Agenda item

To receive the report on the second financial review of 2023-24.

The Committee received the report which provided the second review of the Cheshire East Council forecast outturn for the financial year 2023/24.

Members sought further information regarding the current revenue forecast for Adults and Health which showed in-year forecast pressures of £4.7M and the reasons why the Council had arrived at this point so rapidly when a balanced budget had been set earlier in the year.

The Executive Director of Adults, Health and Integration outlined the factors driving increased costs in adult social care. These included price inflation in social care, with staffing costs in the care sector running ahead of headline inflation; the rate of growth of the aging population in Cheshire East which was higher than other parts of the country; more complex needs leading to higher unit costs; and the numbers of people being discharged from hospital into the community and requiring more complex care.

The Executive Director outlined measures that were being taken to address budget pressures, including a reduction in the use of short-term residential and nursing placements, investment in voluntary sector organisations, a reduction on the reliance of domiciliary and residential care, and capping price increases.

A piece of work had been commissioned to look at how the change within the no criteria to reside criteria and how the numbers of people flowing through hospital post pandemic may be affecting the bottom line.

During the pandemic, to facilitate discharge from hospital at a rapid rate social care teams were funded by central government to facilitate people leaving hospital rapidly. The funding for this had ceased in April 2022 although there was still an expectation that adult social care would act the way it did during the pandemic. It was emphasised that discharge from hospital did not make people eligible for adult social care and it was important to understand this.

A request was made for future reports to be clearer when information was for noting only. Some members felt that the use of ‘consider’ in recommendations could appear that members were being asked to do more than receive the information.

An amendment to the recommendations in the report was moved and seconded which sought to amend ‘consider’ to ‘note’. This was carried unanimously.

RESOLVED:

That the Adults and Health Committee:

1. Note the report of the Finance Sub Committee: Finance Sub-Committee, 2nd November, 2023
2. Note the factors leading to a forecast adverse Net Revenue financial pressure of £4.7m against a revised budget of £136.5m (3.4%).
3. Note the forecast and further mitigations needing to be identified, aimed at bringing spending back in line with budget.
4. Note the in-year forecast Capital Spending of £0.02m against an approved MTFS budget of £0.47m, due to slippage that has been re-profiled into future years.
5. Scrutinise the contents of Annex 1 and Appendix 1 and note that any financial mitigation decisions requiring approval will be made in line with relevant delegations.
6. Note that Council will be asked to approve the fully funded supplementary revenue estimate over £1,000,000 in accordance with Financial Procedure Rules as detailed in Annex 1, Appendix 1, Section 3 Corporate Grants Register, Table 2.