Archived decisions

1

Summary

1.1

The Government's Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR07) requires the Authority to make cashable efficiency gains of £1,055,000 in each of the next three years. In order to deliver its planned objectives an efficiency plan is in the process of being drawn up. We have a proven robust budgetary control process in place to manage our financial resources and the purpose of this report is to show how progress against the efficiency plan will be managed, controlled and monitored within the existing arrangements.

2

RecommendationError! Bookmark not defined.

2.1

That the Chief Officer be authorised to manage the efficiency plan via the Directors' Group financial monitoring process as an integral part of overall budget management.

2.2

Progress will be reported to the Authority in the quarterly budget monitoring reports to the Finance and General Purposes Committee (F&GP).

3

Process

3.1

Managing the budget: the Directors' Group regularly review and manage the budget using a "Decision Spreadsheet (DDS)". This is a strategic financial planning document and is maintained by the Head of Financial and Office Services (HFOS). It comprises four sections for recording key financial information and management decisions:

3.1.1

Available Funds: the list of resources that are available and can be vired to meet new or unfunded expenditure needs; eg contingencies, Modernisation Reserve, grants, declared underspends and one off or ongoing efficiency savings achieved.

3.1.2

Resource Requirements: these are requests for funding spending pressures that budget managers are unable to meet within their existing resources in the current year; eg new projects and posts or unforeseen fluctuations in income or demand for services.

3.1.3

Growth: the record of all new growth requirements identified in Service Plans such as the Integrated Risk Management Plan (IRMP) or Capital Programme. Growth requirements may also be identified in section 3.1.2.

3.1.4

Cashable Ongoing Efficiencies Planned: the record showing progress towards the £1.055m efficiency target for the years 2008/09 to 2010/11.

3.2

Head of Financial and Office Services records details of contingencies and grants from central government such as those for New Burdens and Regional Control Centres etc. together with any funding implications or efficiency gains from reports presented to Service Management Team (SMT). In addition any manager can request an addition to the sheet, either through their director or HFOS or by attending the Directors Group.

3.3

The Directors meet weekly and the Chief Officer regularly requests budget updates. Any decisions taken are recorded on the sheet.

3.4

Expenditure cannot be committed or new projects started until funding has been agreed.

3.5

Monitoring and reporting progress: the Financial Services team together with the Treasurer and Corporate Finance Team produce the quarterly budget monitoring reports for F&GP by extracting information from the financial management system (SAP)

3.5.1

The Financial Services team transfer the information from the DDS to the virement file and record the date of input into the financial management system (SAP).

3.5.2

To distinguish between ordinary virements and those associated with the ongoing efficiency gains the virement file now has a separate section for efficiency gains.

3.5.3

This separate recording will enable reconciliation between the DDS and SAP as well as to provide the narrative for the efficiency gains as these are not readily available in SAP.

4

Contribution to corporate aims and objectives

4.1

This establishes a clear link between our medium term financial plan and our operational plans and objectives.

5

Risk Analysis

5.1

Managing, controlling and monitoring the Service's financial resource requirements corporately in one consolidated process minimises the risk of being over or underspent at the year end and ensures that resources are targeted to priority areas.

6

Resource implications

6.1

There are no additional resource requirements.

7

Equality Impact Assessment

The proposals within this report are considered compatible with the provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights, the Human Rights Act 1998, and the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000.

8

Conclusion

8.1

For several years the Chief Officer and Directors have used the Directors Decision Spreadsheet to allocate financial resources to priority areas. This has proved highly effective as an audit trail of decision making, virement and financial planning. With the requirement to make ongoing cashable efficiency gains in order to fund service delivery needs it is necessary to incorporate this into the corporate budgetary control process.

8.2

The opportunity has been taken to describe the process that is in place for managing the Service's resource requirements at corporate level and to request that the Chief Officer be authorised to manage the efficiency gains as an integral part of the overall budget.

Background information (Section 100D of Local Government Act 1972)

The following documents disclose the 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 the report:

None

Note: The list excludes: (1) published works; and (2) documents that disclose exempt or confidential information defined in the Act.