Issue - meetings

It was noted that in accordance with council procedure rule 17.6, a recorded vote would be taken on the motion or any amendments and substantive motions.

It was proposed by Councillor Yates and seconded by the Leader, that the recommendations set out in the report be agreed, namely:

“Council approves the recommendation from Cabinet as follows:

1. That the General Fund revenue budget estimates for 2020-21 are approved, assuming a £4.95 increase in Council Tax for a Band D.

2. That the HRA budget estimates for 2020-21 are approved, assuming a CPI+1% (i.e. 2.7%) increase in social rents and a freeze in affordable rents for relevant council properties.

3.  That the General Fund and Housing Revenue Account capital programmes

(Annexes 1&2) for 2020-24 are approved.

5. That the Flexible Use of Capital Receipts Strategy for 2020-21 as shown in Annex 3 is approved.

6. That the Section 151 Officer’s Assurance Statement as set out in section 14 of this report is approved.

7. That subject to funding availability, a resource be identified to support coastal projects.

The Monitoring Officer conducted a recorded vote on the motion as follows:

24 Members voted in favour the motion: Councillors Albon, Bailey, Campbell, Currie, Dennis, Duckworth, Everitt, Garner, Hopkinson, Huxley, Keen, Pat Moore, Ovenden, L Piper, S Piper, Potts, Rawf, Roper, Rusiecki, Scobie, Taylor, Whitehead, Wing, Yates.

No Members voted against the motion.

23 Members abstained from voting on the motion: Councillors Ashbee, Bambridge, J Bayford, R Bayford, Boyd, Day, Dexter, Fellows, Game, Green, Gregory, Hart, Kup, Parsons, Rogers, D Saunders, M Saunders, Savage, Scott, Shrubb, Tomlinson, Towning, Wright.

The motion was carried.

Members had a second chance to consider proposals for the 2020-21 budget and 2020-24 capital programme for the General Fund and Housing Revenue Account, as previously approved by Cabinet on 14 January 2020 after the report had gone to the Overview & Scrutiny Panel on 21 January. Cabinet agreed in principle to the Panel recommendation, subject to availability of funding to support coastal projects.

The following Members spoke under Council Procedure Rule 20.1:

Councillor Taylor;

Councillor Bailey;

Councillor Dexter.

Councillor Yates proposed, Councillor Albon seconded and Cabinet agreed the following:

1.  That subject to funding availability, a resource be identified to support coastal projects;

2.  That the General Fund revenue budget estimates for 2020-21 are approved, assuming a £4.95 increase in Council Tax for a Band D;

3.  That the HRA budget estimates for 2020-21 are approved, assuming a CPI+1% (i.e. a 2.7%) increase in social rents and a freeze in affordable rents for relevant council properties;

4.  That the General Fund and Housing Revenue Account capital programmes (Annexes 1&2 to the report) for 2020-24 are approved;

5.  That the Flexible Use of Capital Receipts Strategy for 2020-21 as shown in Annex 3 (to the report) is approved;

6.  That the Section 151 Officer’s Assurance Statement as set out in section 14 of this report is approved.

Councillor Yates introduced the item for discussion and raised the following points:

·  These budget proposals were drafted under financial constraints affecting the local government sector, whilst on the other hand, demands on council services was growing;

·  The proposals were for modest increase in council tax;

·  Social rent would rise in line with government policy;

·  Reserves remained low;

·  There was an intention to invest in services, with an approach for more permanent Operational Services staff.

Mr Willis provided updates at the meeting which were non material changes.

In response to the presentation of the budget proposals, members of the Panel asked questions and made comments as detailed below:

·  The employment of a Thanet Coastal Project Officer was not included in the budget proposals, why?

·  Of the ten officer posts named in the budget, could one of them be replaced with the role of coastal project officer?

·  Parking fines accrued yearly and they were part of the Decrim fund. Could the council through Cabinet, approach KCC and request that the project officer post be funded from the Decrim fund?

·  Was the funding of public toilets (proposed for £750k in 2020/21) coming to an end after the next financial year?

·  This was an ambitious budget. Did the council have resilience to absorb slippage pressures without resorting to the Reserves?

·  What was the budget gap in the current council budget and how confident was the council that the 2020/21 budget would not go down the same route and create a deficit?

·  Would the proposed council housing company contribute to the council budget?

Responding to Member queries and comments Mr Willis said the following:

·  As part of the budget building process, officers reviewed the impact and context for social rent increases over the past ten years of the TDC budgets. In 2012/13, the increase was 6.1% in social rents. However in the last four years it was 1% year on year reduction. Now it is CPI+1%;

·  Social rent levels were far lower than in the private sector (about £92.74 compared to over £200 per week in the private sector);

·  The council budget did not include all officer posts, but those included had marginal impacts to the budget. There was no budget growth to the post in question, hence its exclusion from the report);

·  Any recommendations made by the Panel which had budget increase implications had to equally identify and recommend the source of funding for such proposals;

·  The Decrim reserve was a one-off and it was not good practice to fund ongoing costs from that fund as the funding could change at the discretion of KCC and this could expose council to a funding gap. It should also be noted that as the council collected fines, a cost was incurred in that activity and it was offset from the same fund;

·  The £750k for toilets in 2020/21 proposals was for major works;

·  Going into 2021/22 and beyond there was uncertainty regarding business rates and councils had to prepare for such uncertainties by setting aside reserves;  ...  view the full minutes text for item 221

Members discussed the 2020-21 budget and 2020-24 capital programme for the General Fund and Housing Revenue Account. It was reported that The Government carried out a Technical Consultation on the 2020-21 local government financial settlement in October. This heralded the “biggest year-on-year real terms increase in funding for almost a decade.''

However, nearly half the proposed additional funding was for social care, a quarter for schools and colleges, and more for public health, none of which was to be paid to TDC. Continued funding of New Homes Bonus would be good news, but at least for the last two years, there had been insufficient housing growth in Thanet to qualify for any new New Homes Bonus (apart from a small amount for affordable housing).

It was worth noting that, the Government published the Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement 2020-21 (the “Settlement”) on 20 December. It set out the Government’s indicative financial plans for each local authority, and so enables authorities to prepare a budget for next year and beyond. The provisional settlement did not deviate very much from the technical consultation carried out in October.

It was also reported that the fees and charges proposals were examined by the Fees and Charges Cabinet Advisory Group on 10 October, Overview and Scrutiny Panel on 22 October and approved by Cabinet on 14 November and Council on 5 December. The new charges would provide for an additional income of £208k which was built into the proposed 2020-21 budget.

Members were reminded of the funding gap in the budget proposals and a number of actions had been identified to deliver the savings for next year. The meeting was further warned that unless this plan was adhered to, the council could be at significant risk of overspending the proposed budget.

Councillor Rogers and Councillor Campbell spoke under Council Procedure 20.1.

Councillor Yates proposed, Councillor Albon seconded and Cabinet agree to recommend to Council the following:

1.  That the General Fund revenue budget estimates for 2020-21 are approved, assuming a £4.95 increase in Council Tax for a Band D;

2.  That the HRA budget estimates for 2020-21 are approved, assuming a CPI+1% (i.e. a 2.7%) increase in social rents and a freeze in affordable rents for relevant council properties;

3.  That the General Fund and Housing Revenue Account capital programmes (Annexes 1&2 to the Cabinet report) for 2020-24 are approved;

4.  That the Flexible Use of Capital Receipts Strategy for 2020-21 as shown in Annex 3 (to the report) is approved;

5.  That the Section 151 Officer’s Assurance Statement as set out in section 14 of this report is approved.