Finance Committee - Tuesday 27 February 2024, 7:30pm - Wandsworth Council Webcasting

Finance Committee
Tuesday, 27th February 2024 at 7:30pm 

Agenda

Slides

Transcript

Map

Resources

Forums

Speakers

Votes

 
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
Share this agenda point
  1. Webcast Finished

welcome to the meet this meeting, my name is Councillor Pritchard, and I am the Chair of the Finance Committee, and I'm going to ask the members of the Committee to introduce themselves, starting on my left with Councillor Belton and going round the table.
Tony Belton Battersea Park councillor in Battersea, surprisingly.
and Councillor Jeremy, An Bash Councillor in West Putney ward.
Councillor Claire Fraser, South Phelan.
Norman Marshall, South Balham.
Councillor Rex Osborne representing Tooting Broadway
Councillor Steve World, Shaftesbury and Queenstown.
Councillor Ellard, Richard Jones, representing Northcote, ward in Battersea.
Councillor Mack Corner, Nine Elms Ward
Councillor James Jefferies' Thames field ward.
Councillor Lindsay Hedges Barron Ward,
Peter Ground, Wandsworth Common and opposition speaker for finance, thank you, and we also have with us Cabinet and Cabinet Members Councillor Ireland and Councillor Akinola, would you like to introduce ourselves, hello everybody and your island cabinet member for finance at West Hill Ward?
Councillor Chemmy Akila, cabinet member for voluntary sector, business and culture and Councillor for Tooting Broadway Ward
thank you very much, we have a number of officers present who will introduce themselves when they addressed the Committee and members, can I suggest we change the order of business so that we consider item 17 on the relocation of the Frogmore Dépôt after item 7 Treasury Policy and move agenda items 8 on the change programme and 9 on the digital strategy as the last two items on the agenda is that agreed.
brilliant, thank you very much.
okay, Members, are there any objections to confirming the minutes of the section of the minutes of the public section?

1 Minutes of the Previous Meeting

of the meeting on 24th of of section sorry, the section of the the meeting on the 24th of January held open to the public as a correct record.
great OK, I note there are draft minutes of the short private session held during that meeting, which still need to be finalised before being considered for approval.
OK.

2 Declarations of Interests

are there any declarations of either pecuniary, other registrable or non registrable interests, Councillor Fraser?
thank you, Chair, just like to know I put on record my I work for City and Guilds in my day job, which is a supplier of apprenticeships and technical education.
thank you discuss further down the agenda tonight.
okay and Councillor Akinola.
thank you in my day job I run a charity and we support people affected by cost of living and whilst I'm not recipient of any of the grant in this programme, I think it's worth mentioning thank you very much.

3 Setting of Charges - Environmental Services (Paper No. 24-86)

OK, we'd like to 0 sorry you've got on to it, it's not a pecuniary interest, but just I thought I'd mentioned for completeness that I am an unpaid adviser to the Clapham Junction bid, which is referenced, I think in the town centre paper OK, thank you very much Councillor Richard Jones right OK, let's move on to Item 3, which is the setting of charges.
and I think I will dislike to move straight to questions on this paper, please.
there are all, and I
Councillor Belton,
looking at the enthusiasm for asking questions that I rather imagine it speaks a standard paper going to most committees in the Council cycle, whether the standard increase of what is at 6.00.7%, with a chai inches for concessions or no increases with committee sessions, standard paper gone to all of committees I'm sure it could be argued about but perhaps to the council meeting who knows and so the Jacob vote on it just stated it is okay,
grid
Councillor Graham, one quick back, yes, Bob.
I just wanted to say that we will not be supporting this pay pass by because essentially we don't think that a 6.7% increase is justified, the overall revenue involved is only 10,000 pounds and the potential to actually put people off, getting down from old address or getting rodents removed, I think, significantly outweighs the financial benefit.
in other fences, women said that increases of that level are too much and a problem during the cost of living crisis OK, well, thank you very much for your comments, Councillor Graham.
as suggested by Councillor Bolton, and in that case let's move straight to a vote and you are being asked to support the recommendations for the Executive in paragraph 2 of the paper.
no, sorry those in fact excuse me, I'm so busy looking for the paper, are those in favour, please raise their hands.
OK, thank you very much, those against.
thank you very much, and and the Chair is not customer vote, OK brilliant, thank you very much, OK, let's move to Item 4, and on numbers Chair, can you confirm that 6 for 5 against, and I didn't cast a vote?
thank you.

4 Universal Credit Migration (Paper No. 24-87)

OK, we now look at the universal credit migration paper, Ms Wilson and sorry, I didn't just say a few words about this particular scheme.
OK, Ms Wilson.
thank you Chair.
so from April this year the DW P will be undertaking managed migration nationally and moving the remainder of working age claimants left on legacy benefits to universal credit for once worth that equates to around 6,000 working age residents who have to move from HB to universal credit in the next year of which around 3,000 council tenants the process is not automatic and that means that,
that claimants will have to submit a new claim to the GWP within three months of receiving the migration notice.
so there's a number of risks that I think it's useful to note, the first is, the households are financially vulnerable, many of which are already struggling or in crisis.
and there's a risk that some won't claim within three month windows, so their benefits will stop and they will not be eligible for transitional support from the GWP, there's also a potential Ellerbe impact on the council's rent accounts unlike HB the housing element if you see is paid to the tenant and not directly to their rent accounts as it is for housing benefits, GWP processing times also means that there may be up to a five week delay post you see applications before the tenant actually receives their housing costs.
all of these could impact on the the applicant's ability to pay their rent or ongoing liabilities, which may push those households into further debt. This means potentially arise in the level of rent, arrears and an increased risk of homelessness with an additional number of evictions. So there is, as I said, some transitional support offered by the DW P and whilst they are directing claimants to citizens advice for help, as a Council, we absolutely recognise that we have to do all that we can to support our residents through the migration process so that we can minimise some of the risks that I've just mentioned.
so this paper summarises the proactive work we'll be doing in the coming months, although not specifically referred to in this report, whilst it's not in the Council's gift to bridge the benefits gap, there are some other forms of direct financial support we are able to provide, and that includes things like crisis payments through once with the discretionary social fund, homelessness, prevention, grants and discretionary housing payments. So we will be absolutely looking to these as a sort of any additional way to to help some of our most vulnerable or financially vulnerable households. So I have Penny Lovett here with me this evening. She's the head of housing benefits and property accounts and we're happy to answer any questions that you may have
brilliant, thank you very much, Mr. Wilson, okay, I see Councillor Warrell.
and Councillor Richard Jones, thank you Chair.
sorry.
I think you know to start off, we recognise that most says a lot of people on universal credit are from the most vulnerable parts of the population, and I think we also recognise that there are parts of the universal credit system that are an unjust and unfair such as a 52 week Re rule and so actually I welcome the scheme from the Council and I think all of us around the table we probably would welcome this the scheme and agree with it.
part of the scheme, though, is very dependent on IT and on X and understanding English, for example, so I was just wondering what mechanisms are put in place to contact those people who might not be on e-mail who might not read or write English or might not have access to ITIS our facilities to ensure that they don't miss out and they are supported during this transition period.
hi them, we will do our best to try and contact those that I have more difficulty getting into contact with the service. We do have a visiting officers within Wandsworth as well, that we can use, we have a translation service within customer services that we can use as well, so there are different methods, but I do understand your point that there are people within the community that will be more difficult to contact during this period.
thank you, could I just add, sorry as well pass the paper, I think you'll see is the the we've done, inequality impacts needs a desk assessment to try and make sure we capture some of that and, and that will absolutely feed into our communications plan that we're preparing at the moment.
thank you, Councillor Richard Jones.
thank you Chair.
are we really Re welcome this paper on this side of the Committee table, the the Council, I think, has been quite proactive in this area, it's recognise where there might be a risk of hardship through the transition from housing benefit to universal credit.
and I think the scheme has set up is really quite commendable reading the paper I noticed that there wasn't mention of some of the transitional support measures that we do have in the Council and I was very pleased that officers mentioned those in in the introduction to the paper, including the discretionary social fund, because under the last Council we actually, I think, in anticipation of some of these issues we reform the criteria so that, as well as people currently on benefits being eligible to claim crisis payments and also those who are applying for benefits that can also so, whilst hopefully most people will not be in that position but for those who do
it's great to see a system where officers will be proactively working with those claimants to ensure they get what they're entitled to.
thank you, thank you, Councillor Richard Jones, this.
just thinking about what's been said so far, the committee has been asked to note this paper for information, it sounds like it at Councillor Ireland, would you like to say?
well.
sorry, Alan just wanted to draw attention to him.
first of all, welcome that support, that is very good news there, a level of agreement that, but I'm I was staggered to discover that people in this situation faced was the missing one week's payment or in particular years, or this being one of them, I wonder whether the Cabinet Members do anything to say about that.
Councillor Graham, I'm sorry to excuse me, but I do apologise.
it might be a long wait.
sorry, Councillor R yeah, thank you and I thank you for that, Councillor Belton, and and thank you to the officers. I think this is excellent paper it it's fits very well in our fair and compassionate Council, I think, is excellent. The work you're doing and I'm very pleased with the paper. Yes, I think Week 53 is cruel, we can all do. The arithmetic 52 times 7 is 364 days, but it's totally ridiculous expecting people to save one day's rent so that they've got five or six days saved up for the year when you got 53 Mondays, which is the one coming up. People are on the edge and this is the sort of thing expecting them to find a week's rent from where that could tip them over, and I'm really pleased that we are taking a proactive approach to try to prevent that think it's so important. So thank you very much OK, well, I think
actually I just want to spot gonna be very brief, I I I share the cabinet member's concerns about that point, I just I I do think it's important, though, to recognise that universal credit on balance has actually made the benefit system fairer and allowed people to to escape that previous trap that kept them are unable to pursue employment opportunities. I am prepared to say to because this is one obviously one of the areas where your side and our side will differ, but we're being asked in this position to approve the scheme to help people which I think were universally kept.
the the problem is that this was recognising 2019, everybody knew, and the government promised to do something about it five years later, when the same passion, so that that's the problem.
OK, thank you, OK, let's move to a vote on this, hopefully we are, we've been asked to note this, for information is that agreed by everybody.
excellent, thank you very much, OK, we're now on to Item 5.

5 Council Tax Setting (Paper No. 24-88)

and this is council tax setting, I've asked.
Mrs. Murray is going to give us a brief overview of this before we move to questions.
thank you, thank you Chair, so this paper is the annual budget and Council Tax setting report for the coming year, it builds on the paper that this committee received in January, which sets the
committee spend totals for the coming year,
the paper recommends and adult social care precept of 2% is levied for 24 25 and a freeze on the main share of the council tax, it also recommends for approval the implementation of a 100% council tax premium for second homes and a reduction in the period after which empty properties are charged additional council tax currently two years and the proposal is to move that to one.
and those two proposals are to be implemented from the 1st of April 2025, so just over a year's time, and that's discussed later on in the report, so if I just go very briefly through the report, I think probably in highlight changes since.
January's paper the table on paragraph 9, takes you through the Committee totals that we discussed back in January, referred to there as paper 24 23.
we then got some budget variations that are listed in Appendix A which have been either discussed at other Committees since January or are to be discussed on this agenda tonight.
we've got some technical adjustments that have.
been applied largely in relation to the planned use of reserves, so in order to use reserves in a planned way, we have to add budget into the expenditure totals, we can't just charge expenditure to reserves, so this is the expenditure that then is met by the planned use of reserves and that covers things like the cost of living response.
the change programme
some renewals fund investment and also a planned reserve use in relation to the Borough of Sanctuary and our refugee response, we've then got.
service pressures, contingency budget, which we have once again proposed for approval. We've struggled, I think, the past year we've we've seen a lot of detail at this committee in that January paper about the pressures that we've seen over the past 12 to 18 months across a number of service areas. That's something we haven't necessarily experienced before having so many service areas at the same time that have got significant demand pressures, that's linked not just to inflation but also to demanding our services, particularly around social care, in adults and in children's as well.
and there's reference in the January paper, to pressures on our income from parking and are planning income as well.
so the service pressures contingency helps to mitigate against that risk in the coming year, and that's the budget that we would have to hold the centre and then release if and when we saw that particular pressures were coming to light.
we've also back in January, we had a number of contract and back office efficiencies that were built into the budgets showing that, were we doing all we can to to mitigate against our additional costs.
and they were built in back in January, I mentioned, I think, on the the day of the January Committee meeting we got.
a revised finance settlement for 24 25 and the government had increase the allocations ones with received an additional 2.7 million pounds worth of grant as part of that final local government finance settlement, and that additional income is built into this paper.
we've also then adjusted the business rates forecasts are linked to what we call the N N D are one form which is our estimate of non-domestic rates going forward, and that's generated in an extra 3.1 million of additional funding.
the paper also sets out s as the section 1 5 1 Officer, I have a responsibility to report under Section 25 of the Local government Act 2003, which I must report on the robustness of the estimates and the adequacy of the reserves and the detail of that set out in the paper. I have confidence in both of those things and that set out in paragraphs 20 to 20 to the paper, as I said, references the use of balances and reserves we've got planned use of reserves as set out in the paper and there's an appendix
appendix C, which shows the specific detail of what that spend relates to.
right there, the paper sets out the revised Council Tax levels based on, as I said, a 2% adult social care precept, which is helping to fund what we have seen as significant increased cost in social care and not just the adult social care but also a across children's services and it sets out the 2% general increase as well in addition to the Wimbledon and Putney Commons conservators levy, which is,
it applied to just around 28,000 properties in the borough and the GLA increase as well.
finally, as I said at the beginning, the paper references are proposed increase in Council Tax, the the application of a second homes premium of 100%, and reducing the timeframe for increased charges on long term empty properties.
the levelling up and Regeneration Act came into.
into application from 2024, potentially we've got some work to do on setting out our are the principles around, particularly the long-term empty council tax, but we will be applying those proposed changes from April 2025 that could generate, as up to around 300,000 pounds worth of additional income we need to double-check are,
data and collect the right data on second homes, and there will be a a very specific definition of what a second home is deemed to be, I think probably that's all I wanted to say and I'm happy to take questions, OK, brilliant, thank you very much.
hey, one moment.
sorry, I'm just taking a list, Councillor Graham, would you like and everyone else to leave their hands up, please?
thank you, Councillor Gruen, would you like to ask your questions while I'm taking no, yes, thank you, that's a couple of parts to this, but as I should be quite brief parts, so paragraphs 16 on page 29
talks about the government's inflationary increase of the multiplies, can you confirm that that's actually a non inflationary increase at the rate of inflation, which is CPI of 6.7% in September 2023?
sorry, Councillor Graham, don't quite understand a question 6.7% is the September CPI inflation rate that the government has applied to business rates multipliers, but are on my understanding. An inflationary increase would be an increase above the rate of inflation. What it actually is as a non inflationary increase at the rate of inflation, and it's not correct it's an increase that reflects inflation of 6.7%. Yes says, inflation is 6.7% relevant figure. Paragraph 15 refers to the core spending power increase
of 9.9% now that's the money coming from the government, plus an assumed council tax increase of 5%, can you confirm that if one removes that assumed council tax increase and just looks at the actual funding, so the increase to core funding that the increase from the government was 7 point to 6%?
I don't have that calculation, but I'm sure you, you've looked at the detailed settlement and that's where the figures come from you so.
7.26% is larger than 6.7% and is in fact a real terms increase to core funding, so can I ask the Chief Executive why the Council issued a press release stating that it had received a real terms cut in government funding?
the inflationary costs to the Council services, and we've discussed this before this committee far exceeds RPI or CPI in many cases, but that's there may well be an increase in demand but increases in demand on the same as increases to inflation. Inflation is the increase in the cost of prices, as measured here by CPI at 6.00.7%. The terms real terms, increase or real terms cuts are technical terms that directly relate to the headline rate of inflation. This was not
a real terms cut, this was a real terms increase, so I ask again why the Council issued a press release describing it as a real terms cut, I just give my same answer, which is based on the actual costs of providing services to the Council. Government funding hasn't kept pace with. That is not what real terms means, Councillor is it Councillor Graham, thank you very much. I think you've made your point.
Councillor Osborne.
was next, I believe.
yeah, can I just say that I think it's worth drawing attention to the fact that in a
economic environment in which it's an expected 75%, I think of local authorities in the country at the moment, are going to put their council tax up by the maximum possible, that's not to mention those that are given disparate dispensation to increase beyond their council tax beyond the maximum amount allowed once with Labour Wandsworth.
is providing the lowest council tax in the country and, at the same time, is providing better services with a greener borough, safer streets, stronger communities, as we will see in the papers in the rest of this Committee this evening in some instances I think that's worth noting and I think it's or any or something for us as a Labour administration to be proud of OK, thank you Councillor I was born Councillor Hedges.
yes, thank you Chair, so this is a question to.
the Cabinet member for finance of the budget, a lot of the money has been approved by ESL 83 as some have been acknowledged, but there is, however, are still unanswered pending from the Cabinet Member regarding my question asked at the last Full Council meeting which was requesting the total financial value of decisions taken under the ESA 83 A notices in 2021 to 22 2022 to 23 and to date in 2023 to 24, which you said you'd ask the relevant officer to write to me with the information and sadly I've still not received yet.
and also just one more point from me, paragraph 40, where, where you mentioned that the government needs to.
take action for the cost of living crisis, making it worse, but this is actually not the case and, as we've mentioned before, this was off the back of the pandemic and global inflation as a result of geopolitical factors. This also contrary to what you've seen, what you've said in your comments also contradicts paragraph 6 in the Treasury paper, which highlights the economic impact of the war in Ukraine and rendered rising energy prices. So I just wanted to note that, but if you wouldn't mind providing me with an answer on the ESA 83, a point that would be great, thank you
thank you for your question, I don't have those figures to hand, but I will chase up with the office of councillor, thank you, thank you, and and shall we just take it as an action point from the committee as well, OK that sounds great okay, Councillor Ryan, Bash,
so I'd like to congratulate the Executive Director of Finance and the Cabinet Member for producing a Budget for next year, not raising the main element of Council Tax, but recommending that we take the 2% adult care precept, which we definitely need for those services, I hope will have all-party support for that because from your side you've supported that in previous years.
the question I wanted to ask the Cabinet Member is in paragraph 5, it tells us that there are changes in specific grants from government since the last Committee, and I know we have lobbied for the continuation of the just over 4 million households support grant that we receive this year until the end of the financial year which is vitally needed to support some of the most vulnerable families have we had any further news from the chancellor on this?
thank you for your question, no, unfortunately not there might be something that we might hear some use in the spring statement next week, we hope so because Wandsworth received over 4 million pounds in 23 24 and the household support fund, and we use that money to help crisis support for our our resident.
I think the Government's payments to residents cost of living payments to residents have now finished having a, and yet we've still got high prices, prices might not be rising as fast as they were, but they're not going down again. Energy bills are still rising and we need this money to help our residents. I'm very, very disappointed that we haven't heard yet what's happening there. It makes it impossible to plan, but yes, we need that money. Thank you OK, thank you OK, Councillor Jeffries,
thank you Chair, and it was just a query about the long term, empty premium point and, notwithstanding Miss Mariusz comments about needing to dig into the detail around that a bit more, I was quite surprised that, as I've read it, so I may have misunderstood that as a result of the re the shortening of the long term empty premium timeframe.
and that there are only 90 properties impacted.
I'd think it'd be interesting to understand how many are already subject to the existing timeframe.
this is Mary yeah yeah, so so thank you, Councillor, so what this is saying is that any one time there are around 90, so as soon as we implement this we will get additional income from 90 properties and it will be a rolling potentially 90 each year.
OK, Councillor Beltre.
I was looking forward to being able to reply to some counter-proposal, but if there's no counter-proposal, perhaps there's not much point in talking too much further other than to have perhaps a little go on the inflation.
I believe Councillor Hedges is arguing something about
a statement here about the government. Increasing inflationary pressures may be a bit pedantic to say, but wasn't there are 42 day old lettuce outlived at a certain prime minister and her chancellor of the Exchequer, who everyone in the country thinks added to inflation on a massive scale? I mean, I won't embarrass the minority party by saying it was more than 10%, but almost everyone in the country says or more than 20%, and it pushed thousands of people into lots of debt or mortgage, but we all know that story. That's the public story. So I was a member of the Tory party. I would not be boasting about the government's inflation record because it seems to me slightly weak
and whilst we're on inflation, the fact that on Sunday in September I'm sure Councillor Graham will put me right, inflation was only 7.1% that was on one day but 10 months ago it was at 10% and we have to pay for when it was then and it doesn't come down it doesn't go from 7 from tenders, it's doesn't come down in the sense that,
costs go down, it means the speed with which they're going up goes down, so we still have to pay over what the inflation back in the past, so I think it's remarkably good and I fully support the
the Cabinet Member's recommendation. I just wanted to add a couple of other points to the points that Councillor Osborne made earlier, and that is this is remarkable, especially saying that we are taking 10,000. Perhaps Councillor Ireland will put me right, maybe more than 10,000 of the poorest households completely out of planning council tax at all in the reduction scheme, so I think it is a terrific Budget and I'm more than happy to move it on behalf of the Committee and move that we accept the Cabinet Member's recommendation. Councillor Belton, I understand that but Councillor Corner has been absolutely desperate speak away as well. That is stupid, I'm still moving it fine. Thank you, Councillor Corner, very, very timely this, because Councillor Belton just asked for Councillor proposals. Well, let's have a look at paragraph 6 and 7 of this report, where we have a laundry list of initiatives that are coming out of the chief executives group, which are called Corporate Core. Now this is a huge amount he's apparently tucked in paragraph 7, totalling 1 million pounds in spending commitments. It just seems to me that this Council and the that the so-called Corporate Core is being massively bloated, with initiatives that we do not meet and that could be used to deliver frontline services. So I would like to understand why these all these initiatives are absolutely necessary and why we can't have more information about how they're delivering value, which is greater than a potential council tax cut that they could deliver if they didn't commit to this expenditure. OK, so who would you like to once it who you? I mean the question act, Councillor Ireland and the Chief Executive, please OK, do you wish to
Mr Jackson happy to go first Chair, so I think paragraph 6.
sets out the kind of initiatives that the councils already pursued over the last 18 months or so as an illustration of the additional activity that's been necessary in order to pursue council priorities, and I think in each case of the examples given there, you know reports have come here or to other Committees setting out in more detail the objectives and benefits of those initiatives. This proposal is about ensuring that the Council has got the capacity to pursue those kinds of initiatives going forward in a more rapid and effective way. I'd say because, although those initiatives have been successful, they've often required officers to stop work on other initiatives. So, for instance, a lot of the team that we had anticipated, working on the change programme, were diverted to working on the cost of living commission
the transport strategy team that did the excellent work on the Council's response to you, Liz, were you last, were taken of other positive policy initiatives for a period while doing that, so the experience of the last 18 months or so has shown us that unless we do increase the capacity of the council in these areas, our ability to continue to deliver against council priorities will be impacted and as those new initiatives come forward.
I'm sure they'll be reported to committed, inappropriate way at the appropriate time where more detail will be available to members, thank you, Councillor Ryan, do you have anything to add just to say there's a paper coming up in a few moments about the excellent work done by the cost of living commission which will explain some of the benefits OK, thank you very much.
right.
before he got a Councillor Marshall, is that your hand in the now?
OK.
Councillor Richard Jones,
thanks curiosity on the officer on how much would a 1% increase in council tax have raised in total?
700,000 pounds per year.
so so.
so the maximum would have raised just shy of 4,000,003.5 OK, so the maximum increase of 5 of 5% would have raised 4000005% on Band D.
is, I think,
25 pounds a year.
is that correct not, I think, so I think it's right, yes, it's just that I was taking note of of the cabinet member's comments about, we don't yet know what the government will pay in.
the sorry the
the name has completely escaped the households support fund, thank you.
but we had 4 million of it last year.
5% increase in council tax would have raised 3.5 million, which adds 25 pounds a year onto the band D charge.
we've we've already heard that the poorest households in the borough don't pay council tax, or they get a significantly reduced rate because of the council tax reduction scheme I just want to ask what what was the Cabinet Member's thinking about forego, the Council being able to raise that money itself and instead saving 25 pounds a year on council tax bills where the the poorest households aren't liable for council tax?
sorry, Councillor id yeah, that's fine, well, first of all, at the cost of living crisis is affecting all our residents, not just the voice.
and I think that keeping Council Tax as low as possible is the biggest single thing we can do for the most residents, so it's really really important now we think it's really important to take
the government's recommendation of the 2% for the adult social care precept, because there are particular demand pressures there and the inflation on those services is much much higher than the 6.7% inflation that's reported, so we think that,
keeping the Council Tax low is the best thing we can do the most residents, and that's why I'm proposing it, thank you very much, Councillor Ireland, could I just put just very quickly follow up on that it's just a bit quickly.
it it it's just about trade-offs, and given that perhaps the household support fund may not be renewed this year, but we don't know, it could be higher, could be lower.
that the Cabinet Member is comfortable with not making up that funding
for the 25 pounds foregoing a 25, an increase on the band D, I just might just want to make, I just want an insight into the thinking of the trade of there the Cabinet Member would have done.
yeah
Councillor R and D act as I understand it, or are you proposing that we should put the council tax up, No, I'm
no, I'm just checking, so the car.
so the the the the the Cabinet Member, who will be working will have been working really diligently, with officers for months over this will have more insight than we do and into what funding streams may materialise or not, what I'm trying to get to the bottom of is what trade-offs the administration has made, I mean we obviously support low council tax, we made this Council famous over 44 years for low council tax and this has been made possible through the reserves that the current administration inherited but because the Cabinet Member,
I made a point of the household support funding I wanted to probe what means she looked at of the council raising an equivalent sum itself.
we look very carefully at all options, I I would say that the household support fund for point 1 million we use that money to provide school vouchers for holiday s in the holidays so that children on free school meals have vouchers, they can be fed during the holidays and also so children don't have the indignity of not having the correct school uniform this money is important to our residents, especially the residents.
that our most financially vulnerable, we look very carefully at the options and we consider on balance, given the continued cost of living crisis.
that we need to not just help the low income households in the borough, but help all our residents, and that's why we came to that decision OK, thank you very much, I think Councillor Hedges had something and I also want to check out Councillor Osborne.
right.
thank you Chair, contrary to Councillor Osbourne's and Councillor Belton statements earlier, looking at paragraph 43, which implies the council was keeping council tax low and providing better services for all, was actually misleading.
J, does the Council really believe that they're providing better services, I mean because, judging by the complaints I get from residents in Balsam alone, services are indeed much worse than they ever have been.
who would?
Angela
that was for me because I don't actually agree with what you're saying, by the way I forgot to add that we're not using it, I think we're using less than 1% of reserves to balance the budget, so we're not using Apple's reserves.
I don't think services are worse, I think they're a lot better and we're doubling our investment on roads and pavements, we've doubled our cost of living responses Navenby 15 million pounds though we've expanded, expanded the Phrygian swim.
we are pay all our.
contractors we insist they pay the living wage,
playgrounds, yes I could go on, I could be headquartered in Barrow, and I mean we've got the US support scheme I I've noticed in my ward definitely pavements that were particularly on housing estates, pavements that are neglected potholes have been fixed, then we put a big programme and and I think services have got better.
I was talking to residents yesterday about new lift in their block, absolutely delighted by it, so I don't agree, I think services have got better just to follow up on that, I think if you look at the casework figures, if you go back and ask officers and have a look at the casework figures that are gonna be coming through at the end of the municipal year, you'll see how many just how many are coming out of them. OK, sorry, excuse me, I actually are Councillor Hedges', I don't often like to interject in this. I would comment that members' enquiries and actual casework can be very different things and I would say, and there are some residents who do report differently, so it's not always clear what is going on
Councillor Osborne.
yeah, I just to come back, I am.
very confident that the services have improved under the current Labour administration. As Councillor Ireland said, we have a programme now for roads and pavements, we are doubling the number of mega skips for fly tipping problems. We've opened two new libraries, we're opening our first family hub, and so it goes on and on we are bringing in all kinds of initiatives and improving services all the time. I'm intrigued though, by the
how the minority party gets to a position where they're not going to propose an increase in the council tax but have successfully deployed an argument for increasing the Council Tax in the Finance Committee meeting. But what's interesting about that argument is it betrays their ignorance, they're woeful ignorance about how terribly the cost of living crisis is biting into middle class families just as much as it is in less well-off families, it is operating across the board a cost of living crisis precipitated by their government.
thank you very much, Councillor Graham, and then I'm going to ask Councillor Alan to draw this to sum up, OK, so to try to pick up briefly on a couple of points. The first thing is that inflation, which is the primary driver of the cost of living crisis, is contrary to what has been said and contrary to what Councillor Belsen implied. Now, 4%, and forecast to fall below 3% by the end of the year. Inflation has come down significantly and it is the increase of prices in the shops. It is the increase in in the cost of bills that has actually driven the cost of living pressure, and one of the biggest increases coming now is from the Mayor of London, with his above inflation increase the his share of the council tax, which your side supports now. I'm I did want to come back to touch on the use of reserves because Councillor Ireland suggested that it was around 1% use well, this year alone is more than 5%. If you look on page 30 in the table there is 12 and a half million coming out of reserves this year, there's 30 million drain on reserves under this administration shown across those years, which is well over 10% of the reserves that you inherited. That is not insignificant. That is a substantial depletion, and the fact is that when Councillor Belton bemoaned the lack of a counter-proposal from us, the reality is that it's the additions to this budget since last month that were removed removed and the the flexibility to do so. The the amount of funding from the government has gone up. There would have been given the settlements on business rates given the collection fund surplus, given everything else of substantial net improvement to the Council's financial position since this budget was set. Instead, we have 1 million going on this. This suddenly are chief executives, group funding that wasn't identified last month and suddenly now is important, and we have 4 million which is being used for a service pressures contingency budget, which is, essentially to cover the out of control costs in adult social care and the overspending that was identified before that the administration claims is under control, but clearly isn't, because I've had to allocate another 4 million to cover it this year and even that given the rate of increase in that overspending may not be successful, the fact is, is it not Councillor Island,
that this Council could have genuinely frozen council tax by by cabinet and not having a 2% increase against its manifesto promises, and it could have actually cut council tax, given that in improvement, were it not for those additions to the budget. OK, thank you very much, I've had I'd say Ms and Mrs. Mary had a hand up, so I'll get her go first, so I forget so, thank you Chair, so I just wanted to clarify the point about reserves. Councillor Graham, you referenced the use of reserves which are laid out in a paper, as you say, are very clearly in paragraph 23
it is a planned use of reserves Councillor Ireland specifically referred to using reserves to balance the budget that is less than 1% is less than 1 million pounds that we are using to balance the budget so I just wanted to make that absolutely clear this committee has received a number of papers over the past 12 to 18 months which have specifically related to corporate priorities of this administration which rely on one-off use of reserves, the cost of living crisis, the change programme and support to refugees, and they're the figures that you're picking up. They're not the same as balancing the budget and secondly, I wanted to say was the paper you refer to back in January. You're right, there have been movements. Since then, there has been increased income from government settlements. Just remember that paper back in January declared a 6 million pound budget gap. It wasn't a balanced budget at that point, so I think it's slightly
slightly distracting to suggest that all the games since then could have been used to freeze or cut council tax completely.
and then just finally, the point I think I can't remember sorry who who raised this about what are the trade I think it was Councillor Richard Jones, actually you know the service pressures contingency, this is the fourth year that we've had a contingency the fourth year not the second and certainly not the first it's the fourth, it's a risk based approach to effectively what is an unprecedented level of uncertainty around local government funding and demand on services, so I just wanted to make that clear that this isn't.
unique to this administration, OK for coming back on those points, sorry, coming back on, so I know Councillor Graham, I actually said I would let you go.
Mrs. Mary asked and then I'd like Councillor Ireland, we get the right response to that, I'll tell you you had.
so excuse me, Councillor Osborne, like Councillor Osborne could clearly do with clarification at that.
and as ever that means sorry right, Councillor Island, but thank you very much for your Dr Summit and then we'll move to a vote, thank you very much, Mrs. Mary.
we're very pleased with this beat being in a position to help our residents by freezing the the general pot of council tax, and we do think it's a balanced approach, we think that given the
demand pressures that is just getting more bigger and bigger, particularly since COVID, on social care for adults and children, the amount of money we're spending on temporary accommodation, 20 million pounds, I think, on temporary accommodation that we, we've taken the right approach here now,
demand for our services is increasing because of it is because of government policy, the local housing allowance, you know that led to a large increase in the number of homelessness people which put our bills up.
what more can I say, then, I'm very pleased I think, that we do what we can to help our residents in the cost of living crisis, and we will continue to improve services and, like him, thank you very much, Councillor Ireland, OK, I'd like us now to move to a vote on the recommendation. We need to take some parts Councillor Carter, I thought we might down what on earth made. You think that okay, so recommendation to a is to approve the General Fund budget variations in paragraph 5 to 7 and Appendix A all those in favour. Please raise their hands. Tony can use
I I, that's six all those against.
any abstentions 5 abstentions, thank you, and the Chair didn't vote at BMC can be taken together, endorsing the proposal from reserves and recommending the council tax requirement, so all those in favour of items B and C please raise their hands.
all those against items B and C.
OK, and I think that's no, I'm not cousin vote or item D or budget framework in recommend we re.
excuse me adopt the budget framework in Appendix F all those in favour, please raise their hands.
thank you very much, all those against.
and all those abstentions.
okay, E and F together.

6 Proposed Additions to the Capital Programme (24-89)

we agree with you agreed, I'm very OK and E and F is agreed unanimously, yes, excellent, thank you very much, Councillors, OK, when I move to Item 6, which is the proposed conditions to the capital programme and again Ms Mary, if you'd like to explain a little bit about how we've got these okay excellent OK, thank you Chair, so I'll be very brief so again this paper is an annual paper that comes to a committee at this time of year.
and proposes a very specific additions to the approved capital programme and those additions I think, are listed in Appendix
A or B Appendix A so the proposals in front of this committee are for a number of schemes across a number of investment areas already mentioned, I think, by Councillor Ireland is an increase in investment around the borrower's Highways and or footways.
there is a plan here to spend more money on decarbonising the Council's operational properties and other sustainability projects and there's a a series of improvement works to our leisure centres to keep them in good order and up to standard, and this is an investment here in what was also mentioned earlier the family hub model and improving those locations and a number of schemes around a public realm and making the borough a more attractive place the total capital schemes in this paper come to 44 million pounds additional funding required is referenced in.
paragraph 1 sorry.
lost it.
as paragraph 35 is a table which lists out the additional schemes, the committees that they fall under and the proposed financing, so 44 million pounds we think at this stage that the use of capital receipts and or borrowing, because borrowing is the effectively the balancing figure if and when we have insufficient amounts of capital receipts to apply to the programme will total around 33 million for that new new programme and the revised capital programme which includes the additions and the existing programme is listed in the paper for approval, thank you Missouri, OK, haven't got any questions on the paper.
I can just see any more other than Councillor Gray all right, Councillor Fraser.
Councillor Belton, I'll let let me take it in order, sorry, Councillor Price, then Councillor Corner.
it'll be Councillor Graham first, if you are I, but could people who want to ask their questions just to keep their hands up for one moment has Fraser, I've got you, Councillor Corner, I've got you.
Councillor Felton, I've got you, Councillor Jeffreys, I've got you Councillor, Anne, Bash and Councillor Hedges.
thank you OK.
Councillor Greg,
yes, can I ask?
this has merit, too, to turn to page 98 and the table in paragraph 4.8 there and ask her to confirm that that shows 400 and 3 nearly 444 million pounds of borrowing being added to the housing revenue accounts.
to which we then have to add to look at the level of borrowing being authorised 48 million pounds which is going to be from the general fund and is now new, as of the papers for this meeting, giving us a total of over 450 million pounds worth of new borrowing under this administration because that correct,
Mrs. Mary, yes, but just to clarify Councillor Graham I I think you probably know this, but some of us might not that tabling paragraph 4.8 is a summary of the housing revenue account capital programme, which includes, and the majority of that borrowing relates to the thousand homes programme, so whilst you're right to say that is additional borrowing or that is borrowing under this administration,
the vast majority of that borrowing was actually approved under plans by the previous administration, which has since been supplemented by the change in tenure for the thousand homes programme, so just before you say anything more, Mrs. Mary and the team, presumably the housing revenue account has been discussed in full at Housing Committee the other week.
yes, it will have been, however, Councillor Graham has quite rightly recognised that the papers in here rely on assumptions around borrowing, which include the Council's overall borrowing position, so are relevant to some extent, I'll just to be clear that we don't want to repeat stuff that's already happened at the other at the other committee I I'm not trying to repeat just to respond to that point.
so it is correct that the capital programme
that this administration, inherited from the last one, did assume there was borrowing, although not anywhere, near this level, there has to be said, but a significant element of that borrowing was then to be repaid within short order by the subsequent phases, the often state redevelopment which the present administration will not recoup because it has switched that programme to being 100% social rent and therefore has to borrow the whole amount over a 50 year period and pay the interest rate on it, so can I just ask you, given that there's over 450 million pounds worth of borrowing there what the interest payments per year at the current interest assumed levels of interest rates will be when that 450 million has been borrowed, how much will we be paying out in interest payments payer?
so I am genuinely sorry, Councillor Graham, I do not have that figure to hand, but the paper recognises that there's actually two different rates of borrowing, because a general fund borrowing requires what's called a minimum revenue provision which is referenced in the paper whereas housing revenue account borrowing does not require that so there are different rates depending on whether or not the them API is applied which is in the General Fund the estimates that we've applied at the moment are,
based around current interest rates of 5%, dropping down to 3% over a couple of years' time, and we've mentioned before the the benefit of using internal borrowing, which is effectively instead of going out to the external loan market using our cash balances instead.
that gives us the added benefit of going to the market for external debt at what what is a good time to go, so it doesn't feel like we are ever going to be borrowing at the current rates if rates are expected to go down, which I think they are right in recalling, but before the administration added 120 million pounds. So just at the last meeting in January to the capital programme Councillor Graham Road excuse me, I have a lot of low, I have several other people who want to ask questions. I appreciate that you are probing, but there's a lot the what you've actually has about four or five questions, so please, to quantify the level, I'd go say, is this is it and then I'd like to move on to other people
I just want to confirm that prior to the 120 million being added by this administration to that capital programme not to do with the 1,000 homes programme at the last meeting of the Housing Committee that the debt interest payments were seemed to reach about 20 million per year in 28 29, so that's I mean that's jump that's before we then got this extra 50 million on the General Fund so we're talking about levels of debt interest payments that are orders of magnitude greater than council tax increases. Can I ask Councillor Ireland whether she thinks it is acceptable to authorise, which is what we're being asked to do tonight over 450 pounds plus 4 million pounds worth of borrowing when she doesn't even know how much that would cost per year.
Councillor Ireland, I don't think that's quite what you're being asked to authorise here, as Mrs Murray has explained, the vast majority of the boring you're referring to is HR, which has been discussed and approved elsewhere. We are very confident that any borrowing that we do will be affordable will be really careful. I think we've illustrated in the past two years that we are very careful with the finances. Now I know you'll probably devastated that we haven't wrecked Wandsworth finances because that's what you claimed for the past three or four years you said, but once it comes in they're going to increase your council tax, they're gonna spend all the money, we're not, we haven't we've proved that, so any borrowing we undertake will be affordable will make sure of that, because it's it's for sound financial management. Is what we do today. We're gonna Boris today's Hilton, that's exactly rightwing, but how can you say it's affordable, and you don't know how much Councillor Graham is right, I understand that you obviously feels strongly about this, but you have had foregoes at the question the Councillor has answered, you obviously have different views. Thank you, Councillor Graham,
ken's Fraser, police.
thank you Chair, I just wanted to welcome some of the additions in this as as Chair of the the Transport Committee, I was really pleased to see the the invest, the extra investment that's going into two roads and pavements and just to congratulate the Cabinet Member both for Finance and and Transport for working on on that I think that that's gonna be a big help to many of our residents who who struggle with using our pavements but also those who cycle on our roads as well and just as an example of
some people who say that services have got worse. One example of of how they've got better for some of my residents is 4 2. In my first term as a councillor for two years, I ask for one of my estates the Ryedale estate, to be recovered because there are huge potholes there didn't happen. I was told that there was nothing wrong with them, we have just recovered that estate and we are shortly to recover the pavements there as well. That is the difference that Wandsworth Labour is making and that services have improved.
thank you very much, Councillor Fraser, Councillor Corner,
thank you Chair, I wanted to ask the question around paragraph 11 of this report which relate to strategic, so now, before the election, the now administration spends a lot of time talking about.
how new levies on property developers would help pay for better and
higher quality law enforcement measures could I ask the Director of Finance whether this this plan for strategic still includes the levies on property developers, sorry, I n cats corner, I was busy looking for the the reference page, what an
as on page 63, paragraph 11 comma 63, thank you, and the question was directed to mesmeric mismatch. Thank you, yeah, thank you Chair, so I can. I can answer that very briefly, I just to be clear. We we can't levy what we're not allowed to levy so yeah, a community infrastructure levy is very highly regulated and the use of it is regulated. I think the reference you're making to making is to the the make developers pay principle, which is something that officers are looking at. We continue to look at across a number of different work streams. Section 1 0 6 0
developer contributions are probably the biggest way that we can influence that there is flexibility within the section 1 0 6 regulations and, and it's that element rather than CIL, I think that would be delivering on on that political priority, OK, thank you.
it is too quickly fall out, then will the Cabinet Member can permit or commit to bringing forward plans to deliver on that pledge they made before the election?
as Mrs Murray has explained, officers are working on on this when it's ready, we'll bring it forward.
thank you very much, OK, Councillor Belton.
thank you.
the majority party gets, let's not start from it, Councillor Graham made a point about this vast figure of 400 million.
sorry for 450 minutes. Thank you that I'm sure that not a little about ice makes a big difference over a 50 year timespan what he failed to mention, of course, as 50 years of council rents from having many properties, we're talking about at rent levels that we can not imagine no doubt with if the Tory government continues at the current rates of inflation, well, I won't say it because the tenants might get a bit of the the Ajay arms, but he's ignoring the income side of this completely, and this is perennially the problem with the minority party's position. They don't want us to borrow, even when it's about capital, when any ordinary family, your kids going to get a house, you are more than happy to lend money to them or the bank. They're borrowing, because they've got capital which they can pay off over a number of years, and it's precisely because you didn't do that, that we have the housing shortage that we have now, and it's precisely because you didn't maintain the fabric in the way that you should have done, that we're having to do. It is precisely because you didn't invest in maintaining the roads that Councillor Fraser has now, so I am happy that we're doing, and that is exactly what, but this isn't actually anyway, asking for approval was about borrowing, as I understand it, because that will come later. This is just a programme, an aspiration and the amount of borrowing that we actually have to do at some point in the future is incredibly difficult to know in detail right now because of interest rates, Gambon grants all kinds of things
a very real aspiration about what we think needs to happen to the fabric of the borough and we've got a pretty good track record of doing it pretty successfully so far as Councillor.
Ireland has already pointed out, we've got a freeze in two years, we've done improving services, we're going to continue doing that, we will do this, what this is is about sound financial management and Flower financial management that at the same time allows us to achieve just some of our objection objectives, like providing new housing for people in need, thank you, Councillor Belton, I have got.
you are withdrawing your question okay, the next person on the list was Councillor Anne Bash, so I agree with the director. So excuse me, Councillor Belton can Cheney microphone off, sorry, I agree with the direction of travel of this report and we've let the borough fall into some state of disrepair in terms of our assets, our capital assets, highways, footways, leisure centres, family hubs. So my question to Mrs Murray and the Cabinet Member is, can you give us a little bit more detail of what we will get for? The four and a half million in Appendix A and B for leisure centres happened to be quite an active user of one of the leisure centres, and what will we get for? The nearly half a million in terms of the family have just to give us a bit more flesh on the bone, so we understand
what we're buying, OK, thank you.
Mrs. Mary first, and then Councillor Ireland, which which would way, as you would, yes, so I got a bit of detail. Councillor and bash, on the Leisure Centre are upgrades. There's a there's a couple of a new lifts in that programme. There's air handling units, there's a refurbishment of poolside areas and boilers. So it is a mixed kind of programme but, as I said, it's bringing those assets up to a standard where they will, you know, be able to be used
for many years to come, I suppose over half a million was on family helps that is reconfiguring and refurbishing the buildings that are planned to be used for the family hubs, to make sure that they are configured in a way that supports the programme of works that W and the services that will be delivered.
did you want to add anything, Councillor Orlando, you OK just about that, the we opened our first family haven't even car in September, and this provides a one-stop shop for families to come to get to the PA support, advice and guidance and we think the model is working well, we want to expand that. Thank you,
actually, I'm just going to say something I used to be in the shows, the work of sure start that was Yvonne Carr a long time ago, which was brilliant, and I think you're moving back towards that that model.
I am, I think I have Councillor Hedges was on my list next, thank you Chair, this is a question for the cabinet member for finance, so in paragraph 51 we talk about minimising borrowing and also in.
in Appendix C 3.8 I we talked about borrowing there and you mention that we will maximise external funding avenues and then again in the appendix you talk about external funding.
can you please provide clarity on that, or is that undecided at this time, thank you, Councillor Island.
0, no sorry.
Councillor Ireland, it was in order to minimise borrowing. The Council will maximise all external funding avenues, and also external funding is mentioned in the appendix as well. So I was keen if you could provide more clarity on what you mean by external funding or whether that hasn't been identified yet or can Councillor Hedges. I've just noticed that Mr Mary's got her hand up and you're happy to take her comments first, and then the count then Councillor Gloyer, thank you Chair. So I just think it might be helpful to link in if the change programme paper, which I know I think has been deferred or move to the end at 1.00 of the work streams, a specific change programme work streams that we've been looking at is an external funding work stream so
the change programme investment includes a to a full-time officers working on maximising external funding for a pilot period of two years, it's exactly that kind of work that will identify additional external funding, we've had decarbonisation grant there's other climate change and savings funding that we have accessed previously so,
we're hoping that the new resource, not just against capital but against revenue as well and in additional schemes, will help identify external funding.
OK, thank you very much, Councillor Ireland.
the need to add anything to that, except for that, because we are mindful that our costs are rising, we need to identify as many sources as possible of external funding, sometimes that means putting up fees,
OK is that OK, cancer hedges, yeah, thank you, Councillor Rossport.
yeah, I think there's the central story here is the level of ambition for the borough which the administration has. We are correcting decades of underinvestment in the borough where redressing or unevenness between investment in the different town centres to make it more equitable. We're putting money into the leisure centres as described pay pavements and roads, as described improving services across the board. There have been several references to our manifesto and our election campaign back in 2022. The truth is, we said then that we were ambitious for the borough. We're ambitious for Wandsworth and we want the people of Wandsworth to be ambitious for their borough, so that's what we're delivering with this with this programme, and these proposed additions to the capital budget again, something we're very proud of
thank you very much. I haven't sorry, I have Councillor Graham again and Councillor Corner and that will be it okay, thank you, please not Elmsett as long as it's not for questions, it's not for questions is not ambitious to saddle this borough and debt. That is an ambition that's positively disastrous in its effect. Councillor Belton was talking as though 50 million was neither here nor there, but the 400 million of 150 million is the principle, the actual cost. Over the 50 years he is describing what is not being given. Astonishingly, the administration can't tell us that costs but is likely to be over a billion pounds. Now he talked about the impact on families well and tenants in particular. I think it should be stressed here, after years of having their rent cut and then frozen under the Conservative administration. This Labour administration has increased council tenants' rents by over 15% in two years. That is precisely to pay those interest payments on the debt that you are racking up now. I am making my point Councillor Bolton, I am making my point Councillor Belton, and I didn't interrupt on a point of order. I very seldom do this, but I will be allowed a point of personal explanation after his village choir.
thank you.
so that 15% is to pay debt interest. Now Councillor Belton also spoke about the additional housing units. That would therefore be solving the housing crisis. What no x no extra houses will be built under this administration and 540 just 540 units will be flipped to social rent at a cost that every single tenant you know in 17 and a half thousand properties across the Borough, has to pay for that won't solve the housing crisis, but it will have a significant impact on their car and their cost of living for them. It is an astonishing position to be in to have this amount of debt way through, as would the sort of blasé attitude as though it will make no difference. Now there's one final point that I wish to pick up, one which I wanted to do anyway, so I am glad Councillor Osborne mentioned it. He talked about investment in town centres and redistributing money across the borough. As he will note on page 17, which is what I've said in the past the town centre investment fund, which was established in February 2022 under the Conservative administration, was precisely designed to achieve that and to address the redistribution, and he will see that the 3.5 million pounds which will pay for improvements around Tooting town centre, presumably under his 100 day plan. We've yet to see that 3.5 million is coming from that Conservative fund, so it was the last administration that has addressed that issue in Tooting not his, but thank you very much as Councillor Belton your point of explanation
thank you.
Councillor Gruen talks about me not being certain which figure used fair enough, but it is a reasonable quip, but they aim to say that it completely ignoring the rental income from, let's say, a thousand extra homes over 50 years as a counterbalance for the debt. That's a very one-sided view of it, and he didn't even mention it as a possibility. That's number 1 and the other point he talks about at the level that we've increased rents in very highly inflationary terms. When I was first on this Councillor sorry about that, sorry, I thought he was going to be quick sighs. Nonetheless, my second, my second burst by the personal explanation he talked about rent increases. This Council went from one of the lowest rented councils in the country to the second fires to Westminster in no time flat is party is not one to boast about renting rights. Thank you very much, I think I had before Council was born, I had Councillor Cohen I actually did sod stop after Councillor Corner.
yeah from Councillor, A Osborne, Councillor corner for Councillor Paula, first, please, thank you, Chair. My question relates to page 71 of this paper, where, in the second table down, Nine Elms funding is begins are in the year just gone or finishing at 22 million but has been forecast to be 0 by 2007 28. What confidence can people who want to see a successful, my announced regeneration and all the opportunities that that regeneration area presents and its potential? What confidence can people have in this administration that that work will be completed to
so that we can unleash the potential of that area, and this is a question for the Cabinet Member.
great confidence we keep our word, thank you very much right last point, Councillor Osborne, but please make it.
yes, you'll enjoy it, it's the point of personal explanation on this thing about.
funds that begin under one administration and then are continued under another. Of course, if you get a change of administration, they're gonna be claims and counterclaims as to who is responsible, for what I am reminded of a famous conversation between two great American song and dance men Eddie Foyle and George M Cohen, when Eddie for you said to George M Cohen, I know all your dance routines, George because I did them first and George M Cohen says,
yes, but I did them right, what's gonna be, the point here is that Labour does them right, and that's what people are gonna, remember right, thank you, Councillor Osborne, and Councillor Ireland as it's your paper on the capital, is there anything short and extra to add just that?
our aim is to correct the historic under-investment in the bar, possibly not in some areas represented by the minority party, but definitely in areas south of the borough such as Tooting now, the thousand homes programme is totally necessary, it or the projections show that it is affordable.
but you, you and you talk about 541 social homes split 12, that means a great deal to 541 families, and we're not just talking about a decent home somewhere to live, you know better life chances, reduce crime, reducing homelessness is something we should all be aiming for better healthcare you you can't underestimate the benefits of having somewhere decent and secure to live.
we are also investing on our estates again, might not be noticed by members of the minority party, they don't tend to venture there very often, but if you had you then you would see that lots of paving has been repaired, lifts and windows are going into these properties. Thank right, thank you very much so on that route, Andrew sorry no, but we through which I lay out on a bit of personal explanation argued.
enough Council 8th round, so we didn't venture on to estates, so absolutely excuse me to say, are completely and right.
excuse me, Councillors, I understand that feeling at excuse me councillors, including cabinet members, I understand that things are quite high. Obviously this is important. There's a lot of money and there will be questions about it. However, I think we've had a good debate, we're now moving to the vote
it's technical go on, what is the technicality could cut Mrs. Mary just clarify that, sorry, can you say No, I don't just a technical point in the appendices to every time it says funded by receipts excuse me, so this is a schedule by Councillors, would you like, could you just let me deal with this as Chair everyone, Councillor Graham, I think this is moving away for Councillor Graham and could you stop talking over the top of me, otherwise I shall have to ask you to go and elsewhere. It is not technical if you are
I have heard it and it's not tech you haven't heard I am going to where where there's receipt now in the appendices.
receipts, stroke borrowing, we think they're not borrowing, and I'm asking whether the receipts should act so. Graham Bourne, Councillor Graham excuse me that all of you right, Councillor Graham, you have had at least two goes to second, serve quite so in that case, ask Miss Mary separately or as an inquiry Members might want to know what they're voting on Councillor Graham, well, one is, it is a receipts are borrowing, Councillor Ahmed?
excuse me.
you are being watched by members of the public Councillors, I wish you would remember that I have asked you, I've said we've had a good debate, I've said, I don't think this is appropriate for a technical answer. Please be aware that there are people watching us and one of the things that the people watching us want us to do is think about us managing our debate sensibly and clearly we've had a good debate. We now need to move them to the vote, please, and we've been asked to vote
excuse me, let me say, on the recommendations in paragraph 2, please okay.
Councillor Graham, if you could give us some indication about whether we take this altogether or separately would be really helpful.
the
the
so A to C and E together you said.
okay, right so a is approved the additions to the capital for a general fund capital programme, these prove the revenue.
budget variations and see is to recommend the Council to adopt the capital programme in paragraph. The other point is that in be, I think the first four figures are not to approve, but note because I have already been approved by Appendix 8, the preceding payment. OK, well, fine, that's OK right so could well reapproved them, so we need a Councillor application on that. Obviously, if there's a slight typo, but we'll take it as it is understanding what you've just said, so please can we have everyone in favour of recommendations A to C? Please can I have hands write-up please, including Councillor Belton
6, I reckon you reckon six guy, okay those against those recommendations in HC, OK, thank you no, and those abstaining please.
x 5 abstentions and the Chair didn't cost votes so that 6 4 no against, and 5 abstentions recommendation D, is to improve the Council's Capital Strategy.
could I have those in favour, please, 6, those against five, and that means there's no abstentions and S A and E is to note the ongoing review and that's agreed by everybody, thank you very much Councillors.
okay, we'll now move on to the item 7, which is the Treasury Management Strategy, please.

7 Treasury Policy (24-90)

Mrs. Mary, it is not quite the Mrs. Mary Shaw, but it's heading that way very.
would you like to just highlight the changes to the capital fund for sorry for the Treasury Management Policy yeah thank you Chair, so just very briefly, because I know this is a paper that that comes in a few different guises during the year, so this is to approve the Treasury Policy for the coming year.
it builds on the existing Treasury Policy and it proposes to a small amendment to that policy, which are detailed in paragraph 36 with the changes highlighted in bold the changes here are to allow additional investments in longer term products in order to maximise our returns where we can,
reflecting the fact that our cashflow, whilst projected to a decrease, is expected to continue at a potentially significant level for a number of years, and we need to maximise our returns on that best. We can just a couple of things to highlight beyond that, we've seen a significant increases you know over the past two years in our returns, our current overall average rate of return on our treasury investments is 4.8%. At the end of December, the table at the top of par page 112 shows you that actually, if you take out the earlier investments that feed into that weighted average, our current investments
the the final column on that table are currently running at 5.00.2%, so we are maximising our investments as much as we can, we've mentioned a queue a number of times, the Council Ed, has independent specialist advisers that helps with the policy and also the specifics of its longer term investment strategy and just to clarify,
our benchmarking against other London boroughs is particularly healthy, we've done a particularly good level of return in the past financial year, and that's all credit, I think, to the treasury management team who are very proactive in this area and spend an awful lot of time, effort and energy trying to find the best place for our investments that adequately balances security, liquidity and yield OK, thank you very much Mr. Murray.
Coutts or any I've got Councillor Marshall, anyone else Scott Councillor Hedges OK.
yeah, Councillor Marshall.
to him expanding the capacity for him, longer-term investments.
and just wanted to also note my initial alarm at the page 125 what appeared to be a raid on the pensions resilience reserve as chair of the pension fund, I was rather worried about that.
but are being explained by Mr DeLacy that actually it's a different category of pension reserve, funded tax relief, I suppose I just have the the the one question that the these longer-term investments are not gonna take the form of the property investments made in the 2015 2016 in a limited range of rather illiquid properties investments but rather will be focused on marketable liquid investments in funds rather than bricks and mortar which were not really much play. I don't think we're very well placed to be experts in
that's a question yeah, so I gosh she's there, Mr Rugby's the absolute expert in these things, and in Councillor Marshall could you tenure?
yeah, I say so, the sorry, so the ref, the reference to the property portfolio purchased back in 2016, where we actually use capital receipts, it wasn't a Treasury investment, it was a capital receipt investment.
those properties and Ms Robbie is absolutely expert in this, and that's that's what you live and breathe, isn't it yeah, then they are returning really good returns and they sit outside of the Treasury returns that were shown in this paper the referenced in there but you've had good success in that haven't you and,
they're holding their own yeah, I mean like every investment you know, property prices sometimes go up, I'll go down and the yields go up and down, but eventually at the the they do recover and we have a balanced portfolio, so what you then find is that some properties actually performing much better than others but you know,
I think overall it's the the portfolio has performed well and then just can I just follow up on that Councillor Richard, because there are two points that are relevant to this for things that have changed since, since 2016 number 1 in 2016 we had capital receipts available to invest the previous paper we've talked about suggests that we weren't necessarily had that level of capital receipts available.
and then the second thing that has changed since then is the government has actually the regulations have.
stopped local authorities, borrowing money to buy properties with the proceeds of of borrowing, and not allowed to do that any more, you can do it from your own, your own resources, but you cannot borrow to do that, so in the current position we wouldn't have the resources available either through capital receipts or borrowing to extend that portfolio.
thank you very much OK, Councillor Hedges.
thank you Chair, this is a question to Mrs Murray, and also thank you for putting together all other reports I know it takes, it must take you quite a long time in regard to your the two changes that you mentioned, the increase in the borrowing limit and the cumulative investments marker going from 20% to 25 SEN is now really the right time to take on more risk given the political uncertainty around the future general election result and the lack of financial expertise on on Labour's shadow government government bench.
if, if I can avoid the second half of that question, the so just to be clear, this is proposing changes to the policy doesn't necessarily mean that we will hit those markers and you know there will still be a considered approach in order to determine whether or not it's appropriate to go up to 150 million, so approving it now does not mean that we will activate it straightaway, it would have to be. You know, the right investment at the right time with the right conditions for us to
activate those revised proposals.
OK, thank you.
and nobody wants to say anything about the level of telly we talk to you about that later, Councillor Graham.
yes, could I first of all ask why it is that the borrowing figures shown on page 1 3 4?
and in the table at the bottom, don't match the 8 new estimated new HRA borrowing figures at the top of page 1 to 7.
we all have to take that away, Councillor Graham, I haven't managed to get to the bottom of that, but I will I will get back to you on that and that will be marked as an action point, so I don't forget thank you OK.
the the other point is on page 1 3 7, where we see the authorised limits and projections for a gross external debt, the 405, nearly 460 million pounds shown by 26 27 alone, doesn't include the potential for internal borrowing, so I might take the difference between that and the figure just over 450 as being the amount to be borrowed internally.
you, you're right that the in indicate on page 1 3 70, s external debt only.
we we've spoken separately about this where I think we can present these figures in or in perhaps in a clear away, and I will work on that as I, as I said to you last week, I'll work on that for the next iteration of this paper I mean, as I am referring on the previous item, it is essentially what we need is alongside the them are pay contributions to fund the requirements that are shown for the HRA and General Fund on page 1 3 5
or but we also need the interest that is likely to be involved now, and I know that the rate may change, but at least it can be estimated because we do. We simply don't know if this is affordable, without knowing what those interest payments are. I yeah yeah, that's that's a fair point. We can bring that altogether, I mean I would just make the point that we do know how much our borrowing is going to cost, as it's just not necessarily laid out in this paper, all in one place, which is a point that we've spoken about, and I wouldn't expect Councillor Ireland necessarily to have those figures to hand when it involves the you know the housing revenue account, but in the housing revenue account business plan paper there will be an absolute assessment and it will be built into the framework. How much the additional cost is and then I think it's recommendation B on the capital programme shows the revenue cost of the increased capital programme based on the addition, so yeah, those figures are in the papers, it's just not all being pulled together in one place, so that's what we can definitely work on going forward, coming back, and I did check the housing paper to see where that 120 million extra not to do with the thousand homes was being added. What what impact that would have on future viability because the the fact that, even with the increases in rent that are predicted now it was the interest payments plus the repayment was likely to come within two or 3 million of affordability in 2028 29 that the paper doesn't say it doesn't project up that far. It doesn't show where that 120 million is actually added on the timeline, so it was impossible to tell from what's been published so far, whether that headroom in 28 29 will be breached or not. Yes, I think the paper does talk about ongoing viability. So the the headroom I mean there isn't actually a headroom figure, the the the HA doesn't have
or a fixed headroom anymore, it has an affordability, a principle which is applied, and I think the overriding conclusion of the business plan or will have been, and I know it has been, that the the planned programme
is and still remains and is predicted to be affordable. But I get the point that you don't see the peak debt in that paper, because a framework doesn't go that far, but the assumptions that underlie the business plan, which is the 30 year and the tenure snapshot that does include that this isn't just a question just for clarity, when I was talking about headroom, I'm it informally the level that we felt was right, OK, thank you very much, right, as they don't seem to be any further questions. Could we have a move to a vote on the recommendations in paragraph 2? Please
OK, A to A is to authorise the Executive Director of Finance to determine the treasury policy at all those in favour, please raise your hands.
McKay, all those against, please raise their hands.
Will those abstaining?
sorry I.
yeah, so we're not agree, I think that's a slightly strange position, but never mind okay be to approve as.
I don't want you to explain no, it's fine to approve as required the change the borrowing limit is B. So all those in favour, please raise their hands, although OK, that's six, isn't it all those against?
so 0 0.
5 and that means no abstentions I haven't cast a vote
and C is happy to vote in favour, it has provided the referenced paragraphs 38 to 42 has changed of 40 to 42, I'm sure back or a technical that can be resolved, the typo is that correct.
Mrs. Murray agreed and approved the prudential indicators in Appendix C. Sorry.
D
all those in favour of D to approve, potentially six all those against.
5 OK no abstentions, OK, thank you very much, so that's carried, it's fine right, we're now moving on to the change of order to item 17, which is the relocation of a Frogmore Dépôt.

17 Relocation of Frogmore Depot to Sergeant Industrial Estate (Paper No. 24-100)

Mr Oakbay, would you like to comment and, Mr. Moore, could you just like to explain to us?
very simply, is what's happening here and what this paper is aimed to designed to achieve.
to facilitate the delivery of the Wandle delta master plan, which includes the redevelopment of Frogmore Depot, the Council acquired Sargeant industrial estate along Garrett Lane in 2019 as the new home for the depot.
and it was envisaged at the time that
immovably planned for just after 2028, when most of the leases on the estate expired, since the acquisition of Sergeant property services have worked to ensure that the majority of the leases are aligned to terminate in mid 2028, however, 3 leases expired in 2023 and the tenant wishes to renew them.
the 10 the Council has offered to renew the leases for five years or 10 years, with a break clause in 2028, so the idea is to try to align all the leases to expire in 2028, but the lessee has re has rejected this proposal and request a new 10 year lease without any break clause because the leases are protected. It is currently likely that the matter may be determined by a court. It is therefore important for the Council to confirm its intention to move to silent, as this will assist in buttressing the Council's request by breaking 2028, which will enable the relocation to proceed as originally planned.
outline designs indicate that most of the operations are on front wall, will fit on to silent, which consists of an area that is some 60% smaller than Frogmore.
in order to fund the design and and master plan of both sites, this paper request a working budget of 500,000, this will also help to establish the options for the redevelopment of from one depot, I think I'll leave it there and am happy to ask answer any questions that the committee may have brilliant.
right let's have a change, that's how Councillor Belton first.
Councillor Corner, are you raise it or you describe racking my head?
thank you very much, OK and then Councillor Graham OK, Councillor Felton, will I'm interested to start with him whether there is actually going to be any disagreement about this, so after all it is a plan, in a sense initiated by the last or at last Council and with the previous Councillor whatever words you want to use?
and being supportive yeah, so in a sense it was not going to be any disagreement, I'm quite happy to take it, as is if there is disagreement that I'd put my case, I wonder whether the indication
OK.
yes, thank you so, excuse me, yeah yeah yeah, we are I I can I can assist Councillor Bolton, we are broadly in favour, in principle of relocating the Council's depot from Frogmore to the Sargeant Industrial Estate.
I do have some amendments actually, Mr. Oakley was kind enough to spare some time prior to the meeting to explain.
where officers were coming from on this, which means that I I will actually when we get to that point, revises amendments slightly in a way that I hope will then be acceptable to all parties, because I don't wish to undermine in any way that relocation or the ability of the Council to get what it needs to get in the courts to achieve that.
my my concerns were fundamentally that, and I think this may be taken on board, that we were authorising rather a lot, rather a long way in advance, without it necessarily needing to come back to the Executive or this committee, which in principle at least is something we should try to avoid in terms of governments, I think I think there is a solution on that, so my my remaining question is actually for Councillor Island, which is not about the Sargeant industrial estate or the moving the depot, it's about what the submit administration intends to do with the Frogmore site when it's like vacated
but certainly you have been very helpful.
can I just address those those points, there's no point in discussing you might as well, we might as well get straight to your amendment speakers, you've agreed over everything, and you've agreed that it's a good thing to do as for the first one I think that's if I may say so just a little pedantic sorry I am sorry excuse me,
Councillor Bowden, I think Councillor Graham asked back to call you Councillor Ireland, I am just changing, I was, I think Councillor Graham said that the amendments may have changed yeah so I will clarify it where it gets that point, so I think I think that will help address Councillor Feldman said, but I would like the question answered from cabinet rather than having to say we're making it more difficult to leave.
well, can I have before we go there right, one of the things that you said that Ms Mr Oakbay had very kindly explained to you was I mean, obviously you've said that you're concerned about almost like it's not bright points at least, but the points at which this would come back to Council committee
I just wondered if Mr Rugby or I might be able to explain to us at what point we will see what happens to Frogmore because obviously the current plan in in the paper does covers a long time and seems quite
so.
as as the paper indicates, what we need to do is that we need to do some design and master plan for a more, and until that is done, we are not going to know what was going to look like and you know in its redevelopment once it's really redeveloped the paper does not ask committee at this stage for powers to dispose of the of from so which means that we will need to come back to committee to seek authority to disposal from work and I suppose at that stage will be able to tell the committee what the plans are.
thank you, OK, Councillor.
I think we'll have a Kodak could I have an answer to my question from Councillor Alan Caine because I thought first of all just do slightly nuance what's just been said, it does, as currently drafted the the recommendation D Woodall that would see a whole planning application being prepared and submitted without any return to Council.
say they would do that would all be on delegated powers and also what that planning application would involve whether it would be residential or commercial, the levels of affordability, what the bill costs are likely to be, that that's all left entirely unclear, I think there may be agreement that actually on D,
the deck, we can authorise the Director of Place to prepare a planning application, but not necessarily to submit one, however, even in preparing an application, the administration must have some overall intentions for that site. Clearly the the idea is to put a planning application and get the planning consent and then sell site without building it out. But what do you want to be in that planning application? What are you asking the Director of Place to go and prepare when it comes to Frogmore
yeah, OK, Councillor, Ireland.
sorry, I can't really add much to what Mr Otby said, we're working on the plans and I think I think it explains in a it's still the ones with Den delta master plan, you're still working on the Martin.
so I can't really add anything to what the officers.
I think the lack of clarity reiterates the need for that to come back to committee and the Executive before planning application is submitted.
so, and this will be your Mike is on, did you want to say a bit more, or is it just all now?
I suppose if me if members wanted us to come back with an update at specific points once we haven't a bit more clarity in terms of what happens at trouble, then we're happy to do so, but I kind of think that when we seek a authority to declare from war surplus at that stage it will become into committee with an options appraisal and to to explain to committee what officers propose.
thank you, Ms stronger, does that help you, Councillor Graham, so I I I'd still, or maybe I should set out what these amendments are, now, if you don't want to do well, you're just cutting back on other services bouncing had one thing he wanted to said then we'll pick out the amendments Councillor Belsham did you want to add any more?
all right.
if you don't have to DJ Chair, we were all in agreement on both sides about the desirability of for putting the Frogmore elsewhere and releasing a much more valuable site.
Councillor Graham thinks it's obvious that we want to establish a value to sell it, I don't think that's a tall obvious as knowing my good friend Councillor for Queenstown in Shaftesbury, I just think it is very likely that he wants to make sure a lot of its council housing on the other hand, I think, no favours after the next election.
some people in the minority party would hope to be in a majority and want to do something else with it, one way or another are guaranteed, I'll absolutely guarantee it comes back to some committee or aisle, and we've always resolved big, and I think we're probably frankly about not very much the important point is to
clear up the lease situation so that it's ready in 2028, for whichever party wins next time, to make sure that is what they want, but gets there as they important period and all the rest of the stuff with respect to Councillor Graham is pretty minor stuff. I take your point frankly, but in a way the Director of Place being delegated to submit a planning application assumes that the majority party have had a quiet chat about what it is going to be. Council housing or for sale or whatever it is, but they will clearly have had that chat with the majority party unhappy amazed if that isn't getting Co gets to the minority party in some way or other, but we're way out into the future and this is, I really do think this is nitpicking. What is essential now is to make sure of the legal situation vis-a-vis the leases, and you can come back on on what happens subsequently whenever you like. So this is about whether we can come back at least in terms of what's being proved now. First of all, Page 4 2 9, says at the bottom in Appendix 4 disposal of Frogmore not its potential retention as council housing disposal. Secondly, were it to be put forward as council housing that would have to form part of the planning application, and that is precisely why, when we reaching that stage and when the decision is being made about whether it's council, housing or not, that decision should be made by the Executive, not by officers under delegated powers. So I think what Councillor Belton is actually saying is that the should say prepare rather than submit, which is our amendment, and I think we are in agreement and that that is not pedantic and actually for him to get what he wants. That amendment needs to be put forward,
OK right, thank you very much.
Councillor Graham, could you clarify, I had a new very helpfully and I will say how helpful this is is that very helpfully puts through possible amendments, but you've now said they've changed a bit, I can take you through, so I think the person who needs to be taken yeah I was going to take the car Clark and the committee through so that everybody knows where we are so.
it is not a pedantic point on a so they are making it a firm rather than room from isn't pedantic, because actually, as Members will have seen from the exempt paper that was circulated earlier today, that paper, though it strongly implied that the Council would look to relocate, it didn't actually commit the Executive at that time to relocation. So I think it does have to be affirmed, not reaffirmed, because it has never been affirmed in the first place that may be slightly pedantic, but it's still accurate and the it as it stands is inaccurate. So I don't think that amendment is a problem and we want to keep that in place, so I would speak as circulated
we are removing the amendment to see, although we would like to keep that amendment, I accept that that may cause legal issues which this committee is not in a position to resolve, so we are prepared to remove that amendment to see we are keeping the amendment to die, so is A and D stands C gone and then on be,
rather than amending in that form, while we wish simply to add at the end of be with a further report to the Executive when feasibility studies are complete and and this is simply to stress the fact that although we do support and I think everyone can see that relocating Frogmore to Sargeant would would make sense and until the feasibility, as has been the study that has been completed and we know what the bill cost is, what most massing is heights all the rest of it access points.
it is necessary for the the Executive to actually just reconfirm its intention at that point and so that needs to be addressed in some way. I accept the officers have said it would happen in practice, but it should be there in recommendations, so I hope that those are relatively minor points. That then can be and we can have a level of consensus on this, even though, as I said, we remain in the dark about what the administration wants to do on a problem. Sorry, Councillor Cohen, I just don't check with you on on the scene to keep your amendment as it is, but then with that sentence added no scrap to scrap everything that is currently there and be and just add that sentence at the end, so there did. The the be is as it stands, but with the addition of that point about having a further report to the Executive when feasibility studies are complete,
sorry just reread that for Councillor Anne Bashir's benefit be would be as it stands, but at the end of of the after the words the new Council Depot to add the words with a further report to the Executive when feasibility studies are complete so yeah as it stands in the paper like we Mr Kelly's yeah, yes, so as it stands in the Pepe
OK.
right what I just want to check something though, is I think it will have been monitored, won't it, that there's been a request for a further report, because we've talked about this and I think Mr Otby also said that that was likely to have him just checking for the minutes is that the case, Minister Kelly just to check that we've covered?
you know, I think what I said was that at the point where we know what we're going to do with from where we will be coming back to committee, so whether it's disposal or yeah, it's going into the HRA or whatever it still needs to come back to co-pay which you know just for clarity that this amendment relates to Saddam not not from other be be released aside yeah sorry well it's because I'm looking at the let me have a look
that's okay right, let's move for a vote on this, though so.
oth sorry, I do apologise and okay, first of all I need somebody to second, the amendment A so Councillor Graham Councillor Hedges is seconding the rear from one remove to vodka Councillor Ireland just say whether she would be happy with those amendments in that form.
please repeat, is the rear from the A is reaffirm rather than sorry, take out the reaffirm, because Councillor Graham has said the initial paper, I'm a slightly worried, though, because you referred to a
I think that's fine.
that way, there is that factually correct.
well, I think it's I, I think if you read the previous paper, the the whole reason for acquiring Sergeant was actually as a new home for Frogmore, and so you know whether we are reaffirming or affirming I don't think it makes much of a difference awareness.
I do it if it helps the relevant sentence of the first part.
sorry, I God excuse me, there's too many microphones out.
that special. Thank you now, Councillor Graham, could you like I started, I have to say, so I I mean I I dare I doubt the sentence is actually exempt, but just just because I don't wish to risk that members will find the relevant sentence in that paper in front of them. In the first part, the explanatory notes I provided and it doesn't it doesn't affirm that intention egg, obviously, that was
strongly in mind, I would accept that, but I am on the ground which says it doesn't really matter whether this reaffirm or from I think it should be affirmed, if everyone is happy that it doesn't matter, we might as well just make the change to be accurate.
OK, Councillor, Ireland.
G was just check in with the officers that your understanding.
I'm ha ha either way, you know, I think he means the same thing roughly fine, then then I'll take the officer advice OK.
well, sorry, Councillor Williams made her decision, OK now, be I understand.
right Councillor, OK B now should raid.
authorise the Director of Place to take all actions required to relocate Frogmore to Sargeant industrial in Clay, including carrying out and then surveys, and there should be with a further report to Executive when feasibility studies when feasibility studies are complete, OK if I got a seconder for that place.
Councillor right, OK, so can we vote on that, please, or that the on be 0 and shall we sort C out D what it works?
changes a bit to prepare.
again, can Councillor Andrews say if she is happy with that addition to be which basically just formalises what we verbally said again, I I'd like to take advice that officers teeth.
particularly amendment.
I think.
when when, when I wrote this paper, it followed precedent in and while we've done schemes like this, we have asked for broad powers to be able to go and get on and do it and of course in the preparation or drink preparation of these plans, we will of course be consulting with Cabinet members and other interested members on it and so under the previous administration this is kind of wording that we've used, and so we've just repeated that and followed that convention, if you like so if members would like a further update, then you know I have no objection to bringing it to committee.
OK, thank you very much right.
I'm sorry.
I
you've got clear, I think I, I think, the no sorry sorry, Ms Moore wishes to say something about this as well, I think I think I've managed to clear sorry, sorry, Members could even pull more Interim Director Place just a chipping I'm I'm conscious that one or two the discussions might and the wording in the paper might seem like semantics perhaps I could just bring to aid this this final point about submit or prepare
Mr obeying, his introduction made very clear and no members are conscious that this is coming to you this evening.
with the intention of it being view to another prison defendant. So countless we've risk this sorry just for clarity, I I think there's a confusion here is the submitted prepare relates to md, can is not the subject of legal contention, so I I did check this with Mr Aylesbury in advance, the Committee was the subject to carry out in relation to D. Excuse me, Mr Moore was talking, it would be polite
to hear him and then deal with it, and I would have liked to have heard what Mr Moore said, thank you, Mr Moore sorry, I'm Frederick, I'll have to repeat that sorry I was just going to come on to say members, I do take the Councillor Gruen's point about the being specifically in relation to Frogmore I absolutely get that point.
the the there's a more general consideration, I would just like to to to say to Members this evening, it is deliberate, in our intent, bringing this paper here.
to maximise the chance of the Council's prospects in that, in that Lee Lee potential legal case I I'm not saying the two are the same, they're clearly different sides, but within the Council's overall intention in evidencing and making that clear, I think both the reference to the Frogmore SCI is relevant.
and also the degree of delegation that you're giving is irrelevant.
the separate, but related point I wanted to make is clearly there's a good understanding on the officer side that there's a high degree of Member interest in this overall programme is strategic in nature and therefore there would be a commitment clearly to bring back reports that the relevant steps in stages then I thank you very much, Ms Moore is this. I would like to actually move to the vote on this as fatwa. So for first of all I
I think it would be helpful if we could sort out B and then we can go back to D, so I think there was agreement on B, which is simply what officers have said verbally putting it down, it doesn't undermine in any way that the legal,
position of the Council is just saying there will be a further report, which members have already said I'm gone on, the administration had already said they expect to happen and officers have been happy to provide, so simply putting that in writing merely covers that from a governance perspective.
yes, secondly, we move to the vote now, too.
you've got what we've got you amendments proposed seconded, Councillor Alan, happy to accept that on be put to the vote of the committee.
yeah
so
right, OK, so anyway, sorry, sorry, anyway, dealt with, so you haven't, though yeah, I don't know whether you need you need to have a vote on the amendment okay.
sorry on the outcome, you can then go back to the actual.
items in the paper, OK, that's what we'd met, and yes, sorry, so can we?
can I give way just yet, sorry no, no, no, I apologised, I've Minister Kelly, you were well older, the full equality scheme.
so don't traders like chaos.
if, if you can ask the committee to vote on right, OK, sorry, the first thing is OK, they have met first one, we've got his amendment a.
on paragraph A, which is to reaffirm intention rather than limit.
sorry, a firm rather than rear from OK all those in favour.
I think we're agreed.
nothing to touch us right, OK those.
in favour of the amendment, please raise their hands.
I assume you're in favour of your own yeah, OK, that's five right, but it's the gap to the committee.
are those against please, 6, thank you very much OK, I'm afraid that falls because the vote on be, can I just say that it legally, in terms of showing this Council's resolve and intent to relocate cross-party support, and a unanimous vote in this committee would be helpful to the Council's legal position, and that's a very good point. We are prepared to vote for this with the amendment, but we're not prepared to allow unprecedented levels of delegated authority without a further report coming back, given that it has been accepted that this is technically fine, to add as an amendment and that will secure cross-party support which will materially improve the Council's legal position, we hope that the administration will agree to it right. OK, we now have
the amendment on the which was
around B C D and D together we haven't got say haven't got amendments, say is meant be so all those in favour of amendment be please.
thank you all those against amendment, be please.
as Councillor Graham, thank you.
I'm afraid that amendment forms and then.
D was advised to submit its prepare, which was to secure a golden circle as a central favour of amendment D.
please raise their hands.
or just checking okay, all those against amendment D, please raise their hands so that sic 5 For the amendment 6 against the amendment and the amendment files now we need to move back to the substantive items because I'm afraid I will have to be taken in part fine.
okay are to a reaffirm intention to relocate all those in favour of that, please can you raise your hands that 6, I'm gonna, cost vote this time 7.
okay, all those gains, please, and those abstentions 5, thank you very much.
BC, indeed, altogether, all those in favour of B, C and D, please raise their hands.
that'd be seven, all those against, please raise their hands, thank you, that's fine, thank you very much, Councillor, so that's and Ian 0.
sorry Booth and we've got A and F.
we are in favour of me but can I note that in f we we aren't approving because it's already been approved by Appendix A to the Council Tax setting report, so if it should actually be OK no, thank you I understand I mean I will obviously hopefully we we've had a couple of days before but hopefully we can pick those up in the drafting of the papers for the next tie if if that can be amended then we're where we are happy to vote on in favour of Vienna OK everyone in favour of a rá e and f altogether vote in favour.
thank you, I will vote for them as well, and that's unanimously all.
30 12 of us. Okay, gritter, can I just thank you for bringing it up the agenda because I think the the nature of that debate shape, that we did need the time to discuss it. I'm sorry we ended up in a position where I think not not your fault, that the administration has cut off his nose, despite a Facebook. That is well well. We have ended up anyway. Thank you very much for your thoughtfulness on this and I yeah, I do understand it's very important OK, so we're now moving thing.

10 Battersea Arts Centre Deeds of Variation to the Lease and Rent Abatement (Paper No. 24-93)

to item 10, which is the Battersea Arts Centre variation of lease, OK if those we have a small explanation about this place from 0 excuse me, Councillor Councillor Akinola, sorry, I do apologise every word Councillor Akinola would like to just say a couple of words about this before our officers explain another leaks position.
yes, this this paper is for one of our most loved and well used theatres across the borough and a key partner in our borough of culture Bid as well celebrating its 50th year, something we can all celebrate, and this paper is about securing its future for years to come.
thank you, so this paper seeks permission to modernise Battersea Arts centres, least in order to ensure maximum local social and economic value for the remainder of the 125 year lease on Battersea Old Town Hall.
the least changes will allow PSC to expand its income, generating programmes, with the proviso that once they actually start paying rent at the moment, they are in a rent-free period that the more income they generate, the more rent they would be paying the council, but that would always be affordable because it would be taken. It's a profit, a new methodology. The methodology uses the unrestricted profit that PAC generate
also at this paper asks that, as part of our 2015 commitment to the Arts Council England, that we seek to extend the rent free period, it's currently due to expire in 2028 and where we request permission to extend this to 2035. Under the new process, it is planned to link that to link the social and economic benefits to this extended rent-free period, which will be monitored through a social value agreement to ensure that it aligns with the Council's strategies, policies and priorities going forward and for the initial phase up until 2031, we're proposing to align it with the arts and culture strategy so combined. We feel these variations to the lease will ensure that it better reflects our shared priorities and ensures that the high quality arts and culture programmes that PAC deliver will be protected.
and as well as giving greater clarity for both parties and the security on the lease going forward, it is a Grade II listed building will also put them in a much stronger position to seek further funding both into the building and into their programmes, thank you very much OK, have I got any questions on this from Councillors?
just Councillor Grahame anybody else right, OK, Councillor Graham.
so first I just want to echo Councillor Akinola as well as about the the values at the Battersea Arts Centre brings, and there's indeed the previous administration, but both set up the arrangements there and also put the brine in the current rent-free period in say we are pleased that they are continuing that.
policy, and we were happy to support that in principle, I just have a couple of questions on the the practice of this, so the first is I accept that.
the number of events that are or which is currently the the break clause involved a number of events involved, it is is arguably too high as it stands, and also that in order to allow Bassey onset to pursue
more commercial and income generating opportunities, it couldn't remain at that level.
however, do officers accept that having a number of events, albeit on a lower number of events, is part of ensuring yeah, we have prevented on income generating commercial is part of ensuring that they are providing social value and that therefore it would be appropriate to have some baseline level of events within the new social value agreement.
yes, and so it it's been envisaged that within the social value agreements it would be much clearer to outline what are what are public events, but also what of BCC's strengths is actually their youth programme, the training and development none of that is captured by events and asking them even without changing their model to deliver 800 events is rather meaningless.
I entirely accept that and and I were happy to see that reformed, I'm glad that there was an understanding that that should be reflected in in some way and the social value agreement second question was about the level of rent and a calculation of the level of rent because obviously the the deceptive given which information we have here on on what level of rent could potentially be born.
assume that it wasn't running those income generating commercial events, so now they will be. Are we comfortable that the rent-free period should be extended for that length of time without us knowing how successful those commercial endeavours are, because obviously, if they're very successful, then it might be plausible for them to actually pay some rent towards the end of that period if it gets going, so I'm I'm I'm not saying that this is the wrong approach. I'm just saying how have we looked at that
we have looked at it, I would say, the proviso, so the current the new methodology looked at their accounts for three years, those three years were incredibly unusual, so firstly, those figures are significantly inflated by the fact that they received the payout, the insurance payout for the fire so that counted as unrestricted a significant amount of unrestricted income.
followed by two years of the pandemic, where they weren't able to run public programmes so they did let out the building, both as an NHS,
vaccination centre, but also they did a lot of filming in that space, so we suspect that 72,000, that is the current baseline, as it were, for what this new model is significantly higher than we would see going forward, but that is part of the reason to introduce it now, because this gives us I mean we already have a commitment up to 2028, but this shows that this will give us
proper data to show how that works going forward, as part of the reason we chose to date. 2035, is that we have a separate commitment with the Arts Council that, as part of the funding they received the capital funding they received into the building that we, as the local authority, would ensure that it stayed a cultural venue for 20 years post investment. So it made sense to combine these two figures just before we come back. Councillor Akinola, rightly sobering covered has it? Thank you very much, OK, Councillor Gruen,
I I accept my answer that makes sense. Am I also right in thinking that the ability to to vary the SEVA in some way acts as a check on on that? The if, if it is seen that those commercial commercial activities is almost too successful to justify the free rent, the the requirement can effectively be raised during that period. And just another point on that, although I accept that that made them therefore makes sense to delegate that ability to alter the SEVA, does it really need to be delegated into 21 33
which is some significant time into the next century before it comes back to this Committee or the Executive.
so the reasoning for that is.
every time a policy changes that policy will come to committee and will be agreed, so if we didn't do it as a delegate, it would be two separate papers coming potentially I mean at the moment of becoming to the same committee depending on how committee structure so this was a way that within when the policy or strategies updated that paper can also include how the social value agreement would be updated without it needing a separate,
a separate due process.
within that we're also saying that every three years the SCI will be updated any way in line with the new rent calculation using the methodology, so it's a way not to bogged down the committee, I do understand that, but I I think my point is and and this is what the amendment notable.
brought on that part is just a given that a replacement, our arts and culture strategy taking us from 30 2032 onwards will have to come back to the Committee and that it would be appropriate for the Executive and the Committee at some point to review how the SEVA process has been working, that delegating it until 2031. So therefore, as the new strategy is adopted, the power can be relocated for the next period. Having reviewed how it's worked in the past, that seemed to me to be an inappropriate trek, putting it already out into the next decade before it comes back, but it's not is not delegating it right until we're all dead
OK, thank you.
councillors believe this point, but then I quite like to pick up the amendments after this Council Osborne just just to say that, OK, I recognise that the minority party have a duty to interrogate in detail a proposal like this and that's fair enough, but I don't want while that's happening to lose the overall importance of about the arts centre and in its vision as outlined by Councillor Akinola. It's it's such an important institution in the borough. It brings positive press, it brings investment, it brings a positive social income impact across the borough
it brings in international talent to the borough. It bears reasonable comparison with pledges like the South Bank and the Barbican and Sadler's Wells. It works to support local voluntary groups across the borough, local artists, local residents, local young people and on top of all that, it's looking after one of our most significant heritage buildings in the borough. None of that should be forgotten while we were having this kind of detailed conversation and we should be ready here to as a as an administration to and endorse Battersea Arts Centre for what it is OK. Thank you very much and Councillor Graham. I have two amendments here
3 even 3. So yes, yes, there's one of them is very, very minor, so does the third. The third one is simply to make sure that the Executive recommendations are in a separate paragraph number 2, which is absolute standard and is on every other paper. This evening I think it was just a slip in a typo, almost in the paper typo let's so presumably we don't necessarily if it's Talwar Ed it well, if it doesn't say so, Sky says one not to say. I think we do have to have to change how, Sir Graham I'm just would comment to you which you might like to take. This advice is sometimes that dealing with some of these very tiny amendments. We understand it's difficult for you, the officers do a lot of work, and sometimes they make slight typos. Hopefully we can just agree that what's in the paper is correct for in terms of the Executive bit Bud it isn't correct, it just needs to change, to say to you are supporting fine, but I on what I wasn't being overly critical, I will help if these things are proofread, but I wasn't being, I wouldn't make it a point of criticism as a year
OK, so let's pick up, we'll leave that one because I think that's at the proofreading stage, OK, so the first amendment is I let me explain so basically I that's fine, let's just go for the amendment I, I think I need to explain because essentially I dare I say I do actually agree, I'm Councillor, Krishna I do need to explain this because it has rights. I do need Councillor Graham, one of the things that is very difficult at the moment is, I understand you've got questions, a very sensible one particular questions you can have keep it very brief as to why you want to change it, because you've heard the explanation as to why it is being changed at the moment. I I absolutely accept the explanation given. I was pleased that the number of events that is held would be reflected in the social value agreement. The point of this in
amendment is to stop that insertion into the social value agreement actually possibly being worked against, because that would be a link between the number of events and and the and the breakthroughs within the social value agreement, so as to actually think as phrased then the the recommendation could work against the intention that the the officers are and we agree on it it does no harm to take those those words out.
and it means that there will be, though, that the recommendation will not be in conflict with the intention of officers to include a number of events with Councillor, I understand that the and duly right I think we can read the second one too, so first have you got a seconder for your first amendment to right Councillor Jeffries and for your amendment to paragraph 1 be pot to Councillor Councillor Jeffreys again, OK so will not vote on the amendment to 1, A which was,
officers just comment on whether they agree with you that there is a current re-let conflict, we do have other things to go through, OK, we're going to take a vote, I made, I might be wrong, but I'd like officers' advice on it well and are you likely to change ALMO I mean I think you've heard it will depend on the answer.
all right we're going on the amendment, OK, those in favour of the amendment, please raise their hands.
five of you, thank you very much, those against the amendment, please raise our hands, 6, okay, the amendment 1 are, on 1 A fails, false, or amendment to paragraph 1 be part to those in favour of that amendment, please raise their hands, those against the amendment, please raise their hands. Thank you very much. That's five for the amendment 6 against the amendment, so the amendment falls. We now go into the critical on the broader point of order. I just want to say that we have said we have operated with an understanding that, where the admitted aware, the opposition provides amendments in advance and they are not in conflict with either what officers wish to achieve or the administration which to achieve that. Those amendments will be considered in good faith. If we are now to revert to a position where amendments that you have no problem with are voted down purely because we have put them forward, then we will cease to provide those amendments in advance because you are not acting with goodwill in good faith and it is I I simply do not understand why you have now voted through a recommendation that could undermine your own intention, because you're too stubborn and proud to accept that it might have been drafted in a way that was not helpful to your own purposes, but thank you very much, Councillor Graham, OK, can we now vote on recommendation 1 and we've got recommendations A and B please all of those, or are we taking them separately altogether, so to go and work today
right OK, recommendation A and B those in favour recommendation A and B on the arts
thank you that six those against.

11 Wandsworth Council's Response to the Independent Cost-of-Living Commission's Final Report (Paper No. 24-94)

there aren't any, and those abstaining. Thank you very much, OK, thank you, Councillors, we now move on to the Wandsworth Council's response to the independent cost of living at commission's final report, and I am just going to say that Councillor Akinola would like to make a brief introduction to both that paper and a subsequent paper on the cost of living. She's going to introduce the two we're going to were
then deal with papers
thank you, Councillor Richard, in the spirit of you know, this agenda, I thought it would be useful for me just to speak about both papers together and then we can you can address the officers on their individual papers respectively, so thanks again to the officers and everyone that took part in the Commission you know we've considered the recommendations and this first paper is about the new ideas that officers have generated specifically around debt, which is the next big issue that we can see people affected by cost of living are facing, and the second paper, which is the cost of living update, is about the work that we've been doing alongside the Commission investing in projects which have been benefiting our residents
during from the cost of living reserve, and we've seen lots of innovative projects being delivered across the borough, and I particularly want to give a shout out to the food projects and the increased access to food that our community groups have been delivering OK, thank you very much OK, Mr. Fisher and,
I'm sorry, Ms O'Connor, thank you, OK, if you'd like to say a few words, and then I'll move to questions delivering Councillors. Sorry Councillor Akinola has said this paper follows on from the commission's final report, which was considered by this committee last November. The Executive accepted all 35 recommendations that the commissioners had made and asked officers to go away and work across the Council to develop proposals for how we could take them forward. The brief was to work at pace, recognising the urgency of the task and to and the need to provide as much support to our residents as soon as possible, and the intention is that the commission's report now acts as a catalyst continuing to drive forward policy development across the Council. So this isn't the last. We will see of the cost of living commission
report we will continue to refer back to it as we further develop policies the commission was tasked with looking at the longer-term causes of the cost of living pressures and, accordingly, the services and policies proposed in this report aim to take a more preventative approach, improving our residents, our residents, financial resilience to similar economic shocks in the future.
this report responds to each of the recommendations and also seeks approval for the allocation of a further 5 million pounds to the cost of living reserve to help fund these measures, and I'll also pick up that the report seeks approval for the Council's Food Plan which has been strongly informed by the commission's findings this outlines for the very first time the Council's approach to food policy and draws together the Council's actions related to food.
if approved, we will then look to use this as a foundation for a borough wide food plan which we will co-produce with partners from across the once with system.
thank you, thank you, Mr Fisher McKay, questions by Councillor Graham, any others.
Councillor Corner Councillor, Anne, Bash, brilliant okay, a faraway cat screen, yes, so on page 312, there's a box at the top blimey I was talking about the cost of living food recommendations and identifies three actions these include programme community spaces providing open access,
why are warmth hotter at Lynda et cetera, grant funding of voluntary organisations and community spaces, including access to food and the coordination of the use of council assets to house community spaces, including access to food, all of those are good things to do, none of those we oppose my question is rather given that Councillor Akinola who has mentioned
her her role in her day job and, given that her organisation is directly involved in all three of those areas, given that, even if her organisation does not apply for any of those things, although it has applied in the past, does Councillor Grant's organisations that her organisation works with in the Wandsworth Food Partnership which indeed I believe that her organisation chairs and provides the secretariat to will be,
off by putting themselves forward for grants in its areas, likewise, organisations with which she in her day job competes for funding from the GLA, the government and others will be affected by these actions, can I ask her to explain, because I am,
one is having a disclosable pecuniary interest is not a problem in the sense of showing some issue that or Mr Mina, however, failing to declare a disclosable pecuniary interest when one exists is one I would like her to explain why she believes she does not have a disclosable pecuniary interest in relation to this paper and in particularly in relation to those actions in the action plan.
I think if you'll recall, I said that I run a project where people are affected by a cost of living, but there are no funds in here in this paper that we have applied for now that those my exact words also find it quite insulting to myself, my organisation and other organisations that we work with that they would not be eligible for.
any grant that come out of this draft paper draft paper as a result of trying to support people in our community.
I think she's misunderstood me, I think they should and would be eligible, and that is why I believe that you have a DPI now if you don't believe that you have won, perhaps the monitoring officer could explain whether he believes there is one because there is a duty both on individual councillors to declare an interest and in fact leave the room if as a classical pecuniary interest but there is also a duty on officers to intervene if they think the interests have not been declared so I'd like the Monitoring Officer to say why he believes that there is no DPI given those actions which relate both to councillor economics organisation and also the organisations with which she works as part of her pecuniary interest.
Councillor Graham, the Committee is not an inappropriate place for me to advise on whether or not a councillor is in breach of their obligations under the Code of Conduct and whether or not they may have failed to declare an interest Councillor seek advice from me and I advise them accordingly, Councillor Akinola has stated their position and that is the position if you believe that she is in breach of her obligations under the Code of Conduct you should follow through with the complaint.
my question to you is whether you believe that again, this has been raised prior to the meeting, or you have been told what the course of action is, thank you, I have not been given an answer as to what the monitoring officer's position is, he has said he has not given a position now told me what you should be doing next. I raised this repeatedly outside the meeting I raised it directly, as the Chief Executive will confirm with him last night, so perhaps I could say ask why no room will be given.
because clearly, I repeat my advice to you, if you believe there has been a breach of the Code of Conduct, you should put in a complaint and that will be dealt with accordingly.
question was why you will not rule on this so excuse me, Councillor Gruen, my record my recollection is the monitoring officer said this is not the place to deal with this, you have been told twice already how to deal with it if you believe there is a breach, please may we move on to discuss the paper OK I have Councillor Corner has
Councillor Corner sorry, I think you were this had a question, please, on the paper.
year.
thank you Chair, I wanted to just raise a question about paragraph 20 on this paper, I think it's laudable what the Council has done to identify children who might be eligible for free school meals and ensure that they are receiving that benefit so in terms of making sure that residents who are eligible for wider benefits and concessionary rates as outlined in paragraph 2 20, could the officers just expand a bit on on how that will happen? Is it just a case of identifying individual residents as with the free school meals and just offering to enrol them or is it using technology to identify and water enrol without?
contact without necessarily having to contact people.
Councillor Code, I've seen two people looking at inquiring lie at you, Ms Wilson.
thank you for the, so it is using what we've used previously is the low-income family tracker, so we've done some data analysis and data matching to identify those.
households and those children who are eligible for free school meals, and then we've used that data analysis to to communicate with them, to engage with them, to get them to get those parents to.
to except auto-enrolment and then we've we've worked with the schools to ensure that that happens so so, on the other benefits and concessionary rates, will the same methodology be used to vary the left methodology and just been rolled out essentially to adults? So we've got a number, we've got a programme around the use of lift, and that includes a number of different campaigns, so it will follow the same source of process. It might not always be in auto-enrolment, where we can we will so, for example, one of the campaigns we're gonna look to do is around water-sharing, the water tariffs and we have had conversations with with Thames Water around the auto-enrolment. They're not able to commit capacity at this time, but they've said they, it's definitely on the table for future, but that won't stop us from doing our own work to try and
engage with households who, if who we identify as being eligible for that kind of support and work with them to to ensure that they can claim that support going forward so absolutely using lift wherever we cancer. Thank you and a very quick and final question. Will the burden remain on the people that we contact to register for the benefit to themselves always the council offering to do that for them and thus be supported, spend that far so so obviously the initial engagement is around
having conversations about eligibility, but where we can we do and we have worked directly with with households to support them to make those claims.
so unfortunately there are some benefits, we are not able to do that that fall so things like pension credit, etc but we absolutely provide as much support as we can to to help those households claim the benefits they are entitled to will continue to do that, OK, thank you very much.
Councillor Ryan Bash.
it is nice to see the response to the Commission and the very helpful issues they've raised on a very wide canvas and to see particularly that we're moving to a phase about not just dealing with crisis but trying to prevent and have a more kind of longer-term intervention, so I've got two areas Chair I wanted to ask about I'm sure the officers can deal with two errors or one the first is the money hub team and it's Keogh covered in both papers actually,
to give advice and help for benefits, and particularly for families that are struggling financially, I'm really interested in how it will operate, and in the second paper it talks about two different models, could you give us a bit more information about why we prefer the outreach model rather than the inbound model and how the money hub might work?
with the cost of living hub with C, A C, A B and their benefits, advice and GWP how or how it will work together, so why do you prefer the model, the second area, although it is very different, got that officers is that very different, I'm glad that Roehampton has been recognised at last as a councillor in Roehampton under the previous administration for eight years.
very little was recognised in terms of an area of high need and intersecting and challenging problems in Roehampton, so I'm very glad that's covered in para 47 to 55 of the report about the environment but also the health and wellbeing of the community. My question there is, how will these quite far reaching plans for Roehampton be informed and led by the people who live in Roehampton and the community groups in Roehampton OK? Thank you two questions. OK, money hubs first, and we have
sorry, would you mean sorry, yes, I had good evening if I'd been for Golden the cost of living programme manager just in response to the point about money helps the first thing to say is it's at a very early stage of scoping at all and a lot of the work we've been doing and identifying possible models is based on benchmarking, with other authorities and and so on, that is being done.
I think part of the reason why we were perhaps leaning more towards the outreach rather than the referrals or incoming is based on the experience we've had from other authorities, but also that we're really keen to target people who wouldn't otherwise be seeing it's not another route targeting the the same people and actually part of a conversation we've been having the workshops we've we've initially started to look at is how we target those people at an earlier stage, so looking more to prevention and early intervention rather than it being perhaps the people who already know, and we might already be identifying through things like lift, as was already being described and so on, and I think the other part of the point was very much about working with others and obviously one of the key things. Firstly, as we look at all of the different routes across the the Council and all the different service areas, and so on, they're involved and how we align and make sure we don't duplicate with other things. I think some of the description of the hub implies a physical space in a physical group, whereas actually this may be more of a virtual team that is doing that outreach work and so on, but part of the work we will pilot would also be to look at where best that might be located and where it could align with physical spaces such as the family hub and so on, in terms of then reaching out beyond that to look at how we align work closely with voluntary sector partners and others. That's absolutely part of the the model we are developing and will bring more detail back at an inappropriate time.
and did we cover the Roehampton side of it as well, sorry?
say, Councillor Bashir, you'll correct a Commission.
gave a particular focus to where Hampton, in their the commission's report and in the recommendations, obviously the paper sets out some of the community engagement work that's been going on and will continue, I think I'd like to bring him Mr more, he's our Interim Director of Place who the report sets out is leading on the autumn work to talk more in detail.
good evening again, Members, conscious of the our saw, are very brief, just to touch on Roehampton.
engagement, listening, one of the things I've been really impressed by in the programme that is forming and will come forward in the current months before the summer.
a series of interventions which have actually been shaped by engagement with residents of Roehampton, so I think that's the first point that the programme seeks to respond to the genuine concerns that have come forward already through a discussion with ward members, but directly from the community that touches on areas such as transport, connectivity of the community play facilities and some basic council services around waste and refuse collection so,
I I'm clear that there is a programme forming will be more discussion on that in the in the months ahead, clear intention from the Council to release that in discussion with a local community leaders, all councillors, obviously, and this really being part of the test bed of the administration's approach to place-based services going forward quality of life detailing of services on the ground, I think where we were some of the points out.
I commend to Members more work to do there and I suppose I'd finish by saying that very detailing based on listening to the community must continue, clearly it's not not just a one-off programme, this is clearly part of an ongoing dialogue yeah conscious of time I I hope that response to your question Councillor OK, thank you very much, Councillor Richard Jones,
thanks really briefly, because I pretty much had identical question to Councillor Anne bash, on the money hub and two quick follow ups, if, if I may, one was, I was gonna, ask about benchmarking with other local authorities, which authorities in particular were we looking at and we thought perhaps had had got this right.
secondly, picking up on the point about cab, the the question I was going to ask was and I'm sure it has had was, had we explored contracting the service to cab or a similar organisation, and I assumed not well will be considered it and we prefer the money hub solution because of the integration with the lift platform but if there were other reasons or more reasons I'd be interested to know.
thank you, Councillor, I'm not sure I would necessarily hold anyone up and say they've got it right, everyone's experience is very different, we've said already, we've been speaking with Hackney, we've had other conversations with other authorities, including Leeds and including,
I'll have to come back to you on a couple of the others because one of my colleagues has been leading on it, no, no, absolutely thank you, I appreciate that, but I think what we're keen to do is to take the learning and the experience from a number of authorities and work out what works best for us based on on that learning, so it won't necessarily be something that is exactly the same as this is happening everywhere else.
in terms of the potential of commissioning out from from soon as advice or indeed anyone else saying, as I said, what we're keen is that we develop the model, we look at the best way to deliver that across the council and indeed working with our partners and so on at very early stages in terms of developing it, I don't think it was necessary ruled anything out but I think we are at the moment foreseeing that we would take the lead in this area.
OK, thank you.
Councillor Warren.
thank you Chair just a couple of comments. In terms of both papers, I am glad to see that the emphasis within this as well, building up resilience and capacity within the community itself, within individuals and organisations, I think that speaks very much to moving from a crisis situation to actually helping communities meet their own needs and support themselves. I'd also like to congratulate running through this paper the adoption of the making every contact count model. I think that speaks to our approach to wellbeing. Sitting on the Health Committee is something that we've wanted to push across the Council, and I am glad to see it rolling through different areas. So congratulations on that question. I do have, however, is about, and the Left platform I see has an amazing impact already and you've and you've integrated well, you're referring in the paper to additional datasets, and I just wanted a bit more information about what those additional datasets would be
would be and what we would be looking for within them.
so one of the additional datasets we were looking at was adult social care debt.
so I think we've discussed in this committee previously about the importance of having the information in one place, so we talked about the single view of debt and the reasons why we've kind of not progressed that as far as as we would have liked, but actually the lift platform allows us to include a number of different debt types it's already got things like council tax debt and housing rent arrears but it's not got all of the data in there and in the adult social care debt is an area where,
we wanted to include some information, so we're doing some work around that temporary accommodation, rent arrears as well as another area that we've worked on, so we've got that.
data in there, we've also had conversations with.
with voluntary sector partners about whether we can integrate some of their debt or their data in into this, we haven't been able to progress that yet, but it's definitely a conversation that's still on the table.
and is it it's any other sort of data types that there are indicators of vulnerability, so another dataset where we are going to include is around ones with a discretionary fund payments so we can identify households who've been in receipt of of discretionary funds that crisis support.
we've already got D HP payments on there, so so anything that might be an indicator of of potential financial vulnerability. We're working to get that data onto the onto the dashboard. OK, thank you very much. I'd category, I'm just say we've got just about 10 minutes left and I it would be nice if we could complete this paper and move on. Thank you, aren't I totally agree with you and for that reason what I'm about to say won't be framed as a question, because I I can actually I've actually secured the answer outside this room, so I just want to comment before for move on did this paper and it would be remiss of us too, to vote on it without mentioning this, approves the allocation of a further 5 million to the cost of living reserves. Now paragraph 7 suggests that to support the delivery of the projects in this paper
it isn't because these projects, none of them are costed, and indeed officers confirmed that about 5 million matters of wellbeing appended to the next paper as to this one is not directly to fund any of the things that are provided here. It is our view that the administration should find things it wants to spend money on or that it would be appropriate to spend money and then come to Committee to ask for approval. It is consistently persistently now, for the third time, pluck figures out of the air and then come up with projects after the fact. We fundamentally reject that approach, particularly as on each time we were told that was a one-off act. Three times in a row in less than two years is not one of we will vote against this paper, not because we are necessarily against any of the things that money will be used to fund, but because we fundamentally reject that way of going about funding, particularly when aspects such as the household support fund are in the air. It is irresponsible and it shouldn't happen. OK, thank you very much, I think, Councillor, I can know, if you'd like to come back on that, and then we will move to the vote Councillor regularly, that your comments have been noted. OK thanks very much everybody OK. We're now being asked to vote on the recommendations in the paper
what have you done, you've been lobbying?
conservative government to extend the house household support fund.
we believe that the House of spokesman should be extended, yes, we hope it will be, I think, it's likely to be if it isn't, I will be disappointed, what action have you taken to help achieve that?
I think the Cabinet Member over overstates the influence of the opposition speaker from financial ones as councillor with the chancellor of the exchequer, OK right, thank you very much, OK.
a let's move to a vote, please, so the recommendations are in paragraph 2, A B C and D Councillor Graham, do we take them all together, also OK, so those in favour of the recommendations in paragraph 2 please raise their hands.
I think that six is it and those against those recommendations please raise their hands, thank you, that's five, and there's no abstentions, the Chair didn't cast a vote OK.
thank you very much, we will move on to Florida Councillor Crichel, because I wish us to be able to debate other papers we are happy to accept the next paper without debate, or it needs to be clarified, is whether we are approving or noting what's in D. We support the
administration's intention to make good the shortfall from the household support fund if it doesn't arrive, but I just want to know whether that is a note or whether it should actually be amended to approve, in which case we're happy to vote in favour of approving it. Sorry, I'm just going to double-check something, I think the last time we had a similar change didn't wait because the grants are actually approved through the Project Board. Is that correct? Mr. Evans, wherever he's gone, I know he's here
sorry, yes, yes, so there's so so the grants are actually approved through the formal governance process yeah, that's when I think I think I'll just say for officers for the future if we can,
it did come up before and I'm sorry I didn't spot it, OK is that alright?
pardon I can't hear you, we possibly agreed as paperwork is all to note, just just on the on put it through agreed on the nod, so we can actually debate the next paper before the guillotine falls, OK, yeah, that's all agreed, thank you OK so we now move on to the high streets paper paper 24 96

13 High Streets and Town Centres Update (Paper No. 24-96)

thank you officers.
OK.
Mr. Diamond, if you would, and then you'd better tell me where I've got to do me, do Jones?
well, sorry Councillor Akinola would like to say something very briefly to introduce it, and then, Mr Diamond, thank you. This paper is about supporting in our town centres, which are clearly the lifeblood of our communities, and this paper is about monitor in them in these difficult times to support their survival.
OK, Mr. Diamond, is there anything you need to say before we move to questions, I think probably not, hopefully the paper is self-explanatory and I'll take questions OK, thank you very much, OK, can I have questions, please sorry I've lost my piece of paper Councillor Hedges, Councillor Jefferies'.
Councillor Corner
Councillor Anne Bash
OK, Councillor Hodges, please, thank you, Chair, and Mr Diamond, as you'll be aware that.
I've worked with local businesses in Balham for nearly two years, as you'll be aware that we put a petition together, myself and Councillor Hamilton, or, along with all the ba ma, the majority of the businesses that are in the unloved bit of.
Balham, High Road, which is, I know, not your remit, which is actually TFM else, and we also lobbied the MP for Battersea along with TfN, and we have had no.
no help whatsoever businesses are going down the pan, even the pavements are awful, which is a stark contrast to what the Conservative administration did.
to the Balham Bedford Hill side, when we did a region in 2021, my question to you is what have you done in the last two years to lobby TFM to help those businesses on Balham High Road, and that's you know, taking into account count Councillor Akbar or Councillor Akinola just said about local businesses being the lifeblood?
please can you confirm, thank you, sorry, Councillor Hedges, I think I'd just like to check, I think usually a lobby question is something that will be directly directed to the Cabinet Member rather than.
well.
Mr. Diamond on.
the judge judges drew responses that we would certainly in the last couple of years, I attended a meeting with with, but both Councillors and the MP and or another officers, so I think that the the the the result of that was a visit by quite senior CFL officials to the area so I think that they were understood what the concerns were.
I think in general we've noticed that the we've noted above see the the the difference in quality of public realm and the environment on the Terfel stretches is one that's been brought to our attention by businesses.
so that was the last time we did it, I thought that was a reasonably.
a strong response to the lobbying that took place, I know it hasn't resulted in anything we obviously, certainly through Highways, colleagues and transport, colleagues, we are perennially working with CFL across all town centres, so that you know the the this the this is something which is very, very important I would probably
leave that to them, but I'm certainly able to take that away and and and reiterate that the businesses do want to see action in that one and and ultimately this is one for CFL yeah, clearly there were some points that the businesses were raising that I don't think my recollection was that anything as the Council would necessarily support all of their contentions?
but it is certainly an area that lacks investment for for a period of time.
we've also, as the video we have worked with those businesses to promote them locally.
I know that not a number are in difficulty, but there are others that are successful or is there are businesses that have opened a successful bookshop that's opened along that stretch, so I think in common with a lot of the town centres there's quite a lot of churn depending on,
depending on which businesses is exceeding what local preferences are so tha that's really what we'd done there, but I'm I'm happy to take that back, we do recognise the issue but I'll in terms of them more specific lobbying I'll very quick follow up please thank you Mr Diamonds, so
the T T F. All right dead did come down to Balham High Road, as did the MP, but that was well over a year ago and we still haven't seen anything and more and more businesses are going bust. So would really appreciate your help, because the other side of Alum is is doing really well, so thank you for your support on that. OK, thank you and committee members, I'm just going to say now the guillotine has now, but we've been sitting for three hours, so the guillotine is now fallen and we will consider the remainder of the agenda as follows. We will continue our debate on Item 13 for a further 10 minutes after which time we will vote on recommendations. In any amendments, we will then vote without debate on the remaining items for recommendation to the Executive and any proposed amendments, if either the relevant Director, Section 1 5 1 Officer Head of Paid Service or the monitoring officer or their representatives, are of the view that the Committee must receive advice from before the Committee votes they may address the committee with the chairman's permission Members may ask questions for clarification only on any advice given by officers but not debated.
and any other matters on the agenda will be formally noted, we will now continue our debate on Item 13 Councillor.
hedges that you didn't that was not needing a response.
J, just to clarify that Mr Diamond confirmed that he would go away and see what he could do, OK brilliant, thank you very much.
Councillor Jeffreys.
thank you Chair, the paper recognises the important role that landlords play in supporting the health and sense of place, actually of our high streets on Putney High Street we've seen units held vacant on purpose units not refurbished, and a shift towards landlords tending to agree tenancies with,
certain types of businesses, but don't go down too well, particularly takeaways, I'd be grateful for an update on the Council's engagement with landlords and and whether there's a sofa or a positive sentiment at the moment there seems to be a bit more positivity on the high street but whether that's sort of reflective of real trends towards getting things improved from the landlord perspective or whether that's just the the ebb and flow of of the economy,
sorry.
yeah yeah, Councillor Connolly, thank you for a question. Actually we met with a lot of those big landlords in the summer of last year and had a quite a good conversation with them about what they planned on doing with their spaces. A lot of them are now least some of the bigger ones, not so much and more recently one of the big landlords has agreed to he's. One of the buildings is meanwhile used for small businesses, so there is positive, and it is is a positive move for landlords to actually start making some of these vacant properties usable.
OK, thank you, Councillor Corner.
thank you, Chair, I just wanted to Baker, asked a question of really the cabinet members regarding the Nine Elms town centre, they said some brief commentary on the strengths and disadvantages of Nine Elms town centre, but there isn't a in the appendix as with the other town centres of detailed,
a detailed analysis of of what the Council will do do in that area, this is despite the largest item in the budget being for Nine Elms kind of public realm and highways, so could I just get an answer really from the administration about how serious really they're taking the regeneration and will be Mr Diamond,
undertake to bring forward further detailed plans for this expenditure right, which can
to Mr Diamond. Thank you very much. Yes, I I just to add we, we mulled over what we could include in the report, and indeed the use of the dates that are obviously what's happened in Nine Elms as you've got largely the the power station, a very large shopping centre with probably a very different market and different reach, although there are some elements to the which are local and clearly they, they are responsible for me or for provision of the public realm and management of the public realm. So it's it's it, it, it, it's it's a slightly different context and we didn't think was was particularly comparable with the other more established town centres, but that's not to say that it doesn't, obviously it's clearly economic terms, it's a real, it's a real driver, but it's probably not there yet in terms of its maturity, as a as a as a as a as a local centre, so we we. We did model that over
it is obviously one that obvious that if you're trying to compare lines on a graph as well LA looks very different in terms of levels and shape shapes of the graph so.
I I, I, it's it, did it, it's it's S so different that it felt a bit odd to included in this time, but I think we take the point and it's probably how the area matures and how the links with the power station and other other services in that area develop in order to become what we might consider a mature and established town centre OK, thank you very much, Councillor Fraser.
yeah, thank you, it's actually just taking us back to the earlier conversation about Balham, because I think and just in answer to the point on CFL, you may not have seen, but TFM published last year the update for what they call the whole of the corridor of the cs 7, so they're taking those works together so they published an update last year so that ranges from everything on that CSF and right down to Mitcham, so that includes the plans for for how they'll take those works along that corridor altogether. So if that answers your point on that, I think just on the point, on the unloved bit of Balham, having lived there in that area in 2012, it felt exactly the same now, but I think you also just have to recognise that, as as Mr. Downes' does, a really successful bookshop that has opened and a unit that has been remain vacant for years has recently become a reformer Pilati studio which CofE recommend going to they do very good classes and are sold out every day at the moment, so I don't think we can
but I don't think you can yeah, just as we've talked about that, that's yes, 7 rue goes right, the way down to Tooting which has got, which is performing well in terms of visitor, you can't say that business is failing, is it the result of TFM? There are many reasons why businesses succeed fail and then you can't put it at the hands of DFL for that, because what is happening at that end about the that that CSFB route stretches right the way down to Tooting which notes in here has got one of the most successful town centres. It's got, so so it's not, it's it's a bigger mix, and that's just just to correct that record and there are. There are updates on that on that. CSF and roof
thank you right, sorry, thank you, Councillor ambush, sorry, I let Councillor Price go. I wanted to agree with some of the points. Councillor Jeffreys was making about Putney High Street. I know we all get a bit local when we are talking about high streets, but I wanted to thank Councillor Councillor Akinola for the work she is doing with the bid and also Flora Anderson in terms of working with community groups about trying to attract more shops back, and there's a bit of positivity in terms of the interaction with Putney library, reinventing libraries working with the friends apparently library so there are workspaces there as well as the cafe, that's made a difference as well as improvements to the public realm. So I think the reinventing the library, I would like to keep an eye on whether that makes a difference to the businesses in the area, because there is a lot of footfall in the library OK my last question, I think Town Councillor Welton had a comment
Councillor Bolton,
thank you Chair I, I'm I'll I'll get unhappy with this paper, I must admit.
it seems to me that when you go from a 19th century world with a shopping all the way down, all the main roads everywhere just have a look at a picture of of the 19th century in York Road, where there's not a shot to be seen shopping everywhere if we're changing that into a world where so much is done online so much by car so much big,
big shopping once a week, once a fortnight, once a month, rather than every day, then we've bound after concentrate and we're bound to have to face the fact that outside the town centres or as has been in my lifetime, that's not that long, quite a contraction webs Road, the nearest road to me would have been considered a small shopping centre where and I arrive there, every single shop now other than Nick things has gone, and I think we've got to accept that, and I think that that needs to be in here somewhere our how one concentrates on the atomic world, sorry about the word. I think it was only as the centres
and recognises that that they're gonna be, even though they're gonna be effect and I gotta move to night-time, and that's real difficulty because of a
takeaways and so on, and the way you gonna put a takeaway, as I suppose, could be an industrial sites at somewhere or others, as long as you do it by phone and say all sorts of things, but I think these these issues are not tackled in this paper and that's what I think we need to tackle in the future OK, thank you very much.
just to introduce our amendment Councillor Crichel by this time, so because I'm sorry you will see before you a yes exactly well, A A A A technical, hopefully sensible, amendment that merely removes error on the the basis of what we've seen tonight I don't have much expectation that the administration councils have vote for it, however, Dr Johnson once noted on a repentance as soon as that hope is not expectation and so I hope they still might.
OK, thank you very much, OK, sorry.
simply or simply simply remove some errors in the drafting and tidies it up.
okay, well, have you got a seconder for your amendments, please always a fight over it, and lots of Cafe, Councillor corner for change?
thank you very much, OK, so the amendments and right as everyone got their amendment sheet of amendments in front of them, please, okay, so we're voting on the amendment to a about, and it's this sorry.
I can't I can't.
right happy to OK, first of all, we're happier.
in a it I am they and say, yeah yeah, we're happy to accept those OK, those are yeah grammatical changes, accepted De is taking out the note about the change, was to note the approved night-time strategy that was deleted okay all those in favour of the amendment please raise their hands.
5 OK all of those going to the amendment, please raise their hands, that's the amendment pot as it relates to D A as it relates today, yeah, so A B and C where we're OK with D.
which case then the point on the D needs to be, it needs to be new point, so because diesel is retained, so it can't take the D numbering, so we approved the ongoing subscription 10,000 as described in paragraphs 24 to 25, which should be split and and noted in the recommendations that can be a new point which will be at that point in England in the numbering.
OK, you want to include that can either a seconder for that amendment, please.
right thank you, Councillor Hedges, OK, we'll now vote on right, stating what should have already been social curriculum, we now have an amendment, the change about the approved ongoing, so that's a one that will make the next one f A could we have a those in favour of a please.
the amendment which is now we about approving ongoing subscriptions, please like raise your hands.
thank you, I interesting, post 5, those against please raise their hands.
guillotine, the problem is the way you are voting Councillor Belton.
sorry, excuse me, I suspect both sides would say the problem is the way in which you're voting actually right, so e the amendment fails, the one that was a but is now like F to note the town centre.
that those in favour of that amendment, please raise your hands.
those against that amendment, please raise your hands, thank you, so that's five for the amendment 6 against, so the amendment falls, and what was the last one was to a programme it had already been approved, which were done OK, it shouldn't be there right, thank you very much. Now we have to take the vote on.
the substantive recommendations in paragraph 2 Councillor Graham to help see, as amended right OK to A to C, as amendment will agree
OK, so that's all agreed unanimously, is it thank you very much, OK, we now move to fine, sorry, sorry, sorry, we you have you have now the the also the amendment on what would be a no, that's gone.
of course, I'm sorry that's gone right, OK, we've now got
it's so interesting, particularly to us, I think it's just about a year.
postal voting uptake as hands centre, it's OK, so we're now voting on Item 14, which is the procurement strategy agreed, thank you very much and I'm just going to selfish because I'm so sorry that you've come along but we haven't been able to had Pawlby but we look forward to in future.

14 Procurement Strategic Ambitions Statement (Paper No. 24-97)

OK, item 15 is the annual Equality update

15 Annual Equality Update Report (Paper No. 24-98)

are we happy to agree the Equality Act, OK so?
there is a separate offer.
so stop stop.
hello for those for.
okay, right, annual equalities, paper Item 15, could those in favour of the recommendations in paragraph 2 please raise their hands, those in favour, I am guessing that six because I can't actually say six, I couldn't see where council okay those against please no one or those abstaining, please thank you very much. That's five abstentions OK on the training, apprenticeships and work.

16 Training, Apprenticeships and Work - Developing a Wandsworth Offer (Paper No. 24-99)

focus on parts A to D and E separately. Yes, but can I find the relevant bit of paper H 4 0 8, today, right excuse me for 0 7 psn I think Councillor Thomas Councillor yeah, OK, but I can cope better with paperwork. I submit equivalents late OK, so recommendation, A about the apprenticeship scheme, please those in favour, please write to be, we can agree a today OK, everyone agreed on that. That's agreed unanimously. A
those in favour of a please raise their hands, thank you that six, those against a, and those abstaining 5, thank you very much right and now we've got to change programme dates.

8 Change Programme Progress Update (Paper No. 24-91)

both excuse me ABC earlier writes that all thank you now, it's gone out of order, OK, so we've got recommendations, A B and C on the change programme, those
I think it's it's agreed that's agreed unanimously, thank you very much, Mr. Kelly, on digital strategy and the digital strategy.

9 Digital Strategy (Paper No. 24-92)

OK those in favour of the digital strategy, please raise your hands, those against.
and those abstaining.
thank you very much OK, and that takes us to the end of our councillors, thank you very much for your patients officers, thank you very, very much as well.
we look forward to you and.
declared the meeting ended.