Mach 2 Consulting offers a dynamic long-term financial planning process and model.

Since 2020, the Local Government Act mandates that councils must prepare a 10 financial plan by 30 June in the year following elections. Best practice demands that it be reviewed and updated on a rolling annual cycle.

The challenge of reliably and flexibly modelling your council’s long-term financial sustainability is at the core of this.
Effective long-term financial planning requires:

• Effective engagement with key decision-makers (councillors/executive).
• An accessible, dynamic and trusted financial model capable of scenario development.
• A model with versatile variables and ‘levers’ that you can use to plot realistic future scenarios.
• Clarity/links with other organisational planning instruments and Plans.

Understanding and trust by key players in the process (and the model itself) are paramount.

Mach 2’s LTFP model is not a ‘black box’ predictor of ‘set-in-concrete’ future outcomes: this undermines credibility and defeats the very purpose of planning. That is, to identify what’s controllable and needs to change to deliver outcomes aligned with your council’s financial goals.
So, your LTFP needs to be dynamic, accessible as circumstances and needs change and focused on what is controllable.