Agenda item

The Committee considered a report that set out the financial monitoring position for eight-month period April to September 2019.

The report summarised the projected outturn position for the Council’s general fund revenue account, based on actual and accrued data for this period. Officers were projecting a decrease in net expenditure on the general fund revenue account of £96,766, which included a £39,640 reduction in the statutory Minimum Revenue Provision (MRP) charge to the General Fund to make provision for the repayment of past capital debt reflecting a re-profiling of capital schemes and a reduction in the anticipated income received from investments of £136,865.

Appendix 2 to the report showed detailed information for each service split between direct expenditure and income and indirect costs. Officers monitored the projected outturn against the revised (or latest) budget as this took into account any virement or supplementary estimates approved since the original budget was set in February 2019.

At service level, the projected outturn was £193,991 lower than the latest estimate once adjusted for items either funded from reserve or transferred to reserve.

The reported position at month 6 had forecasted an overspend at total service level of £403,502. The reduction in the forecasted position had been due to the implementation of an action plan drawn up by officers to identify in-year savings, details of which were set out in the report.

A surplus on the Housing Revenue Account would enable a projected transfer of £10.721 million to the new build reserve and the reserve for future capital at year-end.  This had been £212,000 lower than budgeted and reflected modest variations in rental income and repair and maintenance expenditure.

Officers were making progress against a number of major capital projects on the approved programme as outlined in section 7 of the report.  The Council was expected to spend £71.38 million on its capital schemes by the end of the financial year.

The Council’s underlying need to borrow to finance the capital programme was expected to be £41.21 million by 31 March 2020, against an estimated position of £53.35 million, which was due to slippage on both the approved and provisional capital programme, as detailed in the report.

The Council held £107 million of investments and £206 million of external borrowing as at 30 November 2019, which included £192.9 million of HRA loans.  Officers confirmed that the Council had complied with its Prudential indicators in the period, which had been set in February 2019 as part of the Council’s Capital Strategy.

In considering the report, the presentation of the figures shown at the bottom of Appendix 1 to the report, namely the Projected (under) over spend, Movement in MRP and External Interest, and Underlying (under) / overspend on services required clarification.

Having considered the report, the Committee

RESOLVED: That the results of the Council’s financial monitoring for the period April to November 2019 be noted.

Reason:

To allow the Committee to undertake its role in relation to scrutinising the Council’s finances.