Agenda, decisions and minutes

To receive any apologies for absence and declarations of interest.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillor Pavitt.

Councillor Caton declared a non-pecuniary interest relating to agenda item 10 as a trustee of Support For Sight, who were in receipt of a grant from the Council.

Councillor Coote declared a pecuniary interest relating to agenda item 8 as his employer, Bell Day Nursery CIC, hires four of the leisure centre rooms all year round.

To consider the minutes of the meeting held on 1 December 2022.

Councillor Caton said that there were issues within the minutes and that although the statements were minuted correctly they were controversial and that he would pursue them outside of the meeting.

The Chair asked if Members believed that the minutes were a true record.

The minutes of the meeting on 1 December 2022 were approved as a correct record.

To receive questions or statements from non-executive members on matters included on the agenda.

There were no questions or statements from Non-Executive Members of the Council.

Councillor Gregory provided a report on the recent meeting he had attended under the new arrangements of the Director of Planning, Interim Local Plans and New Communities Manager and Chair of the Local Plan Leadership Group, the summary note from which had just been circulated.

He said that he was grateful to the Interim Local Plans and New Communities Manager in particular for the level of detail provided, the attention taken to highlight areas of concern and that he had been reassured and deeply heartened by the meeting.

Councillor Caton thanked Gregory for including opposition leaders in his circulation of the summary note and reminded him that he had agreed to circulate it to the whole of the Local Plan Leadership Group.

Councillor Gregory apologised for forgetting and resolved to circulate the summary note as agreed.

Councillor Evans said that the Director of Planning had already prepared a draft report to go to the third tiers which would contain a lot of information of use to Parish Councils in understanding and explaining the S62a process. He asked Members to share the final report with their parishes.

To consider any reports from Scrutiny Committee.

There were no further reports from Overview and Scrutiny Committees.

To receive for information any delegated decisions taken by the Executive since the previous Cabinet meeting.

·        Voluntary Support Grants Committee, 12 December 2022 – Allocation of grant funding

Cabinet noted the following delegated decision taken by the Leader:

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• Voluntary Support Grants Committee, 12 December 2022 – Allocation of grant funding.

To receive for information any decisions made by the Assets of Community Value committee since the previous Cabinet meeting.

·        None.

There were no decisions to report.

To consider the Leisure PFI report.

Cabinet resolved to:

a.     Agree the additional support at a maximum of £261,900 per annum                       (plus annual RPI indexation), commencing 1 October 2022, and therefore backdated

b. Note the positions in respect of centre usage, charges and   Government utility support

Councillor Coote left the meeting.

Councillor Armstrong presented the PFI report and acknowledged the struggles faced by leisure centres with the cost of living crisis causing serious problems now and moving forward. He said that this was an opportunity to support the leisure centres and help maintain the provision of their services for residents, whilst also protecting the Council.

He recommended that Cabinet:

• Agreed the additional support at a maximum of £261,900 per annum (plus annual RPI indexation), commencing 1 October 2022, and therefore backdated.
• Noted the positions in respect of centre usage, charges and Government utility support.

Members commended the report.

The Leader moved to a vote. The proposal was approved unanimously.

RESOLVED to:

I.       Agree the additional support at a maximum of £261,900 per annum (plus annual RPI indexation), commencing 1 October 2022, and therefore backdated.

II.     Note the positions in respect of centre usage, charges and Government utility support

Councillor Coote rejoined the meeting.

To receive the Corporate Plan Delivery Plan 2022/23 Progress Update.

Councillor Reeve provided an update summarising progress made against the Corporate Plan Delivery Plan as at mid-December 2022.

The update recommended that progress against the Corporate Plan Delivery Plan objectives was noted.

He said that:

• The financial situation of the council was robust
• The update demonstrated a considerable number of impressive activities championing the district
• Within the Economic Recovery Plan focus had been given to the tourism and retail sector, with the introduction of the Discover Uttlesford brand and associated app and website, which was proving successful as numbers accessing it were well above other sites around the country. He noted that the average return visitor to the app spent six minutes on it, which indicated active use rather than casual browsing
• Solid progress was being made with the Local Plan

Councillor Pepper thanked Officers for their hard work and support, acknowledged that Climate Change was at the heart of the Corporate Plan and said that she was, very grateful for the grants and government funding that were being used to improve air quality and reduce CO2 emissions in the district.

Councillor Coote congratulated Officers past and present in social housing who had worked tirelessly.

He said that:

• The Corporate Plan aimed to achieve as much as possible with the limited resources available
• The weather was currently not helping with the delivery of housing repairs
• Funding remained an issue, with government contributions remaining insufficient
• Private rent presented concerns as resources were lacking to achieve the aspirations set out in the Corporate Plan

Councillor Smith said that the insufficient government funds was not a new situation and that the administration should have built in more resilience in the Council`s finances and that balancing the budget with a significant proportion of the reserves was deeply troubling.

He asked Councillor Reeve or Councillor Hargreave to advise what progress had been made in identifying how the £1m budget reduction for the 2022/23 period could be achieved.

Councillor Hargreaves said that council housing was not funded by government, but from the housing rent, although the government should have got rid of the right to buy years ago as it was bureaucratic and resulted in the loss of the best council houses.

He said that the commercial investment programme was established to improve robustness, but had now been blocked by the government, who had provided no substitute finance options.

In response to a question from Councillor Hargreaves, Councillor Coote said that the Empty Homes Policy would consider all homes, not just council houses. Councillor Pepper said that the Warm Homes Grant focused on private rental properties and that she welcomed any suggestions of new applications.

Councillor Caton said that:

• The Empty Homes Policy provided low interest loans to people entering empty properties to refurbish them. He said that the policy was ineffective as it took five years before funding was available through the scheme. He asked if the budget could be addressed to improve the provision
• Comments had been submitted in response to the Cambridge  ...  view the full minutes text for item 71.

To consider the Grants Policy report.

Cabinet resolved to formally adopt the Grants Policy.

The Portfolio Holder for Communities, Health, Youth, Public Safety, Emergency Planning and liaison with the Police and Fire & Rescue Service presented the Grants Policy report.

She thanked the Officers for their hard work.

In response to a question from Councillor Reeve, the Chief Executive said that the current Grants Policy was for a year cycle, but that proposals would be coming forward for consideration, to move grants over £50,000 from a one year to a four year cycle, subject to a service level agreement.

Councillor Sutton proposed that the Grants Policy be agreed by Cabinet for formal adoption.

This was seconded by Councillor Armstrong.

            RESOLVED: That Cabinet formally adopts the Grants Policy.

To receive an update in respect of Housing matters.

Cabinet RESOLVED to:

a.     Note the contents of the Housing Update report

b.     Approve the additional expenditure of up to £500,000 from the Housing Revenue Account

The Chief Executive presented the Housing Update which updated Councillors on a range of operational housing issues, and detailed what actions were being taken to rectify each problem identified.

He recommended that Cabinet:

• Note the contents of this report
• Approve the additional expenditure of up to £500,000 from the

Housing Revenue Account

He apologised for the lateness of the report, which was genuinely unavoidable and related to issues of damp and mould and the related return required by the government and requested at the end of November 2022. The response was submitted by the Council on 19 December 2022, following which, the report was written.

He said that:

• Appendix A contained the Draft Rent Setting Review which had arrived in the building on 21 December 2022, had been published within hours of receipt and would be taken in part 2 due to the proprietary information it contained
• He had not wanted to wait for the new year to report on the matter when he had the information available to bring it to this Cabinet meeting, which would mean that the important work that was necessary could commence 28 days earlier
• The key decision should have been published and notice of it been given 28 days in advance of the meeting. This was not possible so they were seeking to use the Genuine Urgency Procedure, rule 16 of the Constitution. He asked Members to note this, and said that had they known about the need for this decision 28 days ago then it would have been duly published as was routinely required and routinely carried out
• He thanked the Democratic Services Officer and her colleagues for their input and efforts to restore the audio to the meeting recording
• The public gallery was open, that there was currently no legal requirement to provide a live broadcast of the meeting and that there was no question of the validity of the meeting

The Chief Executive said that four issues had been identified, and that the first one related to rent. He said that:

• It was known that the rent issue had been caused by innocent Officer error, how and where the error was made and it had been confirmed that it only affected the current and previous financial years so the scale of the error was relatively modest and involved mainly pennies per week per property
• Refunds would be calculated with interest to all tenants, whether they were in arrears or not, and efforts would be made to contact former tenants and the estates of former tenants. Processing the refunds would be complex and take time to ensure that attention is paid to accommodating tenants who were on Universal Credit or Housing Benefit during the period or part of it
• An individual letter to tenants explaining and apologising had been signed off and despatched today
• It had been necessary to self-refer to the Housing Regulator as a result of this issue, and a meeting with them had been scheduled for the third  ...  view the full minutes text for item 73.