Agenda, decisions and minutes

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the District Executive meeting held on 12th May 2016.

The minutes of the District Executive meeting held on 12^th May 2016, copes of which had been circulated, were taken as read and, having been approved as a correct record, were signed by the Chairman.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Clare Aparicio Paul, Ric Pallister and Vega Sturgess (Strategic Director).  

In accordance with the Council's current Code of Conduct (adopted July 2012), which includes all the provisions relating to Disclosable Pecuniary Interests (DPI), personal and prejudicial interests, Members are asked to declare any DPI and also any personal interests (and whether or not such personal interests are also "prejudicial") in relation to any matter on the Agenda for this meeting. A DPI is defined in The Relevant Authorities (Disclosable Pecuniary Interests) Regulations 2012 (SI 2012 No. 1464) and Appendix 3 of the Council’s Code of Conduct. A personal interest is defined in paragraph 2.8 of the Code and a prejudicial interest is defined in paragraph 2.9.

Members are reminded that they need to declare the fact that they are also a member of a County, Town or Parish Council as a Personal Interest. As a result of the change made to the Code of Conduct by this Council at its meeting on 15th May 2014, where you are also a member of Somerset County Council and/or a Town or Parish Council within South Somerset you must declare a prejudicial interest in any business on the agenda where there is a financial benefit or gain or advantage to Somerset County Council and/or a Town or Parish Council which would be at the cost or to the financial disadvantage of South Somerset District Council.  If you have a prejudicial interest you must comply with paragraphs 2.9(b) and 2.9(c) of the Code.

At the time the item was to be discussed, Councillor Peter Seib declared a personal and prejudicial interest in Agenda item 12: Increase in Councillors on Brympton Parish Council – Community Governance Review, as a member of Brympton Parish Council.  He left the room during consideration of this item.

Questions, statements or comments from members of the public are welcome at the beginning of each meeting of the Council. The total period allowed for public participation shall not exceed 15 minutes except with the consent of the Council and each individual speaker shall be restricted to a total of three minutes. Where there are a number of persons wishing to speak about the same matter, they should consider choosing one spokesperson to speak on their behalf where appropriate. If a member of the public wishes to speak they should advise the committee administrator and complete one of the public participation slips setting out their name and the matter they wish to speak about. The public will be invited to speak in the order determined by the Chairman. Answers to questions may be provided at the meeting itself or a written reply will be sent subsequently, as appropriate. Matters raised during the public question session will not be debated by the Council at that meeting.

There were no members of the public present.

Councillor Sue Steele reported that Musgrove Park Hospital had been inspected by the Care Quality Commission and received an overall rating of good.  They had been rated as outstanding for the staffing, however, there had been some issues in the A&E department. 

Councillor Sylvia Seal reported that SSDC had taken possession of the keys to the Westland Leisure Complex the previous Friday (27^th May).  She said that she had received a number of telephone calls from the public to say they were pleased that the Council had taken over the complex.

Councillor Jo Roundell Greene, as Vice-Chairman of the Appointments Committee, will update Members on the progress the Committee have made in the recruitment of a new Chief Executive Officer.

The Chairman advised that the Appointments Committee had met twice and had evaluated the recruitment agencies to be used and had selected Penna.  This agency were now finalising the advertisement which would be published the following week.  It was hoped that the selection and final interview process would take place during July and an appointment would be made at the end of July 2016.

The Performance Manager advised that the report detailed the annual summaries on Council Plan actions, the Performance Indicators and the complaints made during 2015-16.

The Chairman of the Scrutiny Committee:-

·         expressed their concerns at the number of partially completed actions for the Economic Development team and requested that they attend Scrutiny Committee to discuss the issues and as they would like to work with the team to identify any obstacles and potential solutions.

·         also requested that the Scrutiny Committee be kept updated on Council Plan action C1.12 relating to the regeneration of the former ACI site in Chard. 

·         concluded by expressing their disappointment at the lack of data available on the Contact Centre telephony system (PI 031)  and questioned how the authority would manage the technical challenge of implementing transformation.

The Chairman responded that at the current time, there was no update to the  regeneration of the former ACI site in Chard. 

The Portfolio Holder for Property and Climate Change confirmed that data had been available since December 2015 on the time taken to answer telephone calls in the Contact Centre and he questioned if the Performance Indicator should be amended as it concentrated on the number of calls resolved by the operators.   It was noted that the difference in call volume during the week was the major issue and the Contact Centre was staffed accordingly but there was no plan to increase the staffing before Transformation had been introduced.

The Interim Chief Executive clarified that the Transformation project would not affect the telephony system but would investigate why the public were phoning and divert minor reporting issues to the website or other systems. 

During discussion, it was noted that:-

·         the telephone data available would be circulated to Members.

·         SSDC consider allowing telephone messages to be taken at peak periods so that phone operators could call the customer back at a quieter time.

·         PI 030 related to local groups assisted by the Streetscene service.

At the conclusion of the debate, Members were content to note the performance information provided.

The Housing and Welfare Manager provided Members with a short power point presentation of the public responses to the consultation which had taken place and the proposed changes to the Homefinder Somerset Policy.  She thanked the Scrutiny Task and Finish group who had assisted with simplifying the consultation which had led to an increased response from the public.  She said the majority of proposed changes were small wording issues, however, 131 applicants who were currently in Gold band for under-occupancy would be re-banded into Bronze and 73 applicants in Silver band with children in flats above ground level could potentially be re-banded into Bronze.   All applicants would have the right to appeal if their banding changed.

The Chairman of the Scrutiny Committee confirmed that they were happy to assist with a Plain English version of the policy.

In response to questions from Members, the Housing and Welfare Manager confirmed:

·         If a property was not affordable long-term then the tenants may keep their Gold banding and landlords would give these tenants priority for re-homing.

·         There was an increasing elderly population in the area and some applied for housing in case of need in later life.

·         There were no proposed changes to the re-housing of ex-services personnel.

At the conclusion of the debate, the Chairman thanked the Housing and Welfare Manager and her team for their improved service.  Members were content to confirm the revised Homefinder Somerset Policy and agree that it be implemented.

(Voting: 5 in favour, 1 against, 1 abstention)

The Principal Environmental Protection Officer advised that from 9^th May a new sanction had been introduced by the Unauthorised Deposit of Waste (Fixed Penalty) Regulations 2016 to deal with fly tipping offences by fixed penalty notice.  The new legislation allowed Councils to set a figure between £150 and £400 and it was suggested that SSDC set their rate at £200, reduced to £150 if paid within 10 days.  It was proposed that the fixed penalty notices would be issued for smaller fly tipping incidences, whilst the Council would continue to pursue a prosecution for larger lorry loads of fly tipped waste.

In response to questions from Members, the Principal Environmental Protection Officer confirmed that:-

·         SSDC was not obliged to clear fly tipped waste from private land, but, officers could investigate and take enforcement action.

·         The legislation did not allow Councils to increase the penalty notice if a fine remained unpaid.

·         Outstanding fixed penalty notices would be recovered through prosecution rather than as a civil debt.

·         The average cost to SSDC to clear a small amount of fly tipped waste was £115.

·         Fly tipping was a criminal offence.

·         It would not be possible to increase the fine for a second offence, however, officers would look at the public interest test and may deal with a second offence by prosecution rather than issue a fixed penalty notice.

During discussion, some Members felt that £200 was not a sufficient deterrent and it was proposed that the fixed penalty notice be set at £250, reduced to £150 if paid within 10 days.  This proposal was seconded and when put to the vote, was carried (voting: 5 in favour, 1 against, 1 abstention).

(Voting: 5 in favour, 1 against, 1 abstention)

The Assistant Director (Communities) advised that the existing partnership model had been revised and simplified to allow partners to work quickly on big issues.  If an issue was important then each organisation would put funding towards resolving it.  The partnership would be chaired on a rotation basis in future.

The Interim Chief Executive said the principle was now of an equal partnership and if partners valued a project then they would contribute towards it.  Some funding had been retained to continue the Assembly meetings and provide ad-hoc admin support to them. 

During a brief discussion, Members were supportive of the new simplified governance arrangements and requested that a report be presented in six months time to assess progress. It was also noted that it would be useful to update Members on the Yeovil One Group, the Health and Well-Being Board and the Key for Life project. 

At the conclusion of the debate, Members were content to note the achievements of the South Somerset Together Partnership and their new, simplified governance arrangements.

The Third Sector and Partnership Co-ordinator advised that the grants made by the Area Committees were higher than previous years due to several large projects applying for funding.  Some of the projects had been delivered under budget and so did not claim the full amount awarded by SSDC.

In response to questions from Members, the Assistant Director (Communities) confirmed that:-

·         Small grants of pump priming funding was often all that play activities and youth projects needed to start.

·         A report had been presented to Scrutiny Committee the previous year on the standard assessment criteria used by the Area Committees.

During discussion Members highlighted the importance of encouraging organisations to be self-sufficient and providing a sinking fund to replace equipment.  It was also mentioned that SSDC should publicise the benefit to the community when external funding was attracted to a project in addition to Parish and SSDC funding.

At the conclusion of the debate, Members were content to note the report.

(Councillor Peter Seib declared a personal and prejudicial interest in this item, as a member of Brympton Parish Council. He left the room during the discussion).

The Democratic Services Manager briefly outlined the discussions which had taken place with Brympton Parish Council following receipt of their request to increase the number of Parish Councillors by one. 

There was no debate and Members were content to note that the report would be presented to Full Council for confirmation. 

Members were content to note the monthly news snapshot information.

There were no amendments to the Executive Forward Plan.

Members noted that the next scheduled meeting of the District Executive would take place on Thursday, 7^th July 2016 in the Council Chamber, Council Offices, Brympton Way, Yeovil commencing at 9.30 a.m.