Agenda item

Report of the Cabinet Member Finance

Having declared an interest in this item Councillors McKinlay and Whyborn left the room and did not participate in the debate.

The Cabinet Member Finance introduced the report and explained that as part of this Council’s wider ambitions to support a thriving voluntary and community sector, the council enabled Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS) organisations to rent its properties through offering a rent support grant scheme.

She went on to explain that the current policy was adopted in 2010 as set out in paragraph 1.2 of the report and in March 2011 the assessment scheme was approved by Cabinet with five criteria to be met by applicants with a 20% discount available on each and an additional 20% if a registered charity.

The Cabinet Member reported that through this current policy 16 organisations had been supported with a value of £200K per year in rent subsidy. She highlighted that as the current assessment scheme was based on the council’s corporate priorities for 2010-11, the criteria did not reflect the current priorities of the Council. She explained that the key aim of this revision was to improve and create greater transparency in the assessment of rental subsidy grant submissions and the value added by the VCS organisations in helping to meet the council’s corporate strategy outcomes.

She emphasised that appropriate rent support to community-based organisations and services could support the viability of such organisations and the services they provided to the benefit of the social and economic well-being of the town.

With applicants being able to reach 120% rental discount under the current system, there was a sense that this new approach should be introduced which would enable any rent support grants to be more carefully targeted at those organisations that could demonstrate that they could deliver the best outcomes at best value to the tax-payer.

She asked Cabinet to consider a twin-phased approach. The maximum rent support grant that any organisation would be able to apply for would be 80% of their current market rent. The rent support grant scheme would not apply to those organisations where,for historical reasons, the rent had been set at less than market level.

That Cabinet retain discretion to award a further grant of 10%, bringing the maximum rent support grant that any organisation could receive to 90%. This would only be in exceptional cases and any such decision would only be taken after detailed consideration of the organisation’s financial and business case for the rent support.

The Cabinet Member stated that the report also set out proposals to update the assessment criteria so that it was more in-line with the council’s current priorities and those of its partnerships as set out in sections 3 . Section 4 and 5 of the report set out the new assessment process and principles. She informed that the Asset Management Working Group had been consulted and they resolved to support the recommendations to Cabinet.

The Leader added that this was a valuable policy to the community in terms of the services it provided to residents and not all local authorities had such a policy. He highlighted the rigorous process which had been adapted to the council’s objectives.

RESOLVED THAT

1.    the previous policy “Policy for Property lettings and disposals to the third sector, voluntary and community groups” (Agreed by Cabinet in July 2010) and the associated Assessment Tool and Matrix (Agreed by Cabinet in March 2011) be terminated from the date of this meeting.

2.    the updated Policy for Property Lettings and Disposals to the Third Sector, Voluntary and Community Groups, attached as appendix 2 be implemented as from the date of this meeting.

3.    a new assessment scheme (as detailed in this report and in appendix 3) be adopted for the award of rent support grants to VCS organisations from the date of this meeting.