Public Performance Reporting

Finance

• Each financial year the Council sets a revenue budget to provide its services and also those of the Fire & Rescue and Police services. In 2006/7 the money available to spend on our main services is £223.4 million, a 4.58% increase over the previous year.
• The main areas of spending within this budget area:
  
  

  Education, Culture & Lifelong Learning	£91.3m	41%
  Social Work, Housing & Health	£50.2m	23%
  Police & Fire	£27.6m	12%
  Cost of borrowing	£11.1m;	5%
  Other Services	£16.3m	7%
  Development Safety & Regulation	£25.0m	11%
  Transport Subsidies & Concessionary
  Fares	£1.9m	1%
  Total	£223.4m

  
  
  
• Other budgeted expenditure: Housing Revenue Account £20.600m; Housing Capital - £10.851m and General Services Capital - £12.461m.
• The money we have to spend comes from: Government Grants (57%), Council Tax (22%), Non-domestic (business) rates (19%) and any surplus remaining from previous years (2%).
• In 2005/6 we collected 94.8% of Council Tax due that year (Scottish average : 93.3%).  We continue to recover all money owed from earlier years.
• We encourage Council Tax payers to pay by direct debit, which avoids the need to make regular payments by cash and saves people time.
• We aim to pay Council Tax Benefits and Housing Benefits speedily and correctly. In 2005/6 we reduced processing times from 55 days to 31 days.
• Each Council committee receives regular management reports on the Council’s financial position, and each year external auditors carry out a detailed examination of our accounts.