Agenda item

Members considered the reports within the District Executive agenda for 4 June 2020 and raised comments as detailed below. Responses to most questions and comments were provided at Scrutiny Committee by the relevant officers or Portfolio Holders, except those marked by an asterisk.

Impact of Covid-19 on the Council (Agenda item 6)

·         Para 28 – precept payments – is there any risk that some parishes may not receive the second tranche of payments?

·         Paras 53 to 55 – when was Scrutiny Committee likely to have sight of the new or revised plans and strategies referred to in paragraphs 53 to 55?

·         There are several acronyms throughout the report which may not be known to the public.e.g. DFG and DHCLG.

·         Could there be some clarity about the figures for homelessness, rough sleeping and temporary accommodation as believe the figures reported previously had been much lower.

·         After District Executive could the report be sent to the two local MPs as feel it is important that they are aware of the impact of Covid-19 on the district council?

·         Feel there should be some form of risk profile or matrix available with the report.

·         Para 35 – there is reference to inter-authority borrowing, will that still be be an option in the future, and if it’s reduced what impact could there be on our plans and aspirations.?

Digital Strategy (Agenda item 7)

·         Some members had concerns regarding security and resilience about any future system and where the information would be stored. What jurisdiction and liability would SSDC have if moving to cloud storage, and who would be liable for any breach of information?

·         Some members noted there did not appear to be any measurable timeframes or dates within the strategy document

·         Members noted that around section 7 there was some duplication of numbering.

·         Diagram 10.3 – s

·         Regarding the proposed governance, some members queried who would decide on priorities – the Executive or the Change Board?

·         Some members noted that much of the strategy was dependent on broadband availability and supply, which they noted could be variable in rural areas.

·         Will there be a lessons learned report following closure of the Transformation Programme?

·         Page 75-76 refers to working with partners and integrating with others – how will this feed into the FOLGIS (Future of Local Government in Somerset) work?

South Somerset Families Programme – supporting struggling families, improving life chances for children and young people (Agenda item 8)

·         *A member noted when the original Trouble Families Programme ran it was supported with staff volunteers from SSDC - would we be looking to do that again? If the programme was successful, would we look to extend the programme beyond 3 years?

Planning Validation Guide (Agenda item 9)

·         The Chairman noted that many members, including those of Scrutiny Committee, had attended a workshop the previous week with the Lead Specialist (Planning) which had included a briefing about the draft Planning Validation Guide and Planning Enforcement Protocol – and some feedback had already been provided at that workshop.

·         *A member noted at the workshop a number of comments had been made about retrospective planning, and he had understood that a paragraph would be added about retrospective planning, however he could not see that anything had been included in the proposed document.

Planning Enforcement Protocol (Agenda item 10)

·         No comments.

Investment Assets Update Report (agenda item 11)

·         Members acknowledged the difficult current situation and pandemic restrictions – was there any indication when the contractor may return to the Marlborough development.

·         The risk matrix in the report is difficult to interpret. Many members thought a new format of risk matrix was going to be used for all council reports.

·         Para 28 – is there any indication if the Travelodge investment would be delivered on time given the Covid-19 situation?

·         Given the Environment Strategy, are there plans to do more schemes like the battery storage project?

·         Para 19 – in future reports, for transparency, could there be an additional paragraph about BESS?

District Executive Forward Plan (Agenda item 12)

·         No comments.