Skip to main content

Agenda item

REVENUE BUDGET OUTTURN 2025/26 (FINAL)

REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR – RESOURCES

 

The purpose of this report is to inform Cabinet of the summary position on revenue income and expenditure at the end of the financial year 2025/26.

Decision:

RESOLVED: That Cabinet:

 

(1)  Noted this report.

 

(2)  Approved a decrease of £1.385million in the 2025/26 net General Fund expenditure, as identified in section 8, to a total of £21.400million.

 

(3)  Approved the changes to the 2026/27 General Fund budget, as identified in table 4 and paragraph 8.3, a total £651k increase in net expenditure

 

RECOMMENDED TO COUNCIL: That it:

 

(1)  Approves the net transfer from earmarked reserves, as identified in table 9, of £4.925million.

 

REASONS FOR RECOMMENDATIONS:

 

(1)  Members are able to monitor, make adjustments within the overall budgetary framework and request appropriate action of Services who do not meet the budget targets set as part of the Corporate Business Planning process.

 

(2)  Changes to the Council’s balances are monitored and approved.

Minutes:

Audio recording – 1 hour 56 minutes 24 seconds

 

The Chair invited Councillor Vijaiya Poopalasingham, as Chair of the Finance, Audit and Risk (FAR) Committee, to present the referral on this item. Councillor Poopalasingham advised that:

 

·        The report had been updated for Cabinet to reflect a reduction in the underspend on waste vehicles and the mobilisation of the waste contract, and although this had been funded from waste reserves, this shortfall had impacted the outturn position.

·        Appendix A to the report had been considered, which gave a breakdown of variance in the year and the report gave the final outturn position.

·        Previous carry forward amounts at paragraph 8.5 demonstrated that delivery was constrained by capacity, and there had been concern over significant variances resulting in a big carry forward to this financial year, as this might constrain capacity further.

·        There had been a focus on overspends such as the £169K in relation to Churchgate as indicated on page 489 of the Agenda Reports Pack.

·        Loss of commercial waste revenue was noted and mitigations measures for this were considered.

·        Apart from variances, the Committee were happy with the outturn.

 

N.B. Councillor Amy Allen entered the Chamber at 21:29.

 

Councillor Ian Albert, as the Executive Member for Resources, presented the report entitled ‘Revenue Budget Outturn 2025-26 (Final)’ and advised that:

 

·        The number of car parking tickets sold went up by 4.6%, and penalty charge notices had also increased in this period.

·        They were happy to take on board comments from the FAR Committee. 

·        Table 4 in the report looked at budgets, variances and carry forwards and these were carefully reviewed with Directors and Executive Members, but there was an acknowledgment for more transparency on this.

·        External expertise would be important for the Churchgate project, but there was recognition that they could be more transparent about the nature of the spend on this.

·        There had been further underspend against the budget, but half of this would be carried forward to next year as detailed in Table 4.

·        £1.884M would be carried forward as shown at paragraph 8.3 of the report.

·        Carry forwards from previous years were displayed in paragraph 8.5 to show that there were multiple planned areas of spend.

·        The target level of efficiencies had been met as detailed at paragraph 8.4.

·        Performance against corporate financial health income measures was shown at paragraphs 8.6-8.8.

·        The General Fund was £17.9M by year end with £1.9M proposed carry forward, which was healthier than the £14.4M net position forecast back in February 2025

·        Appendix 1 summarised all the variances across the year.

 

In response to a question by Councillor Daniel Allen, the Director – Resources advised that the costs incurred from the Public Inquiry for the appeal for the application on Barkway Road, Royston would likely be included if they were incurred before the end of March, but this would be checked.

 

Councillor Ian Albert proposed the recommendations in the report, and this was seconded by Councillor Daniel Allen.

 

As part of the debate, Councillor Sean Nolan highlighted that:

 

·        Combining outputs from risk management around capacity with staffing from Local Government Reorganisation would always be challenging.

·        They would need to keep monitoring the above as this was not the first time there had been carry forwards, but they were fortunate to have good staffing levels.

·        Everything needed to be done to support staff while the Council existed.

 

Having been proposed and seconded and, following a vote, it was:

 

RESOLVED: That Cabinet:

 

(1)   Noted this report.

 

(2)   Approved a decrease of £1.385million in the 2025/26 net General Fund expenditure, as identified in section 8, to a total of £21.400million.

 

(3)   Approved the changes to the 2026/27 General Fund budget, as identified in table 4 and paragraph 8.3, a total £651k increase in net expenditure

 

RECOMMENDED TO COUNCIL: That it approves the net transfer from earmarked reserves, as identified in table 9, of £4.925million.

 

REASONS FOR RECOMMENDATIONS:

 

(1)   Members are able to monitor, make adjustments within the overall budgetary framework and request appropriate action of Services who do not meet the budget targets set as part of the Corporate Business Planning process.

 

(2)   Changes to the Council’s balances are monitored and approved.

Supporting documents: