Issue - meetings

Financial Management 2021/22 – Quarter 2 Forecast to Year End

 

 

Meeting: 25/01/2022 - Audit and Governance Committee (Item 303)

303 Financial Management 2021/22 – Quarter 2 Forecast to Year End pdf icon PDF 162 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Executive Member for Financial Sustainability introduced a report setting out the financial monitoring for East Herts Council for 2021/22 as at 30th September 2021. He advised that the report gave a “snapshot” of the Council’s financial position, and how it was not unusual to show an over spend at this point in the cycle.

 

The Chairman referred to the report which forecasted an over spend in quarter one. The Head of Strategic Finance and Property elaborated, explaining that the Planning Department was carrying out a phenomenal amount of work. The pressures included the Harlow and Gilston Garden Town Project, which meant that the council currently had the ninth busiest planning department in the country. He said that recruitment to vacant planning posts and talks with other councils regarding shared services were ongoing. 

 

Councillor Pope referred to Revenues and Benefits outperforming on revenue budget, and asked if grant funding from Central Government helped. The Head of Strategic Finance and Property said that performance continued to be monitored, adding that the department had carried out an enormous amount of work. He explained that the work to assess claims was difficult and that complex regulations changed frequently. He said that several staff had recently left the service, including an experienced manager, adding that it took approximately five years to fully train replacement staff. 

 

The Chairman asked about the level of debtors going up as mentioned in page 303 of the report. The Head of Strategic Finance and Property said that debt figures will move dependant of the report cut off. He added that the intention is to take back and centralise recovery actions and processes to within the Finance Department under the Transformation Programme. 

 

It was moved by Councillor Curtis and seconded by Councillor Alder that the recommendations, as detailed, be approved. After being put to the meeting and a vote taken, the motion was declared CARRIED.   

 

RESOLVED – (A) that the net revenue budget forecast overspend of £132k in 2021/22 be noted (table 1);

(B) the revised capital budget for 2021/22 of £57.060m, with a forecast underspend of £15.825m, be carried forward to 2022/23 be noted.