Issue - meetings

Due to the timescale and print deadlines, the recommendations of the meeting of Cabinet held on 14 February 2023 will be circulated to Members in advance of the meeting of Council.

In accordance with CPR 8.5 of the Constitution there will be a recorded vote for this item.

Item CB 23/11 referred from the Cabinet minutes of 14 February 2023.

It was proposed by Councillor Coffin and seconded by Councillor Boughton that the recommendations at Minute CB 23/11 be adopted. In accordance with Council Procedure Rule No 8.5 voting was recorded as follows:

Members voting for the motion:

Cllrs Mrs Anderson, Bell, Betts, Boughton, Boxall, Branson, Bridge, Brown, Cannon, Coffin, Cooper, Dalton, D Davis, M Davis, Dean, Foyle, Hammond, Harman, Hickmott, Hoskins, Hudson, Keers, King, Lark, D Lettington, R Lettington, Luker, Montague, Mrs Oakley, Palmer, Rhodes, Roud, Shaw, Tanner, Tatton, Taylor, Thomas, Thornewell and Williams

Total: 39

Members voting against the motion:

Cllr Bishop

Total: 1

Members abstaining = Cllrs Clark and Hood

Total: 2

(Total number of Members eligible to vote = 42)

RESOLVED: That the recommendations at Minute CB 23/11 be approved

Further to the meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee earlier in the cycle, this report updates Cabinet on issues relating to the Medium Term Financial Strategy.  It also takes Members through the necessary procedures in order to set the Budget for 2023/24.

Members are asked to note that at the time of writing this report, the final settlement has not been received.  All figures contained in the report are based on the provisional settlement.

Further to the reports to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee earlier in the cycle, the joint report of the Chief Executive, Director of Finance and Transformation, the Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance, Innovation and Property updated the Cabinet on issues relating to the Medium Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) and gave details of the necessary procedure to be followed in order to set the budget for 2023/24.

In addition, the budget setting process for this year had to incorporate the difficult task of estimating the extent and speed of the recovery of the Council’s income and expenditure impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic and the prevailing economic conditions.

Members noted that, as at the time of publishing the report the final settlement had not been confirmed, all figures contained in the report were based on the provisional local government finance settlement received in December 2022.  The Director of Finance and Transformation advised that the final local government finance settlement figure was now confirmed and whilst there had been some minor changes the ‘bottom line’ was the same as the figures previously announced. The Settlement Funding Assessment (SFA) was for one year only and the Fair Funding Review deferred to a future date.  This further prolonged the uncertainty over local government funding.

The local government finance settlement included an allocation of £0.6M for New Homes Bonus (NHB) and a funding guarantee of £1.8M. There was an overall funding increase on 2022/23 of £0.5M. Based on a Government policy statement, it was anticipated that funding for 2024/25 would follow a similar pattern.  Beyond 2024/25 there was no indication of future core funding including any replacement (or not) for NHB which made financial planning difficult.

Members noted that the current global economic conditions, the deferral of reforms to the Business Rates Retention scheme, waste services contract, homelessness/temporary accommodation, climate change initiatives and the Local Plan continued to have significant financial implications for the Borough Council.  Particular reference was made to the Kent Business Rates Pool which the Borough Council had re-joined.  It was reported that increased business rates income was being received due to the Panettoni development on the former Aylesford Newsprint site.

With regard to the Capital Plan, it was noted that the Borough Council was currently debt free and expected to remain debt free until 2029.  Two evaluated schemes had been added to List A and these were the Refurbishment of Gibson East and the Decarbonisation of the Borough Council’s Estate.

The report then described the remaining procedure to be followed in setting the budget for 2023/24 and calculating the council tax.  For the purposes of preparing the budget papers and updating the MTFS a council tax increase of just under 3% (or £6.73) in 2023/24 and 2024/25  had been assumed followed by the higher rate of 2% or £5 [ each year thereafter.]

The Cabinet deliberated on the most appropriate guidance to offer the Council as the way forward for updating the MTFS for the next ten year period and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 11