Agenda item

Members considered the reports contained in the District Executive Agenda for 5 January 2017 and made the following comments:

Report from Yeovil District Hospital NHS Foundation Trust (Agenda item 6)

·         Members noted this report.

Direct Hostel Provision, Move on Accommodation and Support (Agenda item 7)

·         Scrutiny members were grateful to the Corporate Strategic Housing Manager for attending the meeting at short notice to answer members questions.

·         Members sought assurance that multi-agency solutions to addressing homelessness are being sought where appropriate and that effective monitoring arrangements are being put in place to ensure that long term solutions are being provided to our most vulnerable residents?

·         Members noted that £160k would be added to the MTFP for the next 2 financial years whilst the impact of recent legislative changes are assessed.

·         Scrutiny Committee were keen that the scheme is effectively measured in terms of outcomes achieved particularly in the longer term and suggested collecting data with regards to the issues that have been experienced accessing mental Health Services.

Council Tax Support Scheme for 2017/18 (Agenda item 8)

·         Members supported the recommendations and specifically made reference to supporting the current 15% minimum payment being retained whilst the impact of the roll out of Universal Credit is assessed.

Strategic Commercial Land and Property Project (Agenda item 9)

·         Members supported the principles of becoming more commercially minded to support SSDC’s ambition to generate further income streams to support our corporate priorities. The committee noted that it will be important to ensure governance arrangements do not unnecessarily hinder a more commercial approach but would like to reiterate the importance of accountability and transparency when dealing with public funds.

·         Members welcomed the potential for SSDC to develop the in-house capacity so that in the future we will be better placed to put suitable regeneration schemes together ourselves and sought assurance that the money being spent at this stage would lead to knowledge being retained within the organisation over the longer term.

·         Members sought clarification as to what the decision making process will be for the final strategy and assumed that it will need to be a Full Council decision?

·         The importance of looking at other authorities comparable to SSDC was stressed as part of the Strategy development process.

Policy for Awarding Private Sector Housing Grants/Loans and other Financial Assistance (Agenda item 10)

·         Scrutiny supported this approach to maximising available funding streams to provide DFGs. They asked for clarification that any monies paid into funds such as the Joint Community Equipment Service would be solely for the benefit of SSDC residents and wouldn’t be spent elsewhere in the county?

·         In light of the issues currently facing local authority financing and the importance of needing to retain an element of flexibility, members questioned the prudence of allocating specific levels of funding within the policy and suggested that robust  monitoring would be needed to ensure that resources were allocated to where they are most needed.

Medium Term Financial Plan and Capital programme Update 2017/18 (Agenda item 11)

·         Members thanked members of the Finance Team for the informative training session held prior to the consideration of this item.

·         The Committee noted that a fundamental role of scrutinising the budget is to assess whether resources are being allocated to support the delivery of the Council’s priorities. Currently, we do not have an updated Council Plan which in turn means that Capital bids cannot be assessed, thus leading to an MTFP that is not as complete as it has been in previous years. We were pleased to note that the Leader stated that the updated Action Plan would be available for comment before budget papers are considered at Full Council in February.

·         The committee noted that the Car Parking ANPR project will not now go ahead leading to a loss in anticipated income.

·         Members questioned the profiling of the savings attributed to the Transformation Programme and sought reassurance that the programme is on track to deliver the anticipated level of savings.

·         The Chief Executive Officer explained that delivering a successful Transformation Programme would be an inevitable draw on organisational capacity. Transformation will need to be a priority and this will mean there are some things that we can no longer do and that members would be consulted as soon as possible about indicative priorities.

·         The Committee were reminded of the need to conduct appropriate consultation on proposed changes as well carrying out Equality Impact Assessments.

·         The Committee questioned the Unavoidable Budget pressure of removing the Intern Levy and whether this meant we were ceasing the Intern programme. Members were pleased to note as part of transformation the intention is to increase the number of Interns.

·         Members questioned if there was a chance that the capital costs for Transformation could increase as we have not yet procured the software and hardware.

·         The Assistant Director (Finance and Corporate Services) confirmed that only £1.3 million of the £2million originally allocated had been used and therefore the £.7million could be utilised for any increase in projected costs and that reserves were also in place.

·         Cllr Ric Pallister – Transformation Sponsor assured scrutiny members that changes to forward plans and budgets that result/materialise after the budget that they will come forward to Scrutiny and District Executive.

South Somerset Economic Development Monitoring Report (Agenda item 12)

Members thanked the Principal Spatial Planner and his team for all their hard work in bringing forward this report and wished Paul well for his future role.

·         Members noted that going forward it would seem more appropriate to slightly shift the focus of reporting to the additional employment floor space provided as opposed to land used as this would be a more realistic measure. Simply looking at the land target a little too simplistic and would we be better taking a more holistic approach to measures we can introduce to stimulate the economy?

·         Scrutiny Committee noted the obvious link between this work and the emerging Economic Development Strategy and asked that Scrutiny, as has been the case previously, would be involved in the development of the policy.

·         Members supported the suggestion that SSDC start on the Local Plan refresh process sooner rather than later – now would seem a perfect time to start planning in workshops as we have 11 years of data to make more informed policy decisions and to ensure resources are more accurately directed going forward.

·         Scrutiny Members supported the approach of consulting with businesses to build up an accurate local picture and SSDC maintaining an active role in the multi-agency discussions about the future of the A303 and the A358.

CONFIDENTIAL – Exclusion of the Press and Public

In accordance with Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act 1972 (as amended), the Committee resolved that the press and public be excluded from the following items in view of the likely disclosure of exempt information as described in Paragraph 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A to the Act, i.e. “Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information).

Disposal of the Former Stables at Churchfield, Wincanton (Confidential) (Agenda item 16)

Members supported the recommendations contained in the report.