Contact: Bevis Ingram, ext 7508

1. Summary

1.1 The following decision is sought:

To note the position on the 2003/04 budget

2. Reason

2.1 Regular monitoring and reporting on the budget.

3. Other options considered and rejected

3.1 Not applicable.

4. Conflicts of interest declared by the decision maker or a member or officer consulted

4.1 None.

5. Dispensation granted by the Standards Committee

5.1 Not applicable.

6. Reason for the matter being dealt with if urgent

6.1 Not applicable.

Approved by: (signature) Date: (date of decision)

Councillor J Waddington

Contact: Bevis Ingram, ext 7508

1. Introduction

1.1 The Recreation and Heritage budget is the subject of regular monitoring. The position on the budget is being reported to the Executive Member and the Policy Review Committee throughout the year. The Executive Member received monitoring reports in July and September, following an update on the budget in May (which was also considered by the Policy Review Committee). This paper updates the position since September and, following comments at the PRC meeting, provides further detail on the budget figures.

2. Budget adjustments 2003/04

2.1 The Appendix shows the summary cash limits, actual to date and forecast outturn for each service. The overall cash limit for the Recreation and Heritage Department has increased by £72,000 as shown below:

2.2 In addition the base budgets for some services have been increased to reflect transfers from the Policy Fund for permanent commitments such as staff appointments.

3. Budget Monitoring

3.1 The actual to date figures in the Appendix show income/expenditure recorded to 31 October 2003 for each service. The actual figures for some services at the end of September look out of line with the budget, but this is due to the uneven profile of income and expenditure during the year. This was commented on in earlier reports.

3.2 As previously reported, the budget continues to be under considerable pressure. Management action has been taken to address this. However, additional pressures and commitments now make it probable that, without further action to restrict spending, there will be a small overspending against the budget limit for the year.

3.3 The three main areas of pressures are:

· the transitional costs of the Library review,

· challenging income targets, and

· Milestones and the Museums Service.

3.4 The additional costs associated with the Library review were highlighted in the report to the Executive Member in July. The scale of the challenge facing the Library and Information Service management team should not be underestimated. An action plan has been implemented and further actions are being identified. As an additional contingency, £100,000 of the Policy Fund is being held back to meet any shortfall. With this it is expected that the additional costs can be contained within budget.

3.5 Initial indications are that the Recreation and Heritage Department is doing well against its challenging income targets although not all targets will be achieved and some services are making compensating savings as a result. Arts Centres in particular are expecting a shortfall and despite savings made elsewhere in Arts an overspend of £20,000 is now being forecast in this area.

3.6 The Milestones Executive Board has taken action in response to lower than hoped for income from visitors this year. Some of Milestones' functions and costs have been transferred to the Museums Service and the Museums Service is taking action to absorb these pressures. However following disappointing income for September it now looks unlikely that the income targets for the remaining months will be achieved and there is potentially £60,000 more to absorb within the overall Recreation and Heritage budget. A provision has been made in the Policy Fund to meet this.

3.7 The Policy Fund totals £1,874,000 and is intended to support new initiatives directed at key service objectives. It has been created through a combination of additional resources provided in the 2003/04 budget and significant redeployment of existing resources. In order to meet the budget pressures outlined above, the Department has held back from committing some of this. This was initially done as a temporary measure but it is now clear that uncommitted funds will have to be held back for the remainder of the year. In total £152,000 is available, but the total pressures against this fund are £160,000 (£100,000 for Libraries and £60,000 for Milestones) giving a forecast overspend on the Policy Fund at this stage of £8,000. The total forecast overspend for the Recreation and Heritage is therefore £28,000 (£8,000 on the Policy Fund and £20,000 on the Arts budget).

4. Further action

4.1 This monitoring report is based on the figures at the end of October. Five months of the financial year remain. The financial position will be looked at again by the management of the Recreation and Heritage Department to identify further action that can be taken to eliminate the potential overspend. The Director of Recreation and Heritage is determined to ensure that there will be no overspend at the end of the financial year.

Recommendation

1. To note the position on the 2003/04 budget.

Section 100 D - Local Government Act 1972 - background papers

The following documents disclose facts or matters on which this report, or an important part of it, is based and has been relied upon to a material extent in the preparation of this report.

NB the list excludes:

Published works.

Documents which disclose exempt or confidential information as defined in the Act.

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