Agenda item
Minutes:
The Director of Corporate Services advised that this report set out the current budget position in respect of the 2023/24 revenue and capital budgets. The year?to?date position was broadly balanced with no significant variances forecast for the year at the time of reporting.
Revenue Budget
The overall underspend position was further broken down between pay and non?pay budgets; there was an underspend of (£0.226m) on pay and an £0.181m overspend on non?pay activities. While 2 months was a small period to determine any underlying trends it did serve as a guide for further work to identify any potential changes that might impact on the outturn position for the year. The year-to-date positions within all departmental budgets were set out in appendix 1 with more significant variances of note shown separately in the table below: -
|
Area £’m |
Overspend/ (Under spend) to 31 May 23 |
Reason |
|
Fleet and technical Services - Non?Pay |
£0.086 |
The year to date overspend largely related to fuel and maintenance costs, further work would be undertaken with the department to determine if there were any underlying pressures. |
|
Pay |
(£0.207) |
Pay budgets in many areas were reporting small underspends due to vacancies however, this was not expected to continue long term. |
Capital Budget
The original Capital Programme for 2023/24 was £10.116m, a broad overview of the programme is set out below: -
|
Area |
Budgeted Items |
|
Operational Vehicles Budget £5m |
The budget allows for the remaining stage payments for 10 pumping appliances purchased in previous financial years. In addition, the budget allows for the first stage payments of the 3 pumping appliances for the 2023/24 programme. It also includes two Climate Change Vehicles and three Command Units.
|
|
Other vehicles Budget £1.0m |
This budget allows for the replacement of various operational support vehicles.
|
|
Operational Equipment Budget £1.3m
|
This budget allows for operational equipment purchases including thermal imaging cameras and cutting and extrication equipment in 2023/24.
|
|
Building Modifications Budget £1.5m
|
This budget includes the commencement of a programme of Drill Tower Replacements and an upgrade to the Wylfa prop facility.
|
|
IT systems Budget £1.2m |
This budget includes for upgraded Firewalls and digitisation of fire appliances. |
Slippage from 2022/23 of £1.636m had been added to the original budget to give a revised budget of £11.752m. To date £1.4m had been spent predominantly on pumping appliances as considered by Members (Appendix 2). This appendix sets out the revised capital programme and committed the expenditure position against this.
In response to Member questions regarding staff vacancies, the Chief Fire Officer advised that the Service was struggling to recruit to some green book technical vacancies. This was less so for grey book staff as the Service aimed to recruit in time for expected leavers. The Head of HR added that green book staff represented a small proportion of the overall staffing and there were challenges around terms and conditions of employment when compared with the private sector.
In response to further questions, the Head of HR confirmed that digital advertising was used as this could better target people for specialist roles. She confirmed that there were people who worked from home (across a balance between home and the office), some roles were office based at all times and others worked out in the community. She advised that agency staff tended to be used where recruitment had been unsuccessful on a number of occasions and confirmed there were a small number of external consultants employed.
Resolved: that the Committee noted and endorsed the year?to?date position in respect of the 2023/24 revenue and capital budgets.
Supporting documents:
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