Agenda and minutes

Any Member with a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest or an Affected Interest in a matter should withdraw from the meeting when the matter is under consideration and should notify the Democratic Services Officer in attendance that they are withdrawing as they have such an interest. If the Interest is not entered on the register of Members interests the Monitoring Officer must be notified of the interest within 28 days.

There were no declarations of interest.

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting of the Executive on 27 January 2015 together with the accompanying decision records be confirmed as a correct record and signed by the Leader.

The Executive considered the reports submitted on the items listed below and the decisions taken are recorded in the decision sheets attached to these minutes and summarised below:

To recommend to Council the Capital Budget 2015/16.

RESOLVED that the Executive:

2.1       Recommends to the Council

a)         General Fund capital funding of £16.798m for 2015/16 in respect of those schemes listed in Annexes A – E.

b)         The inclusion of an additional budget of £1m for Invest to Save schemes.

c)         The inclusion of £2.219m of expenditure to be funded from S106 as outlined in paragraph 5.25.

d)         That those schemes that attract external grant funding are included within the Capital Programme at the level of funding received.

e)         To bring forward funding of £20k for Superfast Broadband from 2015/16 into 2014/15.

f)          To approve as a supplementary capital approval funding in 2014/15 of £0.447m for Binfield Learning Village at Blue Mountain, as outlined in the Funding Model agreed by the Executive in October 2014.

2.2       Agrees that capital schemes that require external funding can only proceed once the Council is certain of receiving the grant.

2.3       Reviews the indicative programme for 2016/17 and 2017/18 in the light of resources available and spending priorities in December 2015.

To recommend to Council the Revenue Budget 2015/16.

RESOLVED that the Executive, in recommending to Council a budget and Council Tax level for 2015/16:

1          Confirms the original budget proposals, subject to the revisions in section 7.4 and those decisions to be taken elsewhere on this agenda on the capital programme;

2          Agrees the provision for inflation of £1.511m (section 7.2);

3          Agrees the additional budget proposals as set out in Annexe A and Annexe D and in sections 6.2, 6.3 and 7.3;

4          Agrees that the Council should fund the Schools budgets at the level set out in section 8.1 subject to any amendments made by the Executive Member for Children, Young People and Learning following the receipt of definitive funding allocations for Early Years and High Needs pupils;

5          Includes a general contingency of £2.000m, use of which is to be authorised by the Chief Executive in consultation with the Borough Treasurer in accordance with the delegations included in the Council’s constitution (section 9.6);

6          Subject to the above recommendations, confirms the draft budget proposals;

7          Approves the Net Revenue Budget before allowance for loss of interest from any use of balances as set out in Annexe G;

8          Agree a contribution of £0.932m from General Reserves and £3.988m from the Business Rates Equalisation Reserve (before loss of interest on use of balances) to support revenue expenditure;

9          Recommends that the Council Tax requirement, excluding Parish and Town Council precepts, be set as £46.706m;

10        Recommends no change in the Council Tax for the Council’s services. The Valuation Bands therefore remain as follows:

11        Recommends that the Council approves the following indicators, limits, strategies and policies included in Annexe E:

• The Prudential Indicators and Limits for 2015/16 to 2017/18 contained within Annexe E(i);
• The Minimum Revenue Provision (MRP) Policy contained within Annexe E(ii);
• The Treasury Management Strategy Statement, and the Treasury Prudential Indicators contained in Annexe E(iii);
• The Authorised Limit Prudential Indicator in Annexe E(iii);
• The Investment Strategy 2015/16 to 2017/18 and Treasury Management Limits on Activity contained in Annexe E(iv);

12        Approves the virements relating to the 2014/15 budget as set out in Annexe H and recommends those that are over £0.100m for approval by Council.

13        Approves the release of the £0.490m of funds from the Schools SEN Resource Units Reserve from January 2015 to finance start-up costs at Rise@Garth (section 8.1).

14        Approves the medium term budget plan for Rise@Garth, subject to annual review (Annexe I).

A revised recommendation at 2.8 and revised Annex G was considered and endorsed by the Executive at the meeting.

To recommend to Council approval of the Community Infrastructure Levy Charging Schedule for implementation from 6 April 2015 and for the Executive to approve the instalments policy and list of infrastructure for which CIL will be levied and the adoption of an updated Planning Obligations Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) and the withdrawal of the existing Limiting the Impact of Development Supplementary Planning Document.

RESOLVED that the Executive:

(i)         recommends to Council publication of the Charging Schedule at Appendix A;

(ii)        recommends to Council the commencement of CIL charging in Bracknell Forest on 6th April 2015;

(iii)       approved the ‘Regulation 123’ List of Infrastructure Projects for which CIL will be charged at Appendix B for publication on the Council’s website;

(iv)       approved the CIL Instalment Policy at Appendix C for publication on the Council’s website;

(v)        approved the adoption of the Planning Obligations Supplementary Planning Document at Appendix D with effect from 6th April 2015; and,

(vi)       approved the withdrawal of the Limiting the Impact of Development Supplementary Planning Document (July 2007) with effect from 6th April 2015.

To seek approval from the Executive for a waiver of Contract Standing Orders for awarding the pre-construction services and main works contracts for the Blue Mountain programme.

RESOLVED that

1          The addendum to the Learning Village Procurement Plan in Appendix 2 to create an option for combining the procurement of the refurbishment works to the existing club house building earmarked for community facilities with the previously approved procurement plan authorising the use of the Improvement Efficiency South East (IESE) framework for the Learning Village be approved.

a) waive contract standing orders such as to permit the decision for the award of the contracts for pre-construction services and the main contract (including enabling works) in relation to Binfield Learning Village at Blue Mountain to be taken by an Executive Committee.

b) requests the Leader to delegate the decision to be taken by the Executive Committee.

2          The decisions be reported to the next available meeting of the Care Portfolio Review Group .

To determine the Council's response to a decision of the Local Government Ombudsman.

RESOLVED that

1          The report of the Executive to be prepared pursuant to Section 5A of the Local Government and Housing Act 1989 specify:-

(a)        that no action has been taken or is proposed to be taken in response to this report, and

(b)        that no action has been or is required to be taken as the pilot consultancy service which was the subject of the Ombudsman’s decision has been discontinued.

2          The draft report of the Executive attached as Annex A to the Executive report be approved.