was confusing and that it was unclear what the surplus money would be spent on.
211.31 Councillor Hinton continued that the Cabinet could approve funding up a certain amount and he asked for clarification of what the Transformation Fund would be spent on.
211.32 Councillor Ward responded that the reserves would be for future projects unless already earmarked for specific projects. The Transformation Fund would not be allocated, until the Climate Change Taskforce had reported back to the Council.
211.33 Councillor Malvisi detailed the work of the Climate Change Taskforce, and that information and data was being collated across the County by Groundwork, which would be completed by the end of March 2020. She assured Members that the Climate Change Taskforce would report back to Council in April 2020.
211.34 In response to Councillor Hinton’s queries, Councillor Malvisi explained that Groundwork produced environmental impact assessments and carbon reduction reports.
211.35 Councillor Hurren referred to paragraph 11.7, page 47, and asked if the Council was liable to pay council tax on its own empty properties and if there was an audit trail for this. He also queried if the Housing Association billed for unfurnished and empty properties.
211.36 Councillor Ward would respond to these questions outside the meeting.
211.37 Councillor Busby inquired why there was a difference between the figures for Belle Vue on page 86 and page 135, Appendix B.
211.38 The Assistant Director for Corporate Resources explained that the differences between the two figures was because funding for Belle Vue was allocated in the current year and would be carried forward to the year and 2021 when the project required the funding.
211.39 The Assistant Director for Corporate Resources acknowledged that there was an error in the budget and referred to page 56 and said this would be updated before being published.
211.40 Councillor Busby asked for a separate vote for each recommendation, to which the Monitoring Officer explained that the voting would be by roll call and that each recommendation then would be a separate recorded vote. However, should there be a specific recommendation that Members wished to have recorded separately then that would be adhered to.
211.41 Councillor McCraw thought that the General Fund Budget was a complete unit and he did not think one should start dividing the recommendations up separately. He thought that the budget was a sensible budget, having not only received the Budget at the Overview and Scrutiny Committee but received budget briefings before this final General Fund Budget. He recognised there were some issues with the figures, but he thought one could not fairly compare the Joint Investment Strategy with the General Fund Budget since the document served different purposes.
211.42 Councillor Busby asked that it be NOTED that he abstained from voting on recommendation 3.2.
211.43 The recommendations were put to Members for voting and the vote was CARRIED.
211.44 In accordance with Council Procedure Rule 19.3 the vote was recorded as follows:
FOR |
AGAINST |
ABSTAIN |
Cllr Clive Arthey |
|
|
Cllr Peter Beer |
|
|
|
Cllr Dave Busby |
|
|
Cllr Trevor Cresswell |
|
Cllr Derek Davis |
|
|
Cllr Mick Fraser |
|
|
Cllr Honor Grainger-Howard |
|
|
Cllr Kathryn Grandon |
|
|
Cllr Ric Hardacre |
|
|
|
Cllr John Hinton |
|
Cllr Michael Holt |
|
|
Cllr Bryn Hurren |
|
|
Cllr Leigh Jamieson |
|
|
Cllr Elisabeth Malvisi |
|
|
|
|
Cllr Margaret Maybury |
Cllr Alastair McCraw |
|
|
Cllr Mary McLaren |
|
|
Cllr Mark Newman |
|
|
|
|
Cllr John Nunn |
Cllr Adrian Osborne |
|
|
Cllr Jan Osborne |
|
|
|
|
Cllr Alison Owen |
Cllr Lee Parker |
|
|
Cllr John Ward |
|
|
Total 17 |
Total 1 |
Total 6 |
It was RESOLVED: -
1.1 That the General Fund Revenue Budget proposals for 2020/21 and four-year outlook set out in the report be approved.
1.2 That the General Fund Capital Budget proposals for 2020/21 and four-year outlook set out in the report be approved.
1.3 That the General Fund Budget for 2020/21 is based on an increase to Council Tax of £5 per annum (10p per week) for a Band D property, which is equivalent to 3.1%, to support the Council’s overall financial position.
1.4 That from 1 April 2020 properties that are unoccupied and unfurnished (Class C discount) receive a 25% reduction for the first 28 days as set out in section 11.
1.5 That the proposed Pay Policy Statement for 2020/21 as set out in section 12 be approved.
Supporting documents: