Oxford turns to Cambridge (From thisisoxfordshire)

Oxford turns to Cambridge

8:57am Monday 28th August 2006

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Oxford City Council is turning to Cambridge to help get its finances under control.

Councillors have been told they need to see "the bigger picture" and look ahead more when setting budgets. Oxford finance chief Mark Luntley has told all 48 councillors they need to plan ahead and identify policies in advance, rather than at the last minute. And to illustrate his point he said the authority should adopt the approach of Cambridge City Council, which has built a £500,000 'policy space' into its budget so when councillors come up with a project, money is already in the bank. In future the city council is to take into account changes in inflation, interest rates and staff wage increases when working on setting the budget - things not currently done.

Mr Luntley said its was this kind of basic financial planning that would help the council to organise its finances and get itself on a more even keel.

He said the council should adopt a financial strategy "that looks further ahead and points up likely wage increases, interest rates, risks and a whole raft of areas and pressures that are going to hit the council, so we all know where we are going rather than turning up in September and wondering where the budget is going to go next year. We need to be more overt in tracking savings and spending ideas."

Some council departments are already struggling to make their share of efficiency savings.

And a warning came from Mike Baish, the city council's financial and asset management manager, who said: "The pressure of council's costs are considerable - looking ahead the pressures will get bigger."

Meanwhile, the authority has decided to wait before taking a decision on whether to merge some of its 18 business units. The decision has been deferred until later this year, when the council will discover whether it is included in a Government white paper to create a new round of unitary authorities.

If the council is included, it would mean severing all ties with the county council and the city would run everything from education to highways maintenance, social services to housing.

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