Agenda and draft minutes

Venue: Council Chamber, Council Offices, Cecil Street, Margate, Kent. View directions

Contact: Charles Hungwe 

Link: This meeting will be livestreamed

Media

Items
No. Item

62.

Apologies for Absence

Minutes:

Apologies were received from the following Members:

Councillor Farooki, substituted by Councillor Makinson;

Councillor Paul Moore, substituted by  Councillor Pugh.

63.

Declaration of Interests pdf icon PDF 87 KB

To receive any declarations of interest. Members are advised to consider the advice contained within the Declaration of Interest advice attached to this Agenda. If a Member declares an interest, they should complete the Declaration of Interest Form

Minutes:

There were no declarations made at the meeting.

64.

Minutes of Previous Meeting pdf icon PDF 111 KB

To approve the Minutes of the Overview and Scrutiny Panel meeting held on 19 November 2024, copy attached.

Minutes:

Councillor Green proposed, Councillor Currie seconded and the Panel agreed the minutes to be a correct record of the meeting held on 19 November 2024.

65.

Cabinet Member Presentation on Parking

Presentation by Councillor K. Bright

Minutes:

Councillor Kristian Bright, Cabinet Member for Parking made a presentation on the Parking Strategy and asked the Panel to comment on the proposed strategy. During the presentation Councillor Bright made the following comments:

 

·  This was a comprehensive strategy with eight broad objectives; four for on street and four for off street parking;

·  There were fifty two actions with thirty for off street and 22 for on street parking;

·  There were short, medium and long term objectives for the strategy;

·  This strategy was for the period up to 2044. It was a twenty year parking strategy;

·  The aim was to make the car parks enhanced, integrated, future proofed and balanced;

·  The aim was to ensure that streets were well managed, cleaner, enhanced and less conjected;

·  There would be a need to work with residents and businesses for motorists to use car parks;

·  The public consultation had resulted in 4,866 responses being received by the Council. This was quite a high response rate. Eighty six percent supported the vision;

·  There was resistance to flexible tariff structure with 45% responses not in support;

·  Residents talked of the need for a balance between residents parking and dedicated coach and motor homes parking;

·  Residents also talked about preserving green spaces and increasing vegetation;

·  The annual parking budget would fund the quick wins in the strategy;

·  The Joint Transportation Board would discuss the strategy on 17 December before it goes to Cabinet for decision on 19 December 2024.

 

Members asked questions and made comments as follows:

 

·  Would there be use of ANPR technology?

·  These were very impressive proposals and they were a long time coming. How would this strategy be communicated to residents, in order to explain why the Council was considering such proposals?

·  It was pleasing to note that the strategy had proposals for bike hangars;

·  This strategy was important for the local residents as councillors were receiving a number of case work related to parking;

·  The Council should lead the way on electric vehicle charging points that should be established across the district;

·  Having solar panels on car park roofs was a fantastic idea. Was there going to be a review of this strategy in time?

·  The use of ANPR technology would be useful as it would relieve staffing resources and it would also deter anti-social behaviour;

·  The strategy to reduce traffic was welcome. Would car clubs be a council managed or community group managed approach?

·  How would this strategy combat dangerous school street parking during school runs?

·  How much were the quick wins going to cost?

·  Car parks could be enhanced to provide work spaces to enhance the towns;

·  Electric vehicles (EVs) would have a long presence. It was therefore important to review the strategy regularly to take into consideration any changes in technology. It would be helpful to state when the reviews would be and the type of such reviews;

·  Coach parking should be sited where residents would have to walk which would help with their health instead of living them by  ...  view the full minutes text for item 65.

66.

Adoption of Parking Strategy pdf icon PDF 106 KB

  • View the background to item 66.

Report to follow

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Penny Button, Head of Neighbourhoods introduced the report and said that most of the discussion had taken place during the presentation by the Cabinet Member for Parking on a previous item on Parking. Members were therefore asked to comment on the specifics of the proposed parking strategy as detailed in the report and related annex document.

 

Councillor Pugh proposed, Councillor Davis seconded and the Panel made the following recommendation to Cabinet:

 

1.  That Cabinet considers fixing a five year review of the Parking Strategy to enable updates to be made due to changes that may arise;

 

2.  To forward to Cabinet the officer recommendations in the report.

67.

Review the Overview & Scrutiny Panel Work Programme for 2024-25 pdf icon PDF 172 KB

  • View the background to item 67.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Councillor Joanne Bright gave a brief update of the work of the Youth Services Provision Working Party and requested approval for the draft terms of reference that the working party had drafted. These terms were attached as Annex 4 to the work programme report. Two separate survey questionnaires had been sent out to TDC Heads of Service and young people across the district. Responses from this survey would be considered by the working party at their meeting on 9 January 2025.

 

The Panel agreed the new terms of reference, subject to questions in the document being removed from the terms.

 

Members noted the report.

68.

Option to purchase car park, Ramsgate pdf icon PDF 111 KB

  • View the background to item 68.

Minutes:

Andreea Plant, Head of Property introduced the report and made the following comments:

 

·  The report presented to the Panel specifically looked at the Council's option to buy the leasehold interest in the Royal Harbour Multi-Storey Car Park in Ramsgate;

·  The current lease ran until 2073 with no break options;

·  Rent was reviewed every five years based on the construction price index (CPI) and was currently just over £227k per annum. However, by July 2025, it was expected to rise to above £300,000 per annum;

·  The lease allowed the Council to buy the property every five years, with the next opportunity in July 2025. The purchase price would be 12 times the rent amount, currently estimated to be at circa £3.6 million plus VAT, though VAT could be reclaimed if the car park use continued;

·  The Council would also need to conduct legal and survey checks before purchasing so costs could vary slightly depending on the levels of work required;

·  The main reason for purchasing the car park was the significant long-term financial savings it offers;

·  For example, if the rent remained at the forecasted 2025 levels of £302k annually (which the Council knew it would not, as the reviews would bring it up every 5 years), the Council would have to pay £14.5 million pounds in rent over the next 48 years;

·  Whereas if the Council bought the property the cost of borrowing over the same period would be circa £12.7 million, it would be cheaper by £1.78 million;

·  But as was known, the rents would continue to rise, so if the current rate of increase was assumed, the total rental payments could escalate to £27.6 million pounds, therefore purchasing would save the council an even greater amount of up to £14.9 million;

·  These were the financial savings alone before considering the benefits from having full control over the site with flexibility to explore future uses, and full control over maintenance and repairs plans.

 

Members asked questions and made comments as follows:

 

·  Could officers review the calculations just to be sure that these were correct?

·  On a value for ,money basis purchasing this property would be adding to the Council’s assets;

·  The valuation was very high. Was an industry formula used?

·  It was a great idea to take control of this asset. Had a structural survey been conducted to ensure that the facility could take on electric vehicles, as these were heavier than non-electric vehicles?

·  How would the Council deal with fire incidents if they broke out in this facility?

·  How many other assets were being leased by the Council where a similar purchasing approach could be recommended to Cabinet?

·  In February 2023, the lifts were reported as broken and two summers had passed without any repairs having been made to these lifts. Could officers offer a deadline by when these lifts would be repaired?

 

Andreea Plant and Chris Blundell responded to Member questions and comments as follows:

 

·  CPI indexes were used for the calculations;

·  There was scope for variability  ...  view the full minutes text for item 68.

69.

TLS KPI Q1 & Q2 - Housing Performance report pdf icon PDF 82 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Sally O’Sullivan, Head of Tenant and Leaseholder Services introduced the report and made the following comments:

 

·  A brief summary of the KPI showed that the Council’s partnering contractors were performing well and this was also supported by the customer satisfaction surveys. This result was expected for Q1 & Q2 as these were the warmer dryer months, when less repairs were reported;

·  Reports of Damp mould and condensation also declined during Q2. This was a seasonal trend that would be expected. Reports of damp and mould to were expected to increase during Q3 and there was therefore a need to ensure officers were ready with extra resources should they be required;

·  The capital spend did not reflect the progress by the end of Q2. This was because even though a lot of cyclical work had been completed, this did not get invoiced until Q3;

·  Three capital projects had been delayed for the lift refurbishment at Invicta House due the requirement for an application to the building safety regulator. These were as follows:

 

§  Royal Crescent - officers were working toward contract award;

§  Churchfields - this project was booked to start in the new financial year.

 

·  At the end of Q2 the tower block project was where officers expected it to be. With two big milestones being progressed, which were the award of the D&B contract and submission of the BSR applications;

·   The BSR application presented the biggest risk to the project timeline as this was a completely new process;

·  Void performance saw a dip in Q2, with an average of 43 days to turn re-lets. This was mainly due to complex voids being completed during this period;

·  Arrears performance continued to show a positive trend at 3.05% at the end of Q2. This was a 0.19% improvement from the previous quarter;

·  This was the second time the ASB dashboard had been presented. As the data set grew officers would be able to start to observe trends which could inform the way that the team could approach ASB;

·  This was the first time that officers had presented the compliance KPIs as a dashboard. This had been made possible because the reviewed policies reduced the burden on reporting. The report covering the previous period to 31 March 2024 was considered by the Housing Cabinet Advisory Group. In future, all of the new dashboards would also be brought to the Overview & Scrutiny Panel and Cabinet for review;

 

·  The team was also currently part way through an internal audit of the compliance arrangements which would be reported to the Governance and Audit Committee in due course, and any recommendations that impact on the service’s performance or compliance position would be reported in the next cycle.

 

·  There was one property not compliant for gas in Q2. This was resolved in Q3. The current report  was now100% compliant for gas;

·  Fire risk assessments was the only Compliance workstream that was allocated its own dashboard and this was because there still were a lot of outstanding actions;  ...  view the full minutes text for item 69.

70.

The Housing Assistance Policy pdf icon PDF 217 KB

  • View the background to item 70.

Report to follow

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Ashley Jackson, Head of Housing and Planning introduced the report and made the following comments:

 

·  Councils across England were required by the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996 to offer Disabled Facilities Grants (DFGs) to people who qualify;

·  These grants were mandatory and were restricted to helping people with disabilities to adapt their homes to make them accessible and more suitable for their needs;

·  The funding for these grants came from central Government via the Better Care Fund;

·  If a Council wished to offer financial assistance towards anything other than DFGs they had to adopt and publish a Housing Assistance Policy which gave full details of the assistance, they would offer to householders in their area for property adaptation, improvement or repair. The things the BCF money was spent on included the following:

 

§  Individual DFGs;

§  Health and Housing Co-ordinator co-funded with Dover;

§  Town & Country Housing (T&CH) Home Straight scheme (hoarding);

§  Handyperson Enablement Service co-funded with Dover;

§  Contribution towards salaries for staff facilitating the expenditure of the budget.

 

§  It is imperative that the Council has in place a fair policy that takes into account changes since the last policy was agreed in 2019. Proposals that we are consulting on included the following:

 

§  Increasing the maximum grant allowance from £30,000 to £50,000;

§  Extend discretionary grants to tenants rather than just to Landlords;

§  We are also proposing to limit the number of grant applications that can be submitted to prevent fraud.

 

The recommendations to Cabinet are:

 

1.  The consultation draft of the Housing Assistance Policy is approved;

2.  The council conducts a public consultation on the draft policy;

3.  The results of the consultation be published on the Council’s website;

4.  Authority be delegated to the Head of Housing and Planning in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Housing to determine any minor amendments to the policy;

5.  Authority be delegated to the Head of Housing and Planning in consultation with the relevant Portfolio Holder to consider and determine requests to waive the requirement to repay grants in exceptional circumstances.

 

Members asked questions and made comments as follows:

 

·  Why was it necessary to provide for delegated power to two individuals for this decision;

·  Such decisions should go to formal meetings that include the Scrutiny Panel;

·  It was balance between risk and harm to residents;

·  Some Members said that they did not view the approach to delegate authority as being problematic;

·  The pejorative wording at page 26 of Annex 1 should be removed from the document.

 

Ashley Jackson, Chris Blundell and Bob Porter responded to Member questions and comments as follows:

 

·  Grants only become payable when such cases arise;

·  These would usually be cases of extreme personal difficulties for the individuals;

·  Council had carried out a few such cases and it was worth noting that these cases were also confidential;

·  It was also worth noting that S151 Officer had delegated authority to write-off debts to a certain agreed level.

 

Councillor Austin proposed, Councillor  ...  view the full minutes text for item 70.

71.

The Housing Allocations Policy pdf icon PDF 222 KB

  • View the background to item 71.

Report to follow

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Ashley Jackson introduced the report and made the following comments:

 

·  The Council was required to publish an allocations policy. The allocations policy determines who is eligible to apply for housing, how applications are assessed and prioritised and how affordable and social rented homes in the district will be allocated;

·  There are a number of changes from the existing Allocations Policy which are detailed in the report specifically proposed changes to:

 

§  Eligibility

§  Banding

§  Advertising and Allocation

§  Equality and Diversity

§  Complaints

 

·  At the end of November the government announced new regulations to remove the local connection requirements for veterans to access social housing;

·  The Council was currently awaiting the details on this and this update would be included in the revised document. The recommendations to Cabinet were that:

 

1.  The consultation draft of the Allocations Policy be agreed;

2.  The draft policy be subject to public consultation to be conducted early in 2025;

3.  The results of the consultation will be published on the Council’s website;

4.  Authority be delegated to the Head of Housing and Planning in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Housing to make minor amendments to the policy;

5.  That the policy be reviewed on an annual basis, or when required.

 

Councillor Austin proposed, Councillor Pugh seconded and Members agreed to forward to Cabinet the officer recommendations in the report.

72.

Accelerated Temporary Accommodation Programme pdf icon PDF 457 KB

  • View the background to item 72.

Report to follow

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Ashley Jackson introduced the report and made the following comments:

 

·  Overview and Scrutiny Panel was asked to consider and comment on the contents of the report and the recommendations to Cabinet;

·  Thanet District Council had a duty to provide temporary accommodation to people who were eligible for assistance, homeless and in priority need. The demand for temporary accommodation had increased consistently since 2012 and this had been replicated across the country;

·  The rapid increase in people presenting as homeless and in need of TA had played a substantial part on the increasing pressure on local authorities;

·  The Council’s budget for TA in 2024/25 was £1,005,860, offset by a budgeted income of £350,000 from Housing Benefit and rent;

·  These budgets had been significantly exceeded, due to the demand for TA and the net overspend across all Housing Options budgets in 2023/24 was £1.3m and this was forecast to be £800k in 2024/25.

·  The Council was currently accommodating 303 households in temporary accommodation, just under 170 of those were in other parts of Kent, hence the proposal to purchase 170 units of temporary accommodation within Thanet;

·  The business model was explained in detail in the report and officers had developed a toolkit to assess viability. To be viable, temporary accommodation schemes needed to show a saving almost immediately to prevent an impact on the Council’s general fund budget position;

·  In summary to ensure that this programme was financially viable, and a lower cost than the Council’s current temporary accommodation arrangements residents would be charged a social rent and a service charge;

·  The recommendations to Cabinet were that:

 

1.  The council progresses with a programme to acquire or develop up to 170 homes for use as temporary accommodation;

2.  Cabinet recommend the required general fund capital budget of £38.762m as part of the annual budget setting process across the financial years 2025/26 and 2026/27;

3.  A six monthly update on the delivery of the programme is provided to Cabinet;

4.  The letting of these homes will be in accordance with the Council’s Temporary Accommodation Policy, approved by Cabinet in July 2024.

 

Members asked questions and made comments as follows:

 

·  Finance reported an overspend of £800k. At the moment there were a lot of households in temporary accommodation and that if number dropped, would that expose the Council?

·  Why had temporary accommodation become an issue?

·  Were these properties being developed and or purchased by the Council as temporary accommodation exempt from rent to buy?

·  The government was looking into the issue of temporary accommodation across the country. This scheme being proposed by the Council seemed to stand on its own merit;

·  What were the pressures on the General Fund? It would help make clear recommendations if such financial pressures were made known to the Panel;

·  Members fully supported these proposals, considering that some major housing developments were struggling to reach the 30% affordable housing requirement;

·  The new properties to be purchased would help manage the human costs where some households would find themselves in  ...  view the full minutes text for item 72.

73.

Forward Plan and Exempt Cabinet Reports List pdf icon PDF 79 KB

  • View the background to item 73.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Members noted the report.