Agenda item

Colleen Warren, Financial Services Manager:

a)    presented a report to Performance Scrutiny Committee with a summary of actual income and expenditure compared to the revised budget and how any surpluses had been allocated to reserves

b)    provided information on the Council’s:

·         General Fund Revenue Account – for 2021/22 the Council’s net General Fund Revenue Budget was set at £978,410, including a planned contribution from balances of £477,240, resulting in an estimated level of general balances at the year-end of £2,193,359 (Appendix A provided a provisional General Fund Summary. There were a significant number of provisional year-end variations in income and expenditure against the approved budget. Full details of the main variances were provided in Appendix B.

·         Housing Revenue Account – the financial performance quarterly monitoring report for the 3^rd quarter predicted an underspend of £31,226. The provisional outturn for 2021/22 now indicated an underspend of £19.339. This would result in HRA balances as at 31^st March 2022 of £1,025,202. There were a number of forecast year-end variations in income and expenditure against the approved budget. Full details of the main variances were provided in Appendix D.

·         Housing Repairs Service – the provisional outturn for 2021/22 showed a trading deficit of £427,757, a movement of £286,119. The movement was as a result of the delay in billing of void jobs as highlighted at Q3, which made forecasting the outturn position difficult. Appendix E provided a forecast summary, with full details of the main variances provided in Appendix F.

c)    provided information in the following areas:

·         General Investment Programme – the last quarterly report approved a General Fund Investment Programme for 2021/22 pf £11,328,427. Movements in the programme since revised budget approval decreased actual capital expenditure in 2021/22 to £6,631,409. A summary of the budget changes were shown at paragraph 7.2.

The overall cumulative spending on the General Investment Programme excluding externally delivered schemes for 2021/22 was £6,399,908.43 which was 64.21% of the revised 2021/22 programme as per the MTFS 2022-27.

·         Housing Investment Programme – the last quarterly report approved a Housing Investment Programme for 2021/22 of £19,667,939. Movements in the programme since approval of the revised budget decreased actual capital expenditure to £15,263,968 in 2021/22. A summary of the changes was shown in paragraph 7.9 with a detailed breakdown of the Programme being shown at Appendix L.

d)    invited members’ comments and questions.

Question: Members asked whether Yarborough Leisure Centre was insured and what the potential loss on income was from disruption during repairs.

Response: We had tried to claim off the insurance companies but were not successful as they didn’t cover loss of income. We couldn’t claim for leisure centres as they were not part of our income, they were managed by Active Nation. Every avenue that could be explored had been to help mitigate the cost to the Council. We did not pay a management fee to Yarborough Leisure Centre or Birchwood Leisure centre any more as agreed in the contract.

Question: Members asked what money was invested in the Hospitality and Tourism Institute from the Lincoln Town Deal Board money.

Response: This project known as HEAT (Hospitality, Events, Arts and Tourism) was to be developed in Lincoln City. This project was being run mainly through Lincoln College. The City of Lincoln Council was an accountable body, so it was responsible for passporting the Lincoln Town Deal Fund to projects once the terms and conditions were met. Projects were monitored to make sure that funding was spent correctly.

RESOLVED that the report be noted and forwarded to Executive for approval.