To consider the above report

Members considered the council budget for 2017/18. Councillor Saunders Lead Member for Finance, explained that the complex wheels of central government meant that he needed to amend the recommendations as presented in the agenda. The government was reasonably expected to have finalised the parliamentary process for confirming the Local Government Settlement. However, the final decisions had been made but not yet formally published. Therefore, he proposed adding the following additional recommendation:

 

‘The Head of Finance in consultation with the Lead Member for Finance be authorised to amend the budget to reflect the final local government settlement once announced and to notify the council in due course of any subsequent financial changes.’

 

The Lead Member highlighted that 94% of Councils expected to increase their council tax next year.  This figure had risen steadily over recent years, starting from relatively few councils.  Next year, for the first time, the borough was joining the overwhelming majority, with a 0.95% increase, or £8.62 for a Band D home or 17p per week. This was less than half the limit of 1.99% being added by a majority of councils.   It was worth noting that most of the very few who did not expect to increase Council Tax next year had much lower than average older residents and significantly less pressure on their Adult Care Services.  

 

All were keenly aware of the growing needs of older residents for health and adult care services and the likelihood these would continue to rise. After the coming year there was a clear need for the funding of these services to be addressed at national level from progressive taxation.  Meantime, councils had been asked to fund the services from local Adult Social Care Levies added onto council tax bills, 2% last year and 3% more this year, for a Band D home, £18.14 this year and £45.89 next year. 

 

Many residents would not resent paying the levy to fund £3m of additional adult social care services next year, while others, a total increase in Council Tax and Adult Social Care Levy of 3.95% was uncomfortable - £54.51 for a Band D household or £1.05 per week.  For some it would simply be too much, which was why the borough was continuing to only charge 10% of the normal bill to households that simply could not afford to pay, reducing their increase from £54.51 to £5.45 or 10.5p per week. Many Councils were increasing the 10% charge to vulnerable households, some to as high as 25%.  It could not be right for those in the greatest need to be taxed more, not less.

 

Other Councils were seeking to balance their books by increasing the fees and charges they received for everything from green waste collection to residential care, from marriage registrations to library charges, increasing them by substantially more than the reference inflation of 2%. The borough did not subscribe to such back door taxation, so fees and charges had either not increased, had increased by up to 2%, or, if the increase proposed by the relevant officers was more than 2%, this was carefully scrutinised and justified, often by comparison to much higher charges of nearby councils.

 

Capital investments continued to thrive, feeding the critical expansion of  secondary schools, fuelling the regeneration of Maidenhead with additional public parking and a new leisure centre and making York House the accessible home for activities in Windsor. 

 

The Maidenhead regeneration would bring significant benefits for investors in the town, one of the largest of which was residents, with the prospect of very significant developments on five major sites owned by the council.  All reasonable expectations and advice indicated this would generate capital receipts in excess of £150m.  It was this rational forecast which would repay the short term borrowing of £73m for strategic and tactical capital investments over the next two years, and likely also repay the £50 plus million of debt inherited from the previous administration in 2006.

 

The Lead Member thanked all of the leading officer teams and his Cabinet colleagues, who together had crafted the budget, with the expert coordination of the Head of Finance and Chief Accountant in the Finance Team.  The 0.95% increase in Council Tax and 3% increase in Adult Social Care Levy were the logical and legitimate outcome of many weeks of dedicated effort and considerable expertise.  The savings, revenue and capital budgets which the officers proposed with their Lead Members were assembled and after detailed scrutiny, Members had arrived at the proposal before Council.

 

In relation to those who felt the increases next year were the inevitable outcome of allegedly incompetent cutting in the past, the Lead Member commented that this was clearly silly.  The lead officers and Members of the council had achieved an extraordinary transformation of the council over the last eight years, consistently delivering more for less.  The council did not tax residents more over the last seven years because it did not need the money, so instead council tax was reduced by 32.5% less in real terms.

 

However, he was aware that some felt that the professional, prudent and effective management of services had given back to residents taxes they would rather had been paid to the borough to keep it fully funded in line with inflation.  Anyone who felt this way was invited to pay what they had saved into the charity scheme.  A Band D household would need to pay £1676.10 to match the money they had kept in their pocket over the eight years including next year. If they were also happy to pay the Adult Services Care Levy as well, the amount was £1,740.13.

 

The Lead Member was delighted that the Council was adding £160,000 to the grants available for voluntary organisations.  The extended deadline to apply for this additional funding was the end of the week and although the council had already received many new applications, he wanted to ensure no-one missed out, so they should contact him to ensure their application was carefully considered.

 

Councillor Jones, Opposition Leader, thanked officers for their hard work to produce the budget, and to the Head of Finance, the Finance team and Directors for the time they had given her to discuss certain aspects and the evidence base of the budget. She also thanked Councillor Saunders for giving up some of his time.

 

As Leader of the Opposition her role was to provide a response to the budget.  The definition of ‘Opposition’ was antagonists, enemies, adversaries, conflict, clash, polarity. However she saw her role, and that of any elected councillor whether aligned with the political administration or not, to challenge, examine, question in a constructive and non biased way, to be a check and balance, answerable to the residents. This should not be an opportunity for her to stand up and oppose the budget for the sake of it, or for others to throw ‘metaphorical sponges’ back at her. She was appreciative that this year the council had an officer led budget and that the budget added up, which was always a good start.

 

The budget for 2017/18 allowed for an increase to council tax of £36.37 for a Band D property, approximately twice the increase estimated last year in the MTFP.  With this increase, council tax in the borough would be £961.46 and with future demands an estimated £1055.74 in three year’s time. The Net budget requirement forecast increased from £60.7m (last year) to £73.4m (in 20/21).  That was a £31.8million pound increase in funds required in four years but with the increases in council tax and Adult Social Care Levy the council would have a balanced budget

 

The take up of the Adult Social Care Levy was justified. Both the numbers accessing ASC, and the total cost of the care provided, had increased over the last three years. She agreed with the Leader of the Council and the Lead Member that the ‘demand led’ increases in Adult Social Care should not be funded at local authority level but that did not take away that it had been proven that the administration had been too optimistic in their forecasting of achievable savings and estimating increasing costs in the past.

 

In her response to the budget of 15/16 she had highlighted the fact that there was no increase in funding to allow for more resources for the borough local plan. Last year she again detailed the extra £300,000 taken from reserves to fund the planning function but it was not considered necessary to increase the budget. The council had overspent the planning budget consistently over the last four years: in 13/14 by £194,000, in 14/15 by £291,000 and in 15/16 by £629,000.

 

The front page summary highlighted increased investment for effective delivery of the Borough Local Plan and the handling of planning applications. Between 2012 and 2015 the administration took £630,000 out of the budget for the planning department, majorly as a result of the restructure, a restructure that reduced the size of the planning department at a time when the council was well aware of the impact of producing a Borough Local Plan and also an increase in planning applications. This was not increased investment but replacing what should have been there anyway and an area of underfunding that she had consistently highlighted.

 

Some of the items highlighted for increased investment such as  expansion of schools, York House redevelopment, parking and leisure centres were financed from central government grants, developer contributions and borrowing and did not impact on council tax apart from interest on borrowing. Other items such as ‘maintaining the quality of public trees’ were to ensure the council was responsibly inspecting its trees on a rolling basis according to policy. This was not increased investment, rather it was ensuring funding was in the base budget as it should be.

 

The National Apprentice Levy of £280,000, 0.5% of payroll, suffered by the council was the gross amount charged by central government. Of this, £130,000 would apparently be passed on to the maintained schools. This may be correct but could not be considered fair. Most of the schools were small community schools that were already seeing their funding being cut and with staffing costs regularly reaching 85% of their budget, she felt the council would want to ‘top slice’ the money from small primary and first schools.

 

All were seeing a huge adjustment to the way the council operated, moving to a commissioning body. In some areas the council would be in partnership with other councils, still have a controlling interest and a direct line of control; in other areas it will be contract based. She was not convinced the council was out of the cycle of non achievable, or as Councillor Saunders had previously referred to, ‘fatuous’ savings. Some proposals had been backed by a quantifiable and substantial evidence base but others that were moving forward had been lacking in the details that would allow the challenge, questioning, scrutiny that was the responsibility of all councillors. She felt the words ‘well I trust the officers’ was not a justification or excuse for abdicating  responsibility.

 

The Highways department was being outsourced. There were areas, those that were routine, that lent themselves to a contract. Other areas were not so easily quantified.  To place them all in one big pot without addressing the differences in how they operated, without, in her view, presenting the evidence of savings made against possible risks for each individual area, did not allow the scrutiny, the challenge and the transparency for which councillors were responsible. Councillor Jones was concerned whether the estimated savings being generated by outsourcing were viable and whether to achieve savings the council was  losing in-house expertise that would ensure continuity of services in the outsourced areas.

 

The council had some important decisions to make going forward, that would impact on the budget. The council now needed to borrow to fund the year on year capital program. Councillor Jones agreed that, with the amount of development indicated on council owned land, the council should see substantial income being generated for the council that would increase reserves in the future. The decision was whether to accept the one off payment for the land or borrow further to invest, as a partner in the developments, and accept the added cost of borrowing and the added risks of being a developer to hopefully generate additional income going forward.

 

Councillor Jones explained that in the past she had not supported the budget proposals because they were obviously dictated by a political wish to cut tax above all else, but the mistakes of previous budgets could not, and should not, influence her response to the proposed one. The proposed budget had more substance and more evidence base although some assumptions of savings seemed to lack detailed justification. Last year she requested a commitment from the administration that would justify her supporting the budget, which was not given, therefore she had abstained. Her 3 requests were a commitment to:

 

·        reconsider the increase in parking charges, which was done within 2 months

·        put detail into the funding of community wardens; this was still not done but the decision to outsource was reversed

·        ensure that funding was in place so that the  planning department had adequate resources to deliver a prompt service to the residents and also to deliver the Borough Local Plan. She was pleased that this had been addressed in the proposed budget

 

This year her request was that the council looked again at the decision to pass on the Apprentice Levy to small community schools.

 

As long as there was transparent monitoring of outsourcing contracts against a detailed baseline at regular intervals and challenge and scrutiny was provided by all Councillors and accepted by Lead Members, then she believed the budget was the most realistic that the administration had presented at Council.

 

Councillor Sharma commented that the council was cutting taxes but not services. The council was spending more each year on the transport system, which was better than neighbouring councils. He referred to cross county services such as the Maidenhead to Heathrow service. In a similar situation to the bus service petition discussed earlier, if other councils stopped subsidising the service, the council had to step in. The borough was the only council to provide 24 hour bus pass access to its services.

 

Councillor Rankin commented that he had been in the fortunate position to have been involved in the creation of the budget and wanted to express his admiration and thanks for the professionalism and dedication of officers and Members in its crafting. This was a budget that protected vulnerable residents and invested significant capital in the regeneration of Maidenhead, whilst the Royal Borough remained a low tax council.

Naturally with the revaluation nationally and the regeneration of Maidenhead_, next year may be challenging for local businesses and he wished to talkabout the changes to business rates policy locally that the council was implementing to ease those transitions and support beyond. Currently through the local discretionary rate relief policy, which came into effect in April 2016, the Royal Borough could discount retail premisesthat had been empty for 12 months or more, who would receive up to 100% relief on their business rates. The council had been using this effectively to support retail businesses and this year he was pleased the council was expanding this to include commercial and industrial premises from 1 April 2017. Business would be able to apply for relief for three months and six months for these premises respectively. Further, the council would continue to provide relief for charitable causes, in instances of hardship and to support rural community facilities in the year ahead.

 

Councillor Dudley welcomed the challenge from the Leader of the Opposition. He respected the fact that she and Councillor Beer regularly attended Cabinet and he welcomed their constructive input. The borough was a low council tax council; it had the lowest council tax outside London despite higher adult care services demand. Other councils had taken money to put in reserves, the borough had not.  This was a new phase for the council. The borough was incredibly fortunate to have significant property assets but these would be realised over the next decade. The proposed budget represented the strategic decision to invest and adequately fund services. The change of approach was to ensure the most vulnerable were protected. 1700 residents were aged over 90 and this figure was expected to rise to 2100 by 2020. If 25% required care at a cost of £30,000 per person this equated to £3m, or 5-6% of council tax. The council knew it had to create financial environment to protect services.

 

Councillor Bateson commented that council tax had been cut in real terms by 32% since 2007. This was quite an achievement especially when other councils were cutting services or reduce grant funding. The borough had done the opposite, opening more services and increasing the grants budget by £160,000. In Ascot and the Sunnings safer routes to school was a major commitment including pedestrian lights under a bridge and a bridge over the Windle stream.

 

Councillor Bicknell thanked Councillor Jones. His department had struggled to explain how the £400,000 saving through Delivering Differently would work to the benefit of residents. He highlighted that Volker was a large organisation with a £100m turnover and contracts with numerous local authorities. The proposal would improve resilience, continuity and sustainability particularly in terms of sickness or leave. The council had been remiss in not spending money on tree maintenance but £100,000 was now being included in the budget for the next four years to put this right. He would arrange a meeting for Members to met the new faces at Volker.

 

Councillor Brimacombe commented that the path to the budget was well documented; the Lead Member had attended all Overview and Scrutiny Panels and the Audit and Performance Review Panel (APRP) and with officers answered all Member questions. The savings totalling £5.9m had a well documented path from the transformation strategy. The Directors had been in front of the APRP to explain their transformation initiatives.

 

Councillor D. Evans commented that the budget further reinforced the council’s determination to build a new town for all residents. The council had taken a strategic decision to borrow as an investment for young people to be able to live in the town centre. A Joint Venture partner would be announced later in the year, with over 1500 new residences planned to bring vitality to the town centre. He welcomed funding for the Nicholson’s car park to link it with The Landing and existing shopping centre. As the town was regenerated, the council needed to ensure businesses remained open therefore the budget included up to £9m for additional and temporary parking.

 

Councillor N. Airey highlighted that Children’s Services had identified a number of savings through back office efficiencies and deleting of vacant posts and proposed significant investment including:

 

·         £300,000 investment in Home to School Transport following a full review

·         Three additional social workers as demand in the MASH increased

·         £28m in the capital programme across 25 projects including heating at All Saints and expansion at Windsor Girl’s School

 

In relation to the apprenticeship levy she highlighted that if the council took on the cost it would need to find funding elsewhere. The council would work with schools to support them to grow talent, for example a bursar role.

 

Councillor Coppinger highlighted that alongside the growth in demand for adult services, young people with severe mental and physical needs were now living longer, which was a wonderful thing but required help at a cost of £100,000 per year per person. The precept would ensure enough funding was available and no services would be cut for the fourth year running. He questioned reporting of a £13m black hole, which was not possible as a balanced budget had been produced. Councillor Coppinger highlighted that the council’s adult services were moving into a joint arrangements with Wokingham which would provide benefits of scale.

 

Councillor S Rayner highlighted plans for the new Braywick leisure centre which would support improvements in physical health and mental wellbeing. Unlike other councils the borough was investing in libraries, in Old Windsor and the new hub system. She proposed an amendment to the budget to remove the resident burial fees for infants and children up to the age of 18 years of age, which she felt were inappropriate.

 

Councillor Saunders accepted the amendment.

 

Councillor Beer commented that he had been involved as a council representative in lobbying Heathrow to provide a subsidy for the Series 7 bus service to reduce car traffic around the airport. He commented that recommendation ix) should refer to Thames Valley Police and the Environment agency as well as RBFRS as they also charged precepts. Councillor Beer also raise a concern that since the Arthur Jacobs Nature Centre had been run by a specialist contractor, nothing had been heard. He saw nothing relating to this in the budget. He also could not find any reference to how the increase in community Wardens from 18 to 36 would be funded. Councillor Beer also questioned how the customer contact centre would be improved when a £96,000 saving was being made.

 

Councillor Werner commented that agreeing to a budget was like signing to say you agreed with everything, and objecting was like saying you hated it all. There had been improvements in the budget making process but he still had some concerns. The budget was predicated on too many things where detail had not been given, or on issues such as CCTV and the green belt where decisions had not yet been made. He would therefore abstain.

 

Councillor Hill explained that the £96,000 saving in the customer contact centre was a result of smartsourcing, but that this process would only start once AfC and Optalis were in full flow. He commented that calls answered under 1 minute were at 79.4% against a target of 80% and first time resolution was at 89% against a target of 83%.

 

Councillor Saunders commented that he was very grateful for Councillor Jones’ support for the substance of the budget and he very much respected the scrutiny she offered to him and his colleagues.  He then picked out highlights from other Councillor’s speeches:

 

He was pleased that Councillor Sharma had found the budget supported his aspirations to support effective public transport. Councillor Rankin highlighted the extended business rate reliefs the council was promoting to help local businesses. Councillor Dudley painted the clear vision which had set the challenging course with a compass which would keep the council true to meeting the needs of the most vulnerable. Councillor Bateson had echoed his delight that the council would grant £160,000 more to voluntary organisations around the Borough. He thanked Councillor Bicknell for his determination to address issues which may have been overlooked and to pursue the further transformation in Highways. Councillor Brimacombe paid respect to the transparency and scrutiny which had brought the council to the proposed budget. Councillor D. Evans demonstrated that the budget fuelled the much needed Nicholson’s Car Park expansion. Councillor N. Airey reminded Members of the investments in one of the most important roles, the social workers who supported some of our most seriously vulnerable. Councillor Coppinger remained proud that the council continued not to cut services and meet the needs of vulnerable elderly residents. Councillor Rayner had demonstrated how the council was both tackling big projects like the new leisure centre and focusing on those most in need of care by removing the charges for child burials. Councillor Beer would be pleased to find the other precept charges to which he referred in the budget documents and therefore covered by the recommendations.  He would be pleased to arrange for him to receive answers to his other questions in writing. Councillor Werner's compliments were gratefully received. Councillor Hill was extremely proud of the Contact Centre; his teams had received various independent national awards for the efficiency and effectiveness.

The budget was for all the residents of the borough, from the many keen to see the regeneration of Maidenhead pick up pace, to those who simply wanted the council's tree outside their gate to be properly pruned, from those eager to see substantial continuing investment in their children's schools, to those who simply wanted their planning application for a new garage handled efficiently. Most of all, the budget was for those which every civilised society put at the top of their priorities, the vulnerable elderly, physically or mentally challenged and children. He was deeply proud to have led the extraordinary efforts of so many officer and Member colleagues to present the budget.  It was a Conservative and Unionist budget and it served the needs of the union of all residents across the Borough

 

It was proposed by Councillor Saunders, seconded by Councillor Bowden, and:

 

RESOLVED:That Full Council note the report and approve the:

 

i)          Detailed recommendations contained in Appendix A which includes a Council Tax at band D of £915.57, including a 0.95% increase of £8.62.

 

ii)         Adult Social Care Precept of 3% (an increase of £27.75 on the £18.14 precept included in the 2016/17 budget) to be included in the Council’s budget proposals, making this levy the equivalent of £45.89 at band D.

 

iii)       Fees and Charges contained in Appendix D are approved, subject to the removal of resident burial fees for infants and children up to the age of 18 years of age.

 

iv)       Capital Programme, shown in appendices F and G, for the financial year commencing April 2017.

 

v)        Prudential borrowing limits set out in Appendix L.

 

vi)       Business rate tax base calculation, detailed in Appendix O, and its use in the calculation of the Council Tax Requirement in Appendix A.

 

vii)      Head of Finance in consultation with the Lead Members for Finance and Children’s Services is authorised to amend the total schools budget to reflect actual Dedicated School Grant levels.

 

viii)    Head of Finance in consultation with the Lead Member for Finance is authorised to make appropriate changes to the budget to reflect the impact of the transfer of services to Achieving for Children and Optalis.

 

ix)       Responsibility to include the precept from the Berkshire Fire andRescue Authority in the overall Council Tax charges is delegated to the Lead Member for Finance and Head of Finance once the precept is announced.

 

x)        The Head of Finance in consultation with the Lead Member for Finance be authorised to amend the budget to reflect the final local government settlement once announced and to notify the council in due course of any subsequent financial changes

 

(46 Councillors voted in favour of the motion: Councillors  N. Airey, M. Airey, Alexander, Bateson, Beer, Bhatti, Bicknell, Bowden, Brimacombe, Bullock, Burbage, Carroll, Clark, Coppinger, Cox, Diment, Dudley, D. Evans, Dr. L. Evans, Gilmore, Grey, Hill, Hilton, Hollingsworth, Hunt, Ilyas, Jones, Lenton, Love, Luxton, McWilliams, Mills, Quick, Rankin, C. Rayner, S. Rayner, Richards, Saunders, Sharma, Sharp, Sharpe, Smith, Story, D. Wilson, E. Wilson and Yong. One Councillor abstained: Councillor Werner.)