Agenda and minutes

Councillor Murch

Councillors Murch, Hay and Ryder had given their apologies.  Councillor Sudbury substituted for Councillor Hay.   

No interests were declared. 

21 September 2015

The minutes of the last meeting had been circulated with the agenda.

Councillor Sudbury highlighted that her name featured twice in the list of attendees.  This would be amended. 

The Chairman advised that Councillor Ryder had asked that her request that a member of the opposition from each partner be permitted a seat on the Joint Committee, be referenced under the 2020 Vision item (Agenda Item 10).  The minutes would be updated accordingly. 

Upon a vote it was unanimously

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on the 21 September 2015, as amended, be agreed and signed as an accurate record.

None had been received.

No matters had been referred to the committee.

None of the county scrutiny groups have met since the last meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee (21 September)

There had been no meetings of countywide scrutiny groups since the last meeting of this committee. 

Councillor McCloskey did however, explain that one of the Independent Members of the Police and Crime Panel had sadly passed away after a long period of illness.  Two candidates had been interviewed but neither had been considered suitable and as such another advertisement would be placed in the coming weeks.  She asked that members promote this role to people that had an interest in the policing of the County and confirmed that full training would be provided.    

An update from the Cabinet on key issues for Cabinet Members which may be of interest to Overview and Scrutiny and may inform the O&S workplan

The Leader provided a brief update on 2020 vision since the Council meeting the previous week.  He confirmed that all four partners had now agreed the key principles and work was now progressing on devising a timetable for the new services, which he noted did not include GO Shared Services and ICT which would form part of 2020 from the 1^st April 2016.  He reminded members that a cross-party group had been established to look at various aspects and that this would include involvement in service design. 

The Chairman advised that it had been suggested that scrutiny look at customer focus as a particular issue and voiced his preference that this be reviewed by the entire committee rather than by a Scrutiny Task Group.  The Leader assured members that the cross-party group would be looking at this very issue, among other things, but was comfortable that O&S may want to look at particular areas in more detail.

Discussion paper of the Allotments Officer (no decision required)

The Green Space & Allotment Officer introduced the draft Allotments Strategy 2015 (Growing Places). The strategy considered supply and demand for allotments in Cheltenham now and since 2005, as well as feedback from a customer satisfaction survey, to which a third of allotment holders (247) responded in early 2015. An action plan set out proposed activities for five key areas: allotment management; infrastructure, protection, provision and health & safety. One proposal was for the option to use some of the money currently set aside for new allotment provision for allotment site improvements (site security, health & safety and provision for disabled gardeners) instead. She explained that overall, those allotment holders that responded to the survey, were satisfied with the service provision, with 83% considering it to be good or very good. The main issue that was identified as a result of the survey was the need for additional security measures at two sites, where 60% of allotment holders had been the victims of crime in the last 5 years. Feedback on rent was that it was now at the upper level of what some people would be willing to pay.

The Cabinet Member Clean and Green Environment felt that allotments provided a significant public service to residents across the town as well as representing great value and that the high level of satisfaction with the service was, in no small part, thanks to the work of the Green Space and Allotment Officer. He hoped that Councillors appreciated that the things had changed drastically since allotments were reviewed by a task group in 2012, when media coverage had resulted in an inflated waiting list; the position was rather different now. The strategy had already been considered by the Allotments Association, it would be considered by Cabinet in November and this was an opportunity for scrutiny to make any comments or suggestions.

The following responses were given to member questions;

· Clearly the Cabinet Member Finance would prefer that allotments were self-financing but in reality rent covered approximately 80% of the direct cost of the allotment service (water rates, Allotments Officer, etc) and legal advice was that rents were at the upper level of what the council could legally charge. There was an argument that allotments were a form of leisure service and other leisure services and recreational areas were funded by the council. It was estimated that 6-7k people were benefiting from allotments across the borough.

· Legal advice was that the council had no statutory obligation to provide anybody living in a parished area with an allotment. In spite of this the council had always accepted applications from people living in parishes but this became an issue 4-5 years ago but actioned more recently 2-3yrs ago, when the waiting lists were at their longest, these people were accepted onto the waiting list on the basis that priority could be given to those living in non-parished areas. As mentioned before the waiting list had now drastically reduced and this was no longer an issue  ...  view the full minutes text for item 8.

Report of the Cheltenham Spa Railway Station scrutiny task group, to be presented by Councillor Roger Whyborn as Chairman of the task group (see recommendations)

Councillor Whyborn introduced the STG report as circulated with the agenda.  He had considered it a privilege to Chair the group as well as being some of the most interesting work he had undertaken in his time as a councillor.  He felt it was important to highlight some key events between September 2014 and July 2015, by which time the group had concluded its review, before talking through the recommendations.  First Great Western (FGW) were awarded an extension of 3.5 years  to the London service franchise by the Department for Transport (DfT) and as such the ambition for the task group to better understand the franchise renewal process was superseded by events.  Then in late 2014, the Western Route Study, published by Network Rail, which included proposals for an enhanced train service from Cheltenham to London; it was subsequently announced that there would be an hourly service to Paddington from Cheltenham in 2017/18 and a longer term objective for journey times to Paddington of below 2 hours.  The task group devised a motion which was considered and passed by Council in December 2014 and was duly submitted as a response to the consultation.  The task group met with representatives from Network Rail and FGW in March 2015 and were able to press upon them the perceived priorities for Cheltenham’s train service and the station itself. 

In descending order he offered a brief explanation to each of the recommendations of the task group.  The group accepted that not everything could be categorised as a priority and with this in mind had devised recommendation 3, which set out a number of matters which the group felt it was important were kept in mind in future.  The group acknowledged with concern, that a consequence of increased services to London would be an increased pressure on the rail network and the need to terminate additional trains at Cheltenham, putting significant pressure on the single siding.  It was important to note that Network Rail had, for the first time, recognised that there was an issue at Cheltenham.  The task group supported the proposal for 2 bay platforms, not as the only solution, but as the only solution that had been developed at this time.  Recommendation 1 identified the major issues and some of the limitations of Cheltenham Station. Passenger numbers had doubled since the 1990’s and once they exceeded 2 million the station would be put into another Category and this would pose issues, especially to non-able bodied passengers.  He referred members to Appendix 2 of the STG report, a letter from Clare Perry MP at the DfT.  He stressed that though this could easily be perceived as a case of ‘job done’, it should be noted that whilst a significant programme of investment and improvements was planned, not all allocation of monies was complete and therefore there were no guarantees as to if; how; or indeed when the improvements would happen.  He suggested that the reference to devolution would have been more  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9.

Report of the Cycling and Walking scrutiny task group, to be presented by Councillor Max Wilkinson as Chairman of the task group (see recommendations)

Councillor Wilkinson, Chairman of the scrutiny task group, introduced the report, as circulated with the agenda. He felt that there were legitimate reasons for the review, given the need to reduce congestion and improve air quality within the borough. National and internationally renowned experts including John Mallows of Cheltenham & Tewkesbury Cycling Campaign and Bronwen Thornton of Walk21 were co-opted onto the group, which held a series of meetings and heard evidence from a range of people including Officers from Cheltenham Borough and Gloucestershire County Councils. Members of the group also organised a seminar on 20’s plenty (a national campaign to reduce speed in urban areas) and undertook a site visit to Bristol to witness, first hand, examples of good practice in cycling infrastructure and promotion. He accepted that none of the recommendations alone would solve the issues facing cycling and walking but felt that collectively they would go some way. He took this opportunity to thank Tess Beck, who had recently left Democratic Services, for her hard work and enthusiasm throughout the review.

Councillor Wilkinson, along with the Townscape Manager, gave the following responses to member questions;

· All members of the task group agreed that it was not ideal for cyclists and pedestrians to share footpaths but opinion was split about whether cyclists should be permitted on the Promenade and high street in Cheltenham. Councillor Wilkinson's opinion was that both were wide enough to not pose the same problem as cycling on pavements, provided cyclists were responsible.

· The Townscape manager felt that the problem with high street was that there were a number of regimes; some areas permitted vehicles, cycles or neither and some even permitted buses and his general feeling was that there was a need for some consistency. As part of the considerations of the Cheltenham Transport Plan, thought would be given to what to include about cycling. Those that argued that cycling should be permitted throughout did so on the grounds that there would always be someone that would break the rules but that the majority would not.

· The Transport Plan proposed that the regime for buses would remain unchanged except for a possible route across the front of Boots, which would equate to a length of 5-10 metres only. There was a lot of evidence that the more that you segregated drivers from their surroundings, with railing for example, the faster they would drive and railings severely disadvantaged pedestrians.

· The argument for ‘no helmets’ was a view that was held strongly by cycling groups, in an effort to normalise cycling and make it a more attractive proposition to a broader range of people. The task group were not suggesting that cyclists should be advised not to wear helmets but rather that any promotional images should feature cyclists without helmets rather than presenting a stereotypical image of cyclists wearing helmets and hi-vis clothing.

· Evidence suggested that lower speed limits reduced congestion and it was a fact that the impact of a collision at 20mph was far reduced  ...  view the full minutes text for item 10.

DRAFT Devolution STG one page strategy (for approval)

DRAFT Broadband STG one page strategy (to follow)

The Democracy officer referred members to the update which had been circulated with the agenda.  She confirmed that given that the committee had endorsed the final reports and recommendations of the Cheltenham Spa Railway Station and Cycling & Walking STGs, that there were only two remaining active STGs; Devolution and Broadband. 

Devolution – the STG had met for the first time on the 12/10 and devised a draft One Page Strategy.  This document had been circulated with the agenda and the committee were being asked to approve it, which it did.  The STG were scheduled to meet again on the 29/10 and hoped to be in a position to give their initial views direct to the special Council meeting which had been arranged for 16/10.

Broadband – members were reminded that they had chosen not to set ambitions or outcomes for the review given that this was to be a joint scrutiny group with members from Gloucester City Council.  She explained that the group had met for the first time on the 20/10 but having had a presentation from Fastershire on the current position, the group had been unable to agree any ambitions for the review until they had considered more evidence.  As such, there was no draft One Page Strategy for the committee to approve at this time.  This would follow in due course. 

The Chairman reiterated that there may be an item relating to 2020 and customer focus and that this would be scheduled accordingly. 

30 November 2015

The next meeting was scheduled for Monday 30 November 2015.