Agenda item

To receive a presentation by the Director of Finance and Assets

The Authority received a presentation from the Director of Finance and Assets who advised Members that this was the first annual update of the Financial Strategy which was approved by the Authority last year.

Starting with progress to date, the activities for the first year included continuing to lobby for an increase in Council Tax Referendum Limits and for other grants to become part of the Settlement Funding Assessment. A Value for Money (VFM) initial review by external providers was undertaken by a company called Proving Services Limited, who had completed this for a number of other fire and rescue services and BFRS was the eighth service to be reviewed. The senior management team completed a number of self-assessment questionnaires, looking at other external reports, customer feedback, trying to gauge economy, efficiency, stakeholder value, to come to an overall view of the service. There had been a review of the estate footprint and a review of Partnership arrangements would be presented to Members in March 2022. The Portfolio Management Office had been established and the recruitment of a Pensions Officer was complete.

The Director of Finance and Assets advised Members that in terms of second-year activities, there had been a review of the system requirements to either upgrade or replace the main Finance and HR system and it had been decided to continue with the current system because the cost of change would be very high. A review of the budget monitoring and performance reporting arrangements was on-going and a review of the skillset of non-finance staff and elected Members would be undertaken in the last quarter of this financial year.

The Director of Finance and Assets advised that with regard to budget monitoring and performance reporting arrangements, there was a wider review of the framework underway, and this would (amongst other things) bring together the workforce planning and financial reports all in one place.

The Director of Finance and Assets advised that the overall progress to date against the Strategy had been categorised into four key areas covering performance, people, governance and external factors.

The key points of the first annual update were that the funding position had not improved significantly since HMICFRS raised their cause for concern and the three-year Comprehensive Spending Review would hopefully give more certainty. The Council Tax referendum limits were to be announced in the Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement later this month and the outcomes of the settlement would determine how many firefighters and appliances the Authority could afford.

A Member asked why the presentation did not include any financial figures and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that this was a strategy rather than a detailed budget. The detailed budget would be presented to the Executive Committee in February to be recommended to the Fire Authority for approval in February.

A Member asked regarding the recruitment and retention of staff mentioned in the presentation and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that the recruitment in the strategy referred to finance staff only. The Service was currently recruiting for 18 operational firefighter posts and had shortlisted 23 firefighters for medicals following final interviews.

A Member asked what was intended regarding looking at estates and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that this referred primarily to Unit 7, which was a non-operational building housing stores and the urban search and rescue team. At present, the Authority was not looking to reduce the number of fire stations.

A Member asked with regards to the ‘headline increases of circa 3% per year for Local Government announces at Budget 2021’ would that actually represent a net reduction to the Service on the basis of National Insurance increases and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that it should be a slight increase in real terms.

A Member asked if the referendum reserve contained an amount for campaigning and also how many other fire authorities had actually run referendums and how successful had they been, and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that in terms of the referendum reserve, there wasn't specifically an amount set aside for campaigning, the £600k was based on an estimate of the only referendum that has been run recently, for the Bedfordshire Police and Crime Commissioner. It was unsuccessful in its attempts to increase council tax by more than the referendum limit.

The Director of Finance and Assets was not aware of any other services that had held referendums recently and certainly not any fire services.

A Member asked what the Authority’s current borrowing position was and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that in terms of current borrowing outstanding, it was roughly just under £7m. The Authority did not have a borrowing limit, but it had a prudential limit, so it was whatever was considered affordable and sustainable.

A Member asked about the problems of recruiting staff and was there provision to offer a salary above the market rate, and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that there wasn’t any specific contingency to do so, but the Authority did have a small number of posts where a market supplement had been applied. It could be built in as part of the budget planning process if necessary.

A Member asked what a flexi firefighter was and was advised by the Deputy Chief Fire Officer that the flexi firefighter role was quite unique in the UK fire and rescue service, it was a firefighter that wasn’t allocated to a particular station or watch, but could be used to cover annual leave and sickness on any station.

A Member asked if the Authority was not allowed to put up council tax by £5, what was the quantifiable gap, and was advised by the Chief Fire Officer, that the Authority wouldn’t know what the quantifiable gap would be until it received the local government finance settlement. At that point, the Authority would be able to anticipate what the quantifiable gap would be and what measures would have to be taken to bridge that gap.

A Member asked why there were no low, medium or high-risk scenarios in the strategy and was advised by the Director of Finance and Assets that when the Financial Strategy was approved last year, the scenarios were set out within it, and perhaps they should have been repeated in this update, but he would resend them around to Members after the meeting.

A Member asked what a 2% increase was in money terms and also what would the £5 be as a percentage. The Director of Finance and Assets advised that a 2% increase would roughly generate around £300k on council tax and a £5 increase would generate around £1.5m increase. A £5 increase would equate to about an 8% increase in a Band D equivalent.