Environment Committee - Thursday 23 November 2023, 7:30pm - Wandsworth Council Webcasting
Environment Committee
Thursday, 23rd November 2023 at 7:30pm
Speaking:
An agenda has not been published for this meeting.
Disclaimer: This transcript was automatically generated, so it may contain errors. Please view the webcast to confirm whether the content is accurate.
Good evening, everybody, thank you very much for coming to the Town Hall this evening and welcome to the meeting my name is Councillor Gilbert and I am the Chair of the Environment Committee.
welcome to those in the public gallery as well, thank you for coming, so members of the Committee I will now call your names in alphabetical order, please switch on your microphone to confirm your attendance once you've confirmed your attendance.
please remember to switch off your microphone so in alphabetical order, Councillor Apps, please.
Councillor routes, Shaftesbury and Queenstown ward, welcome Councillor Coakley.
Councillor Coakley's St Mary's Ward.
welcome, Councillor Cook, good evening.
welcome Councillor, Geoffrey, good evening, welcome Councillor Mayorkas, welcoming Councillor White Cadogan.
we also hear Councillor Brook.
I'm so sorry, you're not in my name is quite a right for you, but you are nonetheless welcome, I do apologise.
senior, thank you very much also are here with me, is Councillor Gasser, as the Cabinet Member for the Environment.
Good evening, everybody.
and I'll ask the officers introduced themselves later, as we worked through the papers and when they are called on to present their reports, if that's OK, we don't have any apologies, but we do have we have a Councillor attending via teams from home this evening, it's Councillor Sutter's.
thank you, Chair yeah, Councillor Salter, she's not on teams at the moment, but if she does arrive she'll be able to participate in the debate under standing order 66, A which will permit her to participate in the debate, but not the vote, and shall be counted as an apology for the purposes of the minute, thank you Chair.
thank you, Mr. Whelan.
so the first order of business is to look at the merits of the last meeting which took place on the 14th of September, and I've got a printed copy of those here, and I'll just ask members, are there any objections to confirming those minutes as a correct record I'm not seeing any hands so I think that's agreed can I hear an agreed from someone please,
thank you,
just gonna pass these to the officers, and so second point on our agenda this evening is declarations of interests. Thank you. Are there any declarations of either pecuniary, other registrable or non-registered able interests,
can I see hands, Councillor White go ahead, please, a member of a community renewable energy once with a crew, but I don't draw any financial renumeration or benefit in any guidance, thank you, Councillor White, are there any other declarations of interest?
no, thank you very much, colleagues, so the third issue for this evening is we are going to review the agenda,
the order of off papers this evening because we have received a deputation in relation to agenda item 5 and in light of that, and the number of
members of the public present for this item, I'm going to propose that we reorder the agenda and consider the deputation, and that agenda item first, as the first substantive item tonight is is that agreed by everybody.
thank you very much, colleagues, so that means that we are starting, please, with paper number 23.
3 9 8 which is outcome of consultation on proposed Parkrun apostasy park, and I'll just say before we start, if I may, that.
one of the officers who is here to speak to that paper this evening, it's actually her first appearance at the Environment Committee and she's very welcomes that Ms Shira, the shearer, is our leisure and culture contract manager and has been doing a lot of work on this matter and thank you very much for coming this evening.
so at this point I will ask the committee to receive a deputation from Ms Blair on behalf of local residents and businesses, to be heard in connection with paper number 23 3 9 8.
Ms Bingham, would you like to come forward to the table and and tell us about your deputation, please, thank you so much.
the seat at the end has or has a speaker that we think work so hopefully that's a good start, so please do make yourself comfortable. You have up to five minutes to address the committee and then, if you wouldn't mind staying in your seat, we might have a few questions for you, please. So whenever you're ready, please go ahead, so I hope you can hear me. Thank you very much indeed. My name is Jan Springer and I am speaking on behalf of a number of interested local community, people and residents who live in around Battersea Park. I am the Chair of your mansions Prince of Wales Drive, which is a building of over what's 119 families live there at 119 flats and we are, and I have had many concerns regarding
how we could help with the deputation in terms of the consultation that you had, and we were very interested to learn what was going on in the park.
very briefly, I just wanted to say I did write to many of you, maybe not the ones that are here.
but Mr. Mitchell was unable at the beginning when we heard that the park was considering this and I got no response whatsoever, and I'd like that recorded, it is in my note and I'm sure you will have read it, so I don't necessarily have to repeat myself.
the community around Battersea Park local residents feel very strongly that this particular activity we also would agree with. We love people running, we love people enjoying the park. We have no reason whatsoever to not want it to be open to all and sundry, especially young families and children, and we see even with Battersea Park power station that more more people are coming into the park. However, we do have some reservations and I wanted to point them out to you very briefly. I have only got five minutes, so please tell me, it's it's 1943 now so do shout if I overrun, but I appreciate the opportunity of having this conversation with you and obviously I can answer questions if, if you want the main, I think I think from our point of view is that,
we think that this whole question of the consultation paper possibly is a done deal, and that possibly enabled have put themselves in a very awkward situation which we understand they're in, because they will have to deal with the outcome of our actually having a this run where they do not know the numbers of people who will come.
there are, if you look at the consultation process, there will be parts of Battersea Park which will be shut for a period of time, peak time, Saturday and Sunday.
and, more importantly, which we've found, surprisingly, is that the local stakeholders, people like the poetry, cafe, I don't know how many of you actually know Battersea Park, whether you've been in there, go ape, there's various many facilities put in the park, none of those people have been actually consulted as to how this will affect their businesses.
I've got deputations from those people, one in particular poetry who have written today to me and to other people who are interested in the situation that we find ourselves in, to ask the Council why.
you have taken the view to ask people about running and we can all agree we love it and in fact we have many, many races, which I voted. My note to you all about people running and have been for many, many years, whether it's J P Morgan 5 mile races, 10 mile races, all sorts of things going on for children and everything no one is against that, but all of those activities are done without the park having to close any part of the park, whether it's a children's playground, whether it's a car park for a limited period of time, but every week I think the the question I would have is, do you feel as a council, and I know I can't ask this, so you don't have to answer me, but I'm going to ask the question anyway, do you feel, as a council that you have the adequate information based on this grossed up
paper where you've actually gone out, somebody has done the research you've looked at the whole entire population of people who might want to fund Ryan and enjoy running, and then you come back saying Well, we've we've spoken to local people as it's quite clear that that hasn't happened and you haven't spoken to local people, and so I think what we're looking at is is this actual consultation paper, have you got sponsor bias, is there bias? Where is the transparency? In my particular situation? I have not seen anything about the response they have had no response to what I wrote. We would like an independent audit and we would like this review to be reviewed before you make any decision and have a strategic strategy scrutiny of what's been going on because we think from the council's point of view, you are going to have lots of people who are going to want to have compensation for their lack of business, because at first thing every Saturday and every Sunday morning, if you walk round the park. If it's a nice day or live in a nice day, you will have people in there wanting to go, have coffee wanting to take their children and then the moment the gates are open, people are in that park enjoying the PA as a park. You've got lots and lots of other areas where you have this fun run, which goes on two miles three miles down the road. You've got a lot
and I cannot see why you need to have it in a park Battersea Park where things are not open spaces and where there would be a lot of congestion, both in terms of car parking, because, as I have written to one of your colleagues, which is also in my document to you Steve Lane, which is one of your count, people who worked with you I we already reported the impossible situation we find ourselves along the Princess Royal Drive with regard to parking because of the 25,000 new homes which have been built with people coming to and from Battersea Power Station, so we've got toilet issues, we've got parking issues, we've got security issues because there's hardly any police evidence during the week or at the weekends and we feel have your part run doing it for a week, do it for a month, but don't do it
every week, every Saturday, every Sunday and the children's run, although you say it's just children, but the children don't come on their own, they come with parents and there's going to be a lot of traffic, I'm not sure that your due diligence is up to much transparency or scrutiny and that's what I would ask you to consider with respect.
Ms Springer, thank you very much, so there's just over five minutes, but sorry no, that's absolutely fine, I let you go on, so thank you very much for that, I think there'll be a few questions for you now from members of the committee and then we will hear from the Cabinet Member and we'll hear from officers
so I will look for hands around the table to ask some questions, Councillor meerkats, please go ahead.
thank you very much for your detailed, our deputation and thanks for coming this evening. First question, I suppose, is you outline some of the problems that you foresee with Parkrun? Do you have any examples of those problems in other parkruns in the borough or wider that you've encountered us by well anyone else? As far as I am aware, there are lots of other part runs in an open spaces. I think the difference between this Parkrun and the part runs that are in, for instance, in Tooting or in Clapham Common is that they are open and people can come and go there. Isn't the problem, they don't have a big shopping centre, with 25,000 people living there which haven't been there before. I don't know if you know Prince of Wales Dr, but it's a tiny road with bumps, for instance, when you have the Battersea power station, a big firework party which is lovely you have it on two nights now because of Covid and you want the second night to be for children, you have to shut the roads this place, is it's pandemonium, but it's great fun, but that's the difference between this part run and other part runs. We're not against the idea of people running because they come all the time into the park and we'd love having all sorts of visitors from all around the world. The question is is that you're asking it to be a closed shop, and I understand from the other races which go on in the park that they've been told that if part run happens that they will no longer be able to use Battersea Park, so it is a closed shop and I think that's quite serious if you're not aware of that, that's something that you ought to consider.
Councillor McHugh's de do go ahead and, and I think some of these specific points will also be addressed by officers when we so it is a slightly odd order of things in a way, because we'll hear from officers after we've heard from you but Councillor Milk has to do go ahead with a supplementary thanks. Do you have any indication or evidence that 4 again from other park runs that people that attend them do tend to drive flows, that an evidence base is high? So just to question him, I've got to just say I say, do you have any evidence that those who drive in? Secondly just interested in the idea of a closed shop if if occasional runs can't do it because there's a run happening every week and based on the evidence
they are anticipating about 1 to 2000 people in the adult one every week, as a layman to me, that would indicate that that's more open, because you've got tens of thousands of people over a year as opposed to a run that you might have to pay for or that you might have to raise money for charity for to meet the criteria so I was just interested to dive into that little bit as well.
well, I can I can give you a little bit about.
what I had written originally about other runs, and I think that the the thing which I think is important from my perspective is that.
the Clapham Common Parkrun.
he organised the suggesting their actual, I did some desktop research, I can't say to you, I've been to every family and around the country because I haven't IB lie, but the Clapham Common part run the organise suggested runners parking Sainsbury's car park.
obviously I know Judy we've had a nice conversation with her and she was saying what she hopes everybody walks will we hope everybody walks, but they don't and our fear, and I actually spoke to Steve Lane on a number of occasions to do with Battersea power station he was even completely unaware of the part run and the ramifications to the facility.
and in Sainsbury's car park. The cost for 2 hours is a pound per hour and it's open from 7 to 11, just so that you're where Prince of Wales Drive which is borders. The park is the only area that is free parking at weekends. It's an anomaly which we wanted to clear up since Effie races, which hasn't happened, although we've made representation to Steve Lane, and he said he was going to get Battersea Power Station to actually do a review or a survey of traffic, but he hasn't been able to share that with us and I'm not sure it's even happened. So the parking is a significant issue. So the you know, we've got lots of races which go on are literally just a few miles away, they're not very far away there haven't been, you know, you haven't got to go far to find them and in fact one of our colleagues was very kindly given us some information which I received today. This is about part rounds, which started out the answer to your question. This has come from the director called David Beam issues put in the park and he said at the part runs of which there are seven in the vicinity of Battersea Park. They are Clapham Wimbledon, Tooting Common Richmond 0 dear Brockwell and Fulham Palace, Road per fullest Fulham Palace Park, sorry have one thing in common, large, open spaces suitable for a five kilometre run
Battersea Park does not have that space and would need to close parts of the park in none of the above does any part or park off or common clothes, so that is a big distinction between us and any of the other areas in this vicinity.
other other questions, Councillor White good.
yeah, thank you for your submission and for the answer as well, I think you've covered a lot of the areas very well, but I want you to know about the businesses you say the businesses will be impacted well it would surprise Glass, so I can offer you sorry, yes, carry on and,
bringing a lot of people to the area, surely the businesses will benefit from that.
but you would think so if you finish yeah well, I think the thing is, I I've only come into this for the last few days, although I did do this letter originally, but the businesses that we spoke to, which was put in the park, the Cafe Pesce per,
cafe, they haven't been.
consulted and we've spoke tonight to one of your colleagues here who kindly gave us some time with Jude Judi and they said they were going to concert consult with them after if there had been a decision to do this now it seems a bit of a strange way round because these people they cannot have the part shut in any way because early morning they have their deliveries on Saturday and Sunday of food of services of rubbish going in rubbish going out and they are very concerned and in fact I've got a letter here which came from Pier Street Cafe.
sorry, the pair Cafe.
which was a or an amendment or a addendum to the deputation, who are absolutely horrified because they believe that they will lose business. It was contrary to what you might think, that's in your papers, I won't read it, but basically they've believed that they start 7 30. They're open well before the runs start, so if they cannot get in and cannot get out with all their third, and this is prime time Saturdays and Sundays they don't see it as a money earning income, they actually see it as
lack of income, and they will be looking to the Council for.
restitution,
they would actually be wanting to, they obviously have signed a contract with the Council to have a. Do you know whether it's a cafe petri cafe or whatever putting the park go ape, and it's based on so many days of being open, but what you're actually asking it to be done is that this thing starts at 8.00 or whatever the time as it finished is 11, so it's three hours now they're not all gonna go off home, especially if you've got children, they're gonna want to run around or whatever they want to do, which is great, but it means there's a lot of disruption in the park because the part of the park is shut, and that means six hours peak time for all the people who actually have already offered drinks sandwiches, breakfasts and all sorts of things meeting
they will lose that six hours of business and they will be want to be compensated for that, so actually, I think, from the council's point of view there may be problems and if I had been the decision maker on that I would have wanted to have spoken to those people and found out what they actually thought B rather than doing it this way round which is to ask everybody gross it all up to a total population of the country not weighted towards the local community not asking the local,
people who work in in and have cafes if you come to either, if you've been to the pot, but is the lack of toilet facilities, and the poetry Cafe can have over 600 people in the autumn and sometimes in the morning and people are hiking people walking people doing all sorts of things, so I agree with you he ought to have been a money earner, it could have been if it had been handled differently but it hasn't been handled differently.
so what I'm gonna suggest, as I take two more questions, because then I I actually think what we really need at this stage is to hear from officers about the the the issues that you've raised if if that if that suits colleagues, because I I do know that there are a lot of issues that you've brought out, that officers have have very sound answers to, in particular around the consultation, so I've seen Councillor Cook and then I'll take Councillor Apps and then if it's OK, I will move on to hearing from the Cabinet Member and from officers, so Councillor Cook and then Councillor Apps, please
for thank you very much for the presentation and the note, and I've just noticed coming after the summary about your note, most are very well written, it's actually longer than the paper itself, so I don't think I've ever seen that before maybe we will return to it may I may I ask you about the consultation, can we just be completely clear about how people were informed about this how they were asked about it?
the the sort of level of awareness is what I'm interested in residents, and particularly the businesses in the park, because I'm acutely conscious, and I I used to have this portfolio my health myself some years ago, the Battersea Park is a connoisseur of delicate balance.
very, very tight space and we've worked very hard to get, in particular the the the cafe location to work well, and it is now working well, think the current set-up is very good, but it hasn't been like that yeah certainly in recent memory it's really struggled, so I really worry about that how how aware were the businesses and how were they well informed the
I can say that in terms of the it's a good point and thank you for raising it, but the this must have been the best kept local secret, I mean I want my dog four times a day and I was an idiot I would go round and round and round and I've never saw one notice I didn't see it on the outside I didn't see it anywhere but where I did see it once was he was playing in where the the circular where we have the lovely little pavilion and there was one little notice
and that was it, so I thought That's weird, so I went back and I spoke to some people. Obviously I live in a bunch of blocks who are cheek by jowl and I said, did you know that there was going on? No, no, did you know, it was going on no, no, no, and before we knew where we were, I found out that most people haven't got a clue now that actually also is putting the park, it's everybody, because there were so few notices, in fact some of my colleagues or Doreen Balding, as a co-director of of York Mansions, she has got a good line with Mr. Mitchell. She's been
working with him to try and improve, loos and rubbish collection, all sorts of things, and so he somebody she asked and more notices were put out, but that was done literally like a week before the consultation period was almost to end.
and I wrote on the 27th of June my letter in good time and got absolutely nothing, so it is clear that people just did not know that this was going on, Peartree Cafe were unaware up until we went to s, we had him we it's just as this is all happening it sounds ridiculous, but by chance on Monday we had a cup of coffee with each other for us.
at the latest behind me and Jamie and with dogs, and it happened that the owner of the Peartree Cafe found out about it and she has written and put a supplementary question. So there's been no consultation and it is embarrassing because I don't think that's the way the Council would want to work. Having looked at the consultation document, of which there are many many pages, yes, you had an independent, I don't know how independent research company you've got volumetric information about do like running. Of course, everybody would say yes to that. What do you think about part runs great everybody thinks it's a great idea
all around the country, which I can quite understand why you might like to do it, but it's diluted the voice of the community which you serve and which we pay rates towards and which we we are proud of our park. We want people to come into it, but not in this way. This is this, from our point of view, this document, of which you have got many, many pages, with all sorts of graphs showing all sorts of different things, gives you just a very, very holistic idea. Yes, people want to run, but when you look deeper into it and I read it this afternoon,
the detail about the local community and what they think is completely absent, then thank you, Ms Springer, and I know we will come on to the how the consultation was run when we speak to officers, I'm gonna take one more question from Councillor Apps and then we will hear from officers about how the consultation was right. Thank you, Councillor apps go ahead,
thanks so much and thanks for coming, it's good to hear your perspective, I'm really interested, because I I don't live as near Battery Park as you do, but.
re interested in the perception that there's other park runs nearby.
so, from a perspective of someday, living in just off Battersea Park Road, for example, may be in Dodington Rollo estates, on battlefields estates.
how long do you think it would take them to walk to the Clapham Common, where they're all they'd like to? I mean they're not very far away from each other in my document, just so that you're aware Clapham Common is 1.5 miles from Battersea Park, so I mean even I I mean I want that with my dog just going round the park, so it's not far, it's all walking distance. Well, if I could just say like I come from Shaftesbury estate, it takes me 22 minutes to walk to Battersea Park. I'm kind of pretty much equidistant between the two. It's not that quick, it's pretty quick if you're a driver, but if you're like a family and you are wanting to get somewhere, I think we all know, when you're when you're walking as a family, you know that that's isn't it's not so accessible and it's not on your doorstep and actually making sure we've got healthy activities for people on their doorstep is actually part of what we want to do as a council. Would you be willing to see, you know, I mean, obviously you, you'll see as well as everybody else you know how it goes, and perhaps you could feed back to us about what the process or how you find the process as it goes along. I think I think that's being totally presumptuous if you think that people are actually going to drive because they can't walk 1.5 miles I you just answered my one fear, or one of many fears that we haven't got the room, the width, the anything to be able to take on more cars. You've just said the very thing that I just had a
Judy say No, we what we don't want people to to to to drive, we want people to walk, so I think is a very confused message and I don't think that you can seriously suspect that one or insp or, as you know,
think that anybody would agree that you run this thing, you have made him because once it starts, it starts with this. We want to work to improve people's running health vitality, but you know sport is not just the only answer to mental illness. Tranquillity having the Park is that this is a local park mental health issues, people. It certainly will overcome David. It was amazing to see the amount of people who came and walked miles to come to the park, so don't assume that Fun Run is the only answer to mental to distress because it isn't
sorry.
yeah, I think it might be, and I think you might be underestimating some of the barriers to local people in terms of participating in things in Clapham Common. For me, I think it is a considerable barrier and that what we really want to and do do is encourage good health outcomes for people who live locally. It doesn't mean that people aren't going to increasing numbers of young people don't have access to cars. To be quite frank, increasing numbers of people are not car owners, so there will be a lot of people coming by bus by tube, but what we want to do is encourage people who live very locally, who perhaps might not participate in this, particularly if it costs money that they can participate in this, because it's free and open to everyone
well, thank you, I would agree with them with your thoughts, but there's just one point, and then I'll go, but I think I've overstayed my welcome, but the reality is I agree with you on that, but if if the local community was so important, as you say, and I think they are, then why were they not more heavily featured and why was it not waited? Why was a consultation? The world or the United Kingdom, and not the local people, because we are local people and it was the best kept secret. Well, I have got friends who live in the Duddington estate who run regularly
Running is free, you don't have to pay for running and it doesn't, and if you come to the partner, hopefully you will you will see people running every day and then that they're not part of anything that's a joined-up team or any of that nature they just enjoy being in the park, so good. I'm pleased I might see you with my dog OK well on on that note, a commonality. I think we will look for what are proposes that
Ms Springer takes a seat in the public gallery. We now hear from Councillor Gasser on the policy behind the paper, and then we hear from some officers, but I'm sure we can all join in thanking you very much for coming this evening and thanking all of those who contributed to the deputation because I know it's it's you've been the presenter this evening, but a lot of people have contribute absolutely contributed. So thank you all very much. Thank you. Do we go now, then note your? This is a public meeting, so you are very welcome to stay and you're welcome to stay for all the other papers, so thank you for coming at this point, then I will
bringing Councillor Judy Gasser to talk about the background to the paper. Thank you, Councillor Gasser yeah, thank you very much and thank you very much, Mr Springer and everybody, and I'm really sorry that your e-mails van't answered and I can only say you have our attention now we're absolutely listening to your concerns and the certain things that I can take forward for you, I mean you mentioned about the parking issues. I'm very happy to take that forward and all your other concerns about toilets and all of those things I know officers will be listening to those, so I just wanted to take the background to this. Is people have asked us for part, running back to see so many people have asked us. It was a big issue on the doorstep and people contact me about it a lot, so we thought, OK, let's try and take this forward, so then we go to a consultation and I'll let officers talk about the consultation because that's not my area of expertise, but the consultation has come back, that people are broadly in favour, and I know people have concerns, and we will absolutely listened to those concerns and address them as much as we possibly can. But on the whole people are in favour. Even the friends of Battersea Park have told me they are in favour, with certain caveats
and well, your chair, e-mailed me and said they are in favour, but with some worries and I said, and we will absolutely listened to those worries.
so.
I am, I'll leave it to the committee, now the committee must ask officers, questions to try and alleviate some of your worries.
so at this point I'm going to introduce again this year leisure and culture, contract Manager, and Mr. Matthew, Eddy Assistant Director of Environment and Community Services, Leisure, to introduce the paper and, hopefully bring out some of the issues that we've already touched on and follow up following that we'll have questions from the committee members, thank you Mr earlier, Ms Chair, thank you, thank you Chair I'm Joan, Shira, Leisure and culture contract manager, and then I'm here to present the report.
the report on is the outcome of the consultation on the proposal for the part run to be held at Battersea Park currently in Wandsworth Parkrun takes place at 9 a.m. Every Saturday on Tooting Common, which was attended by approximately 600 to 700, but runners as detailed in the report, the Council is keen to support a junior partner and to take place on Sunday mornings.
and an adult part run on Saturday mornings in Battersea Park.
and have commissioned enable our leisure and culture contract contractor to facilitate these events.
enabled have been recruiting volunteers to lead the Junior Parkrun in Battersea Park, aiming for s for Spring 24 launch.
when launched, the events will start at 9 a.m. On a Sunday, and it's estimated that it will attract 100 to 200 children, a come accompanied by their parents, carers.
now, given the physical and mental health benefits, the Council is keen to also support an adult pelt run in Battersea Park on Saturday mornings, which will attract approximately 1 to 2000 runners.
a consultation exercise on the proposed introduction of the Parkrun at Battersea Park was undertaken over a six week period from the 22 of May to the 30th of June, and we had you know, really good response with 3,300 and 63 responses received.
so in summary, you know the consultation outlines are detailed in Appendix 3.
the report recommends officers are instructed to continue to work with enable, with the aim of possibly starting a part run event in the summer.
of 24, and for junior part run event in Spring 24 and for a further review of the impact of the event after six months to be reported back at a future committee meeting.
thank you.
and mistreated did you want to come in as well?
yes, thank you Chair, so I just wanted to add that.
the Parkrun benefits are very well researched and really aligned to the ambition of the Council to improve physical activity for its residents, supporting people with accessible and inclusive activities that are free to enable them to move more more often.
in beautiful settings such as Battersea Park.
the from the consultation results for me, it's a very well responded to a consultation 3,300 respondents is quite significant, one of those.
I think I read that over 70% were local to the park, so that is quite significant in terms of understanding the impact of the users.
while I would also say is, this is an opportunity to bring more people to Battersea Park, to celebrate the what the great asset it is to the community, I feel that we will be able to work with the users and the concessions of whom some have responded to the survey.
to make this a success, and we will continue to work with them to make sure that we listened to everyone's and consider everyone's feedback, so we can make this the best possible of a event for everybody.
there, I think there is a little bit of confusion around.
the access to the park, and I just wanted to clarify that all pedestrian access to the park will remain one gate, will be closed for a period of time, but that would be manned by stewards or the parks police, which will enable deliveries to be able to access in a safe manner we work with the concession to enable that to happen.
sorry, madam I, I will, I think, if there are specific questions, what I will suggest as they are brought up via e-mail after the Committee, I think I've heard your question and then I can answer ask it, but I'm not going to encourage that if you don't mind because otherwise you won't get through all seven of our papers but Mr we do go ahead and maybe you can address the point about access for the concessions. Thank you.
yeah, so the parkrun would start about nine o'clock, based on experience from other parkruns people start to resemble about 15 minutes before, so that we get in there about quarter to nine, most people were dispersed quite quickly after that we Parkrun and enables suggest that there will be no longer than an hour which remain access to facilities which should be quite quick and,
the run is the adult shrine is doing two loops of a circuit, so, even though the run will be progressing after it's got underway, people will be able to progress through the park and with marshals through the route as well, so the impacts should be mitigated from good organisation through stewarding from Parkrun and enable,
thank you Chair.
thank you, Ms 3D, I might kick off the questions if that's OK and then I'll be looking for hands around the table.
I maybe know a bit too much about this because I've done quite a few park runs and I've done a few run-throughs and various other providers and I think one of the key differences with Parkrun is that it's it's provided free whereas I mean PA run through by contrast and it's great fun not knocking it at all but it's it's really expensive per per run when I think we're talking 25 pounds a time and quite quite a different animal.
and having seen Parkrun work in various different parks, I am constantly impressed by how quickly it sort of it starts it's over, and it's like it never happened, could you talk to us a bit about the the way that Park Run is likely in in in through your research to bring in a different group of individuals to the park and to experience the park, thank you.
yes, thank you Chair, so.
the Council and officers are in the process of preparing a leisure, sport and physical activity strategy, and a key theme of our strategy is around access for all we feel that an event like Parkrun and another similar activities and services narrow that that gap or more exact, accessible and inclusive and a key,
part of the Parkrun activity and programme will be the Council Parkrun and enable working with communities that are less likely to participate in physical activity in more of the social, local economic areas.
working with schools, working with clubs and the voluntary sector,
to get more people as part of a very well organised event, but social and communication is one of the key themes that comes out of all the research when it's been analyzed, and I can only say 4 from another personal example I did Parkrun in.
in Tower Hamlets where there is really low participation rates, lots of really low socioeconomic groups and barriers around religion and culture and Parkrun really helped to bring, particularly young girls and mothers together to participate in Parkrun and became very successful, bringing more women and girls into doing PE physical activity which they valued but not as much as the connection with other people in their community as well, so I think this will provide huge value and help us in our mission to get more people more active in Wandsworth.
thank you, Ms 3D, and just to say I think I think one of the differences as well with going for a run or some of the other providers is the follow up, because I think.
particularly for little ones, there's that sort of follow up, as this is how far you've now run over this period of months, and is that sort of sense of bill building up towards something much larger, and I think that for children that's quite meaningful I don't want to dominate this Councillor Apsley, do you want to come in?
thank you, I've got a couple of questions, the first one is is how will we monitor local participation once it starts, it would be really good to keep an eye on it and make sure that we are getting the participation from local people that we desire. The second thing is is, I'm kind of minded that I've seen some very big events in Battersea Park on a Saturday before and I'm keen to know what the arrangements are for deliveries during those events because surely we can mirror them if they're needed on those Saturdays will be needed on other Saturdays too.
so how we can make sure that we, as part of the consultation, with with making sure we enable all these businesses, how we kind of learn from current practice as well.
Mr Reader, did you want to to come in, so I just wanted to re clarify that is not the intention to close the park to the public.
madam Mom, so sorry, but we we, we have the benefit of the officers here who who who ran the consultation and wrote the paper.
Re, Madam Madeleine, I'm so sorry, but we we all have the paper in front of us, and I I'm I'm sure we're all coming from to some degree the same perspective, which is that we are we feel very lucky to have Battersea Park and I don't you know,
please believe me when we want the best for all users of Battersea Park, and Mr Reedie knows this paper very well, and I'm gonna trust his professionalism to come back to you on exactly the point you're raising, please go ahead, Ms Brady, yes, I suppose I wanted to say that we are looking for solutions, you know to ensure that a successful event and that means working with all our stakeholders to make sure where we're working together.
how to harness what can be a great opportunity to bring communities together and Parkrun is a really fantastic way of doing that, and we will work very closely with you know the concessions because it's in our interest that they are well supported because we that is all part of the experience of Battersea Park and we, as I said previously we really hope that this will mean increase in footfall for those concessions as well.
sorry, coming back to your questions, Councillor, which was around how we will monitor local participation, we will work with, enable and with Parkrun Parkway and have good metrics the which will be really helpful and analyzing how successful this would be and it will be key from a Council perspective to make sure that we are reaching the groups and is having the impact that we wanted to and if it's not then we will work with our partners and enable and Parkrun you know through awareness through support through,
you know working with partners in the youth service and voluntary sector.
to make sure that people are accessing it and and it's having the outcomes that we want, I've forgotten what the second question was, I apologise.
about the arrangements for deliveries, but I think you can have covered that pretty much so.
we will work with the concession holders to make sure you know wherever history is collected and deliveries are made.
thank you, Mr. Elliott, have seen Councillor Cook next, thank you, thank you Chair well, I've learned a lot in the last 45 minutes or so, and I must admit that the more I hear both from the deputation and and from the officers so far more more alarmed I'm becoming and I do know Battersea Park very well both as a resident I walked through probably probably sort of once a week and I know the distances involved.
I know the place intimately, but of course I was also responsible for it for several years, know a lot about large events that so were to start, I I think the consultation was clearly seriously flawed, the things that we're hearing this evening I think of a very grave concern clearly people who should have been spoken to weren't spoken to businesses who don't seem to have been engaged in any way.
and I've already mentioned how how how precarious in some ways that that sort of business ecosystem is in the park and we don't do not want to see that damaged.
but the core of all of this, in fact, if I may just rewind, so I just reiterate whatever if everyone has said about running, I mean, I'm I'm a runner going for a run last night.
superimposed. Nobody doubts that and also nobody, certainly I don't doubt how impressive Parkrun has been and the impact it had had for so many people across this country knows I actually am around the world, as you know, was really up about that, guy, the guy who set it up, Bolton and Hewitt, fantastic what an achievement for the question is, Is this the right place for it? I'm delighted it's on Tooting Common, I'm delighted it's on Clapham Common and know lots of people who are running both with a key question here is is Battersea Park, the right place for it, and I dealt with this proposal, but I think it's 2014 2015. We concluded very definitely it wasn't because we couldn't manage the pressures and the key thing was that Parkrun could never give any indication that they could control the numbers in any way, and so when I just heard that you say there's an expectation of 1 to 2000, I am completely astonished because that would make it by some distance the biggest park run in the country, but what an amazing range 1 to 2000, which is another way of saying really you don't have any idea, he's gonna be big, it could be absolutely enormous or just enormous if you have 2000 people in that park all running round in a loop. At the same time, nobody's going going anywhere near it, there's certainly not going to be going across it, the impact will be absolutely enormous and as for the local bit, I have to have to say and and this isn't a direct purpose personnel at you, Mr radio. Of course I know you know that
I have to say I think a lot of your comments about the benefits for the local community are wishful thinking, because what will happen is this NBA basketball course with beautiful place best park in London, in my view, it will attract people from all over the centre of London Chelsea Westminster Hammersmith and Fulham a kind of yeah concentric circles I guess I would guess so and we can't control that.
so I, the 2000 people who might show up, will be largely from across the other side of the river and in many ways, that's a great thing, but we will have no control over it, and so I suggest it was subject to by well how are you gonna control OK at this point I think it's important that we hear from for Mr Radio LA on that point is that is that your question, Councillor Cook, said
it all comes down, there is no way of controlling it, and you know that so the question
no, I why it's a perfectly logical people will come from all around.
while about half, given the location is right by the river, I guess it probably yeah Councillor Cook, over here anyway, I do want us to make the most of this discussion by getting questions to the office on things you can't control where people come from and they'll come roughly Park in the middle, and it will be roughly half an hour either side of the river. I would have thought, so the question is, the question is how is anyone going to control the numbers? Mr really can I add to that question. Is there any evidence that you've seen that half of the participants will come from across the river, and what is your comment about the numbers issue? Please? Thank you
so I have seen no evidence of the reach across the river, I mean quite often, barriers like that are things that prevent people from moving across things so.
in terms of control numbers, the whole part of Parkrun is that people can pitch up nasty attraction to it, so enable and park enable, in particular, I used to run in events of a significant scale, you know the fireworks is, you know, tens of thousands of people so I have confidence that they will have the marshals as will Parkrun.
to enable this to be a success and we're not going to
I wouldn't imagine that the first Saturday that this happens, if it's approved we will get a thousand people, is something that builds up over time and we will build the infrastructure from that.
and we will learn as we go, we have to have confidence in Parkrun as an organisation, they're very experienced, we have to have confidence in enable, as event management companies and people to look after our park.
and I do actually hope that we do get lots of participants but and we will work very hard to make sure lots of those are residents of Wandsworth and particularly the ones that are less likely to participate in activity.
thank you, Ms Judy, I'm just conscious that we're.
the there are quite a lot of questions here about the principle, so I'm going to invite the Cabinet Member to come in again before I take another couple of questions because I do know Councillor Gasser has had a lot of correspondence on this issue and I'd really like to hear from her a little bit more about the correspondence that you had. There have been questions asked this evening about the consultation and the questions that were asked within that consultation and the professionalism of how it was run, and so it would be great to hear your perspective on that, please, and when, if officers would like to add anything on how the consultation was run, I think that would be potentially really helpful. Councillor Gasser,
yes, thank you, obviously I didn't devise the consultation with professional officers that do that.
there are we've heard tonight that people felt it was biased in favour of, I was actually going to put it on, I've had lots and lots of people commenting the other way, saying you are so biased, you're not going to do this, you obviously are setting it up to fail, so you know no reason why some people are happy, nobody's happy as something else.
you're never going to get it quite right, but somewhere in the middle somewhere you know if some people think we're being harsh on why some people are being half the other, we probably some are right in the middle. You know, all these people have answered broadly in favour. Other people have e-mailed me with their concerns. As I said, the friends, I've had an ongoing correspondence with the friends about it, but I do know their concerns, I've shared them with officers. I am listening to that. I'm listening to tonight's deputation about concerns
it would be wonderful if we had lots of people, I know that unable can control a thousand people 2000 people, they control 50,000 people at fireworks, I'm not unduly concerned about that.
I hope very much that the concessions will benefit from this, I don't see why not Tooting Common, I go there all the time, it's a lovely run and every lots of people go for a cup of tea, a cup of coffee afterwards, it's lovely it's good business, it's a really nice atmosphere and everybody's benefiting so I this.
N
we know no, I'm not talking about the fireworks there, so I'm very much hoping the committee will be in favour of this, let's give it a go, I think it could be fantastic for our community in Battersea and on that point and before I move into more questions just on this issue of the way that the consultation was run and talking to concessions about detailed issues like access.
I have not been a councillor that many years but six is enough to know that consultations are difficult to run and that I think if you get too much into the detail before the principle is established that can lead to all sorts of difficulties, can I ask officers to talk about why it is the case that they have not specifically sought out the concessions to talk to them about access and I imagine the concessions,
and really everybody in the area could have attended the open sessions that were run, but officers can you can you talk to us a bit more about that please?
the Chair, I'll come in a little bit about what's in the report, and then Joe Mike wants to follow up because I wasn't here at that point so but in terms of the the concessions, if you can see from the the report that five of the concessions that were in,
in the park have we've had to respond this to this survey, so you've got Galway, you've got London incumbents, you've got Pat in the park.
I didn't know I really have to ask you at Madam if you'd liked Councillor Cook, you know very well how the committees run and the good reason for that is that we have business, that we must get through and the residents have had the opportunity to speak at the tape. Madam Madam, I must chair this meeting, I'm really sorry to ask you again, but we cannot have interruptions in this way because we do have to hear from the officers and from your representatives at this table you had not when you had the opportunity to speak through the deputation, and if you'd like to follow up with any of us, you can do that on e-mail after the safe nick, Madam I'm going to move now to Mr Reedie Mr really, please go ahead. Thank you Chair. So
so I wonder if there are further to the report in that respect, but subject to whether the Parkrun is approved, we will work with those concession organisations, listen and understand their challenges and work together to resolve those and once the run is established, if it's approved we will continue to have that engagement with those concessions and support them support their businesses, make adjustments and modifications to make sure that this is a success and that they aren't disadvantaged by the the Parkrun events.
thank you, Mr. Elliott, I'm gonna take two more questions and then we'll review where we are with time as well, this evening I saw Councillor Cook and then I saw Councillor Apps and then I am going to have to look at the time because we have a number more papers to get through this evening Councillor Cookson and Councillor Apps please.
thank you, Chair, I touched on earlier, but I'm just looking again, it really is quite extraordinary, we were getting a sense here of something.
suddenly it was really just hasn't been looked at in enough detail, it is clearly the case that certain businesses have not been spoken to, I think that that has come out this evening, this is a very, very major decision which could have a huge impact on the most important part in the borough and we have got here a paper which is four pages long, it is when it really is pathetic is totally inadequate. I would expect to see a much much more detailed analysis of what may happen or comment just now from the Cabinet Member
that she's got confidence that enable run events was 50,000 people at the fireworks, there's a very, very big difference that is once a year, this is something I'm talking about, which would be every weekend the impact
the impact of this will be absolutely enormous, and I don't think there's anything like the right, a degree of detailed analysis and understanding of what the impact is going to be. It is has got gone into the into this this work, so to bring all of that to a question, what if you go ahead with this? What are you going to do by way of review mechanism because I would imagine that this could go badly wrong pretty quickly, so how are you gonna get a grip of it? I think you might have a problem actually, because once lots of people are keen on running around the park, you'll have a devil of a job stopping them, but what are you going to do about that? How are you gonna control it
no Councillor Councillor dig ahead to be brief, as the officers have a better answer, but it's it's always gonna be our park, if it goes wrong, we say we don't want to do it any more, but all our officers talk in more detail. Mr Eady yeah, I mean that that is a fact that if we felt there was, it wasn't gonna be a success or it was not delivering on the objectives that we wanted to then absolutely we could stop that, but just want to reassure people that if it's approved tonight,
this is a priority of my team and the Council to make this work, so we will work with all the stakeholders we work with. Community will work with Parkrun, who are an international organisation that run these events, so you know they've got experience from all around the world, so that should give some level of confidence that they wouldn't want to do something that isn't gonna be a success, that is gonna tarnish their reputation or the Council's reputation, or do it not safely? This could be a flagship moment for Parkrun, one of the best parks in the country in the world. So you know they are going to
they are going to make sure that this is a success, thank you.
Councillor Apps, and then I think we'll have to we'll have to move on, I I'll take maybe a couple of more very quick comments, but Councillor apps go here, so the one time when I have known the park to be closed for a considerable length of time was during formula E when we had racing cars,
going round the attract presume resume, and actually there was no access to the park for some time, and I wondered if Councillor Cook thought that was a better use of the park than people running round for free and actually actually I am very glad I was tempted raised it myself and I'm very glad you have raised it because I think you'd actually demonstrate so because that's something I I did and I'm proud that I did. I
OK well, you know, you've asked me the question, let me answer it yeah I'll explain why it's taking root.
because because that was a massive event, it was hugely disruptive. The amount of discussion and consultation that went on was enormous and not everyone agreed with it, and of course there's very conscious of that, but the efforts to make sure that everything is done as quickly and as efficiently as possible and when things were taken out again that it was done in about two days' flight is quite extraordinary, so so yeah, so I think it was delay. Hang on, let let let me finish. It was a massive event that was enjoyed by a lot of people thought it was fantastic, fantastic thing. He'd be doing two things, it was once a year once a year and instead of paying formula three, let me come to the money instead we we, we, we haven't talked about this very much Lewis, if I've understood it correctly, we seem to be paying Parkrun, yeah yeah, well big difference with formula is is that your question, Councillor Kirk workers yeah? I'd like to let Mr Radio answer that point at well it's in the paper we seem to be paying Parker, and I think I think I'm corrected in that, whereas formula 3 paid us several million pounds roughly equivalent to the library, so Councillor Cook yeah, I think we've will understand your point and I think the odds that is what do we get for our money and what I understand us to get for our money is one of our key policies on both health and wellbeing for our residents. It's what many many residents asked us to deliver and it's free, and it is going to bring people to the park to enjoy the park in a healthy way. I I I, I really think we should build on Councillor Moore because at this point you had your hand up for a while and I'm not sure there's anything better to talk about about this go go ahead
so thank you, I think I think we are getting to the end of this conversation, but I mean I guess first of all I just think thank you guys again for the deputation, as I said, it was really detailed is really interesting, I think.
consultations are always difficult. I work a lot on walking and cycling and it is incredibly difficult to get them right, based on again what I've seen, the numbers here are incredibly high. The problem was surprisingly high. Notwithstanding some concerns about location which I do take on board, I just want to say that I am a young councillor, I came into this because you know we want to see progress in our community and we want to see fun positive things happen, open, accessible, free, interesting, exciting. The arguments we had from the other side are that it's going to be too popular and then it'd be too hard to put back in the box which doesn't scan, because you're also saying that it's not good, but if it's too popular, that would imply that it is a good thing because people are doing it and they want to do it, and that's a good thing. So I am really really excited to vote for this paper. I think we should do it cautiously. I trust the officers. I think we are so grateful to their professionalism and the undermining that takes place quite upsets me to be honest, coming from a professional background and I'm just really excited by it, I think it's fantastic
thank you Councillor Murray, because at that point it because it's now 20 to nine and we've had lots of other business to to deal with this evening, so what I'm going to ask is for votes from colleagues on this paper, but before I do, I'm just going to remind everybody who is attending or watching at home what we're voting on this evening. So there are two recommendations at paragraph 2 of the paper. The first A is to instruct officers to continue to work with enable, with the aim of starting, possibly in the summer of 2024 and junior parkrun in the spring of 2024, and be to instruct officers to review the impact of the event after six months and report back to the Environment Committee. So without being said, can I ask the committee whether they agree to support the recommendations in paragraph 2 of the report and I'm looking for hands up
and for those who agree please
and those who are voting against.
and of course, Councillor Sita's, I'm not sure if she's attending but can't vote from home in any event, OK, so that is now carried and we are going to move on to the next matter of business this evening, which is paper number 23 3 9 6 and I'll just think again all of those who attended to hear the debate this evening on that paper we are grateful for your views.
so at this point we're going to ask to hear from officers, Elizabeth bunker, Richmond programme manager, innovative coastal flood resilience.
please do take a seat at the table, thank you sorry, I know I've not captured everybody's name there, but I'm sure you'll introduce yourselves as you introduced the paper, so once you're ready please go ahead.
good evening, Councillors and Priest, to present an update from the Lead Local Flood Authority. Mr Henry Chang, head of engineering group 3, would normally be presenting the paper today, but he's on leave currently, so I'm deputising the paper, updates on the responsibilities of the Lead, Local Flood Authority and how we're carrying these out, and there's several recommendations that I'd like to highlight. So, firstly, Wandsworth Local Flood Risk Management Strategy has been updated to reflect changes in the national strategy and it subsequently been adjusted to feedback from the public consultation which was carried out in March to May this year. When writing the document, we wanted to make it informative for the public and include actionable tasks for the council to tackle flood risk. Following feedback from the consultation, the document has been edited to be more resident and community, focused and more easily readable
so we would like to recommend that the updated document is approved next, the La La Fe has recently been involved in a flood action group in the diamond estate area near Queenstown Road.
this is a public, this is a pilot community scheme set up by Thames Water and its involving the resident group, the Council and the National Flood Forum, the Council nominated the Diamond Estate area, flood action resident group to participate in the scheme in response to repeated flood incidents in this area which are a result of excessive surface water that causes combined sewage overflows, the residents have been extremely engaged in providing vital information and ideas throughout the years that we have been working together.
as part of the Lead Local Flood authorities investigations in this area. Several flood storage opportunities have been identified and the most impactful of these would be opportunities in Clapham Common, which would reduce the impact of surface water flooding by slowing the rainwater movement through the catchment and towards the diamond area estate. These opportunities could result in meaningful flood risk reductions to the area. So because of this we'd like to recommend support that these opportunities can be investigated. Further on Clapham, Common in conversation with local stakeholders, including the London Borough of Lambeth another opportunity lies within Heath Brook Park, where an underground storage tank could be constructed to hold combined sewage overflows to prevent it, flooding the Diamond estate. This option would be pursued in partnership with Thames Water and pending the result of their network drainage capacity investigations. We are trying to maintain a strong and regular dialogue, attempts water to ensure that we can collaborate on any suggested solutions, so we would recommend support for this option and that officers are instructed to consult with Thames Water to expand their drainage network. The final recommendation I'd like to highlight is the proposed flood alleviation works at John Barnes Primary School, so the school is women within the surface, water catchment of both the Diamond Estate area and the Shaftesbury Gate development, which have both suffered repeated flood incidents. The proposed work includes sustainable drainage systems that will provide HRA or client resilience, climate resilience, salary and learning opportunities for the school funding for this project has been provided by the Department for Education and Thames Water, but it has fallen short. Therefore it's recommended that 150,000 pounds is reassigned from the existing capital programme. Budget for flood alleviation works to support this
we also have two other recommendations, so one is to support the implementation of highway suds around the Diamond Estate area, and the other is to support the community police gates project in doing community engagement around the autumn estate, to develop local flood resilience measures with the community that,
tonight I have with me Ellen Gabala and Ella Walsh, who are all all FA officers, and they will be helping me to answer the questions tonight, so thank you for your time and would welcome any questions, thank you very much and thank you to everyone who has come to answer the questions this evening.
and I want to say thank you to all the officers who were involved in producing this paper, because it's an enormous piece of work in particular, thank you for the glossary.
I who admits to going back and forth a few times and also thank you to Nick Oliver who clarified a question of mine, which was about per recommendation f, and just who you'll be talking to in Roehampton because it's always good to know which that you'll also be working with Lennox and we can close the state so thank you for that so, colleagues, do you have any questions on this paper saying, Councillor Brooks, please go ahead?
thank you, Chair, and thanks for the paper guys I anticipate, we'll be supporting everything in it in terms of the recommendations I'd had a quick question about the
lack of mention of the gully drains around the borough and how we CA and our efforts to keep those clear, because very often they're either at capacity full of leaves or all silted up from a previous sort of heavy rainfall or flood event.
is
is there anything that the Department could do or in the in the context of flood mitigation that could be done?
that we could keep those gully drains more clear or have them emptied more often.
thank you, Councillor Bruce Les, I will say when, when I have raised that sort of issue with officers in the department, they have been really responsive and I think it's Mr. Mayor, I often talk to, but so that that's my experience but please do go ahead.
yeah, thank you and I'm sure that Henry would answer this much better than I well, but I will attempt to answer your question, so in the previous few years we've increased the gully cleansing schedule, so it's about.
ensuring that that contract is carried out and that the gullies are cleared at a more frequent rate, also part of the local flood risk management strategy action plan is around increasing kind of community awareness and we do have a flood and gully blockage reporting tool on the website and, although officers do try and inspect the roads as frequently as they are assigned to, it doesn't mean that we can get to every road every day and check them all the time. So we are aiming to increase community kind of awareness of these tools so that they can tell us what's wrong, where and then we can respond to that ad hoc which is part of the gully cleansing contract.
thank you, then, so Councillor Cook, and then Councillor ups, yeah, thank you, don't know so it's an impressive for an interesting report.
id I I know the area very well around John Burns because you used to be by my ward, so I liked so I was well aware of the flooding problems, I was kind of curious, isn't there a bit of a sort of mixing going on here?
about the specifics of the problem around the Shasta estate and and that and that school in particular, and I guess to two questions I have to some extent I mean as to the physical infrastructure of the school, isn't great, I'm sure they'd be the first to admit that, but also the drainage infrastructure, there's the Shaftesbury estate. Is that not really down to Thames Water to to sort that out? I know it's been a problem for years and so are we in a sense letting Thames Water slightly off the hook because they ought to be sorting a lot of the problems described here, sorting them out
yeah, so I guess the flooding in this area is quite complicated in terms of responsibilities, because Thames Water are responsible for the water that's in the drains, but we are responsible for the surface water so yeah, it gets a bit complicated, so I guess any N John Burns Primary School teams what it is funding the majority of the project and then we're just filling the gap that's needed so they are contributing to that area as well.
thank you, Councillor Apps, yeah, thank you. I represent Jasper in Queenstown, which has one of the world's most affected and, of course, includes the Diamond and the Shaftesbury development and estate. I find it really interesting actually that all the division of you know who's in charge of what aspect and there's lots of divisions and yet most of them sort of crossover in terms of the impact so you know when the the sewers are more likely to fill up at the same time as the rains coming down because it's an impact of that and how you manage that whole agency approach and make sure that each
body is taking its fair share of responsibility, and I realise that we've got overall sort of management of that.
also, I just want to ask about there's gonna be a lot of development in the Shaftesbury as well, close to the Shaftesbury estate in Ashley Crescent, or the Gideon Road part, and also on Tyneham Close.
there's also a lot of very wide pavements, then there's lots of opportunities for more suds, be good to know that we're planning that as part of that development, because obviously that's gonna put additional burden, it's all good, it's good good homes for local people is a much improved scheme since its its predecessor scheme under the last administration, but it still there is that opportunity to make sure that we do sort of develop those studs as part of that scheme, which will also make it much nicer place to live as well with greenery.
I've got some questions specifically, I got in touch with the unfortunately the diamond estate and group of flagged group weren't able to join us tonight, but they did have some additional questions as well that I'd like to share with you, so you know they're obviously concerned about the flooding events every five to 10 years, I think sometimes these 1 and 130 are quite misleading. You know, and I explained that before about why they're captured in that way, but one of the things that they say is because obviously they're in crisis from having to dealt with flooding, events that you're dealing with, trying to repair your homes and everything that they've they found it very difficult to kind of engage with authorities and how you've helped them to do that. So if you go through some of that
another question is that they've really found great progress in terms of working with Thames Water and the borrower, but they'd like to see more progress, for example individual properties, having they're funding applications for work on their individual properties of pushed forward.
and then there's there's also the question about Thames Water because obviously a lot of this is terms of it Thames Water's some of their systems are inadequate, how we hold out their feet to the fire in terms of making sure that they are doing their best for this local area, I do understand about the problems because I've got the railway line and then we have to have that development so, for example Heath Brook Park, how do we push them towards making sure that they've got sewage capacity and the sewer capacity?
them to deal with the amount of overflow that we're dealing with, so if you could kind of come back on some of those questions that would be great, thank you.
yes, No problem. Thank you for the question. Sorry, the car, a couple of things to cover there. Firstly, I wanted to mention that the Lead Local Flood Authority, which is us and we act as a statutory consultee on all major planning applications. So in terms of that development, you mentioned that sort of application would would come to us as a consultee, and then we would have the opportunity to check their drainage strategy, then we would make sure that their PR proposing the correct sustainable drainage features, and we really do a lot of work on encouraging developments to implement those measures and make sure that we're not increasing any runoff rates.
sorry in terms of the I believe the next question was about what progress we've made collaborating with the community in that area and and our work with Thames Water. So as part of this diamond estate community pilot, we attend meetings every two months or so with the residents in attendance at those meetings are also Thames Water and the National Flood Forum, so we do have that face-to-face opportunity quite regularly to discuss these issues and also hold Thames Water accountable, make sure that we're getting updates on the work that they're doing and that they've promised one and that the residents are getting the same thing, we have really good open channels of communication with them.
so we have recently commissioned the feasibility study which is mentioned in the report, but Thames Water are also doing their own study on the underground drainage infrastructure at the same time, so what they've done over this summer is they've installed sewer level, monitors into key points around the area and over the next few months they'll be monitoring how the sewers respond to rainfall.
and it's a little bit complicated, but they'll use that information to validate a computer computer model that they've built of the drainage system, but we're expecting that outputs from this study in January, so our hope is that once we've kind of got their conclusions that they have drawn about the underground infrastructure, we've identified locations where we can implement above-ground sustainable drainage systems like those wide pavements that you mentioned, we can come together and determine the best solution for the residents and that will obviously be involved in those conversations as well through these sort of for action group meetings
yeah, so we really are kind of keeping those channels of communication are open and holding thameswater responsible where appropriate, so I wasn't sure if there was anything else that I missed.
sorry, just on the individual property changes, how long do you think that will take, yes, sorry Thames Water currently have the funds to carry out property surveys, so what we need to be happen in terms of property, flood resilience, so this could be flood doors or flood gates, air bricks of measures that are implemented on individual houses to increase their resilience to flooding. So in order to implement those measures we need to undertake surveys, and this is actually
following with Thames Water at the moment as part of the community pilot, so they need to draw down the funding to take those surveys, and we do also need to wait for the results of their study before we can determine the most effective mix of measures so we can't really go ahead and implement those.
without all the information like what we're waiting for in terms of how the drainage system is operating.
thank you, that was really helpful and answered some questions I had as well, Councillor Coakley go ahead.
thank you, thank you for your report, I particularly like the mention of Heyford Park, I lived in Baycliff path which is really close to there and it was, and I lived in, I lived there for 20 and 21 to 2020 to 2021 when there was a particularly bad flood and the water was going up to our door.
so I was just wondering, when the the installation of this of this capacity building for the flood will or how Wyden Empire will have on the surrounding area, like, would it be able to reach to the sort of estates or like what the sort of knock-on effect would be.
and then my second question was, I saw a mention of pocket parks for capturing it and, having again having having lived in that area, I do know an area that would be would be like a perfect place for a pocket park so would have has there been sort of a plan drawn up for pocket parks like a sort of poker bar strategy will there be a waste or input into that and to suggest possible locations where we could hopefully make a good difference?
I can take the Eastbrook pack, then.
so the attenuation tank would be underground and Heath Brook Park, so there would be some disruption to the park while it was being built, but after that it'd be restored back to how it is at the moment and in terms of the wider effects there's been some very high level feasibility studies or just one feasibility study done.
at the moment, and it's just a net feasibility stage, so we don't have exact numbers on on how far it would reach that there would be a good amount of storage in the park, so I think it would have quite a big effect on the surrounding areas and definitely would affect what would help Diamond estate which is just up the road from it.
yeah, so adding to that
as well as Heath Brook Park as part of this feasibility study. We've also got the highway said, suggestion, the thoughts about Clapham Common that we'd like to investigate, so really the solution for that area will be a combination of lots of different interventions to actually make the the difference that we need to see in that area. If you've been there during a flood, you know that there is a huge amount of water as, as you say, you have so yeah. We really need that network of interventions, taking all of those opportunities to be able to to make a substantial difference, which is why, where we have to kind of investigate those property flood resilience measures with the residents that are being affected because there's no short term solution right now.
so that's one point, and in terms of suggesting places for pocket parks, I think that's a brilliant idea and in the past when we've had kind of more finalised feasibility studies with the shortlists we've actually gone to local councillors and said, what do you think about this, but do you think you've got any more suggestions or that kind of thing, so I think that would be a great thing for us to implement as well to to get your food guy's feedback on where you think it would be a good opportunity. Thank you very much and an unconscious you know. Suggestions for pocket parks would be something that that Councillor Gasser, I'm sure would be very happy to hear about
conscious of the time Councillor Waite, I might just take one more question and I think we probably need to move on because it's no 9 o'clock, please do go ahead, they are trying to brief, is really really impressed by the John Burns.
example is is truly impressive I mean, is there any opportunity to spread that to other schools, I mean, is there the money available to be able to do something like that yeah, I think it's definitely worth.
investigating and that if they could be used as a case study for further scores in terms of funding, the SDF funding for southern schools, and I think there would definitely be a further and an opportunity that we could investigate.
thank you very much and I completely agree. It's a great presentation of what's gonna be happening at the school. So at this point I'm gonna ask colleagues whether they agree to support the recommendations to the Executive in paragraph 2, I think that unanimously agreed. Thank you very much, colleagues, okay, and thank you officers, we're gonna move on to another paper now, so thank you for staying for that one. So we're on to now agenda item number 4, multiple dog-walking licensing scheme, that's paper number 23 3 9 7, and I think we're going back to Mr Eadie and Ms Ciara
I'd like you to introduce the paper, if you would please, thank you.
thank you Chair.
following the approval at the September Committee for a three year borough wide public space protection order, it was agreed that officers would officers would bring back a report to a future meeting on to set out the proposals for a revised licensing scheme for consideration to be introduced from the 1st of April 24.
the main changes are the introduction of an annual fee payable by all professional dog walkers, regardless of the numbers of dogs that they walk from a single dog up to an upper limit of six dogs.
through an annual renewable licence and the reduction of the number of dogs that they may be walked by them, any individual from eight to six.
copies of the terms and conditions, application, form and code of conduct for the revised licensing scheme are provided in Appendices 1 2 and 3 in the report.
the introduction of an annual fee for professional dogwalkers licence springs the borrower's arrangements into line with neighbouring boroughs who all charge annual fees with a further proposal that the licence for the professional dog walkers will be in the form of an identification style card attached to a lanyard under the terms and conditions of the licence the licensee shall be required to wear the lanyard in such a way that is clearly visible at all times when walking dogs in licensed parks and open spaces. This will assist monitoring by authorised officers and other responsible dog owners.
the engagement with our professional dog-walker holders has been ongoing, whereby we have been in a position to agree the changes that we have now got in place, it is also of note to be aware that DEFRA are looking at licensed since licences of professional dog walkers, also as part of their ongoing review of animal active activities regulations.
and any future changes would supersede any local scheme that we have in place.
therefore, the report recommends approval that
approve the amendments to the existing licence scheme, the maximum number of dogs that may be walked at any one time by an individual dog-walker to be reduced from eight to six, and that's with effect from the 1st of April 24, and also to approve and authorise the details for the revised licensing scheme for professional dog walkers.
so that we can, you know, can get the permits in place and introduce that also from the 1st of April 24, and we've also put in confirmation of an appointment of wood and been straighter to assist the parks and the police administer the scheme.
thank you, thank you very much for sure and I might go directly to Councillor Brooks at this point because, just as we were starting, I you mentioned an amendment, so we've not seen it in writing, I don't think it's been discussed with officers yet and it's probably most efficient to get get that out in the air I've actually open now so do you want to explain?
thank you, Chair yeah, so the amendment that we are going to suggest is to remove.
on recommendation 3 B, what's between the two comments, so that would take out the permit scheme for once with residents to who own more than four dogs, this doesn't seem to be in line with the rest of the recommendations, which are all about bringing ones within line with neighbouring boroughs and closer to what we're expecting Defra to do.
this is separate to whether you're walking them in the park, it's about owning them, I couldn't see when I was looking around our website any current scheme, but what people owning more than four dogs, if they had them at home and things like that it seems to be a bit more intrusive than the professional dog-walker thing and not about the same thing at all.
and as an aside, I would you be expecting people to wear who owned more than four dogs to be wearing the lanyards and an ID card in the same way as professional dogwalkers, it seems a bit outside the scope of what the rest of the papers trying to do so, whilst we, I think, supports the rest of the recommendations we would want to take out.
that permit scheme for ones of residents who own more than four dogs because it doesn't seem to align with the rest of the recommendations. Thank you, Councillor, but what I'm gonna do is brilliant, Mr Chadwick, at that point, if that's OK and then if there's anything else from Mr Radio, Ms Shearer, please to go ahead, yes, thank you, Chair. I think I I can understand where you're coming from Councillor you, you may have seen as scurrying around just on the cusp of the start of the meeting because we were just
thinking that through, I think I think the reality is that.
this is a helpful sentence for Wandsworth presence with more than four dogs, because it helps overcome the problem that there would otherwise be for those residents related to the separate PS Pio.
so I I can I I I t, I think simply we haven't explained that interrelationship very well, but hopefully Matthew and Joe will explain that some more. Thank you. Thank you that that's my understanding as well. That is that this isn't about marrying up something that's already in place. If anyone has anything else to add on that, but I think I think what we're saying is that it has to be this way because of the provisions we already have in place Michelle is nodding at those sorry, yes, that's correct. The PSP we've got in the Borough, the Borough Wide PSP 0 only allows to walk dogs up to up to four dogs, so this scheme is split in two. You could say so we've got a residents' permit licence to allow residents to walk there's no licence for owning dogs. This is walking dogs in up our parks and open spaces
so it's for those residents that walked dogs greater than four dogs to the upper limit of six.
so they can actually undertake that, because the in the PSP 0 we've actually put reference to say, people can walk greater than four dogs, but they need to have a licence to do so and that ha that's how it links in, so there's one element for the residents, individual owners and there is one element for the professional dog walkers, which is a limit from one to six.
Councillor Brett's go ahead, thank you for various explanations, just not to be too pedantic, it does say own.
not walk, so could we have that changed?
because I think this is really I can see you're ready to come in, thank you.
I I don't think it's a problem of change there, he'd be own and walk.
you know, in accordance with our PSP, so we great that that sounds like that's agreed then, and it's helpful, if it was helpful to have the amendment at the start of the meeting, even better would have been obviously a few hours before the meeting, but I'd remember what it's like to be in your shoes.
some more questions and then I think we will try to move on quite quickly, so I can see Councillor Dobson and Councillor Cockley, thank you.
yeah, I'm interested in the so the relation between the owners and how long we've had this in place, so is this place under the previous PSP or and then the second question really is.
why was it decided to include that in the PSP 0, so what are the reasons for for asking people people to be limited to four dogs, thank you.
the legislation of the public space protection order has that reference of up to four dogs and we've always had before the PSP 0, we had our bylaws which managed that which allowed us again Lincoln into our and it was previously a multiple dogwalkers licence scheme which covered anyone walking greater than four dogs but the upper limit previously was eight so we've addressed that by ensuring it's included there's a reference in the PSP o which links into the licence scheme to facilitate those who walk dogs up to the upper limit 6
thank you, Councillor Khan click ahead.
thank you for the paper Maschera, I was wondering, just in the comparison table, which is really useful between our proposed charges to individuals and other borrowers, I noticed that the on the only other borrower that dons a similar sort of staggered, so that's one to two dogs is 75 three to four dogs 155 to 6 300 the only other book Barclays doing does a similar sort of staggered fee is Lamberth, so I was just wondering if you could
given explanation as to why we chose to do it in that way.
and also also some borrowers, chosen also to charge different rates to individuals who are invested in the borrower, so I was also wondering why we also decided to keep that at the same way, add a curiosity, thank you, Councillor Coakley do go ahead mature, thank you.
weaves staggered our prices, so it would be fairer on those who walk less than the upper limit, and that that's our that's our reasoning for that.
we've also with regards to residents, keeping a scheme for residents. You know we, you know, we want to. These are public parks, we don't want to restrict the usage, but we want to manage the usage accordingly, and you know we do have a number of dogwalkers who are on the boundary of Tooting Common in Lamberth and it would be unfair of us to exclude them in the scheme, but they would have to go through that you know exactly the same process as anyone else supplying. Thank you
thank you, I think I think that's really helpful and I'm not see any more hands and I am conscious of the time, so I'm gonna propose that we move to to the vote so just to clarify then I think we've had a proposal to amend paragraph 3 B to remove the word own and replace it with walk, I'm I I think Councillor Brooks has proposed that if I could get a seconder
Councillor Cook, so hopefully that's clear enough for the record, so then I'll ask colleagues if you are happy to support the recommendations to Executive in paragraph 3.
I think that's unanimously.
honestly agreed wow, including the amendment perfect, thank you very much, colleagues, that's.
item number 4 closed and then we jumped to item 6, which is the increase in fees for fly tipping and litter that's paper 23 3 9 9 so with thanks to mature Mr Eady, I think we know going to hear from Ms Wright head of inspection and enforcement enforcement so.
I'm gonna have a very quick introduction from Councillor Gasser and when we'll hear from officers, thank you, thank you just to say I get more correspondence about fly tipping and littering than probably anything else. I've got people that every Monday morning was WhatsApp me loads of pictures. It is such a scourge and it's a few anti-social people doing it, and I think a lot of them are not even ones with residents, but we really have got to use every tool that we've got to try and stop this and one of our tools and the manuscripts which are going really well and that is bringing the ref the fly-tipping rate down, which is fantastic, another tool. I've got a task force of officers across the department looking at all the problem areas, what can we do about them and then another tool obviously is fining littering and fly tipping, and I think it's time we got a bit tougher the government's recently changed the rules were allowed to increase the fines. I would like us to take that opportunity and find these horrible, anti-social people that messing up a borough for everybody else.
thank you, Councillor Gasser, and I couldn't agree more, we do get those pictures very regularly and I'm sorry then they will end up in your room works.
so, Ms Ms right, please do go ahead, thank you.
the right we issue. We have a 0 tolerance policy against litter and fly-tipping, and issue f p n fixed penalty notices at the first of the first time the offence occurs, which is fine, but we have to make sure they're issued consistently, fairly and correctly. There is no legal right of appeal to an f p n. It is a criminal offence. If you've been issued it or you don't want to pay or you disagree, then you can take it challenge it in a magistrates' court. However, to suffer the blow, we have a compliance manager in our team who will review any ESPN's that that will come back to us, so we have got an informal review process
at the moment, the fines are set at 150 pounds for littering on 400 pounds per fly-tipping, but we've got the opportunity to increase them to 500 for littering and a thousand for fly tipping.
there is, of course, there is still the option for very serious offences to take them straight to prosecution.
but in our experience we don't really, we don't really have a lot of that in Wandsworth, you know the lorry loads there there, it happens very occasionally, what we mainly have is low level, fly tipping that happens by people in their own or a neighbouring streets.
the odd black bag, a bed base or wardrobe that kind of stuff where f p n issuing of paeans is, is it a better and quicker way of dealing with the problem than pursue it through the courts?
first, very clear, thank you very much, I I think we might get lots of questions on this because it is local councillors, it's one of our biggest.
however, raised issues
I, I think one of the questions we've discussed as a team is about the difference between littering and fly tipping, and I think it would be helpful to talk about that a little bit if we could say, although obviously that's addressed at paragraphs 13 and 14 of the paper,
I mean, I can think of an example which I.
which is household waste, but which has dumped on a weekly basis someone's worth common, and I think that crosses that line, it certainly does in the residents' minds who sort of deal with it, I mean the Chair of Wandsworth Common.
she's brilliant, she goes through it because she's so outraged, and I I think, that's where you know someone's residential bags, they've taken the time to go and walk out halfway down the road and across and enter the Common, and that's probably,
more egregious, but could you talk to us a bit about the difference there because the difference in the fine is really significant, thank you, yeah, I mean, I think first and foremost we see fly tipping as a more deliberate act, that's definitely fresh, you know that's for sure.
the LA the legal different DEFRA guidance says that up to a sack full of waste should be considered as glitter, that's not set in stone, that's not law at salary guidance, there is case law where 20 bags that have been dumped have been classed as litter.
so they are interchangeable.
but when you're issuing fly tipping F P and you've really got to you, you've actually got to witness it, you can't take a witness statement and then issue an ESPN if you can do that for littering.
it's a lot, it's a lot harder to issue an espn for fly tipping in the news for littering.
that's really helpful, thank you, I'm looking for other Councillors with questions on this Councillor Cook go ahead.
yeah, thank you wrong. I broadly welcome this and obviously we will want to clean up and abolish infuriating when machines say so,
stiffer penalties, good good thing, hopefully, will have a deterrent effect, my only one sort of slight concern, and I think it is is quite sly and I know the officers are very sensitive to it already by I do think we should just be mindful of it, I'm sure we've all come across
residents who approaches who have yeah, for whatever reason somebody else has moved the bag or has been a genuine misunderstanding. They've been hit with a fine, it's given them quite a shock and yeah, sometimes depending on someone's circumstances, that can be really quite upsetting, so it follows that the bigger fine is gonna be even more upsetting. So I just want to know that that degree of sensitivity will remain given the options concerned. I'm sure he will, but I just want to make that really really clear about the overall objective that obviously I support
okay, Ms Friday, I can see you are agreeing with Eleanor Green, we we aren't gonna change anything and we will listen and we will review cases that are brought to our attention.
thank you, Councillor Reps.
yeah, I think we would agree with with that, I would like to characterise your approach, the Ms Ms Riot, as tough but fair.
which I think is what we want to see, and I want to thank you for all your hard work on this because you are incredibly responsive to our concerns, thank you, thank you.
thank you, and I I think, is worth repeating that this is part of a suite of measures as nearly as part, it's the manuscripts, it's the extra, the mobile CCTV cameras for temporary deployment, it's about deterrence, so, and there are some really helpful statistics in the paper on the enforcement actions that are taken because I know we're often asked in e-mail correspondence about that only.
okay, I'm sensing agreement, so I'm gonna ask colleagues if you support the recommendations in paragraph 2 of the report, I think that's unanimous agreed, thank you very much, colleagues, and thank you Ms right.
we will now move on then to pay or item 7, which is paper number 23 3 7 2, which is Wandsworth estates recycling and we will be hearing from Ms abstain, please, and I'll just say well, Ms Epstein's taking a seat at the table.
this is a paper that has already been to the Borough residents Forum and to the Housing Committee, and it's coming also to the Environment Committee for scrutiny tonight. Councillor Gass's or anything, you'd like to say before we start, thank you just quickly. This is another aspect of our plans to clean up the borough. You know, we know there are problems on some of the estates, as there are some of the streets, and this is a direct intervention initially in Tenant states on a trial basis and then on, depending on what we learn there, we will roll out interventions across all of the estates because we really do need to
enable our residents to live in clean areas that they can be proud of.
thank you, Ms Epstein, would you like to introduce the paper, please? Thank you yes, thank you, Chair and Co, and thanks Councillor Gasser, so as Councillor gas I mentioned, this is to try and address some problems that we've got on. Council manage estates that haven't necessarily been invested in and that bins haven't been replaced as often as they would like to be. There is certainly problems with capacity and contamination on our estate, so the approach has been multifaceted, so we have trialled on one estate, in particular the William Willison a number of interventions. It's well known that communicating with these residents is more challenging
and they're often less engaged, so we did some face-to-face, doorknocking and surveying to get their opinions before we introduced the interventions and have held focus groups, we've done various stages of interventions to a first stage of just replacing bins that didn't have a huge impact, so at every stage we've reviewed that with sampling and introduced subsequent interventions so that has fed into the proposals that are to be rolled out around nine other priority estates and then subsequent similar but not to the same extent improvements across all of the assets. So one of the key other, the key issues, is communication and signage, make what we noticed is a lot of the been enclosures. Altering the signage on the bins was behind the bin cupboard doors, so it's not surprising that bins might be contaminated because you can actually see what was meant to go in the bin, and what wasn't a lot of it is also about where the bin is placed so traditionally, or the refuse bins or inside bin cupboard or under bin duty, and then recycling, bins or outdoors. So
on the nine priority estates. We're looking to trial, co-location of refuse and recycling. When we held focus groups with William Wilson, they were very vocal about refuge suites, so refugees do, because a lot of problems getting blocked very expensive to repair, so we will consider closing shoots if necessary. I'm not gonna do about blanket closed, because there are some people that need them and use them, but where they are causing problems and there is a demand to close them and suitability that we can provide alternative solutions. We will be
the other element of the paper is moving to the new collection vehicles were phasing out the old paladin bins, small number of those are left and a couple of locations have specific round bins, doors that paladin fit, specifically in so that will include again external housing units that the bins can be placed in to resolve that issue.
thank you very much reception, that's really really helpful, and I will say I'm delighted with this paper, I think the focus on individual estates and on what what fits for individual estates is is really really positive and
the changes that were made on the Alton estate, for example, on Harbridge Avenue, bringing in those new bins were so popular, so I think I think this is exactly the right direction of travel, I'm just looking for hands for questions, Councillor Cockney go ahead,
thank you Chair, I just wanted to ask the from the statistics of the cost, it seems that the the nine priority estates will cost nearly as much as all of the other estates combined when it comes to the sort of replacement, and I wanted to know so of how it's got to that that point that has there been a sort of have these nine particular stage they not had enough investment in the past standards and the sort of paying catch up is that the main reason why there's such a big sort of price gap.
say the nine priorities dates were flagged as having the most problems from our contractors from my client teams around overflowing bins and contamination and fly tipping. A lot of the issues are connected around bulky waste, fly tipping as well, so the the reason, so that's why they were selected. They are more expensive because we're proposing the external bin housing units for those estates. I think obviously it is quite a lot of money. What we've proposed is that we come back after we've put those in in place, we're not saying we definitely won't do all the other estates, but I don't know exactly how many housing units we need on all of the estates, across the whole borough. That in itself is quite a big project because each each block you have to assess to see whether there is suitability. A lot of those will involve putting additional hardstanding and dropped kerbs to allow bins to be moved around, so it's quite a large project, which is why we said we'd focus on the priority estates in and get that, and then we can report back on progress. Some of those estates might not need additional external housing units, it will depend on the individual estate and and, as the Chair said, you know it is so detailed about each estate, which is why we've only focused on those to start with but yeah we will come back and we'll try as in the process, so everyone will get additional signage
and additional capacity replacement of damaged and dented bins, a number of bins have been dented over many years, that's predominantly because large bulky cardboard gets put in and blocks them, and then you can't get that out so it gets bashed against the vehicle to get that out, so obviously we're getting new trucks which will hopefully make the damaged bins.
lower and part of it is the messaging about how we tell residents to present that cardboard as well, so but all of the council estates will get that offer of increased capacity, extra of communications and improved signage, but not the housing units.
thank you that that's really helpful and just on the shoots I it's really really helpful to hear that you're considering where you would close those, and I know you're working closely with the are EIS through the B or F because I've had long discussions with chairs of EIS, where they've said that we we know this building, we know no one uses those sheets, whereas it'll be different in different places. So that's really welcome. I can see Councillor Brooks and then I might add then Councillor Apps, and then I'm gonna draw close on this paper to go ahead, Councillor Brooks, showing thank you, I think broadly we supported and our colleagues on the Housing Committee did that as well, so I think we're quite happy and excited that the bin storage areas might be a bit less messy, but there was a bit less overflow, which is not a small question about the manuscripts on throw 9, noting that the the collections will increase
where does the waste from the mega chips go at the moment, does or does it go to W to be way like everything else?
yes, a the skip itself is, obviously this is Sharon's area, but I know quite a lot about murder escapes to, so the skip itself is provided by Capper, and they are a construction industrial specialist company, they have a myth, as you say, a wood recycling facility in
Mitcham, I think I went there last week,
and so they provide the container they take all the container away, they sort the waste and then they dispose of anything that isn't recyclable, so yes, in theory this way should be going to Western Riverside if it is recycled, we have the power to request for it to not go to Western Force side Western Riverside have confirmed that they can't recycle up to the same standard as caper.
because their Murph is designed for domestic waste and anyway is rubble, it's things that you, you don't want to be putting in with your plastic and cans, so that is it's still in discussion with Western Riverside, but that is where it is now.
thank you, that's really helpful, and I saw Councillor Abs, thank you.
a more good news about manuscripts, but I just wanted to come on to the housing units for the bins because I think they do make such a difference in the estates and it makes it much more pleasant, we've had an issue in Savannah estate that we've had a lot of the bins have been left out of the housing units because people park in front of them and I've requested double yellow lines.
I know there was an attempt to install double yellow lines previously to stop parking, but there was somebody parking the day that they were doing it, so I think a couple of things one is is, can we have a 0 tolerance approach to things like that? You know making sure that we tweak and that we are kind of
progress these schemes and make sure they're working properly. But secondly, where there are things like you know, I know when we were installing use school, keep clear. We were prepared to kind of remove cars or vehicles if they were in the way of the painting and we need to take the same approach with our council estate. So it's just a kind of press that point that we kind of want to make sure that we're really making sure that we're providing these great new housing units, but also that residents have an opportunity to use them and keep their estates lovely
I think just to reassure you, we've built an effective working partnership with the Housing Department, you know all this is why the paper went to Housing Committee and to here, because we've done all of this jointly, we all agree that no not necessarily prosecution, but some behaviors on estates is is being allowed to run free.
and so we have talked, I know the Tom Crawley and Ian Stewart in housing are working with Sharon, we are hoping to bid for some additional mobile cameras that we can use specifically for housing estates, and so to try and yeah and enforce that and and from my sideways collection often we can't get vehicles into estates because cars are parked in non-places so again getting those yellow lines but not just getting the airlines but you have to enforce them and so to having a joined-up approach to enforcement might be a way a solution for that,
thank you very much that this really is addressing so many things that I've written so many e-mails about over the years, so thank you very much, I think I'm hearing that there's agreement on this paper as well, so just to formally say to the committee, do you agree to note the recommendations in paragraph 2 of the report?
thank you, colleagues, so we're now at and thank you, Ms Epstein, and we're now at Item 8, that's the annual charges report environment that's paper number 23 400, thank you very much, Mr. Boylan, for your patience and since Mr. Boylan and Mr. Eady who will be talking to this paper, do you want to come in Councillor Gasser very briefly?
just very, very quickly, I mean this is the annual review of charges, and we do have to put them up, I'm afraid, because we've experienced terrible inflation, obviously fuel prices everything else in the last year so we have had to increase, but what we have done is greatly expanded the universe of people who won't have to pay those charges because we are very keen, as we said before, that all our residents can access our facilities.
and so we've increased the group of people, so as basically anybody on a means tested benefit can apply for the concession rights now, so we really hope that will encourage people to use our facilities, thank you, Councillor Gasser, is that Mr Moorland would like to come on first, thank you.
thank you Chair, yes, good evening committee, my name is Alex Mullen, head of finance and performance for Environment and Community Services as Councillor Gasser has set out, this is the annual paper proposing changes to fees, fees and charges again high inflation over the previous two years and again high inflation since we previously reviewed these so unfortunately we are in the position where we are needing to increase these we will be looking to balance this cost with.
a limit on the overall increase so is setting out a proposal to align it with the the rate of CPI, but to freeze concession rates across across all concession categories that exist within the current charges, and it also sets out an update on the specific concessionary offer for Leisure Services, which certainly my colleague Mr. Eady would be able to provide a further update on,
or I can do so as well.
by the way, yeah, so anyway, so the the the previous update was presented to the Committee in February 2023 and that presented a a proposed expansion of the concessionary offer for Leisure, which was rolled out during the summer of 2023 following the positive, albeit initial results of that it's then proposed to expand this.
to include a wider selection of eligible residents, whoever various sort of mean tested benefits in criteria, and also to include a new, targeted free swimming offer from April 2024, so I'm very happy to answer any questions on that.
thank you very much, that's really helpful to set that, and it's in its context as well and see how successful those lower charges have been, I'm not seeing any hands, colleagues.
so in in that case, shall we shall we just take a vote, so committee do you agree to support the recommendations in paragraph 3?
that Simon Wessely agreed thank you for that, obviously very convincing in restrictions the reports, so colleagues, we are now on the last item.
no credit, the stadium, afraid, sorry.
pay we're on Item NA number 9, now once with Corporate Plan performance report paper number 23 4 0 1.
and we will be hearing from Ms O'Connor
and Mr. Fisher, Councillor Cassidy, you want to say a few words.
OK, I've given the time Miss O'Connell pulsating, thank you so much, I'll be really brief and it's just me not Jamie Fischer here this evening as well, so Claire O'Connor assistant director of climate change policy and communications, the Committee have in front of them the regular report that we bring to you every six months. This provides a comprehensive update against the corporate plan actions which are in the remit of this committee, and it also provides the CQC quarter 2 performance against the key performance indicators that again are within the remit of this committee. It should be noted that some indicators are reported annually. So if Councillors are looking at the table and expecting to see an indicator that isn't there, that is because the reporting frequency is every 12 months, not every six
thank you, Ms O'Connor, and I can see Councillor Brooks would like to come in. Thank you. Just a question mark, one of the kibbutz, at the bottom of page 4 2 2, the KPI about percentage of household waste sent for reuse, recycling and composting that's gone down. Could you explain why? Thank you? Thank you. Is that Ms Epstein would like to take that one? Thank you yes, so, yes, we are very disappointed, as I know I've been here for nine months and not great that my first quarter reporting has gone down, but I guess to reassure people that I have only been here for nine months so, and we've put a lot of things in place to see that improving
I just wanted to give a bit of context of how that sits in the region, Western Riverside and London as a whole, so generally, recycling rates are going down and that is believed to be in part due to the cost of living crisis people can't afford to buy as much as they were, people can't afford to waste things that they were before, so the the sort of reuse economy is expanding and Claire would hopefully say that that that is the case, but also that we're starting to see the shift post COVID as well. So we had a boom in COVID when everyone was working from home and now people are going back into the office, so a lot of that waste that they were recycling in particularly that they were producing at home, is now back in business stream, so
overall, our tonnages are down on refuse and recycling, but are just slightly more on the recycling.
thank you, I think I think that it makes a lot of sense in terms of what we all saw during the lockdown.
I am not saying any other hands, sir Councillor Oscar had.
I am interested in this point actually, because offices is something we all notice in the report, I wanted to ask you about contamination because one thing I've noticed in some of the estates, as I think people to save costs are using orange bags rather than black bags that's an observation that I've made but is that one that's shared is that concern for us and also,
do you think there's gonna be an impact from food waste collection? Could that help us with this with well, certainly with the percentages? I hope so yeah we've were predicting between 3 and 6% increase by rolling out the food waste. Obviously that depends on how much how many people are participating. We know that we have a high number of flats in the capture from flats is always going to be lower because people have to take it from a higher block, and also what you tend to say, we've seen this with Richmond, as you roll out a food waste service, everyone realises how much food waste they're wasting because they're putting it in a bin and segregating it, and then they stop wasting quite so much
say you have a real peak when you introduce it, and then it starts to tail off a little bit so, but also a number of other measures, the the contamination, I think in the past we've been too stringent on contamination, and so we've often rejected waste that has been deemed as too contaminated for the right reason because we pay more from contaminated waste, but even in a load, that is 30% contaminated, you've got 70%, good recycling, and so I think a lot of that was being lost. We have
changed a practice with Serco where the drivers believed that the load was so contaminated, that when they went to the tip they tipped it as rubbish. So we stopped that in July and that is starting to see about half a per cent on our recycling rate in the first couple of months already, so that has diverted an extra 400 tonnes of the refuse onto recycling. It has shifted our contamination rate, but only from about 11% 13, so it hasn't had a big issue, so we'll be doing some other things behind the scenes that to try and push the boundaries a little bit and just wow that hopefully we're sorry might see contamination going up, so actually one of our key K P eyes is contamination, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Yes, it is bad, but not as bad as an L
a worse recycling rate and all of that material going for disposal, so a little bit complicated but yeah, we're trying to push contamination and obviously all the work around estates to push messages, we've also got a current campaign at the moment called recycle right, which is exactly about contamination and making sure that people,
putting the containers in the right place, whether that is the contamination in the recycling or the recycling, in the refuse just to try a very clear, simple message, so hopefully you'll have seen that or seen that coming soon to try and get that message across.
thank you, that's really clear and very thorough, as ever, Councillor Coakley, thank you, I also wanted to ask about the KPI involving the percentage that of monitoring locations that achieve the no to air quality objectives, because, even though we had an increase, we were hoping to have 100% and,
there has been, I think, eight locations that exceeded this at 1.00 point, so I just wanted to know.
what sort of could have influenced in those particular locations, what could have influenced it, that we weren't perhaps predicting, and how can we sort of mitigate that in the future?
I can answer that one Chair, so this is the target that is set for 100% is a very stretching target and we would be very confident at the start of the year that we, we probably wouldn't have been able to achieve that what the the main reason for this is that this is the the this sort of the the minimum target for air quality, and we would like to achieve that across the entire the entire borough.
what generally happens is you have a number of key locations where it is very, very difficult due to volumes of road traffic for us to be able to achieve those we are making improvements, and I think you can you'll be able to see as part of the preparation via quality action plan that actually a lot of those graph are slowly going down and I think some of the measures included in there we will be able to make some more improvements for the for the coming year as well.
thank you, I've got Councillor White and then I might wrap this paper up, do you go ahead please?
yeah, so the same KPI that Councillor Brooks I've asked about and the waste.
sorry, recycling, S Cook, is it the waste or recycling?
its waste and recycling yeah, so could that be anything to do with the the banks that Serco were using was there was a lot of Mr live or miss pickups because of breaking down veins and things like that?
possibly yes, so we did have a lot of vehicle breakdown says, particularly on the estates, so I think a lot of the overflowing bins would have been. They have invested in some hire vehicles and got some vehicles from other contracts so a side of this week, unfortunately, generally the service has been much more stable, possibly could have put some people off on estates, they were the most people that were affected say, hopefully with some new vehicles and a more reliable service, we'll do some extra comments as well with the new contract get people back in using services if they've been put off in the past
thank you that that's really helpful, so I think I'm sensing there are no more questions, so this is a report for information, in any event, so just asking the Committee to note the report for information, and that concludes the meeting of the Environment Committee, so thank you very much to all the officers who've stayed. Thank you, colleagues and goodnight everybody,
- 23-396 Lead Local Flood Authority (LLFA) Update Rev B, opens in new tab
- 23-396 Appendix A - Wandsworth LFRMS, opens in new tab
- 23-396 Appendix B - Wandsworth LFRMS Action Plan, opens in new tab
- 23-396 Appendix C - John Burns Primary School, opens in new tab
- 23-397 Multiple Dog Walking Licensing Scheme Final, opens in new tab
- Park Maps - T&Cs App 1 - 10 10 23, opens in new tab
- Appendix 1 - PDW terms and conditions, opens in new tab
- Appendix 2 - application form, opens in new tab
- Appendix 3 - Code of Conduct, opens in new tab
- Appendix 4 - resident permit - terms and conditions, opens in new tab
- Appendix 5 - resident application form, opens in new tab
- Appendix 6 - Resident - Code of Conduct, opens in new tab
- Appendix 7 - Wandsworth PSPO consultation report, opens in new tab
- Appendix 8 - EINA, opens in new tab
- 23-398 ParkRun consultation Battersea Park report, opens in new tab
- Appendix 1 Parkrun consultation, opens in new tab
- Appendix 2 Parkrun consultation, opens in new tab
- Appendix 3 Battersea Park parkrun consultation v3, opens in new tab
- 23-399 WBC Increase in Fees for Flytipping and Litter (FPNs), opens in new tab
- 23-372 Wandsworth Estates recycling, opens in new tab
- Appendix 2 Focus groups findings, opens in new tab
- 23-400 Annual Charges Report Environment 24-25 - FINAL, opens in new tab
- Appendix A - Libraries 2024-25, opens in new tab
- Appendix B - Sports 2024-25, opens in new tab
- Appendix C - Culture, Events & Filming 2024-25, opens in new tab
- Appendix D - Parks 2024-25, opens in new tab
- Appendix E - PSAD 2024-25, opens in new tab
- Appendix F - Bereavement 2024-25, opens in new tab
- Appendix G - Sports combined, opens in new tab
- Appendix H - Leisure Centres 2024-25, opens in new tab
- Appendix I - Waste 2024-25, opens in new tab
- WBC APPENDIX J - HO 23-24 v3, opens in new tab
- Environment Committee - mid-year 23-24 performance report, opens in new tab
- Deputation Request, opens in new tab
- Treasuring Green Spaces - Parkrun Deputation 22.11.2023 Final, opens in new tab
- Appendix B to the Deputation, opens in new tab