Agenda and minutes

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the previous meeting held on 2 June 2020. The draft minutes can be viewed at: http://modgov.southsomerset.gov.uk/ieListMeetings.aspx?CId=141&Year=0

The minutes of the meeting held on 2 June 2020 were approved as a correct record and would be signed by the Chairman.

An apology for absence was received from Councillor Robin Pailthorpe.

In accordance with the Council's current Code of Conduct (as amended 26 February 2015), 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.

There were no declarations of interest.

A member of the public addressed members regarding his concerns about a particular planning application which was awaiting determination - a large building in Kingstone parish for the construction of carnival floats. He raised a number of points, some of which included:

·         That Scrutiny Committee should have a role in planning applications.

·         He felt that the public had not been adequately consulted about the application and the applicant had not engaged with the local community.

·         He was of the opinion that some councillors had already expressed their support for the application.

·         The application should have an Environmental Impact Assessment.

·         Multiple concerns about the planning process.

The Chairman explained that members had noted the concerns raised, however, the Scrutiny were not in a position to comment or provide a response about a planning application. The Scrutiny Committee would forward the comments and concerns to the appropriate officers in the Development Management Team and also to members of the Area West Committee.

This is an opportunity for Members to question the progress on issues arising from previous meetings.  However, this does not allow for the re-opening of a debate on any item not forming part of this agenda.

There were no issues raised from previous meetings.

The Chairman made several announcements including:

·         He and the Vice-Chairman had recently had a meeting with the Leader to discuss the role of Scrutiny, and were due to have a follow up meeting in the near future.

·         A reminder of a member briefing about the SCC One Somerset Business Case taking place on 13 July.

·         There would be an extra meeting of Scrutiny members on 14 July to discuss the SCC One Somerset Business case – likely to be informal meeting due to timeframes.

·         A reminder about training webinars being hosted by the Centre for Public Scrutiny.

·         A welcome to Stephanie Gold who would be the new Specialist (Members) from 1^st July 2020, and hence be supporting the Scrutiny Committee. He wished to convey thanks and best wishes, on behalf of the committee, to Jo Gale who had moved to a new role within SSDC.

The Chairman reminded members that most questions had been answered at the Scrutiny Committee hence there were no updates to report.

Members considered the reports within the District Executive agenda for 2 July 2020 and raised comments as detailed below. Responses to most questions and comments were provided at Scrutiny Committee by the relevant officers – except those marked by an asterisk:

SSDC Covid-19 Recovery Strategy (Agenda Item 6)

·         Members welcomed the positivity about going forward with the recovery phase. However, some members felt the report did not clearly reference what would happen should there be a need to go back to the response phase if there was a spike in Covid cases locally.

·         Page 17 – Some members sought reassurance that Environment would not only feature as a key area of recovery, but would also feed in to the other four key areas, in line with the Environment Strategy.

·         Are there plans to learn from other districts about recovery ideas and options?

·         The report refers to the Recovery Advisory Group (RAG) having member involvement but does not detail the membership – it was felt that more detail was required.

·         Members queried how the monitoring of progress would be reported and the frequency of such reporting? Scrutiny recommend that there is quarterly detailed reporting, with possibly more frequent snapshots / thumbnails of progress in between. A request was made that Scrutiny Committee are provided with an opportunity to make suggestions for the performance monitoring dashboard.

·         It was felt that there should be some member involvement with the Recovery Co-ordination Group (RCG) – and perhaps at least a Portfolio Holder who is on the Recovery Advisory Group (RAG).

·         Some members noted that job losses may mean recovery takes longer. What is being done to prioritise economy as there may be different opinions about priorities. What will be the emphasis area of recovery?

·         Page 23 – Role of RAG – some members noted the role seemed to include some of the Scrutiny function. How will the Scrutiny Committee be involved? It was noted that the Scrutiny Committee were keen to be involved and help, and as all other Task and Finish Groups were currently suspended, there is potentially capacity for members to be involved with a Task and Finish type workshop.

SSDC Priority Project – Accelerating Housing Delivery Report (Agenda Item 7)

·         *Some members noted that the Action Plan in the Three Dragons report an Options Report being written based on priority options – has the report been written yet, if not, was there an indication when it may come forward?

·         *Will this District Executive report be circulated to the Area Committees for consideration and comment?

·         *The recommendations of the report on page 34 – members noted that £350k was being requested in total. Members queried what the cost had been for the Three Dragons report and what the brief had been. How had the report come about and the need for such a report agreed?

·         *It was opportunity to look at the way things are done in South Somerset. Was there an option to give a timeframe by which to be developed  ...  view the full minutes text for item 139.

There were no updates on matters of interest.

The Chairman noted it was hoped some work would resume soon regarding the Task and Finish Group project plan.

Regarding the Council Tax Support Task and Finish Group, the Vice-Chairman  queried if there was a timescale for the work if there was a need to go out to public consultation. The Specialist (Members) clarified that there was a need to establish what could feasibly be done in the timeframes available. There was also a need to consider the economic impact and changes in circumstances due to Covid.

One councillor noted she had been contacted about activities at a local community facility as there had been some confusion relating to the Covid restrictions. She asked about the process for signposting such queries, as she felt there needed to be some clarity about who to contact locally. In response, the Specialist (Members), acknowledged there was no clear mechanism for such queries but she would investigate who could best help with the query and ask them to contact the group directly to offer some advice.

The Specialist (Members) commented that during consideration of the District Executive reports that there had been several references to Communities of Practice (COP). She acknowledged that perhaps the wider committee may not have a full understanding of the purpose and function of COPs, and noted the new Specialist (Members) would look more in depth at how they work and perhaps discuss with the lead officers about them coming to Committee to explain the role of COPs. In response, the new Specialist (Members) advised that she would circulate the Terms of Reference for each COP to members for information.

Members were content to note the Scrutiny Work Programme.

Members noted that the next meeting of Scrutiny Committee was scheduled for Tuesday 4 August 2020, as a virtual meeting via Zoom.