Agenda item

The Council is required to set a balanced budget and agree the level of Council Tax for 2023/24 and this report contains a summary of the proposals that have been considered for inclusion. The proposals were considered and scrutinised in detail by the Budget Joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee on 9 January 2023.  The proposals have been consulted upon by residents and businesses during the period 16 – 30 January 2023.

Purpose of report

The Council was required to set a balanced budget and agree the level of Council Tax for 2023/24 and this report contained a summary of the proposals that had been considered for inclusion. The proposals were considered and scrutinised in detail by the Budget Joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee on 9 January 2023. The proposals had been consulted upon by residents and businesses during the period 16 – 30 January 2023.

Decision

Cabinet recommended that Full Council:

1.    Set a General Fund budget requirement of £16.800m for 2023/24 detailed at section 2 of the report and shown in detail at Appendix A (inclusive of special expenses). 

2.    Propose a Council Tax level of £178.58 for 2023/24 (Band D property) after taking into consideration the consultation findings.

3.    Notes the indicative base estimates for 2024/25 and 2025/26 as detailed at Appendix A.

4.    Approves Housing Revenue Account (HRA) dwelling rent increases of 7% in accordance with Government guideline rent providing an average rent of £92.90 per week.

5.    Approves an increase in HRA garage rents of 5%.

6.    Approves an increase in shared ownership rents by 7%.

7.    Approves the HRA Revenue Summary for the year 2023/24 and notes the indicative budgets for 2024/25 and 2025/26 shown at Appendix A of the report.

8.    Approves the fees and charges detailed at section 4 of this report and shown at Appendix B.

9.    Approves the General Fund Capital programme for 2023/24 to 2025/26 as detailed at section 5 of this report and shown at Appendix C.

10. Approves the General Fund Capital Financing statement detailed at Appendix C of this report.

11. Approves the General Fund Capital Programme budget carry forward of £2.513m from 2022/23 shown at Appendix C of this report.

12. Approves the Housing Capital Investment programme for 2023/24 to 2025/26 detailed at section 5 of this report and as shown at Appendix C.

13. Approves the HRA Capital Financing statement detailed at Appendix C of this report.

14. Approves the Housing Revenue Account Capital Investment Programme budget carry forward of £3.515m from 2022/23 shown at Appendix C of this report.

15. Approves the movements in General Fund Revenue and Capital reserves and balances detailed at section 7 of this report and shown at Appendix D.

16. Approves the movements in HRA revenue and Capital reserves and balances detailed at section 7 of this report and shown at Appendix D.

Alternative options considered and rejected

There was no option not to set a Budget for 2023/2024.

Reason for decisions

The Council was legally required to set a balanced budget each financial year.

The Budget proposals were first scrutinised in detail by the Joint Budget Scrutiny Overview and Scrutiny Committee on 9 January 2023. Both the initial proposals, and proceedings from the Joint Budget Scrutiny meeting were then considered by Cabinet at their meeting on 10 January 2023.

The draft fees and charges increases were consulted upon during the period 16-30 January 2023 and the results from this consultation were:

·       Those that agree or strongly agree with a £5 increase to green waste charges were 28% of respondents

·       Those that neither agreed nor disagreed represented 11% of respondents

·       Those that disagreed, or strongly disagreed represented 61% of respondents.

There were 264 respondents to the consultation, and the strongest representation was from the PE6 postcode area, which represented 45% of all responses.

The 2023/2024 Budget proposals and those indicative budgets for the years beyond had been prepared in the context of significant financial events that were having a detrimental impact on the Council’s financial outlook, such as inflationary increases, an increase in energy prices and employee pay proposals. These unforeseen pressures had seriously impacted the assumptions that had underpinned the Medium-Term Financial Plan (MTFP).

The Budget Stabilisation Reserve was created to fund short-term Budget pressures either from unforeseen expenditure or from unbudgeted exceptions; this would be utilised for one year only and was a one-off event. The balance of this reserve as at 31 March 2023 was forecasted to be £2.904 million and it would be necessary to use £1.534 million of this reserve in order to achieve a balanced Budget for 2023/2024.

The Deputy Leader of the Council further summarised the contents of the report:

·       A balanced position for 2023/2024 would be achieved after using reserves, but the Budget would be unbalanced following this based on current financial forecasts.

·       There were two key elements to the HRA budget proposals; the rent setting proposals and maintaining investment in the housing stock.

·       To ensure services to housing tenants remained of a high quality, further investments totalling £1.3 million were proposed, to be met in part by a 7% increase in rents. This increase was necessary, based on government guidance. For those residents in receipt of various forms of welfare, benefit support was increased by over 10%, to fund the increased rent in these instances.

·       Broadly, discretionary charges have been increased in line with inflation and were on a cost recovery basis.

·       The focus of the General Fund had been on continued investment in the Council’s assets, and the procurement of assets to maintain service delivery.

·       The capital programme contained a number of projects funded by government grants, including Disabled Facilities Grants (DFGs), Future High Streets Fund (FHSF), and the newly created UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF).

·       The HRA capital programme focused on investment in housing stock, driven by the knowledge of the stock conditions survey.

·       The 2023/2024 Treasury Management Strategy was considered by Governance and Audit Committee at their meeting on 30 January 2023 and recommended for approval by Full Council.

Members and officers were thanked for their work on these proposals.