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Good evening, Members. Welcome to the corporate policy and resources committee. Office in attendance tonight are Terry Collier, to my right. Deputy Chief Executive, Leo Neil, Chief Executive is joining us via teams. Linda Herron on the top. Dias, Legal Services Officer, Deputy Monitoring Officer. Karen Codd down in the dyes, Principal Health Safety Initial Officer. for Downer Bahoshi, I hope I pronounce that correctly. Thank you, Principal Environmental Health Officer. Jeremy Gidman, Asset Management Consultant, is joining us via teams. Marta Imig, Strategic Lead Housing. Here she is, she's in front of me, sorry. Shawn Bowen, Asset Manager, is joining us via teams. Coronie Holman Group Head Assets is joining us via teams. Paul Taylor, Chief Accountant, is joining us via teams. Matthew Williams, Committee Manager, is assisting with streaming, the meeting and Christine B, Senior Committee Manager to my left. I would especially like to present a welcome to our guests this evening. Ann Phyllis, and Darren Levy, non-executive directors for Noel Green Estates. Darren is joining us remotely. Officers, when you have finished presenting this evening your item, you may leave. Please note this meeting is being live broadcast to YouTube for the public to see and hear the proceedings, so please turn on your microphone when speaking. Could I ask everyone please to turn off any mobile phones or switch them to the sign-up mode now? Thank you. In the event of a fire alarm sounding, please follow Council's office as out of the building and do not use the lift. Can I also remind members where necessary to complete the gifts and hospitality book, which is located by the signing sheets for you into chambers? I have used my discretion as chair to amend the order. The items to be considered, so the officers that have filed the travel can have that item to stay up with first. An email was issued this afternoon to all members with the revised orders. Okay, moving on to item 1. Apologies for absence. Can the committee manager confirm if we have received any apologies for absence? Yes, chair, we have received apologies from Councilor Botflower and Councilor Lee. Thank you. Are there any other apologies from Councillors? Moving on to agenda item 2. Minutes. Are the minutes of the meeting held on 15 April and continued on to 23 April 2024 agreed as a correct record of proceedings? Thank you. Item 3. Disclosures of interests. Does any member have a disclosure of interest to make in relation to any item on this agenda aside from the standing declaration from those committee members that are also sorry County Councillors and Councillor Nichols, who is Director on the Noel Green Estate Support? No? Item 4. Questions from members of the public? There have been no questions submitted from members of the public. Item 5. Terms of reference. This item is to note the terms of reference for this committee following a change of structure to the committee system. Does any member have a question? No? Does the committee agree to note the updated terms of reference for this committee? Thank you members. Minutes of former committees, ages 19 to 40, and supplementary agenda pages 3 to 18. Following the approval of the changes to the structure of the committee system and the dissolution of the administrative committee, economic development committee, neighbourhood services and enforcement committee and the development subcommittee, this committee needs to approve the final minutes of those dissolved committees. We will approve each set of minutes individually. Members are reminded that understanding order 10.1, the only part of the minutes that can be discussed are their accuracy. Do members agree the minutes of the last administrative committee held on the 8th of February 2024 as a correct record? Thank you. Do members agree the minutes of the last economic development held on the 11th of January 2024 as a correct record? Thank you. Do members agree public and confidential minutes of the last neighbourhood services and enforcement committee held on the 21st of March 2024 as a correct record? And finally do members agree the public and confidential minutes of the development subcommittee held on the 20th of May as a correct record? Councillor GILSON. I do have a couple of corrections, Chair, for the minutes of development subcommittee held on 20th in which I think there are three points. What our development subcommittee held on? Councillor GILSON. Does it relate to anything in confidentiality element? Councillor GILSON. No, I do not believe it does. Okay, that's fine. Please proceed. Sure, that does to wrap me if you think it does. It was mentioned in the development subcommittee 20th of the 3rd, bear with me. Bear with Corla? Yes, 20th of the 5th. Richard Mortimer said that a meeting, and this is for the health committee services, that minutes 44.30, the minutes would be provided of the March 2024 consultations for both White House and Benwell House, however this was not recorded in the minutes, and will need to be corrected. Thank you for raising that. I've got one other one. It was said, the group head assets advised, that this was very focused consultation with ward Councillors and adjacent local residents that would be most affected. I have not had in my questioning, I have not seen any evidence that the ward Councillors attended any meeting, and also there is no evidence that two of the three ward Councillors for that particular ward were actually informed of a said meeting to do with Benwell House. This is primarily to do with Benwell House. This has been requested, and Cora Lee Holman very kindly has looked into this and she has requested the information required, but I would like the minutes to be updated that ward Councillors, two of the three ward Councillors will not actually do not appear to have been communicated with. And one final point was said in the meeting that the residents' primary concerns were related not merely to TPO trees, and this is at minutes 38.30 being ill with honey fungus and needed to be replaced, but it should have been said that residents were quite upset that healthy TPO trees were being chopped down in contravention of the Council's own laws. So, I think that should have been expanded because we need to demonstrate that residents' concerns are actually highlighted. So, I'd appreciate if that could also be in the updated development subcommittee minutes. Thank you so much. Thank you, Councillor Guten. Just bear with me one moment, please. Just bear with me, we're just going to clarify all your points, and Christine and B and I are just making sure that we've got them missing down so that they can be added according. Just give me one moment, please. Councillor Gibson, your concern is that after the meeting that the information given in the meeting does not appear to have happened and you want that reflected, is that correct? So, what the minutes are, is there a record of what happened in the meeting and what was said at the meeting. What we can do is, if the rest of the committee agrees, can note your concerns about the minutes here, but because the minutes of the meeting are a record of what was said in that meeting at that time, that's what those minutes have to reflect. Does that make sense? In that case, how would it be amended if what was said in the meeting was incorrect? That's something that I can take up with the monitoring officer. I don't know if Linda wants to advise. I can take up that. Can I go? I'll double check and get back to you on that one. Absolutely, and I'm very happy to provide the information I have in front of me. Thank you very much. Councillor Gibson, we'll make sure that's all noted and that you will get a response, and with your permission, I'd like to be copied in on that as well. Thank you, Chair, you're very welcome. Thank you. Okay, moving on to, we are going to move on now to item 18. Sorry. Sorry, does that mean we are approved, are we being asked to approve those minutes then, or are we not asking the question, because I don't think anyone said approved. Is that what I mean? Yes, so do you want to come back on that, Christine, please? Thank you. Yes, so if the committee is reluctant to approve the minutes as they stand, we can bring an updated set of minutes to the next meeting for the committee to have, to review. Thank you. Yes, thank you. Thank you for that. Brilliant. Okay, thank you. So moving on to item 18, look, I know we're going to move around just for this item, and that's due to, we have somebody with us today, Annie Phyllis from Noel Green Estates, and with, I'd like to proceed with item 18. So this is Council's medium-term financial support of Noel Green Estates. Due to the attendance of external attendees, I've used my discretion as Chair. For the committee to consider item 18 first. We need to exclude the public and press for discussion of this item on the agenda, because of the likely disclosure of exempt information within the meeting, meaning of Part 1, sorry, scheduled 12A of the local government at 1972. Do I have a proposal for this, please? Thank you, Councillor Bateson. Do I have a second to please? Thank you, Councillor Williams. Is the proposal to enter closed session agreed? Thank you. 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I will take it up with the Unisons. I know there's a current one and another person is being attending courses. So I would have to clarify with them as well. If you could do that, be most grateful. Thanks, Cara, and if you can make a note of that, Christine, so you could come back to members, that would be great. Thank you. Councillor Harkins. There's a long list of things that's being included in it, and the one thing that I noticed wasn't included in it was the RAC Concrete thing. Should that not be included in the list as well? Can I have a good answer that for us, please? >> This is something that we could include. Obviously, we would have to find out the responsibility, so I could look into that as well, and could add ones that have completed. Thank you for your question, Councillor Harkins. Any other members have any questions? Councillor Rubinski. Thank you, Chair. On the page 46 where it says applicable to, I just wondered, do members of the public need to be included in that when they attend meetings, or if they're in our buildings? I can't see them listed, but it might be further on. It does include visitors to the premises, and I believe that when they attend, they are given what do we say responsibilities as well, about emergencies, evacuation and so on. So in certain respect, yes, it does include visitors. Okay, thank you. >> So to clarify that's incorporated. Okay, that's fantastic. Okay. Councillor Gibson. Colleen, just very quickly, as far as the scope of the, this actual health and safety statement of intent, does that actually include properties that we have where we've got tenants in them, or does that come under a completely different umbrella? Yes, it does come separate from this, yeah. >> Thank you, Councillor Gibson. Any other questions? Okay, does the committee agree to adopt the corporate health and safety policy? That's right, one, apologies, adopt the corporate health and safety policy, and two, to otherwise achieve executive degree, minor variations to the adopted health and safety policy, is that agreed? Thank you, members. Kevin, you're welcome to leave, and go down. Thank you for your time. Thank you, moving on to item eight. 2023 to 2024, revenue carry forward to 2024 to 2025, pages 95 to 100. Before I introduce this item, I'd like to advise members of foreign discussion with officers. We've agreed that moving forward, finance reports will have a link to a glossary of financial terms, which will be a live document which will evolve over time. This is to help both Councillors and external readers to understand references to financial technical terms. This will be reviewed by the members financial reporting group. Committee has also considered requests of 30,983 of 2023 to 2024, revenue expenditure to be carried forward to 2024 to 2025. Portale is online and he will present this report. Please proceed. Thank you very much. Good evening, Councillors. The report before you is a very straightforward report. We have had two requests to carry forward expenditure from 2324. They are highlighted in appendix A, and they total 30,983 pounds. Just let me turn the volume down. It's better, thank you. In terms of that, it literally is exactly what it says on the tin, so on that basis, I'll take any questions, please. Thank you, Paul. Do members have any questions? Please raise your hands now, so I can write them all down. I have two, no more. We will go to Councillor Halkins' first, please and Councillor Gibson. Thank you. With the unused better neighbourhood grants, is it possible to turn around and add it onto this use one, so that instead of having a £1000 each, it is £1000 and a little bit rather than it going back into a pot? Talking about that for us, please, thank you. That has not got anything to do with this report, Leader. Can we kick to the report, please, Councillor Halkins, thank you. Councillor Gibson. I was just going to ask, what can we do with the money rather than carry it forward and add in for item? That's a very good question. There's two parts of that. One, they can't carry it forward in for item. It needs to be spent actually by 30th of June, otherwise it goes back into general fund. And the answer to your question is, this committee is at perfect liberty to refuse to carry forward. And then that money would go straight back into the general fund for future use by this committee. Thank you. Thank you, Paul. Any other questions? Can a feature? Just really a pedantic point. In the report, why are we talking about thousands of thousands rather than just straight millions? Paul? Just basically a convention, we can use millions or we can use £1000. It's just a convention for the report. What we're trying to do is be consistent throughout the report. So it's just different people's views, neither right nor wrong. Thank you. Okay, Councillor B but did you want to come back on that? I'd like to come back as to, what about the members of the committee? Are they happy with thousands of thousands or just go to straight millions? Millions. Millions. Can you just bear with me one second? Thank you, Chair. This is something we can pick up at the Financial Reporting Working Group in terms of what is useful to Councillors, so it's useful to have that feedback. The only comment that I'm making is that they're actually quite small amounts we're talking about. 31,000. That's 0.0. Sorry, 0.0.3 million. So in this instance it might actually be easier for the general lady to just refer to it in terms of thousands, but we can certainly pick that up. And the Financial Reporting Group can come to view in terms of the way forward on reports in a way which is helpful to Councillors. Thank you. Thank you, Terry. Thank you. Members? Okay. Any other questions? Sorry, does the committee agree to approve the request for 30,983 of 2023 to 24 revenue expenditure to be carried forward to 202425 as set out in Appendix A? Thank you. Moving on to item nine. Quarter four revenue out-turn report as of 31st March 2024, including addendum. The supplementary addendum to pages 19 to 64, and the second supplementary agenda pages 3 to 6. This item is for the committee to note a reduction in the surplus at out-turn from 10 million, 875,000 pounds to 10 million, 604,000 pounds, a difference of 271,000 pounds for the year to 31st March 2024, and to approve a reduction of 271,000 pounds in the transfer to the sinking fund reserves. So, I'm just going to go through each of the points here, and then Paul is going to present this report. So, one, and approve the following transfer to reserves. I will go through those once Paul has said his report. Paul may ask you to speak. Thank you. Thank you, Leader. The report before you is in two parts. We have the main report and addendum. I got to deal with the addendum first. The addendum is arisen because during the final review stages of the statement of accounts, we became aware that the maintenance charges and interest charges had been coded to lease creditors as opposed to being charged to the comprehensive income and expenditure statement through the cost centre for refuge vehicles and refuse collection. That is why we had the addendum to reduce the surplus. The surplus has arisen, just bear with me, while I go to the report. We are looking at a £10.6 million net surplus and we are asking you to approve transfers of £3 million to the business rates, £6.608 million to the sinking fund, £1 million to the general fund, and to note the transfers of £1.4 million to section 106 and community infrastructure levy. The federal fund base is at £1.6 million to EMR reserves in respect to the unspent Afghan support grants. A couple of key things to highlight to you. Because of the timing of this meeting, we have to publish the accounts ahead of this meeting. If possible, you can, as you have mentioned, also, share a complete account and audit as you will accept these recommendations. If you make changes to the recommendations, we will be changing the statement of accounts to reflect your decisions from there. Again, to highlight a couple of key points for you, one is that there is a technical accounting adjustment that we have made which, due to being carded by 31 March this year, they did not materialise. Therefore, we have, in accordance with, generally accepted accounting principles, released that provision back into out-turn, and that accounted for £4 million. The second item you need to be aware of is our collection fund. We have following a change of staff and new eyes, fresh eyes going in on our collection fund. We have identified that there is a surplus of £3 million, and we are recommending that this is put into reserves to allow for an independent review of the collection fund to double check the office's work to make sure that that is correct. That review, the information has been passed over today and we are expecting the answers back within the next 7 to 10 working days. In the meantime, we are recommending prudence and caution and putting the money into reserves rather than allocating it to a specific project. If we then have a look through the report, the report is structured so that it shows you where the underspecency has occurred and how we intend to – or the recommendations rather for you to consider on how to use that surplus and allocate it to reserves. And I think it is, again, prudent to put the money into reserves. We are facing some uncertainties. One of them which we will discuss in the next report is the capitalized revenue costs. They stand at £6 million, £16 million, and there is a strong possibility that subject to Council's strategy on our affordable housing projects, strong possibility that some of that capitalized revenue costs may be released back to the budget, and Council will have to find funds to meet those costs. So being prepared and putting that money away for such an eventuality, I think, is a positive situation for this committee to consider. And also, in dealing with that, it also means that we have put some money aside ahead of the next four years' worth of budget deficits that have been predicted for this Council based on the medium-term financial plan. In terms of the other – how the report is laid out, we have kept this in line with the budget report we gave to this committee so that you can see how it's performed in terms of the cost centres at net expenditure level, 2.4, how we're doing on interest and earnings at 2.5, and we're summarizing what's happened. A couple of key things again for this committee to note. One of the plus sides of interest rates being so high, we have yielded just under £1 million worth of extra interest from our investments, particularly over the overnight money market and lending on the inter-local authority lending market. And in terms of rents received, we've highlighted the £4 million adjustment but also, because of an accounting adjustment, we get an additional £ whisk of rent for lease incentives and indeed, our landlord costs have come in at smaller than we had anticipated, making savings of £1.4 million. Those are the key points in terms of the reserves, as this committee is aware, officers are able to put money into reserves and also recommend that this committee puts money into reserves, but only this committee and Council can take reserves or authorise the use of said reserves. So the report does summarise that. We talk about the EM leave reserves. Again, we are able to inform you that we have increased our EM leave reserves by approximately £2.5 million taking into account the adjustment that we've made in the addendum. So again, another positive story for this Council and our sinking funds have only reduced by just under £2 million, as opposed to the predicted £10 to £11 million from there, but as a result of putting money into the sinking funds, should this committee decide that is the right thing to do. I do not propose to go through every variance, but we have highlighted the significant variances by each cost centre. So you can see that for the committees that you were on and now the committees you are on. And in terms of the shared prosperity fund, you'll see it's highlighted in TBC. I'm able to confirm that under the funding for to be received from do luck, Department of Housing and Department of Loving Up and Housing and Communities, we are receiving or we're having to pay money out in the first couple of years of the grant and then sorry the program, and then the grants come in in years three, four, five onwards and we'll cover the expenditure that's been incurred. We've highlighted again the rental income, commercial and regeneration assets in 4.2 and delighted to advise that cage is in a good position in terms of our accounts. We have the accounts being audited, and as with spelthorn direct services, they should be back with us later this month for finalisation, but a good position to be in. In terms of that leader, I propose to stop there and take questions. Thank you Paul, do does members have any questions, please. Councillor Button. Thank you Chair. In section 4.1, there's lots of savings which are due to staff vacancies. So I think my calculation is that the vacancy rate is about 14%. Now this must be having an effect on services, so I'm just wondering how badly services are being affected and what is being done to fill these vacancies. Thank you, Councillor Button. I'm going to ask Paul to answer that and then over to Terry. Thank you. Thank you very much. Good question, Councillor Button. Two things. One, we do have a significant number of vacancies, and that's in the employee section, but that is usually offset by a number of temporary staff and contractors which show in the other costs area. So in terms of the figures you quoted, you are broadly in line. We have 450 approximately FTEs. We tend to run at around about 390, that upper end of 390, occasionally going into the 400. So yeah, about 15%. Now in terms of services, I think it's fair to say that a number of our services are under pressure. We are feeling the challenges, but services at the moment, don't appear to be affected because we have got temporary cover and contractors in, and where they are impacted. Matt and indeed, committees will be notified. Thank you. Thank you, Paul, Terry. Thank you, Councillor. Thank you, Councillor. Good question. As Paul has commented, of course this is not a new issue. I'm sure you've noted and I did, I think you've asked similar questions on previous reports. So this is an ongoing issue which is not unique to this Council. It's a challenge of recruiting and retaining staff across another part of the public sector. And, as Paul says, that does result in some additional use of agency and interim staff. We have over, trying various measures, so we can offer this process of approval for additional market supplements where services are finding difficult to recruit so that they can offer a top-up, which can help to recruit and retain staff. We're trying to be innovative in terms of how we advertise opportunities as well. And this issue, as the Chair of the Audit Committee, your Councillor's button will be aware, is one of the key corporate risks and the corporate risk register. Some of you would continue to keep a focus on because it is a challenge and it does impact in some service areas more than others, particularly those areas who employ professional, highly qualified staff. It can be particularly challenging in terms of some of those areas such as legal or ICT, for example. So, you're absolutely right. It is an ongoing issue and will remain a key focus corporately. Thank you. Thank you, Terry. I can't – I need to call to Councillor O'Neil. I've got one next and then Councillor G prose. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Yeah, just to add to Tera, I think the other thing, just to say as well, is as Terry said, as Councillors across Surrey and beyond face, similar sort of pressures. The other thing we obviously do need to continue to look at, and we do keep our finger on the pulse of that and try to pursue, is collaboration opportunities as well. Because as I say, sometimes some of those opportunities, yes, are related to finance, financial benefits, but actually some of them are purely resilience-based. In terms of making sure that we can share potentially share resources where possible. It's not always easy because everyone faces the same pressures, and everyone is quite pressured about their own staff and retaining their resources. But actually, there are chances to work together, and I think there's been, except to increasingly, across Surrey, that we need to look at that going forward. Thank you, Leigh. I was actually going to say the same. And I think, Terry, just wants to add something to it. I will come to you, Councillor Giet, but I have Paul, I think, on the same question. And then I'll come to you if that's OK. Terry. Thank you very much, Chair. And prompted by these were my point, a tangible example of actually how we're trying to work effectively in partnership to improve our ability to recruit and retain staff. It's actually the finance partnership, which we are progressing with Mulvadi. And that's where we're moving towards creating a single finance team across the two varieties. And that will create a bigger team, which will create some efficiencies, and it will enable us to use the power of the financial system more effectively with a slightly larger systems team, for example. But it will also create some more interesting queer paths, which we think will help retain staff and recruit staff and give them an opportunity to work across a wider range, more interesting areas. And the other aspect we've gone to that particular project is also we're seeking to grow our talent. So last year, Paul successfully restructured and created two apprentice posts, because one way of addressing his challenge of recruiting how he skilled professionals is actually to try and grow them through training and development. Thank you. Thank you to Paul, just to finish off. Thank you very much. Again, just to come back to Council button, if we have a look at the report where we highlight cost of services. And I'm just going to, I think it's 2.1. One of the variants is that if we take the sale and the Afghan money out. No, it's not 2.1, there it is 2.4. You'll see net expenditure. We had a 3.3 million underspend. If we take the sale money and the Afghan money related to in recommendations D and E. You'll actually find that the costs, cost centers broadly broke even during 23 24. So they managed to use their underspends in salary, they were paying tempts and contractors and. Under pressure they are delivering the services that this Council expects to be delivered. Thank you. Thank you, Paul. Thank you everybody for answering that question. Council button. Is that okay with you? Yeah. Thank you. Pleasure. Firstly, I do my best to share your job postings on LinkedIn to my LinkedIn. So I don't know if that helps, but that's something that can be done. And excuse me again, I, you know, I work in full time with kids. I find it a bit difficult to read 750 pages of documents beforehand. If this is my misunderstanding, then I do apologize. But would any of this revenue be used for the curveball that we've been throwing this year, which is the best value inspection and is probably going to cost us, they were saying about 250K? Good question. Who would like to answer that? Paul? That's a very good question in terms of that. This is the joy of putting it into the reserves. It can be used for. But if we are going to pay for it out of reserves. As I mentioned earlier, Council will have to say so on that. I would expect that money to be covered from general expenditure in the normal scheme of things. But again, when we come to do year end and look at things, there are opportunities for us to make recommendations to Council to use reserves rather than a normal budget. So, yes, is the answer we can, but it will be discussed in a much wider context, Chair. Thank you. Thank you, Paul. Can I have a gate, should you have you with a response? Yes, that's fine. Thank you. You're very welcome. Are there other members? Please raise your hands. These will be the final two points. First of all, would Councillor Gibson and then Councillor Bingdon, please. Thank you. Very simple question. Further to Councillor Guicher's question, should these funds go into reserves? Have they already been earmarked for something that will come back to Council, or will they sit in reserves until something comes up? I expect they've been already earmarked, just asking the question. I bet they have. Paul, would you like to answer that, please? Specifically, I cannot tell you of a project that they will be used for, but as mentioned in the pre-summery leader, there is every expectation that these funds will be utilized from reserves to cover the deficits that are coming down the road at us for 25, 6, 26, 7 and 27, 8, but I'm not aware of anything specific in terms of putting these monies in that they will be used for other than monies going into sinking fund back into the business rates reserve, going to the general fund, the general fund gives us that contingency approach for dealing with minor items as they occur, where we don't have to use earmarked reserves, we have a contingency fund for Council to consider. Thank you. Thank you. That too is just going to come back from that. Thank you. All right, I think Paul is clearly explained in terms of the general fund. It's a little bit different because it's more of like a flexible emergency pot or contingency pot but Paul's explained it very well. Well done, Paul. Thank you. Councilor Bingdon. Thank you, Chair. And I have three questions to ask Paul. First one is regarding source of borrowing. So we know the is 15% of our expenditures from borrowing. So can you clarify this source of borrowing from central government or from peer borrowing defer to once? We do want a time, please, Councilor Bingdon. Thank you. Paul, we would like to answer that first please. Thank you. Yeah, there's in terms of the projects that we're dealing with capital projects, we will 99% of the time, we will go to the public works loan board after we have exhausted all our internal funds, so that we make sure that we're only borrowing what we have to from there. In terms of short term day to day cash flow, we are very fortunate. We are a net lender to the inter local authority rate, but occasionally with our cash flows and the timing of some of the large payments we have to make, we have to borrow for four weeks, eight weeks to cover that, but in the main, it's public works loan board after we've exhausted all our internal borrowings. Thank you, Paul. Yeah. Councilor Bingdon, the second question, please, and then we'll take that one. And did you say you had three? Yes. Thank you, Chair. So, second one. So, what are the council use the spend grand money to reduce their borrowing, and what is your corporate expenditure strategy with one to five years time. Thank you. One question. Paul, did you hear that? Okay. I'm struggling a little bit to hear about. Sorry, gone, you're going. Sorry. I was going to ask Councilor Bingdon if she could say once more because I struggled at the end. So if you basic client council have been done, I'd be most appreciative. Thank you. Okay. So, so what are, why why don't they counsel not use it on spending money, which grand money to reduce the borrowing? Okay. And I think the fairly well is what is your corporate expenditure strategy with one to five years time. Thank you. I think I understand that. And if I haven't, please come back. But I think this strolls into treasury management strategy territory. Chair, because the borrowing strategies laid out there. And I think, again, I think it was Councillor Gibson that highlighted interest rates. But we wouldn't necessarily want to be wanting to reduce borrowing where the interest rate is 2.3% when we've got other funds or something coming down the line for us, where we may have to borrow at 5%. So it would not make sense to pay off borrowing at 2.3% when we then have to take out loans at 5%. It's better for us to retain the funds, wait until interest rates movements were on shifting sands at the moment. I happen to be a chief accountant rather than a turf accountant. But I think I can make a lot of money trying to bet which way interest rates are going to go in the Bank of England. So we are cautious and we will not repay loans when it's fixed at 2.3%, if we're having to take out loans at 5%. That does not make sense. But again, I think we're going into treasury management strategy rather than revenue out. I'm going to tell you something quickly on that and then we'll move forward, thank you. Thank you Paul. There will be a report probably coming in autumn to this committee in terms of options being sent out by our Treasury Manager devices only close on the very points Paul has made. But it's also worth not losing sight of the fact that over the longer term, particularly once we get beyond this financial year because after this financial year, the scale of our capital programme will drop dramatically and it will drop to a few million pounds. So we're going to be able to get a little bit of a random with very little in the way of a need to borrow. And in that context, over time, we will be said to be paying off our borrowing. And if you were to look at the draft table accounts which were published earlier today for 23, 24, you'll notice that in terms of non-term borrowing, we actually paid down 14 million pounds last year. So we're going, the amount would be paying off each year will steadily increase. So it's worth being aware that over time, we are, we have got, effect is all not seen because we've got a profile in terms of the repaints until that all those debts are paid off over the next 42 to 44 years. Thank you. Thank you for your questions, Councillor Bingdon. Okay. Right. Moving forward, does the committee want no to reduction in surplus at out turn, sorry, from 10 million 875,000 to 10 million 604,000, a difference of 271,000 for this year to March 31st, 2024, and to approve the recommendations to transfer the surplus to reserves outline. Thank you, members. Moving on to item 10. Thank you. Okay, item 10, capital out turn report 2023, 2024, supplementary append agenda, sorry, pages forgive me, members, I've got Hey, leave and I'm suffering. So forgive me. This item is for the committee to note, one million six hundred eight thousand projected under spend against this estimated capital program for 2023, 24, as that 31st of March 2024, as set out an appendices, A and B. And to recommend to Council that the capital project is topling two million nine hundred and ninety thousand are removed from 2024 2025 estimate capital program as set out in appendix C, Paul Taylor, will represent this report over to you, Paul, thank you. Thank you share the report before you deals with our capital monitoring and I think before I get into the body of the report, I would like to come back to comments on Ben well one at the end, and I'll explain why to this committee. At the moment we are projecting and underspend subject to what we're going to talk about in Ben well one in a minute. But we've set that out in appendix A and B and in appendix A we give you the summary. And on that summary you can see what we've spent in the year to date what we spent cumulatively what the Council approved budget is what the managers out turn is, and what the variances are. We do summarize the variances for you in 1.8 where we cover all the items between the in brackets underspend without brackets over spend, and there are a number of items in there which I'll take questions on rather than go through them individually. The other thing this committee needs to be aware of is that there are a number of final contracts which have just been negotiated some 2, 2 and a half years after we have completed the projects. And this is down to contractors taking much longer to resolve their final accounts and submit their final accounts, and please bear in mind that a number of these projects were being constructed during covert. So there's a number of challenges that both the Council is facing an offer and contractors are facing, and it's now down to negotiation to get things sorted out. But I'll take questions on 1.8 there in a moment. At 1.9 shows you that having agreed and finalize these contracts. We've got about 17 and a half million pounds to come out of the capital program which bear in mind, which bears out Terry's comments our capital program is reducing. So in terms of ensuring we have the projects that have received committee stroke Council approval where appropriate over a million pounds, particularly for the newer projects. And they are being removed from the capital or recommended for you to remove from the capital program. We will be finalised in the future, they will have to come back with a report to committee. And this is based on the instruction we received from corporate policy and resources to the tail end of last year, early part of this year. There's a highlight there the two projects I think you need to be aware of as a committee is the website at 85,000. That is has been deferred by 12 months. While we resolve procurement challenges with that contract. And a revised report will be coming back to the relevant committee. And the other area is the cost centres, there's two projects around about 130,000 combined. And that's also supported because of the re structure within the customer services team. And the group head will be bringing that report back in the short term, i.e. the next six months to the relevant committee to ask for that program and go through that program again. All in all, it's a favourable position in terms of our capital program. It is falling as it should do. And those are the key points from the monitoring report. The other key points, as I mentioned in the revenue monitoring report is the Council's development projects. And as you can see by the table in 2.4, those are the schemes that we have. And there is a substantial amount of capitalized costs sitting in our balance sheet as a result of these projects. In broad terms, the monthly interest charge for all our development properties is just under 70,000 a month. And then it's whatever costs are approved by the relevant committee for officers to go out and spend. As we saw with some of the projects last year, design costs, etc. That our council approved or committee approved from there. But at the moment, we have just short of £16 million sitting in our balance sheets and the future of this does require council to make some strong inroads and strong decisions around these properties, so that they can move forward and deliver the affordable housing that the residents need and the borough needs. And if they don't move forward, there is every possibility that these funds that are sitting in a balance sheet will come into the revenue budget for 24, 25 or 25, 26. And the funds that you recommended to be placed into reserves could well be utilized to cover shortfalls on this particular area. Chair, I think that is the main points that I would like to go through, so I'll go over to any questions please. People, does anyone have any questions? Councillor Gage. Thank you on the appendix so sorry I've lost them all. I really just wanted to question things like the said our occasional toilet block, the greener recreation, the mannequin, I understand these, these are minor. On her uses the parks, etc. You do notice when toilets are tired and you blame on the council, I note in the description that the projects on hold and to commence subject to community letting's policy being reviewed by Councillors that a task group is to be set up and how long will it take to set up the task group and hence to move forward with these minor but noticeable projects? Thank you for your question, Councillor Gage. Paul, would you like to answer that please? If the committee accepts the recommendation, these will be removed from the capital program with immediate effect and therefore, the relevant committees and indeed officers will have to resubmit plans for Council to consider. The other option you have is not to remove them and leave them in the capital program. However, if they're not moving forward, they do have an implication for our capital financing requirement. And I think in terms of good housekeeping, it does make sense to remove projects that may be improved a year to two years or beyond or prior to that ago, so that we reduce our capital financing requirement and help show the Council's finance in the best light possible. I hope that answers the question, and if it doesn't, I'll come back but Chair, I realised I would have come back on Ben well one. Yes, I've got that noted. If I can just ask Colle, if there's anything you'd like to add to that please first. Thank you, Chair. No, I don't think so I think Paul's covered it off some of these projects are quite historic, they're not things that we've actively been working on in the last year or two. So probably the parameters that were set in the first place have changed. As has just been raised, we are working on the community letings policy, that's an active piece of work that's being undertaken at the moment and hopefully will be concluded within the next few weeks. As you'll recall, Chair, the amendments to the community letings policy were agreed, it's just now a case of identifying the sites that we're happy for potential development to come forward on, and that's the piece of work that we're undertaking at the moment. Thank you. Thank you, Colle, tell me we'd like to come back on that. Actually, I've covered the point I was expecting, which is in terms of clarification that we are within a few weeks away from the outcome in terms of that community letings and then being able to move forward, which I think was one of your key questions. Thank you. Perfect. So hopefully that answers your questions. Yes, yes, I think it's important to have an answer in case, you know, residents are right into us and saying what's the state of these toilet? That's the state of these toilets, why you fixing them. So, yeah, thank you. And you've got the children, you need to take them to the toilets. I get it. Absolutely. Thank you. Councillor Gibson, anybody else please raise their hands now. Otherwise I'm going to move on Councillor HOWkins and that will be the last question. Thank you, Councillor Gibson. Thank you, ma'am. Further to Councillor Gietch's question, really all I wanted to ask is if these projects are removed from the estimated the estimate capital program where do they all go so that we can keep an eye on them and reintroduce them back into life. Thank you. Good question, Paul. That they don't go anywhere, apart from being removed from the capital program, that means they are not approved. Nobody can spend any money on that particular budget without committee approval. And then they would come back to the relevant committee when the project was to be started again. Having said that, we would, of course, be the custodians of this record keeping as will committee services. So we will have a track of the projects that have been removed. Should anyone want that information in the future? Thank you. Thank you, Paul. Thank you, Paul. So if somebody wanted to revive one of these projects, we would have the ability to do that through the committee. Thank you. Thank you. Councillor HOW couldn't answer your question, please. With the portal cabins at the nursery, are they standard protocols or are they kitchen ones? I know it sounds weird one, but they want to be on the health issue. That's not really relevant specific to what we're talking about today, but we can get you an answer on that. And if I could ask committee services to get back to Councillor HOW can someone be most grateful. Thank you very much indeed. Thank you. Okay, moving forward. Chair, we've got to come to Venwell one. Oh, yes. I was going to say that. I honestly was. Go ahead, Paul. My apologies for preempting you. And on this particular basis, I would ask currently to provide input as required. Councillors, in the report, we have highlighted that bedwell one is underspent by £2 million. Councillor Nichols has raised some questions which we are looking into. And I don't think we've quite got the full answers to it in terms of some of the budget setting process that has taken place on Benwell one. The reason for that is that there was proposals for a project, an initial project over a period of weeks and months, the projects have changed. We've gone from various iterations of 57 units at Benwell, which was called Caesar court for 55 units rising up to 60 plus units. And then over phases one and two, then it was agreed that phase one would be implemented and phase two will be put on hold because phase two was a construction, whereas phase one was a conversion, and with a little bit of construction work to go on to raise this height of the building. And there is just a little question mark over the budgets and what was approved and what is delivered. So I'll go back through the records to research this and identify the exact position, but as it stands at the moment, we are showing an underspent based on a Council approved budget of 13.8, and that is under question. But in terms of this monitoring report unless courage received information in the last two or three hours that updates this, I would suggest that we note Benwell one, that it is finished. It will come off our capital program, but there is a what I would call a mopping up exercise to do to highlight to this committee, the exact nature of, is it an almond to spend or an overspend and what was the actual approved budget. And this is going back to 2016 which is preceding a number of officers who are dealing with this now, Cori, is there anything you'd like to add. No, I think you've covered that quite concisely thank you Paul. Thank you so that we are and Benwell one leader over to you. Thank you. Okay. So we move forward. I'd rather late call off you go. Sorry, Chair. I was wishing to speak on this Benwell one point and it wouldn't have been appropriate to indicate earlier. No problem. Go ahead. Two points I think members should bear in mind. This relates to some quite clear failures of governance around the provisioning here, which do need to, does need to be inspected. The change in budget allocation was never agreed by any paper that's in the public domain or indeed in the confidential record. So that's one thing. The second thing is, it seems to me rather bizarre to claim an underspend when there is no budget for what's being the target. So I spent X, but I never knew what the target for X was. It's something else. Instead of building the 69 units as promised, which is what the budget was for, we've only delivered 55. So this is an underspend, this is an overspend. I don't know. But to claim £2 million to spend and be all happy and to dance down the street looks to me to be the wrong thing. Thank you, Councillor Nicholas. Did you want to come back on that, Paul, with all? I think there's any point, the comments from Councillor Nicholas are noted. There's further work to do where we're reaching inclusion and come back to the committee. Thank you, Rachel, for Councillor Noodle's raising this. Thank you. Me too. Thank you. Okay. Councillor Gibson. Thank you, my last, very quickly, please. Just further to Councillor Nicholas's comment just now, is there traceability of the difference between the units that were amocked and the units that were actually built, just checking? All the information that Councillor Nicholas has requested, including that, is all being looked at. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Moving forward, does the committee note that 1,608,000 projected underspend against this estimated capital program for 2023, 24, as at the 31st March 2024, and two agree to recommend to Council that the capital projects totaling 2,990,000 are removed from the 2024 2025 estimate capital program. In the 2011 appointments to outside bodies 2024, 25, pages 101 to 104, supplementary agenda, pages 5, 6, published today. The committee has asked to consider the nominations to the outside bodies for 2024, 25, the municipal year as proposed by the group leaders. Kristina B. Scenic Committee Manager will introduce this item. Thank you, Kristina. Thank you, Chair. There's a number of organizations which are independent from the Council, but have an impact on its service areas in order that the Council can maintain effective partnerships for the number of these organizations, representatives of the Council, usually elected Councillors sit on the various committees and forms responsible for them. These appointments are usually made annually, and they are now in the remit of the Corporate Policy Resources Committee, except for those outside bodies reserved for appointment by Council. In the supplementary agenda, published today are the nominations to outside bodies, put forward by political group leaders, and I'm happy to take any questions. Thank you, Kristine. Do members have any questions? Councillor Nichols. Thank you, Chair. If I could withdraw my nomination for Surrey Environment Partnership for myself, there's other people doing that, and I'm quite happy to step aside. Thank you, we just note that down. You'll spare with me one moment, please. Thank you. Okay, that's sorted. Okay, are there any other questions? Okay, as there are more nominations and positions to some of the outside bodies who will need to vote on these nominations, please can members raise their hands in favour of the nominee, they wish to appoint. For Ashford and St Peter's Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, there are two nominations, Councillor Sue Duran and Councillor Paul Woodward. Those in favour of Councillor Sue Duran, please raise your hands. Those in favour of Councillor Woodward. That goes to Councillor Sue Duran. Thank you, members. For Heathrow Committee engagement board, there are two nominations. Councillor Sean Beatty and Councillor Siraj Guali. Those in favour of Sean Beatty. Those in favour of Councillor Seraj Guali, please. That goes to Sean Beatty. Thank you, members. For the strategic aviation special interest group, there are two nominations for the representative position. Councillor Sean Beatty and Councillor Paul Woodward. Those in favour of Councillor Sean Beatty. Those in favour of Councillor Paul Woodward. Thank you, Councillors. He's appointed to that position. For the Surrey Environment Partnership, there are three nominations. No, we are now down to two. That's right, OK. Those, so that means that we have, so we have Councillor Tony Burrell and Lisa Brennan, Councillor Lisa Brennan. Those in favour of Tony Burrell, please raise your hands. And those in favour of Lisa Brennan. Thank you, Councillors. Tony Burrells will be moving as appointed that position. For the Surrey Tribal Community Relations Forum, there are two nominations. Councillor Cairn Halkins and Councillor Denis Salagopoulos. Those in favour of Cairn Halkins, please raise your hands. Those in favour of Denis Salagopoulos, please raise your hands. No one? OK. Thank you, Councillors. Councillors, Cairn Halkins is appointed to that position. Does the committee agree that the remaining nominations outside board is for 20-24 municipal year as proposed by the group of leaders? Okay, members. Moving on to item 12, membership of the committee asset subcommittee. Page 105-112. Committee is asked to agree that membership of the commercial asset subcommittee. Christine's going to speak on that. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Political group leaders put forward the membership for the commercial assets subcommittee at the Council meeting that met week and a half ago. Council was not able to agree those nominations as they need to be agreed by the parent committee, which is this committee tonight. Those members are included in your papers, I think. Thank you, Christine. Does any member have a question? No? OK. Does the committee agree that membership of the commercial asset subcommittee agreed? Item 13, Financial Reporting Working Group pages 113 to 118. This item is to consider the reestablishment of a member working group focused on the financial reporting, the terms of reference for the working group, and the membership of the working group. Terry Collier will present this item. Thank you, Chair. Hopefully, this is a fairly straightforward report. You'll see the terms of reference, which are essentially unchanged on the terms of reference we had before, apart from the fact that we've increased the suggested minimum number from two Councillors to three Councillors, because we do feel this is a really, really important working group and it would be good to at least aspire to have at least three Councillors on the working group. The working group has already been very helpful, and in particular, one outcome from the past work of the previous working group was put in place. The four blocker or four square summary, and as you see, we're applying that to every committee report, so it is helpful and already in this meeting tonight we've discussed some issues which the working group can pick up. So, we're not asking the committee to confirm that we establish the report, and then secondly, we're asking for Councillors to step forward and get involved in the working group. Thank you. Thank you, Terry. Before I request nominations to sit on the working group, does the committee agree to establish the working group and its terms of reference? And I'm not disputing, don't worry about the establishment of the committee, but I just wanted to note that last year it met during the day, which I think excludes quite a few Councillors, including myself. So just to note that, thank you. That could be difficult for sure. So, I'm going to ask, are there any nominations to sit on the working group? Please raise your hands. Okay, so I have Councillor Williams and Councillor ... Sorry, Councillor Nicols, just bear with me, I just need to speak to the ... I do apologise. One moment, please. Just for clarification, because monitoring, also, who's standing in didn't hear whether we all agreed to, before I request the nominations, to sit on the working group, does the committee agree to re-establish the working group and its items? Sorry, it's terms of reference. Is that agreed? I agree. Thank you, Members. So, now I have Councillor Williams and Councillor Nicols. Councillor Gibson, did you want to put yourself forward to? For well, for clarification, I'm just asking you, are we asking for volunteers or are we asking for nominations? Well, we need three volunteers. No nominations, yes. Thank you. Okay. Brilliant. So, Councillor Gibson as well. All in, Councillor Button. Right, I can ... Sorry, you want to say something, Councillor Button? Yeah, I'd like to nominate Councillor John Doron. So, we have four. Can I just confirm? Yes, Councillor Williams? I was going to nominate Sean Beatty. Okay, so we now have five. Okay. Okay, so I've just checked, we can have all five. Is that agreed? Agreed. Happiness. There we go. Sorry, just to confirm, I have Councillor Wright. Thank you, Members. Item 15, exclusion of the public and press exempt business. We need to exclude the public and press from the discussion of the remaining items on the agenda because of the likely disclosure exempt information within the meaning of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972. Do I have a proposal for this, please? Councillor Beecher and can I have a seconder, please? Thank you, Councillor Bateson. Is the proposal to enter closed session agreed? Agreed. Thank you. Thank you. [BLANKAUDIO]