Agenda and minutes

7.1             Apologies for absence were received from Councillors G J Bocking, D T Foyle and M J Williams. 

8.1             The Committee’s attention was drawn to the Tewkesbury Borough Council Code of Conduct which was adopted by the Council on 26 June 2012 and took effect from 1 July 2012.

8.2             There were no declarations of interest made on this occasion.

To approve the Minutes of the meeting held on 17 April 2018.

9.1             The Minutes of the meeting held on 17 April 2018, copies of which had been circulated, were approved as a correct record and signed by the Mayor. 

1.   When the continuous alarm sounds you must evacuate the building by the nearest available fire exit. Members and visitors should proceed to the visitors’ car park at the front of the building and await further instructions (during office hours staff should proceed to their usual assembly point; outside of office hours proceed to the visitors’ car park). Please do not re-enter the building unless instructed to do so.

      In the event of a fire any person with a disability should be assisted in leaving the building.  

2.   To receive any announcements from the Chair of the Meeting and/or the Chief Executive.

10.1           The evacuation procedure, as noted on the Agenda, was advised to those present.

10.2           The Mayor thanked all those that had attended her Mayor Making ceremony on 8 May for helping to make it a memorable and enjoyable occasion. 

a)   To receive any questions, deputations or petitions submitted under Council Rule of Procedure.12.

(The deadline for public participation submissions for this meeting is 9 May 2018).

b)   To receive any petitions submitted under the Council’s Petitions Scheme.

11.1           There were no items from members of the public on this occasion. 

To receive any questions submitted under Rule of Procedure 13. Any items received will be circulated on 15 May 2018.

(Any questions must be submitted in writing to Democratic Services by, not later than, 10.00am on the working day immediately preceding the date of the meeting).

12.1           There were no Member questions on this occasion. 

To elect a Leader of the Council (who will also be the Chair of the Executive Committee) for the ensuing Municipal Year.  

13.1           Upon being proposed and seconded it was         

RESOLVED          That Councillor R A Bird be elected as Leader of the Council, and therefore Chair of the Executive Committee, for the ensuing Municipal Year. 

13.2           Councillor Bird thanked the Council for having confidence in him; he hoped that he would perform in accordance with their expectations.

To elect a Deputy Leader of the Council (who will also be the Vice-Chair of the Executive Committee) for the ensuing Municipal Year.  

14.1           Upon being proposed and seconded it was

RESOLVED          That Councillor J R Mason be elected as Deputy Leader of the Council, and therefore Vice-Chair of the Executive Committee, for the ensuing Municipal Year. 

14.2           Councillor Mason thanked the Council for his appointment and promised to fulfil the role to the best of his ability for the good of the Council and the Borough of Tewkesbury.

Any papers available prior to the meeting will be circulated to all Members.

1.      To determine the Membership of the:

• Executive Committee.
• Overview and Scrutiny Committee.
• Audit Committee.
• Planning Committee.
• Licensing Committee.
• Standards Committee.
• Ad-hoc Committees:

o   Employee Appeals Committee;

o   Employee Appointments Committee;

o   Housing Allocations and Homelessness Review Committee; and Panels and Liaison Groups as follows:

o   Gloucestershire Police and Crime Panel;

o   Shared Legal Services Joint Monitoring and Liaison Group; and

o   Shared Building Control Joint Monitoring and Liaison Group.

2.      In accordance with the Constitution, to receive a report from the Leader of the Council and take any action necessary.

3.      To determine:

a.  the Outside Bodies to which the Council should make appointments and the representation on those Bodies.

b. To delegate authority to the Borough Solicitor, in consultation with the Leader of the Council, to nominate other Members to attend a meeting of an outside body in the event that the nominated Member or their representative is unable to attend. 

4.      The Council will at this stage adjourn for a brief period to allow each Committee, as set out below, to hold a formal meeting to conduct the business set out in the enclosed Agenda: 

1.     Overview and Scrutiny Committee.                                 

2.     Audit Committee.                                                     

3.     Planning Committee.                                                

4.     Licensing Committee. 

5.    Standards Committee.     

Membership of Committees 2017/18

15.1           Upon being proposed and seconded it was

RESOLVED          That the following Committee Memberships be AGREED:

Report from the Leader of the Council

15.2           The Leader of the Council indicated that, as part of the Constitution, he was required to report at the Annual Council meeting on the number of Lead Members and the scope of their Portfolios for the coming year, the number of specialist Members and the specialist areas to be covered, and any other matters in relation to the political management of the Council.  He proposed that the number of Lead Members remain at nine with a Support Member for each; the Members to take on each Portfolio would be confirmed at the Executive Committee on 6 June 2018 as set out within the Constitution.  In respect of the Economic Development/Promotion Portfolio, he intended to remain as the Portfolio Holder with the addition of the Council Plan, External Relations and Communication, and Community Leader for Emergencies from the previously named ‘Leader of the Council’ portfolio.  He would be proposing that the remainder of the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 15.

To appoint three Members of the Council as Trustees of the Mayor of Tewkesbury’s Appeal Fund for the ensuing Municipal Year. The Trustees for 2017/18 were:

Councillors P W Awford, J R Mason and D J Waters.

The Mayor and Chief Executive are automatically Trustees and as such Councillor Hatton cannot be one of the named Trustees for this year.

NB: The Fund is officially called the Mayor of Tewkesbury’s Appeal Fund but this does of course refer to Tewkesbury Borough.   

16.1           It was proposed, seconded and

RESOLVED          That Councillors P W Awford, J R Mason and D J Waters be appointed as Trustees of the Mayor of Tewkesbury’s Appeal Fund for 2018/19.

To consider the Overview and Scrutiny Committee’s Annual Report.  

17.1           Attention was drawn to the report, circulated at Pages No. 16-39, which set out the draft Annual Overview and Scrutiny Report 2017/18.  Members were asked to consider the report.

17.2           The Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee felt that the report demonstrated the breadth of coverage provided by the Committee.  The work undertaken should give assurance to Members – and the communities they served – that the Committee more than fulfilled its Terms of Reference in ensuring that the Council was open and transparent and held accountable for its decision-making.  In terms of specific pieces of work undertaken, he indicated that the adoption of the new Economic Development and Tourism Strategy in June 2017 was the result of a dedicated Overview and Scrutiny Committee Working Group.  He believed that the value of the Committee was maximised in shaping policy and strategy and the Economic Development and Tourism Strategy was now helping to drive one of the Council’s key priority areas.  As Members would be aware, the recent review of the water supply outage was possibly the Committee’s highest profile piece of work for a number of years.  As Chair he was extremely proud of how the Committee had conducted itself during the public hearing which had lasted for several hours.  Questioning had been robust but fair and he also made reference to the willing engagement from other agencies, particularly Severn Trent Water.  Over recent years, the Committee had also reviewed its own effectiveness and the benefit of that could be seen during the hearing, especially in terms of the quality of the supplementary questions that had been asked.  In addition, the Committee received the Council Plan performance tracker on a quarterly basis and valued this as an excellent tool to monitor progress against actions.  The Committee had continually challenged the performance information and had helped to drive a proactive plan for tackling enviro-crimes, an improvement plan for Development Services and the development of a Planning Enforcement Plan.  With regard to the coming year, the Committee had been tasked by the Council to monitor the delivery of the Development Services Improvement Plan; it looked forward to receiving the report on the water outage and the summary of lessons learnt; and it would be monitoring the refreshed Council Plan which was on the Agenda for this evening’s meeting.  The Overview and Scrutiny Committee always held a mirror up to itself to ensure it continued to add value - for example, the introduction of pre-briefings prior to Committee meetings over the last couple of years had helped Members to focus on what was really important - and it had also received independent critique from an external facilitator; he provided assurance there would be more of this in the future. 

17.3           With regard to the review of the water outage, the Leader of the Council indicated that he had sat in on some of the hearing and had also been very impressed by the way the Overview and Scrutiny Committee had gone  ...  view the full minutes text for item 17.

At its meeting on 25 April 2018 the Executive Committee considered the year three refresh of the Council Plan and RECOMMENDED TO COUNCIL that the Council Plan be ADOPTED, subject to the following amendments:

·         ‘Our priorities and objectives 2016-20’ – second bullet point entitled ‘Promoting and supporting economic growth’ amend fifth point to read ‘Promoting Promote the borough as a visiting visitor attraction”;

·         ‘Our priorities and objectives 2016-20’ – third bullet point entitled ‘Growing and supporting communities’ amend second point to read ‘Achieve Maintain a five year supply of land’; 

·         ‘Why this is a priority – Finance and resources’ – first bullet point entitled ‘Seek to be financially independent of the government’s core grants’ amend point a) to read ‘Deliver the Council’s transformation programme to deliver a balanced budget’.;

·         ‘Why this is a priority – Growing and supporting communities’ – amend second bullet point heading to read ‘Achieve Maintain a five year supply of land’;

·         ‘Why this is a priority – Growing and supporting communities’ – amend point b) under the fourth bullet point to read ‘Achieve the council’s affordable homes target by working with local housing providers’;

·         ‘Why this is a priority – Growing and supporting communities’ – amend point d) in the fourth bullet point to read ‘Work to support the Severn Vale Housing Merger with its partners in accordance with the programme’ ‘Work with Severn Vale Housing Society, Bromford Housing Group and Merlin Housing Society in respect of their merger’;

·         ‘Why this is a priority – Customer focussed services’ – amend first bullet point to add ‘To continue to proactively enforce against enviro-crimes including flytipping and dog fouling in accordance with the action plan’;

·         ‘Why this is a priority – Customer focussed services’ – amend point d) under the third bullet point – to read ‘Look at Investigate digital methods to improve customer engagement’.

The amended version of the Council Plan including the above amendments is attached.

18.1           At its meeting on 25 April 2018, the Executive Committee had considered a report which detailed the year three refresh of the 2016-20 Council Plan.  The Executive Committee had recommended that the Council Plan refresh be adopted, subject to the following amendments:

·           ‘Our priorities and objectives 2016-20’ – second bullet point entitled ‘Promoting and supporting economic growth’ amend fifth point to read ‘Promoting Promote the borough as a visiting visitor attraction”;

·           ‘Our priorities and objectives 2016-20’ – third bullet point entitled ‘Growing and supporting communities’ amend second point to read ‘Achieve Maintain a five year supply of land’; 

·           ‘Why this is a priority – Finance and resources’ – first bullet point entitled ‘Seek to be financially independent of the government’s core grants’ amend point a) to read ‘Deliver the Council’s transformation programme to deliver a balanced budget’.;

·           ‘Why this is a priority – Growing and supporting communities’ – amend second bullet point heading to read ‘Achieve Maintain a five year supply of land’;

·           ‘Why this is a priority – Growing and supporting communities’ – amend point b) under the fourth bullet point to read ‘Achieve the council’s affordable homes target by working with local housing providers’;

·           ‘Why this is a priority – Growing and supporting communities’ – amend point d) in the fourth bullet point to read ‘Work to support the Severn Vale Housing Merger with its partners in accordance with the programme’ ‘Work with Severn Vale Housing Society, Bromford Housing Group and Merlin Housing Society in respect of their merger’;

·           ‘Why this is a priority – Customer focussed services’ – amend first bullet point to add ‘To continue to proactively enforce against enviro-crimes including flytipping and dog fouling in accordance with the action plan’; and,

·           ‘Why this is a priority – Customer focussed services’ – amend point d) under the third bullet point – to read ‘Look at Investigate digital methods to improve customer engagement’.

18.2           The amended version of the Council Plan had been circulated with the Agenda for the current meeting at Pages No. 40-57. 

18.3           The recommendation was proposed by the Chair of the Executive Committee and duly seconded.  With regard to the amendment to the third bullet point, a Member expressed the view that this was a significant change and he asked for an explanation of the thinking behind it.  The Chair of the Executive Committee advised that, whilst being financially independent was a general aspiration, in terms of being a commitment in the Council Plan, it was felt that this would be very difficult to achieve within the timeframe recognising the challenging circumstances of government financing. 

18.4           During the debate which ensued, a Member agreed with one of the first principles in the document under ‘Our Visions and Values 2016-20’ in relation to putting customers first; however, there was very little reference to customers throughout the remainder of the document.  He found this disappointing as he felt that there were a few occasions over  ...  view the full minutes text for item 18a

19.1           The Mayor proposed, and it was

RESOLVED          That, under Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the meeting for the following items on the grounds that they involve the likely discussion on exempt information as defined in Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act. 

To approve the separate Minutes of the meeting held on 17 April 2018.  

20.1           The separate Minutes of the meeting held on 17 April 2018, copies of which had been circulated, were approved as a correct record and signed by the Mayor.