Agenda item

(Copy herewith)

The Strategic Finance Manager presented the report. The report presented the financial position to the end of December 2015 for the General Fund and HRA revenue and Capital budgets.

It also presented the car parking income and usage to the end of January 2016 and the updated position regarding the Council’s outstanding debts to the end of January 2016

It was advised that the general fund revenue position to the end of December is forecasting a saving of £722k by the end of the year.  The main variances that make up this difference were outlined on page 10 and 11 of the report and supported by the detailed information in the appendices.

The Strategic Finance Manager stated that the HRA revenue position to the end of December is forecasting a saving of £1,293k due to continued good performance of arrears management resulting in forecast lower contributions required to the Bad debt provision and in addition the identification of costs capitalised to capital schemes.

In addition to this, the Interest and finance costs are forecast to be under budget for the reasons for are mentioned in the report on page 11.

The GF Capital Programme is currently forecasting a roll forward of £1.5m and a saving of £236k to the end of December.

The HRA Capital Programme is forecast to slip £1.5 to 16/17 financial year in relation to the NPH Capital ITC budget and the managed budget on improvement to homes. It was reported that this is an improvement on the period 6 position reported to the last Audit Committee.

The corporate debt report was attached at Appendix 6. It was advised that the overall outstanding arrears have increased by £2m compared with same point last year.

In response to questions from the committee the Chief Finance Officer responded as below

·         That the 3.25 million pound loan to NTFC was cancelled and removed from capital programme

·         Council need to fund certain planning appeals from its reserves.

·         A breakdown of Civic and Mayoralty expense can be provided.

The Revenues Manager clarified that Northampton Borough Council anticipated savings of 3.2 million but actual savings was 2.6 million but still have saved a great deal of money.

In response to questions from the committee the Strategic Finance Manager advised that there was an environmental service review of ground maintenance contract and the environmental services line reflects the pay mechanism deduction for poor performance of contract the Environmental Services contract.

In response to further questioning from the committee the Chief Finance Officer responded as below:

·         That there were no successful candidates following interviews for an Assets Manager and therefore had an interim in place longer than anticipated. Not having someone in that role impacts the business. NBC have appointed a permanent candidate since.

·         Restructure was needed to deliver savings in budget proposed.

In response to questions from the committee The Senior Audit Manager advised that reports regarding payroll and HR services come from LGSS internal audit.

The Chair requested that a brief report to be presented at the next meeting outlining the number of interim staff and vacant positions at the moment at NBC broken down into grade and department.

He also requested a short explanation on FA01, RG04 and HS05 in appendix 1 of the report.

RESOLVED

2.1      The Audit Committee considered thecontentsofthefollowingfinance   reports:

·    General FundRevenueMonitoring (Appendix1);

·    General FundCapital Monitoring (Appendix2);

·    HRA RevenueMonitoring (Appendix3);

·    HRA CapitalMonitoring (Appendix4).

2.2    The Audit Committee notedthe positiononcar parkingincomeand usageas at 31January (Appendix5A and5B).

2.3    The Audit Committee notedthelatestpositionin relationto theCouncil’s outstanding debts asat 31 January (Appendix6)

2.4    The Audit Committee considered whether it requires anyadditional informationin orderto fulfil its governancerole.