Agenda and minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillor S Doyle, Councillor Farrell arrived at 18.04

The minutes of the meeting held on 20^th January 2022 were approved and signed as a correct record. 

(Moved by Councillor R Pritchard and seconded by Councillor M Bailey)

(Report of the Chairs of the Scrutiny Committees)

Councillor Rosey Claymore Chair of the Health & Wellbeing Committee attended to update Cabinet in relation to two items discussed at the committee.

1.    Update from the Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust (MPFT).

The Committee had raised the following motion:

That Cabinet consider the feasibility of producing ‘wellbeing’ portal on Tamworth Borough Council website linked to MPFT Communications Team 

The Leader agreed that Cabinet accepts the recommendation

(Moved by Councillor J Oates and seconded by Councillor M Summers)

2.    Reset & Recovery

The following motion was raised

The Committee recommends to Cabinet to consider another location other than that of the Assembly Rooms for interim, front of house customer services as quickly as possible. 

Agreed that Cabinet would look at the options and Cabinet moved the following motion:

That Cabinet ensure that this is discussed as an agenda item at the next Reset & Recovery Board meeting on 23rd February and feed back to Health & Wellbeing Chair.

(Moved by Councillor J Oates and seconded by Councillor M Bailey)

Councillor Steven Pritchard, Vice Chair, Corporate Scrutiny Committee attended to present the following motion:

The Committee recommends to Cabinet that the Audit & Governance Committee be requested to look at the the tendering process used by the Council with a particular regard of the scoring mechanism process and that it report back to Cabinet or Corporate Scrutiny on its findings.   

(Moved by Councillor J Oates and seconded by Councillor R Pritchard)

QUESTIONS FROM MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC NO. 1 Under Schedule 4, 13, Mr H Loxton asked the Portfolio Holder Environment & Leisure the following question:-

Mr Loxton was not in attendance and the Chief Executive asked the question on his behalf

“I’m sure councillors would agree with me it’s amazing to see so many volunteers picking up litter in our town, and I’m sure they would like to take the opportunity to thank them all.

Can I ask as a result of the amount of litter now being collected by these groups and individuals if the cost of litter removal spent by the council themselves has reduced, and if so how that money saved has been utilised?”

Councillor Pritchard gave the following reply:-

I would like to place on the record the councils thanks to everyone who gives up their time to pick up litter.

As a proud member of Tamworth Volunteer litter pickers, who have collected around 8,000 bags of litter, I would like to praise the ordinary men, women and children from the town who roll up their sleeves to tackle the litter and fly-tipping issue that plagues our society.

The activity of voluntary litter pickers doesn't save the council any money.

Indeed the authority is planning in spending more money on cleaning Tamworth and we are hiring new staff to help clean up our HRA estates.

However the work of voluntary litter pickers does greatly enhance and compliment the authorities' efforts to tackle litter.

Less litter on the streets means that our staff can walk further on their litter picking rounds, they can also cleanse larger areas when supported by community litter pickers.

Voluntary litter picking also means some areas can be visited less frequently by council staff due to community litter picking being so effective, and the council can redeploy litter cleaning staff elsewhere in the Borough.

Finally, volunteers litter picker also clean areas that are outside the councils responsibility, greatly adding to the cleanliness of Tamworth. 

We also looking to do some research with members of Tamworth Volunteer Litter Pickers to asses if areas litter picked by volunteers stay cleaner for longer.

I also want to add that Volunteer litter picking provides real encouragement to our street scene operatives, who are so thankful for the communities' efforts. 

During the height of the pandemic the street scheme team was stretched to the limit, so without the hundreds of local volunteers it would have struggled to help keep Tamworth clean.

There are several dedicated litter picking groups that operate in and around Tamworth, as well as many other community and voluntary groups, schools, organisations, businesses and clubs that do litter picking.

To every single volunteer litter picker in Tamworth, I say thank you and keep up the amazing work.

(Report of the Portfolio Holder for Environment, Entertainment and Leisure)

Agenda item 10 was discussed before agenda item 6

Report of the Portfolio Holder for Environment, Entertainment and Leisure to  request the release of £50k from the Councils Capital Contingency budget to the Capital programme, for the refurbishment of existing play facilities in the Borough

(Report of the Leader of the Council)

The Leader of the Council proposed the Vision Statement, Priority Themes, Corporate Priorities and Plans and their inclusion in the Corporate Plan. 

The recommended to approve the recommended package of budget proposals to enable the Council to agree the:

• General Fund (GF) Revenue Budget and Council Tax for 2022/23;

• Housing Revenue Account (HRA) Budget for 2022/23;

• 5 Year General Fund Capital Programme (2022/27);

• 5 Year HRA Capital Programme (2022/27);

• 3 Year General Fund Medium Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) (2022/25); and

• 5 Year HRA Medium Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) (2022/27).

To comply with the requirement of the Council’s Treasury Management Policy in reporting to Council the proposed strategy for the forthcoming year and the Local Government Act 2003 with the reporting of the Prudential Indicators and the requirement to prepare an annual Corporate Capital Strategy.

(Report of the Leader of the Council)

Report of the Leader of the Council to provide the Committee with a performance update and financial health-check.  This report was considered by Corporate Scrutiny Committee on 1^st February 2022.

(Report of the Leader of the Council)

Report of the Leader of the Council to enable Cabinet to consider joining the proposed Staffordshire Leaders Board. The Council along with County Council and the other 7 District and Borough Councils have been meeting to formalise a new Leaders Board to facilitate closer and stronger two tier working and to position this group to enter into discussion with Government for a formal “County Deal”.

(Report of the Portfolio Holder for Finance, Risk and Customer Services)

Report of the Portfolio Holder for Finance, Risk and Customer Services to ask that Members endorse the amount of debt written off for the period 1st April 2021 to 31st December 2021.

To consider excluding the Press and Public from the meeting by passing the following resolution:-

“That in accordance with the provisions of the Local Authorities (Executive Arrangements) (Meeting and Access to Information) (England) Regulations 2012, and Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the press and public be excluded from the meeting during the consideration of the following business on the grounds that it involves the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in paragraphs 1, 2 and /or 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A to the Act and the public interest in withholding the information outweighs the public  interest in disclosing the information to the public”

At the time this agenda is published no representations have been received that this part of the meeting should be open to the public.

(Report of the Portfolio Holder for Finance, Risk and Customer Services)

Resolved:  that the recommendations in the report be approved

(Moved by Councillor A Farrell and seconded by Councillor R Pritchard)

(Report of the Portfolio Holder for Environment, Entertainment and Leisure)

Resolved that the recommendations in the report be approved

(Moved by Councillor R Pritchard and seconded by Councillor J Oates)