Agenda and minutes

59.1          In the absence of the Mayor and Deputy Mayor, nominations were invited for the chair of the meeting.

59.2          It was proposed, seconded and 

                 RESOLVED           That Councillor J W Murphy be elected as Chair for the ensuing                              meeting.

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

60.1          The Chair advised that the meeting was being held under the emergency provisions of the Coronavirus Act 2020 and, specifically, The Local Authorities and Police and Crime Panels (Coronavirus) (Flexibility of Local Authority and Police and Crime Panel Meetings) (England and Wales) Regulations 2020. The meeting was being broadcast live via the internet, it was not being recorded by the Council but, under the usual transparency rules, it may be being recorded by others.

61.1          Apologies for absence were received from Councillors G F Blackwell (Mayor), P W Ockelton, A S Reece (Deputy Mayor) and C Softley.  

62.1          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.

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

To approve the Minutes of the meeting held on 26 January 2021.

63.1          The Minutes of the meeting held on 26 January 2021, copies of which had been circulated, were approved as a correct record.  

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 17 February 2021).

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

64.1          There were no items from members of the public.  

To receive any questions submitted under Rule of Procedure 13. Any items received will be circulated on 22 February 2021.

(Any questions must be submitted in writing to Democratic Services by, not later than, 10.00am on 15 February 2021).

65.1          The following question was received from Councillor Munro to the Lead Member for Built Environment.  The answer was given by the Lead Member for Built Environment, Councillor Gore, but was taken as read without discussion.

At full Council in January 2020, the Head of Development Services confirmed that a review of the Statement of Community Involvement and Planning Scheme of Delegation would be included in the Development Services service plan for 2020/21. It is completely understood that this was delayed due to COVID. It is now understood that the intention is for the seminar for Members to contribute to the review of the Statement of Community Involvement to go ahead in 2021.

Question:

Please can the date for this seminar be advised. It is further understood that the review of the Scheme of Delegation is due in December 2021, please can this be confirmed and if this includes the Member seminar in December 2021.

Answer:

The intention is to review the Statement of Community Involvement after work has been finalised on the review of the Local Plan. At this moment in time, it is not possible to provide a date as to when a Member seminar will be held.  

With regard to the review of the Scheme of Delegation this is not currently scheduled to be reviewed.   

65.2          The Chair invited the Member to ask a supplementary question. The Member asked the following and the Lead Member advised that a written response would be provided outside of the meeting:

Is the review of the Statement of Community Involvement delayed due to a lack of staffing, what is the link to the Local Plan and who agreed to shelve the review of the Scheme of Delegation when both had been agreed at Council 13 months ago.

To recommend the appointment of Civic Heads for the Municipal Year 2021/22.  

The decision was taken by Council in February 2020 to elect Councillor Andrew Reece as Mayor for 2020/21; however, in accordance with the Local Authorities and Police and Crime Panels (Coronavirus) (Flexibility of Local Authority and Police and Crime Panel Meetings) (England and Wales) Regulations 2020 the Council did not make new appointments for 2020/21 with the previous arrangements remaining in place which now expire in May 2021. The Council is therefore now asked to confirm that Councillor Andrew Reece take office as Mayor for the Municipal Year 2021/22.

66.1          Upon being proposed and seconded, it was

                 RESOLVED           That Councillor Andrew Reece, be appointed Mayor for the                         ensuing Municipal Year.

The decision was taken by Council in February 2020 to elect Councillor John Murphy as Deputy Mayor for 2020/21; however, in accordance with the Local Authorities and Police and Crime Panels (Coronavirus) (Flexibility of Local Authority and Police and Crime Panel Meetings) (England and Wales) Regulations 2020 the Council did not make new appointments for 2020/21 with the previous arrangements remaining in place which now expire in May 2021.  The Council is therefore now asked to confirm that Councillor John Murphy take office as Deputy Mayor for the Municipal Year 2021/22.

66.2          Upon being proposed and seconded, it was

                 RESOLVED           That Councillor John Murphy be appointed as Deputy                                            Mayor for the ensuing Municipal Year. 

At its meeting on 3 February 2021 the Executive Committee considered the 2021/22 budget and RECOMMENDED TO COUNCIL:

1.     That a new budget of £9,270,575 be APPROVED.

2.     That a Band D Council Tax of £129.36, an increase of £5.00 per annum, be       APPROVED.  

3.     That the use of uncommitted reserves totalling £431,108 to support the base budget       be APPROVED.

4.     That the inclusion of growth items within the budget for 2021/22 be APPROVED as    proposed in Appendix A to the report.

5.     That the capital programme be APPROVED as proposed in Appendix B to the report.

(If a Councillor intends to move a Motion or Amendment in relation to the Council’s annual budget, the text of the proposed Motion or Amendment must be submitted in writing to the Borough Solicitor by 9.00am on the working day preceding the day of the Council meeting).

67.1          At its meeting on 3 February 2021 the Executive Committee considered the 2021/22 budget and made a recommendation to Council.  

67.2          The report which was considered by the Executive Committee had been circulated with the Agenda for the current meeting at Pages No. 14-32.

67.3          In proposing the recommendation, the Chair of the Executive Committee explained that the budget was the result of a lot of hard work by Members and Officers and he paid tribute to the Head of Finance and Asset Management and his team for their outstanding work in creating a balanced budget at a very difficult time and in exceptional circumstances. The Lead Member for Finance and Asset Management seconded the recommendation from the Executive Committee and reiterated his thanks to the Head of Finance and Asset Management for the work he had put into ensuring the Council had a balanced budget that it considered acceptable.

67.4          Members were advised that, in accordance with the Council Rules of Procedure, an amendment to the budget had been received in advance of the meeting, which had been circulated separately prior to the meeting with the comments of the Section 151 Officer, and the proposer of the amendment was invited to introduce it. The Member advised that he would also like to thank Officers for the hard work that had gone into the budget process and for answering the various questions which he and others had posed in order to have a full understanding of the budget. He noted that £431,000 was being taken from the Council’s reserves to ensure a balanced budget was achieved and that the Section 151 Officer was satisfied that the projected level of reserves was adequate for 2021/22 and that £97,500 expected salary savings had been included. However, it was also noted that the report did not identify how the budget was broken down by service line which was the reason for the first two points of the amendment. He thanked the Section 151 Officer for his response to those points in confirming the savings identified for 2021/22 and that no further savings could reasonably be included as plans had not progressed sufficiently over the previous 10 months to give assurance that potential savings were deliverable, did not have a significant service disbenefit and had been subject to sufficient consultation. In addition, he thanked the Section 151 Officer for his commitment that a link to the budget book – which showed a line by line detailed analysis of the budget - would be circulated to all Members when the 2021/22 issue was complete, as well as undertaking to include an additional appendix in future budget reports which would provide a breakdown of the service area and budgets that were contained in the main body of the report. The proposer drew particular attention to the proposed amendment to remove £10,000 for the IT Auditor and £50,000 from the investment top-up fund and to add £10,000 for green initiatives; £10,000 for initiatives to reduce flytipping  ...  view the full minutes text for item 67a

At its meeting on 3 February 2021 the Executive Committee considered the Interim Housing Strategy and RECOMMENDED TO COUNCIL that it be APPROVED.

(Please note an amended version of the Strategy addressing typographical and consistency errors is attached).

67.17        At its meeting on 3 February 2021 the Executive Committee considered the Interim Housing Strategy and recommended to Council that it be approved.  

67.18        The report which was considered by the Executive Committee had been circulated with the Agenda for the current meeting at Pages No. 33-35. The strategy had been amended following the Executive Committee meeting to address typographical and consistency errors and the amended version was attached to the report at Pages No. 36-115.

67.19        The Chair of the Executive Committee proposed the Committee’s recommendation and it was seconded.

67.20        A Member expressed her thanks to the Officers for updating the document and for their hard work on the strategy – particularly with the difficult issue of rural affordable housing. She was pleased that the housing team was making inroads to collecting the data required to provide rural affordable housing across the areas of the Borough where it was most needed. Another Member referred to Page No. 44 and queried why information from 2008/09 to 2014/15 was included in respect of the number of private sector rents – she questioned whether there was any more up to date information that could be referenced or whether the information should just be removed. In response, the Acting Housing Services Manager explained that the information was a useful addition to the strategy so he would look to bring the data up to date when it was available rather than removing the paragraph completely. The Borough Solicitor confirmed that this amendment could be delegated to the Chief Executive, in consultation with the Lead Member, to make once the data was available.

67.21        During a brief discussion which ensued about affordable housing, the Acting Housing Services Manager confirmed that the allocation for the commitment of 40% affordable housing was made in the Joint Core Strategy and was not something that was driven by the Housing Strategy. The Joint Core Strategy was currently being reviewed and that review would inform the Housing Strategy in the future.

67.22        Upon being proposed and seconded, it was

                 RESOLVED           1. That the Interim Housing Strategybe APPROVED.

2. That authority be delegated to the Chief Executive, in                             consultation with the Lead Member, to amend the document     with the updated information for increases in private and          social housing rents (last Paragraph of 2.1 of the Strategy)       once it was available.

The Council is asked to formally set the Council Tax for 2021/22.

(A report will be circulated prior to the meeting).  

68.1          Having agreed the Council’s 2021/22 budget earlier in the meeting, attention was drawn to a report, circulated separately, which asked Members to approve and set a Council Tax requirement for 2021/22.

68.2          The Lead Member for Finance and Asset Management explained that as the billing authority, Tewkesbury Borough Council must formally approve the Council Tax for the forthcoming year including the Council Tax levels set by the County Council, the office of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Gloucestershire and the Town and Parish Councils in the Borough. The overall position was summarised in the table at Paragraph 3.1 of the covering report with further detail provided in the appendices. For 2021/22 the average Band D Council Tax within the Borough would be £1,871.99 per year which was an increase of £84.36 or 4.72%. He felt it was interesting to note that, although the Borough Council had needed to increase its Council Tax level by the maximum permissible in order to balance the budget, other bodies which formed the overall Council Tax had not increased by the maximum permissible and yet, in percentage terms, Tewkesbury Borough’s rise was still the smallest increase and its share of the overall Council Tax bill had fallen to 6.9%.

68.3          The recommendation was proposed and seconded and, in accordance with the Local Authorities (Standing Orders) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2014, voting was recorded as follows:

68.4          Accordingly, it was

                 RESOLVED      1.  That it be NOTED that, on 1 December 2020, the Council                                calculated:

a)     the Council Tax Base 2021/22 for the whole Council area as£35,403.02 (Item T in the formula in section 31B of the Local Government Finance Act 1992, as amended (the "Act")) and,

b)     for dwellings in those parts of its area to which a Parish precept relates as attached to the report at Appendix C.

2. That the Council Tax requirement calculated for the Council's own purposes for 2021/22 (excluding Parish precepts) is £4,579,735.

3. That the following amounts be calculated for the year 2021/22 in accordance with Sections 30 to 36 of the Act:

a. £56,036,083 being the aggregate of the amounts which the Council estimates for the items set out in Section 31A(2) of the Act taking into account all precepts issued to it by Parish Councils;

b. £49,214,446 being the aggregate  ...  view the full minutes text for item 68.

The Chairman will move the adoption of the following resolution:

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

69.1          The Chair 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 of                                 exempt information as defined in Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the                              Act.

To approve the separate Minutes of the meeting held on 26 January 2021.

70.1          The separate Minutes of the meeting held on 26 January 2021, copies of which had been circulated, were approved as a correct record.