Issue - meetings

Overall Approach

The 2022/23 budget proposals will be scrutinised with consideration of relevant service area budgets by Scrutiny Committees with the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Scrutiny Committee considering both its own budget responsibilities as well as any issues raised by the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee, to produce an overarching set of recommendations.

This approach enables all Scrutiny Members to question and challenge the budget proposals across services, to better understand the implications of the budget proposals across the Council and to make effective recommendations to Cabinet and Council.

The proceedings of all Scrutiny Committees will be livestreamed and publicised through normal channels.

The Council must have full regard to and consider the impact of any proposals in relation to equalities prior to making any decisions, as set out in equality impact assessments, and any identified risks and mitigation action required.

Public Participation

There will be an opportunity for members of the public to address each Scrutiny Committee meeting and make oral representations/presentations on any matter relating to the proposed budget, in line with the public participation scheme.

This Meeting

At this and other Scrutiny Committees in the current cycle, Members are asked to identify salient issues within each Committee’s areas of responsibility, to examine the general thrust of the budget and take an overview of priorities and prospects.

At this meeting Chief Officers/ Heads of Services will report on

·         the Cabinet’s Target Budget for Services and likely implications of the 2022/23 target for individual areas of service (e.g. in percentage terms compared to current levels) and how those areas have been prioritised;

·         any comparisons between the current year and next year’s proposals for the major service areas, to illustrate the scale of change within those activities and how the budget has been allocated across services in those years (to illustrate changes of emphasis or priority);

·         any “alternative delivery models” or other initiatives contemplated for given services and how it is thought that these may reduce costs; and

·         impact assessments undertaken in relation to the draft budget.

In addition, the Chairs of both the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and Health & Adult Care Scrutiny Committee will be invited to comment on their Committee’s deliberations – in the context of any wider corporate issues that might be incorporated into any recommendations from that Committee to Cabinet and the Council.

Report and Budget 2022/23 Impact Assessment

Joint Report of the Director of Finance, Chief Executive, Director of Public Health and Chief Officer of Highways, Infrastructure Development & Waste  (DF/22/03) on the proposed budget for Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services for 2022/23, attached.

For ease of reference:

Communities, Public Health, Environment and Prosperity – page 12

Corporate Services – page 22

Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste – page 32

NB: An overview of the impact assessments for all service areas entitled Budget 2022/23 Impact Assessment has been made available to all Members of the Council so that Scrutiny Committees have access to all equality impact assessments undertaken as  ...  view the full agenda text for item 27

(Councillors Davis, Hart, Hannaford, Twiss and Randall-Johnson attended in accordance with Standing Order 25 and spoke to this item at the invitation of the Committee.)

The Committee noted that the proposed budget for the 2022/23 financial year would be scrutinised by individual Scrutiny Committees.

The Chairs of the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee would present any relevant resolutions and an overview of those issues arising to the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee.  This Committee would also consider the draft budget proposals within its own remit, providing an opportunity for Scrutiny Members to comment on proposals for the Council’s Budget in its entirety. The resulting resolutions from Scrutiny will be reported to Cabinet and Council.

This would follow the opportunity for individual Scrutiny Committees – at this meeting – to have an initial overview of the budget proposals and examine them to identify any specific issues or areas of interest that might be considered at the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee for incorporation into any recommendations to Cabinet and Council.

The Committee then considered the Joint Report of the Director of Finance, Chief Executive, Director of Public Health and Chief Officer of Highways, Infrastructure Development & Waste (DF/22/03) on the provisional financial settlement made by Government and the spending targets set by the Cabinet for each service area which included inflation, commitments and any service prioritisation reductions. The Report also detailed the proposed medium-term capital programme for the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services and how it was funded.

The Cabinet, at its meeting of 8th December 2021, had set Revenue Budget targets for 2022/23. That Report outlined the targets in paragraph 2 which represented an overall increase of £48.7 million or 8.4%. The increased Revenue Spending Targets for 2022/23 now totalled just over £629 millions.

As detailed within budget monitoring reports, significant pressures had been and were continuing to be experienced within Devon and across the country. The unprecedented set of circumstances faced by the country had led to demand growth, cost base increases and acute labour shortages. Adult Care and Health and Children’s services in particular were continuing to experience in year operational pressures and many of the current year pressures were translating into budget pressures for 2022/23.

It was proposed to further support time limited pressures, invest to save programmes and to provide the critical services with time to manage demand and transform further by utilising some of the Council’s reserves.

The Capital Programme for 2022/23 to 2026/27 would be presented to Cabinet at the February Budget meeting.

At the Cabinet meeting on the 12^th January, an update was given following the Provisional Local Government Settlement 2022/23 which was received on the 16^th December 2021. The 2022/23 local government finance settlement was for one year only and was based on the Spending Review 2021 (SR21) funding levels. As part of SR21, the Chancellor had announced an additional £1.6bn per annum (2022/23 to 2024/25) for local government and the majority  ...  view the full minutes text for item 27

Overall Approach

The 2021/22 budget proposals will be scrutinised with consideration of relevant service area budgets by Scrutiny Committees with the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Scrutiny Committee considering both its own budget responsibilities as well as any issues raised by the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee, to produce a single set of recommendations from all Scrutiny Committees.

This approach enables all Scrutiny Members to question and challenge the budget proposals across services, to better understand the implications of the budget proposals across the Council and to speak with one voice to make effective recommendations to Cabinet and Council.

The proceedings of all Scrutiny Committees will be webcast and publicised through normal channels including Twitter and Facebook.

The Council must have full regard to and consider the impact of any proposals in relation to equalities prior to making any decisions, as set out in equality impact assessments, and any identified risks and mitigation action required.

Public Participation

There will be an opportunity for members of the public to address each Scrutiny Committee meeting and make oral representations/presentations on any matter relating to the proposed budget, in line with the public participation scheme.

This Meeting

At this and other Scrutiny Committees in the current cycle, Members are asked to identify salient issues within each Committee’s areas of responsibility, to examine the general thrust of the budget and take an overview of priorities and prospects.

At this meeting Chief Officers/ Heads of Services will report on

·         the Cabinet’s Target Budget for Services and likely implications of the 2021/22 target for individual areas of service (e.g. in percentage terms compared to current levels) and how those areas have been prioritised;

·         any comparisons between the current year and next year’s proposals for the major service areas, to illustrate the scale of change within those activities and how the budget has been allocated across services in those years (to illustrate changes of emphasis or priority);

·         any “alternative delivery models” or other initiatives contemplated for given services and how it is thought that these may reduce costs; and

·         impact assessments undertaken in relation to the draft budget.

In addition, the Chairs of both the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and Health & Adult Care Scrutiny Committee will be invited to summarise their Committee’s deliberations – in the context of any wider corporate issues that might be incorporated into any recommendations from that Committee to Cabinet and the Council

Report and Budget 2021/22 and Impact Assessment

Joint Report of the County Treasurer, the Chief Executive, the Director of Public Health and the Head of Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (CT/21/05) on the proposed budget for Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services for 2021/22, attached

For ease of reference:

Communities, Public Health, Environment and Prosperity – page 12

Corporate Services – page 22

Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste – page 34

NB: An overview of the impact assessments for all service areas entitled ‘Budget 2021/22 Impact Assessment’ has been made available to all  ...  view the full agenda text for item 210

(Councillors Hart, Davis, Gilbert, Parsons, Hannaford and Randall-Johnson attended in accordance with Standing Order 25 and spoke to this item at the invitation of the Committee.)

The Committee noted that the proposed budget for the 2021/22 financial year would be scrutinised by individual Scrutiny Committees.

The Chairs of the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee would present any relevant resolutions and an overview of those issues arising to the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee.  This Committee would also consider the draft budget proposals within its own remit, providing an opportunity for Scrutiny Members to comment on proposals for the Council’s Budget in its entirety. The resulting resolutions from Scrutiny will be reported to Cabinet and Council.

This would follow the opportunity for individual Scrutiny Committees – at this meeting – to have an initial overview of the budget proposals and examine them to identify any specific issues or areas of interest that might be considered at the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee for incorporation into any recommendations to Cabinet and Council.

The Committee then considered the Joint Report of the County Treasurer, the Chief Executive, the Director of Public Health and the Head of Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (CT/21/05) on the provisional financial settlement made by Government and the spending targets set by the Cabinet for each service area which included inflation, commitment and service prioritisation reductions. The Report also detailed the proposed medium-term capital programme for the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services and how it was funded.

The Cabinet, at its meeting of 9th December 2020, had set Revenue Budget targets for 2021/22. That Report had also updated on the recent Spending Review (SR2020) and presented Budget Targets for 2021/22, which were set out in in full at paragraph 3 and represented an overall increase of £28.4 millions or 5.2% (based on Revenue Spending Targets for 2021/22 of just over £571 millions).

In terms of the Spending Review 2020, this confirmed a one-year spending review, not the three years hoped for, but with the economic and financial impact of the Pandemic this had been reduced to one year.

This Report also outlined the key messages from SR2020 that would impact next year’s budget. Some of these included:

×          Core Spending Power to increase by 4.5%;

×          A new Social Care grant of £300 millions (nationally);

×          The Council Tax increase that would trigger the need for a referendum was 2%;

×          The option to set an Adult Social Care Precept of up to 3%;

×          Current Social Care grants would continue next year;

×          A public sector pay freeze, except for those earning less than £24,000;

×          The National Living Wage would increase by 2.2% to £8.91 per hour;

×          A grant of £670 million nationally to offset some of the impact of the Pandemic on the Council Tax Base;

×          A Council Tax Income Guarantee Scheme to compensate authorities for 75% of irrecoverable losses in the current year;

×          The  ...  view the full minutes text for item 210

Overall Approach

The 2020/21 budget proposals will be scrutinised with consideration of relevant service area budgets by Scrutiny Committees with the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Scrutiny Committee considering both its own budget responsibilities as well as any issues raised by the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee, to produce a single set of recommendations from all Scrutiny Committees.

This approach enables all Scrutiny Members to question and challenge the budget proposals across services, to better understand the implications of the budget proposals across the Council and to speak with one voice to make effective recommendations to Cabinet and Council.

The proceedings of all Scrutiny Committees will be webcast and publicised through normal channels including Twitter and Facebook.

The Council must have full regard to and consider the impact of any proposals in relation to equalities prior to making any decisions, as set out in equality impact assessments, and any identified risks and mitigation action required.

Public Participation

There will be an opportunity for members of the public to address each Scrutiny Committee meeting and make oral representations/presentations on any matter relating to the proposed budget, in line with the public participation scheme.

This Meeting

At this and other Scrutiny Committees in the current cycle, Members are asked to identify salient issues within each Committee’s areas of responsibility, to examine the general thrust of the budget and take an overview of priorities and prospects.

At this meeting Chief Officers/ Heads of Services will report on

·         the Cabinet’s Target Budget for Services and likely implications of the 2020/21 target for individual areas of service (e.g. in percentage terms compared to current levels) and how those areas have been prioritised;

·         any comparisons between the current year and next year’s proposals for the major service areas, to illustrate the scale of change within those activities and how the budget has been allocated across services in those years (to illustrate changes of emphasis or priority);

·         any “alternative delivery models” or other initiatives contemplated for given services and how it is thought that these may reduce costs; and

·         impact assessments undertaken in relation to the draft budget.

In addition, the Chairs of both the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and Health & Adult Care Scrutiny Committee will be invited to summarise their Committee’s deliberations – in the context of any wider corporate issues that might be incorporated into any recommendations from that Committee to Cabinet and the Council

Report and Budget 2020/21 and Impact Assessment

Report to follow.

The Committee welcomed the proposed budget for the 2020/21 financial year being scrutinised by individual Scrutiny Committees.

The Chairs of the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee would present any relevant resolutions and an overview of those issues arising to the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee.  This Committee will also consider the draft budget proposals within its own remit, providing an opportunity for Scrutiny Members to comment on proposals for the Council’s Budget in its entirety. The resulting resolutions from Scrutiny will be reported to Cabinet and Council.

This would follow the opportunity for individual Scrutiny Committees – at this meeting – to have an initial overview of the budget proposals and examine them to identify any specific issues or areas of interest that might be considered at the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee for incorporation into recommendations to Cabinet and Council.

The Committee then considered the joint report of the County Treasurer, the Chief Executive, the Head of Public Health, Environment and Prosperity and the Head of Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (CT/20/04) on the 2020/21 Budget which included sections on the Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement made by Government and the budget targets set by the Cabinet for each service area which included inflation, commitments and savings. The Report also detailed the proposed medium-term capital programme for the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services and how it was funded.

The Cabinet, at its meeting of 11^th December 2019, had set Revenue Budget targets for 2020/21 which totalled £529.974 millions. 2019/20 had been the last year of the four-year Local Government Financial Settlement and 2020/21 was hoped to be the first year of a new multi-year settlement that would contain the outcome of the Fairer Funding Review, the Business Rates reset and 75% or 100% Business Rates Retention, but this had not happened.  In September, the Chancellor announced a one-year Spending Round (badged as a ‘Roll-forward’ for Local Government) but it did contain some proposals for additional funding including the SR19 Social Care Support Grant, Schools funding and SEND High Needs Block The Fairer Funding Review along with both the Business Rates reset and Retention plans were delayed until at least 2021/22.

On the 20^th December, the Secretary of State for the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government, The Rt. Hon. Robert Jenrick MP, made a written statement to Parliament on the Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement 2020/21. This was as expected and gave an opportunity to increase the Spending Targets that were previously set. The settlement was for one year only. The targets were revisited by the Cabinet on 15^th January 2020.

In relation to Council Tax, the referendum limit was 2% with social care authorities allowed a 2% social care precept. The three elements of the Business Rates Retention system (Baseline Need, NNDR Baseline and Tariff/Top Up amounts) had all increased by 1.63%, in line with the September 2019 CPI inflation figure. The Revenue Support Grant  ...  view the full minutes text for item 166

Overall Approach

The 2019/20 budget proposals will be scrutinised with consideration of relevant service area budgets by individual Scrutiny Committees with the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Scrutiny Committee considering both its own budget responsibilities as well as any issues raised by the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and also the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee, to produce an overarching series of recommendations.

This approach will enable all Scrutiny Members to critique, question and challenge the budget proposals across services, to better understand the implications of the budget proposals across the Council and to make effective recommendations to Cabinet and the Council. 

The proceedings of all Scrutiny Committees will be webcast and publicised through normal channels including Twitter and other social media.

The Council must have full regard to and consider the impact of any proposals in relation to equalities prior to making any decisions, as set out in equality impact assessments, and any identified significant risks and mitigation action required.

Public Participation

Additionally, there will be an opportunity for members of the public to address each Scrutiny Committee meeting and make oral representations/presentations on any matter relating to the proposed budget, in line with the public participation scheme.

This Meeting

At this and other Scrutiny Committees in the current cycle, Members are asked to identify salient issues within each Committee’s areas of responsibility, to examine the general thrust of the budget and take an overview of priorities and prospects.

At this meeting Chief Officers/ Heads of Services will report, inter alia, on:

×          the Cabinet’s Target Budget for services/suite of services;

×          how that compares to the target figure for 2019/20;

×          the likely implications of the 2019/20 target for individual areas of service (e.g. in percentage terms compared to current levels) and how those areas have been prioritised;

×          any comparisons between the current year and next year’s proposals for the major service areas, to illustrate the scale of change within those activities and how the budget has been allocated across services in those years (to illustrate changes of emphasis or priority);

×          any “alternative delivery models” or other initiatives contemplated for given services and how it is thought that these may reduce costs; and

×          impact assessments undertaken in relation to the draft budget.

In addition, the Chairs of both the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and Health & Adult Care Scrutiny Committee will also be invited to comment on their Committee’s deliberations – in the context of any wider corporate issues that might be incorporated into any recommendations from that Committee to Cabinet and the Council

Report and Budget 2019/20 Impact Assessment

Joint Report of the County Treasurer, the Chief Executive, the Head of Communities, Public Health, Economy and Prosperity and the Head of Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (CT/19/04) on the proposed budget for Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services for 2019/20, attached.

For ease of reference:

Communities, Public Health, Environment and Prosperity  (page 10)

Corporate Services  (page 20)

Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste  (page 32)

[NB: An overview of  ...  view the full agenda text for item 103

(Councillors Randall-Johnson, Sellis, Barker and Davis attended in accordance with Standing Order 25(1) and spoke to this item at the invitation of the Committee.)

(Councillors Atkinson and Colthorpe declared personal interests in this item by virtue of being a trustee of the Exeter Food Action and a trustee of Involve, Mid Devon CVS respectively.)

Councillors Randall-Johnson and Sellis as Chair and Vice-Chair respectively of the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee and the Children’s Scrutiny Committee reported on the proceedings and recommendations from their respective Budget meetings.

The Committee noted that the proposed budget for the 2019/20 financial year would be scrutinised by individual Scrutiny Committees according to the remit set out in the Constitution, with an overview of those issues arising being further debated by the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee as well as draft budget proposals within the Committee’s own remit, providing an opportunity for Scrutiny Members to comment on proposals for the Council’s Budget in its entirety and also the Chairs of both the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee attending and presenting, as required.

The Chairs of the Children’s Scrutiny Committee and the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee will present any relevant resolutions and an overview of those issues arising to the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee.  This Committee will also consider the draft budget proposals within its own remit, providing an opportunity for Scrutiny Members to comment on proposals for the Council’s Budget in its entirety. The resulting resolutions from Scrutiny will be reported to Cabinet and Council.

This would follow the opportunity for individual Scrutiny Committees – at this meeting – to have an initial overview of the budget proposals and examine them to identify any specific issues or areas of interest that might be considered at the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Committee for incorporation into any recommendations to Cabinet and Council.

The Committee then considered the joint report of the County Treasurer, the Chief Executive, the Head of Communities, Public Health, Economy and Prosperity and the Head of Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (CT/19/04) on the provisional financial settlement made by Government within the current and anticipated public sector funding regime and the spending targets set by the Cabinet for each service area which included inflation, commitment and service prioritisation reductions. The Report also detailed the proposed medium-term capital programme for the Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services and how it was funded.

The Cabinet, at its meeting of 12th December 2018, had set Revenue Budget targets for 2019/20 which totalled £493.850 millions.  The targets incorporated inflation and pressures and income initiatives and savings required to set a budget within reduced funding levels provided by Government in the recent provisional financial settlement. This included funding for budget pressures of £33.353 millions that mainly related to additional expenditure to allow for service growth to cater for demographic changes such as increased children and adult service users and unavoidable cost pressures. Savings and income initiatives of £13.398  ...  view the full minutes text for item 103