To receive a presentation from Mayor John Biggs

The Committee received a presentation from Mayor John Briggs he set out the Council’s key achievements over the last seven months since the election and noted that this had been a particularly busy period. The questions and comments from Members on the report may be summarised as follows:

The Committee:

·         Noted that the LGA Peer Review in June, which had noted areas of improvement around developing an open culture; strong leadership; the Council’s healthy financial position and ongoing work around an increasing the pace and appetite for change;

·         Noted that the Council has made strong progress in its improvement journey, culminating in the Council’s directions lapsing in September;

·         Was advised that further work has included the development of the Council’s new Strategic Plan, Partnership Plan and aimed to improve transparency by revising its Performance Reports;

·         Was informed with regard to Children’s Services, the Council has prepared for Ofsted visits, launched a social worker academy, held an Early Years Summit with key partners and offered free meals to children to stave off holiday hunger;

·         Noted that to further address poverty, the Council has continued its Council tax Reduction Scheme, based on 100% Council Tax Liability;

·         Noted that to tackle ASB and crime, the Council has increased funding and continued Operation Continuum to disrupt drug markets in the Borough;

·         Was informed that the Council has also (i) Launched the Breath Clean campaign to change behaviours to tackle air pollution across Tower Hamlets; (ii) Built new Council homes to address the Borough’s affordable housing needs; (iii) Helped 5,000 residents find work through a new WorkPath Programme; and (iv) Brought waste back in-house to improve waste and recycling service delivery; and

·         Was advised by the Mayor that regarding the future uncertainty with both Brexit and the Fair Funding Review and the Council’s efforts to mitigate any risks of uncertainty through launching a Brexit commission.

The Committee then queried the Council’s work and plans on following areas:

·                     School Planning:

What can the Council do to alleviate school funding difficulties? The Committee noted that the Council has limited influence over school budgets. Schools are facing budget deficits and year on year cuts, exacerbated by demographic changes resulting in take up in some areas lagging behind full capacity. The Committee noted that the Council does not have resources to shore up these deficits but is working with schools to mitigate the impact.

How is the Council easing school planning uncertainty? The Committee noted the problems with predictability in the west of the Borough and had consulted with key stakeholders.

·                     Childcare Support:

The Committee noted that Government funding provides 30 hours of childcare for under 5s for working parents, compared to 15 hours of childcare for non-working parents. This is not assisting parents get into work and alleviating child poverty. The Committee noted that the Council is looking at providing a package of funding (approximately £1m) but Government has delayed its plans on packages on this.

·                     SEND funding:

The Committee noted that the overspend in SEND spending needs to be addressed by 2020 and queried the process and timeframes of consultations around services likely to be affected, such as the Support for Learning Service (SLS). The Committee also noted that there were difficult choices around SEND across the country, which included reduced services around transportation and diagnosis. There will be more detail in the budget, which is due to be published at the end of the week.

·         Local Authority Day Nurseries:

The Committee noted that it had not received a report from the Mayor in Cabinet responding to the OSC’s call-in recommendation to further consult on the decision to close the Local Authority Day Nurseries (LADNs). The Committee asked for clarification on the Mayor’s key drivers in deciding to close the LADNs, against the Committee’s recommendations. Further, the Committee highlighted the diversity benefit gains that LADNs provide in supporting parents of under two year olds work, with potentially better value for money than WorkPath. The Mayor highlighted that the funding was not in place and does not believe the model to be correct. Accordingly, the Mayor noted that early years and under 5’s were an area of growth in the budget but not through LADNs.

•     Air Quality:

The Committee noted the pressures of housing demand in the borough and queried how the Mayor intends to protect green spaces and air quality for residents near TfL roads. The Mayor highlighted that the borough is the second densest local authority in London but had schemes of pocket parks, larger green spaces incorporated in the community infrastructure levy. The mayor also highlighted that the borough had some of the worst air quality in London and was in breach of EU guidelines and the Council was looking at road configuration, parking charges and planting to tackle air quality. However, traffic is also linked to resident behaviours and a more long term education piece was required to encourage residents onto public transport.

·         Housing:

The Committee also queried how the Council was driving social housing building, addressing building delays and penalising land banking? The Committee noted that the Council’s powers to penalise land banking are limited. To meet London’s housing needs, the housing market depends on the private market. Last year 32 schemes lapsed and the economy will impact development in the private sector. The Committee noted that the Mayor mentioned land banking in his manifesto and further queried how he was working with the Mayor of London to set appropriate housing targets. The Mayor of London has set out 50% more housing, compared to the Local plan, which conservatively expects 35% more housing in Tower Hamlet’s Local Plan, based on viability assessments. To meet these targets, the Mayor noted programmes of estate regeneration and new Council homes acquisition and building.

·         Rehousing Large Families:

The committee noted the need for 4/5 bedroom houses to rehouse larger families. The Mayor noted that the waiting list can be over a decade and that this was a significant issue, which Tower Hamlets could not solve on its own. The Council have worked on incentives and better use of resources by addressing under occupation. The Council is also working on a limited program of knock-trough’s.

·         Waste and Recycling:

The Committee noted that the waste and recycling service required improvement and has now been brought in-house. The Committee queried how the council would tackle low recycling levels and whether bringing the service in-house would be more cost beneficial. The Mayor highlighted that recycling levels tended to be less in boroughs with less gardens and was more resource intensive in high rise dwellings and therefore would be unlikely to save money. The Committee also noted past problems in measuring recycling levels and requested more information on this (see actions).

·         Fast food shops and licensing:

The Committee noted that some areas have significant numbers of fast food restaurants, which was worrying at a time of high levels of childhood obesity. The Mayor noted that the Council can regulate change of use licensing and last year rejected 63% of applications. There are also rules around how far from schools fast food restaurants can be. However, the borough is an attractive place for entrepreneurial business start-ups and the Council need to work with businesses to encourage healthier options and nudge behaviours to through educating young people.

·         Direct Payments:

The Committee commented that some of the performance figures around adult social care required clarity. In particular, MP3.1 commentary needs to be more detailed to state how many service users and carers are not supported through direct payments and the impact on those people.

·         Care in People’s Homes:

The Committee noted introducing charging of home care and day care. The Committee noted that charging was only introduced recently and is dependent on the level of income. Monitoring is taking place to ensure this doesn’t lead to hardship and people are not refusing care packages because being charged.

The Chair Moved and it was:-

RESOLVED

The Committee welcomed more opportunity to engage with the Executive to influence the Council's policy development, for example

1.    Jointly establishing terms of reference on charging for home care;

2.    Working together on the Council Tax Reduction Scheme around minimum floor income, due to be determined next month; and

3.    Reviewing the two child allowance to understand the impact on universal credit and housing benefit and aligning the Council scheme with the Government’s scheme.

In conclusion, Councillor Francis thanked the Mayor for his presentation Council’s key achievements.