Councillor Ashton introduced the report and highlighted key challenges as set out in the report. He also drew Members’ attention to £1.1m of savings achieved, reoccurring annually.
At the invitation of the Chairman, Councillor Prince addressed Cabinet and in summary raised the following points:
· A request for a graph indicating the cumulative impact of predicted deficits;
· A plan to mitigate the impact of the predicted deficits should be in place and clearly defined by September 2018.
· The financial impact of the various major projects underway should be clearly defined.
In response, Councillor Ashton advised that paragraph 11.9 of the report set out the impact on the revenue budget of major projects.
In response to Cabinet Members’ questions, Councillor Ashton stated that the reason for the significant difference between the best and worst revenue projections (graph at Paragraph 11.6 of the report) was the large amount of uncertainty currently facing local authorities in general. This included potential changes to Business Rates and the New Homes Bonus. As a consequence, it was not considered helpful at this time to produce an action list to address the savings required for a “worst case scenario”.
Cabinet agreed to the following for the reasons set out above and outlined in the report.
RESOLVED:
That the report be noted.