David Freeman, (VCS Strategy Manager) presented the report.

The report provided an update on the proposed LCF mitigating actions and other MSG transitional arrangements agreed in principle at Cabinet on 31st July 2019.

The report also contained details of:

•           The proposed renaming of the Emergency Fund to ‘Contingency Fund’ to provide ‘bridging funding’ for MSG groups facing a significant loss of Council funding.

•           Revisions to the criteria for the fund to reflect the changes.

•           An update on the implementation of the LCF. Agreements had been reached with all but one of the projects to be funded and the issues in respect of this project were in the process of being addressed. Regular monitoring reports would be submitted to the Sub – Committee on progress with the LCF.

•           A proposal to waive a pre - funding condition relating to the submission of a premises agreement for two organisations to allow payments to be made.  The two groups were: Age UK East London in relation to occupation of 82, Russia Lane, and REAL in relation to occupation of Jack Dash House. No other groups, apart from the two highlighted in the report had outstanding lease issues. Progress on these arrangements would be reported to the Sub – Committee.

Councillor Tarik Khan (Scrutiny Lead Resources) advised of the Overview and Scrutiny’s questions on this report regarding the plans to notify community organisations of the name change from the Emergency Fund to the VSC Contingency Fund.  Clarify was also sought about the risks to the Council of wavering the funding condition requiring a satisfactory premises agreement.

Written responses to the questions were noted and would be published on the Council’s website.

In response to questions from Members, it was confirmed that: the Council is working with MSG groups to help identify ways to secure alternative sources of grant funding. This may involve helping them secure funding from the Contingency Fund.  It was also noted that, to quality for funding from the Contingency Fund, organisations must demonstrate amongst other things that they had had clear goals and a realistic chance of securing funding from other sources.

Officers also confirmed that the decision making process for the Contingency Fund would be the same as for the Emergency Fund with authority to agree proposals delegated to the Divisional Director, Strategy, policy and performance, in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Resources and the Voluntary Sector.

A full list of the mitigation action, including the specialist support to be provided,  was set out in in Appendix A of the report.

RESOLVED:

1.         Note the progress and budget allocation relating to the transitional arrangements and equality mitigation actions for projects  whose current MSG funding came to an end on 30th September 2019 as set out in the report and appendices

2.         Agree the propose changes to the Emergency fund as set out in paragraphs 3.7 including the new name, ‘Contingency Fund’.

3.         Agree the variation of funding conditions in individual cases as set out in paragraph 3.10

4.         To note the specific equalities considerations as set out in Paragraph 4

The meeting was adjourned at 6pm and reconvened at 6:30pm due to a fire alarm.