Agenda item

This report presents the latest workplan for the Panel.

The Chair introduced this item to the Panel. She asked for the Foxhill (MoD Site) presentation to be heard at a future meeting and for an update on Boat Dwellers & River Travellers to be added as a future item so that the Panel’s previous work is monitored.

The Chair then made the following statement. A copy of which will be available online as an appendix to the minutes and placed on the Panel’s Minute Book, a summary is set out below.

I would first like to thank the officers who have patiently borne the brunt of our efforts to make policy and scrutinize the Council’s procedures and projects.

Especially to be mentioned in dispatches are Mark Durnford, Emma Bagley and Donna Vercoe. Their work was especially valuable when we had a Task and Finish Group.

I would also like to thank senior officers, especially Graham Sabourn and Derek Quilter, and their teams, who taught me a lot.

It will perhaps (I hope) be the task of the next administration to build on the work we have endeavoured to do on the Major Projects experience to construct local economic strategies tied into housing and infrastructure development, so that we do not end up with soulless housing estates of commuters.

Firstly, this Panel was required to scrutinise policy moving through the system: elements of the Core Strategy, the Houses in Multiple Occupation, and the Licencing of HMOs. We had to interact with other Panels on matters such as homelessness and river safety, but I think we made a significant contribution. Certainly our compliance could not be taken for granted. No rubber stamps here! Thank you all for wading through pages and pages and exposing the really important points for development.

Secondly, while I was in charge, we surveyed the areas where Major Projects were supposed to flourish and enhance development or even, dare I say it, regenerate a community. So we considered the developments in Keynsham, Paulton, Midsomer Norton, Westfield and Radstock.

Thirdly, we did some important policy work ourselves. Next to the Homecare Study I chaired as Task and Finish for the Wellbeing Panel, I am most proud of the Boat Dwellers and River Travellers study which I hope will produce tangible results for good for those who live on our rivers and canals. It has already attracted European research interest via the University of Cardiff, and I have just received an email from the lead researcher (Dr Lawson)  saying as a result of studying our efforts, he had completely changed his view of scrutiny, and saw what a positive value it had.

Fourthly, we have engaged in what I hope will be a constructive dialogue with ‘responsible providers’ and heard the plans of Curo, Knightstone, and Guinness. I hope others will follow later this year.

Finally I think we have been open and receptive to tenants and members of the public who raised their concerns in a way most helpful to us. So I have encouraged people to bring their problems forward to us, so that we can try and find either a policy resolution, or an individual answer. The bronze level of alarm systems in Curo Housing is a good example of this. There has also been an opportunity to improve communications between Council / residents / providers, as in the more recent case of ‘preparation for tenancy’ and debt counselling.

Councillor Steve Hedges wished to thank her for her role as Chair on behalf of himself and the other members of the Panel.