The problem of a £million under spend is almost as bad as a £million overspend. Will they let us carry over the underspend? No.We have to be corporate. Will they make us carry over the £million overspend? Yes. We have to budget better!

The boss was known to make a drama out of a crisis and a £million overspend is a crisis. The budget problem is psychological as much as financial. In business managing such a large budget (£100 million ) within 1% would be success. But in local government the figure of a £million overspend is a banner headline in the local paper and the first item in the local talk radio show. 

A day locked away with the head of finance and we get the figure below the magic number. The figure was not the final figure. So no need to panic. The final figure is not the figure at the end of March, that is still a projection albeit a fairly accurate one, money coming in and going out in the last few weeks of the financial year doesn't show up in the final accounts for a few more weeks. Well that's how they explained it to me. The local rag still went with a headline that had £1 million in it but not front page. It also turns out the public are not as bothered about an overspend as the opposition councillors are. 

Another year it was the opposite problem. Half way through the financial year the budget was projected to be overspent, the breaks were put on a little too severely and the end of year budget report was showing an embarrassing £million underspend. If you're a voluntary organisation that lost its grant or a relative of an elderly person who had their care hours reduced as part of the budget cuts then this news is going to make you very annoyed. If you are the MP who fought the losing battle to keep the local day centre open then you have questions you want answered. It's an open goal for the opposition party.