Councillor Tony Jones declared an interest in this item as a Board Member of the Wirral Growth Company.

The Director of Regeneration and Place Alan Evans presented this report which highlighted the processes for monitoring the 2021/22 budget and the budget setting process for 2022/23. The Committee was accountable for ensuring that the committee budget remained within the relevant envelope and was to take collective responsibility via the Policy and Resources Committee to ensure that the whole Council budget remained in balance at all times, by agreeing mitigating actions to bring the budget back in line, should a deficit be forecast.

One of the key documents required to enable the Council to receive approval for exceptional financial support was a balanced five-year Medium Term Financial Plan (MTFP).  This document was prepared by Officers and required committee oversight and approval, and whether any proposals within it should be taken forward into business cases and brought to workshops and a further report to Committee.

In answer to Members questions, it was emphasised that any income which was deferred because of delayed schemes would not be lost but would be realised in a different financial year.

Resolved (by assent) - That

(1)  the content of the report and the current forecast position of savings for 2021/22 and the ongoing work being undertaken to mitigate any under-achievement be noted.

(2)  the current proposals within this report from the Medium Term Financial Plan from 2022/23 – 2025/26 and the Director of Regeneration and Place be included to develop them into full business cases, where appropriate, for inclusion in the 2022/23 budget proposals to Policy and Resources Committee at its October meeting for approval.

(3)  a series of budget workshops be convened to identify any alternative savings/income/reductions in pressures to ensure that a full suite of costed and deliverable proposals can be recommended to the Policy and Resources Committee at its October meeting for approval.

(4)  the Zero-Based Budgeting project within the budget workshops be commenced to contribute to the overall savings target of £170k in 2021/22.