Agenda and minutes

Any apologies for absence will be noted at this point.

The Chairman confirmed that due to a meeting clash she would need to hand over chairmanship of todays meeting to Vice Chair Cllr Bangert at 15:40pm. It was also confirmed that Cllr Johnson would be late joining the meeting.

To approve the minutes of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting held on 16 November 2021.

To receive an update on progress against recommendations made to the Cabinet and the Council.

The minutes of the meeting held on 16 November 2021 were approved.

The Chairman will announce any urgent items that due to special circumstances are to be dealt with under the agenda item below relating to late items.

There were no urgent items.

Members and officers are reminded to make any declarations of disclosable pecuniary, personal and/or prejudicial interests they may have in respect of matters on the agenda for this meeting.

There were no declarations of interest made.

The procedurefor submittingpublic questions in writingbyno later thannoon 2 workingdays before the meetingis availablehereorfromthe Democratic Services Officer (whose contactdetailsappear on thefrontpage of thisagenda).

It was confirmed that there had 4 questions submitted for public question time. The Monitoring Officer Mr Bennett provided advice to the Chairman stating that as these questions were all addressed for Chief Inspector Carter and therefore did not meet the public question time criteria for members should the Chairman want these questions to be heard it would be right that these be asked and answered at the start of item 6 [Chief Inspector carter – Sussex Police].

It was also confirmed by Miss Lavender that question two had been withdrawn by the member of the public.

Chief Inspector Carter will be in attendance to provide members with an update on current policing challenges and issues, as well as answering questions put forward by Members ahead of the meeting.

The Chairman read out each public question that had been submitted, welcomed Chief Inspector Carter to the meeting and invited him to provide the Committee with his answers to the questions and an update on current policing challenges and issues across the district.

C.I Carter advised members that policing of the hub is derived form a number of different sources, neighbourhood policing teams which in include PCSO’s and warranted officers. Chichester District has one named PCSO for every electoral ward, meaning there are 14 PCSO’s with another 2 in training starting in the coming weeks. He explained that the reality of policing is that he could not tell members how many officers there were in any one place, at any time across the district as they operate a very flexible policing model to ensure they can spread the teams in order to place officers where they are needed to be at any point. He confirmed there are several different teams that the district benefit from, divisional response teams, force teams most visibly those are road, firearms, and dog policing teams. The Rural crime team at Midhurst which provides a significant benefit to rural communities. Finally, he highlighted to members a variety of policing incidents that had taken place across the district recently. He also addressed that there had be a number significant concerns brought to his attention previously and more recently regarding speeding and the inappropriate use of vehicles, across the district he wanted to reassure members that the police are taking steps to tackle this issue. He confirmed that for the calendar year for 2021 up to 20 December 2021, Sussex Police issued 8716 tickets or summonses.

In turning to the questions submitted by members of the public he provided the following answers;

Answer to question one:

“I am a Police Officer, I cannot become involved in politics, my job is to enforce the law that is enacted by parliament subject to tests, proportionality, necessity legitimacy and accountability.”

Answer to question three:  

“The riding of an e-scooter on anything other than private land (with the landowner’s permission) is not currently permitted. They are mechanically propelled vehicles; you have to be licenced and insured and they have to be subject to testing. However, there is no offence of selling them. Officers do have powers to deal with escooters, but like all other powers the individual officers are accountable for their use and has to undertake a dynamic risk assessment of any action they are about to undertake and there are some very obvious risks when it comes to dealing with someone on a moving object. I am personally disappointed that Mr English has witnessed officers apparently ignoring persons on escooters. I have some clear expectations that officers will, if it is safe to do so, intervene with someone using one. I have recently reiterated those expectations to my teams here following a separate incident elsewhere. Together with our partners, especially Chichester District Council, we have undertaken action  ...  view the full minutes text for item 49.

The Committee are requested to agree 3 members for the membership of this Task and Finish Group including the election of a Chairman.

RESOLVED

The Committee agreed that the membership of the Affordable Housing Task & Finish Group were Cllrs Bangert, Lishman, Graves and Purnell. Cllr Bangert was elected as Chairman.

Members are requested to consider the latest Work Programme 2021-22.

The Chairman advised that she and the vice-chair would be undertaking work with officers to look at the items remaining on the work programme for the Committee’s March 2022 meeting with a view to moving a number of these items to meetings of the committee scheduled for the new municipal year.

After a short discussion it was clarified that the Chichester Festival Theatre and Pallant House Gallery items had been suggested to report through the Environment Panel in the future. The Chairman confirmed that the committee would be provided with a draft agenda to pre approve for March’s meeting.

Consideration of any late items as follows:

a)    Items added to the agenda papers and made available for public inspection.

b)    Items which the Chairman has agreed should be taken as matters of urgency by reason of special circumstances reported at the meeting.

There were no late items.

The Committee is asked to consider in respect of the following item(s) whether the public, including the press, should be excluded from the meeting on the grounds of exemption under Parts I to 7 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972, as indicated against the item and because, in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exemption of that information outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information. The reports dealt with under this part of the agenda are attached for members of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee and senior officers only (salmon paper).

Or

There are no restricted items for consideration.

Cllr Apel read the part II resolution in relation to agenda item 11. This was proposed by Cllr Apel and seconded by Cllr Purnell.

RESOLVED

That with regard to agenda item 11 the public including the press should be excluded from the meeting on the grounds of exemption in Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972 namely Paragraph 3 (Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information)) and because, in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exemption of that information outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

The Committee adjourned for 10 minutes at 15:33pm.

The Committee is invited to note the outcome and subsequent recommendations from the Future Services Framework exercise and make comments to Cabinet.

Mr Buckley introduced the item.

Members asked a number of questions and these were answered by Mr Buckley, Mr Ward and Mrs Hotchkiss.

Two amendments were proposed and seconded for recommendations 2.7 and 2.9 and these were carried.

RESOLVED

The Committee agrees the recommendations as amended in sections 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4, 2.5, 2.6, 2,7, 2.9 and 2.10 of the report.