DENBIGHSHIRE Council will increase its budget for fixing winter damage to its roads after senior council officers admitted they hadn’t allocated enough funds in previous years.
At a meeting this week at Ruthin County Hall, the council’s highways and environment department estimated it will end the financial year with an overspend of more than £2m.
The council’s cabinet were discussing a finance report and debating the council’s revenue budget for 2024/25.
A report said the department had overspent by £2.06m in the council’s highways and environment department alone.
The “increased costs of the waste service” was blamed on the overspend, amid the problematic launch of the council’s new ‘Trolibocs’ service last summer.
But the report also listed “winter maintenance” as the reason for going over budget.
Speaking at the meeting, Cllr Martyn Hogg asked if the council was setting aside more money for winter maintenance in future.
“Winter maintenance, do we budget for service disruption due to bad weather and extra winter maintenance due to bad weather?” he said.
“Obviously it is quite difficult to do because predicting the weather is always difficult, but do we actually budget for it and then see how good we were at weather forecasting, or is it just always going to be an overspend?”
Head of finance Liz Thomas said the council was increasing the budget and would also set aside money in the reserves in case of a “severe winter”.
“In the budget we just set for 2025/26, we have recognised that our budget for winter maintenance isn’t sufficient even for a mild winter,” she said.
“We’ve had a few mild winters of late, and the costs of even providing a service in a mild winter isn’t sufficient, so in setting the 2025/26 budget, we did include a pressure to increase that budget.
“It wouldn’t cover us, though, for a very severe winter, but what we did at cabinet last month is (provide) funding in a reserve to cover adverse weather conditions because that would seem to be an appropriate way to deal with movements in the weather that we can’t forecast.”
The highways and environment report stated: “The current outturn prediction is £2.066m overspend (previously £1.564m).
“The overspend relates to increased costs for the waste service (£1.628m) and winter maintenance (£807K) offset by savings and additional income across the service (-£369K).
“The movement this month of £502K relate to increases to fleet costs in the waste service (£430K), winter maintenance (£237K), and variances across the service offset by additional income for streetworks (-£165k).
“There remains a high risk on this service during these winter months.”
Whilst there have been significant underspends in some council departments, education and children’s service are also predicting an overspend of £2.244m.
Denbighshire’s planning, public protection, and countryside department is also predicting an overspend of £751K.
The council’s adult social care and homelessness department is reporting a likely underspend of £1.086m; other departments reporting an underspend included corporate budgets, with an underspend of £4.268m.
The cabinet noted the budgets set for 2024/25 and progress against the agreed strategy.
Final figures for 2024/25 are due to be presented next month.
