The Director of Care and Health introduced the report which set out the financial monitoring information for the Adult Social Care and Public Health Committee as at Quarter 2 (1 Apr – 30 Sep) 2022/23.

The report provided Members with an overview of budget performance for this area of activity, including progress on the delivery of the 2022/23 saving programme and a summary of reserves to enable the Committee to take ownership of the budgets and provide robust challenge and scrutiny to Officers on the performance of those budgets.

Members were informed that at the end of Quarter 2, there is a forecast adverse position of £0.629m on the Committees net revenue budget of £115.107m with mitigations to balance the budget at year end. This position was based on activity to date, projected trends in income and expenditure and potential mitigation to offset areas of adverse variance.

Committee noted that officers would be looking to draw down £567k of the Social Care Grant held in corporate reserves. The main driver of the budget pressures was an increase in support packages to enable discharge from hospital, primarily into residential and nursing care. This is alongside a large increase of people requiring residential care, and a reduction in domiciliary care. Additional resources had been provided by the Department of Health and Social Care, to support winter pressures. Members were informed that Wirral’s allocation of this funding was £1.5m

Resolved – That

(1) the projected adverse revenue position at Quarter 2 be noted.

(2) progress on delivery of the 2022/23 savings programme at Quarter 2 be noted.

(3) the reserves allocated to the Committee for future one-off commitments be noted.

(4) the forecast level of reserves at Quarter 2  be noted.

(5) the current activity profiles from 2017 to Quarter 2 of 2022/23 be noted.