Cabinet considered the report regarding the latest financial update.

The Lead Member for Finance and Ascot informed Cabinet that as we moved further into the year the availability of transactional and operational data had created greater certainty over the year end outturn position and most services had improved. We now projected a favourable variance of £46K on the revised revenue budget which was an improvement of £389K on month 4.

Cabinet were informed that at the year-end general reserves were now projected to be £7.105M and above the minimum level of £6.7M.  There had been a host of budget movements, so he highlighted those that he saw as significant. 

In children’s Services the picture was complicated, particularly for the deprived, Covid had been the cause of increased domestic abuse, increased levels of referrals and greater complexity of need for children needing placements. This all added to cost but it is made worse, because there was a supply shortage of care places and care providers had opportunistically increased charges. In 2019 a high-end placement cost £250K a year today the has doubled to £500K.

He was delighted to see that the tender for Home to School transport had changed a projected £254K overspend into an underspend of £50K.

Finance had legitimately used just over £500K of the Control Outbreak Management Fund to support the cost of children’s placements.

With regards to the Dedicated Schools Grant, over the years the deficit had increased to £3.4M. In a recent conversation with the Director of Children’s Services’  there was a risk that the council might be called upon to support the deficit, rather then just the schools. The Lead Member had agreed that additional context on this risk would added to the month 8 Finance monitoring report.

Place had suffered more than any other directorate with loss of income, parking revenues in Windsor and Maidenhead were 68% of the budget but based on this data £3Million of the covid reserve allocated to parking would cover the loss. 

Leisure centres, run by Leisure Focus, were having a difficult year and, although it was not clear, thanks to Sales Fees and Charges, we would have some income in the order of £500K. We had entrusted some of our most significant revenue generating assets to Leisure Focus, a presentation by Mark Camp-Overy the MD, gave him some confidence that he will improve our leisure offer to residents and sensitively add a dash of commercialism that would increase the financial return.

In Adult Social Care the reported overspend on Mental Health Services sets into sharp relief the impact that Covid has had on some people’s lives. Overall ASC was forecasting an overspend of £506K or 1.2% of their £40M budget. Table 19 on page 744 showed that across all services the number of people requiring a service had increased from just over 1000 to 1153 an increase of 11.5% So he might have expected the overspend to be higher. The council have had continuing funding support from the CCG but also costs have been contained, which telled us that Optalis and our in-house teams are doing some great work.

Cabinet were asked to consider two new capital projects:

Purchase of Waste Vehicles to deliver the collection model of fortnightly general waste collection, recycling and food waste weekly and green waste fortnightly the contractor required six additional waste vehicles. Two vehicles would be purchased in the current financial year with a further four vehicles to be purchased during 2022/23.  Approval was sought to vire £235,000 from the Infrastructure Delivery Programme budget to purchase two waste vehicles with no additional financial impact on the capital programme in the current financial year

Datchet Barrel Arch flood mitigation scheme.

Datchet Barrel Arch was a Victorian brick-built culverted watercourse running west to east through the centre of Datchet. It discharges into the recreation ground ditch, the Penn Road culvert and ultimately into the Datchet Common Brook. Following a comprehensive CCTV structural survey, an outline scheme had been drawn up and costed to line the brick culvert to protect the structure and reduce future maintenance at an estimated works cost of £220,000. £60,000 funding was available in-year to cover survey and design fees.  There was no reason to delay the barrel arch project, as it will contribute to the objectives of the River Thames Infrastructure Scheme to mitigate flood risk in Datchet, Horton and Wraysbury.  Approval was sought to vire £220,000 of capital budget from the River Thames Scheme Infrastructure project for Datchet Barrel Arch repairs.

Cllr Werner mentioned that over the last four months the budget had gone from left to right, overspen to underspend.  He asked if the Lean Member was confident that he now had a handle on the budget.  He also asked that with regards to the need to purchase waste vehicles was this a failure of the original contract as we had reverted back to a previous position so there should be no increase costs.

The Lead Member for Finance and Ascot replied that given we had a budget of over £101 million he would not call the recent variations as varying wildly.  The Chairman said that as long as there were no significant external impact they were confident in the budgets position. 

The Lead Member responsible for the waste contract said that as mentioned earlier in the meeting the additional costs was due to a decision to move towards a zero carbon position and bringing back a five day collection.

Resolved unanimously:  that Cabinet notes the report including:

i)            The Council’s projected revenue and capital position for 2021/22.

ii)          Approves a capital budget virement of £235,000 to purchase two waste vehicles.

iii)      Approved a capital budget virement of £220,000 from the River Thames Infrastructure Project to the Datchet Barrel Arch project to mitigate flood risk in Datchet, Horton and Wraysbury.