Purpose

To provide an overview of the Quarter 1 forecast position on both revenue and capital for the 2026/27 financial year.

Decision

EMCCA Board:

A)     Noted the Quarter 1 forecast position of the Combined County Authority for the 2026/27 financial year, including:

•         Revenue forecast underspend of £0.80m against the revised budget

•         In-year Revenue budget pressures of £4.8m for 2026/27 and proposed funding sources

•         Capital Programme forecast underspend of £2.8m

•         The main budget variances across Corporate Leadership Team (CLT) portfolios

•         The current and forecast position on Revenue and Capital Reserves

•         The Mayor’s Office Quarter 1 Forecast

•         Treasury Management performance

B)     Noted the following draw down of reserves, which had been reflected in the Q1 forecast and further detailed in Section 5, these have been approved under delegation of the S73 officer:

•         £2.5m from Transport reserve for Transport service budget pressures relating to concessionary fares and contract price increases

•         £2.8m from Transport reserve from a further budget gap identified over and above the previously approved £4.3m initially projected against available funding

•         £0.4m from New Programmes Fund for the HR System implementation

•         £1.7m from General Reserves for Transport Support Services

•         £1.4m from Supercluster EMIZ to fund approved programme delivery

C)    Approved the consolidation of two earmarked reserves which relate to similar purposes, the ‘Organisational Development and Capacity reserve and the ‘Development’ reserve. The balance of £1.26m to be transferred from Development into the newly designated Organisational Development and Capacity.

D)    Noted the following virements, which have been reflected in the Q1 forecast and have been approved by the Section 73 Officer.

•         Virements from Directorate Budgets to the Corporate Expenditure budget to increase the contingency pot, which will be used to fund Revenue pressures.

Consisting of:

o        £4.5m virement from Finance to Corporate Expenditure to transfer the investment income budgets

o        £0.58m from across directorates from the reduction in Pension Contribution rate (16.3% to 13.2%)

o        £0.3m of Q1 salary underspends, £0.2m from SIG and £0.1m from Place