Agenda item

Cabinet considered recommendation to amend the budget setting timetable for 2025/26 to accommodate a late provisional local government finance settlement received just two days before this Cabinet meeting. This would provide sufficient time to finalise the budget proposals for the forthcoming year. This report set out a revised committee timetable for Cabinet’s consideration and approval. The budget setting process began this summer. Cabinet and officers had dedicated a tremendous amount of time and effort to get to the position they were in now. Cabinet thanked all who had been involved and contributed to this process to date. The typical corporate budget setting cycle for Thanet District Council involves:

·  Taking an early draft budget for consultation or a budget strategy paper to Cabinet in the November preceding the forthcoming financial year;

·  Present the draft budget at an early January Cabinet meeting;

·  Overview and Scrutiny Panel review the draft budget in January and consider making recommendations to a second January Cabinet meeting;

·  Cabinet approves the draft budget in January and recommends the budget to Council for approval;

·  Council meets in early February to approve the budget; and the Council tax for the next financial year is usually approved at a second Council meeting in February. This year an early draft budget or budget strategy paper was not presented to an autumn meeting of the Cabinet, which is due to the context in which the budget is being set for next year.

The last two years the Council has been in a position to accommodate a significant amount of growth in the budget, both reflecting inflationary increases and genuine service investment. This was largely facilitated by increasing the amount of business rates and fees and charges income in our base budget. As such a draft budget and consultation was beneficial to this process, as meaningful consultation could be undertaken on a range of budget proposals.

For next year’s 2025/26 budget there was less scope to increase the income budget from business rates and fees and charges as there had been in recent years. At this stage of the budget setting process, at the point of writing this report, there was also uncertainty about the level of central government funding that would be allocated to each local authority for the forthcoming year. Whilst there remained uncertainty over the council’s funding allocations for next year, significant progress had still been made to develop the 2025/26 budget.

One of the key tools for implementing the budget strategy was the use of budget prioritisation meetings, to consider services’ current resource allocations and also assessing any budget proposals. Heads of Service and Directors were asked to formulate proposals against the priorities contained in the Corporate Plan, so that the Council could prioritise activities which align with the things that matter most to local people. A series of prioritisation meetings were chaired by the Leader of the Council, who was assisted by a panel comprising the Deputy Leader, Portfolio Holder for Finance, the Chief Executive, the three Directors, the Head of Finance, Procurement and Risk, the Head of Strategy and Transformation and also Finance Officers. There were numerous budget prioritisation meetings, held throughout July and August. At each meeting a specific service area was considered and the relevant Portfolio Holder and Head of Service were invited to present any budget proposals for inclusion in the draft budget and answer any questions the panel had regarding the finances of that service area. These proposals had been ranked and prioritised, with the number that could be included in the budget being determined by the level of funding that was allocated in the settlement.

To further support the budget process, the views of residents on the shape of next year’s budget would be captured through an engagement exercise in the new year. Due to the short timeframes involved it would only be possible to run a relatively short consultation exercise. After carefully listening to residents, Cabinet would return in the next year with the final budget proposals to recommend to Council for approval.

Councillor Yates proposed, Councillor Keen seconded and Cabinet agreed the following, that:

1.  The proposed revised committee timetable for the 2025/26 budget setting process; and

2.  To note the progress made to date in developing the 2025/26 draft budget.