Agenda and minutes

To receive any apologies for absence from Councillors.

Apologies were received from Councillor V Ricketts.

To receive information on any changes in the membership of the Committee.

Note – When a member of a Committee is unable to attend a meeting of a Committee or Sub-Committee, the relevant Political Group Leader (or their nominated representative) may, by notice to the Monitoring Officer (or their nominated representative) prior to the meeting, appoint a substitute member from within the same Political Group. The contact details on the front of this agenda should be used for notifications.

There were no substitute members.

Councillors are requested to declare any interests on items included in this agenda. Please refer to the workflow on the preceding page for guidance.

Declarations received will be reported at the meeting.

There were no declarations of interest made on this occasion.

To confirm and sign as a correct record the minutes of the Meeting held on 20 November 2024.

RESOLVED: that the minutes of the meeting held on Wednesday 20 November 2024 were approved as a correct record.

To receive any public questions, statements or petitions submitted in accordance with the Constitution. Further information on the requirements for submitting these is available to view at the following link:-

https://democracy.bcpcouncil.gov.uk/ieListMeetings.aspx?CommitteeID=151&Info=1&bcr=1

The deadline for the submission of public questions is mid-day Thursday 20 February 3 clear working days before the meeting.

The deadline for the submission of a statement is midday Tuesday 25 February the working day before the meeting.

The deadline for the submission of a petition is Tuesday 11 February 10 working days before the meeting.

There were no public issues on this occasion.

The Council’s constitution provides that Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) Committees may consider requests for work from a range of sources, including requests from Portfolio Holders, Cabinet and Council. 

The O&S Committee is asked to consider two requests for scrutiny recently made by Council and one request for scrutiny from a Portfolio Holder, and to determine these requests in line with the associated constitution procedure rules.

The Scrutiny Officer presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'A' to these Minutes in the Minute Book.

The Council’s constitution provides that Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) Committees may consider requests for work from a range of sources, including requests from Portfolio Holders, Cabinet and Council. 

The O&S Committee is asked to consider two requests for scrutiny recently made by Council and one request for scrutiny from a Portfolio Holder, and to determine these requests in line with the associated constitution procedure rules.

This item was discussed as part of the wider work plan item.

The items considered were as follows from Council:

• Van Life – Community Pact - To this end, the Council resolves to: develop a Community Pact, requesting that the Place and Environment OSC consider the detail, for all vehicle dwellers that will:

(a) Outline a clear plan to establish designated safe parking areas with access to basic amenities for van dwellers that will provide both permanent and temporary sites for vehicle dwellers and ensure that they have secure and legal places to stay.

(b) Meet anticipated future requirements and facilitate access to essential services such as healthcare, sanitation, and education, ensuring that all residents can live safely and healthily.

(c) Set up an ongoing forum for dialogue between local communities and travellers as a safe space in which discussion can take place and issues can be resolved quickly.

(d) Promote anti-discrimination policies that protect these communities from harassment and unfair treatment, whether by private individuals or public authorities, alongside the responsibility of all concerned to abide by existing laws and expectations.

• Climate and Nature - Request that the Environment & Place Overview & Scrutiny Committee determines a scrutiny process focused on the relevant key priorities within the Corporate Plan, with an emphasis on protecting the most vulnerable in society from the effects of climate change.’

The Portfolio holder submitted the following request

• Cliff and Coastal Erosion Management - Scrutiny suggestion raised by the Portfolio Holder following cliff slips in the BCP area over the last year, with a view to ensuring that the council is doing everything it can in relation to coastal management and managing the impact on our residents, visitors and the area as a whole.

There was discussion around these items from the Councillors and Portfolio Holders who submitted the request going into more detail around these.

RESOLVED that all items discussed be added to the work plan as above. 

To consider responses received from the Cabinet to recommendations made by the Overview and Scrutiny Board.

The presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'b' to these Minutes in the Minute Book.

RESOLVED that the responses from Cabinet were noted by the Committee.

This report presents the fifth annual update to Cabinet on progress towards commitments made in the BCP Council Climate and Ecological Emergency Declaration, made on the 16th of July 2019.

2023-24 progress against the main commitments is:

·       Make BCP Council and its operations carbon neutral by 2030 - scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions reduced by 8.6% from the 2019 baseline

·       Work with the wider community to make the region carbon neutral before 2045 – according to data released in 2024, total area-wide emissions for 2022 had reduced by 12.6% from the 2019 baseline.

The report also introduces new emissions dashboards to make progress transparent and presents draft Roadmaps that identify key decisions for consideration if targets are to be achieved.

The Portfolio Holder for Climate Response, Environment and Energy presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'C' to these Minutes in the Minute Book. The report presented the fifth annual update to Cabinet on progress towards commitments made in the BCP Council Climate and Ecological Emergency Declaration, made on the 16th of July 2019.

2023-24 progress against the main commitments is:

·       Make BCP Council and its operations carbon neutral by 2030 - scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions reduced by 8.6% from the 2019 baseline

·       Work with the wider community to make the region carbon neutral before 2045 – according to data released in 2024, total area-wide emissions for 2022 had reduced by 12.6% from the 2019 baseline.

The report also introduced the new emissions dashboards to make progress transparent and presented draft Roadmaps that identify key decisions for consideration if targets were to be achieved.  The report highlighted actions taken to date to reduce emissions.

The Council have had some successes and the case studies outline those, specifically Two Riversmeet Leisure Centre where there were large solar panels and heat pumps which were taking the load.

The Committee was given another demonstration of the new Climate Dashboard which was being updated regularly and was available for the public to review within the Sustainability Pages on the Website after the cabinet meeting. The Committee had previously had a briefing on this and had the opportunity to have a look at it and were informed that this had changed since then.

The Committee asked the Portfolio Holder if the Climate Reports could be made easily accessible from the home page of the BCP website to make it easier for the public to access.

A frequently asked questions button has been added to the homepage of the dashboard which is expected to be added too, as the dashboard progresses.  A feedback form had also been added to the page.

The dashboard had BCP and BCP Area sections, BCP Council covers the council Emissions and BCP area covers the area emissions.  

The data come from 2 different areas

• BCP council the data was the in-house data that the Council hold
• BCP area the government provides the data on the areas and sectors they select and want to report on.

The information was grouped as follows:

• Scope 1 – Energy
• Scope 2 – Fuel
• Scope 3 – Emissions from elsewhere.

It was reported to the Committee that the internal progress on carbon reduction was poor and services had been struggling to survive. Changing the fleet of vehicles to entirely electric would give savings in energy.

It was reported that the officers were not confident the Council would hit the 5 year target however the Committee noted that there were currently no yearly targets to measure this against.

The Chair thanked the Climate Team and IT for getting the dashboard together.

RESOLVED that

a)    The Committee propose to the Portfolio Holder  ...  view the full minutes text for item 38.

The BCP Housing Strategy was produced in 2021 and set priorities to be delivered over the following five years. Given the challenges in the economy and the housing market both locally and nationally, a review has been completed to consider delivery to date, key challenges, and what has changed since 2021. The review then considers how the Delivery Plan needs to adapt to ensure delivery against the strategy objectives is maximised.

This report outlines the proposed key changes to the Delivery Plan, which Cabinet is asked to approve. It also proposes a new Governance Structure to improve oversight and programme management of the Plan in its final stages.

The Portfolio Holder for Housing and Regulatory Services presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'D' to these Minutes in the Minute Book.

The BCP Housing Strategy was produced in 2021 and set priorities to be delivered over the following five years. Given the challenges in the economy and the housing market both locally and nationally, a review had been completed to consider delivery to date, key challenges, and what had changed since 2021. The review then considered how the Delivery Plan needed to be adapted to ensure delivery against the strategy objectives was maximised.

The report outlined the proposed key changes to the Delivery Plan, which Cabinet was asked to approve. It also proposed a new Governance Structure to improve oversight and programme management of the Plan in the final stages.

Best practice in other councils was looked at to understand what BCP Council could do better.  Bringing down the number of void days in BCP housing stock was priority.

The Committee was informed that there was a Housing Dashboard to show development against the strategy.

The Committee were informed that there was wealth inequality in the ages of people able to buy property due to it being unaffordable for different generations. 

The Portfolio Holder stated that they will be setting up a housing steering group once the paper has been to Cabinet in April.  The hope was that the steering group would contribute to the strategy.

RESOLVED that the Overview & Scrutiny Committee recommend to Cabinet that that the Housing Strategy Steering Group be comprised of one member from  each political group and one unaligned member.

Voting: Unanimous

The Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) Committee is asked to consider and identify work priorities for publication in a Work Plan.

The Scrutiny Specialist presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'E' to these Minutes in the Minute Book. The Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) Committee is asked to consider and identify work priorities for publication in a Work Plan.

Cllr Felicity Rice submitted a Scrutiny request on Play Streets  as follows:

·       ‘Please can the council update us on establishing a simple Play Streets Policy to BCP? A simple email/verbal update is enough – no need for significant report writing, I would prefer the time to be spent on getting a play street policy in place.’

RESOLVED that the Overview and Scrutiny Committee review, update and confirm its Work Plan, including the request for scrutiny submitted by a councillor at Appendix F. Regarding Appendix F Cllr Rice would communicate with the Transport team and would give a verbal update to the committee at the next meeting.

Voting: Unanimous

The date of the next meeting is Wednesday 2^nd April at 6pm.

The next meeting will be held on Wednesday 2 April 2025.