Agenda item

The Leader of the Council explained that this item was being taken as urgent as there was concern with the existing cremators and the council could not afford to delay the programme to replace them. The option to take this as urgent had received the approval of the Chair of Overview and Scrutiny.

The Cabinet Member Clean and Green Environment introduced the report and firstly wished to put on record his thanks to the opposition for agreeing to this report coming as an urgent item and for officers for their hard work hard in achieving this.

The Cabinet Member reminded Members that in September 2015 Cabinet approved the principle of building a new crematorium on council-owned land to the east of the current cemetery and in October 2015 Council approved a total budget of to £7 443 100 for the proposed development of which £6.5 million of this budget was allocated to design and build. He reported that the pre-construction phase was fast approaching and Wilmot Dixon had been appointed as principal contractor and Pick Everard as project managers. He explained that there were two main issues :

1)    Site Access-the conclusions of the access options study were being considered by the programme team. The difficulty with  the existing network of routes within the cemetery was recognised as was the necessity for a temporary haul route to the south of the cemetery to facilitate construction vehicles to avoid disruption.

2)    It was important to future proof the new build which included car parking and landscaping and he wished to address the issue of a second new chapel which was currently outside the scope of the current programme. If a second new build chapel was built once the new facility was in operation this would be disruptive to the service (or even shut it down for a period of time). He was therefore proposing that a second chapel be included in the planning application for the new facility. He informed that the increase in costs of including the second chapel would be £460k which was substantially less than the original quote. 

It was therefore proposed by the project board that the scope of the programme be varied to take account of the wish to fully explore the potential for delivering a second chapel within the new development and to ensure that increased estimates relating to potential access road options could be accommodated within the original budget. The Cabinet Member highlighted that the existing buildings would not be redundant but their use in the future was uncertain which was why the view was not to let the funds allocated for their refurbishment lie idle when the funding could be reallocated to allow the project to move forward.

The Cabinet Member said serious consideration should be given to the views of the local funeral directors who supported the proposal for a second chapel. In view of population expansion both within the borough and beyond there would in any case be increased demand for the service.

In terms of seeking approval for the preparation of a business case to determine whether a second chapel should be constructed he said there were options which could be considered for the existing listed building such as a café or a place to hold wakes. He also believed that any sale proceeds from the nursery site should be ringfenced to the service.

Members supported the proposal and believed that the proposal that additional financial support be diverted to the new build development from finance originally identified for refurbishing the existing chapel was sensible. They recognised and welcomed the fact that the new build chapel would have 150 seat capacity with an additional capacity of 60-75 seats should a second chapel be built.

RESOLVED THAT

1.    the restructuring of the crematorium programme budget be approved and specifically that additional financial support be diverted to the new build development, from finance originally identified for refurbishing the existing chapels;

2.    the consequent change in scope of the programme as detailed in Section 2.7 be approved ;

3.    the preparation of a business case to determine whether a second new chapel should be constructed, as an integral component of the new crematorium development, as set out in Section 3 be approved;

4.    the assessed changes to the programme’s risk profile, as set out in Section 5 and Appendix 1 be noted.