Venue: Council Chamber - County Hall, Llandrindod Wells
Contact: Stephen Boyd 01597 826374
No. | Item |
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Apologies To receive apologies for absence. Additional documents: |
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County Declarations of Interest To receive any declarations of interest from Members relating to items to be considered on the agenda. Additional documents: Minutes: County Councillor T Van-Rees declared a personal and prejudicial interest when the County Farms Estate was discussed during the budget debate. |
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Chief Executive's Announcements Additional documents: Minutes: The Chief Executive reminded Members of their duty to set a balanced budget and the rate of Council Tax by 11th March.
The Chair advised that she was changing the running order of the agenda to take the item on the budget next. |
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To consider the Medium Term Financial Strategy 2020-2025, 2020-2021 Budget and Capital Programme for 2020-2030. Additional documents:
Minutes: Council considered the Medium-Term Financial Strategy for 2020-25, which included a Financial Resource Model for 2020-25, the revenue budget for 2020-21 and capital programme for 2020-21 to 2029-30. (Copy filed with the signed minutes).
More than 10 Members stood to request a recorded vote on the budget.
Just prior to the start of the meeting an addendum to the budget proposing a Council Tax increase of 4.8% had been circulated by email to Councillors. The Chair advised she was prepared to accept the report as it was a minor amendment to the budget. County Councillor Pete Roberts raised a point of order noting that the Constitution only allowed minor amendments to be accepted if they had arisen out of debate and that there had not been a debate. Council was adjourned at 11.40 and reconvened at 12.00. The Chair advised that she accepted Councillor Roberts’ point of order and the Portfolio Holder for Finance withdrew the addendum.
The Portfolio Holder for Finance presented the budget report. The budget was supported by the Medium Term Financial Strategy which set out how revenue and capital resources would be used to deliver the priorities set out in Vision 2025. The MTFS provided a set of clear principles which would drive the Council’s budget and spending decisions over 2020-25 which Members and others could examine and judge the Council’s financial performance against. The Portfolio Holder for Finance noted that services continued to perform well with Powys ranking 5th in Wales in terms of overall performance using Public Accountability Measures. Work on school transformation was continuing at pace and there had been sustained improvement in Children’s Services performance.
The Portfolio Holder for Finance advised that the settlement gave the Council a cash increase of £9.5 million which, when adjusted for transfers into the formula of specific grants, was a 4.2% increase on the previous year. This represented the largest increase in funding for a decade and followed the Cabinet’s lobbying of Welsh Government to raise the issues facing rural authorities supported with the evidence provided through the Rural Cost Analysis. The budget included an additional £6 million each for schools and Children’s Services to meet cost pressures. The budget also included an additional £0.5 million a year for roads’ maintenance, an area highlighted for concern during the public budget consultation exercise in the autumn. Welsh Government had given no indication of the future allocations for 2021-22 onwards, but in view of current economic and fiscal projections and in the absence of other information the MTFS set out a worst likely scenario predicated on an assumption that Aggregated External Finance would reduce by -2% for 2021-22, 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25. Based on these assumptions the total recurrent reductions required from 2021-22 to 2024-25 amounted to around £49 million. £10.79 million of cost reduction proposals were proposed in the 2020-21 budget. Members of the opposition groups spoke against the budget arguing that the proposed Council Tax increase was unaffordable for residents and that some of ... view the full minutes text for item 4. |
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To receive and consider the 2020 update of Vision 2025 Our Corporate Improvement Plan. Additional documents: Minutes: This item was deferred to the meeting on 5th March. |
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Statement on Storm Dennis Additional documents: Minutes: The Leader made a statement on the Council’s response to Storm Dennis. The whole of the county had been affected and there had been flooding in Brecon, Crickhowell, Llanelwedd, Llangorse, Knighton, Welshpool and Ystradgynlais. 129 residential and 33 commercial properties had been affected by flooding and the number was still rising. There had been 20 school closures, 50 road closures and bridges had been damaged. Costs were not yet known but were likely to run into many millions. The Leader paid tribute to staff and partner agencies. She outlined the financial assistance available to householders and businesses.
County Councillor John Morris spoke about the flooding in Crickhowell and he argued that the Council’s response was not appropriate to the scale of the disaster. |