Agenda and draft minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillor M Bailey and L Clarke.

The Committee reviewed the minutes of the previous meeting held on 29^th January 2025, it was noted that there was an error in the previous minutes for item 86, recommendation 2 was moved by Councillor L Wood and not Councillor L Smith, the minutes were moved subject to this amendment.

(Moved by Councillor B Price and seconded by Councillor N Statham)

Councillor N Statham declared that she would be providing an update for a later item from the MP as an employee of the MP.

To receive an update from the Chair

There was no update.

Update on responses received to Reports of the Infrastructure Safety & Growth Committee:

·          

There was no update to share, the Chair confirmed that they would attending Cabinet this week to present the Committee recommendation from the meeting on the 29^th January.

The Chair introduced the item and welcomed the Assistant Director for Environment, Culture and Wellbeing, and the following partners –

Gareth Mead from Severn Trent Water

Andrew Brett from Staffordshire County Council

Mike Jenkins from the Environment Agency

Ruth Needham from Trent Rivers Trust.

Ruth Needham provided the Committee with a presentation highlighting the following –

Ø  Understanding water quality is very complicated.

Ø  The Rivers Anker (from Warwickshire) and Tame (from Birmingham) flow through Tamworth and the Bourne Brook joins from Staffordshire.

Ø  The Environment Agency sampling spots were highlighted.

Ø  Larger (main rivers) are looked after by the Environment Agency.

Ø  Smaller water courses which flow into larger course (ditches/streams) are looked after by the County Council as the lead local flood authority.

Ø  Slide 5 - Water quality is influenced by a number of factors including modifications and engineering to rivers reducing capacity to use natural processes to breakdown pollution; pollution from agriculture and sewage and diffuse sources of pollution (not from a pipe) such as farm and road run off during heavy rain.

Ø  Slide 6 – gave percentages of the sectors influencing pollution in the last month (it was noted that there was a link with background to the figures as they do not make sense on their own).

Ø  Slide 7 – ideas on nature-based solutions to improve water quality relating to diffuse sources, including creating wetlands or river restoration schemes; the aim of separating rain from dirty water to spread the polluted water and slow it down so that it settles. The use of Sustainable Urban Drainage Schemes (SUDs) and swales or vegetative management were also discussed.

Ø  Slide 8 – ideas for what Tamworth Borough Council could look at including instilling green infrastructure such as green roofs and Suds into new planning areas and putting developments in the right place; working with communities to promote good practise and a link for a campaign called ‘love your river’ was shared. The idea being to stop pollution getting into the rivers, instead being soaked up into the land. Landowners have an opportunity to help with this by putting in buffer strips and working with others, it was recognised that this meeting was a start in this.

Ø  Slide 9 – an example of work being done by the West Midlands Combined Authority who are being proactive in this area.

Ø  Slide 10 – the Rivers Trust are working with ‘Citizen Scientists’ to help collect more data and if there was interest locally, they could work with a community group on this.

Ø  Slide 11 - highlighted the catchment area upstream of Tamworth and Defra encourages a catchment-based approach where organisations/neighbours talk to each other and agree on a policy to support rivers.

Gareth Mead from Severn Trent then provided a presentation highlighting that they worked in the river protection team with a team of river rangers who check rivers and work with organisations such as the Rivers Trust and highlighted the following information –  ...  view the full minutes text for item 94.

(Discussion item)

There were none.

To receive updates from any Working Groups

There were none.

(Discussion item – link to Forward Plan is attached)

Browse plans - Cabinet, 2024 :: Tamworth Borough Council

There were no new items identified from the Forward Plan.

(Discussion item – to review the Infrastructure Safety & Growth Scrutiny Work Plan)

Councillor N Statham provided an update that the MP, Sarah Edwards had met with Lightspeed on the 5^th February and outlined constituents concerns. They had confirmed that all projects within the borough would be finished by June. It has been requested that the current two week notice be extended and they had given a direct email for any case work from Tamworth and it was recommended that any complaints are shared via this email.

The Committee concluded that there would be limited scope of what they could achieve at the Committee and therefore that this would not be added to the workplan.

The Chair noted that the final Committee meeting is on the 5^th March when they are expecting the Community Safety Update, the County Council attending to look at the road infrastructure within Tamworth as well as written updates for the Joint Waste Service and the Nature Recovery Declaration and the Committees draft annual report.

The Committee considered areas it may like to look at in the new municipal year such as the economic strategy.