Agenda item

Revenue Budget Savings 2015-16

Decision:

Having considered an open officer report, and presentations by the Cabinet

Member for Resources, Councillor Kevin Bonavia, the Chair of Overview &

Scrutiny, Councillor Alan Hall, and by Mr David French on the Youth Service,

the Mayor agreed that:

(i) the officer proposals for budget reductions set out in Appendix 1 be noted;

(ii) officers be authorised to carry out consultation where public/stakeholder

consultation is necessary in relation to any of those proposals;

(iii) consultation with staff be authorised in respect of any proposal which

would involve staff reductions;

(iv) following due process decision making in relation to the following

proposals be delegated to officers:

A5 £275,000

A7 £250,000

A10 £600,000

E2 £1,125,000

E3 £200,000

E4 £595,000

E5 £134,000

F1 £1,900,000

G1 £950,000

I1 £2,090,000

J1 £751,000

K1 £594,000

K3 £200,000

L2 £280,000

M1 £1,000,000

O2 £50,000

O3 £600,000

P1 £229,000

(v) in respect of all other savings, officers be required to bring a full report on

the budget savings proposals back to Mayor and Cabinet for decision at the

earliest opportunity, but in any event not later than 11 February 2015; and

(vi) savings previously earmarked for 2015/16 in earlier years' budget reports,

as summarised, be approved.

Minutes:

The report was presented by Councillor Kevin Bonavia who highlighted the

significant level of savings that had to be achieved which he attributed

directly to what he considered the mistaken and unnecessary policies of the

Coalition Government.

Councillor Joe Dromey reported to the Mayor the initial outcomes of the big

Budget Challenge which he was to present in greater detail to the Council

meeting at the end of November.

Councillor Alan Hall, Chair of the Overview & Scrutiny Committee, next

addressed the Mayor and presented the written views of the Public Accounts

Select Committee which also summarised the considerations made by all the

other Select Committees. He said he expected scrutiny members to be able to

assist in the detailed examination of certain proposals and in respect of two

areas, Public Health and the Youth Service, task and finish groups would be

established to facilitate this. He emphasised that equalities reports would be

needed on all proposals.

The Mayor responded by stating he found the work undertaken by scrutiny

very helpful as it had opened up the detail on many proposals and he

expected it to be reflected in the decisions made. He also said he found the

Big Budget Challenge to have been a useful exercise and while it had not

discovered solutions to the Council’s financial problems, it had raised

awareness of the immensity of the task the Council faced.

The Mayor then considered each service area individually and agreed the

recommendations shown below. In doing so he highlighted the following

aspects

Savings A6 & A8 – Public Health Programme Review – the Mayor noted

these would be considered by the Health & Well Being Board, the Healthier

Communities Select Committee and the Scrutiny Task & Finish Group.

Savings F1 & I1 – Corporate Business Support Service & Management and

Corporate Overheads – the Mayor required future consideration of shared

services to begin.

Saving G1a –Blue Badge Charges – this was to be removed from the

consultation process with resubmission in 2015.

Saving K1 – Prevention and Inclusion Service – although this was to be

delegated to officers for decision the Mayor expected an update report to be

provided for Mayor & Cabinet and for Overview & Scrutiny.

Saving M1 – Housing Strategy and non-HRA funded services the Mayor

stressed that he expected all decisions delegated to officers to be taken on

the basis of the consideration of full reports with legal and financial

implications.

Saving O1 – Discretionary Freedom Pass scheme – this was to be removed

from the consultation process with resubmission in 2015.

Saving Q2a – Review of Youth Services – The Mayor was addressed by Mr

David French, the Chair of the Children and Young People’s Voluntary Sector

Forum. He urged the Mayor to reject Option 2 and consider Option 1 as a

starting point to talk about the future of the service. He believed a staff seeded

mutual could work but that it was important to ensure safeguards were in

place to prevent any mutual from undercutting voluntary sector providers. He

suggested a duty of co-operation be considered with board seats for the

voluntary sector on any mutual created and set funding for a number of years

for that part of the voluntary sector that provided youth services.

In response the Mayor concurred with the suggestion that Option 1 be

rejected and accepted advice from the Head of Law that no implementation of

any savings could take place until consultation had been completed and

considered.

As an additional piece of work to the savings items he had considered the

Mayor asked officers to set up a way of reviewing the Council’s use of

consultants and an explanation of the reasons for their use.

The Executive Director for Community Services mentioned there would be a

consultation on the reorganisation of the Probabtion Service which would

involve the Council.

Having considered an officer report, and presentations by the Cabinet