Issue - meetings

(To receive a report from the Executive Director – Resources which updates on capital spending compared with budgets for the financial year which started on 1 April 2019)

That the current position on the capital budget be noted.

Consideration was given to a report from the Executive Director – Resources which provided an update on capital spending compared with budgets for the financial year which started on 1 April 2019.

The Assistant Director – Strategic Finance reported that the tables in the report showed the actual expenditure and any grants and contributions for the eight months of the financial year to 30 November 2019, along with the forecast for spending and a comparison of the forecast against the approved budgets.  For projects the whole life budget and forecast of the project was shown.  It was reported that an underspend of £0.5m was forecasted across the projects for this financial year.  However, in terms of project schemes and the whole life budget was forecasted to be underspent by £13.2m.  Of this, £11m was due to the Boston Barrier scheme which was proposed to be replaced by various schemes as part of the 2020/21 onwards capital budget setting process.

The Chairman of the Overview and Scrutiny Management Board (OSMB) advised that OSMB had considered the Executive report at its meeting on 30 January 2020 and had supported the recommendations in the report.  The Comments of OSMB had been circulated prior to the meeting for consideration by the Executive.

The Chairman of OSMB highlighted that the delayed opening of the Lincoln Eastern Bypass from Spring 2020 to Autumn 2020 was not currently expected to generate increased costs, and informed the Executive that he had written to the Executive Director – Place on behalf of the OSMB requesting further information on how the costs were being managed.  The Executive Director – Place advised that he had received the request and would be providing the information, in the form of a written response, to OSMB.  However, he advised that within the cost envelope for the scheme there was a risk contingency included for the entirety of the scheme rather than for individual elements.  The scheme was subject to regular review by the project team.  It was noted that the weather events in the three months prior to Christmas 2019 had been extreme and had impacted on the scheme.

RESOLVED

            That the current position on the capital budget be noted.