Mid and East Antrim Borough Council’s interim chief executive Valerie Watts has confirmed the local authority has a financial deficit of £7.2m.
In a statement to councillors on the local authority’s financial position at a meeting of the borough council at The Braid, in Ballymena, on Monday, she said that she had requested to do so in the public part of the meeting “to keep members abreast of developments and to keep the public informed of the progress that we are making in this issue of our finances”.
She said: “As members are aware, I reported to you at that special meeting held on 11th September, the in-year financial deficit of approximately some £7m, and clearly as a council, we need to address that in order that Mid and East Antrim Borough Council meets its statutory obligations to achieving financial break-even at financial year end on 31st March.
“I stress again that is a statutory obligation on us as council. So just to remind you that we are facing a significant number of legacy challenges as well as challenges that were identified in phase one of the PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers) support work.
“In response to budgetary challenges, it was clear that Mid and East Antrim required immediate support to stabilise our finance and procurement functions whilst improving existing processes and policies and designing new operating models, finance and procurement functions.
“The findings have been translated into clear next steps which will enable us to restore grip on control in the short term whilst developing and embedding a sustainable approach for the future.
“In terms of what has actually been addressed to date – so in relation to the council facing significant and growing budgetary pressures, we have begun to address this by developing a forecast expenditure for the financial year 2023/24 based on existing committed spend by looking at patterns of spend in the last couple of years and basing our forecast expenditure with what we know will also potentially be growth items in next year’s budget, so that is to help us kick off the rates-setting procedure with the most up-to-date financial information we can possibly have.
“In doing that, this has identified a budget gap of approximately £7.2m which again has been used to inform our next steps."
A review of council assets was on the agenda behind closed doors at Monday’s meeting with the spotlight on Smiley Buildings in Larne and Ardeevin in Ballymena.