Issue - meetings

To consider and decide on the recommendations as set out in the associated report. 

RESOLVED – That Full Council be recommended to adopt the Partnership Plan as detailed in Appendix A of the report

REASON FOR DECISION: The Plan sets the key priorities and direction of travel that will allow the Council to plan services and budgets and deliver on key actions. 

Councillor Ben Chapelard, Leader of the Council introduced the report set out in the agenda and provided an update following the reports progression through the Overview and Scrutiny Committee and all three of the Cabinet Advisory Boards, which included the following:

-       The name of the report had changed and would now be referred to as the Tunbridge Wells Borough Council Plan 2022-2024.

-       The report laid out the priorities for the Council, known as the Focus on Five.

-       Under each of the priorities, there were details of key projects and actions the Council wanted to take between 2022-24.

-       Following the reports progression through Overview and Scrutiny and the Cabinet Advisory Boards, the two main pieces of feedback were:

o   The original name ‘the Borough Partnership Plan’ wasn’t supported.  This has now been changed.

o   The document lacked detail. This was being considered with a view to providing a lot more detail against each of the priorities.

-       It was very much an interim plan, with a longer term Corporate Plan to follow in about 12-14 months.

RESOLVED – That Full Council be recommended to adopt the Partnership Plan as detailed in Appendix A of the report

REASON FOR DECISION: The Plan sets the key priorities and direction of travel that will allow the Council to plan services and budgets and deliver on key actions. 

To consider and provide a recommendation to Cabinet on the proposals set out in the attached report.

Councillor Ben Chapelard, Leader of the Council introduced the report set out in the agenda.

Discussion and questions from Members included the following:

-       The Plan, whether the 5-year plan or an Interim Plan was the purview of the Council, not the administration.  This had been raised at Overview and Scrutiny and would be taken back to Cabinet Members and considered before going forward to Cabinet.

-       The version of the plan was a final version for the purposes of presenting it to the Cabinet Advisory Boards.  The document was a live document and would be updated as projects were started/taken forward.

-       A draft Strategic Plan would be available by spring 2024.

-       The Plan should read towns not town and this would be rectified for the next version.

-       It was hoped that staff would be comfortable approaching Members to discuss and share their roles.  A number of days had already been spent back on the ‘shop floor’ to gain a better understanding of what officers did. 

-       The Council was hoping to recruit a new Head of Human Resources that would look at how to better recruit, support and develop staff. 

-       How the Council handled enquiries etc. was currently done in person by Call Centre staff.  Consideration would be given as to whether this was the most effective way of handling calls or whether the Council should consider giving higher permissions to the Call Centre staff to see whether this would make the system more efficient.   

-       An example of where cost efficiencies had been achieved was the de-carbonisation of the Weald Sports Centre.

-       Following the submission of the draft Local Plan, the Council had now received an initial findings letter from the Inspector.  The letter included a number of modifications which the Inspector had suggested either needed to be adopted or considered by the Council.  The Council now had time to consider the modifications before submitting a revised draft Plan.  Due to the complex nature of this work there was currently no timescale, but work was ongoing. 

-       The Community Safety Unit (CSU) was not included as a specific priority  but would continue ‘business as usual’.   

-       Reference was made to the Budget Report (Agenda Item 7) and in particular paragraphs 2.65 and 2.66.  Paragraph 2.65 gave details of three improvement recommendations made by the external auditors:

o   A new corporate plan be brough forward, this will provide the focus required to help meet the challenges ahead.

o   In line with the new corporate plan, the Council should develop a long-term savings plan, failure to do so could lead to an unsustainable financial position developing; and

o   A Human Resources Strategy should be prepared, formally approved; and circulated to appropriate officers. 

-       Paragraph 2.66 stated that the recommendations were welcomed and would address the issues faced by the Council without a Corporate Plan.

-       It was suggested that the auditors would want the Council to produce an Interim Plan, pending the creation of a  ...  view the full minutes text for item 72

Councillor Ben Chapelard, Leader of the Council, presented the report as set out in the agenda.

Questions from Members included the following:

-       Community Land Trusts (CLTs), such as the scheme being discussed in Cranbrook, had not been mentioned under the priority of genuinely affordable housing and social rental housing but were mentioned in the submitted Local Plan with recognition that TWBC were to work with them going forward. Whether this would happen in the next 18 months was dependant on the progress of the Borough Partnership’s Affordable Housing Strategy.

-       Digital transformation was not to streamline staffing costs but to make efficiencies for staff, such as virtual assistance on the website for issues such as reporting bins and giving higher permissions to call centre staff to be able to complete tasks without referring issues back to other officers. These efficiencies in turn could make savings.

-       ‘User Pays’ was the idea that users of specific services would pay for them rather than being subsidised by the entire Borough, which was introduced as a guiding principle by a previous Conservative administration. Due to the ongoing financial situation, it was important to charge for those services such as car parking. Other ideas for services which would be user-paid were still in development and not for public broadcast at the time.

-       The inclusion of Great Hall and Torrington car parks in the list for consideration of disposal in the Asset Management Plan 2023/24 meant they would not be disposed of until a full review of the parking strategy for Tunbridge Wells so there was some time before they were in a position to sell and by that point technology would have moved on to the point the cameras would need to be replaced. Likewise, in that period EV charging was likely to become far more necessary as more people bought electric vehicles.

-       The length of time it took to produce the Plan was due to the Borough Partnership being a new administration and every new Cabinet Member needing to understand their Portfolio before being able to do anything. The Plan had been in place since November but Cabinet were bringing it through the Cycle now with much already completed or in motion.

-       The Champions mentioned within the Plan were unpaid positions, unlike in previous administrations, which were filled by Members with areas of interest which aligned with the ‘Focus on Five’ and who supported Cabinet Members in delivering those priorities.

-       Transparency was a priority with a joint approach between Councillors Hall and Hayward on both safeguarding finances and digital transformation.

-       The Parish Chair’s convention mentioned within the Plan was expected to be a big event to get all Town and Parish Councils together as the Borough Partnership put their new Corporate Plan together in the next 12-14 months. This involved deeper engagement to try and understand the perspective of the towns and parishes within the borough. The emphasis on Town councils as well as Parishes would be  ...  view the full minutes text for item 16