Issue - meetings

Discussion paper of the Cabinet Member Sustainability

The Cabinet Member Sustainability introduced the report as circulated with the agenda.  The report informed members of progress on the garden redesign and consultation process and the Cheltenham Festival proposals for Imperial and Montpellier Gardens. The intention was for the designs, together with feedback from the consultation and today’s Council Debate to be reported back to Cabinet for a decision at the end of July. If approved by Cabinet, phase 1 of the works would be worked up in more detail and more accurate costings obtained. Planning and listed building consent would be applied for where required with a view to works being undertaken during this coming Autumn and Winter.

During the debate that followed, Members acknowledged that the festivals were vital for Cheltenham and the council needed to support them. However the gardens were an iconic part of Cheltenham which had been there long before the festivals and needed to be protected. It was accepted that the balance between the festivals and the gardens was a difficult issue to resolve but it was a very important issue to the people of the town and therefore they should have the have the biggest say.

Councillor Malcolm Stennett, as the Chair of Economy and Business Improvement Overview and Scrutiny Committee (EBI), raised particular concerns about the involvement of overview and scrutiny in the process. Whilst he supported the festivals he had seen no proper business plans. On 7 March 2011, EBI had requested a report on the issue but the paper had been light weight and contained no economic information.  Consequently the committee had passed two resolutions. Firstly the committee had recommended that Cabinet receive additional economic and financial information in order for them to be in a position to assess the benefit of implementing changes to the town centre parks in an endeavour to meet the requirements of Cheltenham Festivals. Along with the proposed options consideration should also be given to maintaining the status quo and / or using areas at the racecourse or in Pittville Park. Secondly the committee requested that they be involved in reviewing the economic aspects during the next stage of the consultation and receive a detailed report on the options with a full financial breakdown when it is available.

The Cabinet Member Sustainability had received a reminder in May that EBI were expecting this report at their July meeting. The response received had been disappointing as the Cabinet Member had refused EBI’s request for the second time saying that he saw no benefit in officers spending time preparing the information requested. As chair of EBI, he had insisted that a report was received at their next meeting on the 18 July so that O&S comments could be fed into the Cabinet meeting on the 26^th of July.   He would continue to press for this report.

Councillor Stennett concluded that it was exceedingly worrying that work was proceeding without giving due consideration to the full financial aspects of  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9