Purpose

The report presents the revenue and capital outturn position for financial year 2022/23.

Decision

(1)  To note the revenue budget outturn on budget position for 2022/23, after allowing for carry forwards and transfers to reserves.

(2)  To approve the revenue carry forward proposals listed in the tables in paragraph 3.7 of the report.

(3)  To approve that all other over budgets are written-off as an exception to the Budget Management Rules for 2022/23.

(4)  To approve the transfer of £0.06m to corporate earmarked reserves.

(5)  To note the revenue virements for 2022/23 reported for information in Appendix 2(i) of the report.

(6)  To note the reserve positions and the use of flexible capital receipts shown in paragraph 3.21 of the report.

(7)  To note the outturn position of the 2022/23 capital programme in paragraph 3.30, and the funding outlined in paragraph 3.32 of the report.

(8)  To approve the capital rephasing and write-off of net underspends as listed in Appendix 3 of the report.  This reflects the outturn spend position on projects against final budgets as detailed in Appendix 4(ii) of the report.

Reasons for the decision

The report identifies that, after allowing for carry forwards and transfers to corporate reserves, the Council delivered a favourable outturn position of £0.06m in 2022/23.

Considering the pay award was in excess of £2.6m higher than budgeted, combined with significant financial pressures in Children and Education Services, to end the year at a favourable outturn position shows strong financial management across the organisation.

Alternative options considered

The option to carry forward over budgeted spend was considered which would mean that services would have to make up any deficits in 2023/24 with a considerable impact on service delivery especially in light of the challenging economic environment in 2023/24 and possibly beyond.