Agenda and minutes

There were no apologies for absence.

The Executive is asked to approve the minutes of the meeting held on 5 January 2023.

The Committee considered the minutes of the meeting held on Thursday 5 January 2023.

RESOLVED:

To approve the minutes of the meeting held on Thursday 5 January 2023.

A copy of the Register of Interest for each Selby District Councillor is available for inspection at www.selby.gov.uk.

Councillors should declare to the meeting any disclosable pecuniary interest in any item of business on this agenda which is not already entered in their Register of Interests.

Councillors should leave the meeting and take no part in the consideration, discussion or vote on any matter in which they have a disclosable pecuniary interest.

Councillors should also declare any other interests. Having made the declaration, provided the other interest is not a disclosable pecuniary interest, the Councillor may stay in the meeting, speak and vote on that item of business.

If in doubt, Councillors are advised to seek advice from the Monitoring Officer.

There were no disclosures of interest.

The Executive are asked to consider report E/22/36 – REPORT TO FOLLOW.

The Lead Executive Member for Finance and Resources presented report E/22/36 which asked Members to endorse the actions of Officers and note the contents of the report, approve re-profiled capital programmes and Programme for Growth as set out at Appendices C and D and approve the use of the HRA Surplus towards the additional costs of Boiler Replacement.

Members noted that the end of Q3, current estimated full year revenue outturn estimates indicated surpluses of (£305k) for the General Fund (GF) and (£241k) for the Housing Revenue Account (HRA).

The Executive Member explained that all new general fund savings had been delayed to 2024/25, post Local Government Reorganisation (LGR). The £195k saving in the Housing Revenue Account for the housing system would be aligned to delivery of phase 2 of the project which was anticipated to be in Q4 2022/23, although savings would not be realised until future years and resource requirements for local government reorganisation may impact on delivery timescales.

The Executive were informed that at quarter 3, the capital programme in the General Fund was forecasting an underspend of £0.59m, which was related to the investment in the Industrial Units which was proposed to be pushed back to 2023/24. In the Housing Revenue Account, work was expected to be delayed on St Wilfrid’s Court and the Housing Acquisition and Development programme, resulting in £0.7m being phased back into next year. This was partly offset by anticipated overspends on the budget for boiler replacements by £0.277m due to failures. In addition, £2m had been added to the property refurbishment budget, funded from S106 affordable housing receipts, which was approved at the Extraordinary Council meeting in January 2023.

The Programme for Growth projects spend was £1,635k in the year to Quarter 3 including £766k on staffing costs.

The Leader emphasised the importance of the work to address boiler failures in the Council’s housing.

The Executive Member commended the report.

RESOLVED:

The Executive

i)      endorsed the actions of Officers and noted the contents of the report;

ii)     approved re-profiled capital programmes and Programme for Growth as set out at Appendices C and D;

iii)   approved the use of the HRA Surplus towards the additional costs of Boiler Replacement.

REASON FOR DECISION:

To ensure that budget exceptions were brought to the attention of the Executive in order to approve remedial action where necessary.

The Executive are asked to consider and approve report E/22/37 and endorse the actions of Officers on the Council’s treasury activities for Q3 2022/23.

The Lead Executive Member for Finance and Resources presented report E/22/37 which asked Members to endorse the actions of Officers on the Council’s treasury activities for Q3 2022/23 and approve the report.

Members noted that the report reviewed the Council’s borrowing and investment activity (Treasury Management) for the period 1 April 2022 to 31 December 2022 and presented performance against the Prudential Indicators.

The Lead Executive Member explained that the Council’s investments held in the NYCC Investment pool had averaged £87.8m over the quarter at an average rate of 2.79%, and earned interest of £617.0k. Total interest earned to the end of December stood at £1075.2k (£775.5k allocated to the General Fund; £299.7k allocated to the HRA) which was £960.8k above the year-to-date budget. Current trends indicated that forecast returns for the year could be in the region of £1,853.7k (£1,337.1k GF, £516.6k HRA) a total budget surplus of £1,701.2k. For the General Fund, any interest earned above a £350k threshold was to be transferred to the Contingency Reserve. This figure was currently forecast to be £987.1k.

The Executive acknowledged that investments had performed positively as a result of the regular and sustained rises in Bank of England base rate that had been experienced over the course of the year, as well as higher sustained cash balances. Base rate had risen from 0.25% when budgets were initially set, to the current level of 3.50%. The forecasted return for the year took into account the tapering effect of these rises, as older investments at lower rates matured and were replaced by newer investments at higher rates. This position remained fluid as further base rate rises, currently anticipated by the market, would serve to further increase potential returns.

Members also noted that in addition to investments held in the pool, the Council had £4.55m invested in property funds as at 31^st December 2022. The funds had achieved a 3.22% revenue return and 16.75% capital loss over the course of the year, resulting in revenue income of £127.4k and an ‘unrealised’ capital loss of £914.6k. Following the peak in capital value reported in the Q4 2021/22 and Q1 2022/23 treasury reports, a subsequent capital loss had been incurred as a result of the current strain on commercial property markets, driven by the increasing cost of borrowing that had been seen as the year progressed. These funds remained long term investments and changes in capital values were realised when the units in the funds were sold.

The Lead Executive Member clarified that long-term borrowing totalled £52.833m at 31 December 2022, (£1.6m relating to the General Fund; £51.233m relating to the HRA), interest payments of £1.917m were forecast to be paid in 2022/23, a saving of £59k against budget.  The Council had no plans for any short-term borrowing for the year.

With regards to prudential indicators, the Council’s affordable limits for borrowing were not breached during this period.

In looking ahead to the remainder of 2022/23, Members were pleased to note that investment  ...  view the full minutes text for item 64.