Agenda, decisions and minutes

Venue: Committee Room 1, Civic Offices, Merrial Street, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, ST5 2AG

Contact: Geoff Durham  01782 742222

Items
No. Item

1.

APOLOGIES

Minutes:

There were no apologies.

2.

MINUTES pdf icon PDF 66 KB

To consider the minutes of the previous meeting.

Minutes:

Resolved      That the minutes of the meeting held on 17 January 2018 be agreed as a correct record.

3.

DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

To receive declarations of interest from Members  on items included in the agenda.

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interest stated.

4.

REVENUE AND CAPITAL BUDGETS AND COUNCIL TAX 2018/19 pdf icon PDF 131 KB

Decision:

Resolved (i)   That the 2018/19 General Fund Revenue Budget as detailed in this report and in the report to Cabinet dated 17 January 2018 be recommended to Full Council for approval.

 

Resolved (ii)  That the Capital Programme 2018/19 as detailed in the report to Cabinet dated 17 January 2018, with the exception of reducing the budget for replacement Waste Bins to £100,000 from £150,000, be recommended to Full Council for approval together with the funding of £80k redundancy and associated costs in 2017/18 from the current year’s capital programme, funded from capital receipts, as set out in section 5 of this report.

 

Resolved (iii) That the gratitude of the Cabinet be conveyed to the officers who had worked to develop the budget for presentation to Council.

Minutes:

The Executive Director (Resources and Support Services) submitted the 2018/19 Revenue Budget and Capital Programme 2018/19 for approval by Cabinet prior to a meeting of full Council on 21 February.

 

The Portfolio Holder for Finance and Resources reported that, following a request made by a member of the Finance, Resources and Partnerships Scrutiny Committee (24/01/2018) a more detailed scrutiny of the costs of replacement waste bins had been carried out and the budget for this item reduced from £150,000 to £100,000. This amount of £50,000 would be included in the Capital Programme.

 

Resolved (i)              That the 2018/19 General Fund Revenue Budget as

detailed in this report and in the report to Cabinet dated 17 January 2018 be recommended to Full Council for approval.

 

Resolved (ii)             That the Capital Programme 2018/19 as detailed in the

report to Cabinet dated 17 January 2018, with the exception of reducing the budget for replacement Waste Bins to £100,000 from £150,000, be recommended to Full Council for approval together with the funding of £80k redundancy and associated costs in 2017/18 from the current year’s capital programme, funded from capital receipts, as set out in section 5 of this report.

 

Resolved (iii)            That the gratitude of the Cabinet be conveyed to the

officers who developed the budget for presentation to Council.

5.

FINANCIAL AND PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT REPORT TO END OF QUARTER THREE (OCTOBER - DECEMBER) 2017-18 pdf icon PDF 66 KB

Additional documents:

Decision:

Resolved      That members note the contents of the attached report and agree to the recommendation that the Council continues to monitor performance alongside the latest financial information for the same period.

 

Minutes:

The Executive Director (Resources and Support Services) submitted the Financial and Performance Review report – third quarter 2017/18 which described the performance of the Council.

 

Resolved      That members note the contents of the attached report and

agree to the recommendation that the Council continues to monitor performance alongside the latest financial information for the same period.

 

6.

QUESTIONS TO CABINET

Minutes:

The Portfolio Holder for Corporate and Service Improvement People and Partnerships circulated at the meeting questions to Cabinet from Councillor Naylon which are set out below together with the response to each issue.

 

 

What efforts have been made to keep as much useable office furniture electronic items and good quality sundry items out of skips and into 'destinations' which can benefit from them? (Reference the move to Castle House).

 

Firstly officers can confirm that no items to date have been skipped (in fact - the items that were put to one side as scrappage - have been sold to a staff member who had placed a bid for them).

 

The process that has been put in place for re-using items is as follows:-

 

a) Officers throughout the authority have been contacted to identify their service (business) needs for furniture and supporting equipment. Such items have then been taken to all other offices/sites (e.g. Kidsgrove CSC), subject to availability (noting that some items can only be relocated once the Civic Offices has been vacated). Also some furniture has been used to set up a ‘drop in’ centre at the depot to support both agile working and business continuity.

 

b) A number of enquires / requests for items were received from voluntary organisations within the Borough and where we have been able to support such requests items have been dispatched.

 

c) Next, having gone through steps (a) and (b), other items still regarded as surplus have been sold to staff who have made bids (note that where supplier quotes have been received (e.g. office furniture) any bids have been benchmarked against such to ensure value for money).

 

d) Commercial buyers have been contacted linked to certain commodities e.g. printing equipment; plotter; inks and cartridges; planning paper; and these have been sold on to the highest bidder.

 

Quotes have been received for some furniture items – although not yet sold. That said there is very little interest in office chairs and officers are seeking an alternative outlet(s) for these items. Three organisations have been contacted regarding the Council’s Chamber furniture, however due to the bespoke nature of this furniture there is no clear interest in purchasing this.

 

In addition specialist companies have been contacted reference the number of used safes the Council has and there has been no interest in purchasing these (albeit 3 very small safes have been sold onto officers in the same way as furniture items). To minimise/negate Council costs two self-storage operations were contacted and one has a genuine interest in taking the safes at no cost.

 

There are certain items that will require disposal which may incur costs to the authority e.g. fridges/freezers (albeit there may be an interest from ‘Furniture Mine’ to take some of these items; this would of course be at their own risk if the Council were to approve such). With regard to fire extinguishers officers will look to minimise the cost of disposal to the Council by utilising some to replace older units  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

7.

URGENT BUSINESS

To consider any business which is urgent within the meaning of Section 100B(4) of the Local Government Act 1972.

Minutes:

There was no Urgent Business.