CONCERNS have been raised that financial savings achieved by not filling vacant jobs will have a negative impact on service delivery in Blaenau Gwent.

At a meeting of Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council’s Corporate and Performance scrutiny committee on Tuesday, September 3 councillors received a report on how the 2023/2024 revenue budget stood at the end of the financial year on March 31.

The overall provisional out-turn position across the whole council shows a surplus of £4.3 million has been made on its budget of £184.3 million for last year.

When the budget was set in February 2023, the council had agreed the need to use £4.2 million from specific reserves to balance the books in the face of the cost of living crisis.

The report explains that the “favourable variance” will drop after the money is moved around council accounts going: “to and from reserves.”

Once all the transfers have been made the report says that “only” £820,000 from specific reserves will be needed.

The report explains that savings and under spends have been made by council departments by not filling vacant posts.

Cllr Gareth Alban Davies of the opposition Independent group said: “I notice a lot of the portfolios are underspent because of staff shortages.

“I wonder how that is impacting on the council’s ability to provide services in certain areas.”

The council’s chief officer for resources, Rhian Hayden said: “By and large we are delivering the services that our residents expect us to deliver.

“I’m not saying it’s easy and I’m sure staff turnover and vacancies do have an impact but I’m not aware that it’s having a detrimental impact.”

Commercial and customer chief officer Bernadette Elias added: “There are areas of concern that we need to monitor.

“We do that and it’s part of our workforce planning and risk management.”

She added that the issue is monitored at corporate leadership team to ensure that: “capacity issues are not creating pinch points for service delivery.”

Cllr Tommy Smith of the council’s Labour ruling group said: “I think this report is quite positive overall and is much better than we could have anticipated.

“We appear to be holding the water back from the door.”

Councillors noted the transfer to and from reserves and approved the report which will go on to be discussed by Cabinet.