Agenda item

To consider the level of spending against the Council’s Revenue and Capital budgets for the first eight months to 30 November 2016.

The Committee considered the financial performance monitoring report, which set out the summary revenue budget position for the Council and its individual directorates for month 8, the period April 2016 – November 2016, together with an outlook for the remainder of the year. The report was complemented with an assessment of progress to date against the latest capital programme.

Members raised concerns regarding the overspend in Children’s Services. Councillor Blackburn reported that the main reason for the overspend was due to the high costs of placements for the significantly high number of Looked After Children. He provided the Committee with an update of the recruitment process of a new Director of Children’s Services, noting that a key interview focus for candidates had been their plans to reduce the number of Looked After Children, as well as reduce the costs of placements.

The Committee discussed the unsustainability of the high cost of placements and it was considered that a significant proportion of the costs of placements was for security rather than for therapeutic work to address the issues of the child and family. Councillor Blackburn advised the Committee of the plans to address the issues of the high costs of placements, providing Members with details of the a short term ‘crash pad’ facility, which was hoped would help to avoid the commencement of court proceedings and expensive care placements for some cases.

The Committee also raised questions relating to the overspend of £250,000 by the illuminations service. Mr Cavill, Director of Place advised that the overspend had been as a result of the Lightpool project not achieving its targeted level of income, as well as other illuminations projects costing more than had been initially expected. Mr Cavill reported that it was hoped the overspend figure would be reduced before the end of the financial year as there still remained some income sources yet to be accounted.

Members raised questions relating to the sustainability of the Lightpool project and Mr Cavill advised that the project would be sustainable in the longer term and that some of the costs had been initial start-up costs that would not be recurring costs for future years. He explained that the Lightpool village had not been as successful as had initially been hoped due to the difficulty of selling food, drink and merchandise concessions, as a result of there being many vendors already established for making those type of sales in Blackpool. The Committee discussed the difficulty in trying to ensure visitors bought official merchandise and Councillor Blackburn explained that unfortunately there appeared to be very little that could be done to prevent sales from non-official vendors, especially if the vendor had a pedlar’s certificate.

The Committee raised questions relating to the overspend of £100,000 in print services. Councillor Blackburn advised that due to technological advances there was a reduced demand for a centralised print services unit and whilst the service was not losing money, it was not currently meeting its income target. As a result, he noted that the service would remain under review.

The Committee noted the deterioration of the working balances and questioned whether the Leader of the Council was confident that there were adequate reserves. Councillor Blackburn advised that it was important to ensure reserves were at a healthy level as in the current financial climate it had to be accepted that there were higher levels of risk for the local authority. He explained that the overall financial position if not for the overspend in Children’s Services would be on target and it was noted that there were still significant earmarked reserves and four months of the financial year remaining to improve the level of working balances to at least £3 million.

The Committee agreed to note the report.

Background papers: None.