Rotherham Council finance bosses questioned over unspent £5m Covid grants

During an overview and scrutiny meeting yesterday (November 17), councillors questioned finance officers over the unspent cash.

A report to the overview and scrutiny management board stated that the government has provided the council with £8.3m emergency funding, to weather the storm of the pandemic during 2021 and 2022.

The report adds that it is “too early to fully and accurately estimate the financial impacts” of the pandemic, and that the council has carriedforward £5.3m of emergency support funding from 2020 -2021.

“If needed, this will be used in 2021/22 or held in reserve for financialpressures over the longer term,” states the report.

Councillor Taiba Yasseen said: “I’m surprised that we’ve accumulated that much in reserves, and should that money have been allocated during this financial year, or did it cover a longer period?

Judith Badger, strategic director of finance and customer services at Rotherham Council told the meeting: “General reserves are uncommitted….that’s the bail-out reserve.

“The funding has been given in recognition on the impact on councils’ finances of Covid-19.

“What the council considered alongside some of the other funding that we were given, was expecting that we would have ongoing issues into this year.

“We used the Covid grant where we needed to, to ensure that our out-turn last year was sound.

“What we didn’t want to do was use it unnecessarily, so we’ve tried to plan what support we need for our communities, how we fund that from the different grants.

“A lot of what we have carried forward into this year is already committed, for example, the contained outbreak management fund, of which some of that is used for the test and trace support, self-isolation payments.

“There’s a whole plan of what that’s to be used for.”

Rob Mahon, head of corporate finance at the council added: “A lot of the Covid grants were time limited, whereas the £5.3m wasn’t.”