Agenda, decisions and draft minutes

To receive any apologies for absence.

Apologies were received from Councillor Gwill Wren (Councillor Dawn Johnson chaired the meeting in his absence) and Councillors Lance Duddridge and Kathy Pearce were absent.

To approve the minutes from the meeting held on 12 March 2025.

Resolved that the minutes of the Scrutiny Committee – Communities held on 12 March 2025 be confirmed as a correct record.

Resolved that the minutes of the Scrutiny Committee – Communities held on 12 March 2025 be confirmed as a correct record.

To receive and note any declarations of interests in respect of any matters included on the agenda for consideration at this meeting.

(The other registrable interests of Councillors of Somerset Council, arising from membership of City, Town or Parish Councils and other Local Authorities will automatically be recorded in the minutes: City, Town & Parish Twin Hatters - Somerset Councillors 2023 )

No additional interest, new or updated declarations of interest were made at the meeting.

The Chair to advise the Committee of any items on which members of the public have requested to speak and advise those members of the public present of the details of the Council’s public participation scheme.

For those members of the public who have submitted any questions or statements, please note, a three minute time limit applies to each speaker and you will be asked to speak before Councillors debate the issue.

We are now live webcasting most of our committee meetings and you are welcome to view and listen to the discussion. The link to each webcast will be available on the meeting webpage, please see details under ‘click here to join online meeting’.

Nick Hall spoke in a personal capacity on the issue of regulating Glastonbury Festival. His questions are shown below with responses in italic text provided by Head of Regulatory Services which were read out at the meeting by Chris Hall - Executive Director, Community Place & Economy at the meeting.  A written copy will be provided to Nick Hall following this meeting:

Event Management Plan

Creation of this plan still falls primarily to GFEL and without Somerset Council pressure they will continue to control this and hence will control the level of community consultation. My view now is that this is an outcome of there not being a fit-for-purpose community consultation model.

It is GFEL’s responsibility to produce the Event Management Plans, they are reviewed by Somerset Council and other Agencies.  Therefore there is sufficient oversight of these plans from regulatory bodies.  Once the licence is issued there is no requirement for further consultation with the public on the operation of the licence.  In addition to consulting regulatory bodies GFEL undertake meetings with local Parish Councils both before and after the event to allow issues to be raised and discussed.  There is also now, at the request of the Scrutiny Committee, a Councillor engagement group that has been established to allow Somerset Council councillors to raise and discuss issues from the community directly with Somerset Council.  Therefore there is in place appropriate community consultation.

Alleged Noise Breaches

The existing Premises license was designed when there were a few small overnight venues open i.e when there was a midnight curfew.  The Festival’s commercial model, probably driven by customer demand,  now needs significant venues to operate through the night. Somerset Council can’t enforce the overnight noise restrictions (PN2) without significant restrictions to GFEL’s commercial model and hence are under pressure to turn a blind eye to the overnight noise restriction under the License condition PN2.

As discussed at the scrutiny committee in October 2024 Somerset Council undertakes independent noise monitoring throughout the duration of the festival.  In addition GFEL also have noise monitoring provisions in place.  The noise monitoring undertaken in 2024 did not identify any breaches of licencing conditions

Helicopters

I’ve been in correspondence with the CAA. The keys points are:

·         CAA is not directly involved in the provision of Air Traffic Control over the Festival site.

·         GFEL requests flying restrictions through a Restricted Airspace (Temporary) “RA(T” (attached). Through their “Glastonbury Airspace Co-ordination Team”, GFEL requires written permission for all flights. This puts GFEL at the centre of nuisance arising from helicopters e.g. they knew that 50 helicopters would fly over Pilton village on Monday morning.

·         CAA confirms that there are no Licensed Heliports around the site although they recognise that high activity sites need an assessment. In 2025 it appears that GFEL is moving to a single Heliport and indications are that it will be Licensed by the CAA.

·         Heliports are covered by normal 28-day rule for planning but any permanent structures do require planning permission. I assume Somerset  ...  view the full minutes text for item 103.

To discuss the work programme.

To assist the discussion, the following documents are attached:-

a)    The Committee’s work programme

b)    The Committee’s outcome tracker

Please use the following links to view the latest Somerset Council Forward Plans and Executive Forward Plan of planned key decisions that have been published on the Council’s website:

Somerset Council Forward Plans

Somerset Council Executive Forward Plan

Members agreed that a Scrutiny Informal online workshop with the service to come up with a forward work programme for next 12 months would be helpful

Jamie Jackson – Scrutiny Manager advised Members that the meeting calendar will be agreed by Members at the Full Council Meeting in May, the final draft is currently being circulated to the Chairs and Vice Chairs of Scrutiny for their consideration.  It is likely this committee will meet again June.

Members agreed that a Scrutiny Informal online workshop with the service to come up with a forward work programme for next 12 months would be helpful.  Members were asked to let Gwill Wren or Dawn Johnson known if they have any additions.  Flexibility will be required to allow for urgent items to be added.

Members discussed recent issues with Gypsy travellers in Taunton and considered prioritising this in the committee's work programme. However, they decided to wait for the completion of a working group being set up even though there were concerns regarding the further delay. Chris Hall informed Members about increased activity from mobile travellers between Easter and summer and clarified that mobile travellers and the resident traveller issues in Glastonbury are very separate. It was agreed that it might be appropriate to invite Kirsty Larkins, Service Director for Housing, to a future meeting for updates.

To receive the report.

The committee noted the report.

On behalf of Christian Evans, Head of Finance Business Partnering, and Kerry Heppel Finance Services Manager who were both unavailable to attend this meeting, Chris Hall gave a presentation on the Communities Revenue Budget. 

Scrutiny is asked to:

1.    Provide any general comments or observations to the Executive.

2.    Consider if the actions in the report are appropriate and suggest any additional actions.

Chris Hall highlighted the Key Points from the report:

Community Services Budget:

·         2024/25 net budget: £32.981m, forecast underspend: £3.260m (increase of £0.508m from Month 10).

·         2023/24 net budget: £37.4m, outturn underspend: £3.9m.

Housing:

·         Balanced outturn forecast for 2024/25.

·         Increased demand for temporary accommodation.

·         Forecasting an overspend of £1.509m, mitigated by savings and drawdown from Earmarked Reserves.

Customer Services:

·         Forecasting an underspend of £0.510m, slight decrease from Month 10.

Cultural Services:

·         Forecasting an underspend of £1.299m, slight increase from Month 10.

Regulatory and Operational Services:

·         Various underspends across Registration Services, Environmental Health, Bereavement Services, and Street Cleaning.

·         Open Spaces forecasting an overspend due to higher than anticipated costs.

Service Management Actions

·         Housing, Cultural Services, and Regulatory and Operations have implemented actions to absorb any overspends within their services.

The end of financial year position is not yet available but reporting of the underspend is expected to continue.  Service will aim to be using less reserves when setting next financial years budget. 

During the discussion, the following points were raised and responded to: -

Chris Hall confirmed that

·         although a budget may show an underspend, that saving may be moved to fill a gap or pressure elsewhere in the Council. It may also be the case that there is an expectation of a saving the council would make through devolving or transfer of the assets.

·         Devolution is a saving is to Somerset Council as we no longer provide those services and budgets have been updated to reflect that. 

·         Regarding Underspend – some of this can be forecasted ahead, for example, Directorate were aware there was too much money allocated in the Leisure budget so that will now be updated for next year’s financial year forecast.  That money will be taken out and moved to another service area. 

Sarah Dowden confirmed regarding income recovery from private sector housing income relates to charges around licencing.  The budget had sat in wrong place since vesting day so work was still ongoing to bring legacy council’s accounts in line.  Sarah agreed to respond with further detail.

Members raised concern regarding unfilled posts and savings attributable to those posts, are those savings sustainable if some of those posts were to be filled?  Chris Hall confirmed the Directorate had to consider if recruitment was necessary due to the large workforce restructure. They don’t intend to hold vacant roles deliberately and are aiming to populate the vacant roles however there are challenges to recruitment for certain areas.

Sarah Dowden confirmed that Markets have transferred to city, town and parish councils in the former Mendip Area.  They are anticipating 13,000 under achievement  ...  view the full minutes text for item 105.

To receive the presentation.

The committee received the presentation.

Chris Hall gave a presentation on HRA Housing – Landlord Housing Options Appraisal, this relates to the properties that Somerset Council are responsible for. Having inherited from the previous two stockholding district councils , there are currently two different ways of delivering services to those tenants, it could be considered more streamlined and beneficial for the tenants were there to only to be one.

Chris highlighted:

·         Somerset Council manages 10,356 homes within the Housing Revenue Account .

Ø  Homes In Somerset: Manages 4,157 homes.

Ø  SC’s In-House Service: Manages 6,199 homes.

·         Both services are performing well and do not require intervention however duplication as a result of having two organisations. They are effective in responding to changes despite their small size.

·         Opportunity: Review the two models of operation to consider a single landlord proposal for efficiency, aiming to simplify and standardize services across Somerset. Anticipated savings will support the HRA business plan and housing growth. The scope includes managing existing and future housing stock and responsibilities to leaseholders.

·         Review Goals: Not intended to save money for the council’s general fund or amalgamate with other housing providers. Savills finds Large Scale Voluntary Transfer not viable. Tenant engagement is not a referendum.

·         Options Appraisal: Review costs and performance standards, explore service provision gaps, understand tenant values, use a consultant for fair engagement, consider models for tenant requirements, assess risks and consequences, and provide a recommendation to the Council.

·         Tenant Engagement: Focus on outcomes, not models. Tenants have a say but not a vote. No change to property ownership, rents, or service charges. Some may experience a different brand. Other stakeholders will also be engaged.

·         Employee Communication: Inform employees about the options appraisal and update regularly. Formal consultation after direction is determined. Restructuring is inevitable for a combined service, with timing dependent on the model. Both likely outcomes will result in a TUPE transfer.

·         Possible Outcomes: Savills views stock transfer as not viable. The executive prefers stock retention. Likely options include moving the entire service in-house or to Homes in Somerset. Focus remains on retaining stock ownership with Somerset Council.

·         Project governance:  this project will be considered at Executive with Community Scrutiny also engaged.  It will be overseen by the Lead member and Chris Hall, whose role will be to oversee the delivery of the project to ensure that Somerset Council gets a model that is deliverable.

·         Next Steps:

Ø  Project Steering Group: Agree on the scope of work for consultants.

Ø  Procurement: Hire consultants.

Ø  Project Launch: Engage Tenants, Members, and Employees (early May).  All member briefing taking place next week.

Ø  Consultation: Begin non-key decision consultation.

Ø  Tenant Engagement: Conduct engagement during summer.

Ø  Consultants Report: Summarise engagement responses (Dec 2025).

Ø  Council Approval: Prepare report for approval (before April 2026).

Ø  Transition Planning: Plan transition to the new model.

Ø  HRA Business Plan: Update for 2026/27.

Ø  Transition: Implement during 2026/27.

During the discussion, the following points were raised and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 106.