Venue: Remotely via Microsoft Teams. View directions
Contact: Rachel Percival 01792 636292
No. | Item |
---|---|
Disclosure of Personal and Prejudicial Interests Minutes: In accordance with the Code of Conduct adopted by the City
and County of Swansea, the following interests were declared: Rachel Percival - (Item 6) - personal interest, left prior
item 6 and re-joined for item 7 onwards. |
|
Prohibition of Whipped Votes and Declaration of Party Whips Minutes: None. |
|
To receive the minutes of the previous meeting(s) and agree as an accurate record. Minutes: Minutes of previous meeting were
agreed. |
|
Public Questions Questions can be submitted
in writing to Scrutiny scrutiny@swansea.gov.uk up until noon on the working day prior to the meeting.
Written questions take precedence. Public may attend and ask questions in
person if time allows. Questions must relate to items on the open part of the
agenda and will be dealt with in a 10 minute period. Minutes: There were no public questions
received. |
|
Budget Proposals 2023/24 - 2026/27 PDF 792 KB Invited to attend: Cllr Rob Stewart - Cabinet Member for Economy, Finance and Strategy Ben Smith – Director of Finance / S.151 Officer Additional documents:
Minutes: Cllr Rob Stewart Cabinet Member for Economy, Finance and
Strategy and Ben Smith the Director of Finance and Section 151 Officer attended
to give an overview of the draft budget. They talked through the following: ·
Formal budget consultations have started and are
ongoing. ·
Significant cash funding for 23/34 has been
agreed but this does not fully cover any pay awards. ·
Over £75 million worth of cash sums going in
over the next four years into directorate budgets, with more going into central
pots but the real terms spending power will still be impacted. ·
£15m has been budgeted for energy costs to cover
short term inflation cost rises. This will be taken from the Economic Recovery
Fund in the short term. ·
£22.3 million of cash savings are required from
services and a further near £3 million from schools, making £25 million in cash
savings required at the moment on the planning assumptions made. ·
Current reserves stands at £168m with £40m
earmarked estimated spend for the current year and £30m earmarked spend for the
coming year. ·
Up to 68 full time equivalent roles are at risk
with ongoing mitigations to reduce this number. ·
The cost implications of the current and forecast pay awards for local
government staff and teachers with fall upon the Council. ·
Up to
£50m future borrowing is forecast. Any borrowing will be delayed until rates of
interest are more attractive. ·
There
is no plan to draw further on the Insurance Fund (£14m) this year especially as
Cabinet only recently agreed a major draw in current year. Officers are
confident this is well-funded at the present time, based on relevant
information and advice. ·
The is
a current assumption of a 5% rise in Council tax for planning purposes but no
decision yet and will only be finalised when all other costs factored in. ·
The
Fire Authority Levy which is independently set is yet unknown. Early
indications are that the levy could rise by between 8% and 17%. |
|
Q2 Revenue and Capital Budget Monitoring 2022/23 PDF 584 KB Invited to attend: Cllr Rob Stewart - Cabinet Member for Economy, Finance and Strategy Ben Smith – Director of Finance / S.151 Officer Additional documents: Minutes: Cllr
Rob Stewart and Ben Smith talked through the Q2 budget monitoring report for
22/23: ·
Quarter
2 Monitoring report demonstrates similar picture to Quarter 1. ·
Directors
have been requested to avoid overspending and overall there is just under a £3
million overspent forecast however the teachers’ pay increase is anticipated at
a £3.4 million cost pressure which will be drawn from school reserves ensuring
the overall budget balanced. ·
There
is an under spend on capital financing which is being used to top up the
Capital Equalization Reserve. ·
There
are emerging pressures in housing which will affect the HRA finances. |
|
Q2 2022/23 Performance Monitoring Report PDF 158 KB Invited to attend: Cllr David Hopkins – Cabinet Member for Corporate Services & Performance Richard Rowlands – Strategic Delivery & Performance Manager Additional documents: Minutes: Richard Rowlands Corporate Performance Manager presented the
report. It was noted that: ·
Out of 27 comparable indicators in the report,
14 showed improvement or maintained performance. Of the remaining 13, 4 showed
a decline but within just 5% of the previous result, 2 showed a drop in
performance attributable to the effects of the pandemic and 7 showed a drop in
performance not related to the pandemic. ·
There were 6 new indicators during quarter 2
mainly as the result of the introduction of a new social services performance
framework by Welsh Government. ·
Safeguarding performance remains strong, but
challenges also remain in terms of workforce capacity, which is an issue across
health and social care. ·
A shift to preventative and well-being
approaches is envisaged by the social services well-being act which are yet to
be fully embedded due to investment being directed towards health boards.
Although the Council is committed to investing in preventative models. ·
Education attendance figures have dropped but
are within 5% of the previous result. Work is being undertaken by the Education
and Skills Corporate Delivery Committee to look at this issue. ·
Economy and Infrastructure has seen an
improvement compared to the same period last year in the number of projects
with social benefit clauses and Beyond Bricks & Mortar in their
contracts. There was a slight fall in
the % of planning applications determined in 8 weeks due to vacancies within
the team. ·
In regards to tackling poverty, the processing
times for Council tax and housing benefits has dropped. Similarly to last
quarter, staff continue to be diverted to administer Welsh Government grants in
addition to some loss of staff. ·
There is an increase in staff sickness due to
the impact from the pandemic and delays to health treatments issues and
personal stress. ·
Work is underway to seek to develop new climate
change and nature indicators aiming to be introduced for the first quarter of
next year or as soon as possible thereafter in line with the work needed to
define them and ensure data is collectable and reportable. |
|
Sustainable Swansea Update PDF 339 KB Invited to attend: Cllr Andrea Lewis – Cabinet Member for Service Transformation Martin Nicholls – Chief
Executive Sarah Lackenby – Head of
Digital and Customer Services Marlyn Dickson – Strategic Change
Programme Manager Additional documents:
Minutes: Martin Nicholls, Chief Executive presented
this report. The following was noted: ·
Sustainable Swansea has
been previously brought to scrutiny and this report covered the remaining
outstanding items. ·
Sustainable Swansea has delivered close to £70
million worth of savings and contributed to service reform and that some of the
reviews highlighted the Council offers competitive services with value for
money. ·
A number of queries
about the report were made in regards to how well the progress made met
achieved the intended outcomes. These will be set out in a letter to the
Cabinet Member for response. |
|
Additional documents:
Minutes: No comments were made on the
attached letter to Cabinet Members. |
|
Minutes: No comments were
made on the Work Plan. |
|
Letter to Cabinet Member - Service Transformation PDF 341 KB |
|
Letter to Cabinet Member - Corporate Services and Performance PDF 346 KB |
|
Letter to Cabinet Member - Economy, Finance & Strategy (Leader) PDF 352 KB |
|
Cabinet Member Response - Economy, Finance & Strategy (Leader) PDF 159 KB |
|
Cabinet Member Response - Investment, Regeneration & Tourism PDF 139 KB |