Agenda item

The Chamberlain to be heard.

The Chamberlain provided the Committee with an oral report regarding the Medium Term Financial Plan and Local Government Finance, following the recent Budget announcement.

The Chamberlain advised that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had announced a one-year slippage to the aspirations to achieve a budget surplus, which would therefore allow some smoothing of the further cuts to local Government finance which were anticipated over the course of the next Parliament. The overall amount which would be cut from Local Government funding would be likely to be announced in the Autumn Spending Review. However, it had been confirmed that Local Government and Policing were not within budget areas which were protected against cuts.

The Chamberlain confirmed that the Corporation’s prudent budget assumption was that the formula funding element of the Government grant would no longer be received by the Corporation by the end of the decade.

A report on the savings proposals for the City of London Police would be brought forward to the appropriate Committees in September.

The Chairman requested that the Chamberlain provide a further update on Local Government Finance to the Committee’s September 2015 meeting.

RESOLVED – That the Committee notes the verbal report.