Issue - meetings

That the County Council approve the recommendation of the Cabinet from its meeting held on 17 February 2015 as set out in section 9 of the Cabinet report attached to the Council report.

In moving the recommendation Councillor Aaron Shotton, the Leader of the Council and Cabinet Member for Finance, commented on the significant reduction in the Revenue Support Grant for 2015/16 and the three year challenge faced by the Council in the Medium Term Financial Plan to make savings of £50m.  Efficiencies of £20m had been made in the past two years and the requirement to find a further £18.2m of efficiencies in one year had been unprecedented.  A senior management restructure had been undertaken and there was an urgent need to review the delivery of services and a pragmatic approach had been taken to be innovative and efficient.  Councillor Shotton spoke of the difficult decisions that had been taken and added that the worst impacts had been mitigated by the use of £1m of reserves.  The recommendation to approve the budget was seconded by Councillor Bernie Attridge. 

                        The Chief Executive introduced the report to provide Members with the recommendations of the Cabinet for the Council Fund Revenue Budget 2015/16.  He also welcomed the Corporate Finance Manager to his first budget meeting as Section 151 Officer and spoke of the exhaustive process that had been undertaken.  The Executive Summary in the report detailed the work that had been carried out in the past four weeks to bring the budget from a gap of £0.777m in January 2015 to the balanced budget presented to Cabinet earlier in the day.    

The Chief Executive and Corporate Finance Manager gave a joint presentation and commented upon the following areas:-

·         Final Budget Position

·         Roles and Duties of Council

·         Closing the Budget Gap Stage 1

·         Outcomes of Overview and Scrutiny

·         Closing the Budget Gap Stage 2

·         Professional Opinions

·         Implementing the Budget

·         Medium Term Financial Plan

The Chief Executive spoke of the six key service reviews that were to be completed and would be referred to Cabinet for a final decision.  Evaluation of the implementation of these reviews would be undertaken by the relevant Overview & Scrutiny Committee within its Forward Work Programme.  The budget gap in January 2015 had increased to £0.852m as a result of four amended proposals suggested by Overview & Scrutiny Committees which the Chief Executive detailed.  The Corporate Finance Manager highlighted the three key areas which had enabled the Council to achieve a balanced budget as at 11 February 2015.  This included the use of £0.270m of reserves which had not generally been advised in the past but the Corporate Finance Manager was content to support this level of funding on this occasion due to the scale of the financial challenges faced.

            On the Medium Term Financial Plan the Chief Executive explained that a large number of efficiencies had already been identified but that it was expected that at least two more years of ‘cuts’ and efficiencies would be necessary.  There was currently no indication from Welsh Government of the funding for 2016/17 and it was therefore difficult for the Council to predict the level of cuts required.  He thanked the Corporate Finance Manager  ...  view the full minutes text for item 95