Decision details

That Cabinet noted:

·       The General Fund forecast £11.7m adverse outturn variance against the approved budget for 2023/24.

·       The performance on delivery of savings (as summarised in Section 3).

·       The General Fund additional net risk of £1.1m against which Executive Directors plan to mitigate in full (as summarised in Section 4).

·       A forecast underspend of £0.8m within the HRA and that over- or under-spends that materialise on the HRA will be funded by a transfer from or to the HRA general reserve at the end of the financial year.

·       A forecast in-year deficit of £16.4m accumulating to a total £56.1m carried forward deficit in the DSG for 2023/24.

·       A breakeven position on Public Health services.

·       A forecast £2.9m underspend against the revised Capital Programme’s Budget (Section 6).

·       The grant bid application to Sport England for swimming pool support funding

·       The temporary funding sources totalling £1.1m to facilitate temporary support for LA Maintained Schools and nurseries in financial difficulty.

That Cabinet:

·       Approved the Great Western Credit Union request to approve a loan from City Funds of £0.7m at a fixedrate for 7 years (Section 7.1 and Appendix A2).

·       Authorised the Executive Director, Adult and Communities, in consultation with the council’s S151 Officer and the Deputy Mayor with responsibility for Finance, Governance and Performance’s acceptance of the grant from Sport England for swimming pool support funding if successful and the procurement and contract award for expenditure of that funding.

·       Approved the proposed redesignation of the Traded with School reserve of £0.250m to facilitate temporary support for LA Maintained Schools and nurseries in financial difficulty (Section 7.2 and Appendix A5).