Agenda item

A report of the Head of Strategic Support enabling the Committee to review and agree the scrutiny work programme.

Two reports including a supplementary report of the Head of Strategic Support were submitted to enable the Committee review and agree its work programme (item 6 on the agenda filed with these minutes). 

The Strategic Director of Housing, Planning, Regeneration and Regulatory Services, the Head of Planning and Regeneration, the Head of Landlord Services and the Democratic Services Officer assisted the Committee with its consideration of the two reports.

The following points were raised:

·         the Housing Capital Programme figures would be finalised at the same time as the draft budget in January/February so for the Committee to review this topic at its December meeting the figures would be unconfirmed and of limited detail.  If the Committee waited until its March meeting to scrutinise the Programme it would be too late to shape the report before it was submitted to Cabinet at its meeting later in March 2020.

·         the Local Development Scheme was published once a year setting out the key milestones for the preparation of the Local Plan.  The Scheme’s milestones would be reviewed by the Project Board and were usually confirmed in January / February and then proposed for agreement by the Cabinet at its meeting held in March 2020. It would therefore be difficult for the Committee to schedule any meaningful scrutiny of this topic before its submission to the Cabinet.

·         there was an expectation upon Scrutiny Councillors to be proactive in researching topics to determine if they would benefit from scrutiny.  Informal meetings could be scheduled to scrutinise topics in between formal committee meetings, and additional formal meetings could also be scheduled to enable the Committee to fulfil the role asked of it by the Scrutiny Commission. Concerns were raised about how to document any recommendations made at these types of meetings.

·         if the Committee wished to receive a briefing about topics, before proposals were submitted to Cabinet, there was a potential for information to be provided that was not fully developed and which could change during the period after the briefing and before the report was submitted to the Cabinet.

RESOLVED

1.            that a report detailing high level figures of the Housing Capital Programme be scheduled to the Committee’s meeting to be held on 10th December 2019;

2.            that the Scrutiny Commission be asked to consider scrutinising the Local Development Scheme as part of its pre-decision scrutiny before the Cabinet meeting in March 2020;

3.            that Committee requests that the Scrutiny Commission provides clarity and further guidance with respect to how it can fulfil its role of pre-decision scrutiny at an earlier stage;

4.            that an update is provided to the Committee at each of its meetings regarding the quarterly figures for the 5 year Housing Land Supply;

5.            that the information provided by the Head of Planning and Regeneration to the Corporate Services Scrutiny Committee after its meeting on 25th June 2019 with respect to its concerns about the new planning service structure be also circulated to members of the Housing Planning Regeneration and Regulatory Services Scrutiny Committee;

6.            that the current position with the Committee’s Work Programme be noted

Reasons

1.            To enable the Committee to fulfil the request by Scrutiny Commission to complete pre-decision scrutiny on topics at an earlier stage.

2.            The Committee considered that it would be difficult for it to meaningfully scrutinise this topic prior to its submission to the Cabinet but was of the opinion that the importance of the subject matter indicated that it would be advantageous for the topic to be scrutinised.

3.            The Committee were concerned that its current meeting schedule, the report schedule of the Cabinet and its current remit did not fit with the request of the Scrutiny Commission to complete pre-decision scrutiny at an earlier stage and sought further guidance.

4.            The Committee wished to closely monitor if the Council’s Housing Land Supply falls below 5.5 years.

5.            The Committee wished to receive the information previously circulated to the Corporate Services Scrutiny Committee.

6.            To enable the Council’s new scrutiny arrangements to operate efficiently and effectively.