Issue - meetings

That the Committee accepts the reasons for the overspend in the Streetscene and Transportation Portfolio and is assured by the on-going work within the service to mitigate the overspend.

The Chief Officer (Streetscene and Transportation) introduced the report to provide more information on the reasons behind the projected overspend of £1.108m for the financial year 2015/16 in the Streetscene and Transportation Portfolio.  

                        He explained that the projected overspend was due to a number of elements which had been as a result of the delay in implementation of some proposals.  He assured Members that these delays would not reoccur in the future and were therefore one-off overspends. 

            Waste Collection Policy

                        The Council’s revised waste collection policy was approved by Cabinet in April 2015, which created a delay in the introduction of a number of revised working arrangements for the waste service.  The policies required significant consultation and could therefore not be implemented immediately after approval by Cabinet.  The cessation of the waste container delivery service which was introduced in July 2015 had resulted in an overspend of £50,000 and the new service charge for a second garden waste bin was to be introduced from March 2016 resulting in a loss of income of £25,000.  Following extensive public engagement and resident/member notifications, the seven day waste collection service had been introduced from mid-September which meant that the full year benefit had not been achieved. 

                        The proposed rationalisation and changes to Household Recycling Centre provision (HRC) were further delayed by a Call-in on the original Cabinet decision and as a result of the delay, the total overspend was £175,000. 

            Car Parking Strategy

                        The Strategy was approved in April 2015 and had been delayed due to the need for a full statutory consultation period which resulted in a loss of income amounting to £110,000 against the full year target at period 5. 

            Grass cutting policy

                        The grass cutting policy was also approved by Cabinet in April 2015 which included the reduction in the frequency of some grass cutting services and the decision to outsource some of the provision.  The decision came after the commencement of the grass cutting season and the delay resulted in the partial loss of the full year saving of £50,000. 

            Zero tolerance for littering

                        The Chief Officer (Streetscene and Transportation) explained that a later than expected introduction of the proposals had contributed to the overspend within the service which he was confident was a one-off. 

Other areas, including the reduced electricity sales from the gas engines at Brookhill and Standard landfill sites (shortfall in income of £150,000), the under achieving income levels in the waste recycling market (loss in income at period 5 of £236,000) and Denbighshire County Council reviewing its own contractual arrangements for composting their domestic garden waste (loss of £60,000 income), had all contributed to the overspend within the service.  The Chief Officer provided details of the reduction in rates per tonnage of glass, aluminium, steel and paper and said that, because this was a national problem, it had been identified as a corporate risk rather than a risk to the service. 

In response to a question from Councillor Marion Bateman about the gas  ...  view the full minutes text for item 59