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Agenda and minutes

Venue: Exe Room, Phoenix House, Tiverton

Contact: Carole Oliphant  Member Services Officer

Link: audio recording

Items
No. Item

1.

Election of Chairman (The Chairman of the Council in the Chair)

To elect a Chairman for the 2019/2020 municipal year.

Minutes:

RESOLVED that Cllr C R Slade be elected Chairman for the municipal year 2019-2020.

 

2.

Election of Vice Chairman (00-01-32)

To elect a Vice - Chairman for the 2019/2020 municipal year.

Minutes:

RESOLVED that Cllr B Holdman (in his absence) be elected Vice-Chairman of the Committee for the municipal year 2019/20.

 

 

3.

Apologies and Substitute Members (00-02-33)

To receive any apologies for absence and notices of appointment of substitute Members (if any).

Minutes:

Apologies were received from Cllr Mrs C P Daw who was substituted by Cllr B A Moore and from Cllr B Holdman who was substituted by Cllr L J Cruwys.

4.

Declarations of Interest under the Code of Conduct

Councillors are reminded of the requirement to declare any interest, including the type of interest, and reason for that interest, either at this stage of the meeting or as soon as they become aware of that interest.

Minutes:

Cllrs Mrs I Hill and B A Moore declared personal interests with regard to Item 9 (6 Month Leisure Update) as they held Zest Cards.

5.

Public Question Time

To receive any questions relating to items on the Agenda from members of the public and replies thereto.

Note:   A maximum of 30 minutes is allowed for this item.

Minutes:

There were no members of the public present.

6.

Minutes of the Previous Meetings pdf icon PDF 74 KB

Members to consider whether to approve the Minutes of the meetings held on 15th March 2019 and 19th March 2019.

 

The committee is reminded that only those Members present at the previous meeting should vote and, in doing so, should be influenced only by seeking to ensure that the minutes are an accurate record.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Due to the new administration, the minutes of the previous meetings were noted.

 

7.

Chairmans Announcements

To receive any announcements that the Chairman may wish to make.

Minutes:

The Chairman thanked the Group for electing him as Chairman and following the recent press release with regard to food inspection congratulated the Environmental Health Team for their hard work.

8.

Grant Funded Agency

To receive a presentation and overview of the work of CHAT.

Minutes:

Alison Padfield (Manager) from CHAT (Churches Housing Action Team) gave an overview by way of presentation on the work of the organisation. She explained that the organisation had been established for 24 years, had a team of 10 staff with 20 volunteers and worked across the whole of Mid Devon.  She outlined the areas that the organisation focussed on which was primarily tenancy support, housing advice and debt and money advice. 

 

Emergency help was provided for those in need which included:

 

·         The foodbank, which was generously supported by the local community and referrals were made to the organisation from outside agencies which included Social Services, AGE UK, Citizens Advice, GP’s , the job centre and schools.

·         Hardship – mobile phones, home start up kits, travel and tents were made available

·         The Fuel Poverty Fund – £2045 had been granted

·         A warm welcome – the use of showers, clothes washing facilities and somewhere safe to be

 

She outlined the number of clients in the previous year and the general statistics available, the work of the volunteers, the fund raising that had taken place and the plans for the future.

 

Discussion took place regarding:

 

·         The grant funding supplied by the District Council

·         The impact of Universal Credit

·         The work taking place in rural areas and how Councillors could raise awareness of the organisation

·         How much the service was welcomed and the good work that it did

 

The Chairman thanked Mrs Padfield for her attendance.

9.

6 Month Leisure Update (00-26-30)

To receive a 6 month update on Leisure Services from the Leisure Manager.

Minutes:

The Leisure Manager gave the Group an update by way of a presentation highlighting the work of the Leisure Team and the number of staff (186 team members with 60 FTE) across the 3 leisure facilities at Exe Valley, Culm Valley and Lords Meadow which operated for 106 hours per week and 362 days of the year.  In the last financial year 894,329 visits had been made to the facilities.

 

She explained the partnership work and health and wellbeing initiatives taking place on both the wet and dry side of the facilities and the GP referral scheme for specific rehabilitation that was also taking place.

 

She provided photographs of each site and explained the refurbishment that had taken place and the work that was proposed for the future.

 

The Chairman thanked the Leisure Manager for her presentation and update.

 

Notes:

 

i)             Cllrs Mrs I Hill and B A Moore declared personal interests as they both held Zest Cards;

 

ii)            *Report previously circulated, copy attached to minutes.

10.

Motion 554 (Councillor R J Chesterton - 20 March 2019) (00-46-52) pdf icon PDF 96 KB

To consider the motion passed to the PDG from the Council:

 

Parish and town councils should, in reply to any street naming proposal from a developer, be allowed to recommend to this Council that a street be named after an individual, including the living.

 

Please note: Having considered the above Motion the Policy Development Group are asked to consider whether this Motion should either be supported or rejected. This decision will be referred back to Council on 24th July 2019.

 

Minutes:

At its meeting on 24 April 2019, Council had referred the following Motion to the Community Policy Development Group for its consideration.

 

Motion 554 (Councillor R J Chesterton - 20 March 2019)

 

Parish and town councils should, in reply to any street naming proposal from a developer, be allowed to recommend to this Council that a street be named after an individual, including the living.

 

The Group had before it a report* of the Group Manager for Legal Services for consideration. She outlined the contents of the report explaining the procedure in place, the guidance that was available, the possible implications of naming a street after a living person and how other Devon authorities dealt with the matter.  She highlighted in particular the guidance from Plymouth City Council.

 

Cllr Chesterton explained the reasoning behind his motion as he felt there was a desire to name streets after people who had achieved something in their lifetime and that this should be recognised whilst they were still alive.

 

Consideration was given to:

 

·         Achievements could be forgotten and naming a street after a particular person would be well received

·         The need for the local community to approve any proposal and the consultation process that took place

·         The checks and balances that would have to be in place prior to any recommendation

 

It was therefore

 

RECOMMENDED to Council that Motion 554 be supported.

 

The Policy Development Group also recommended that the following wording be placed in the Council’s procedure:

 

In exceptional circumstances should a proposal be made to name a Street after a living individual, on the grounds of them having made an outstanding contribution to the locality and/or its people, these will be permitted if both approval by the individual and unanimous agreement between the Cabinet Member with delegated authority for the service and appropriate Ward members is received.

 

(Proposed by the Chairman)

 

Note  *Report previously circulated, copy attached to minutes.

 

11.

Revenue and Outturn Report (1-01-09) pdf icon PDF 294 KB

To consider a report of the Deputy Chief Executive (S151) presenting the Revenue and Capital Outturn report for 2018-2019 presented by the Principal Accountant.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Group had before it and NOTED a *report of the Deputy Chief Executive (S151) presenting the Revenue and Capital Outturn report for 2018/19.  He outlined the contents of the report informing the meeting of the following highlights

 

·         The final monitoring report presented to the Group prior to the election had predicted an end of year deficit of £65k for the General Fund. However, the final position had improved by £84k meaning that the General Fund for 2018/19 would finish with an underspend of £19k

·         In year financial monitoring throughout 2018/19 had been very accurate.

·         It had been possible to set aside funds to Earmarked Reserves where needed.

·         The recommendation to the Cabinet to carry forward circa £12m from the 2018/19 capital programme to fund schemes in the years to come. In addition to this the recommendation to transfer to earmarked reserves £459k which had been unspent.

·         The positive position of the HRA which showed a saving of £613k and  the transfer of the same to earmarked reserves.

·         The Collection Fund and how effective the Revenues section had been in collecting Council Tax and NNDR during extremely challenging economic times

·         Market Walk and Fore Street shops in Tiverton. There had been a number of voids throughout the year but in December 2018 every unit in Market Walk had been occupied although overall rents had been lower.

 

The Principal Accountant provided detailed information of the outturn for the specific budgets under the remit of the Group highlighting the major variances within the report.

 

Consideration was given to:

 

·         The underspend on the Capital Programme and which projects had slipped and when they would be progressed

·         Funding for the Garden Village

·         Remittances received via Planning S106 agreements.

·         Whether variances could be depicted minus the additional windfalls so that a clearer picture could be identified

 

 

Note  *Report previously circulated, copy attached to minutes.

12.

Performance & Risk (1-29-24) pdf icon PDF 60 KB

To consider the Performance and Risk out turn performance against the corporate plan and local service targets for 2018/2019 presented by the Group Manager for Performance, Governance and Data Security.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Group had before it and NOTED a *report of the Group Manager for Performance, Governance and Data Security regarding the Outturn performance against the corporate plan and local service targets for 2018/2019.

 

The officer outlined the contents of the report highlighting the total refurbishment of the fitness studio at Lords Meadow, the completion of the trim trail at Amory Park, the compliance with food safety law, the announcement by Gigaclear regarding the delay in delivering superfast broadband across Devon and the digital inclusion work that had commenced.

 

Consideration was given to:

 

·         The record number of food inspections that had taken

·         With regard to scores on the doors, over 96% of food establishments were good or very good.

·         The on-going risk of cyber security

 

Note:  *Report previously circulated, copy attached to minutes.

13.

Start Time of Meetings (1-38-04)

To consider the start times of meetings for the municipal year 2019-2020

Minutes:

It was agreed that the Group would continue to meet at 2.15pm for the remainder of the municipal year.

14.

Identification of Items for the Next Meeting (1-39-00)

Note: This item is limited to 10 minutes.  There should be no discussion on the items raised.

Minutes:

There were additional items proposed to the work programme.