Issue - meetings

It was proposed by Councillor Wells and seconded by Councillor L Fairbrass that Members agreed the recommendations within the report, namely:

“Recommended that Council resolve:

1.  That having considered the business case it becomes the policy of this Council to explore further the abolition of the local government district areas of Canterbury, Dover, Shepway and Thanet and the constitution of a new local government district area of East Kent comprising the areas of those districts.

2.  That the unspent balance of the £20,000 previously agreed by the Council to fund the preparation of the business case be made available to fund a consultation and public engagement exercise.

3.  That the Cabinet be requested to ensure an appropriate consultation and public engagement exercise is undertaken to ascertain views on the proposal set out in 1 above.

4.  That a further report be submitted to the Council prior to the making of any submission to the Secretary of state.”

Councillor Constantine proposed, seconded by Councillor Matterface, an amendment to the motion which replaced recommendation three with the following wording:

“That this Council gives the residents of Thanet the opportunity to voice their opinions via a referendum.” 

Upon being put to the vote the amendment was lost.

Following further debate, Members voted on the substantive motion and agreed to approve to the four recommendations as shown above.

Cabinet debated the report on the Business Case for the proposed Single East Kent Council. Members acknowledged the comments that were forwarded to Cabinet by the Overview & Scrutiny Panel. Cabinet further provided a response to recommendations from the Panel.

Councillor Campbell and Councillor Bayford spoke under Council Procedure Rule 20.1.

Councillor Wells proposed, Councillor L. Fairbrass seconded and Cabinet agreed that in making final recommendations to council and Members took into account the comments of the Overview and Scrutiny Panel and thereafter agreed the following:

1.  That having considered the business case it becomes the policy of this Council to explore further the abolition of the local government district areas of Canterbury, Dover, Shepway and Thanet and the constitution of a new local government district area of East Kent comprising the areas of those districts;

2.  That the unspent balance of the £20,000 previously agreed by the Council to fund the preparation of the business case be made available to fund a consultation andpublic engagement exercise;

3.  That the Cabinet be requested to ensure an appropriate consultation and public engagement exercise is undertaken to ascertain views on the proposal set out in 1 above;

4.  That a further report be submitted to the Council prior to the making of any submission to the Secretary of state.

And

5.  In response to recommendations from the Overview & Scrutiny Panel, Cabinet confirmed that with respect to recommendations 1, 2 and 4, in accordance with the Council decision of the 14^th July 2016, the strategy to implement any proposed merger is part of our budget and policy framework and therefore a final decision will be made by Full Council.

In addition the Overview and Scrutiny Panel forms a vital part of the budget and policy framework procedure and must be given the opportunity to look at and make recommendations on the final report prior to it being considered by Full Council. Therefore, the generic timetable for Thanet will be amended accordingly;

6.  And whilst not specifically referred to in the report, Recommendation 3 which states that ‘If there was an early recognition that the timescale for implementing the project was slipping, an early decision should be made by each of the participating councils to seek permission from the Department of Communities and Local Government to extend the current administration by a year’ is accepted and will be taken on board in future discussions by Officers and the Leader moving forward.

Cabinet also thanked the Overview and Scrutiny Panel for their positive input into this matter.

Madeline Homer, CEx introduced the report and gave a brief background of the process that started with a July 2016 Full Council adoption of the Statement of Intent to explore the potential for the creation of a single East Kent district by the five district councils. They then asked for the drafting of a business case to explore the proposals further. This led to a report that was considered by Cabinet on 16 February 2017.

Hannah Thorpe, Head of Communications gave a rundown of the methodology to be used for the public consultation and stakeholder engagement. Miss Thorpe made the following points:

• There would be four strands to the consultation;

§  1,000 sample survey to be used, consisting of 250 randomly selected residents for each of the four districts that will take part.

§  There will be pre-selection questions that will be asked before respondents are accepted into the 1,000 sample population;

§  There will be an open questionnaire which can be completed by any member of the public;

• Single day Stakeholder Forum to be held with local businesses, education and other sectors;
• Series of residents stakeholder forum events to be held;
• All of the above events to be co-ordinated by an external organisation ORS (Opinion Research Services) who are highly qualified and have conducted similar events in Dorset and Cambridgeshire;
• ORS have requested for a Member briefing session to advise councillors on the process for the public consultation to be used ahead of the consultation events;
• The consultation will be launched on 24 March 2017.

When the Chairman invited the Panel to comment on the proposals for the East Kent Merger as contained in the report, the following comments and points were raised:

• Would the approach to the consultation be same across the four local councils that are involved in the proposals?
• How would the selection for the respondents to the consultation survey be done?
• What would happen if one of the councils pulled out of the proposed project after the public consultation?
• Was the final decision to be made by Cabinet or Full Council?
• How did these proposals link with proposals for devolution?
• In the event of the merger going ahead would councils share each individual council’s debt?
• What was the combined debt for the four local authorities?
• Was the Panel going to have another opportunity to review the proposals further down the process of the merger?
• Has inflation for the period in question been factored into the proposals (up to 2015)?
• There were growth rate reported in the business case of 19-27%. Where did Thanet sit on that scale and in what sectors were these figures in reference to?
• Would the electoral boundaries have been resolved by the time the election for the new council?
• Would the local Plan being drafted be put on hold until after the merger?

Members also made the following observations:

• The merger was a significant project which required time to think through the process;
• The process required a strategic leader to successfully  ...  view the full minutes text for item 105

The Leader briefly introduced the topic for discussion before giving an opportunity to the Deputy Leader to propose amendments to the recommendations.

Councillor Lin Fairbrass proposed, Councillor Brimm seconded and Members agreed the changes to the recommendations so that in instances where the report referred to ‘public engagement’, it should in all instances read ‘consultation and public engagement.’

Members were also advised by the Deputy Leader that an additional document to the report which provided some information on the proposed consultation brief had been tabled at the meeting. The brief would be discussed at a workshop of the CExs and Leaders to be held in the week beginning 20 February 2017 and the consultation approach would be shared at the extraordinary Overview & Scrutiny Panel, Cabinet and Council meetings scheduled for 02 March, 09 March and 22 March 2017, respectively.

The Leader said that the purpose of the meeting was to consider the business case for the merger of the four (originally five) east Kent local Councils that are Dover, Canterbury, Shepway and Thanet. The project was necessitated by the long term challenges faced by the local councils. Working and operating as separate entities, the four local authorities would be required to identify combined additional savings of £60 million by 2025. This challenge would impact negatively on service delivery by these local authorities.

Over the last few years councils have experienced significant budget reductions due to the economic difficulties faced by the national and international economies. This year Thanet District Council is faced with an additional £1 million budget cut by government which has been re-directed to social care services for some local authorities. This ongoing situation called for councils to develop innovative approaches to overcome these challenges.

The following Members spoke under Council Procedure Rule 20.1:

Councillor Campbell;

Councillor Constantine;

Councillor Bayford;

Councillor Game;

Councillor K. Gregory;

Councillor Taylor-Smith.

Councillor Wells proposed, Councillor Lin Fairbrass seconded and Cabinet recommended that Council resolve:

1.  That having considered the business case it becomes the policy of this Council to explore further the abolition of the local government district areas of Canterbury, Dover, Shepway and Thanet and the constitution of a new local government district area of East Kent comprising the areas of those districts;

2.  That the unspent balance of the £20,000 previously agreed by the Council to fund the preparation of the business case be made available to fund a consultation and public engagement exercise;

3.  That the Cabinet be requested to ensure an appropriate consultation and public engagement exercise is undertaken to ascertain views on the proposal set out in 1 above;

4.  That a further report be submitted to the Council prior to the making of any submission to the Secretary of state;

And further approved the following:

1.  To request that Canterbury City Council undertake a public and stakeholder consultation and engagement exercise to ascertain views on the proposal set out in 1 above that can be taken into account by the Secretary of State for Communities and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 410