Agenda item

Community Services - Future Tandridge Programme Update

Minutes:

The Committee received a report which provided the financial context and an overview of the Future Tandridge Programme’s 2-year savings plan. Upon approval, this report would form the basis of a draft budget which would be proposed at the Strategy & Resources Committee in November. Individual budgets would then be proposed at the Strategy & Resources Committee in January 2025 and Full Council in February 2025.

The financial context of the Council had been discussed at the previous Strategy & Resources Committee in September and Full Council in October. The principles approved at these meetings had been used to develop the 2-year savings plan. Officers highlighted that it was unclear how much the Council would receive following the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s Autumn Statement. A settlement from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) to provide clarity on how the Statement would affect the Council was expected in December, therefore, the financial context of the Council outlined in the report remained the same. 

For the Council overall, the savings plan detailed a saving of £4 million over 4 years. This would involve £1 million in savings in the first year and an additional £1 million saved each year in years 2, 3 and 4. The savings plan looked at more difficult areas where savings could be located within Community Services. Officers highlighted key areas of the savings plan and explained that:

  • a key principle of the plan was to avoid impact on services to residents. Savings were being located in areas that would not impact residents. However, this had not been possible in every area, so some changes within the savings plan would have an impact.

 

  • the structure of the savings plan involved 3 key groupings: finance, which would involve a corporate review of the budget, to locate areas of improvement; services, which would involve a review of current spend on services and transformation which would involve long-term changes to provide future savings.

 

  • an initial 2025/26 target was set in April and was updated in October. The target demonstrated that the Council could achieve the £2 million savings in 2 years. The main method to achieve the target had been with the finance led approach. £300,000 worth of savings had been located for 2024/25 from reviewing areas of the budget where savings could be made that would have a low level of impact. 

 

  • revenue generation would be considered in 2 main parts, identifying savings toward fees and charges. Officers explained a session would take place with Members in December to discuss fees and charges. The savings plan assumed the Council would receive an inflationary increase of 2% on charges the Council do not have control over and 5% on Council controlled charges. The Garden Waste Club service would then generate a higher increase at 6.5%. This would generate £14,000 additional revenue for the Council. Together, the increase would result in an additional revenue of more than £150,000 for 2025/26.

 

  • commercial and revenue opportunities had been located for the waste and cemetery areas, with improvement in these areas to be further developed.

 

  • £225,000 of savings had been allocated to service-led initiatives, forming part of the £1m target for 2025/26.

 

  • the digital programme would be important for the overall transformation savings. Officers reported that the MyAccount portal had now opened for the public regarding Revenues and Benefits with further implementation to take place in December for the Waste and Operations service.

 

  • the savings plan would deliver a reduction of £400,000 in discretionary spend, which would result in a 30% reduction in the net budget over the 2-year period. The 2-year savings plan detailed indicative targets and would move from asset investment to asset transfer by locating leaseholders or Parish Councils who would take on this responsibility. Officers explained a discussion with Parish Councils at the Parish Assembly had been positive, with many Parish Councils keen to work with the Council toward asset transfer or support.

 

In response to Member questions, Officers explained that further discussions would take place with Parish Councils on playgrounds regarding asset transfer. This would be developed further upon report approval; however, individual responsibilities would be decided on a site by site basis developed from discussions with Parish Councils. Officers noted that as long as an agreement would be made, any obligations or previous agreements, such as through Lottery funding, could be passed over to the Parish Council.

 

R E S O L V E D – that:

 

A)   the financial context and progress in the development of the 2025/26 Budget and Medium-Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) be noted.

 

B)   the budget principles, approved by Full Council, which underpinned the approach to the 2-year savings plan and which the Committee is required to operate in be noted.

 

C)   the savings targets in Section 3 of the paper, subject to details of how the savings would be made in the January Community Services Committee papers be approved. The targets would form the basis of the development of the 2025/26 Community Services draft budget to the Strategy & Resources Committee.

 

Supporting documents: