Issue - meetings

Background:

This report provided details of the provisional local government settlement that had been announced, via a written statement on 19 December 2022.

The report explained that the Council Tax referendum limit had been set at 3% for certain local authorities, including unitary councils, which was in addition to an Adult Social Care precept, which provided the flexibility to relevant local authorities to increase Council Tax by a further 2% above the referendum limit. Medway’s Draft Budget assumed that Council Tax would be increased by 3%.

Concerning business rates, the report explained that the Autumn Statement had made a series of announcements to help businesses, and the Provisional Settlement confirmed that the impact of these measures would be funded by the Government.

The report also provided details of the impact on other grants, set out at sections 6 to 10 of the report, all of which resulted in a net increase in resources of £5.362million to that reflected in Medway’s draft budget.  The Government had also confirmed local authorities would not need to deliver the charging elements of the Adult Social Care reforms, which the draft budget had assumed would cost the Council £3.3million, which therefore further reduced the budget gap by at least that amount.

Reasons:

The provisional levels of funding announced are a fundamental component of the 2023/24 budget, and their announcement is a further stage in the process to prepare a balanced budget for the coming financial year.