Agenda and draft minutes

Cabinet Member for Housing and Tackling Homelessness - Wednesday, 22nd January, 2025 4.00 pm

Venue: Council Chamber - The Guildhall, Portsmouth. View directions

Contact: Allison Harper, Local Democracy Officer - Tel: 023 9268 8014  Email: Allison.Harper@portsmouthcc.gov.uk

Media

Items
No. Item

1.

Apologies for Absence

Minutes:

There were no apologies.

2.

Declarations of Members' Interests

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interest.

3.

Council Housing Budget 2025/26 (including rent setting)

Purpose of Report

 

The law requires that all income and expenditure relating to Council Housing is accounted for separately in the Housing Revenue Account (HRA).  All other Council income and expenditure is accounted for together in a separate account called the General Fund. This report deals solely with the HRA.

 

The City Council has delegated the function of setting rents, charges and revenue budgets for Council Housing to the Cabinet Member for Housing and Tackling Homelessness.  Following consultation with residents and leaseholders, this report seeks to address all HRA budget issues.

 

The purpose of this report is to seek the Cabinet Member's decisions on the City Council Housing budgets, rents and other charges and to give authority for managers to incur expenditure in 2025/26.

 

The report also seeks to:

 

  • Note the Forecast Revenue Outturn for 2024/25 and give authority to the Director of Housing, Neighbourhood and Building Services & the Director of Finance and Resources to amend the budgets to reflect the latest available information prior to finalising budgets for 2025/26.

 

  • Note the Forecast Revenue Budgets for 2026/27 to 2028/29 arising from the proposals set out in this report.

 

  • Set rents with an average increase of 2.7%, which is in line with the maximum increase allowed by Central Government's Social Rent Setting Policy.

 

The report focuses on the context for the rent and service charge setting for 2025/26, references to previous years' context are included where appropriate.  The report for the 2024/25 rent and service charge setting is available on the Council's website.

 

RECOMMENDATIONS

 

It is recommended that the Cabinet Member for Housing and Tackling Homelessness approves the following:

 

  1. The Forecast Revenue Outturn for 2024/25 arising from monitoring discussions with Managers, as set out at Appendix 3, be noted.

 

  1. All rents and charges to be effective from Monday 31st March 2025 or such other date as determined by the Director of Housing, Neighbourhood and Building Services, in consultation with the Director of Finance and Resources.

 

  1. Dwelling Rents for 2025/26 to be set with an average increase of 2.7%, which is in line with the maximum allowable under Central Government's Social Rent Setting Policy, as summarised in Appendix 4.

 

  1. General Service Charges for 2025/26 to be set at this meeting, as set out in this report, and in accordance with Appendix 5.

 

  1. Sheltered Housing Service Charges for 2025/26 to be set at this meeting, as set out in this report, and in accordance with Appendix 6.

 

  1. Laundry Charges for 2025/26 to be set at this meeting, as set out in this report, and in accordance with Appendix 7.

 

  1. Heating Charges for 2025/26 to be set in accordance with Appendix 8.

 

  1. Garages and Parking Site Rents for 2025/26, as shown in Appendix 9, be approved and authority to let garages at reduced rents where demand is low be delegated to the Director of Housing, Neighbourhood and Building Services, in consultation with the Director of Finance and Resources.

 

  1. The Revenue Budget for 2025/26, as set out in Appendix 3, be approved and authority  ...  view the full agenda text for item 3.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Alan Denford, Finance Manager, Housing, presented the report, the purpose of which was to seek the Cabinet Member's decision on the City Council Housing budgets, rents and other charges and for the Cabinet Member to give authority for managers to incur expenditure in 2025/26.

 

The report was also for the Cabinet Member to note the Forecast Revenue Outturn for 2024/25 and to give authority to the Director of Housing, Neighbourhood and Building Services & the Director of Finance and Resources to amend the budgets to reflect the latest available information prior to finalising budgets for 2025/26. 

 

In addition, to note the Forecast Revenue Budgets for 2026/27 to 2028/29 arising from the proposals set out in the report and finally, to set the rents with an average increase of 2.7%, which was in line with the maximum increase allowed by Central Government's Social Rent Setting Policy.

 

Sally Scattergood, Assistant Director, Housing, set out the programme for change as detailed at 6.3 of the report.

 

Members' Questions

In response to Members' Questions, officers clarified:

 

·         In relation to the change at Wecock Farm housing offices, the service was not aware of any of the post offices being scheduled for closure but noted that, in addition to payments being accepted at the Post Office, the process had begun to give tenants the ability to use pay points at various convenience stores thereby increasing the locations available for payment to tenants.

·         The Wecock Farm housing office would be redeveloped eventually and the current proposal was to repurpose the building into four flats, once planning permission had been granted.

·         It was not clear how much compensation would be received from the Government for the National Insurance contribution increases.  However, the methodology for allocation would be for the general fund or council tax services only and for the total cost of service rather than wage bills.  The interpretation currently was that none of the compensation would come through to the HRA to help with the deficit or to reduce service charges.

 

Members' Comments

Members emphasised the fact that the proposed increase was not going to cover costs as noted in the report and outlined by Alan Denford.

 

Resident Consortium Questions and Comments

Mary Bailey noted the improvement in relations with Mountjoy following the consortium meeting with them.  They considered the rent and service charge increases fair.

 

Mandy Buxey raised some issue with the service charge and asked for clarification why the service charge had decreased for people living in houses whilst it had increased for those living in flats.

 

Officers clarified that compensation had been obtained from the General Fund recognising the users of the Play and Youth Service who were not council tenants.  This had been put towards the Service Charge for both flats and houses meaning that the charge for flats would have been higher than proposed.   The main driver of the increase in the service charge was for staff due to the increases in the pay award and in employer national insurance contributions following the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.