Issue - meetings

To receive an overview from the Interim Section 151 Officer.

The Interim S151 Officer provided a presentation which gave an overview of the financial issues for moving to a new Council.  The presentation covered:

·                Context – the financial issues associated with moving from six to one Council.  There were currently six budgets, six teams in different locations and using different systems.  Work around disaggregation was referred to and other moving parts such as demand led services, capital, staffing, TUPE, council tax and stranded costs.  Members of the Shadow Dorset Council would vote on the Budget for 2019/20 in February next year

·                Financial Strategy – there was a focus on protecting front line services and delivering resources for transformation

·                Medium Term Financial Forecast – in respect of a question with regard to retained business rates, the Interim S151 Officer noted that there was not currently clarity about how the new scheme would work

·                2019/20 Budget

·                Capital and bringing six programmes together – the S151 Officer briefly referred to a current disagreement on the apportionment of disaggregated debt between the two councils, which could result in a £600k to £900k impact

·                The situation with Reserves

·                Balancing the Budget

·                Transformation savings – this was about doing things differently

·                Other factors being looked at for example spending protocol, financial systems harmonisation, internal and external auditor appointments and banking tender process

A number of questions were raised and responses provided including:

·                The amount of audit work taking place would be reduced as there would only be a need to sign off books for one council and not six as currently.  There would be no change to the frequency of audits

·                There may be opportunities to use capital receipts from selling of assets.  Savings would be phased

·                There would be an opportunity for this committee to scrutinise the Budget during mid-January 2019.  The timescale for this did not fit in with the current date for the committee in January and therefore this may need to be reviewed

·                Council Tax harmonisation would be from day 1

·                In response to a question with regard to the position with pension funds, the S151 Officer noted that this had been reviewed by an Actuary and although there were slightly different funding positions they were not too far apart.