Council's Budgeting in a Mess

2.18.47pm BST (GMT +0100) Wed 9th Sep 2009

An embarrassing failure either to forecast spending accurately or to monitor it effectively was revealed at a meeting of West Berkshire Council's Executive last Thursday. After only a quarter of the year, the expected overspend by the Council is already well over Half a Million Pounds.

Commenting on the figures, David Rendel, the Liberal Democrats' Finance Spokesperson said, "As the proportion of elderly people grows, more money has to be spent on their care. Yet year after year WBC fails to take proper account of this and always underestimates the amount to put into the budget.

"This year they must have known that they were likely to receive fewer applications for major developments, given the economic downturn and the fact that the locations for the next round of major developments had yet to be decided. Yet the forecast overspend of £150,000 in the Planning dept. has been blamed largely on this.

"Meanwhile the overspend in Highways and Transport was shown in the table of accounts as £250,000. £150,000 of this was explained as an unexpectedly low income from parking enforcement. When asked what the other £100,000 was due to, the Portfolio holder said he did not know. He promised to find out and to send the answer later in writing.

"I was appalled that the Councillor responsible had no idea what a £100,000 forecast overspend in his budget was about. That's not a small sum of money. I would have expected him to be more on top of his brief".