Agenda item

To consider a report from the Director for Digital, Sustainability & Resources, a copy is attached as item 6.

Before the Committee was a report by the Director for Digital, Sustainability and Resources, copies of which had been circulated to all Members and a copy of which is attached to the signed copy of these minutes as Item 6.

The report was the final budget report of the year, the culmination of the annual budgeting exercise, and asked members to consider:

?         The final revenue estimates for 2022/23 including any adjustments arising from settlement; and

?          An updated outline 5-year forecast.

The budgets reflected the decisions taken by members to date in relation to agreed savings proposals and any committed growth. The budgets were still to be adjusted for the proposals to invest in services detailed in Appendix 2 which were considered by the Adur and Worthing Executives the previous week.

The budget was analysed by Executive member portfolio. In addition, the draft estimates for 2022/23 had been prepared, in accordance with the requirements of the Service Reporting Code of Practice for Local Authorities (except in relation to pension cost adjustments that did not impact either on the Budget Requirement or the Council Tax Requirement).

The respective Adur and Worthing 2022/23 Estimates and Council Tax setting reports had already been considered by the Worthing Executive on 31st January 2022 and the Adur Executive on 1st February 2022. Both the estimates for Adur District Council and Worthing Borough Council included their respective share of the cost of the Joint Strategic Committee.

Officers advised that since writing the report, the Councils had received full settlement which had resulted in the following marginal changes:-

·         Adur District Council was better off by £570; and

·         Worthing Borough Council was better off by £2,400.

As a result, Officers were not proposing to amend the budget papers going before the Full Council meetings later in the month.

A Member questioned whether Officers were satisfied that an inflation figure of 2% was sufficient. The Committee was informed that it was difficult to be absolutely certain. The biggest element of inflation that the Councils experienced was with pay. Settlement was still awaited for the 2021/22 pay award by the negotiating body and that pay award was expected to be 1.75%. Officers advised that looking ahead to next year, it was likely that most Councils would struggle to offer more than 2% but the Councils would have to wait and see how the negotiations went. There was some risk to the Councils energy budgets going forward, but the Councils had to a certain extent mitigated that risk by committing to short fixed term contracts, so weren’t expecting to experience those inflationary pressures until the latter part of 2022/23. In addition, there were inflation provisions within the budget to help mitigate against those increases.

The Committee acknowledged that these were financially challenging times and these financial pressures were unlikely to ease in the near future when the outcome of the pandemic was better understood. The reports mapped out where the 2 Councils were in paragraph 3.3 of the report, setting out the strategic programmes the Councils had established to deliver new income and savings for the next 5 years. These included the Major Projects programme which would lead on delivering regeneration projects to increase employment space and additional housing and the Strategic Asset Management programme which would lead on delivering the income growth associated with the Strategic Property Investment Fund.   

Decision 

The Joint Strategic Committee:-

1.    noted the proposals to invest in services outlined in Appendix 2 which were considered at the Executive meetings in early February; and

2.    noted the proposed 2022/23 budget detailed in Appendix 3. The respective Council shares had been approved by the Adur and Worthing Executives. The budget would be adjusted for any changes to the Investment in Service proposals.

Call In:

The call-in deadline for the decision will be 5.00pm on the 18th February 2022.