To receive any apologies for absence

Apologies for absence were received from Councillor Stuart Carroll and Councillor Donna Stimson joined the meeting remotely.

To receive any declarations of interest

No declarations were made.

To consider the minutes of the meeting held on 27 October 2022.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That the minutes of the meeting held on 27 October 2022 be approved.

No appointments were made.

This item had been withdrawn from the agenda and would be considered by Cabinet in January 2023.

Cabinet considered approval of proposed service groupings for re-procurement and the proposal to strengthen the client team by bringing highways inspection, programme management and quality monitoring back ‘in house’.

Councillor Haseler, Cabinet Member for Planning, Parking, Highways & Transport explained that the cabinet paper outlined options and recommendations for the future highway maintenance service delivery model, when the current Volker Highways contract expired on 1 April 2024. It was recommended that a procurement exercise was undertaken in order to obtain contracted services for the majority of activities and functions. It also recommended strengthening the in-house client team by delivering highway inspections, programme management and quality monitoring ‘in house’. It was suggested that re-procurement be undertaken for three separate contract groupings:

•           Highway maintenance

•           Street cleansing (including public conveniences)

•           Highways professional services

Councillor Haseler explained that in 2017, the Council entered a five-year highways management and maintenance contract with Volker Highways Ltd to provide a range of services with further 2 year extension until 31 March 2024. This was the maximum that the contract could be extended. The current commissioned service contained the following core elements:

·       Highway and Bridge Inspections

·       Highway and Bridge Repairs

·       Drainage and gully clearance

·       Winter Service

·       Street Cleansing

·       Project Delivery

·       Tree Inspections

Within the Cabinet report table two set out where the services sat prior to outsourcing in 2017 and recommendations of where they should sit going forward based on the review. The rationale for bringing certain aspects back in house was to provide greater quality and cost control for the Council. The proposal recommended that the majority of elements were delivered by external providers because they were specialist technical activities e.g. technical bridge assessments or construction functions such as winter gritting delivery/ road resurfacing. A paper recommending award of the contracts was planned to be considered by Cabinet in September 2023 with any cost implications being considered in the budget setting process for 2024/25.

Councillor Johnson seconded the proposal.

Councillor Rayner commented that Highways was the one aspect of Council delivery that affected every resident and noted that the Residents Survey showed that 89% of those that responded were satisfied with the area they live in.

Councillor Hilton reflected that Customer Enquiries was proposed to move in house and supported the paper as he considered it was optimum for the Council to own that interface.

Councillor L. Jones agreed with the recommendation as she had previously called in the outsourcing decision in 2017 and supported the change which she hoped would provide better ongoing customer service.

Councillor Werner stated that he considered it was the wrong decision in 2017 and supported the move to bring these services back in house.

Councillor Johnson commented that the administration was not ideologically opposed to outsourcing when it was appropriate and provided best value.

Councillor Hasler concluded by thanking colleagues for their support and the officer team for pulling the proposals together including market and external engagement.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY that

i)          the report be noted and

ii)         the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5b

Cabinet considered the report dealing with the statutory requirement to set the Council’s tax base for 2023/24 noting that the tax base was used by Thames Valley Police, Berkshire Fire and Rescue Authority, local Parish Councils as well as the Royal Borough for setting precepts and Council Tax for the coming year.

Councillor Hilton, Cabinet Member for Asset management & Commercialisation, Finance and Ascot advised the meeting that under Government regulations it was necessary for the Council to review its Collection Fund and decide the following:

·       the Council Tax Base to be used for setting its 2023/24 Council Tax

·       its Council Tax Collection Rate for 2023/24; and

·       the estimated Council Tax deficit for 2022/23.

He explained that provision had been made in the proposed 2023/24 tax base for new properties that were likely to be occupied before the end of the next financial year. The growth in local development continued and this was estimated at 1,089 additional properties. Appendix D set out the Band D equivalent properties that were included in the CTB1 return at 69,605.09. The estimated impact of additional properties and revaluations adjusted for non-collection and reductions for valid discounts was 305 which gave a tax base of 70,250.20 properties.

He stated that a review of eventual collection rates had been carried out which revealed the assumptions to calculate the tax base at 99.5% were adequate.

It was explained that although Business Rate tax base could be estimated using the previous year’s returns it was not possible to calculate the actual Business Rate tax base until Department for Levelling Up, Communities and Housing (DLUCH) published the NNDR1 return in January. Therefore, this would be included in the Budget report along with other assumptions about income.

Councillor Johnson seconded the proposals. 

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY that:

i)               the report be noted;

ii)             the Council Tax base for the whole of the Borough area, for 2023/24 at 70,250.20 as detailed in the Cabinet report and appendices be approved. This was an increase of 513.88 over the 2022/23 base, a 0.74% increase;

iii)            the Council Tax collection rate of 99.5% for 2023/24 be noted; and

iv)            an estimated deficit on the Council Tax Collection Fund in 2022/23 of £1.989m, of which the Council’s share is £1.58m be noted.

Cabinet considered the proposed draft revenue budget for 2023/24 based on the current information available.

Councillor Johnson, Leader of the Council set out the budget consultation process including an opportunity for discussion at the Overview and Scrutiny budget challenge session, the public consultation, further meeting of Cabinet in February as well as a full debate at Council. He reiterated that the Local Government Financial Settlement was not anticipated until late in December which therefore meant that element of the draft balanced budget proposals were based on assumptions. He was proud to reflect that the Council was proposing a balanced budget with an accompanying low level of Council Tax. He regretfully acknowledged that residents would be asked to contribute a higher level of Council Tax for the reprioritised budget focusing on key areas such as Adult Social Care and Children’s Services. He stated that this needed to be benchmarked against rocketing financial pressures as the Council was not immune to the rising costs being experienced by residents including increasing fuel costs, inflation and borrowing costs as well as obligations to support asylum seeking children. He acknowledged it had not been an easy process to deliver the budget proposals.

Councillor Hilton, Cabinet Member for Asset Management & Commercialisation, Finance & Ascot presented the Cabinet report reiterating that like other organisations local government was facing significant financial challenges such as high interest rates, inflation and additional uncertainty around funding levels. The Autumn Statement had confirmed that Council tax could be increased by up to 2.99% before a referendum was required and a further 2% for adult social care precept. He confirmed that it was proposed to increase Council Tax by those levels. He explained that a 4.99% increase for a Band D property would mean £58.09 increase to £1223.11 which was still lower than others in Berkshire. He noted that precepts from the Police and Fire & Rescue Service would be added to this figure. He advised that for every 1% Council Tax was increased the Council would raise £831K. The budget had been set whilst pressures on services such as Adult Social Care, Children’s Services and housing were increasing. Recruitment challenges remained across services and the risk that some income budgets may not recover to pre-pandemic levels. The medium-term financial strategy was aligned to the Council’s Corporate Plan for the period 2021-2026, “Building a borough of opportunity and innovation” which set out the Council’s overarching strategy and priorities.

The budget proposals would be consulted on until February 2023. The outcome of the consultation would be fed back to Cabinet alongside analysis from engagement with other key stakeholders such as businesses and partner organisations.

He explained that within the Cabinet report:

·       Table three was the draft revenue Budget for 2023/24

·       Table four set out Service Department growth above £0.100m

·       Table five set out Service Department savings above £0.100m

·       Individual budget growth requirements were shown in Appendix C

·       Equality Impact Assessments were appended to the report at Appendix D to explore the impact of proposed changes

Cabinet  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5a

Cabinet considered the report detailing the draft capital programme for 2023/24 onwards including proposed new capital bids and planned expenditure for bids previously approved by Council. Together with the capital strategy and capital cashflow, it provided an overview of the Council’s proposed capital planning and expenditure.

Councillor Hilton advised that the report set out the draft Capital Strategy and proposed capital programme for 2023/24 – 2025/26.  Once agreed the Council could confirm the implications on its future borrowing and the implications on its final revenue budget and Medium Term Financial Strategy. He explained the programme was linked closely to two other strategies: the draft Treasury Management Strategy setting out how the Council would fund and afford its planned level of capital investment in 2023/24 and beyond and the Medium Term Financial Strategy 2023/24 – 2027/28 which sets out the Council’s revenue spending for the next fiscal year and indicative spending plans for 2024/25 – 2027/28. Both were reviewed by the Audit and Governance Committee in October.

The draft Capital Strategy as set out in Appendix B provided a high-level overview of how capital expenditure, capital financing and treasury management activity contribute to the provision of services; along with an overview of how associated risk was managed and the implications for future financial sustainability.  It demonstrated how revenue, capital and balance sheet planning were fully integrated. The draft strategy was also reviewed by Audit and Governance Committee in October.

He stated that the current volatile political and economic climate created a high level of uncertainty and had driven the high level of interest rates and increased borrowing costs. The Capital Review Board had met regularly to review the existing capital programme to ensure that unnecessary schemes were dropped and agreeing optimal financing arrangements on all schemes to reduce the pressure on the revenue budget.

Councillor Hilton advised that with interest rates at 5% a £10m increase in capital expenditure would result in an increase in annual borrowing costs of £500,000 on the revenue budget so for 2023/24 the Council had focused on:

•                fully funded schemes, where the cost of the scheme is fully or largely met by external funding.

•                unavoidable capital investment – predominantly relating to immediate requirements to replace or enhance essential fixed assets for service delivery, such as IT assets for business continuity.

Using this strategy, the Capital Programme was prioritised into four key areas: regeneration schemes, major strategic acquisitions, efficiency projects and operational schemes. These would be funded by:

•           capital grants

•           developer contributions in the form of s106 & CIL

•           partner contributions, and

•           capital receipts

Table 3 set out the 2023/24 Capital programme in detail with sources of funding. The total draft Capital Programme for 2023/24 was currently £40,950,000, of which the largest share (£13,756,000) related to the ongoing cost of existing capital schemes. New capital investment amounts to £13,357,000 for fully funded schemes and £3,377,000 for corporately funded schemes.  The net cost of the 2023/24 programme to be funded from borrowing was  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5b

To consider the Forward Plan for the period December 2022 to March 2023

Cabinet noted the Forward Plan for the next four months including the following additional changes:

·       ‘Housing Allocations Policy’ was withdrawn from the agenda and would be considered by Cabinet in January 2023

·       ‘Corporate Plan Review’ would be considered by Cabinet in January 2023

·       ‘Stakeholder Masterplan Document for land in Maidenhead’ would be considered by Cabinet in January 2023

·       ‘A Vision for Windsor’ would be considered by Cabinet in February 2023