Report of the Strategic Director (Neighbourhood Services)

The Council is forecasting an estimated budget shortfall of £44m in 2023/24, £85m in 2024/25, and £112m by 2025/26. After the use of c£16m smoothing reserves in each of the three years, this reduces to £28m in 2023/24, £69m in 2024/25 and £96m by 2025/26. Officers have identified potential savings options to reduce the budget gap totalling £42.3m over three years.

This report sets out the priorities for the services in the remit of this committee and details the initial revenue budget changes proposed by officers.

Even after these proposals there remains a budget gap of £7m to close to get to a balanced budget in 2023/24 and further savings and cuts options will be required to be worked between now and January and be reported back to Scrutiny committees in February. Each scrutiny committee is invited to consider the current proposed changes which are within its remit and to make recommendations to the Executive before it agrees to the final budget proposals in February 2023.

The Committee considered the report of the Strategic Director (Neighbourhood Services) which was the first in the cycle for the budget programme 2023-26. It set out an overview of the services within the remit of this scrutiny committee and their key priorities. The budget growth assumptions in the Medium-Term Financial Plan were set out. The report provided a draft set of officer proposals for further savings for 2023-26, developed in the context of the financial challenge facing the Council.

Key points and themes in the report included:

·         Providing an overview of the service and priorities;

·         A description of the service budget and the proposed changes;

·         Describing the proposed savings programme;

·         Workforce implications;

·         Equality and anti-poverty impact; and

·         Future opportunities and risk.

Some of the key points that arose from the Committee’s discussions were: -

• That the Council had been put in the difficult position of having to identify cuts this year and in previous years, through no fault of its own;
• Concern about the impact of job losses in this economic climate;
• Proposals for reducing the hours that the Art Gallery was open;
• The importance of libraries, galleries and culture to the well-being of Manchester residents, in particular recognising the role that libraries played in supporting people, and the impact of the cuts that the Council was being forced to make;
• The impact on local community groups of the proposal to reduce the Neighbourhood Investment Fund (NIF) for each ward;
• Staff turnover in Community Safety and Compliance; and
• The proposed withdrawal of the Central Library digital media lounge.

The Strategic Director (Neighbourhood Services) recognised the vital role that libraries played and advised that officers had been very careful to ensure that the cuts proposed did not result in libraries closing or reducing their opening hours.  In response to a Member’s question, he reported that it was not envisaged that there would be a significant environmental impact of the proposed savings but that there could be a reduced capacity to increase the work to tackle climate change, for example, reducing the capacity for the NIF to support community projects could mean that some local environmental projects did not receive this funding.

In response to a question about the vacancy factor referred to in the report, the Head of Finance explained that this was a way of taking into account that not all staff would be at the top point of their salary grade, that there would be a natural turnover of staff, with posts vacant for a short period, and that not all staff would be in the pension fund, which the Council contributed to.  In response to a question about inflationary pressures, he advised that the figures in table one in the cover report included elements of inflation, where they tended to be held corporately rather than under individual directorates.

The Senior Operational Lead (Galleries) reported that the savings proposal related to reducing gallery opening hours would be achieved through removing vacant posts in the visitor engagement team.  She advised that her service was reviewing how to reduce the gallery opening hours, which could be through closing for an additional day or opening later in the morning.

The Head of Compliance Enforcement and Community Safety reported that there were recruitment and retention problems in the Licensing Out of Hours team due to the shift work and her service was reviewing the shift patterns.  She advised that the problems with recruiting to Trading Standards posts was part of a national problem, which the Council was addressing through a “grow your own” programme.  Therefore, she advised that they were not anticipating that the underspend on staffing would be as high in future.

The Citywide Services Manager explained that the digital media lounge had been temporarily closed during the pandemic but had not re-opened and the proposal was to keep it closed.  He advised that the lounge had provided access to Mac computers but that these had since been re-located into the Music Library within Central Library.  He reported that the digital media lounge had also provided additional desk space, commenting that the amount of study space in the Music Library in Central Library had been slightly increased.  He also informed Members about the proposed reduction in the stock team, which would be achieved by people leaving and removing vacant posts.  He advised that this was linked to the reduction in the book fund and also to improved technology, which meant that less data-inputting was required when new stock was bought.  In response to a question from the Chair, he acknowledged that the proposed reduction in the book fund would be a challenge but advised that officers would look at the areas of purchasing which would have less impact on residents, such as electronic information subscriptions, and stated that he was confident that it would have little impact on the purchasing of books for children.

In response to questions from a number of Members in relation to events, the Strategic Director (Neighbourhood Services) explained that officers had tried to protect funding for important community events and those that had the largest impact on the city, economically and socially, and that, following this consideration, it was proposed that funding be removed from the Christmas Lights Switch On and New Year’s Eve Fireworks.  He advised that these events could still take place if they were funded by a different source and that these would be savings, not money which would be reinvested elsewhere.  He reported that proposals relating to Bonfire Night events were being submitted to the Environment and Climate Change Scrutiny Committee, including looking at doing alternative community events.  He advised that this year, when the Council had not re-introduced its Bonfire Night events after the pandemic, was being used as a trial and that decisions would be subject to an assessment of the impact this had had on communities and neighbourhoods.  The Chair advised that the Committee would be receiving a report on this at a future meeting.  In response to further questions, the Strategic Director (Neighbourhood Services) advised that the Christmas Lights Switch On would not have taken place this year, regardless of the budget proposals, because Albert Square was not available; however, the proposal was to not fund this event in future years.  He advised that the events which it was proposed not to fund either had less of an impact or could potentially be funded from other sources.  He advised that the costs of Bonfire events had been increasing and the intention was that the Council would fund other events in the autumn but not bonfires and fireworks, subject to the assessment of what had happened this year.  He clarified that the proposals for Bonfire Night would involve making savings of £40,000 but using the rest of the money to fund alternative events.

The Executive Member for Skills, Employment and Leisure stated that no one wanted to be making these decisions but the proposals were being put forward as the ones which would have as limited an impact on the economy of the city and on residents’ well-being as possible.

The Executive Member for Vibrant Neighbourhoods thanked officers for their hard work in developing these proposals and advised that Members’ feedback would be taken on board.

The Statutory Deputy Leader expressed concern about the wider impact of the cuts that the Council was being forced to consider.

Decision

To note the report, subject to Members’ comments.