Report of the City Treasurer (Deputy Chief Executive) attached

This report provides an overview of the outturn of capital expenditure and financing for 2018/19, the forward commitments for 2019/20 to 2023/24 within the capital programme and how funding streams were managed to best utilise resources available to fund the capital programme.

The Committee considered a report of the City Treasurer (Deputy Chief Executive), which informed Members of the outturn of capital expenditure and financing for 2018/19, the major variances between the 2018/19 outturn and the previous Capital Programme monitoring report submitted in February 2019 and the commitments to be carried over into the five-year Capital Programme 2019/20 to 2023/24.

The Deputy City Treasurer referred to the main points and themes within the report, which included:-

·                The final spend position for the Manchester City Council Capital Programme in 2018/19 was £361.6m compared to a revised budget of £400.0m;

·                The outturn for the 2018/19 Programme on behalf of Greater Manchester was £91.2m compared to a revised budget of £95.8m;

·                There was a capital programme variance of -£43.0m between the budget and the outturn position.

·                The variations by service area;

·                The funding arrangements for the 2018/19 Capital Programme;

·                The proposed capital programme budget re-phasing to reflect the planned delivery of projects in 2019/20 to 2023/24 and the cumulative impact of these adjustments; and

·                Risks to future forecasts.

The report was also to be considered by the Executive at its meeting on 26 June 2019.

Some of the key points that arose from the Committees discussions were:-

·                Confirmation was sought that that cycleways, including the Manchester to Chorlton cycleway were being scrutinised appropriately;

·                Clarification was sought as to whether variances in the Capital Programme were being measured against the original agreed budget or the revised budget position; and

·                It was suggested that the variance in spend within the Parks programme should scrutinised alongside the Parks Strategy by the Community and Equalities Scrutiny Committee, especially given that Parks now appeared to anticipate that it would not be likely to be able to successfully apply for £8m of grant funding that had previously formed part of the capital strategy, as the application criteria have changed in the intervening period.

The Executive Member for Highways, Planning and Transport assured the Committee that the Council’s Neighbourhoods and Environment Scrutiny Committee had previously scrutinised cycleways, including the Manchester to Chorlton cycleway and would continue to do so as part of its work programme for the current municipal year.

The Deputy City Treasurer advised that the variances in the Capital programme were measured against the revised budget position.  The Executive Member for Finance and Human Resources advised that for future reports, the variance would be measured against both the original budget position and revised budget position for greater transparency.  The City Treasurer reminded the Committee that unlike the revenue budget, the capital budget process was designed to be more fluid in order for greater flexibility and the need for appropriate adjustments.

Decision

The Committee:-

(1)       Notes the report and recommendations asked of the Executive;

(2)       Recommends that all future reports to the Committee containing information on spend against budget of any kind, shows the variance against both the original and revised budget;

(3)       Recommends to Executive that in its future reports, it requests that variance figures are measured against agreed original budgets as well as the revised budget position for greater transparency;

(4)       Recommends to Communities and Equalities Scrutiny Committee that as part of its scrutiny of the Council’s Parks Strategy, it also looks at the variance in spend within the Parks programme and the loss of the potential grant income that was anticipated.