Agenda item

2020-21 Budget Setting

Minutes:

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;

·  The current budget had a £730k overspend, but the situation was improving. This experience will inform the drafting of a realistic 2020/21 budget;

·  The council would be loaning £1million to its housing company as part of setting it up. To fund that loan, TDC would borrow at lower rates than would be available to the company. These were still ideas being developed.

 

Councillor Campbell proposed and Councillor David Saunders seconded that the 2020 Council budget made provisions for the recruitment of a Thanet Coastal Project Officer.

 

In view of the advice given by Mr Willis, Cllr Bayford proposed and the Panel agreed that it would recommend that Cabinet considers identifying a resource to support coastal projects.

Supporting documents: