Tynwald will be asked next month to approve an unprecedented extra £46.7m in supplementary votes to cover department overspends.

The fact that the Department of Health and Social Care is once again requiring a supplementary vote will come as no surprise but the scale of it – an additional £30m – may not have been predicted.

In addition the Department of Education, Sport and Culture is seeking £8.9m to get back on budget while the Department of Infrastructure wants an extra £5.665m and the Department of Home Affairs £2.2m.

Treasury Minister Dr Alex Allinson said: ‘Overall this has been an exceptional year, we have not seen overspends of this magnitude before.’

He said a number of the costs pressures that departments had faced had not been in their gift to control including rising energy costs and higher than expected pay awards, many of them determined by pay review bodies in the UK.

Dr Allinson said: ‘The current economic situation has caused exceptional pressure on government departments, particularly around high inflation and pay awards in addition to their own specific issues.’

But he added: ‘Should they have been anticipated and budgeted for? Without fiscal discipline to deliver efficiencies and value for money there is a danger that overspends like these could recur.’

Despite the scale of the overspends, a favourable financial position means Treasury will be able to avoid the need to draw further on reserves.

Additional income tax revenue of around £48m is expected to be received while expenditure from internal funds is lower by about £29m. As a result, the amount drawn from reserves is forecast to be much lower than the planned £152.9m, even taking into consideration the supplementary votes.

Dr Allinson said: ‘We estimate government revenue will be significantly increased this year and we will be able to deal with these supplementary votes without going into reserves. But we need that fiscal responsibility across all departments, to come in budget.’

He added: ‘I’m not happy with the fact that we have to go to Tynwald for these supplementary votes. But there are common themes for all these four departments. All employ a lot of people and some pay awards have been higher than expected, particularly in terms of healthcare and education.’

The teachers’ pay award for 2023 cost an extra £4.8m plus £1.6m for the previous year’s award. A 7% pay award for police officers and 6% for firefighters, backdated to April, together with spiralling energy costs, have contributed to the DHA going into the red.

Meanwhile, the DoI has had to find £1.18m to cover a pay award for Bus Vannin staff, and fund a £2.5m increase in energy costs, extra staff for air traffic control and increased costs of airport security.

Dr Allinson said there were more promising signs this year with inflation coming down and as result wage demands not being as high as they have been.

He added: ‘Treasury will be working closely with the departments to ensure they continue to exercise strong financial management and control.’