Agenda item - Oral questions from Councillors

67.1         The Mayor noted that 9 oral questions had been received and that 30 minutes were set aside for the duration of the item.  The Mayor then called on Councillor Janio to put his question to Councillor Yates.

 

(1)  Councillor Janio – The Future of Local Democracy

 

67.2         Councillor Janio asked the following question, “I attended the Greater Brighton Economic Board meeting with you earlier this week, an organisation that has brought almost £200 million of Government investment in this region over the last few years. Do you agree with me that the Greater Brighton Economic Board has been an extremely worthwhile body for this Council to be a part of?”

 

67.3         Councillor Yates replied, “Of course I do and I was really glad that we were part of setting that up as a Labour administration. I am also really pleased to say that it was something that I noted in one of my columns in the Brighton & Hove Independent probably 6 months or so ago when the Annual Report came out that highlighted the massive benefits of working collaboratively. Local Authorities can’t always do stuff immediately within in their environments, it is wrong to think that our economy ends at our borders in terms of our Local Government borders. Working across borders makes sense for the many Brighton & Hove residents who choose to work outside Brighton & Hove as well as the many thousands of people who work inside Brighton & Hove but live outside it. We shouldn’t think that this Council Chamber or its boundaries is the ‘be all and end all’ of the economy.”

 

67.4         Councillor Janio asked the following supplementary question, “Can you confirm that when you are Leader of the Opposition after May you will continue to engage constructively with the Conservative Government over similar worthwhile projects?”

 

67.5         Councillor Yates replied, “I am not sure there will be a Conservative Government come May. I certainly cannot say what is going to be happening to our borders and nor could anyone else. Let’s be perfectly honest, the chances of that are the same as the chances of the Conservatives going for a vote of confidence in Theresa May in another 12 months’ time. It is not happening and I refer you again to Rule 9.11 in the Rules of Debate for this Council, you ask questions about policy not pedantry.”

 

(2)  Councillor Mac Cafferty – City Clean Planning

 

67.6         Councillor Mac Cafferty asked the following question, “My residents suffered yet more chaos over the Christmas period when once again the Labour Administration couldn’t get communal bins emptied. It would be one thing if this hadn’t been the same issue as that experienced but once again communal bins are being left for days. This isn’t happening in a vacuum, complaints about collections have doubled. With both Christmas and Pride events were known about well in advance. Both are annual events, so to be told in the aftermath of the missed collections and overflowing bins over the Christmas period, but expecting the situation to return to normal within 3 weeks was good, is quite frankly insulting. Will Councillor Mitchell agree with me that this is no way to plan for waste and recycling collections?  If there are Bank Holidays or other delays that have a knock on effect on collections that this Council knows about there needs to be much more robust practices in place to prevent overflowing bins and keep collections regular where possible.

 

67.7         Councillor Mitchell replied, “We are aware there were some issues over the Christmas period with regards collections.  More rubbish and recycling is produced at Christmas and communal bins filled up quickly.  Residents were asked not to leave rubbish bags by the side of full communal bins where they can be ripped open by animals and seagulls, but to find an alternative bin.  Based on the experiences, the approach to planning for next Christmas will change.  In addition to this, officers have started conversations about resource planning for the summer:

 

•      Bin capacity and the types of bins on the seafront are being reviewed;

•      Options for installing recycling litter bins along the seafront are actively being considered;

•      The need for additional temporary staff to litter pick are being explored, and

•      Conversations have started with the Pride organisers to improve waste management for 2019

 

Through the Modernisation Programme, plans are underway to make the service more resilient, for example:

 

•      Round restructures will ensure the service is reliable with collections made on       the scheduled day. This will be achieved by balancing the workload across crews, reducing, if not eliminating, missed collections;

 

•      The rollout of further solar powered litter bins will reduce the number of litter bin collections, increasing;

 

•      Reviewing street cleansing routes will ensure those areas with high levels of litter will be visited at an appropriate frequency.

 

To complement these service improvements, education campaigns will be launched; reminding residents, visitors and businesses of their responsibilities to keep Brighton & Hove clean. This will include making clear what the implications are if they are found to be littering, flytippng or committing another environmental enforcement offence.

 

67.8         Councillor Mac Cafferty asked the following supplementary question, “I wanted to draw Councillor Mitchell to Labour’s Manifesto commitments that they made to the city in 2015 that they would “Make collecting refuse a top priority” the Leader and senior Councillors will directly oversee work to improve the service. Why is Labour trying to hide these election commitments by removing their 2015 election pledges from their website at: www.brightonhovelabour.com”

 

67.9         Councillor Mitchell replied, “I think I did give you an extremely detailed answer to your first question which sets out the work underway and I would draw your attention to the several City Clean update reports that have been coming to Environment, Transport & Sustainability Committee that give a lot more detail of all the things we are doing to improve the service.”

 

(3)  Councillor Gibson –Expanding Council Housing

 

67.10      Councillor Gibson asked the following question, “Given the housing crisis with around 1700 people in homeless and temporary emergency accommodation, and the high private sector rent in the city and the loss of social housing under the ‘right to buy’ which the latest figures show that we have already lost 55 a year over the last four years before the end of that period, which compares with the new Council House Building Programme where we have achieved 172, so we are losing social rents and replacing them with affordable. Given this but also that we do have £30 million unspent borrowing at the time that the borrowing cap was abolished and lots of ‘right to buy’ receipts so we have an opportunity to do something and given also that the quickest way to do something about this is to actually expand our supply of council housing by buying, my question is, Do you agree that we should use more borrowing and usable right to buy receipts to expand further the programme that you yourself initiated and it is an excellent programme. Buying homes for Council use a programme known as the ‘Home Purchase Scheme’ so that we may be able to achieve more and alleviate homelessness and address the housing crisis in the city more quickly.”

 

67.11      Councillor Meadows replied, “I think question I got from that was ‘Do we want to continue building new homes’?  Yes  Do we want to continue with our ‘Hidden Homes Programme’ which is in addition to the 172 new homes, we have the ‘Home Purchase Policy’ where I believe there are 8 and we are increasing that. Yes we do want to increase provision in the city.”

 

67.12      Councillor Gibson asked the following supplementary question, “To be specific the question is “Do you support expanding the ‘Home Purchase Policy’ using ‘Right to Buy’ as usable receipts to enable more Council Housing?. These other things are all very positive so if we could answer this specific question.”

 

 

67.13      Councillor Meadows replied, “As I understand it, under the ‘Hidden Homes Programme’ and our ‘Home Purchase Policy’.  Yes we can use ‘Right to Buy’ receipts and I would hope that we can continue.”

 

(4)  Councillor Hyde – Taxi Trade

 

67.14      Councillor Hyde asked the following question, “Does the Labour Administration consider that it has better knowledge than professional taxi drivers with regards to the best options for transporting people door to door around the city in the most economical and quickest way possible?”

 

67.15      Councillor Mitchell replied, “I don’t consider that we have better knowledge what we do is to work very closely with taxi trade representatives and we are always keen to hear and to learn from them in relation to any highway planning issues, roadworks or other such things that will affect their trade.”

 

67.16      Councillor Hyde asked the following supplementary question, “What solution has the Labour Administration offered to the local taxi trade with regards to the major problem that will be caused by the removal of the roundabout at the Aquarium with regards to making Madeira Drive one way only which will result in the only exit for all traffic at Duke’s Mound adding at least one mile to the journey and excessive congestion at that junction and all traffic currently flowing in East Street that has a one way route that leads to the seafront at Kings Road and the Queen’s Hotel that they can only turn left at that junction which is East bound because of the no right turn in place, which in turn means all traffic heading west, which currently uses the roundabout to loop back around will have no possibility of going west bound without being forced into Valley Gardens in search of a way to go west bound.  This will result in dangerous U turns on the seafront Kings Road. What solutions have you offered to the trade to overcome these points?

 

67.17      Councillor Mitchell replied, “The plans for Valley Gardens Phase 3 are evolving and the revised plans were published yesterday.  They show a right turn only for taxis exiting Pool Valley onto the A259 to travel west which will be explored as part of the detailed design stage and subject to Road Safety Audits and a Traffic Regulation Order, if progressed. We have done that by listening to taxi trade representatives.

 

As part of the extensive public consultation and stakeholder engagement that has been undertaken to assist in developing the preliminary design for phase 3 of the Valley Garden project we have involved representatives of the taxi trade in a number of meetings and workshops where we have listened to other requests from them and where we are doing our best to meet them. The most recent report that will be coming to Environment, Transport & Sustainability Committee next Thursday has, as a recommendation, on the front of the report that councillors note the plans being developed for the bottom and the top end of Duke’s Mound and that these works are going to be progressed and undertaken in tandem with the rest of the detailed design work on the main scheme. The report also outlines that we are looking more closely at the western end of Madeira Drive to facilitate the current loading, unloading operations that are required to be undertaken there as at present.

 

(5)  Councillor Page – Recycling: Incineration & Doorstep Advice

 

67.18      Councillor Page asked the following question, “I note that Councillor Mitchell said 2 loads of recycling were sent straight for incineration but there did not seem to be any management or supervision to resolve the fact that one round was putting black bags in it and I am disappointed to hear that.

 

When we talk about contamination isn’t Veolia recycling there in great part to sort out the contaminated stuff. It is an enormous modern facility at Hollingdean. Given Councillor Mitchell’s answers already is about, I have called it ‘Doorstep Advice’ because Cllr Mitchell talked about an education campaign that sounded like just reminding residents that they might get fined if they do ‘this or that’ but does she agree that there is insufficient in person advice to those households, that minority, which do mess up their recycling. Does Cllr Mitchell agree that with the change from 3GS that there should be more doorstep advice to reduce contamination?”

 

67.19      Councillor Mitchell replied, “The material recovery facility at Hollingdean is there to sort, recycle and separate it from materials that can’t be recycled but it does not have the capacity to deal with an unlimited amount of contamination. We collect our ‘recycle it’ separated and we separate out glass from the dry mixed recycling. We get a good price for that, it is a high quality ‘recycle it’. We have to be very mindful that we don’t issue too many contaminated loads to the facility.

 

In relation to the ‘awareness and education’ raising that I referred to earlier, we have carried out the trial in the Montpelier area of the city to find out how we can make recycling easier for residents. In that case it relate to communal bins where we use communal bins of a different colour. The reports on that feedback were given to ETS Committee and we are now looking to roll out some of the things that we have learnt more widely.  Another strand of our increasing recycling programme is to actually now look at doorstep collections and to see how again we can re-emphasise what recycling we collect and what we don’t. That work is also in hand as part of the modernisation programme.”

 

67.20      Councillor Page asked the following supplementary question, “With the bringing in house of the enforcement contract the need for not just education about what we can recycle and what we can’t but the casework follow-up of those households which constantly seem to not take on board the education, is that not something that should be given more resources and would be cost effective to do so?”

 

67.21      Councillor Mitchell replied, “I think bringing the enforcement service back in house will give us all sorts of opportunities to deliver a much more tailored service to the residents of Brighton & Hove and far more focused. I don’t necessarily see an enforcement team delivering that education and awareness I think we have to look at working with schools and community groups to get the message out in a rather different way than using enforcement.”

 

(6)  Councillor Nemeth – King Alfred

 

67.22      Councillor Nemeth asked the following question, “Councillors voted at the last Full Council meeting to call on the Administration to enlighten us as to the identity of the Lead Member for Hove’s biggest ever single site building project, the new King Alfred, or at least appoint somebody to do the job. Having heard nothing I think we can all assume that whoever answers today is that secret lead member.

 

Has the lead member even met in person once with Crest Nicholson to discuss the project?”

 

67.23      Councillor Yates replied, “Councillor Janio instructs me to just say no, that is good advice in many circumstances.  No I have met with Rob Star and I discussed how to meet with Crest Nicholson and when to meet with them and what would be an appropriate way, in order to try to move things forward.  I have to say I asked specifically to be able to meet with Crest Nicholson before the Policy, Growth & Resources Committee on 24 January this year.  Crest Nicholson were unable to provide their Chief Executive for a meeting in that time scale, luckily I have a meeting I believe next week. However that will be passed our point of decision of P,G&R last week for a decision and sign off by the end of today. Judging from the snow I am guessing that is not happening.

 

67.24      Councillor Nemeth asked the following supplementary question, “Can it please be acknowledged that it was probably a mistake not to get on to Crest Nicholson case much earlier. It was really important to build a rapport with such an important partner especially as the relationship is somewhat strained anyway.”

 

67.25      Councillor Yates replied, “I would have liked to have met with Crest Nicholson some time ago, I think it is fair to say I made the approach which wasn’t accepted. I will be meeting with them next week.  On another matter it is important to recognise that we are mostly elected as councillors on the basis of street litter, etc.  We employ a significant number of highly experienced officers who have been meeting with Crest Nicholson on a very regular basis to make progress on intensely complex legal development issues around the development agreement. It is not for me to interfere in that process.”

 

(7)  Councillor Deane – Artists’ Residencies

 

67.26      Councillor Deane asked the following question, “Can you tell me how hard the Labour Members of the TDC Committee fight to retain the Annexe artist’s studios in Belmont Street which were sold off to the highest bidder.”

 

67.27      Councillor Robins replied, I can’t it is a very good question and deserves a proper and full answer which I shall make sure you get.

 

67.28      Councillor Deane asked the following supplementary question “Will you not agree that the sale contradicts your role as a committee member responsible for culture in this city, and will you commit to putting processes in place that will safeguard the city’s artists for the future.”

 

67.29      Councillor Robins replied, “I shall ensure that you get a full and proper answer.”

 

(8)  Councillor Bell – Pavilion

 

67.30      Councillor Bell asked the following question, “A senior officer has recently left who was primarily employed to see the move of the Pavilion and the Museums in to a Trust status.  Would Councillor Robins confirm that the officer’s move and not being replaced shows the lack of commitment from the Labour Administration to the work force of the Pavilion?”

 

67.31      Councillor Robins replied, “No I won’t confirm that.  Furthermore I think we have demonstrated that at every junction commitment to the work force in the Pavilion.”

 

67.32      Councillor Bell asked the following supplementary question, “I was pleased to hear that response but would it not be fair to say that as we have been constantly asking for is to have a survey of the work force to see how they are feeling and to see at this moment at time whether they do feel they have a link with us in the Council while we are going through the period of moving them into a single Trust.”

 

67.33      Councillor Robins replied, “I personally have spoken to the staff on a number of occasions, Cllr Platt has spoken to the staff with me and I sit on the Federation at the Pavilion.  They can come to us at any time and do come to me. I address their concerns and always have done.”

 

(9)  Councillor Sykes – Sculpture in the City

 

67.34      Councillor Sykes asked the following question, “Following the excellent work of Hove Civic Society in developing the Hove Plinth to fruition  to widespread acclaim can Cllr Robins inform Council what the administration’s view is of Hove Civic Society’s proposals for a series of sculpture trails entitled ‘Sculpture in the City’ in Hove and Brighton.”

 

67.35   Councillor Robins replied, “The Council recently adopted a new cultural framework “Daring to be Different”, developed through the city’s Arts and Creative Industries Commission.  The framework includes a commitment to developing a public art strategy, which will establish actions for the commissioning, maintenance and funding issues.  At the same time, the city’s new Destination Experience Group will be exploring concrete ways to improve the offer and experience of visitors and its first meeting will take place next month, following the adoption of the new Visitor Economy Strategy. While there is nothing to prevent different stakeholder groups from initiating projects, and given its limited capacity, the Council is reliant on the goodwill, energy and resources of other parties, the administration does believe that it is more effective to work collaboratively with a range of partners, to make the best use of the resources available and to co-ordinate efforts.

 

Members may also be interested to know that Hove Civic Society representatives are part of the discussions to implement the agreed strategies and their input, energy and resources are of course welcome, at a time when the Council’s resources and officer capacity are limited, and we are happy to continue to work with them.”

 

67.36      Councillor Sykes asked the following supplementary question, “I am fearing that this has been an idea that has been in the offing for some time, I think Cllr Robins is aware of it, that we have this cultural framework and strategy on the way. Now that we have that the fear is that this initiative from Hove Civic Society won’t be taken seriously, I would like an assurance that more than the general affirmation that this might be a good idea, that it will be taken seriously.”

 

67.37      Councillor Robins replied, “Absolutely we will take it seriously I recently toured Portslade with a member of the Hove Civic Society to look at areas in Portslade that we thought  might be useful to put some of the artwork in. We looked at Easthill Park’s walled garden, an area in Victoria Park where the new bowls club is going to be put in, and an area in front of Portslade Town Hall.”