Agenda and minutes

To receive declarations of interest from Members.

Councillors I Courts and T Richards OBE highlighted their Council appointments to the North Solihull Regeneration Company.

To answer any questions, if any asked by any resident of the Borough pursuant to Standing Orders.

None received.

To receive for information only the minutes of the previous meeting held on 9 August 2018.

The Minutes of the last meeting of the Board held on 9 August 2018, was submitted.

RESOLVED

That the Minutes of the last meeting be received for information, subject to the inclusion of Councillor T Hodgson as having been present as Opposition Spokesperson for the Green Group.

The report:-

(i)   informs Full Cabinet of the financial position as at 31st July 2018 (Period 4) against Revenue and Capital budgets and the latest Red, Amber, Green (RAG) ratings for the delivery of the current Medium Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) savings 2018/19 to 2020/21. See Appendix A for more detail;

(ii)  informs Full Cabinet with a summary of the individual Cabinet portfolio holder pressures and mitigations for the period of the MTFS 2018/19 to 2020/21 with headlines for any key emerging pressures and proposed mitigations. See Appendix C for more details;

(iii)  summarises the reports to the individual Cabinet portfolio meetings during September 2018; and

(iv)  provides details of all the budget virements which have taken place up to Period 4 of this financial year, as required by Financial Regulations and the revised budget resulting from those virements, which Members are asked to approve. See Appendix B for more detail.

The Cabinet was informed of the financial position as at 31^st July 2018 (Period 4) against Revenue and Capital budgets. The report also detailed a summary of the individual Cabinet Portfolio pressures and mitigations for the period of the Medium Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) 2018/19 to 2020/21 as well as all budget virements that had taken place up to Period 4 of this financial year.

In considering the report, Members attention was specifically drawn to the following:

·  There was a forecast favourable variance for Core Council of (£0.413 million), and an adverse variance of £1.579 million for the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG), to arrive at an overall adverse variance of £1.166 million.

·  The Core Council revenue budget forecast included an adverse variance of £0.161 million for Children, Education and Skills portfolio, which was offset by a favourable variance of (£0.574 million) for the Resources and Delivering Value portfolio. The Adult Social Care and Health portfolio showed a net nil variance with the planned use of the contingency funding and for the portfolios which were linked to the Managed Growth and Communities Directorate, their combined variances forecasted a net nil position overall through the use of reserve funding.

·  The Children, Education and Skills portfolio financial position was currently the subject of a detailed financial review, the outcome of which would be reported to Members of the Budget Strategy group as part of the 2019/20 budget process.

·  The total Capital Programme budget was currently £46.253 million for 2018/19 (excluding the HRA capital programme). Actual expenditure to the end of July was £3.068 million. There was a forecast favourable variance of (£6.627 million) which was summarised by Cabinet Portfolio within the report itself in greater detail.

·  The 2018/19 (Year 1) budget included savings of £6.703 million (after repayments was £2.606 million) in line with the current MTFS. The latest position showed that 71% were RAG rated as Green with 29% RAG rated as either Red or Amber, compared with the 2017/18 position this time last year of 76% and 24% respectively.

·  The RAG delivery status at this point this year compared to this point last year was marginally worse for Year 1, but better for Years 2 and 3.

RESOLVED

(i)  To note the current financial position; and

(ii)  To approve the budget virements made up to Period 4 of 2018/19, as summarised in Appendix B to the report.

The Cabinet was informed of the Additional Housing Revenue Account Borrowing Programme as published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG). The report also sought approval in principle to the Councils bid for additional Housing Revenue Account headroom to finance the delivery of new social rented housing.

In considering the report, Members attention was drawn to the following:

·  An important part of achieving more new housing was to increase council housebuilding. The Governments 2017 Autumn Budget announced that up to £1bn of additional Housing Revenue Account (HRA) headroom (borrowing approval) would be available for councils in high demand areas. Outside of London, Solihull was one of 75 local authorities with HRA’s that were eligible to bid.

·  The Additional Housing Revenue Account Borrowing Programme bidding prospectus was published by MHCLG on 26 June. £0.5bn was available to local authorities outside London and the remaining £0.5bn was available to London Boroughs. The Prospectus offered additional borrowing to finance capital expenditure in 2019/20, 2020/21 and 2021/22.

·  Officers had initially considered the best development opportunities for making a successful bid under the Programme and proposed to do so on the following basis:

-  Faulkner Road (Lyndon ward). Seven social rented bungalows

-  Anglesey Avenue (Smith’s Wood ward). Seventeen houses for social rent

-  Auckland Drive (Smith’s Wood ward). Thirty six apartments for social rent.

·  The current borrowing bid was for 60 new homes at an estimated total development cost of £6.2m. However, the bid deadline of 7 September 2018, had now been extended until the end of September which meant that additional sites could now be included, giving an increased total of 101 potential new homes.

·  In all cases, development was subject to further Cabinet approvals, a successful bid, and planning consent. Consideration of public representations that are received as a result of advertising the notices of intention to dispose of areas of public open space, to facilitate some development sites, would be reported to Cabinet in October along with details of the schemes to be funded by the headroom bid.

RESOLVED

(i)  To note the Additional Housing Revenue Account Borrowing Programme, published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government;

(ii)  Approve in principle the Council's bid for additional Housing Revenue Account headroom to finance delivery of social rented housing; and

(iii)  Agree to receive a further report to the October Cabinet meeting that sets out more detail of the schemes to be funded by the headroom bid.