Contact: Gordon Shinn, (01962) 847545; [email protected]

1 Summary

1.1 This report sets out the proposed Children's Services revenue budget for 2008/09, a provisional budget for 2009/10 and 2010/11 and recommends a revised budget for 2007/08.

1.2 The following decisions are sought:

a) To approve for submission to the Leader and Cabinet:

1 The revised budget for 2007/08 totalling £881.815m (as set out in appendices 1 and 2)

2 The base budget for 2008/09 totalling £901.540m (as set out in Appendix 3)

3 The proposals for growth totalling £14.439m (as set out in Appendix 4)

4 The proposals for redeployment of resources totalling £2.898m in 2008/09 (as set out in Appendix 4)

5 The proposals for efficiency improvements totalling £1.572m (1.1% of the base budget) in 2008/09 (as set out in Appendix 5)

6 The annual review of income and charges (as set out in Appendix 6)

7 The summarised trading accounts of business units (as set out in Appendix 7)

8 The detailed budget for 2008/09 (as set out in Appendix 8)

9 The workforce implications of the proposed budget for 2008/09 (as set out in Appendix 10)

10 The provisional total base budget for 2009/10 of £939.769m and for 2010/11 of £976.321m (as set out in Appendix 11).

11 The request to consider a one off invest to save allocation for in house foster care of £1.4m in 2008/09 to be repaid in 2010/11. This enables additional investment in the in-house foster care service to be repaid within the three year budget period, partly by reducing Independent Foster Provider placements.

1 Reasons

1.1 Cabinet has requested that service budgets be prepared for approval by Executive members within the provisional budget guidelines set by Cabinet in December 2007 and submitted to the Leader and Cabinet for consideration in February 2008. Proposals need to be submitted to the Cabinet on 8 February 2008 in order to influence decisions on the 2008/09 budget and council tax.

1.2 The budget proposals contained in this report are developed from the Corporate Business Plan, the Children and Young People's Plan and the service priorities. These have been developed to support the priorities of the Corporate Strategy.

2 Other options considered and rejected:

2.1 The total of the budget proposals in this report equal the guidelines set by Cabinet, subject to Cabinet approval of the request for an invest to save allocation of £1.4m for in-house foster care in 2008/09, which is to be repaid in 2010/11. A budget in excess of the guidelines is not affordable and a budget below the guidelines would not enable service objectives to be met.

2.2 For the Schools Budget options were developed with Schools Forum. For the non schools budget the significant investment proposal for foster care is the subject of a business case and option appraisal elsewhere on the Executive Lead Member for Children's Services (Education) agenda.

3 Conflicts of interest declared by the decision maker or other Executive member consulted - none

4 Dispensation granted by the Standards Committee - none

5 Reason(s) for the matter being dealt with if urgent - none

Approved by: Date: Date: 23 January 2008

Councillor David Kirk

Executive Lead Member for Children's Services (Education)