COUNCIL MEETING
WEDNESDAY 2 MARCH 2011
BUDGET STATEMENT BY COUNCILLOR DAVID WATTS
LEADER OF THE COUNCIL
Mr Mayor, honoured guests, fellow councillors, ladies and gentlemen, it gives me
great pleasure to present the budget for Broxtowe Borough Council for 2011/12. In
these times of financial crisis and cutbacks this is a budget that the Council can be
very proud of, showing other councils how it can be done. The Liberal Democrat and
Labour councillors who have worked on this budget for many months have delivered
what the people of Broxtowe want, a budget which is fair and does not add to their
strain in difficult financial times.
The headlines of this budget are very clear. There will be no increase in council tax.
There will be no withdrawal from balances. There are no compulsory redundancies
and no reduction in front line services. This is a balanced budget and what’s more it
is a budget that delivers exactly what the people of Broxtowe expect from us.
We have achieved this through the work of the officers in being willing to be
innovative and to find new and better ways of doing things. As one of our officers put
it to me recently, “when times are hard it is up to us to show how good we are, and if
we can’t do it we shouldn’t be here.” I‘m pleased to say that our officers have more
than shown their worth. In particular I would like to thank the leadership shown by
Ruth Hyde and Malcolm Staley, who have shown a willingness to engage with the
difficulties and to lead by example. I’d also like to pay tribute to my predecessor as
Leader of the Council, Michael Rich. It was Michael who saw the problems that were
coming and, during his time as Leader, that we put in place the cost saving
measures which have stood us in such good standing this year. Without this
foresight, achieving the savings that we have in the way that we have would simply
not have been possible and the budget would have been far more difficult.
In the budget for next year we have had to address the fact that the Formula Grant
from central government has been reduced by 14.2%. On top of this we have had a
reduction in the amount we receive in our benefits administration grant of a further
£172,000. This was the biggest reduction of any council in the country. I have written
to Mr Pickles to ask why he feels that Broxtowe is better placed to handled benefit
payments than anyone else but he hasn’t had the courtesy to reply. The position has
been made even worse with the reduction in grants that we receive from the County
Council, including such things as the county retaining the waste recycling credits that
we used to receive, which was worth approximately £50,000 a year to this Council.
This was a payment for the material that we as a borough collected and the County
Council should be ashamed that they are no longer passing this on. That would be
the equivalent of almost 1% on our council tax.
To address this challenge we have adopted a four pronged programme. We have
looked at what additional income can be brought in, we have looked at how we can
redesign our services, we have looked at efficiency savings and we have looked at
raising prices where we have to. Each of these themes contributes towards the
budget being balanced.
In terms of additional income we are looking to raise an additional £365,563 by
exploring new income streams. These have been trailed in the Budget Working
Group where they received all party support. By investing in new equipment and new
Membership Advisors for our leisure centres we aim to increase our income from
them by £100,000, which will match the increase of last year. Our new Swimming
Development Officer at Kimberley Leisure Centre will result in an annual saving of
£15,588 and we have been able to renegotiate our joint use agreement with the
Kimberley and Chilwell schools and the County Council which will provide a further
£42,975 next year. By working with the Primary Care Trust we have also secured
£36,000 to fund the exercise referral scheme for a further year.
The Bramcote Crematorium, which we run jointly with Erewash, has been improved
and we constantly look for innovative ways to further develop the facilities there. We
expect to receive an additional £25,000 income from here.
Finally, we have been allocated a grant of £146,000 by the government provided that
our council tax increase is zero. This equates to about a 2.5% increase in council tax
and so we are happy to accept this. This money will be built into the Formula Grant
for future years so that we will get the benefit of this going forward as well.
Our second strand of thinking was to redesign services, so that we could provide
more or the same services for less money whilst also seeking to increase the quality
of services. By reducing duplication, waste and inefficiency we have already
identified and put in place £823,000 of savings over the next five years together with
a further £17,750 of cashable savings which are about to come to fruition and which
are reflected in this budget.
The Sustainable Communities EIG recently concluded a piece of research into trade
waste and this report has been accepted by the cabinet. By introducing a new
recycling service for trade waste we should see a net income of £10,000 during the
first year, and this will hopefully expand in the future.
A partnership between the Kimberley School, our four leisure centres and the
Broxtowe Partnership has generated a pot of £103,139 over 3 years for a Football
Development Officer to increase community participation in sport. This shows the
benefit of partnership working at a time when it is regrettable that the County Council
have withdrawn from the LSP.
We have taken the inspection of play areas back in house, saving us £26,000 per
year. We have also achieved a £50,000 saving on grounds maintenance and street
cleaning through greater productivity. I would particularly like to thank our staff for
efforts like this.
Our third aspect of planning is to find efficiency savings, in other words providing the
same services for less money. We anticipate a saving of £629,150 from these. We
have engaged in the concept of shared services, so that we now share some ICT
services with Rushcliffe and Newark and Sherwood. This should save us £20,000 a
year and the same amount should be saved with a shared benefit fraud service
arrangement with Ashfield.
We have made a very significant saving in staff costs this year. A strict vacancy
control policy have identified further savings of £144,950 next year on top of that
which we had budgeted for this year. Next year we aim to achieve a further staff
saving of £210,000 through tight vacancy control, flexible retirements and voluntary,
not compulsory, redundancies. We have exceeded a similar target in 2010/11.
We have reviewed our procurement policies and kept a tight control over spending.
During the last five years this approach has generated a cashable saving on print
and design of £70,000 and next year the improvement to the print and design
services will save us a further £8,000. We will save £10,000 from reductions in
mobile phone usage next year and most significantly the new arrangements for
energy procurement have saved us over £100,000 in the forthcoming budget.
We have made a further £116,200 of savings from other budget headings which do
not affect the quality of front line services. This includes such things as reducing
window cleaning on council buildings and cutting down expenditure on Christmas
decorations. When we carried out a public survey this was identified by the public as
the number one way they supported of saving money.
Finally we have looked at raising prices in some areas. We are introducing charges
for pre-application planning advice, we have raised charges for pest control (but we
are still providing free rat and mice services for residents) and have increased
charges for summonses, which will bring in an extra £30,000. Overall these
increases will bring us in an extra £132,200 a year.
There are a few other matters to mention. We have assumed that the national pay
agreement for council staff will match that of the civil service, in other words
increases for low paid staff but no increases for higher earners. We have included
these figures within the budgets. On the General Fund we have also included
revenue developments of £135,000 next year to cover the cost of the elections in
May as well as the ongoing commitment to the government connect programme,
which enables the secure transmission of data to and from government departments.
I think that for the future we need to ensure that an amount is set aside each year for
the election to build up a reserve so that we do not face such a significant
development again.
The Beeston BID will bring in an extra £200,000 to spend in Beeston Town centre.
This is not money that the Council will control and does not form part of the budget,
but it is encouraging to know that this money will be being invested in Beeston.
Within the Housing Revenue Account budget for next year there is an increase in
council house rents of 7.1% as from 1st April 2011, which is the recommended
amount from the government. We have also made an allowance of £35,000 for pay
within the HRA but no other allowance for inflation.
Within the General Fund we have allowed an amount of £140,000 to cover pay
inflation. Again we have made no allowance for other inflation. As with the HRA the
challenge will be to find the best prices for everything and to ensure that we
maximise the savings that can be achieved to ensure that budgets balance. We will
be providing a General Fund revenue contingency of £25,000 and, adding £10,220
to the General Fund reserve, but we will be withdrawing £10,000 from the Business
Growth reserve. Some monies remain within the General Fund contingencies and
the Policy Reserve this year which we will carry forward to next year.
Finally, we have now been notified of the amount that this council is to receive for the
New Homes Bonus. We will receive £190,000 next year for this. We have not
allocated this within the budget figures as the notification was received too late but
plans for its use will be brought forward in due course.
The details of the budget are as set out in the recommendation in the papers tonight.
I am able to confirm that the figures for the Police Authority, Fire Authority, County
Council and Kimberley Town Council have been confirmed as printed in the papers
before you and it therefore gives me great pleasure to move this as a
recommendation.
This is a budget which continues to establish a sound financial footing for Broxtowe. I
suspect that many authorities will struggle to achieve a balanced budget this year
and Broxtowe can be proud that we have achieved this. The people of Broxtowe put
their trust in us to provide a proper budget to keep the Council’s finances in a proper
condition without adding unnecessarily to their own difficulties during this period. We
have fulfilled that trust.