Agenda and minutes

The Chairman welcomed everyone to the meeting.

The Chair will draw attention to the emergency evacuation procedure as follows:

If the continuous alarm sounds, you must evacuate the building by one of the designated exits and proceed to one of the named assembly points. The designated exits are sign-posted. Arrangements are in place for the safe evacuation of disabled people. The assembly points are: the front and rear of Riverside, Temple Street.

The Chair drew attention to the emergency evacuation procedure.

Apologies were received from Cllr Liz Richardson, Cllr Alan Hale, Dr Jo Farrar, Jean Fossaceco, Clerk to Shoscombe PC, Tony Heaford (Chair B&NES ALCA), Martin Robinson (Chairman, Dunkerton and Tunley PC), Les Wild and Marion Wild of Paulton Parish Council, and Batheaston PC.

The Chair thanked those who had attended his event for Councillors the previous month. He noted that requests had been made that this event should be annual, this, however, would be something for the next Chair of Council to decide.

The minutes of the meeting of the 24^th May 2016 were approved as a correct record, subject to the addition of Councillor Vic Pritchard to the attendance list, and signed by the Chair.

This item will include a presentation by David Trethewey, Divisional Director Strategy and Performance. The following link to the West of England Devolution Agreement is provided as background information on this item

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/west-of-england-devolution-deal

Councillor Warren, David Trethewey and Andrew Pate gave a joint presentation on the West of England devolution proposals. A copy of the PowerPoint slides used in the presentation is attached as Appendix 1.

Councillor Warren said that he thought that a detailed presentation on the proposals would be helpful in clearing away misconceptions that had arisen.

David Trethewey said that in essence the proposals were about the transfer of powers from central government to local areas. Eight areas of the country have  agreed devolution deals with the government. There were different issues and priorities in each of these eight areas and each area had to consider how to get the best deal for itself. The Councils in the West of England had been working successfully together for a number of years. What was proposed was not the merger of the Councils; it was about working together on the issues specified in the deal. The West of England is a net contributor to the national economy, Manchester is not. Challenges in the West of England include static productivity, skills shortages, housing, areas of deprivation, traffic congestion and an infrastructure deficit. The deal for the West of England included new money, unlike the deal for Cornwall. The deal proposes an elected Mayor for the region.

Councillor Warren underlined that the West of England deal was the best in the country in terms of funding per capita. There were aspects of the deal that he was not happy with, but he thought it was a good deal that would bring significant benefits to the region.

Andrew Pate said that the deal would mean an extra £900m over 30 years. This would in fact probably be spent over 10-15 years. There could be additional money if the West of England showed that it had done a decent job with the devolved powers and money. There was a City Deal for the West of England already in place, which had produced £500m of economic development in the region. The City Deal allowed the West of England to retain 100% of the growth in business rate revenue. Changes were proposed to local government finance that would allow all local authorities to retain 100% of business rate growth from 2020, giving rise to a risk that the City Deal could be undermined. Only the devolution deal could give full protection against this risk. There were also proposals to devolve existing funding, such as the Local Growth Fund, which could raise the value of devolution deal to over £1bn. The West of England would also get a seat at the table in the negotiations about the proposals to reform local government funding. The deal involves a 50/50 split between capital and revenue. The revenue would enable more flexibility and the ability to finance borrowing without having to increase Council Tax.

David Trethewey spoke about the powers and responsibilities that would delegated to the West of England (slides 10-13).

Councillor Warren drew attention to the constraints on the power  ...  view the full minutes text for item 39a

There were none.

Andy Thomas and Sara Dixon gave a presentation on Atrium, an on-line web collaboration tool. A copy of their PowerPoint slides is attached as Appendix 2.

Andy Thomas said that the Atrium system was designed to facilitate collaboration between the Council and the parishes and was built on the Council’s existing website, with no charge to parishes for its use.

Andy said that he would welcome contact from parish representatives who wanted more information about Atrium and that Sara would be happy to visit parishes to talk about it.

Martin Shields, Divisional Director, Environmental Services, and colleagues will give a presentation.

Martin Shields, Divisional Director – Environmental Services gave a presentation on Environmental Services. A copy of his PowerPoint slides is attached as Appendix 3.

Martin said that he had joined the Council in November 2015. He had previously worked for a city Council that had only one parish, so the parish forum was attended by only three people. He was pleased to see so many parish representatives at tonight’s meeting and would be happy to meet anyone who wished to speak to him after the meeting. If there were particular functions in Environmental Services about which representatives wanted more detail, he would be happy to present on them at a future meeting.

Martin’s presentation included an update on the Parish Sweeper Scheme and information about the control of fly tipping.

Kelvin Packer, Group Manager Highways and Traffic, gave a presentation.

He said there were two kinds of consultation. There were formal, statutory consultations, as for example on Traffic Regulation Orders. For these the Council had to follow the prescribed timetable and process and could not vary it to allow the consultation to be synchronised with parish meetings, for example. There were also informal consultations, and most highway issues which involved the parishes fell into this category.

Parishes sometimes approached the Council with requests for highway schemes. In the past they would often be told that their request could not be implemented at the present time and that it had been added to the task register. He thought this was unhelpful for the parishes and for Council officers. In the future he thought it was better to take a more robust line and be upfront about whether a scheme was realistic or not, and what the timescale would be.

Highways schemes went through various stages, such as feasibility, preliminary design and detailed design. Even at construction stage issues could arise that required plans to be changed. It was therefore a challenge for the Council to keep local residents fully informed. He was seeking more effective means of communication; perhaps the Atrium system could be one of the information channels. He asked the meeting to note that the consultation element is part of the overall cost of a scheme. Leafleting every resident affected by a scheme costs money. Money spent on communications is money that is not available to spend on actual construction works.

In an effort to improve efficiency a Deputy Group Manager for Highways had been appointed, whose task it is to oversee the implementation of the capital programme. He is introducing a new governance system, and key gateways are now being operated on schemes. In future no work should be started until all the relevant stages have been checked. In the past it had sometimes come to light at a late stage that somebody had not been consulted who should have been, or that feedback received had not been acted on. Hopefully gateway reviews would prevent that happening in future. Areas where more information could be provided electronically had been identified, including street works reports and future programmes of work. He was aiming to provide more information in a more transparent way to enable parishes to find it more easily.

Consultation sometimes uncovers issues that lengthen the planned timescale for a scheme. Highways is therefore moving towards a two-year delivery cycle for schemes, in which the initial consultations and design work are done in one financial year and construction takes place in the following financial year. This will enable much clearer information about the timescale of the construction phase to be given to parishes. This is unlikely to delay schemes, as most already have a two-year delivery frame.

Kelvin Packer (Group Manager - Highways & Traffic) and Stefan Chiffers (Senior Engineer - Traffic Management) will give a presentation.

Kelvin Packer gave a presentation. A copy of his PowerPoint slides is attached as Appendix 4.

New approach to highways schemes

Kelvin said this was a piece of work developed by Stefan Chiffers (Senior Engineer - Traffic Management). Highways had decided to move away from the traditional approach, which was to tackle individual problems at individual locations without considering the bigger picture. A whole route corridor approach had replaced the previous single-location focus, in the hope that individual schemes could contribute to the improvement of the whole route.

Accidents on the A37

Concerns had been raised by ward and parish councillors and residents along the A37 corridor following a series of fatal accidents. A great deal of help and support had been received from specialist officers in the Police. The route had a whole range of challenges, including varying speed limits and different types of junctions.

Analysis of accident data

Evidence was sought to inform decisions making.

There had been 90 accidents over the 5 years, an average of 18 per year. Of these 18% were KSI (= killed and serious injury) accidents. Analysis of the data had not revealed an obvious trend. The Police send data to Highways on all road traffic collisions. From this data bar charts were produced and the data was plotted on a map to see whether there were clusters of accidents at particular locations, or whether they were spread over a wider area. As a result 12 cluster sites on the A37 were identified, which are listed on slide 8. Highways can provide further information about these locations if parishes wish to request it.

Cost data from the NHS are used to calculate the cost to society of accidents. This enables work at specific locations to be prioritised on the basis of the cost to society of accidents at those locations. It had been calculated that spending of £138,750 on A37 improvement works could result in a saving of £614,795 in cost to society.

Implementation

An effort was being made minimise inconvenience, by carrying out different types of work at the same time.

Improvement measures that will be implemented on the A37 are detailed on slides 11 and 12. They include:

·  reductions in speed limits

·  improvements to signage

·  improvements to the road surface and road markings

·  pruning of vegetation

·  restoration of 2 safety cameras to working order

Work will commence in the current financial year. The first pilot scheme will be at Pensford. There will be consultation on the details of specific works. This new approach to highways improvements will be rolled out across other routes. Highways will develop a number of ‘shelf ready’ schemes to take advantage of funding that only becomes available at short notice and for a limited period.

Questions from the meeting

Councillor Brian Simmons asked whether Highways took into consideration the data produced by the Association of British Insurers. Kelvin replied that ABI data was not used, nor were statements from residents about the frequency of accidents. It was  ...  view the full minutes text for item 41b

A briefing note from Mark Reynolds, Group Development Manager, is attached.

A wide range of further information on these and other planning matters relating to town and parish council can be found on the web page linked below

http://www.bathnes.gov.uk/services/planning-and-building-control/planning/planning-advice-and-guidance/parish-and-town-council

Mark Reynolds, Group Manager – Development Management gave a demonstration of the Planning Portal web site https://www.planningportal.co.uk/.

As an example of the information available on the site he focussed on Permitted Development Rights

https://www.planningportal.co.uk/info/200187/your_responsibilities/37/planning_permission/2. He demonstrated the interactive tool available on the site at

https://www.planningportal.co.uk/info/200125/do_you_need_permission/90/interactive_house

He drew attention to the information available about changes of use https://www.planningportal.co.uk/info/200130/common_projects/9/change_of_use and Lawful Development Certificates

https://www.planningportal.co.uk/info/200187/your_responsibilities/37/planning_permission/3

Bob Simons (Chairman of ALCA) suggested that the replies given by the Council in relation to chapter 5 of the Government’s Technical Consultation on Implementation of Planning Changes did not suggest a very high regard for Neighbourhood Plans. He asked whether there was anything the Council could to ensure that Neighbourhood Plans had a role in planning applications. Mark replied that Neighbourhood Plans were hugely important. They form part of the Development Plan against which planning applications were considered. The Technical Consultation did not change that. The Technical Consultation looked at measures to speed up the delivery of Neighbourhood Plans. Nationally there were not yet many Neighbour Plans, but there were quite a few in B&NES.

The information in the briefing document was noted.

The information in the briefing document was noted.

The response was noted.

The information in the briefing document was noted.

A note is attached.

The briefing document was noted.

Andy Thomas updated the meeting on the process for this review, highlighting the report which had been made to the CTE PDS Panel on 9^th May and the process of engagement which the B&NES branch of ALCA were currently undertaking with members on the issue

The update was noted.

Bathavon Forum

22 June, 6pm, St Gregory’s School

Keynsham Area Forum

30^th June, 6pm, Fry Club and Conference Centre

Somer Valley Forum

6^th July, 6pm, venue tbd

Chew Valley Forum

7^th July, 6pm, Chew Valley School

The dates were noted.

Dates of future meetings:

12 October 2016

15 February 2017

Potential future Agenda Item: Survey of War Memorials.

Dates of future meetings:

12 October 2016

15 February 2017

Potential future Agenda Item: Survey of War Memorials.