Agenda item

(a)

Question to Councillor Worden from Councillor Andrea Davis “This meeting is being held in a location not accessible by public transport, the majority of other meetings open to the public are also at this location.  This Council last year, Signed a Climate Change Declaration....can the Leader of the Council outline the steps being taken to make these meetings accessible by public transport, not only would this reduce carbon emissions but also would make the meetings accessible to residents who do not have access to a motor car.”  Councillor Worden’s response “Thank you Cllr Davis for your question. It is unfortunate that Brynsworthy is not well served by public transport and as I have said for some time I would like to make the meetings more accessible to the public.  This has been recognised by the council which runs a mini bus service for officers to encourage people to use means other than private vehicles.  We have also had discussions with DCC over cycle routes and footpaths but have not been able to move this forward.  There is a bus - Bus routes 71 and 72 stop at the bus stop at the end of the lane to Brynsworthy Environment Centre. The bus travels from Barnstaple and stops at 9.54, 13.04 and 16.04.  The bus travels in the opposite direction (i.e. from Torrington to Barnstaple) and stops at 13.18, 14.18 and 17.30.  The reason why the Council moved from the Civic Centre must also be borne in mind.  By moving to BEC we saved around £300k per year which was necessary because with around 40% being cut by the government from our total income to continue at the Civic Centre was unaffordable.  We would like to explore what else we can do, with our partners at DCC, in the future to encourage more bus routes to access this area and to perhaps encourage the extension of the cycle route over the A39 at Roundswell so that it serves the offices. As you know we already hold our planning meetings at Barnstaple Rugby Club because of the number of people who wish to attend.”  In response to a supplementary question, Councillor Worden advised that the Council would be exploring other methods for communicating with the public and to make Council meetings more accessible to the public.

(b)

Question to Councillor Worden from Cllr Paul Henderson “Can the Leader confirm that Commercial Waste collection customers have not been invoiced for their collections for a period of time and what action is being taken to rectify this situation.”  Councillor Worden’s response “Thank you Cllr. Henderson, this was a concern. The invoicing to some businesses had fallen behind schedule and it has taken some time to get all customer arrangements and associated delivery tickets collated to ensure that the invoices are a true reflection of the services customers have received.  Invoicing has now been brought up to date in November 2019 and all customers affected have now received their customer accounts.  Improved controls have been put in place to ensure this does not materialise again. Moving forwards we plan to carry out a full review of our Commercial Waste business; we will be liaising with customers to ensure that the service matches their expectations as we want this to be an efficient service that we can be proud of.”

(c)

Question to Councillor Worden from Councillor Jeremy Yabsley “How many outstanding Planning Enforcement issues has this Council open on its books at present and how many are being determined within the guideline time scale?.....Does the Enforcement Service have sufficient capacity to deliver this requirement.”  Councillor Worden’s response “Thank you Cllr Yabsley for your question. The planning enforcement function currently has just over 600 open cases which is too many and apologies for the long answer but you will see that we are working to improve the situation.  The caseload has steadily risen over the last 4 years, mainly due to periods of under capacity.  In March 2018 the team lost 2 officers, leaving just the team leader. Although both posts were filled neither candidate had any planning or investigative experience so needed extensive support and training. This again impacted on the outstanding work which has been rising since 2018 - 462 new investigations were raised in 2018 and 539 in 2019. One of the new recruits left the team in 2019 after not settling to the work.  An internal candidate was appointed and started with the team September 2019 and inherited a large backlog.  Similarly, the other team member has a large inherited backlog which impacts on the team’s ability to respond to new demands.  When the team has had reduced numbers, the caseload has risen and even with the team at full strength it will take two years to get the number of outstanding cases to a manageable 200.  Unfortunately, the detailed reports for how many are being determined within the guideline time scale are not yet available from the new IT system, however, the team acknowledges that timescales, as published in our compliance and monitoring plan, have not been met. On a more positive note the team are now dealing with new requests in a timely manner and complaints to feedback have dropped off.  It is worth highlighting that the planning enforcement function in this Council is delivered differently than in some others.  Rather than the function being delivered by a single team, the enforcement team registers new enforcement cases, carries out the initial investigation, and then passes the case onto a planning officer for their view on the planning merits of the case.  The case then goes back to the enforcement team for pursuing the action agreed with the planning officer.  Legal services are also involved in the drafting of enforcement notices and prosecutions, should the case reach that stage. I highlight these dependencies because capacity in these teams has a direct impact on the delivery of the enforcement service and both have had their own challenges over recent years.  In response to our current situation the team is undertaking a process review. The enforcement team have led the way in using the new planning software as a case management tool and are on the verge of a paperless environment system, subject to mobile working. The team are also looking to rebrand the service and review approaches to compliance and monitoring. A leaflet is being produced to better inform the public of what the team does. It is intended to publish monthly bulletins to inform the public on common planning issues that result in enforcement investigations with the aim of educating and thereby reducing workload.  The enforcement officers have begun to draft decision instructions to speed up the process and relieve some of the pressure from the planning officers and the team leader has been drafting enforcement notices without reference to legal services, with their agreement.  The team has been at the forefront of developing joint and closer working with colleagues in other services such as council tax, housing and environmental health and has been chosen to be part of a pilot collaboration as part of the transformation work.  The team leader has been trained as a Financial Intelligence Officer under the Proceeds of Crime Act. The new team member is authorised under the Community Safety Accreditation Scheme and the other two team members are in the process of achieving the same. Drones are being considered corporately as an additional tool to assist in the work. All of these activities and measures are designed to improve our communication and interaction with the public and professionalise the team.”