Transcript

Performance Select Committee today. I'm told there's a fire drill expected today at two o'clock. I have every hope that we won't be here at that time. But in case of a fire alarm sounding, everyone's asked to leave by the nearest exit and assemble at the top car park. You can use your mobile phones, but make sure they're switched off or put on silent. And you can use them for social media things, unless it gets irritating. Webcast is being made, and recording will be available afterwards. And also participation by video conference on Microsoft Teams is allowed. And those joining the meeting remotely, please use the raised hand function. And we'll try to see it on the tiny bit of the screen that we can see. And people know how to use microphones, I won't go into that. So, item one, apologies for absence and substitutions. There are no substitutions, but we have apologies from Andy Lynch, Tim Hall and John O'Reilly. And I see certainly John is joining us online. Item two, minutes of the previous meeting held on the 18th of October. Can I sign those as an accurate and factual record of the previous meeting? Thank you. Any comments anyone wants to make on them? No, no, no, jolly good. Declarations of interests. Are there any declarations of disclosable pecuniary interests, significant personal interests, or any gifts or hospitality accepted? No, thank you very much. Item four, questions. We have one question from Catherine Barth, and the answer is in the papers submitted. I don't think Catherine is joining us, is she, for a supplementary. However, despite there being no supplementary, I'm not entirely sure that the question is answered. I think it's a very odd answer, if I might say so. So, it answers the part about carbon emissions, but it doesn't specifically say why the land and property line in the EIG says all individual service estate transformation projects should be stopped. And I don't know if Diane Wilding is online yet. Yes. Oh, yes. Yes, Councillor. Can we have something a bit more specific? Yes. Well, the question, I wasn't sure what particular projects was mentioned by Councillor Barth. She just asked which was stopped. We're not stopping any existing projects, but what we are doing, because we're reviewing the estate due to the financial pressures that we're receiving at the moment, we are looking at any estate transformation and making sure it fits into the holistic programme. So, we're not stopping any projects per se, but we are sense-checking projects to make sure that we're looking at more community and customer-based programmes and estate pieces, if that makes sense. Sorry. So, the line, which is quoted by Catherine Barth, all individual services, state transformation projects should be stopped. That's only part of the picture? It is only part of the picture. In context, it's just to review all current programmes in the context of a holistic estate projects, just to make sure that we're sense-checking the sole occupation of properties. But Simon wants to come in, and I'm sure he'll cover it better than I will. Thank you, Chair. Yeah, no, just to add to Diane, I think there's two things, one of which is in the asset-in-place strategy of 2019, there's a clear direction to minimise the adoption or maintenance of single-use assets. So, this part of the answer is pitching at, can we identify opportunities to bring services together in fewer buildings where the services are compatible, which is part of this. And the second part is, in doing so, what we're also trying to seek to do is to minimise or optimise our overall estate size, which of itself will reduce the carbon footprint too. So, part of the question was about reducing carbon emissions. Yes, that's also a kind of driver here. So, it's the point that Diane said. We're not looking to kind of impact our overall and agreed capital programmes, but where we can identify opportunities to co-locate, let's co-locate. And in doing so, let's have basically fewer, better buildings that are better performing and greener. Okay. Thank you, Simon. Grateful for that. If we can move to item front. Oh, I'm so sorry. Can I come in on a supplementary supplementary, if you don't mind? The estate strategy 2019. We're actually coming towards the end of 2024. When can we expect an updated estate strategy? Thank you, Chairman. The asset and player strategy was originally designed to cover up until 2025. So, that's correct, Simon. Sorry, you're on mute. And we're always reassessing it anyway, because of different circumstances, different issues across the estate. So, I think this year and the ongoing improvements that we're making will culminate into an update. Oh, yes. What people are saying around the table is when? 2025, I would suggest, Simon. Yes, we may add, Chair, so at a site level, the team has got a site-specific strategy for every property, whether it's a short, medium or long-term retain. And we can aggregate that up to what does the overall picture look like. We have done a lot of work on that, which relates to this question about where can we consolidate and where do we want to retain in the long term, allied with understanding all the new assets that we're creating as a result of the capital programs in the adult services space, for example. So, by 2025, we can aggregate all that and give you a very clear picture of where we are now and what the 2030 picture might look like as we move forward. Thank you. Steve. Thanks, Chair. An item here would be, can we just make that an entry in the forward work plan or action tracker so that we can pick that up sometime next year to coordinate when that updated strategy document might come to us or it might be available? Is that possible? Thank you. Chair, could I also add that we can also, as part of that, provide an update on what we've achieved against the current asset in place strategy authored in 2019? Because we have made significant progress against that. That would be very helpful. Thank you, Simon. Okay. Is everybody down on that one? Thank you very much. If we can move to item five, cabinet response to select committee recommendations. The committee will have seen those and gone through them. Can we note the cabinet response to the committee's recommendations following the budget deep dives and briefing sessions? Agreed. And I invite comments from members, if there are any, and suggestions or questions on this response that should be picked up or may be picked up by the budget team. Steve. Yeah, thanks, Chair. I mean, cabinet responses are welcome and thank you very much for those. I've got some several questions and it may not be the right place to do this now, otherwise we probably won't get out of here before Christmas. But I believe there's a quarterly liaison meeting in the 18th where we might be able to pick up some of these additional questions. But, for example, on the workforce cost deep dive, we talked around the organisational design principles and the responses, the cabinet notes, recommendations complete, the organisational design principles have been updated. And the information that was shared to us was a set of principles that included spans and layers and it's not clear what updates to the organisation have been made out of that. And it's not clear if all aspects of the organisation model have been fully completed and implemented into the organisation. And from our briefing on this one, it's not. It was basically a model that was going to be implemented. So there are just some clarification questions that I would like to share and get some clarifications on those points as well. And probably not for now because I've got quite a few questions off the back of that one. But if I could maybe share that offline and then we pick it up on the 18th of December. I think that's very helpful. Thank you very much. Okay. If we could move to item 6, scrutiny of the 25-26 draft budget and medium-term financial strategy to 29-30. We have a number of witnesses. I'll greet them all now so I don't have to keep repeating it as we go to different bits. We have David Lewis, the Cabinet Member for Finance and Resources, with us in the room, along with Rachel Wigley, Nicola O'Connor and Louise Lawson. And I mention them all together because this is their fourth performance this week. I've only heard, after today, I would only have heard three of them. And I've apologised for not hearing the fourth, of course. But, no, thank you very much. I know you've put an enormous amount of effort into this. We also have Denise Turner-Stewart, who is with us online. A particular welcome to the Deputy Chief Executive and Executive Director for Resources, Andy Brown, who is with us for the first time. And, again, thank you very much for the meeting you had with the officers of the committee earlier this week, which I think was very productive. We have Liz Mills, the Strategic Director of Customer Service Transformation, Adam Whittaker, Principal Strategy and Policy Lead. And, online, we have Simon Crowther, Executive Director of Environment, Property and Growth, Diane Wilding, Director of Land and Property, and, hopefully, Matt Scott, Chief Digital Information Officer. Can I invite the Cabinet Member for Finance to introduce the items? Thank you, Chair. Good morning. As you say, this is the fourth Select Committee meeting this week with my introduction. As you've attended three of the four, you might even be able to give it. Certainly, one of my Cabinet colleagues said to me after yesterday, he said, I could give that speech now, I think. Anyway, thank you. So, just to introduce the draft budget, which was approved by Cabinet, as you know, last week. And we're talking about the revenue and capital budgets for next year, for the 25-26, and the medium-term financial strategy for the next five years, up to 29-30. We're operating, as you all know, within a very difficult financial background, and the climate is difficult and challenging, and as a consequence of that, in setting the budget, or producing the draft budget, we've had to take some difficult decisions in terms of our priorities, in order to get it to the point that we've got it to, but we do put up of importance in ensuring that the financial resilience of this authority remains strong. And, as we've said before, over the last few years, we've put up of effort into ensuring that the Council's finances are robust, we've built up reserves, and, despite the challenges that we face as a sector, and, sorry, County Council is not exempt from that, we don't want to do anything in terms of our budget going forward that would jeopardise the resilience and robustness of the Council's financial position. And we're not prepared to do that. And we're not prepared to do that. We started setting, working on the budget for 25-26, almost immediately that the last budget for this year was concluded, after full Council at the beginning of February. And, as I think you all know by now, it works on an iterative process, whereby, on a monthly basis, the next version of the draft budget is produced. We look at, we work on a budget envelope principle, but we look at the pressures which are facing each part of the organisation, we look at the efficiencies which are identified, we make assumptions about the grant income, and we have the gap which has to be closed. And with each iteration of the budget, those numbers are updated, and we've got to the point where a draft budget was finally produced and approved by Cabinet last week, which has a gap of £17.4 million in it, which is of the magnitude that in previous years, when we got to the stage of the budget setting process, we've had a gap of a similar sort of size. We did commit, at the start of this process, to have a full engagement process, and I hope you all agree, as a select committee, that we've engaged with you. I think this is the third budget meeting I think we've had with this select committee, and we've had similar meetings with all the other select committees. You've had the opportunity to do your deep dive work. We've also given opportunities to each of the opposition groups to have briefings on the budget. We've also engaged externally with our residents and external organisations to get their input into the budget setting process, and that's a two-part process. We kicked that off when we were developing the draft budget, and the second stage of that process opened as soon as Cabinet approved the draft budget last week. We're currently going through that phase to get input from our residents and get input from our organisations within Surrey and across Surrey in terms of their views of what we've published as a draft budget, and recommendations and suggestions for how we should close the gap. Your recommendations that came out of your deep dive work were considered and will be considered as we move forward from the draft budget stage to the full budget. Today is an opportunity for you to scrutinise that draft budget, and we're very much looking forward to getting your recommendations on that draft budget and how we can work from where we are to the final budget, and ideas for closing that gap of the 17.4 million that exists. And we'll talk, and Rachel will talk us through in a minute, the different options for how we could potentially close that gap, the options which are open to us. But, of course, in all of this, we do have to be mindful of the fact that we don't yet have details of the local government settlement, and those details will become available, we think, on the 19th of December. And so we've assumed at the moment, in terms of the budget, that there will be flat funding. But things are becoming a bit clearer. We had the government's budget at the end of October, which contained recommendations and proposals which will impact on the finances of this council. And we also had a ministerial statement a week or so ago, which also began to put a bit of meat on the bones of what the government were intending to do. What is not totally clear at the moment is exactly how the money and the funds which the government have announced will actually be allocated directly to us. For the purposes of the budget, sorry, for the purposes of the draft budget, we've assumed a council tax increase of 2.99%. And the reason that we've assumed that is that we didn't know at that stage, when we were putting the draft budget together, whether or not we would be permitted by government to actually go to the full 5%, which has been the position in previous years, 3% on council tax plus 2% on the adult social care precept. In the ministerial statement that we got last week, it was confirmed that we can, in fact, go up to that full 5%. And just for your benefit, every 1% that we raise council tax by generates just over 9 million in income for us. We are ambitious, so despite the challenges that we face, we are an ambitious council, an ambitious cabinet. And you'll see that from the slide that we have been able to include sufficient money within that draft budget to invest and continue to fund a number of initiatives, which we as an administration and cabinet believe are important and we wish to continue to focus on. As I say, we'll talk about the options for closing the budget gap in a minute, but there are a number of options open to us, which we will consider once we fully understand from the local government settlement exactly what the grant income is going to be. As I said at the beginning, we are also, as part of this budget process, looking at the medium term financial strategy for the next 5 years. And our view is that things are tough at the moment, they're likely to get even tougher going forward. The government have indicated that there will be a three-year financial settlement for local authorities, which we support. That would make planning very much easier for us. For the last few years, it's just been a single annual local government settlement. So, in principle, we support the three-year proposal. But the indications are that there will be some form of funding review carried out before next year. And all the indications from the discussions that have taken place with government indicate that the funding review will likely be detrimental in terms of the amount of income that we get as an authority. And as likely to result in a reduced funding and as likely to be driven by deprivation indices and things like that, which will divert money away from authorities such as our own. So, at the moment, if you look at the medium term financial strategy over the next 5 years, you can see there's a significant gap, almost 200 million, which will have to be closed over that 5-year period. And, you know, as I said, the indications are that we're not going to be helped by any settlement that comes out of government. We are working, as you know, and are investing in a significant transformation programme across the Council. And I think it's important that we see that transformation programme in the context of the efficiencies that we're also driving out of the system. The two go hand in hand. When we talk about efficiencies, I mean, ultimately, this results in reduction in cost, but you can't just reduce cost and continue to deliver frontline services or any other service, to that matter, if you don't actually change the way in which you operate. So, the transformation programme underpins the way that we intend to operate. The changes which will come out of that programme will enable us to deliver those frontline services, but in a more effective and a more efficient way. So, as I say, when you look at the budget and you look at the efficiencies that we've committed to as part of the draft budget, think of it also in terms of the money that we're investing in transformation and the fact that transformation is an enabler, which will enable us to drive those efficiencies out of the system. So, at that point, I'll hand over to Nikki. Thank you. Thanks. Good morning all. Nikki O'Connor, Strategic Finance Business Partner for Corporate Finance. In the interest of time, I'll just pull out some of the key headlines on the overarching Council budget for both revenue and capital. So, based on current assumptions, the overall revenue budget envelope for 25-26 is estimated to be just over $1.2 billion, which is a $34 million increase from the current year revenue budget. As Councillor Lewis has already said, that is based on an assumed increase in council tax of 2.99% and broadly a rollover of funding, grant funding from the current financial year to next year. The government's budget at the end of October in the policy statement last week gave indications that the council tax referendum limit would be up to 5%. So, as Councillor Lewis set out, that's up to 3% on core council tax, an additional 2% adult social care precept and did give us some indication of funding. So, in terms of our assumptions of a rollover, there's a couple of grants in there we're probably being a little optimistic on. So, expect the final settlement to suggest we'll get less than we're assuming in the draft budget. But also, I'm sure you're all aware, the policy statement and the budget announced some new funding sources for councils. We have no specific indication of the allocation of that new funding that we will get, so it's set a national pot of money for things like additional social care funding. We don't know what the council's allocation will be and it's heavily dependent on the formula and the allocation methodology adopted by government as to how much of that we will get. What the policy statement last week did confirm is that the new government are taking into account in those allocation decisions both deprivation, although it didn't give an indication of how deprivation would be measured, and also councils' ability to raise council tax, so those councils with higher tax bases likely to see less of that new funding than those with lower tax bases. So, that gives the overall estimated increase of 34 million. Alongside that, directorates have identified pressures of 108 million. And that would therefore have required efficiencies of 74 million to be identified to balance the budget, as we are required to do. So far at the draft budget stage, directorates have identified 57 million of efficiencies, and that's where the gap of 17 million comes from. So, the difference between what we've identified and what we think we need to identify based on all of those moving parts around identified pressures and funding. As part of the work to develop the budget for 2025-26 and the medium term financial strategy to 29-30, we have also reviewed the capital program. As you're all very aware, the cost of construction has increased significantly over recent years, and we've seen successive rises in interest rates, making borrowing costs higher. Interest rates have come down recently, but they're not expected to decrease, certainly not as quickly as they increased over the last couple of years. And therefore, it's really important to look at our capital program. A line-by-line review of all the schemes in the program has been done with a particular focus on those requiring borrowing to ensure that the capital program proposed is affordable in terms of the ongoing revenue impact of borrowing to fund that capital program is deliverable and is proportionate to the size of our overall net budget. At that point, I'll hand over to Rachel. Thanks, Nicky. Good morning, everybody. Rachel Wigley, Director of Finance, Insight and Performance. So, you've heard already about the £17.4 million budget gap, and I'm just going to take you through the options that we're looking at to close the gap. So, the first option that Nicky's already talked about is additional government funding. As you're aware, you've heard this morning, we won't know with any certainty until we get the provisional local government settlement. And there is significant uncertainty into the medium term, which I'll come back to in a moment. Another option that we're looking at is continuing to look at efficiencies and reduce pressures wherever we can. So, we'll continue to do that until we get to the final budget, which obviously goes to Cabinet in January and Full Council in February next year. We've looked at our reserves. So, our usable reserves are around 12% of our net revenue budget. So, that's about £140 million. We've worked hard over the last few years to rebuild those depleted reserves, which were at a very low level in 2018. We've assessed those reserves given the financial environment that we're working in, and we consider those to be about the right level. And we wouldn't, as officers, consider using those reserves for ongoing expenditure, only for use of one-off expenditure. And then finally, the increased council tax option, which both Councillor Lewis and Nicky have already talked about. And as we've said, we think we could go up to another 2% for the adult social care precept. But again, we need to work that through, and that will obviously be a Cabinet and Full Council decision next year. And as Councillor Lewis has said, just as a reminder, every 1% increase in council tax delivers about £9 million worth of funding. So, going into the medium term and what that means for us, I think you've probably heard already significant uncertainty going into the medium term. We've had many years of only single-year settlements, which makes future planning incredibly difficult. We think we've got a commitment from the new government for multi-year settlements, and we're hoping for that, because that will bring some certainty in our planning. The timing and the impact of fair funding, which I know that you've heard from us in previous years, still remains unknown. Our current assumption is that that will be at the earliest, 26-27, and we think there will be transitional arrangements. So, we've assumed flat funding, in effect, for the medium term. So, looking at all the pressures that directorates have worked through, and the efficiencies that they've been able to exemplify so far, we have a medium term budget gap of £193 million, which is around 16% of our net revenue budget. So, at that point, without reiterating again where we are on reserves, I will finish. Thank you. Thank you very much, Nicky and Rachel. If we can move to the questions. The question one, which is in my name, has been largely answered. So, I'll just say, is there anything you might want to add in terms of rate retention levels? Certainly, Chair. I can just outline what the assumptions are in the draft budget. So, obviously, the council tax collection rates are informed by information that we get from our boroughs and districts. Based on historic information, the collection rate is forecast in the draft budget at 98.5%. That's the average across all 11. Obviously, they differ slightly from one to another. And we're assuming council tax growth of about 0.95%. Business rates is slightly different in terms of that. So, there's kind of national allocation. So, business rates, upper tier authorities retain 10% of what is collected. But we also get kind of reliefs and additional business rate grants set by central government. And those assumptions are all broadly in line with what we're receiving in current year. And we've got some indication in the policy statement, again, that that's broadly what we're looking to see in the settlement. Thank you. That's very helpful. I see no supplementages on that. So, we go to the second question from Leslie. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Again, you've answered part of this question. But if it's possible, could you give a little bit more detail on how you expect that 17.4 million to be bridged, particularly with restructuring and staffing reductions? Would be quite good if you'd give us a little bit more detail on that. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor. So, yes, I covered the options in the introduction. So, additional government funding, possibility. We're not too hopeful. But that is a possibility. But as I said, we're continuing to look at efficiencies and driving down any pressures where we can. And we'll continue to do that. And obviously, the council tax increase option and use of reserves for one-off. But specifically looking at your point about staffing, the implications on staffing, which I think is what you're asking about. We are looking across the council at how we can restructure, be much more efficient. And we have the organizational redesign program, which Liz Mills may pick up later. There's no set target for those financial efficiencies. We're continuing to do what we can. And we will continue to look at where it makes sense to join services together, to look at where we can be more efficient. We've got the recruitment and retention program already in place. So, we're not recruiting where it doesn't make any sense and where we know that we might have stuffing, restructuring coming up anyway. So, yes, that is definitely an option. As I said, we'll continue to work in those areas. And we're looking at it across the council. So, we're not focusing it on any particular area. That is a general process that we're looking at across everything. Steve. Thanks, Chair. Just a quick follow-up. Hello. It's me again. So, one of the items we talked about that was mentioned was the possible increase on council tax going over 2.99%. And every percentage point was, what, £9 million. So, forgive me for being cynical here, but it just seems that raising that again by another 2% gives you 18 mil, which is going to cover off that 17.4, which is... Convenience is the wrong word, but I just want to seek some assurance that every stone will be looked, will remain, you know, turned over, as it were. And every other option will be looked at before we start to look at, again, you know, passing the cost onto our residents because everyone's struggling. And to basically have council tax going up to 4.99% plus the 2% ASC precepts. So, it's 2.99, that's what you can... Plus 2. Plus 2. Plus an additional 2. So, that's going to be 4.99. Okay. It's good that you financed it here to help on this one. So, I just want to seek assurance that that would be the last resort that we do to pass on this cost to our residents, please. Thank you. David. And then I'll... Because we're probably going to pass on to David anyway, because it's a... It is a political decision in terms of council tax fund. I'm under no illusion that Cabinet also see it as the last resort as well. I see where you're going in terms of the convenience, 18 million, 17.4 million. From a finance perspective, yes, it does look like that way. But as Nicky's just described, we know from the written statement that we're actually going to be likely to get less formula funding. I did want to cover off in terms of the overall likelihood of fair funding. I know it's a question, but effectively, the redistribution that we're going to see in terms of tax bases and deprivation, funding is going to be going away from shire counties, if you like, and districts and boroughs, and it will be going towards metropolitan areas. So, that is therefore effectively forcing councils, little choice but to raise council tax. However, covering your point, yes, corporate leadership team are looking at particularly the further efficiencies and identified pressures. We've got one area of concern, employers' national insurance. We've been told that we're going to get funded directly for our direct staff costs. But our suppliers will have that impact and that will see itself coming through in the supply chain as well. So, we don't know exactly what that cost will be. We've got some estimates around that, particularly around adult social care. So, we do have some variables coming into it. The corporate leadership team have been meeting regularly on this to look at how can we drive forward the additional efficiency, additional efficiencies that come forward. And that also includes the FTE reductions through organisation redesign and where that they can happen. Those plans are still in their infancy but will come to the fore. We're also looking at the reduction of pressures as well. As we said, the budget is going up by £108 million in terms of how can we contain that cost as best as possible as well as delivering more efficiencies, 57 million at the moment. But we have to deliver those in year. But what we're currently looking at is what further efficiencies can be made and what further costs can be contained. So, we will be looking at that and I'm pretty confident that there will be movement before we get to the final budget proposals. Okay, thank you very much. If we could move to question three from Hazel. Thank you, Chairman. 57 million of efficiencies have already been identified to help close the budget gap in the 2025-26 budget. Are these identified efficiencies considered achievable? Thank you. Shall I take that one? Thank you, Councillor. So, yes, you're right. 57 million so far in the draft budget. And there may be more, as I said, depending on the options to close that budget gap. What we are expecting, and we're having a thorough and rigorous look at all of this, is having delivery plans for each one of those efficiencies. And, of course, so alongside that, we also want to make sure any risks are also highlighted so that we can work through those as well. As you're aware, we've delivered a significant amount of efficiencies over a number of years. And each year, it does get more difficult. So, hence the need to recognize that difficulty and work our way through the risks on those. But, nevertheless, directorates have signed up to those efficiencies and we've had a thorough review this week from our select committees. Yeah, so I think that hopefully answers your question. Thank you, Chairman. The impression I get from you is that it's not completely certain whether these efficiencies are deliverable, because you'll have a delivery plan with risks and, therefore, there is an element of uncertainty about it. I note from the papers that some efficiencies which were proposed for the current financial year have proved to be undeliverable and, therefore, are being reversed for the next financial year. So, do you think there's an element of uncertainty and risk of not being achievable is perhaps greater this year than for the current year? I don't know whether I would say greater. It just is getting increasingly more difficult as we work our way through those efficiencies. But that's why we've got a transformation program in place as well. So, working through all the directorates for the organizational redesign to deliver as much as possible. As I said, we do have that budget accountability in place. We're working on delivery plans. And those efficiencies that prove undeliverable at the end of the day, we do expect services to look at alternatives. So, you'll see from the 24-25 budget monitoring reports that we've been able to find some mitigations for some of the things that we haven't been able to do in 24-25. So, it is a balance, absolutely. So, the things that are undeliverable, we'll have to look for alternatives in future years. So, they become pressures, but then we'll have to find more efficiencies. And in year, we look for mitigations as well. Steve. Thanks, Chair. Yeah, I'm picking up on Hazel's points around the previously unachieved efficiencies. You mentioned that there are delivery plans highlighting the current identified efficiencies. Can we confirm whether those delivery plans for those previously unachieved efficiencies were in place? Or is this a change in approach now to ensure that where efficiencies are identified, but there is a plan in place and, dare I say, accountability for those efficiencies? Because, again, it's a big, big juggling act, a big task to actually get all of this done. And if we have efficiencies that are highlighted which don't actually come about, that puts huge pressure on reserves and officers, et cetera. So, I'd just like to understand a bit more around those previously unachieved efficiencies in the last year's budget. And the delivery plans that you mentioned, is that a change off the back of that? And how can we be assured around the accountability that those efficiencies being identified by directors, et cetera, are achievable? And what happens if they're not? Thank you. Yes. So, we've always had the expectation that each efficiency would have a plan. We have now, we're now enforcing that. So, there should have always been, there's always been an expectation that there's plans behind it, but we're going through a rigorous process now. And we will, we will be enforcing those plans. We've always, since 20, the end of 2018, beginning of 2019, we've had budget accountability statements. So, each exec director and director sign a budget accountability statement to say that they will deliver their budget, their best spend within budget, their service within budget. And where they can't, they need to look for mitigations to do that. And, of course, sometimes there are things where it's out of control of either the service for whether that's demand or extra pressures that come in that weren't foreseen at the time. And that's why we've got reserves, usable reserves, that we can use should Cabinet agree to do that. But that would be our last resort. So, our main thing is to work through the plans, make sure we understand all the risks, get mitigations in place, and work with those services to look at other options. Yeah, of course. You probably know where I'm going to go with this one, don't you? So, the previous efficiency plans did have delivery plans, but they weren't enforced. Our expectation was that they would be, they weren't necessarily for all of them. But we are now putting a full plan in place to make sure they do that. But if you look at the 24-25 budget monitoring report, we've also overachieved on some things as well. So, and that's part of the mitigation. So, where services can't find their original plans, planned efficiencies, they will look for mitigation. So, we've got some overachievement and some undeliverable within 24-5. Okay, thank you. The kind of next logical step from that, from my point of view, would be to have a look at the previous year's efficiencies, the efficiency plans for where they weren't enforced, where they weren't achieved, and if we could maybe have a look at that as part of our work going forward. And it's more about lessons learned and improvement. You know, trying to basically retrospectively go back and, believe it or not, it's not what I'm about. I'm trying to just get improvements going forward as I'm sure everyone else is as well. The budget accountability statements, again, it's an interesting area here. Have these been enforced as well? And the question is, were these enforced previously? And is the same process going to happen in the current budget cycle? And again, can we get a view on what budget accountability statements were provided and how many were met? So it's around that look back, but equally looking forward to say, okay, we've recognised there are some changes to be done or some additional oversight or scrutiny to be done, and it may well be something that we might want to consider bringing into this committee for a further deep dive. So budget accountability statements, as I said, have been in place since 2019. 100% of them have been signed every year. David wants to come in. Yeah, on the question of delivery of efficiencies, I just wanted to make the point that the efficiencies which are in the budget are not efficiencies that have simply been imposed on the organisation by the finance team. They're efficiencies that have been offered up by the individual directorates and services. So it's, you know, they've looked at their activities and it's, you know, so in a way, if there is any look at the efficiencies and the ability or inability to deliver them, and historically, in a way, it probably would be better going through those select committees rather than the select committee because it's their efficiencies. Yeah, thanks, Chair. I think Rachel's been very diplomatic. They were signed off, yes. Were they deliverable? Question mark. So I think that's the bit, certainly, that I come in and look at. Definitely, lessons can be learned from the past, but I think there's more value in looking at how we are going to enforce and look at, say, the efficiencies and the delivery plans being delivered in 2526. So part of the workload on my radar is for the efficiencies that form the final budget proposals. There will be a change in governance around how those plans are delivered and there is an oversight on those from the leadership and those directors are held, those directors that sign them off are held to account in terms of their delivery. Budget monitoring is clearly effective here because it flags variances and those variances come through from demand, inflation but also through from either over-delivery of savings or under-delivery of savings. But what I want to ensure is that when efficiencies are put on the table, that we are clear about their interdependencies. Part of the final budget proposals, which will help me do my Section 25 statement about the robustness of the estimates, will be looking at the savings and to see how those directors ragrate them effectively in terms of their deliverability and their interdependencies and risks. And I know in some services they are dependent on factors that are potentially outside of their control. The budget is based on the best estimates at that time, but it's having the management controls in place to ensure that the delivery plans are being delivered. And then when things go out of kilter in terms of the budget, the interventions and the actions that are then being taken. So definitely there is learning from the past, but certainly where we are going forward is that it is enforced in terms of delivery plans and that they are signed up to, but they are then held accountable in terms of the delivery. And then there's oversight from the organisation in terms of where they aren't being delivered, either on time or in terms of the value that action is then taken. Okay, thank you very much. Okay, yes, I think we've explored that thoroughly. Can we come back to national insurance contributions, which the deputy chief executive mentioned earlier? Obviously, there have to be concerns about the impact on contracted services. Notably, I think those provided by other smaller organisations or by charities. What will the councillor do to mitigate the impact? Thank you. Nikki. Sorry, I was joking. So, yeah, so obviously in terms of the direct costs to the councils of our employees, government has announced simultaneously that local authorities will be reimbursed for that. I think it is important, though, for the committee to note that we don't have any confirmation at the moment about how that reimbursement will be calculated or allocated. So there's definitely a risk, I think, to the final budget that it's not fully funded, and that's one of the many moving parts that we're still working through as we approach the final budget. But as you say, that reimbursement is not extended to our providers, and there will no doubt, therefore, be price pressures that we see as a result of that that are not currently built into the draft budget position. Contract inflation is built in, but it's not council's responsibility to ensure that we're reimbursing all of our providers as for the impact of a national policy change, but there is no doubt that we will very likely, I think, see price increases on that. And we are absolutely, as Andy said earlier, working through what that might mean in terms of the financial impact on the final budget. That's very helpful. Thank you. You said that contract inflation is built in. I may have missed it in the pack, but to what extent is that built in? Is there a percentage across the board or different for different contractors? So, in short, the latter, we have a kind of corporate non-pay inflation assumption of 2%, but that is to be used in the absence of any better insight. So, directorates build in contract inflation. You'll see it as a pressure line in all of the directorate positions. And they build that in based on their knowledge of what's actually written into terms and conditions of specific contracts and or other market knowledge. So, for example, we know some markets like energy, food, et cetera, don't follow the national inflation position. So, it does differ from one directorate to another. Thank you very much. I've seen other supplementaries. Can we move to question five from Leslie? Thank you, Chair. This is regarding slides 19 and 20 on the equality analysis of 25 and 26. I note the concerns and things of mitigation raised in that equality analysis. Were there any further areas identified by residents? I'm specifically concerned about the SEND special educational needs in that regard. And how can the Select Committee be reassured that residents will be sufficiently protected by mitigating actions undertaken? Thank you. Thank you. I'll take this one. So, Adam Whittaker, principal strategy and policy lead. So, I think it's important to note that the themes that are captured in the slides are positioned as cross-cutting themes. So, these are themes that are coming out of quite a few different equality analyses, including any that might be related to SEND. So, I think it's important to note that with that process, it is iterative. So, the information that's been presented to the committee is the best available information at this time, and there will be more work to do in line with the delivery of those efficiencies to further consult and engage residents on where relevant the impacts of those changes. So, just to give one example of where this is going to be applied in practice. So, take customer transformation programs. So, there's a clear commitment within the full impact assessment that was presented back to the Cabinet in July to make sure that people with protected characteristics would be consulted and involved for testing any new aspects of that program. But there's also other impacts that can be anticipated. So, again, using that program as an example for any digital materials. There's processes in place to make sure that they are accessible depending on the different information processing needs for different residents. So, there are mechanisms that are already in place that can be anticipated. And we can make sure that those are reflected in the assessments without necessarily needing to ask residents about that because it feels self-explanatory. In terms of the assurance piece, so, as mentioned earlier, there will be delivery plans around these efficiencies. And as part of the review process and implementation, the impact assessments that the analysis is based on will need to be reviewed on a regular basis. So, another suggestion would be that as part of the committee's work for any work that you look at as part of the forward work program going forward, you may want to ask for a c-copy of the assessments to take that into account and help to support that assurance piece. I agree with that. Steve. Thanks, Chair. Just on the very, very quick one. There are a number of equality impact assessment documents that were shared from several directors. And they all have different looks and feels across all of them and different levels of detail as well. I was wondering if it might be possible to, as a whole organizational view, to look at the look and feel, the template of those EIA documents to try and at least make sure there's some level of consistency across those so that you are being able to compare apples to apples. So, it's just, I just looked through it more than it just felt that they were, well, they appeared to be coming from different organizations as it were. So, if we can have a look at some of those, that would be quite helpful. Thanks. And just to come back on that, so we do encourage officers to use a consistent template. I think possibly why you may have got different pieces of information with different levels of format is because of the stage of development some of those assessments are at. So, there are some efficiency plans that are still being worked up and they need to kind of go through that screening process. So, we have a full template that we encourage officers to complete that gives a significant degree of information. But then there's also a screening process that we encourage people to do before that in case there's any uncertainties around what the impacts may be before they proceed to doing that full analysis. So, we absolutely do encourage the use of a consistent template for doing that. Okay, thank you. Well, we'll have a look at the completed EIAs when they come back to us before budget in February. Thanks. Thank you. If we could move to the last question in this section, question six. Largely answered, if we can do it reasonably briefly. Yeah. Question six. Yeah. Thanks, Chair. I mean, this has been relatively well covered, I think. But the field on the fair funding review, it's a bit of an unknown at this particular point. You're trying to basically hedge bets and so forth. One of my favourites, yeah, you've done it, you've practically answered it saying, you know, have you done what if modelling? And we've heard a fair amount of that. We're trying to anticipate a number of different areas. I don't know if you'd like to talk about any more. I think you might have covered most of it. So, absolutely you have covered most of it. I suppose I'll just pick up a few things. So, as you're aware, fair funding has been promised for a number of years and is probably the most significant impact on our medium-term funding for the Council. The new government have reaffirmed their commitment to review the assessment of needs and funding reform. And we are expecting consultation during 2025 on that. We are currently anticipating it to impact from 26, 27. And as I said earlier, the policy statement, I think, gives the best indication we've got so far in terms of the intentions and the considerations that government are taking into account in relation to that funding reform, which is absolutely targeting areas of deprivation and areas with lower tax basis. So, less ability to raise income through Council tax. So, I think it's fair to say it's very likely or very, very likely that the Council will see a significant reduction in its government funding through any fair funding reform. We did, particularly for this week, as you say, we do a lot of modelling and a lot of variables. But for this budget setting process for 2025-26, we did actually get an independent review of our medium-term funding assumptions. And that helped alongside us to model a huge number of different scenarios. I think there was over 20 variables playing into that. And essentially, the finding was that, obviously, unsurprisingly, the further into the future you get, the more divergent the various scenarios there are in terms of funding. But it reaffirmed that our forecast medium-term funding gap is well within that range of what they think the most likely scenario is for the Council. And I think the only other thing I would say is that what's really key for us in terms of any fair funding reform and consultation is any level of transitional funding that the government put in place that would essentially, for the short term, dampen the impact on those, either the kind of biggest winners or the biggest losers, so to speak. There's some transitional arrangements to dampen the effect and stop one-off kind of all happening in one year, so smoothing the impact of any loss. And that will be very key for us, I think. Okay, thank you very much indeed. If we can move to the second section on Finance and Corporate Services. Can I invite the Cabinet Member, if he wishes, to introduce this section? That's you. No, sorry, I don't think there's anything further to say at this stage, Chairman. Let's go straight into the questions. Thank you. Andy, do you wish to introduce something? No, I think in terms of brevity, I think everything's there in the slides. We'll move straight on to questions. Marvelous, thank you very much indeed. First question, question seven from Leslie. Thank you, Chair. I seem to be asking a lot of questions today, but anyway. Could you clarify how combining those two directorates, Finance and Corporate, and Customer Dealing Change, has affected these areas' budgets and the overall 25-26 budget? How would the planned work of these directorates be funded across the medium term, please? Thank you. Okay, thanks, I'll take that. So, effectively, there is no impact, they've just been consolidated. So, apart from a small segment that's come out from the changes in the corporate leadership team restructure, effectively, the budgets that were under Finance and Corporate Services and Customer Dealing Change have been brought together and retitled resources. So, in terms of funding, it's exactly as you see in the draft budget documents now, in terms of the proposals going forward in next year's budget and the MTFS will effectively be funded as all other services are funded through Council's government and government grants. So, the only impact it has been is effectively to consolidate the services. So, if we're not really making great efficiencies, was there any reason for combining them? I mean, what was the thinking behind combining them then? It's just, it's making a much bigger directorate in effect. So, if there's no efficiencies or very little, why are we doing it? Okay. Not in the short term, but obviously, going forward, and you'll see in efficiencies, there's efficiencies around org redesign within each individual areas. I liken resources to effectively a collection of professional functions effectively, and there will be efficiencies that will be made across the piece. So, going forward, in terms of answering the question directly, there is no impact, it's put it together. But going forward, yes, there will be efficiencies that are made, and they'll be not only within resources themselves, in terms of efficiencies, but across the wider Council as well, in terms of those core functions that we provide, whether that's finance, procurement, communications, there's those functions that we will look to centralise as well. So, there are efficiencies that are planned, and that's why we're bringing that function together. Okay. Thank you very much. If we can move to question eight from David Harmer. Yes. Thank you, Chairman. Slide 25 in the collection shows that income increase or inflation is expected to fall markedly from 25 to 26 and remain lower for the whole balance of the five-year medium term. What's the logic for this assumption? How robust would you regard it as being? And how were the exact figures generated? Thank you. Yes, this is actually an error, and we are going to correct it in the final iteration of the budget. And you will see that also the expenditure inflation change is low as well, so we'll be adding back in. But the net impact is about £20,000, so it's not material. Between the two, income and expenditure, you mean? Yes. So, the net impact is negligible. So, it would be a trivial barrier? Yes, it's just realigning it from 26 to 27. That's fair enough. Are you sure you've got it right now? Thank you. Can I just briefly ask, are the inflation forecast Treasury figures? So, they're, sorry, they're the corporate, and we're using the inflation levels that we estimate to be, so for pay it's 2%, and on non-pay from 26 to 27 it's 2% as well. All right, so specific to the council, or councils. Yes. Based on, yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Steve. Thanks, Chair. Sorry I didn't get your attention before. I just had a follow-up question on slide eight. So, there's an item in the last paragraph about directorates' proposed efficiencies, and we've obviously talked about business plans and signing up, et cetera. So, it talks in here about staffing reductions in the number of services, 1.2 mil. The votes, have they all been identified? Have they all been signed off as part of the, what is it, budget accountability statement, and the efficiency plans? Have they been all done, have been identified? No, because there is an HR process to go through in terms of restructure plans. So, there's a target there. There is form, there is discussions taking place, but then obviously we have to then go through a consultation process with staff that are affected. So, you'll see in there staffing reductions, I think I'm looking at slide 26 in there, that's got around organisation redesign staffing reductions across those functions, but there is a due process to go through. However, saying that, we know what the target is, and there are ideas around that, but there's due process to go through. Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Chair. Thank you. We'll now move to your question nine. Thanks, Chair. Capital financing costs, revenue, budget. It looks like there's a proposed reduction in the latest iteration, and it's almost like we're trying to reduce capital expenditure in our current iteration, and going across the longer medium term, are we looking to basically increase that capital expenditure in future years, and what does that actually do to our overall attitude to our investment and risk strategy? So, it's almost like we're basically pulling back that capital expenditure in the current year, but are we basically doing that because, you know, is there any long-term problem of basically doing that? Are we Rob and Paul now to pay Peter later? So, what is behind that? Yeah. Sure. Sure. So, we are consciously trying to bring down our capital investment. I think it's worth just looking backwards slightly, in that a number of years ago, it's kind of recognised that at Council, our capital spend was quite low compared to our peers, and that we were under-investing in some of our asset base, and there was a conscious drive to spend more capital and essentially have a short-term injection of capital to kind of bring up the quality of the asset base, but always with an intention that that would be short-term and that we would need to reduce back down to lower levels going forward. So, in some ways, this is in line with that plan. Obviously, that plan to kind of inject more capital was prior to the high cost of capital that we're seeing now, and we absolutely do as an organisation need to get used to not spending as much capital as we have over the last kind of three or four years. So, that review of the capital programme has focused very much on kind of statutory requirements, health and safety, statutory services, and indeed capital investment that generates ongoing revenue efficiencies in the budget. So, to your point that there's no point taking out capital if it's got an ongoing negative impact on the revenue budget. So, very much a focus on continuing to do some of those big key schemes that will drive revenue efficiencies in the future. In relation to investment and risk, I suppose a lot of, all of that in terms of, I wasn't sure if you were talking specifically about borrowing and investment strategy risk. Obviously, that's all included within an annual capital investment treasury management strategy, which is in the process of being drafted based on the capital programme, and will be scripting by this committee in January in advance of it, forming part of the council papers. So, there'll be an opportunity for you to see the specifics within that. Thank you, thanks. David. I was slightly concerned about how you're generating the reduction that you're talking about here. Is that because some of the capital items have been fully paid out and so they're dropping off at the end of the term, or is it because you're expecting rates to come down? And if the latter, that makes me quite nervous because I think it might easily go the other way. Yeah. I mean, to be clear, our capital financing costs over the median term are increasing every year, year on year. They're just increasing at less than they were before we reviewed the capital programme. So, there absolutely is some borrowing costs that fall off because loans reach the end of their term. And we do make assumptions about interest rates informed by kind of market insight. We're not expecting interest rate, we are expecting interest rates to drop during the next 12 months, but not by as much as we were six months ago and certainly not, as I said earlier, as quickly as they increased. So, the reduction is a reduction in the rate of increase as opposed to a reduction overall. So, there is still, you'll see in the draft budget papers, a very significant capital programme planned, which comes with increased revenue costs associated with the borrowing to fund that. We are just trying to decrease the steepness, I suppose, of that increase because of the direct impact it has on the revenue budget. So, what you're saying, I think, is that there's actually more coming into that area of the budget than there is falling off at the end of term? Yes, because we are still investing heavily in our capital programme. That's fine. Okay, thank you. Okay, thank you. I see no other supplementary. So, if we could move to Hazel's question 10. Thank you, Chairman. How would you characterise the risk profile of the budget? Which risks cause greatest concern and would most seriously threaten sustainability of the Council's budget and financial position if they materialised? How confident are you that robust plans are in place to mitigate these risks and can officers illustrate the evidence for this confidence? I recognise that risks might be unforeseen demand, inability to realise identified efficiencies or external factors, but I appreciate your answers to those questions. Thank you. Thank you. Cracking question. This is one that should be asked in every Council, to be honest. So, yeah, there is significant risk. I would say, I mean, this is my eighth week in the Council, but Summit County Council is in a relatively good financial position compared to the rest of the local government sector. You might compare that when you see the rest of the local government sector, but there are many positives here. However, there is still significant risk, and I will draw out the risk in, as I say, the Section 25 statement that goes as part of the final proposals, which is a report to Council. But to give you an idea, we've talked about some of the funding reform, without doubt. I could be very cynical at this point, but it's quite clear where that direction is going. We'll get an indication around the 19th of December for 25-26. So, therefore, the potential loss of funding coming out of fair funding reform, it does represent a risk to us. We obviously need to deliver the efficiencies. There's 57 million there at the moment. That may increase. But then also we need to deal with the overspends and the demand as and when they arise. And I'll talk about some of the mitigations on that as well. There's things that are outside of our control. We talked about funding, but there are other potential government policy changes that can come down the line. Normally, we get new burdens grants, but we know that new burdens grants is almost always not enough to deal with the actual cost of that policy change coming through as well. The whole economic situation, uncertainty around that. We've talked about inflation and interest rates. Those will potentially have an impact on us. And then lastly, constant significant risk for me is the dedicated schools grant and the high knees block. So, the safety valve agreement effectively and the delivery of that. There's also currently uncertainty around the override and that effectively, I think, is removed the 31st of March in this financial year. One more year, 26. Sorry, it affects my statement. Let me just clarify that. Because it's the 31st of March, 2026. If the override is removed, then I have to put that into consideration in the setting of the 25-26 budget because it's in that financial year. So, I'm very much hoping that in the settlement that the override is extended and therefore it doesn't crystallize what would probably be a tsunami of 114s coming down the local government sector. In terms of mitigations, we've worked hard, as Rachel said, in terms of our reserve levels. So, we need to be conscious around that. We've gone from a low position and we're now in a healthier position, but we need to make sure that we aren't dipping into those. And we must avoid the spectre of using reserves to fund ongoing spend. If we go down that trajectory, we will be in serious trouble. We, as I said before, we're going to have more of a focused oversight as an organisation and the leadership on savings delivery. And that's coming in for 25-26. We have things in place, but we've been a bit more tighter and having a bit more discipline around holding directors to account and making sure that they are being delivered. Or, where they aren't, the intervention is taking place. And that's in addition to the regular budget monitoring that will take place, which already demonstrates, in my view, that there is strong controls around flagging variances and then taking action around those as well. The ongoing focus around the transformation programme, because that is an enabler of efficiencies and living transformation there. That will be taking place as well. But then overall, we've got collective responsibility as directors and accountability. The finance team are improving that through the finance academy. And lastly, it is our level of reserves. That is the last line, if you like. And we hold a general fund to deal with financial shocks. But equally, I talked about the high needs block. We also hold an offsetting reserve, which is currently equal to the anticipated deficit that is outlined in the safety valve agreement. The risk is that we don't hold to the safety valve agreement and that deficit grows and will have to be dealt with in future financial years. Thanks. Thank you. Oh, David. Yeah, thanks, Chair. I just wanted to add to that, that, you know, each year, as you know, we include in the budget, a 20 million unallocated contingency. And, you know, despite all the challenges and pressures we've had over the last few years, and particularly, you know, the last couple of years with high inflation, we've managed to live within our budget. And even last year, which is probably one of the most challenging years that we've faced as a local authority, both in terms of the high levels of inflation and the increase of demand, at the end of the year, we were only 3.3 million over, I think, which was the first time in five or six years that we've had to use any reserves just to cover that final outturn. So I think that the historical performance should give us a degree of comfort, you know, without being complacent, that we can actually achieve these budgets that we've put forward. We've done so up to now. And I've got no reason to think that we're not going to for the next year. And the fact that we have been prudent in having that 20 million contingency, which ideally we would like to use to top up reserves. But, you know, it's there and, you know, it has provided us with the necessary buffer, if you like, in previous years. So hopefully, if you just look back on our historic performance, that will give you a degree of confidence that we can deliver what we say. Thank you, Ed. Thank you, Chairman. I slightly answered my question, but I'll start with the other side part. Are there any little pockets of other pockets of money tucked away? I go back to my days as portfolio holder at Borough, and the finance team and I, we always had little pockets of money stacked away under, I was going to say, under different guises or commonly known as the back pocket. I just question that. It's slightly flippant, but, you know, you raise the point about saying you've got some money. So it begs the question, just what else is there? And then the second part, and David actually mentioned that, the contingency, which as an employer of services in my past was a word I never allowed. It should be banned from the English language. There is no such thing as a contingency. There has to be, if you want to spend money, you've got to find it from elsewhere. But that excludes or does not include drawing on reserves. And I think you answered that. But just those two questions. Thank you. This should be fascinating. Do you know, that is the first question I asked Rachel and Nikki when I joined is where is the section 151's back pocket. But as David said, there's 20 million budget contingency. I mean, there will be a change on the approach to this in the final proposals. And I've been discussing that with the team about moving us to a more sustainable position. Because equally, I don't like the word contingency. Because effectively, do directors, services see that as well? I can just fall back on the contingency and be bailed out from that. So, there is also then linkages in terms of how we fund transformation going forward. And we've talked about one-off funding for one-off activity to deliver efficiencies or outcomes. And there is a chance to move it to that positioning and that strategy going forward. But there will be more detail from that. But in terms of your back pockets, no. I've gone through. There are budgets that we hold centrally that are probably difficult to forecast and unknown. In terms of we hold budget, for example, for severance costs and redundancies that occur during the year when you're dealing with restructures. But it's very difficult to ascertain exactly what that's going to be until later in the financial year. But there's no magic pot at the end of the rainbow. Thank you very much for that answer. Last question in this section. Steve. Thanks, Chair. This kind of segues quite nicely into the discussion we've just been having about reserves. And I guess the question here is, assuming a balanced budget, are we confident that budgets going to be balanced without the use of reserves? We've talked a lot about it today, the £140 million reserves funding one-off budget items. So again, if we can just maybe have a bit, I think we've covered this a lot already. But it's one of those items that, and you've talked a little bit about the contingency. And if people do see the contingency as a backstop, and you mentioned that approach is being changed as well. But let me just cover that off a little bit and all that would be helpful, please. Thank you. Thank you. So I think, and we have covered it off, in terms of using reserves to balance the budgets. It is an option, and Rachel went through that, but we are not planning to use reserves to fund ongoing spend. However, within the budget proposals, you will see that we are using to draw reserves to fund activities such as transformation. And that is, so that is formed as part of the budget that we are setting. In terms of the final budget proposals, we will be going through, and again, I keep mentioning section 25 statement, but in addition to the robustness of the estimates, there is also about the adequacy and the level of reserves. So we will be using the risk assessment to look at what should be the level of general fund reserves, and we'll do that. And it's going to be specific to Surrey County Council in terms of the financial risks that are faced in terms of authority and our setup. And from that perspective, I use our exposure and liabilities for our companies, for example. Are we taking those into consideration in terms of those risks? And therefore, if a financial shock was to hit the council, what reserves do we hold to be able to deal with that? We talked about it's currently at 12%, 140 million, so it's at a healthy level, but we do need to look at that and view that going forward. So I think in terms of the contingency, budget contingency aspect, if I just expand on that, it is changing it effectively to a contribution to reserves effectively, that 20 million that we hold to enable future funding of transformation to take place. So we will need to continually transform to deliver efficiencies. The 57 million of efficiencies cannot be undertaken unless there's transformation activity taking place. So it's a shift in terms of how we're trying to deal with that. But equally with that, there is more rigor and importance around delivering efficiencies in year, because effectively we're expecting services to deliver a balanced budget and therefore not draw on that amount. However, it will still be a backstop, and therefore if, for whatever reason, services do overspend or certain efficiencies aren't delivered, then we'll have to draw into that 20 million contribution. Thank you. Okay, thank you very much indeed. We're now moved to the section on customer digital and change. And firstly, can I invite the cabinet member for customer and communities to introduce the item? Denise. I think you're on mute. Yes, you are on mute. Thank you, Chairman. So firstly, I would like to say that it's really important that this committee isn't just looking at the cost and the savings of the customer transformation program. I know this section looks at the wider transformation responsibilities that Liz Mills will pick up, but also the return on investment and the improvements. The imperative around the customer transformation program was always to put the customer at the center of everything we do. And we know anecdotally that we had a number of areas where that was not satisfactory and it was absolutely the priority and ambition of this council to address those. We have monthly cabinet check ins on the progress of the customer transformation program. I know that the business case is coming to this committee in February, but just in terms of the immediate quick wins. I mean, we've got a really good story to tell. We've already got trials in our locality hubs. So we've got enhanced center management in our Merstam hub, which is a very deprived community, extended digital inclusion in Walton Library, development of our team around the community function in North Guildford, which is a key neighborhood, as well as our website, customer and solutions hub, which is improving self service. And we know that again, anecdotally, we've had a lot of feedback saying that that could improve and that's being addressed. Even things like page not found errors being corrected, you know, very fundamental basic issues that we shouldn't have had in the first place. Huge improvements for our blue badge issuing. We're trying co-pilot fix my street has gone live happy or not survey again. We've had 80% satisfaction through that and the customer champions and customer promise, which internally I think is really motivational for our staff. It's really been embraced. So I think it's really important, as I say, alongside all of the financial considerations to recognize what a difference this program has made in its first few months of existence. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Denise. Does the executive director or section 151 office want to add? Liz? I have nothing to add. Thank you. Thank you. Andy, I'll take that as no. Yeah. If we can move to the first question, which is from me, customer transformation program requires a drawdown of 3.4 million from reserves in this financial year, which totals a requirement of 11 million this year. Which was initially 11.3 million. What's the projected cost of the wider transformation program and over what period will the projected savings and improvements be delivered? Liz? Thank you. I'm happy to answer that question. So you're right to draw out the 11 million pounds, and that is from the one-off reserve spending approach and envelope. In addition to that, this year there's 12.1 million pounds worth of expenditure that is built into the medium-term financial strategy. And so just to look at it in the totality as we sort of stand this year, that would be the investment that's required. And what we're expecting in terms of delivery on that this year is 4.8 million pounds of ongoing efficiencies. And around 25 million pounds worth of cost containment, which is in relation to the safety valve and the additional needs and disabilities. In relation to the transformation program as a whole, we expect those benefits to build over the medium-term. So we're not expecting to see all of that as short-term benefit. And so it's important just to see the nature of that over time. And we are building those efficiencies in. So for example, in the coming year, we've built in 5.5 million pounds worth of efficiencies in relation to the organizational redesign work that we've been hearing about. And we're happy to think about any more detailed questions on that. In relation to the major parts of our transformation program, which might be helpful just to shed a bit more light in terms of the investment and return. In relation to our adults program, we're investing 8 million pounds through to the period 26-27. And we will be seeing efficiencies over the period of 83 million pounds that are built in. And similarly, on the children's additional needs and disabilities, we're seeing 11 million pounds built in. And over the period, 114 million pounds worth of efficiencies linked to the cost containment. Thank you. That's very helpful. As Denise said, we'll see the business case at our February meeting. As the only supplementary I would ask is largely the question that's set down by David Harmer. I'll come to David Harmer's question. Thank you, Chairman. First of all, just for Denise, the feedback I've had from the various rural parishes that I represent on Fix My Street is much stronger plus. And most of them are saying, why didn't you do that before? Is there other areas where you could do the same sort of thing? Good question. But that's not really for this discussion. No. So, the full business case document, if I could put it like that. How will we be assured, or how will the committee be assured, that the cost of transformation is proportionate to the projected savings? Are officers able to assure the committee that proposals provide return on investment throughout the rest of the medium term as well? Yes, absolutely. I can talk about the assurance mechanisms in place. So, as has been highlighted, the full business case will return to this committee to make sure that you're fully sighted on that. In fact, we have a briefing planned for next week. We have been through one internal process for approval for the initial drawdown of funding. And we will be going through the second internal stage gate review process, which will continue to scrutinise the investment, the benefits, both financial and non-financial. And as Councillor Turner Stewart has highlighted, that is really important for us to make sure that we are putting the customer at the heart of the work, and that we're not just seeing financial benefits, but that we really are seeing a return on investment for our customers. And it will scrutinise the programme plans and associated resources ready for the return on investment. So, that whole package will be available through the stage gate process. We've also recently reviewed our transformation programme and to make sure that we're building in the lessons learned, for example, from the DB&I programme. So, there's activity underway to make sure that we have got change readiness and other factors which will pay attention to those recommendations. And there is a transformation board which is chaired by the chief executive and that will take monthly reports in terms of our progress and the way in which we're delivering that business case. And then from there we go into the informal cabinet arena as well to provide updates and through to lead cabinet members. So, through the scrutiny processes, through the cabinet member arrangements and into the corporate leadership team, will be the ways in which we'll make sure we're staying on track and delivering those benefits as planned. Okay, look forward to that. Thank you very much. Steve. Thanks, Chair. Just a quick follow-on on question 12. And it's something that we talked about at Risk Committee previously when the case came and before it went to cabinet about the drawdown of £3.4 million from reserves to begin funding with. We've heard talk about reserves today and about only using reserves for one-off costs and not using them for ongoing spend. So, the question here is, so what was the definition used to basically justify this £3.4 million drawdown from reserves to the customer transformation programme on the basis that we've heard that reserves will only be used for, or will only try to be used for this one-off spend. Thank you. So, the business case contained a range of required investments in order to be able to deliver the programme. None of those have translated or will translate into base budget requests or requirements. We may see benefits in the base budget and the medium-term financial strategy will demonstrate that over time. So, those types of investments are in things like the expenditure to upgrade our website and the review of our website, to be able to upgrade our customer relationship management technology and other technologies required to support and automate processes. processes to be able to support project activity and personnel changes so that we can draw teams together and drive through benefits, and also in process and journey redesign activities. So, those are the broad bases, but those are not things that will carry forward into business-as-usual operational activity. They are one-off investments to be able to right-size and reset the way in which we have our experience for customers supported. Okay, thank you. I look forward to seeing the business case when it comes to this committee, surely. Thanks. Lance. Lance. Lance. Lance. Thank you, Chair. So, just a sanity check on what you said earlier on the figures. So, I heard that there was an 8 million investment in adult social care, which would lead to savings or efficiencies of 83 million, and an investment in children's services of 11 million, which would lead to savings or efficiencies of 114 million. Are those numbers built into the medium-term financial strategy? They are. They are, yes. Okay. Thank you. Oh, Ed. So, it's very about a quick point. Backing up what David was saying and picking up what Denise was saying on Fix My Street, the feedback I've had from a lot of people, many of whom, how do I put this, have not been fans of Surrey County Council for one reason or another, which I fail to understand, have been saying how great it is and how user-friendly it is. And they haven't gone as far as saying why haven't we done it before, but they're really praising it. And even I find it easy. I'm not, as some would know, a technocrat on this committee. But thank you, Denise, and all the people who have been involved in it. It's been most useful. Thanks. Anyone wish to comment or is it stand by itself? Okay. I'm not sure there's anything more to add to that. Thank you. That's what I thought. Okay. Thank you very much indeed. So, if we can move to the final section in this item, Land and Property. We have Simon Crowther, the Executive Director, and Diane Wilding, the Director of Land and Property Online. Who would like to introduce this item? I think Natalie has sent her apologies, hasn't she? She did indeed, yes. Yes. Okay. Well, in which case... Oh, Simon. Yes. Well, sorry. Thank you, Chair. Apologies. I hadn't prepared to kind of introduce the item. I was just ready to field some questions. That was it at this stage. That's fine. That's fine. So, we'll move to the question 14 from Ed. Thank you, Chairman. This isn't just on budgets. I've been... I recognize we've been told off on not to focus just on budgets, but to look on policy and everything else. So, I take these things on board. I am struggling to understand how the synergy of the different departments works, and how this will feed through into a better experience for the population at large, including ourselves. You know, they seem to be very disparate. I mean, from having spent 40-plus years in the built environment, a certain amount of experience on these things. I just think that it's a very disparate area. And, yeah, obviously, we're looking at budgets and how that's going to work through. But that is a question in time, I accept. So, I'm really focusing more on how is this going to impact our residents, and also, how are we going to carry out our duties in terms of looking after the property, looking after the property for our staff, and improving the highways and infrastructure. I'm struggling to understand, and I really welcome somebody just explaining to me how that is going to work. Thank you, Chairman. Thank you, Chair. Yes, Simon. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. I shall do my utmost. So, yeah, apologies for any confusion that's been caused by the changes within the organisation. So, you will recall there was a directorate called Environment, Transport and Infrastructure, led by Katie Stewart, and that took on two additional teams in December 2023 with the arrival of the land and property team that moved out of resources and the economy and growth team. And that new, bigger directorate then became called Environment, Infrastructure and Growth, or EIG. So, there are too many acronyms moving around your rights. So, EIG was established in December 2023 with the arrival of those two teams, in addition to the former ETI directorate. The previous exec director left in July, and it was decided at that point for the purposes of continuity to effectively appoint two interim exec directors, one to deal with four of the teams in place, and one to deal with three of the teams. So, my role is to cover the environment, property, waste, and economy and growth teams. And my colleague, Owen Jenkins, covers highways, planning, major infrastructure projects, and the kind of business support team. The intention is to bring these two interim. So, Owen and I work very closely together. So, operationally, we still function as one directorate. We still have meetings as one directorate. And we kind of work very closely together. So, the changes of nomenclature, let's say, are more confusing than the operational activities. The operational activities continue in tandem. And the scope of the directorate has not changed since December 2023, even though the titles have changed. So, there should be absolutely no impact on residents as a result of these interim changes whatsoever. And the plan to deliver those services is in no way influenced by these interim changes. What we are looking to do is, having brought property and economy and growth together, are there some opportunities to restructure things as a new directorate, which were not taken forward back in December 2023? So, yeah, apologies. You've got too many acronyms. There are two interim exec directors still working very closely together as one directorate, but the scope of the directorate is as it was in December 2023. I hope that helps to some extent. No. What I've heard is background as to why, but I haven't yet heard why, how this is going to help and improve the services. What I've heard is that there's no change. Well, that's not acceptable, quite frankly. We want to see an improvement, whether that's called change or what. And, you know, it's... I know some of my colleagues, I'm looking at one of them, may want to have some comment on the property aspect, won't you? Yes, you will. Yes. But it doesn't help me. I... The question was, how is this going to help us deliver a service to residents? And I haven't heard yet. Thank you, Chairman. Any response, Sam? Yes. So, I have to come back. So, what we are looking at is absolutely how do we transform the directorate as one directorate? How do we drive forward service? So, we are looking at initially, and we're out of consultation now, statutory consultation to the directorate level, the senior tiers. How do we basically realign the accountabilities within the directorate such that we can be more effective? Alignment of accountabilities, consistency of accountabilities across the leadership team. Making sure there's a logical structure regarding those functions that focus on delivery versus perhaps those functions that focus on policy, regulation, enforcement. Making sure that we recognise the different skill sets across the team and we bring those together and co-locate those where it's coherent to do so. So, we are absolutely looking internally as to how we will transform that leadership team and distill down into what, in our mind, is a more coherent set of service offerings. There are some areas that need to be transformed. You may be aware. Land of Property went through a transformation exercise in the last 18 months. The economy and growth team is going through an internal restructuring process right now. We are looking to bring together some other teams under a combined, excuse me, environment and planning function. So, yeah, we absolutely are looking at internal transformation which will make us more effective and we would hope deliver greater impacts and benefits to those who experience our services. So, the residents or visitors coming through, sorry. Thank you, Simon. Nick? Can I just say I don't like the word hope. Nick? Thank you, Nick. Thank you very much. I had some questions really on the capital receipts expectations in particular in relation to land and property. My recollection was that some years ago a list of surplus properties within the County Council was agreed. I'm not talking about House Horsley Garten here. And I would be interested to know how successful that has been in relation to the numbers of disposals, the capital receipts and what is anticipated for the forthcoming year. I've got a supplementary question after that. But how does this affect our financial situation? And if perhaps by any chance we were more successful this year than expected, is that somehow result in money in the back pocket? Thank you. Thank you, Chair. I've just asked Diane to join as well, because I think we're running a bit ahead of schedule. So in terms of capital receipts, the one headline figure that I have to hand is the target that was set in the asset in place strategy that was mentioned earlier in the meeting was to deliver 150 million of capital receipts by 2030. Between 2019 and 2024, we have now delivered or met that target of 150 million overall. And we also have a plan and an allocation within the MTFS. I think it's 46 million instead of 46 million of receipts between this year and the next two years. So we will exceed the 150 million target that was put in place in 2019. And apologies, Diane has just joined, so she will have missed the second part. But does that answer your first question, Councillor, or did you want to follow up? No, I think that's fine. It might be interesting to know what we were expecting to achieve in the next financial year, unless I missed the answer. But I had a further question. It's a specific question in relation to Cabinet last week. I may have got this wrong and if I did, my apologies. My understanding was that approval was being sought for a particular disposal. I won't go into details of where. And that there had been two offers received, which are obviously different. and that for some reason the recommendation was to approve the lower one, quite significantly lower, and eventually the decision was to accept the higher one. I would be interested to know the circumstances in which what appears to have been a mistake occurred. Thank you. Thank you. I may bring Diane in, but I'm inferring that might be referring to a potential disposal, whether it was either conditional or an unconditional offer. But I can't recall the details, but that's the only example I can think of to mind. Yes, I can concur. I would need to look at the specific example and report back, just so I know the detail. And can I explain the circumstances? Thank you. Chair, can I also just do – sorry, before I was interrupting. Just, Councillor Darby, your earlier question about what's our target for next year. What we have is an overall target for disposals over three years, which I think is 46 million, which includes this year and the next two. Yes, so, okay, I understand that. But is there any effect on the forthcoming financial year on our finances, whether there's going to be a deficit or a surplus and how that works through actually into our finances? Perhaps it makes no difference if we have an overall target over the next three years, but does it affect an individual year's budget on a year-by-year basis? But going back to my question about the particular thing from Cabinet last week, I'm concerned that the answer isn't obvious and available immediately. But if it isn't, so be it. I think there needs to be – I would be grateful for perhaps offline confirmation, which could be fed back to the Chair, and take it from there. Thank you. Andy. Yeah, all I was going to say, Chair, I'm happy to – and probably Simon or Diane will do that. I'm just conscious it was a part two paper that was in the Cabinet, so it's probably best to take it offline in terms of the reasons why those offers were taken forward. So we can come back to Councillor Darby on that. Yeah, that's very helpful. I was going to say I'd be surprised if there weren't commercial confidentialities involved in this, so a careful note that doubtless will be confidential. Thank you very much. Can we move to question 15, which is Hazel. Thank you, Chairman. Slide three of the presentation refers to place and community support to improve outcomes for residents. Can officers please explain what this means and provide some relevant examples? What impact does this have for residents and what costs are associated with these forms of support? Thank you. Simon. Thank you, Chair. If I start and my colleague, Liz, I think will join or follow up. Thank you, Councillor. So I think the kind of – what does it include? It includes many, many different types of activities and initiatives. One of the ones that I just start to introduce is perhaps one you're familiar with, which is some of our capital or our hub schemes where we're establishing or refurbishing existing premises or establishing new premises where we will co-locate services into, as I say, a new or refurbished building. It relates back to the question that we had at the beginning of the meeting. So that's just one of the examples where it could be a property-led or property-enabled outcome, which is, as I say, a new facility where we're co-locating. So we have examples in Weybridge and Staines, Sunbury, Merstam is an existing hub. So they will be some of our facilities where we're, as I say, bringing services into fewer locations, better facilities. And, again, the school is better on the carbon footprint point that we made earlier. Can I bring Liz in at that point, please, to share? Hello. I'm happy to just add a little here. So what we're also doing under this piece of work is drawing together quite a wide range of existing activity. So we already have a very vibrant towns and villages set of work and approach, the team around the community activity, the work that's been referenced in our customer program in relation to the hubs we're developing in our library infrastructure and so on. So all of this is around maximising those use of resources, spaces that are combined with others, and equipping staff to be able to help those in the communities even more than they are able to do at the current time. Thank you, that's very helpful. Hazel? Thank you. That's helpful. Okay, thank you very much. I see no other supplementaries. So... Oh, sorry, yes. It's a very dangerous thing on property not to say that. Thank you for the answer you gave Nick Darby on the capital receipts. The one area that hasn't been looked at or we commented on in this round is the maintenance and the ongoing revenue spending on property and looking after, and is this declining, or reducing should I say, not declining, how are we getting on? Because if we're disposing of properties, ergo, there should be a reduction in spend on revenue spend on our property. And I haven't seen that reflected in the figures. Do we expect this any time soon? Because all I've been hearing, actually, is we're starting this programme. We're doing a programme. This programme is going to start. It just feels... It's all about to happen. I'd like to see something definitely happen. Thank you. Simon. Should I comment? Sorry, Diane Wilding. The maintenance backlog is extensive and there is an imperative to reduce the estate. The disposal programme is fast-paced at the moment. We've pushed quite a lot of disposals through Cabinet. The plan is to continue that. We're reviewing all vacant properties that were held for strategic purposes and operational purposes to make sure that we're holding them for the right reasons because security costs, maintenance costs, backlogs, et cetera, are a pressure in land and property. So we will be taking those disposals and amalgamating properties with speed next year because it's imperative due to the revenue pressures. So there is a lot of activity. There are a lot of disposals going through Cabinet. But next year will culminate in a lot of projects going through to reduce the maintenance burden and the holding costs of property for Surrey. I think a bit like Steve. When is Christmas? Because I think between Steve and I we might run into next year. So I'll park at the moment. Thank you. Thank you. Steve. Just to follow on from that question. You mentioned that there's a maintenance backlog. So that obviously gets my attention when you basically talk about that. What is the size of that maintenance backlog in a monetary term, in a physical time term? And where can that maintenance backlog be seen, please? Well, we're just receiving the condition and life cycle reports from our strategic partner macro. That will advise us on all the fabric maintenance work that's required across the estate. Once we have that and we have it this month, actually, we're running through what are the serious maintenance works that needs to be delivered. Our maintenance program is 30 million per year at the moment in terms of capital spend. That's split between schools and operational properties, non-schools, obviously. So at the moment, 30 million per year, schools and non-schools is what we're investing. That's addressing the backlogs. We're undertaking a huge program at the moment on community schools, re-roofing, replacing classrooms, etc. So 30 million per year on minor capital works maintenance, ongoing holding costs, which are expensive at the moment. But once we have the results of the life cycle and condition reports, we'll be able to give an accurate account of what needs to be done, what the investment is and what properties we will be holding in the future. So I can share that with the select committee when that comes through. We've assessed it and we can look at the financial obligations for the council. That would be very helpful. Thank you, Steve. Thanks, Chair. Thank you for that. And it's good to know that there's an updated report coming forward on that one, which would be welcome to see that when it does appear. I'm working on the basis that there would have been a previous report available on this. So a question on the back of this is going to be, so where is the information that this committee, where can I go and have a look at the previous reports on the maintenance backlog for the property that this council holds? Because you've got an update coming forward and you mentioned there's a maintenance backlog, so you must know there's work to be done. So where was the previous report on that one and how do we get a look at it, please? Yes, I can share. We had an internal report from 2019, 2021. That information wasn't as in-depth as we would have liked. It was high level. So that's why we commissioned MACRO to give us a full report on life cycle in particular. But we can share the information from 2021 and 2019, which has guided the maintenance program since that date and prioritize what needs to be done in terms of emergency works, etc. and the schools re-roofing program. But we can share that information. It's just not in the detail we required. And it didn't give us the life cycle assessment. Thank you for that. I must admit, what I'm hearing is there was an internal report on 2019. I'm going to be now 2024. And I'm just quite amazed that there's a report, 2019, 2021, internal, and now we're basically just doing an update here. And I'm looking around at colleagues, and colleagues here are quite exasperated as well. If we can see that internal report, and Chair, I think we might want to do a deeper dive into this and add it to our work program at some point because part of the thing about having a maintenance backlog or having a maintenance program is to be proactive in dealing with maintenance so they don't become bigger problems and that we have fit-for-purpose buildings, and you mentioned schools and classrooms and so on. I mentioned some of my colleagues from the independent group are going to probably ping me with some examples they can show me to as well where maintenance may not have been done. So this is a little bit worrying to actually hear this. I don't know if colleagues are minded to come in on this one. I think we'll take that offline and consider your suggestion. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. David. Thank you, yes. From your answers, this is all capital maintenance, and it could be quite a substantial scale. And so I think it would be quite important that we understand just how great the scale is and how it's growing and or declining over time and what you anticipate happening in the next few years. Ditto. Would that be a practical thing to provide? Yes, definitely. It's a priority for land and property at the moment. We are assessing every building in terms of its efficiency, its condition and its future use. They are the portfolios and buildings that we're looking to dispose of and look for modernised buildings where the maintenance backlog isn't so substantial. We have increased the investment and we are proactive in looking at asset management plans for each building so that we fully understand its lifecycle and whether it's fit for purpose for the services we require. So that information can be supplied. Just to comment on the reason a maintenance report wasn't updated last year, we had to deal with a rack and asbestos issue, so that was a priority. So we're now on top of that as well. So it was a slight, that caused a slight delay in the lifecycle and maintenance surveys. But yes, we can provide that and we can provide asset management plans for each building. Thank you. Ed. Completely off piece and it's not a finance question but it is a relevant question whilst we have senior officers here including the Deputy Chief Executive. As you know I chair the planning and regulatory committee and a lot of applications come to that committee which have had an involvement from land and property. And I've, at times struggle, and this is something we can pick up later on Chairman, but at times it's struggle to get the relationship between the service, the different elements of the services and land and property. You know, we get situation, there was a recent case where an application came where quite frankly the committee just threw it out because it was not an appropriate use of that land. But he had been supporting. What I'd like to at some stage pick up, Chairman, if we could, of the relationship between, the interrelationship between the services that are coming forward to develop land and which ties it in with land and property and, you know, there is a cost here but make that provision. I think you get where I'm coming from on this. Thank you Chairman. I told you it was off piste. Thank you very much. I don't know if Diane wants to say anything. Well, one thing I could add is that the process is that service are asked what their requirements and needs are in terms of the estate. That is fully considered by land and property. We carry out the option appraisals, the viability, we report back to service, provide those options. It all intertwines with the MTFS and the funding that's supplied for different projects and the relationship continues in that way. And in making sure that we're collaborating, we're trying to cover the needs of the service, but being realistic in terms of what the options are across the portfolio and the estate and obviously the costs. Our colleague's happy with recommendation one. Nick? I'm sure recommendation one is absolutely fantastic, but since I can't read, I have no idea what it says. I should know better. I do beg your pardon. I'll read it. The select committee welcomes the council's work to deliver a balanced budget in an extremely challenging financial context through aligning revenue budgets, capital investment and transformation plans within both directorates and the organisation and recommends that the integrated approach continues to be employed in future years. I think that's a statement of fact and view. We're happy with that. Let's move to... Sorry, can I just make a comment? Of course. I think the first word, the committee notes. So the committee welcomes? Welcomes. In that case, if it's no reference to notes, it's fine. It's fine. That's marvellous. Okay. Everybody happy with that? If we could go to recommendation two. The select committee appreciates the importance of ensuring continued financial resilience to protect services for residents and the important progress made to bring the budget gap to the remaining 17.4 million, but recognises that difficult decisions will continue to be required to close a gap that is likely to continue to grow over the remainder of the medium term. I think that again is a statement of fact. David? Well, I was just going to say, is it? Is that a statement of fact, the last bit? Have we derived that from officers? On the portfolio holder? Or both? Well, I think we've heard from several officers, particularly from the section 151 officer, these are not going to be easy decisions necessarily. Yeah, the MTFS shows the gap is going to grow, and then probably come the 19th of December it will get even wider, I suspect. But certainly a statement of fact is correct. Nick? Thank you, Chair. Again, it may be that there's no problem with this, but I'd just like to be sure that we're not making comments in relation to the whole of the Surrey County Council budget, because we have three other select committees who will have had a look at it, and if we're looking at the whole, I'm not sure that we've investigated the whole. So I think we need to be cautious in our recommendations in making it clear that we are only covering things which have been covered by this committee. Except we do have an overview of the entire budget, and of course the PAC does include matters that are not matters for this committee. And as Clare has pointed out, we're commenting on financial resilience as opposed to what communities or adults or children may want to do. But would it not be beneficial, Chairman, to add in to the recommendation somewhere near the top, and we might ask other committees to look at it from their point of view? Which they have all done this week. The problem, Chair, is that you may have been to all of them. The rest of us, I'm fairly confident, haven't. We don't know what those other committees may have concluded as a consequence of their deep dives, for instance. I have to say, personally, I'm very nervous about making comments in this committee about the whole budget proposal. Yes. Although, I mean, I read that, and if anyone's got a suggestion of re-wording it, obviously I'm in the market for that. But what we're talking about is the gap of 17.4 million as opposed to where those changes or reductions should be made. Yes, but we need surely to make the point that we require the assistance of all aspects of overview and scrutiny to assist in this process. Well, yes, of course. Well, I think we should say so, just so they know that we're asking them to think about it. I mean, we could get rid of the last line from, but recognizes, because, you know, I'm sure all the select committees recognize that in their areas. But if we don't want to comment on that, we could remove that. Well, we could say something like, but, yes, take it out at that point, but say, delete, recognizes that difficult decisions will continue to be required, and then put a comma after term, say, and invites all select committees to contribute to that process, or something like that. Or the whole council. Well, the whole council, can we? Can I jump in here? Of course. I think we're getting a bit out of shape on that one, to be honest. I'm still struggling with this sentence, made to bring the budget gap to the remaining 17.4 million. I mean, it should be to close the budget gap to the remaining, to be honest. And then when you bring that in, you know, but recognizing, I think we, as a committee, and I think we all councilors, whichever committee, recognize that difficult decisions will be, will be made, will continue to be made to require to close the gap that is likely to go over the remaining, potentially this likely. I would rather potentially than likely, let's be positive here, notwithstanding we all believe it's likely, but potentially, you know. That's where I would bring that in. And, you know, it's a stated fact. It is going to be incredibly difficult. Yes. Yes. I mean, we can get over the point about select committees by saying that difficult decisions will, can you, the council will need to make difficult decisions. Across the board. Yes. Well, the council. The council is across the board. Across the council. Yes. Are people content with that? So the last line says, but recognizes that the council needs to make difficult decisions to close the gap that is likely to continue to grow over the remainder of the medium term. Yes. Because they are, in the end, council decisions. Yes. Yes. We agreed on that one. Yes. Good. Recommendation three. The select committee welcomes the completion of equality impact assessments for proposed budget measures, but recognizes that there is more progress to be made in standardizing these and ensuring high standards for their completion. The select committee recommends that this continues to be assessed as part of its work overseeing equalities and diversity. Yes. I think that's exceptional. Thank you. It doesn't really reflect the evidence that you heard, to be quite frank. I mean, Adam explained why there were differences and the fact that we were working and do work to a pretty standardized approach. And the reason for the differences was because you'd seen the impact assessments at different stages. And so I think that evidence is not reflected in this recommendation. Okay. Okay. What? What? What? What? What? Well, where it says more progress. At that point. So, Chair, David, I mean, I think the recommendation does basically acknowledge that there has been work done on the completion of the EIAs for the proposed budget measures that we see in front of us. They are at different stages. That's not in dispute. My comment and question was around the structure, the definition, the template, and the consistency of those templates. So, the question is not the fact that the EIAs haven't been presented as part of the budget cycle. I acknowledge they are at different stages. My question and challenge has been answered, and we're going to see some updates later on. And I think the recommendation is just highlighting the fact, recognizing there's more progress to be made. There is. And we've talked about standardizing them to high standards, et cetera. There's a template there, and there's an acknowledgment that those templates will be supported to be used in the fullness of those templates. It's just about consistency, that's all. The first sentence implies more progress to be made in standardizing these. I think we have got a standardized approach. Absolutely. So, just to back up what Councillor Lewis was saying. So, it is about, there is a standard process, but it accepts that the way that some of that information has been presented. I think what you're suggesting is about how the information's been presented for today, and what the committee's seen so far, if I'm understood correctly. Okay. There's a standardized approach. There's a template that's there. Yeah. The information's in different stages. The information that has been presented isn't in a standard format. There's a standardized approach. From what I'm hearing, it's not being followed. Am I right? Am I wrong? And that's something we'll look to rectify. So, am I correct? A standardized approach, it's not being followed. So, it's not. So, the reason that it's at different stages, as I alluded to earlier, is because of the different stages of development that the impact assessments are at. But, again, it's something that we appreciate what you're saying, though, about the inconsistent look and feel, perhaps, of the information, and that's something that we need to address going forward. Okay. Just to clarify, there's a standard approach, a standard template. Has it been followed? Yeah. Yes. It has been followed for the most part, but like I said, it's something that we need to sort of make sure that everyone is following consistently, as you said. But we definitely don't encourage sort of the following of different approaches, because there is a standardized template that way. So, maybe, instead of saying to standardize, it is to say, follow standard approach. Yes. In these matters. We can make that change to basically welcome to completion of the proposed, but recognize that there is more progress to be made. I think that's what David's a little bit concerned about, that there are some final updates on EIAs to come in January. So, there's some more work to be done on them, correct? Correct. Okay. You could say, you know, this committee recognizes that the standard template is used, you know, be factually correct. Sure. Rather than there's more progress to be made, you know, so you could say that you recognize that the standard template is used, and that the reporting, more progress could be made with reporting the outcome or something. And, Chair, maybe we'd take this one offline, otherwise we might be here to New Year. Yes. I mean, it's nothing to do with this committee, but I do know one area where I don't think an equality assessment has been done. Well, if it has, it's not right. Great. And, therefore, yeah, let's take this one offline and agree in the committee. But, I take the point that David makes. Okay, if we could move to four. The select committee welcomes the reduced capital financing costs in the revenue budget, but voices concern about the deliverability of the scale of the remaining capital program and risks that this may, therefore, pose to key priority areas of investment, such as additional school places and the the adult social care transformation. Yeah, that's fine. Maybe we should finish that one at the words key priority areas, as the other bits aren't really us. Areas of investment, yeah. Yeah, that's fair. People happy with that? Good. Thank you. Okay, question. Recommendation, five. So that committee endorses the council's review… Renewed? Reviewed? Reviewed? Reviewed. Okay. No. Renewed, yeah. Renewed. Or just leave out that word, council's attitude to risk and the budget's risk profile and recommends that work continues to revise… work continues to revise overall risk Chairman should we be drawing in the work of the audit governance committee because I think they still cover the risk register and that's the if you like in terms of risk the senior committee and I would look to them because they do all the work from memory I know we've had lots and lots of fun haven't we Nicky on risk yeah yeah that's the right word monitor the committee notes the significant risk associated with the transformation programs and has continued concerns about siloed working and effective governance and oversight of the programs at the heart of the council efficiency savings noting the experience of my salary and urges the section 151 officer to prioritize focus in this area we haven't really got that everybody happy we're confident in that last bit because Andy assured us of that when he met with the officers the other day so but it's an important thing to say okay happy with that recommendation six accountability for delivery of efficiencies the committee supports the additional focus on good governance and increased oversight of the delivery of savings through implementation of efficiency delivery plans and robust monitoring to hold directorates to account and looks forward to reviewing the success of this approach we can't really argue that we've brought okay yep and if we're happy with that and finally I think it is recommendation seven the committee notes concerns about the maintenance backlog and request to review past and current maintenance reports in more detail possibly via a task and finish exercise I think that reflects broadly what was being said around the table okay is everybody happy with all of those and there's one we'll come back on the wording of thank you can I particularly thank all of the teams who've been helping us today and notably the finance team who've had a marathon and I have to say in my experience in local government I genuinely never experienced such openness and transparency about the budget process so both the cabinet members and the senior finance officers really thank you very much on behalf of the committee thank you yeah good right where are we now who was that never right if someone wants to say something say it let's go to the item seven forward work program and recommendation tracker so for the February meeting we do have as we've discussed earlier the customer transformation program update the vice chairman and two vice chairmen and the scrutiny officer and I are discussing what we might put additionally into that program and we will come back to the committee when we've got more concrete ideas of a second item for that other than that are there any comments on the forward program Nick yeah thank you very much chair we've just discussed it really the repairs issue and I think there was a suggestion that the whole thing should be brought to this committee the noting is fine but we haven't got anything in the forward work program and I think we should even if at this immediate moment it's without a date is we are short of an item for February is it too early to do that I'll leave it to you it's not my decision at all during the discussions earlier today Steve also I think made a suggestion about another item which might come before this committee my apologies I can't recall what it was it may still be appropriate it may not just ask us to think about it you're probably referring to unit 4 stabilisation the My Surrey project and that is also something that's been considered potentially for the February meeting but Claire will talk to Jake and we'll discuss that and come back to the committee okay thank you thank you chairman on the other element you might you might want to consider making it clear that we're not trying to get the whole of the council's efforts in that direction but we probably need to break it down into at least two parts and possibly three over time as things become clear yep that's fair again Claire will talk to Jake by the way Jake isn't with us because he's not well oh really by the way so just on the My Surrey thing and Stephen knows the Audit and Governance Committee asked for a report to be produced in January we've just got to be a bit careful we don't sort of duplicate effort and workload I mean if they're producing a report you know I don't know whether that's sufficient to come to your committee or somehow we need to try and coordinate it we should at least note it yes yeah no we were aware of that I'm grateful for that David which is why we know we can if necessary put it on the February agenda because we know the report will be available in January but we don't want to turn on another piece of work for February that's the point I'm making if the work is being done for January and the report being produced for January somehow we need to align what your requirements are with that report so there's a single piece of work that's done because it takes a lot of time in order to oh absolutely yes I wouldn't want too lots of work done okay anything else on the forward work program no okay thank you if we can go to the actions recommendations tracker lots of red ink but that may be there are things we can discuss can we note that report okay thank you very much indeed so the date of the next meeting is the 5th of February and as Christmas intervenes in that can I wish everyone a happy Christmas and thank everyone for the contributions today if we could stop the webcast thank you again so of the week I would I would