Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council’s Cabinet meeting on Wednesday 6 March 2024.
To download the agenda, reports and appendices: https://www.nuneatonandbedworth.gov.uk/meetings/meeting/209/cabinet
Right good evening ladies and gentlemen it has turned 6 o’cl so we will make a start on this evening’s cabinet meeting uh welcome everyone to uh cabinet tonight um we are being recorded uh for future broadcast I’m aware that uh Council Condor is also recording himself so we’ll turn to item one which
Is the evacuation procedure I believe everyone present has heard the evacuation procedure before so I’m not going to go over that save to say please leave through the nearest available exit and we meet outside the old bank at the front item two apologies we have apologies from councelor
Gutteridge item number three which is Declarations of interest uh are there any declarations Beyond those which are already stated I have one to add which I have recently sent off to committee services and I’m now a member of the board of the conservative Counselors Association so just so everything is above board on
That one that takes us onto agenda item four which is the minutes is everyone happy that I sign them off as a true and accurate record okay thank you that takes us on to agenda item number five which is public consultation I’ve been made aware of
Public speakers on agenda items 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 and 13 Mr Smith and Mrs condore on item six and then Mrs Condor on the rest of the agenda items that I mentioned before so I don’t see any reason to deviate from the public lished agenda order I would remind public
Speakers that they should stick to the agenda item under consideration and the subject matter that is before cabinet tonight if you do not then I will ask you to come back to the matter in hand and if you do not and persist in doing so I will move on to next
Business that moves us on to then agenda item number six which is the homelessness and rough sleeping strategy 24 to 29 councelor gby um so the homelessness act 2002 imposes a duty on all local housing authorities to carry out a review of homelessness in their areas and to formulate and publish a homelessness
Strategy based on those findings um the current strategy expires in April of this year and this new strategy will will pick up from um where we left off at that point and um we’re looking at tackling the causes and impact of homelessness and we want to make sure that we are
Doing everything that we need to do within our gift to do them in the right way for the people who we serve and when we talk about homelessness I’ve said this quite a lot before this isn’t just people we see living on the street so that that needs to be made clear there
Are many forms of homelessness uh and there are many solutions to those those issues and we take great pride in actually identifying people with issues within our homeless uh communities and helping them out as best as we possibly can although that isn’t to say that everybody is satisfied with the level of
Help that they are offered and also that sometimes when we do offer help to people who are homeless who are homeless they don’t actually accept it so there are two ends of the scale and a big Spectrum in between so this strategy is actually something that um has been
Produced in partnership with our external third party um providers as well so this it’s not just us that deals with homelessness however we are the lead Authority within within our bough and this is our document that we have to produce through the uh statutory legislation so I’ll uh I’ll present that
Chair okay councilor Markham thank you we do have two public speakers on this item I’ll turn to Mr Smith first responsible for producing this corporate fairy tale should dung their heads in shame it Bears no relation to the reality of the misery that this is being caused by the council’s housing
Department who are in and in particular the housing homeless services and their partners with the complaint system being broken deliberately to stop residents registering their many and valid complaints anyone who dares to draw attention to this cruel vindictive service are targeted by the safer neighborhoods team with false allegations using their
Partners to actively try to sidence any voice that exposes the corruption in this Corporation and the criminal Behavior using the courts to criminalize residents for exposing your crime crimes wasting tens of thousands of pounds of taxpayers money to silence valid complaints about your actions the levels this Corporation will stoop to to
Protect its criminal activities is endless this Corporation and its Partners in this report are not fit to serve this community in particular the safer neighborhood team particularly the people charged with running them CLA goby and Christian Shaw CLA goby is under investigation for a hateful remarks about the send
Children who have been victims of abuse by the safer neighborhoods team and Christian sha at the police is not the responsibility of the council who have been under investigation for their role in the death of a vulnerable young man in the bah 7 years and it’s still ongoing two people heading the safe
Neighborhoods teams item organizing and is why the whole organization should be replaced for the safety of re in which case we’ll move on because we’re strain beyond the agenda item that we are paying over 400,000 for five Executives to oversee this Corporation proves that they are
Unfit to serve and they should go as well Mr Smith thank you good night Mrs Condor I trust you’ll bring some sanity to the rest of the proceedings points to make actually the printed version does not seem to be exactly the same as the online version
Because I picked up quite a few typos and pro problems and thing which don’t seem to be in here so that that is an issue because obviously most of my comments were related to that main I think it’s totally inappropriate to have a photo and forward by counselor gby or
Any politician I mean I know why it’s councelor goldby because that’s her portfolio holder but it is a strategy for the burough for the council it’s not for from your particular party and it will date and the strategy should be apolitical if at the next elections the control of the
Council would change and things this strategy would still be in place so I think that’s very inappropriate why has this not gone to a scrutiny panel first it’s really important bit of um protocol and things is to I mean it should surely have gone to the housing scrutiny panel first for
Discussion other little things like Mrs K I’m I’m trying to give you full attent my full attention but it’s been has it been resolved okay sorry about that I just wanted to make sure I was able to pay full attention to what you were saying please
Continue now stood out for me was that 82% of the people who are coming to for help and things have been diagnosed with a mental health problem so I actually want you as the council to write to the government WR to and campaign wherever you can for we need much much better
Mental Health Services because this although you’re not responsible for mental health services it is coming back to the whole bough and as a problem similarly a lot of the problems would be helped by stopping the right to buy because that has actually been a massive cost to society where people you know
Things are coming there’s far fewer rental properties at a reasonable rate I know that’s not your party policy but things um the other comments say don’t seem to tie in with what I saw online so I won’t make them apart from there are some glaring typ OS and things that
Should be clarified on the the page 13 and 14 I believe it is of the actual strategy the um things against the columns just sort of run out young person age 18 to 25 years requiring dot dot dot that is not helpful to anyone who hasn’t seen the full full version
And there was also one of the other tables said it was from 20 10 to 2023 this one here and every year is labeled as 2010 so someone hasn’t proof redit and that’s you know happens time and time again so it’ be really good if those things were actually picked to
Before it goes out to to be adopted so I guess most of you haven’t actually read that and picked those errors up thank you on what Mrs Condor has said no in which case we’ll go to any non-cabinet member councelor Condor and that’s not the most important
Thing but it just shows these documents aren’t being read I mean on the on the slightly updated version on page 24 every single year is down to 2010 there is just no checking of this stuff I I Echo what Michelle says this document should go to the scrutiny panel
It should have someone an officer responsible able to ask questions have a look at all the information it cost a vast amount of money to produce this and we need people to be engaged in it it shouldn’t just be something on the wall and then coming to the issues of
Homelessness we have about 1,700 empty homes in the burrow the vast majority will get reused within six months to a year but there’s hundreds and hundreds are not being reused yeah we need to be looking at this as different opportunities yeah can we improve supply
Of housing we then have the other end of things when are we’re failing when we’re evicting people the people who sometimes have mental health problems we’ve had people in this chamber um trying to talk to me and other counselors to try and get someone to help them because the
Counselor hasn’t managed to talk to them you the front door is locked so much of the time officers are unwilling or instructed not to talk to people so we do have a a lot of things we need to sort out and I think a scrutiny panel would be a great environment to actually
Get people in and actually do a proper look at this stuff if you look at things like the homeless survey yeah we found 10 people sleeping rough having blocked up all the doorways in the Town Center like deams Etc these people are sleeping further out particularly in the summer
We have two or three sleeping out in Weddington I’m sure there’s two or three sleeping on every ward in the burough and so we’re only seeing a very small number that are actually very visible and because of the dangers of being homeless a lot of them are sleeping out
In um little woods and cuses Etc and the data the data is so useful we’ve got some Diggy little graphs that are unreadable I think at the end of the appendix which is a source of data we should have some data tables so actually we get the values included so we can
Actually see the data and include all the people who didn’t respond when I queried about all this data one of the points the officers made was like by sex or by nationalities some people don’t answer well if we don’t know the don’t knows or won’t answer all Etc we don’t
Get a full picture so I I think the data tables are really important and this is such an important subject we should be having working parties on this we should be having scrutiny on this homelessness cost Society an awful lot of money and it’s many reasons yeah there’s the young
Who are chucked out their homes the people with drug problems the people with mental health problems chair can I please proper working party on homelessness because it’s a massive problem thank you chair thank you councilor Condor any points of clarification on what was said no what I would point out Council
Condor is that scrutiny is not within the control of the cabinet if scrutiny wishes to have a look at the homelessness strategy then it is by all means invited to do so if that is what it wishes to do and I am sure that councelor gby and her team will be more
Than happy to to support any inquiry that they may have but to say that um and I think it’s also important to say actually that you have alluded to some very specific individual cases and you are not privy to all of that information um and there are ongoing
Court proceedings with a number of them I don’t think you should be commenting on them without knowing the full facts behind those cases because what you may have been told is not accurate and I know certainly from myself I have been harassed at home by some of these people
And I know that counts the has as well which is completely unacceptable um and there are always two sides to a story no because no you can’t I’ve corrected something you’ve said corrected you may not councelor Condor you know councelor condore you know that any non-cabinet member speaking is at
The discretion of the chair it’s not in it’s not required councelor conort you’ve had your say I’ve had mine end of counselor goldby you know the rules by now you’ve been here long enough there is no right to reply there should be there isn’t you’ve been here long enough please learn the
Rules councelor goldby thank you chair I mean Mr Smith’s left the room but he is talking in terms of complete fantasy and conspiracy theory for sure um the the stuff that is coming out of his mouth is oh you you can’t even begin to counter it because it’s not in the Realms of
Reality quite frankly um the complaints system for anybody that wishes to make a complaint is there to be used it’s not shut down it’s not um kept out of the Realms of of people the fact is that we have people who we we house on a temporary basis who do not
Abide by the rules we’ve had uh temporary accommodation uh not only us but but certainly P3 have that has been completely trashed P3 have had to spend significant amounts of money on a certain individual who was pretty much harassing the staff they had to get injunctions against this member who uh
Who is is being harassing P3 staff the I mean I think in one instance it cost them around 50,000 to refit one of the properties that this individual was living in and and I I have a feeling that this individual is somebody who councilor kandaka might be alluding to
Um but still there are two sides to every story without a doubt and in respect to the osps um it has been pointed out that the strategy has been on the forward plan at the OSP for quite some time and if a counselor wants to bring it for in front of the committee
For review they are well within their rights to do that they can go through and submit a member’s inquiry at that point to the OSP at any time it’s been there on the forward plan so I take I take your point about the um typos it’s
Not something that I enjoy um but to say that the documents haven’t been read is is not true they go they go through various filters and sometimes you can’t see the wood for the trees because you’ve read it that many times that you just you know you you don’t spot it so
That’s something that I’ll pick up with the team um the mental health problems this was brought up at the last Council about was evicting people with mental health problems and I corrected that then that people with mental health problems get offered a lot of assistance and they don’t necessarily take it so we
Don’t just go evicting people and I believe the officers have actually clarified this with you that we don’t just go evicting people who have mental health issues we have a full support system in place should they require it and want to accept that help now again there are varying degrees of people with
Mental health problems there are some with greater capacity than others and the ones who are skimming just on the edge of having full capacity you know they are responsible for their actions it’s we have Tendencies for a reason we have to also take it into consideration particularly when you’re talking about
Closed communities and the the communities that live close together in for example blocks or um you know the the ilus the the accommodations that aren’t house uh houses that you you have to take into consideration the impact on behavior that the neighbors have because it’s not nice it’s not nice being
Terrorized in your own home and some people do do that and some of these people then claim that they’ve got mental health issues and they go through capacity checks and are found not to not to have the the mental health issues that are being claimed and are in fact
In in full capacity um um I don’t I don’t actually agree with the fact to say that officers are being instructed not to talk to anybody that is completely false that is not the case at all there are certain protective measures that have to be taken when we
Deal with certain individuals and there are certain individuals who cannot be approached because they are a risk to officers and to uh counselors that is very very serious ious and it is a last resort that we have to take but we do have to take into consideration the fact that officers
Cannot deal with everybody in the way that they wish to be dealt with and some people do get violent and it may be the people who you look at and think their eight stone went through what are they going to do but some people get very
Violent and and officers do have to deal with that so if it gets to a point where we refuse to deal with somebody there has to be a very very good reason and a lot has to be experienced before we get to that point again because we understand that these are vulnerable
People and nobody wants to turn away a vulnerable person nobody wants to have to say we can’t we can’t deal with this anymore but we do have to put in protective measures for our staff we do have to put in protective measures for people like me unfortunately you know
Because they do come after me but I won’t sit here and have you say that that they’re instructed not to talk to them because that is not the case that is absolutely not the case uh and I will leave it there important points actually before a court will grant a possession order it
Must be satisfied that a possession order is reasonable in the grounds and that it meets the legal tests there are pre what are called pre-action protocols which the judge has to be satisfied have been met um if there is a suggestion that someone may lack capacity that the
Judge can and does order capacity assessments of those people and if necessary the court can invite the official solicitor to act on their behalf or find um what is called a litigation friend someone to uh act on their behalf before the court and every single possession uh list before the
Court has a duty solicor scheme for possession work only um so if anyone’s house is at risk or rental or mortgage um then they can approach the duty solic scheme for free and they will go in and represent them but the earlier they engage with the duty solicitor the
Better they can do so before they get to court and at court itself and I know that uh the housing team will signpost people to those sources of support but it is always a last resort but if we do find that there are cases where there are say £77,000 worth of rent
Careers everyone in this chamber at budget said we wanted to see more social housing in one way or another the only way we are going to get that additional social housing is by building it and by build to build that we need the funds to
Do that and that means that we have to have the money which is owed to us coming in so that we can replenish the stock Revitalize the stock build new stock acquire New Stock and that means that there is not just a legal contract but a social contract that this Council
Has with its residents that if we are providing you as a council with a house at significantly subsidized rates we expect you to follow the rules engage with us wherever possible if you fall into trouble we will do everything we can to help but at the end of the day
There are a line of people outside our our doors wanting social housing if someone is being aggressive being violent to their neighbors why do they deserve a house over someone who has three kids who just wants a nice quiet life to bring their kids up in instead
Of being in a hotel I will put my money in my backing on that family every single time over the person who is terrorizing their neighborhood they have forfeited that right to our help and I’d make no apologies for that so we move on then to the vote all
Those in favor of the recommendations subject to the typos being addressed please show thank you that is carried that moves us on to agenda item number seven which is the bedworth physical activity Hub update councelor Markham yeah thank it is quite self-explanatory but as we know the bth physical activity Hub has
Already been approved at previous cabinet and this report is before us today to agree Reber stage 4 start early um so that the initial enabling Works can go ahead and to prepare the site for for the project to continue in the time scale required um it’s crucial that
Enabling works are undertaken on site to keep within the agreed time limits enabling Works identified being on site in early April to establish pathway construction site entrance for construction hoarding and compound setup with the ability to commence Earth moving works at the bth uh miners Ware
Park um so basically we just need this to be agreed so that it can go forward and I ask for approval as recommendations printed on page 102 thank you okay uh we have Mrs con to call down to speak to see this happening but I have severe reservations with what
I’ve been reading in this report it seems very dubious to spend £3 million on something which you haven’t got all the money for and things could be found and things we could have 3 million and spent and have absolutely nothing to show for it in fact be worse
Off because you then have to try and re of go go back on what’s actually been done it um 1 million pound contingency seems very little on a estimate of 30.6 million if you’ve watched any of the grand designed programs which have been going on for many
Years they in variably go well over budget and even when there’s 10% of contingency that gets eaten up so I think 1 million is not enough contingency um in there it seems very sad that very lots of things will go particularly the skate park it says the
Learn to ride and skate park facilities will be reviewed to take account of the overall budget and revisions to these areas may be made if quired I know from every project that’s ever happened with either of the councils with County or hit they go over budget we’ve were told with the Bermuda
Bridge thing about cycle bits oh yes that will be done if there’s money left over of course there’s no money left over and again here and the skatee part was removed we you were told us that that because we were going to have this lovely spanking new one it looks like
That is very likely not to happen and it’s just very very sad further in what does JCT mean please I couldn’t find any to explain that to sign off the formal JCT contract what’s that can anyone tell me Mrs well I hope some the lack of reply from anyone is not encouraging and
The removal of the green Corridor so for people getting there by bike and what have you and things it’s just very very sad and you know although it would be really hard to say that you have to build it on the same site it would be
Much much safer if it been decided there and then knock it down build it rebuild it we’d probably have finished rebuilding it virtually by by now so thank you appications Mrs condore I will give officers an opportunity to come in in a bit because there might be some technical aspects to
Answer no councelor Condor as non-cabinet member I’m expecting you want to speak you um one of the key things from many many years of watching Grand designs is you see the real problem is always getting out the ground you can estimate the cost of building brick walls and doing all
The all the above ground stuff fairly accurately but it’s really clear from this officer’s report that the big unknowns and the point at which we can have a price from the contractors is when they actually know what they’re building on are they building on Solid ground or are they building on
Bemon and the history of the park implies they’re probably building on something like bemon it has always been a project struggling with budget it has always been over engineered and goldplated if you look at the size of the building it is a superb Leisure Center out of all
Proportion to what we’ve had in the past in bedw and it’s good that we’re going to get a bigger Leisure Center but if it get becomes such a goal plated thing it will sink in the blamon and when we look at the officer’s report it said the cost
Of the project was initially identified is 27 A5 million we know an identical ledure Center in DOA at decade before was 26 million the estimates were never realistic and you can’t just blame all the Waring Wars and all the other issues for the price going up fundamentally this
Project’s gone the same way as a climbing wall the council depo and all these there’s been too much optimism and no one actually being that sanity check this project is something we desperately need we desperately want a new Leisure Center in bedworth and it’s going to be
So sad that we may not get one because we are blind to the risks I hope that it’s the ground is solid and I hope construction costs when we get to the tendering process are enough to be affordable but I really fear for this project because the alarm
Bells are really ringing when I I hear things like ground investigations and we haven’t yet got a a price or even a a order of magnitude with the range of prices that this may may get at the end of re stage four yeah we should be doing
Better we should be doing a a safer process and I I agree with Michelle we should really have looked at the option of building on the existing site I know we have had the pain of 18 months of not having a pool but we could guarantee to
Have a replacement then at a lower cost and built- on ground we know is relatively solid thank you chair cool anything the officers wish to come back on uh director Hollis some of those points if I can just point out on page 115 it does detail that the skate park and the
Leide cycle facilties is included in the 30.6 million um yes it does detail in paragraph 3.2 but until we’ve got the final prize we’ll have to review everything as it comes in the rebber stage th for sorry rebber stage three pricing an estimate was based on a
Frozen design of the D scope project nothing has changed since then what has changed since 2021 22 is that the price of construction inflation and everything else has increased dramatically compared to what it was prior to covid so the price the 27 million price at that time was correct
That was part of reeba and professional cost Consultants looking at the size of the bed with physical activity Hub at that time as reported to September cabinet the descope project was um redesigned and we brought that forward to planning in February to look at the the the design of the facility and
Making that slightly smaller and within a project budget set that we’ve now got for 30.6 and we are working and have been working very hard with the project management team the cost consultants and also the preferred contractor bam and the figure that they provided of the 30.6 they were comfortable with that
Time obviously Market changes and and the feeling is with the sport England consultants and other partners is that there’s not been significant changes since that estimate was whether was uh forthcoming so yes we need to wait for that final figure but U there is some comfort in that we are trying to drisk
The project as much as possible in terms of land and site investigations which is why those Works have been undertaken prior but I think until we um have that final figure and that Comfort we working with external Partners Consultants we’ve got sport England sitting there as a critical friend and they are evaluating
This project along with other projects that are being delivered across the country the do project was delivered at that price but that is several years ago and I think what people do forget is it was probably three years previously or two years previously a contract was signed for that to be delivered because
It’s an 18mon 24mth delivery of a project so a contract is signed two years prior to it was actually completed if not longer and and that 5 years ago for the do the industry was totally different for construction costs it’s far different to what we are now um so I
I think it’s a realistic time scale we’ve got to meet specific requirements for D and for sport England and that is the reason why we’re progressing at this time thank you chair I get really frustrated when we constantly get this Spectre of Doom being talked about with
This project and it’s always from the same quarters and we’ve heard it again from our from uh the speakers tonight we have worked tirelessly as a cabinet with officers across various disciplines from Finance to uh procurement to business and Regen to uh Leisure as well as and this is the critical thing external
Consultants in their fields which we don’t have the expertise for to actually try and get this right yes uh the gram Road um experience wasn’t great and in fact I remember calling that out in opposition again having the The Climbing Wall uh was a disaster but that was because it was all done
Internally at great speed with very little breathing room to actually consider these things on this and on all the other regen projects it has to be said we are always going back to First principles of what is it we want to achieve and can we afford what we want
To achieve aieve none of the projects ever have been goldplated that is categorically untrue where we can take things out uh we have done to bring the cost down it did start off at 27 and a bit million pounds it ballooned to 34 million at one point and it may be An Inconvenient
Truth and and councilor Condor said oh I’m I’m fed up of hearing about the war and Ukraine and the economy this that the other I’m sorry but it happened facts are facts you can’t get away from them interest rates have gone up to 6% when they were at
0.25% before having a massive impact on on the economy and on local authorities uh ability to uh borrow and what we can afford we have seen construction prices go up year after year as a result of um the supply chain issues because Ukraine and Russia have impacted what is a
Global supply chain we are not immune from these things so we have to keep banging on about them because it is the truth it is An Inconvenient Truth to some but it is the truth nevertheless and I actually think it is vital that we get on with this it wasn’t uh the the
Skate park was actually taken out because it was unsafe that was the report it was a danger to the public and that was a truth we could not Escape either so it was removed do we then put another temporary one in to take it out
Whilst we build the new one no we are not going to spend twice for something we only need once it comes back to count the G’s old adage of measure twice and cut once we can live without it for now as long as we get it in the future once
The whole scheme is delivered and I think the residents of bedworth and the surrounding a it’s not just bedworth that use it there are people from Whit Stone and Bingington that actually go over and and cross the border in into bed so to speak we are allowed over
There contrary to some popular belief um and I know I spent many years going over to bedworth and my grandparents in Whit Stone you’d go over that way because it was easier so we have gone through this line by line and it feels interminably long time uh going through it but I know
Myself and the finance portfolio holder and coun the Markham together with the officers we have strained every senu to get this into budget because we know how important it is to the residents of bedworth and Beyond and I’m actually proud of the work we’ve achieved if no
Even if no other party is so uh the chief exec would like to uh mention something as well thank you chair there’s just two or three points I I want to emphasize as well from an officer perspective the first one of those is the initial cost
Of 27 million for the uh uh initial scheme that was put together working very closely with sport England and their cost experts now they obviously oversee schemes of this nature up and down the country so there’s that ability there to to make sure that was of the right Quantum I think that’s very
Important to note that it wasn’t just something that we came up we were working very closely support England so at that point in time the 27 million Circa was an accurate cost um the second point to mik is that we’ve done some initial ground um inves
Ation and that is partly why we’ve the scheme has been redesigned to take account of those ground investigations and come up with a a a a center that will be able to be built on the ground conditions there so again that is forward um looking and looking
In the detail of how we construct this um the third Point um relates to why in my view it is absolutely correct that we build a new center before we decommission the old one and that is to provide our resident with a service for the longest time we
Can and not withdraw that service in an area where we know we have health issues so why would the council wish to withdraw a health and well-being Center for a prolonged period of time and deny our residents access to that and then the fourth very small point is JCT is joint construction
Tribunal which is a very wellestablished form of contract used in the construction industry thank you thank you chair uh thank you chief executive um any other Cabinet member I know Council Markham wishes to come in something that um was just said at point three um why would we knock it
Down um which would leave our residents without any facility for a couple of years I mean that just wasn’t an option the reason that we’re building it is so that there is next to it and then knocking it down after is so that there will be continuous use for our residents
Um it just wasn’t an option to knock it down first thank you chair um startling statistics and I make no apology for for banging on about it because I do it with my warshire district leader colleagues and they um I think they’re Fed Up of me banging on
About it but I’ll carry on is that of the 22 most deprived areas in warshire 17 of them are in n and bedworth and where the physical activity Hub is in bedworth it is in the epicenter of almost every single area of deprivation in bedworth when you look at the map you
You lay it over where the physical activity Hub is it is right within the epicenter of where almost every single area of deprivation is in bedworth and to take that out would be a dereliction of Duty so we have to make difficult decisions in order for the long-term
Benefit of the residents and I think that’s exactly what we’re doing here tonight I just think it’s a shame that others can’t necessarily see that so unless there’s anyone else who wishes to comment uh we’ll move to the vote on the recommendations all those in favor please show that’s carried thank you very
Much um that moves us on to agenda item number eight which is building a better burough delivery plan 2425 um I will move that as uh leader of the council it is there as on one of the agenda I find the right one yep it’s on
I think we ought to label these agender one two and three in future if we’re going to have have these um so it’s on page two of the agenda and it goes through a number of the areas but I think it’s also important to note that
This has been in place for three years now there have been some great improvements some areas where we would have liked to see more Improvement um over the years but um I think it’s fair to say that it need it will need a full wholesale review um after the election
Anyway as I think it is good practice to do in any event after period of three or 4 years um so I think it is a statement of where we are now not necessarily um the full um picture direction of travel because it does need um some review and
I’m sure the new chief executive will also like to get his hands on that um as well at some point um does that receive a second uh uh councilor crof thank you I have uh Mrs Condor wishing to speak my my main comment was really was just very disappointing then priority three
Sponsor sustainable green approach which is needed more than ever I mean we’ve seen the effects of climate change the wetest you know February ever and things that it’s a lot of those ones which are Amber rather than green and you know just not B seeming to be tackled with
The same enthusiasm as as other parts of the um strategy um on number six on the section three it does say a draft Green Space strategy produced for December 23 so I would love to have a pointer as to where I will can find that and what
Consultation is going on over it and just a bit more information on that thank you HED really good but the delivery is virtually non-existent and there’s bits like trying to collect more section 106 money which is laudable but we’ve still got so much we haven’t spent from the previous
106 money we’ve already collected uh particularly when in tournament we’ got2 200,000 to improve the foot paths whether we ever get that um done and that’s exactly the sort of thing the bill batter should be doing it should be saying we need to actually get the money we collected transformed into the
Mitigation a and yet our foot paths have been washed away by all the storms which then enhances the reason why we need to be looking at the climate change issues which are also being deleted by this Council everything goes hand in hand more housing more pressure on the foot
Paths and everything else or infrastructure and the build back better should be building the stuff we need to cope with a larger population more climate change more stresses on our system and even like little things like improve imunity lighting and enclosed space lighting that would be absolutely
Superb cleav Gardens I think had about 20 ,000 a year electricity bill just for the landlord lighting there was so many old light fittings in all those stairwells so the bill back better in terms of improving our carbon footprint and improving the lighting quality those stairwells everything actually makes
Positive feedback it is it is actually making things better to actually Revitalize and use the latest technology it will save us a lot of that 20,000 and and I say the nothing wrong in effectively with what your aims are but you’re just not delivering them and
Your budget last week which had half a million pounds of Staff savings will actually mean even less is delivered as the council becomes more dysfunctional as it has less staff thank you chair any points of clarification no I actually think there’s an awful lot being delivered in this Council since we
Took control in 2021 and I would actually challenge C coun Condor to go up to a number of the officers in in this Authority and tell them that I don’t see an awful lot being delivered cuz that’s what he just said and I think that is fundamentally and
Grossly unfair um I know a lot of officers who have worked their socks off and that’s a polite phrase um I’m sure many would come up with some more graphic phrases but they would all be equally valid um to actually deliver at break next speed a number of changes whether be
Imposed on us by legislation from central government whether it be through the Regeneration program and the and the priorities that this Administration has whether it be uh through uh looking after and and growing our economy um to the basics of making sure that those in our social housing are
Looked after and attended to and the most vulnerable protected I think there’s an awful lot going on this I think it’s a great shame that councilor Condor said what he did and I hope he would apologize uh for that he may disagree with what has been done that is
A fundamentally different issue but to say nothing has been done is categorically and demonstrably untrue and I would say as leader and on behalf of the rest of the cabinet to all of the officers from the chief exec right down to the to the to the most humble at the
Coold face thank you for everything you have done because without you we set the direction we set the budget we enable the the money to follow to the the projects we want to happen but without you as the officers none of it would be delivered and our residents would be
Much the poorer without your efforts and to say that we are making officers lives worse again is fundamentally untrue because lots of those vacancies which are in there are vacancies which have been there for a number of years and haven’t been needed or been unfilled and
We’re finding that we are a ble to do in a number of instances more with less or actually change how we work because what we did in the old days is no longer fit for the 21st century and we need to drag this Council out of the Ark and into the
Modern era and that is what we are doing some people may not like it but actually uh colleagues at least we set a legal budget not everyone could say the same so any other member wish to speak councilor gby um the staff reorganization and the removal of uh
Vacancies actually it was the assistant directors in in my team that did the the staff reorganization I I asked what they could do gave them literally a blank piece of paper and the the remit was the strategy is this the delivery is up to you how
Will you do that so for you to say that that things aren’t being delivered I again I take exception to but actually we’ve been very very engaged particularly in my portfolio very very engaged through the ads who have been actively involved in the restructure the reorganization the service reviews and
The outcomes it’s not been me sitting there telling them how they are going to do their jobs because quite frankly if I have to sit and tell someone how to do their job should they really be doing their job is is there’s a problem so I
Don’t I don’t want it to go uh into the public record that we’ve just cut loads of uh staff positions in this place because that’s not true not true at all and like you say some of the positions that we we no longer require have been
Unfilled for two years well if if a job’s not been done by someone for two years and the world still turns clearly you don’t need somebody to do that job it makes perfect sense but I won’t have you say that the um the staff aren’t doing their jobs or that they’re not
Delivering because that’s was what was being said chair and uh I just want to Spring to the defense of of certainly my my portfolio thank you okay we have the recommend recommendations as printed all those in favor please show thank you very much that’s carried
That moves us on to item nine which is the general fund budget monitoring quarter 3 councelor Croft thank you for this information to budget the other week uh but we are required to bring the outturn reports for the uh the various accounts uh and these reports bring it
To the end of quarter 3 which is the end of last calendar year and the the point I would emphasize for the general fund report which is item nine which is that while we have had issu within the year with increased recycling costs increased agency costs increased audit costs we’ve
Taken some pretty strong action on that front with the recruitment freeze with getting better investment income with getting better planning income thanks to councelor Smith and his team and we’re now forecasting a quarter of a million surplus at the end of the year which is considerably better than we did at
Budget setting February 2023 so I’ll move the report then as written Mr chairman we have Mrs condore as a public speaker thank you here because you’ve got things like saying spend pressure agency cost are also causing additional pressure on the budget and at the same time you’re saying you’ve got
Recruitment free but it it doesn’t make sense because you actually need the people doing the job so you don’t have to pay the agency so there’s a bit of discrepancy there and things and also it says like um number of planning appeals has caused a large increase in legal
Cost and then further down it says the planning fee income is in excess of the budget and is expected to remain high during the year to think surely the money that’s coming in from planning fee income should be for the planning department so that when there’s inappropriate applications which then
You reject and lead to appeals but that that’s the whole point of the planning fees to to balance balance things out there so those things seem I didn’t I raised this at the last cabinet meeting and I still I didn’t get an answer and I don’t even know who who to approach to
Get an answer and things but you’ve got this about audit fees have increased and things but the pressure of 40,000 in the budget in your budget things said that it was due to um extra questions and things from external audit because they weren’t happy with the accounts things not because audit
Fees had G gone up so there’s a bit of question mark in my head is this 40,000 a oneoff or is this 40,000 because audit fees have increased or is it because you’ve had this extra need for external audit I know you’d say you don’t answer questions here please can someone point
Me to who I do ask to actually get the answer thank you any points of clarification no any non-cabinet member uh chair um you didn’t actually put your hand up me to IND okay cond call then I put my hand up sorry the wrong order but the camera takes a while
To pan around and I just did things in the order was most appropriate um it’s a interesting set of figures these because if you look at the Top If you look at page 51 you can see your budget was 18 and a half million and you’re spending
With 19.7 million so at the sort of top line of the um um progress report you’re over spending but then if you go further down you see various things like the staff wages have gone up less than expected and you’ve got more investment income but a lot of that stuff is timing issues
As my wife said and I’m not allowed to sit next to her but she’s only just there um it’s absolutely important to understand that if we take a lot of planning income we’ve then got to spend lots of officers time dealing with those applications and the dealing with those
Applications will be in the next financial year and any appeals will be in the next financial year Etc likewise building your 20 million pound hotel or whatever hasn’t yet had much of an impact on the interest rates you pay so on these set of accounts you’re paying
Just under half a million pounds of Interest according to his paperwork but obviously that will then lead into you’re paying half 1 million one and a half million 2 million interest in the next financial year as all these projects actually then are fully paid for and of course the hotel we know is
Going to be yet another month late and another month late so which means the me income from the hotel will be late so um although it looks Rosy on paper it’s a timing issue it’s how we effectively have signed all these contracts but haven’t yet had to pay for them or taken
In all these planning applications and haven’t yet had to deal with them and the point about staff numbers if we have a few less planners if we have a few less people doing section 106 all these things delay when things happen but at someday you have to put that path into
Weddington you’ve got 200,000 for you have to look at that planning application go a planning committee may your planning appeal there is a lot hidden here which is going to come back to bite us thank you chair points of clarification to councelor condore no anything that members wish to come back on councelor
Cof for planning fees is because we have put in provision I’m sorry for planning work is because we have put in provision for the planning appeals that are that are currently taking place that is very prudent budgeting because otherwise if we hadn’t done that and say the appeals
Had not gone our way we would have been hit with a cost that is why we have put in the provision and I without going into the details of how to account for things you can’t just mush lines together in the outturns you can’t just say that’s got planning on it and that’s
Got planning on it and you can net it off uh we we we do have to disaggregate the the income from the increase in fees and the very good work that Council Smith is doing uh in terms of uh planning performance agreements and really getting the best out of out of
His Department uh so so we we have to have to account for it in on on that basis the point about um and it’s been raised again so I’ll correct it again uh the point the point to council condor’s uh comment about uh cutting cutting
Heads uh the number of uh the number of heads you have is not a kpi what we are looking at is transformation and that is getting the getting a better result out of a smaller staff base and you can do that lots of ways you do that through better
Processes you do that through making uh taking advantage of new technology what what you don’t do is you don’t just keep saying ah we’ve got the same number of staff and you keep we have that exact number of staff and to alter it is a is
A good or bad sign uh that is a very poor way to run an organization and just saying oh you you’re going to cut heads and that’s going to affect efficiency is not the way we’ll approach it we’re going to have a proper transformation program where we take vacancies we we look at
Workload we look at uh processes and get to a position where we have a smaller Council which costs less but a better Council that does a better job and that’s the whole point of the uh the transformation plan thank you je indicated some of what I was going to talk about
But C cond talked about um talked about The Upfront um transactions that we’ve taken the money in but we’re not going to deal with it till next year totally wrong totally wrong um a lot of The Upfront costs on the appeals that we’re currently going through have been aced over the last
Three four months while we’ve been employing a KC to build our cases for these three appeals so it’s quite right that we put in in that Reserve fortunately the planning department is doing excellent work at the moment and we’re well over budget in terms of income so it does offset that but you’re
Totally wrong in your assumptions um just a pick up on a few points audit fees have gone up it’s a national issue we wish it wasn’t um it’s been a headache for local authorities up and down the country of of all colors and none um and certainly um something
Sparking debate in my inboxes from the LGA and the district councilors Network and I’m sure the chief executive gets similar um missives from time to time um but it is correct that if members of the public or indeed uh members of of the council submit um persistent queries
About um little audit things here and there that has a cost it it it’s a basic fact if you ask for someone to do a piece of work which is above what is already been quoted for there will be a cost to do that and that does mean that
If there are people who do it to make life difficult for officers or try and make life difficult uh for various other people with an ulterior motive rather than actually trying to make things better and I think that does happen in a number of occasions that it is an
Ulterior motive rather than um trying to to make a benefit then that costs the council and it costs the taxpayers unfortunately um when it comes to agent spending we need to get this right that we will only put in an agency request where that vac where that position that
Job is needed we will not do that for a position which we intend to leave unfilled or is no longer necessary and I can tell EV the public Mrs Condor councelor Condor every single request for uh recruitment which is not a statutory service comes through me and cabinet
And I ultimately sign that off as leader of the council for every single request for any any uh recruitment beyond that which is a statutary service and I do check and I do Challenge and I do go back and ask the cabinet members go back to your portfolios and tell me is this
Still needed is this still relevant or is there a different way we can do things if it is needed we’ll do it if it isn’t or something can be done in a different way we go back and challenge because that that’s our job and that’s how we make savings and that’s how we
Make efficiencies by checking and challenging and overspending I think councilor Croft has said this many times over the past 12 months but I think it Bears uh repeating when we set the budget back in two for 23 24 there were things which were lumped on us literally after we’d
Approved the budget actually which we had no control over and I know that the finance director was equally um annoyed because it meant uh more work so recycling fees from uh centry city council they in they uprated their fees to us after we had set the budget that was what an excess of
£120,000 that we had to find um we had the pay award which was higher than budgeted across the country we are we are part of a national joint negotiating committee with the rest of local government and almost every single Council had budgeted for x% percentage and then the uh awarding body came in
Higher than everyone expected so that had yet again unforseen implications across all the different budgets um but we will staff in the right areas so we’ve actually increased Staffing in the budget in the antisocial Behavior team because we see the value and the priority of making sure that we defend
The interests of those who don’t have the ability to defend themselves and want the right to acquire and peaceful life and that takes time and effort and work to take through the right processes and when it comes to the hotel C contor is quite right we haven’t necessarily
Borrowed as much as we expected at this stage that’s because it’s called prudent treasury management where we don’t need to borrow at this precise moment in time we don’t do so we only borrow at the moment we actually need to borrow on the open market I’m not a financial Guru or
Accountant that’s what I quite honestly pay the finance director for um to give that advice and tell me when is the right time to borrow internally and when is the right time to borrow on the open market and if she says to me it’s better for me to borrow internally and wait a
Bit until we look on the open market then that is what I and the rest of cabinet will do um and councelor Croft has explained that at however many meetings it has been over the past three years and it hasn’t gone in probably won’t go in but we will repeat it as
Many times as is necessary and you want to come back on on that councelor craft is that we have now of course retooled our regeneration program so there would be no additional general fund uh exposure in terms of our borrowing cost so when the uh the borrowing costs start to hit you will
Also see in another line because we can’t combine it together because that’s accounting uh the offset of the income from the project ask from cabinet before we vote on the recommendations no in which case all those in favor thank you now moves us on to the HRA account budget monitoring councilor
Croft for the h which as we know is a bit of flux because this is the last uh we are currently in the last Financial year where we’re using the old business plan because of the issues we’ve discovered during this budget setting process but uh even under that uh burden
We’ve we’re projecting to come in under budget by about £140,000 at the end of this financial year so I’ll move that gby thank you uh Mrs Condor you put down to speak on this item housing revenue account sorry for the council house and hostiles income assumptions for rent are
Not being achieved now is the council house refer to the town hall here or what used to be the council house and is now eaten house things and given that we’ve got high LEL of homelessness surely what I don’t understand why those aren’t at you know
Capacity and why is the rent not being achieved I’ve put here table on page 61 but I don’t know which 61 it was have you found your point now Mrs condore is that the end of your public speaking okay I thought I thought you were looking at something in your papers
And going back to your papers sorry okay okay then any points of clarification to M clarification okay any non-cabinet member councilor condore we have all the depending it says um what number they are on the front so we can actually find things easy when there’s so many different
Depending um addendums um a couple points I wanted to make we keep referring back to the mess the last a Administration left us in without actually explaining what that is we seem to actually have a roughly balanced housing revenue account we seem to be paying off money for depreciation and
Money against Capital things so I I don’t see the housing revenue account crashing in this update and it’ be really useful like the comments we had a couple weeks ago budget where we say we’re going to end up with 300 million pound debt to actually see the graphs of
That and to see where that relates to what’s going on here because we seem to be flying level here um in terms of income and expenditure roughly and over the very long term if you wait long enough an ice cream will cost a million pounds or point a beer will cost 22
Million P so when we just throw numbers around it is very useful to know whether that’s indexed or not indexed and what decade or what century that refers to in terms of a bit more the detail it is really useful looking at appendix one which is on page 60 and 61 because there
Are various things going good and going bad um I am a worried by the assumed rents are not being achieved line um because that’s actually quite a big bit income 26.8 million or 26.4 million are we not getting our voids back into use enough yeah it’ be useful to get some
Clarity on where we’re missing uh our expected rent income and there’s a lot of good news and potentially more good news about utilities and if we start to do Greening up it does say Savings in relation to utilities as one of the things we actually benefited from and
Actually we’ve done a lot of refurbishment R Hadad and C had new roof recently we didn’t put solar panels on so while we had the scaffolding on we should be doing these sort of jobs and actually getting the revenue account in even better shape thank you
Chair no in which case it’s open to debate councelor goby clearing up a few misconceptions Council house and hostiles income we are very unlikely to be receiving a 26 million pound income of homelessness the council housing stock however will generate that income it’s Council house as in the stock not just eating house
Next door because if we’re making 26 million quid off eating house next door I am totally in the wrong line of business and I’m going to open up my own hostel tomorrow uh so that is one rather I’ve just explained that yes uh so it’s the council house and hostile
Income because it’s income from Council houses and hostels again 26 million um we don’t just throw numbers around again this is this is quite disparaging to officers who are spending an awful lot of time unpicking all of this stuff going on I mean Vicki sat there and to
Say that she’s just throwing numbers around I was very clear at the budget setting last week that the numbers that I was discussing was not anything politicized it it had come from our finance team the head of which is sat there she does not throw numbers around she provides accurate information for us
To base uh our business plans going forward and we are reviewing the business plan and the numbers that were the 300 million is over the life of the business plan which was explained last week at the end of that business plan that is what the debt position having
Paid off debt up until that point we would still be left with over a quarter of a billion pounds to pay off should we follow that business plan which is why we’re reviewing the business plan I made that very clear last week uh it was explained in detail and the assumptions
That that rent isn’t being achieved um again it’s one of those things that you keep saying that we keep banding about when we’ve done the the uh Deep dive into how we are efficient and how streamlined the services are the rent is not being collected in a timely manner
Which means that people are simply not paying their rent which is going to change because we have a new team we have a new structure and that now comes under my housing officers not the revs and Benz officers therefore this whole restructure that you say that we keep
Pointing back to the old ways which was the old ways which was the inefficient ways which was not bringing in the income that it should have been is being addressed has been changed and yeah it’s there in black and white the rents weren’t being achieved because we simply
Weren’t collecting them now we will be collecting them that line should not be in there for as long a second longer than it needs to be we will be getting on top of the the rent array and we will be clearing those off as quickly as possible and again if people don’t
Aren’t able to pay their rent we have teams that can help them with that I explained that at the last budget setting we have new customer service teams set up within housing to help people to do that again it comes under the new way of doing business not the
Old way of doing business which we inherited which I will keep pointing back to because it was inefficient and it wasn’t helpful so again another new way of doing business brought in by us and I will stand on those things and I will keep pointing that out because the
Old way of doing it led to Legacy debt led to crippling finances at the end of the business plan and we cannot stand for that so we will be changing things and it will be dealt with as we are finding them so I do take exception to
The fact so some of the terminology that is used about people banding numbers about and throwing things around when literally the head of finances sat there she does not do that and everything is based on solid finances going forward thank you chair um there are a few
Points I wanted to pick up on and these have been mentioned before but I think it’s important to actually highlight them again um is a lot of the problems that we have found with the HRA is that since 2012 when we had H self- financing and you can argue the rights or wrongs
Of HRA self- financing um it was borrowed essentially on an interest only mortgage so we’ve only effectively paid the interest off uh that was decision made back in 2012 by the by the then controlling labor Council that debt has now matured um and we are now in a position
Where we will have to rebor some of that money and interest rates com now compared to to 2012 or even compared to 3 years ago are significantly different and that means we will have to pay more on that and as I said at full Council
Before we should not be in in the future in a in a position where we haven’t paid off an Element of the capital of what we have borrowed we need to I accept on on the HRA that you can’t necessarily pay everything back in in in one term but to
Not pay anything back and just the interest is not not best practice um and it puts us at a significant disadvantage and part of what has been explained to me by the finance and the housing teams is that a lot of it was based on we would
Borrow pay it off and then rebor to pay off uh what we had and that isn’t sustainable in the long run which leads to this compounding problem when it comes to the renter is councilor gby is absolutely right that things weren’t being done as they should be a large
Part of that is down to covid that you couldn’t do that and as I mentioned earlier um in relation to the homelessness um item there is a uh rent possession protocol pre-action protocol that you have to go through uh a checklist if you like which the court will not even entertain giving a
Possession order unless you have followed certain procedures and that involves doing your due diligence with your um tenants and chasing them up and checking they’ve been all right and and sending them the requisit letters and and Chasers and offers of of of help our staff could not physically go
Out and do that in the height of the pandemic um they are now which means that we are able to get the processes rolling again but that because of the necessity of the pandemic where we couldn’t go out that meant that some processes had to stop because of of the
Nature of what we were going through but we are picking that up again uh with the aim of bringing the renters down we’ve always had renters as a Council no council is is a zero rent is show me one which is and I’ll show you a
Fantasy but we can do better we must do better because we need that money in our account as I said before so that we can actually upgrade and renovate a lot of our existing stock and buy new stock or build new stock for those who need it
And I have made it crystal clear to officers alongside the deputy leader that the rent situation now needs to be brought to heal um we can know no longer keep relying on covid we’ve been out of that for at least 2 years now let’s get back on target there were some
Legislative changes as well that were brought in about length of periods of time for serving documents Etc but we are getting on top of that and quite rightly so because the residents need and deserve that any other comments no in which case I’m move to the vote on the recommendations all
Those in favor thank you that’s carried agenda item number 11 which is the capital budget monitoring councilor Croft outturn for Capital at the end of last calendar year I won’t spend too much time on it because it’s slightly outdated now we are forecasting a substantial underspend against against
Budget last year but that is because we obviously took the opportunity to review the program and uh downsize it uh to to make it more economic to our abilities at the moment so I shall move that councelor gby thank you very much uh Mrs condore you wish to speak from the
Public thank actually three because I’ve just spotted another thing changing places where are those being placed I know the ones by bed with Market because I understood the one in the knon was going to be in the museum but you’ve canceled the museum project so I just
Wonder where that’s being done please um CCTV I mean I don’t have a problem with more being spent if it’s required to get it thing but I do have concerns is that it’s not being used to its full thing when I asked you at full Council were incidents of you know bad
Driving and things in within the Town Center that are picked up on the CCTV reported to the police or would you do that you you didn’t want to answer my question so I want to know if money more money is being spent and that’s okay but
It’s got to be act then the information on the CCTV needs to be used and used used fully and the other thing I’ve just noticed on bamir Recreation ground a change request to complete additional works for biodiversity was approved at corporate program board who is this what
Thing I’ve never heard of this board and I just wonder who who’s on it where it sits how we know what decisions they making thank you any points of clarification no any non-cabinet member Council cond call to call a 61 million pound under spend uh an opportunity to
Review things your capital budget was 88.7 million and you expect to spend 26.8 million the sheer error in your forecast of what capital programs we’re going to do is astonishing and we now have a 43 million pound cut in regeneration projects as of the budget last week and I ask a question
All the time in my head what’s happened to the project we cancelling because in here quite a few items like the Wheat Street Junction Etc the museum upgrade the the current forecast is now zero spending but we must have spent hundreds of thousands putting planning applications in design work
Both ourselves and the County Council so somewhere there must be some aborted costs you can’t spend all the money designing a museum extension putting it into planning and then not do it and that money not appear somewhere in the accounts and I understand sometimes you can’t put it in as capital because
You’ve not got anything as a result of all this money but it then must appear in the revenue account as aborted costs and the compensation to wshi County Council for the money they’ve spent on projects which you’ve pulled the funding for so there’s a massive mystery as to
Where yeah £43 million of work cancelled there must be already one or two million pounds spent maybe three or four million on those projects where are you hiding that abortive project cost or does that appear in the accounts in some future years when it actually crystallizes those projects are never happening on a
Few more things I always passionate about getting empty homes back into use it’s the biggest braining we’ve got is if we’ve got 1,700 empty homes if we can get 20 of them into use because we can loan them some money or some of this and we’ve got two lines on here empty homes
Work in default we’re not spending anything on and empty property loans these are both really good schemes and we’ve got zero expens on both and the final thing I’ll mention Mr chair uh chair is the fly tipping cameras when you first took over 3 years ago we had
Count coun Evans brag about how we had this wonderful £5,000 worth of cameras and every year it’s in the capital budget and every year it comes in and then yet again it’s been zeroed so your picture of us spending all this money on fly tipping prevention is as fake as
Your league tables as being best in the region the the the fight tip incomers a really good idea but we just keep saying we’ve got them we’re installed they’re working and then we account show they don’t exist so can we please have some real spending and some real effort in
Our Capital program and our revenue on fly tipping because we are nowhere near the best in the West Wind and we’re not the worst yeah we have some very active Enforcement Officers looking at fly tips and seeing what evidence we can pick up but we need to do better and that should
Be in the capital program and we should be getting these things working thank you chair anything in general councelor craft aware that uh this is the outturn for The Current financial year Capital program uh and that the museum project for example has been looked at for many years so some of the
Costs he is referring to are not hidden they will be prior year costs so they will not show in this program uh when it comes to uh the fly tipping camera provision I believe that’s a provision for maintenance and upkeep and for for additional cameras that we we have got
The cameras we have got them in place uh and i’ just like I’d just like to put him up some of his wording really CU he sits there with with I know I can snark for England but he does he he does deserve uh but uh it it is not an error
In the forecasting it’s a quite deliberate change to the program that we’re we’re not going to proceed with some of these elements and you cannot simultaneously sit there and say that uh and and say that oh it’s uh it’s terrible that these things are so expensive it’s terrible that these
Things won’t won’t make money it’s terrible that you you put all these in the program in the first place and then simultaneously sit there and say oh but it’s terrible that you’re not doing it it’s terrible that you’ve taken it out it’s I wanted this to happen uh or on uh
As he was implying on on the the previous uh the previous item that in the long run we’re all dead uh like like with like with mayard Kan said it’s it’s like oh it doesn’t matter that the council cripples itself with debt because it’s uh it’ll be in a few
Decades time uh it is it is prudent forward budgeting to review your uh to review your I wasn’t quoting him directly it’s a reference um it’s uh it’s prudent forward budgeting to review your programs and cut your coat according to your cloth to use councelor Wilson’s um to use Council Wilson’s
Favorite phrase and uh the corporate program board unless the officer want to correct me is H is a very standard practice of an internal Committee just to manage capital projects that’s you’ll get that at any company my company calls it the investment committee but uh uh that’s just how it works internally at
The council mentioned but the empty property team are part of of the restructure so we’ve been looking at the way the empty property team work and also the loans literally if no one’s applying for the loans we can’t give the money out so there there’s a little bit of uh
Clarification to to be done on that and and just to follow on from what council Croft is saying not that long ago Council cond condore wanted us to get loans out on all of these uh these projects that we’re now not doing so had we have listened to him at the time we
Would have debts on projects that we’ve now moved out of the program so you you can genuinely you can’t have it always it’s it’s like more depending on which day of the week it is depends on which approach you get to these capital projects so we’re M say
Now it’s counts the G’s turn please be quiet you misrepresent an awful lot of people and we don’t get the opportunity to put you right so please councel condore councelor Condor please let Council goal be finished and Mrs Condor carry on and you’ll speak no further at this meeting everyone has been everyone
Has been quiet whilst you’ve been speaking please give them the same courtesy even if you don’t like what they’re saying accurate and honest councilor condore glass house is all that councelor goby to you outside about some of the things that you’ve been saying about me in public I’ll be happy to
Correct you about some of the things that you’ve been saying that are not honest and correct about me if you’re so up on having that done I’ll be happy to do that thank you so I did answer uh Mrs Conor’s question at Council whether she liked the answer that’s a separate issue
But there was an answer nonetheless um and to answer the other point the other changing places provision in Nan will not be at the Museum has never intended to be at the Museum it will be a unit installed in the pingal um and that is all
The intricacies and my new shy are being worked out by the team uh to get that up and running uh we’ve had to secure some other sources of funding along the way to to deliver that but that is on its way the one in the Town Center is in
Mark to B the new library which is uh the subject of a planning application at the moment so I can’t comment on that too much more but I think um councelor Croft put it far more eloquently than I had about the uh various different positions that we have experienced over
The years if I’d have listen to all the advice from uh over the way in the chamber about I should borrow money for this I shouldn’t borrow money for that I should borrow it from here I should borrow it from there I would have that many personalities I wouldn’t know what
To do with myself because I’d be listening to that much conflicting advice now in this job you listen to an awful lot of advice from your own side from officers usually at least that stays the same and will stay in the same uh Direction rather than keeping on
Constantly changing and I won’t do that I will do what is right which is to look at the finances we have available and then go ahead with the projects we can afford without lumbering the residents of this burough with a massive mortgage it cannot pay off that is financially and politically insane
And we will not do that others may choose to do that but we won’t so that moves us to the recommendations as printed all those in favor please show thank you that is carried that moves on to local council tax support scheme councelor Croft thank
You Mr chair we bring it at the February budget setting meeting but we’ve held it back this year just because we need to update some of the legals and some of the policies as are set out at 4.2 in the report this is our standard annual scheme to assist people those who have
Some difficulty paying their council tax uh and the full I will just point out that the full scheme is not actually including the paperwork we do have the PDF in the electronic copy but uh it’s as as we usually bring it I’ll second that from the chair Mrs Condor you put
Down the speed wording in the scheme I haven’t seen anything come through in recent years about of How It’s actually being utilized so are the percentages that people put in and what have you and get out is it fully utilizing the scheme so that the money
That goes is put into it is actually all being utilized for people in the just give it a few moments for the public to leave