Agenda item

To note the report from the Lead member for Environment and Climate Change.

The Leader of the Council, Councillor Bill Revans, introduced the report which included a summary of the key decisions taken by the Leader and Executive.

Member Questions were received from:-

·       Councillor Leigh Redman – Uncollected Council Tax

The questions and responses are attached to the minutes in Annex B.

The Council discussed the report and the following points were addressed to Lead Members:-

Leader of the Council

·       Concern was raised on the conflicting information given to the City, Town and Parish Councils for the devolution project.

Deputy Leader of the Council

·       Concern was raised that the funding for Spark had not been mentioned for next year.

The Lead Member advised that the finer details of the breakdown of funding would be included in the report going to the January meeting of Executive.

·       Councillors requested that the data on council tax collection rates be taken through Scrutiny.

The Lead Member agreed as there was a lot of data to process and would feed into a piece of work to monitor collection rates.

·       Councillors queried why City, Town and Parish Councils had been told to put their precepts up by a certain amount.

The Lead Member stated that City, Town and Parish Councils were sovereign councils and so therefore Somerset Council would not instruct on how much to raise the precept by.

Lead Member for Adult Services

·       Councillors queried the costs associated with Europe Newton and whether they were related to transformation and within the budget calculations.

The Lead Member advised that transformation was part of the scrutiny function, the costs were part of the budget and so far they were on track to make savings.

Lead Member for Communities, Housing and Culture

·       Concern was raised on the Octagon Theatre and the process followed for its closure.

The Lead Member advised that work was being carried out to investigate if the theatre could be reopened, the closure process was based on the business case.

·       Councillors requested that the Lead Member talked to Yeovil Town Council to give them an update on the work.

·       Councillors highlighted that Community Scrutiny had received an update on homelessness and prevention and concern was raised that if there was a reduction in funding, it would impact on the service.

The Lead Member agreed that there was a housing crisis in Somerset, with figures increasing and lack of support from Central Government. She urged councillors to keep using the scrutiny function to raise the topic.

The Chair called for a vote to extend the meeting by 30 minutes.  The vote was taken and carried.

The Council discussed the report and the following points were addressed to Lead Members:-

Lead Member for Transformation and Human Resources

·       Councillors queried how many officers worked a reduced week, as they had received an out of office email advising them the officer only worked 4 days.

The Lead Member advised that the Council was not proposing a 4-day work week, this would have been due to the officer working a part time contract.

The Council noted the report.