Agenda item

The Committee considered the Revenue and Capital Budget Monitoring Report in relation to the Health & Social Services, which provided an update on the latest budgetary position as at 31^st October, 2023 in respect of the 2023/24 financial year.

The Health & Social Services was forecasting an overspend of £9,740k on the revenue budget. The main variances on capital schemes indicated a forecasted variance of -£49k against a net budget of £1,906k on social care projects, and a -£184k variance against the Children Services projects net budget of £517k.

Cabinet Member for Resources highlighted that the forecast budget overspend on Children’s Services was an area of significant concern to the corporate budget position and in recognising this a working group had been set up to investigate and identify corrective action where possible.

A number of questions were raised to which officers responded. The main matters were as follows:

• Concern was expressed regarding the excessive cost of agency staff in residential homes and it was asked what safeguards were in place to ensure the reliance on agency staff would not be the same in the next financial year. Officers advised that a working group had been set up to help gain an understanding of the work demands. It was hoped that an improvement in the  financial position would be evident in the next monitoring report. Work had been undertaken to establish an in-house flexible pool of casual staff and if successful would reduce the reliance on agency staff.
• In response to concerns regarding the overspend of £9.7m and what the likely position would be at year end, the Committee was advised that while the figure was concerning it was for the departments within the remit of this Committee and that corporately the forecast was lower due to the underspend in the Chief Executive and Corporate Services Departments. It was also noted that there was an underspend position in respect of Capital Charges. Once again, the Committee was reminded that the monitoring work addressed the ‘actual performance’ based on data up to the end of October and that the accountants worked closely with all the service departments to review the trends and areas of overspend. It was stated that the increase in the use of agency staff had been identified as part of the monitoring process and had highlighted that unless corrective actions were put in place the financial position would deteriorate further.
• In reference to Appendix B, it was asked what the ‘alternative ways of working’ meant. Officers stated that recently Welsh Government had consulted on a rebalancing care and support white paper which considered how commissioning was undertaken with a greater emphasis on mitigating against market failures. An example of this would be the development of more in-house capacity with a specific example of Plas Y Bryn care home which closed last year and was subsequently bought by the Local Authority. It was also stated that there was an ambition to develop in-house children’s facilities to mitigate against the excessive cost of out of county placements.
• In response to a question regarding the grant received for Unaccompanied Asylum Seeker Children (UASC) officers advised that the funding was received from the Home Office as income that is attached to each unaccompanied child that received support.

UNANAMOUSLY RESOLVED that the report be received.