Issue - meetings

To receive an update from Councillor Charlotte Morley on her work during 2018/19 in her capacity as Portfolio Holder for Finance.

Councillor Charlotte Morley presented an update on the work carried out to date during the 2018/19 municipal year in her capacity as Executive Portfolio Holder for Finance. 

It was noted that pressures on parliamentary time had delayed a Government announcement regarding the Local Government Settlement and more details would be provided as soon as they were available.  It was envisaged that the main pressures on the 2019/20 budget would include: inflation, the decrease in funding from Surrey County Council and fluctuations in rental income.  It was noted that details of the impact of the changes to business rates would be included in the update given by the Assets Portfolio Holder at a future meeting.  However when developing the Council’s budget, officers adopted a prudential approach when forecasting the rents expected from town centre properties.

Universal Credit had been launched in Surrey Heath on 28^th November consequently it was still too early to ascertain what impact the changes would have on residents.  The Council was not responsible for paying the benefit to recipients and therefore had no control over any payment delays.  To help mitigate against any delays, officers had undertaken a significant amount of work in the run up to the roll out of Universal Credit to ensure that recipients received everything they were entitled to without undue delay and two weeks full rent was being given to benefits recipients as soon as the notification to stop the housing benefits was received in order to help bridge the gap between the two payment systems.

Arising from members’ questions and comments the following points were noted:

·         Decisions to reduce or stop the provision of any services would be made by the individual departments.  It was the responsibility of the Section 151 Officer to ensure that any budget set by the Council was sustainable.

·         If the Council received notice of a negative Revenue Support Grant then there were a number of options that the Council could consider in order to balance the budget including: increasing income, cutting services and putting unfunded capital projects on hold.

·         The impact of Brexit on the local and national economy had been acknowledged and contingency planning was taking place.

It was requested that any further questions be forwarded to Councillor Morley.  The Committee thanked Councillor Morley for her update.