Agenda item

NOTE: The deadline for receipt of amendments to all reports issued with the final agenda is midnight, Monday 23 September 2019.

Report attached (subject to agreement by Cabinet).

Two questions by Residents’ Group and three questions by Labour Group answered by Leader of the Council.

Report AGREED without division.

It was confirmed that a report had been agreed by Cabinet at its meeting on 18 September 2019 concerning an update of the Council’s Medium Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) and budget for 2020/21. The report summarised the Council’s current financial situation, updated on the MTFS and proposals to close the funding go and also gave an update on the 2019/20 capital programme.

Questions on the report were submitted by the Residents’ and Labour Groups and were responded to by the Leader of the Council as shown below.

From The Residents’ Group with reference to paragraph 1.5 of the report

Question:

1.         Would the Leader of the Council confirm why there is a £818K overspend in the Neighbourhoods budget and how this has been allowed to happen?

Answer:

The Neighbourhood Team are working to reduce the current overspend before the end of the year. The current projected overspend for the end of the year has reduced to £485k. As set out in the report, the pressure is partially due to the delayed delivery of the Keep Havering Moving Strategy. Work streams within the strategy are underway but there has been slippage in some timescales. It is not unusual for new strategies to take longer to bed in than anticipated which is why the Council holds a contingency budget and reserves.

There has also been a reduction in income from cremations compared to previous years.

The Neighbourhoods Team are identifying savings in other areas to mitigate the overspend e.g. from an over-recovery of garden waste income and lower planning and business support costs.

All departments aim to be within budget by the end of the year.

Question:

2.         Would the Leader of the Council confirm what action he is taking to rectify the overspend situation in the Neighbourhoods budget?

Answer:

The Leader and the Cabinet monitor the Council’s budget on a monthly basis and hold Directors to account when there are overspends. Potential mitigations are discussed on a monthly basis.                                                                                                                 

From The Labour Group in relation to Appendix A of te report.

Question:

1.         In the service improvement programme and efficiency proposals there are 42 items listed to meet the saving target - a draft budget for each area must have been established. Please could this be added to the report so that the impact on services could be better understood by members?

Answer:

The proposals listed in Appendix A are to inform Councillors and other key stakeholders of the areas being considered for savings and efficiency in order to balance the budget. As explained at the Cabinet meeting on 18 September, these proposals are in the process of being fully analysed and quantified to enable recommendations to be made to the November 2019 Cabinet and ultimately to full Council in February 2020. At this stage the full analysis of each proposal has not been fully completed so it would be misleading to add figures which will inevitably change.                                                                                                                 

Question:

2.         A number of these items refer to the reduction in use of agency staff and the replacement with more cost effective internal staff. While we applaud this, was this not part of the original savings proposals and if not why not?

Answer:

The Council continually reviews the number of agency staff it employs on an ongoing basis. The current savings and efficiency process has identified that primarily through the new People Strategy additional savings will be possible through the initiatives of that programme. The People Strategy will be presented to Cabinet in November for consideration.

Question:

3      On item 31 it is suggested that you cease to use agency staff and instead use ASYE's to reduce agency costs. As ASYEs are relatively newly qualified staff and agency staff are generally more experienced what mitigating factors are the Directors of Children's and Adults Services putting in place?

Answer:

The Council alongside other London boroughs is faced with challenges to recruit and retain permanent social workers. Through the Havering Social Care Academy, across both Adult and Children’s Services, a comprehensive strategy to attracting and supporting the workforce is in place and being implemented.

The ASYE scheme is one initiative which will enable the Council to increase the number of permanent staff through training and development of newly qualified social workers. It is recognised that in the initial phases these workers will have lower caseloads but this will be managed carefully by the service in order to minimise the impact on the service and allow at the appropriate time, release of more expensive agency staff. This proposal will sit alongside other initiatives to recruit permanent social workers and it is recognised that this strategy will be a process over several years.

Across both directorates, there have been successes. In Children’s Services, they have moved from a 45% permanently recruited social care workforce in October 2016 to 80% as of August 2019. In Adult Services, there has been stability over the last three years, with a current permanency rate of 85%. 

The report was AGREED without division and it was RESOLVED:

1.      That additional capital budget is added into the 2019/20 Capital Programme of £4 million to fund the Smart Working Programme, with the revenue costs of the capital funding to be met by invest to save from the income raised through renting out spare office capacity freed up by the programme.

2.      That £14.7 million is added into the 2019/20 Capital Programme to replenish the capital allocation for new opportunities with capital charges funded from the business cases.