Cllr Simmons, Chair of the Scrutiny Finance Panel presented the report. He said there was a huge amount of external uncertainties at the moment so the focus of the Finance Panel had been testing the robustness of the assumptions made.

He made the following comments:

·         The Budget balances over 4 years but he was cautious about the Council’s approach in year 4 to transferring £800k from the general fund to balance the budget.

·         The Council is maximising revenue through trading services which the Panel support.

·         We would like to see which fees and charges (rec 2) we have discretion to raise and which we do not.

·         Reducing licensing fees (rec 4) might create more revenue from street trading for areas outside the city centre.

·         Revenue from car parking fees may be affected by proposed new rail routes and should be labelled high risk (rec 6)

·         Invest to save initiatives are happening in the capital programme but not in the revenue budget. There is £750k in the Invest to Save fund which has not being used. The Panel believe officers should be encouraged to suggest more high risk schemes.

·         Given that contingencies on high risk efficiency saving projects have not been drawn on. Council could consider releasing more contingency.

·         The Panel supported the Audit and Governance Committee looking at the governance of the companies and whether the council has the in-house expertise to run them.

·         He queried some of the political priorities in the budget and asked whether the money allocated to the Council tax support scheme (rec 12) was the best way to get people out of poverty. Likewise the apprentices’ scheme (rec 14) has a significant cost to it.   What assessments are done to prove the value of such schemes?

·         He mentioned the archive project and the need to fund the completion of it. As items might cost us more in the future if we don’t fund them properly now.

Cllr Turner, Board Member for Finance, Asset Management and Public Health made the following comments:

·         The Finance Panel report was thoughtful, useful and productive and was a good example of scrutiny working well.

·         It is prudent to leave the contingencies as they are, and not spend one off contingency in service delivery. We encourage managers to suggest efficiency savings. Suggestions will not always be successful and will get harder and harder every year. So it is important we retain the contingencies in case projects don’t work out.

·         Invest to save – correct most are capital but we are keen for revenue suggestions as well.

·         Note the big challenge in year 5, we don’t know what is going to happen.

·         Challenge of creating a trading company. The market is changing, and we recognise we already have a significant market share in some areas (trade waste for example). There is also the challenge of experienced officers retiring in the next few years which will have an impact.

·         The Council tax support grant is not a massive expense. We will review it and see how we can we maximise its impact. Cllr Brown said that we haven’t included the Council tax support grant in the budget without considering it every year.  Did discuss with the Scrutiny Committee how we would review it in the future.  Removing it doesn’t necessary provide savings as it would be hard to collect council tax from those who currently receive support.

Cllr Turner said that in terms of the budget bids (rec 16):

·         Supportive of the fraud team,

·         Archive, there is a predicted underspend in Law and Governance which we will roll forward - so this work can progress.

·         Streetscene: It is being reviewed whether Westgate will be cleaned by the new tenant. We could offer Westgate a contract to clean it for them.