Agenda and minutes

Venue: This meeting will be held remotely. The meeting can be viewed live by pasting this link into your browser: https://youtu.be/OVrmS5kNGA0

Contact: Suzanne Bennett/Liz Knight, Governance Services - Telephone: 024 7697 2299/2644  E-mail:  suzanne.bennett@coventry.gov.uk/liz.knight@coventry.gov.uk

Items
No. Item

7.

Declarations of Interest

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interest.

8.

Minutes pdf icon PDF 317 KB

Minutes:

The minutes of the meeting held on 21st April 2021 were agreed as a true record. There were no matters arising.

9.

One Coventry Plan Annual Performance Report 2020-21 pdf icon PDF 298 KB

Report of the Chief Executive

 

Councillor Duggins, Cabinet Member for Policy and Leadership has been invited to the meeting for the consideration of this item

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Councillor G Duggins, Leader of the Council, introduced the item. The One Coventry Plan was an annual report to look at the progress of the Council against key indicators. The headline figures were that 70% had either got better or stayed the same over the year. This was a remarkable achievement considering the context of Covid-19 and the Leader was very proud of the work done by the Council to support the city, including Covid Marshalls, distribution of support grants to business and the Job Shop especially for supporting 1000 people to acquire employment over that period of time.

 

The Committee received a presentation which summarised the key points contained in the report.  This year, the report not only covered the current plan (2016-24), but also refreshing the plan to create greater alignment between the key themes and priorities that were emerging in the city and regionally, and the work that was undertaken across Council services and with partners.

 

This included Brexit; UK City of Culture; climate and sustainability; infrastructure projects.

 

As well as the overall performance the presentation focused on the three priorities in the One Coventry Plan. Under Globally connected there had been a decrease in a broad range of economic measures including GDP, business rates, employment and unemployment and city centre footfall. For Locally committed there had been challenges around crime to fly-tipping; demand for children’s services; missing education and adult social care indicators and Delivering our priorities. For Delivering our priorities there had been Improvements in a range of measures from self-service transformation to sickness absence and carbon emissions.

 

The Board was also presented with a timescale of next steps and activity including an All Members performance seminar on 9th September and the Refreshed One Coventry Council Plan.

 

Following the presentation, the Committee asked a number of questions and received the following responses:

 

·  There were 5 successful prosecutions, 11,444 notices and 124 fixed penalty fines for fly-tipping over the period. There were another 20 cases waiting to go to court. Figures for fly-tipping were on a decline with April showing a 30% on last year. Indicators were moving in the right direction.

·  A task and finish group had been set up by the Communities and Neighbourhoods Scrutiny Board to look at this issue in more detail, including the impact of residents having to book an appointment at the tip.

·  The indicators for condition of the road networks had been national indicators which were no longer required nationally but were continued to be used to measure road standards

·  The One Coventry Plan is not a statutory requirement, but something that the Council choses to do. The value is that the plan is a live document and enables Members to have an understanding of performance. There would be engagement with residents on their priorities as part of the refresh of the plan.

·  Life expectancy had gone in the wrong direction. Data on the gap in life expectancy between the highest and lowest areas of the city would  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9.

10.

Scrutiny Management Issues

Councillor N Akhtar, Chair of the Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee, attended the following meeting of the Cabinet Member for Housing and Communities on 11 June 2021. Councillor Akhtar agreed that the decision was urgent for the reason indicated and that call in should not apply:-

 

Acceptance of Grant Funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund towards the project to transform St. Marys Guildhall

 

The reason for urgency was that the next meeting of Cabinet was scheduled to meet the day after the grant agreement needed to be signed off under its expiry date.

 

Councillor Akhtar has also been invited to attend the meeting of the Cabinet Member for Jobs, Regeneration and Climate Change on 15th July to consider that the decision is urgent for the reason indicated and that call in should not apply:-

 

Surrender of Existing Lease and Simultaneous Re-grant of a New 150 Year lease in Relation to 49-51 Corporation Street 

 

The reason for urgency is that there is an urgent need to complete the surrender and regrant of a new 150 year lease for the property as this enables the third phase of Belgrade Theatre development plan to be completed and occupied. It is also important that as the majority of the £5m development cost for the whole scheme is coming by way of grant funding and that as the accountable body, the Council secures the grant funding outcomes agreed, of which phase 3 is part.

 

Also there is a desire to complete the works as soon as possible during the City of Culture year, enabling the maximum use of the new space. To this end Complex Development Projects (CDP) who own the long lease of the building, have commenced the refurbishment works for the Belgrade at risk. They are looking for payment from the Belgrade for the internal construction works as soon as possible. The Belgrade can’t get access the grant for this to pay CDP until the new lease is in place.

 

In accordance with the Constitution, these matters are reported to inform the Committee of the reasons for urgency.

 

Minutes:

The Committee noted that Councillor N Akhtar, Chair of the Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee, attended the meeting of the Cabinet Member for Housing and Communities on 11 June 2021. Councillor Akhtar agreed that the decision was urgent for the reason indicated and that call in should not apply:-

 

Acceptance of Grant Funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund towards the project to transform St. Marys Guildhall

 

The reason for urgency was that the next meeting of Cabinet was scheduled to meet the day after the grant agreement needed to be signed off under its expiry date.

 

Councillor Akhtar had also been invited to attend the meeting of the Cabinet Member for Jobs, Regeneration and Climate Change on 15th July to consider that the decision was urgent for the reason indicated and that call in should not apply:-

 

Surrender of Existing Lease and Simultaneous Re-grant of a New 150 Year lease in Relation to 49-51 Corporation Street 

 

The reason for urgency was that there was an urgent need to complete the surrender and regrant of a new 150 year lease for the property as this enables the third phase of Belgrade Theatre development plan to be completed and occupied. It was also important that as the majority of the £5m development cost for the whole scheme was coming by way of grant funding and that as the accountable body, the Council secures the grant funding outcomes agreed, of which phase 3 is part.

 

Also, there was a desire to complete the works as soon as possible during the City of Culture year, enabling the maximum use of the new space. To this end Complex Development Projects (CDP) who own the long lease of the building, have commenced the refurbishment works for the Belgrade at risk. They are looking for payment from the Belgrade for the internal construction works as soon as possible. The Belgrade couldn’t get access to the grant for this to pay CDP until the new lease is in place.

11.

Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee Work Programme 2021/2022 pdf icon PDF 267 KB

Report of the Scrutiny Co-ordinator

Minutes:

The Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee considered their Work Programme for the current Municipal year.

 

RESOLVED that the Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee note that an additional meeting had been arranged for 26th August 2021 to consider a report on Council subsidiaries. The meeting would be held in person.

12.

Any Other Items of Public Business

Any other items of public business which the Chair decides to take as a matter of urgency because of the special circumstances involved.

Minutes:

There were no items of public business