To receive any announcements from the Leader.
Minutes:
Spelthorne, along with the rest of the country, continues along the government’s roadmap out of lockdown. From 17 May, indoor hospitality could reopen, and our Officers have been working with these businesses to ensure they remain Covid secure. We have been supporting our ‘non-essential’ retail since they were given the green light to reopen on 12 April. Almost £50 million in relief and grants has been provided to businesses in the Borough during the pandemic so far. This includes:
§ £16m for original lockdown and discretionary business support grants
§ £18m for 20-21 Business Rates reliefs for retail, leisure, hospitality, and nurseries
§ £5.6m for Tiers and new lockdown business support grants (this includes £496k for the Additional Restrictions Grant paid to date)
§ £3.9m for three months business rates relief and two thirds relief thereafter for rest of financial year for retail, leisure, hospitality to the tune of £7.7m
The Council held a public consultation with businesses about what support is most needed. The consultation closed on 16 May. Applications are also open for the Restart Grant scheme, under this scheme local authorities will receive funding to be allocated in one-off grants to businesses.
The Council ran a successful election on Thursday 6 May and delivered a Covid-safe environment for voters, volunteers, and staff. If I could take this opportunity to thank all those who were involved, your hard work is very much appreciated. The full results can be found on our website.
The first consultation on the Staines Town Centre Development Framework began at 9am on Tuesday 18 May and runs for six weeks until Tuesday 29 June. The Council is asking people who live, work, study, shop and spend leisure time in Staines to respond. A leaflet is being sent to every home in the Borough to make residents aware of the consultation. This Objectives and Options consultation is the first stage of consultation on the Staines Development Framework and is open to all.
This Council will be eliminating 5.7 tonnes of annual carbon dioxide emissions with the installation of solar panels at the Council's depot in Ashford. The works, which have been supported by an £11,000 grant by the Enterprise M3 Clean Growth Programme, took place in Spring.
Nominations are open for the Spelthorne Youth Awards. These are for special young people aged between 5 and 19 years living or receiving education within Spelthorne who deserve recognition. The deadline for nominations this year is Friday 28 May, with the awards evening taking place in July.
A new online Leisure Directory for 2021 has been published on our website. The directory contains a huge range of clubs, social groups, and sporting activities on offer in Spelthorne as well as halls for hire, parks and open spaces, providing a wealth of options for residents.
Following a workshop undertaken with IESE in February this administration has confirmed its intention to implement its CARE priorities for the Council’s forthcoming Corporate Plan:
Community
Affordable Housing
Recovery
Environment (Climate Change)
The IESE workshop also included a discussion about options for a set of values for the Council. Such values are useful for Councils to help define who we are and provide the underlying context to the way in which we do our work.
Using the options discussed it is proposed to base the new values around a relevant acronym ‘PROVIDE’. In doing so, this would potentially fit well with the CARE priorities (as a Council we CARE and PROVIDE) and would assist in the process of embedding these with staff and Councillors. The proposed values would be:
Pride in our Council, communities and borough
Responsive and flexible
Open and accountable
Value for money
Integrity
Dependable
Empowering
It is proposed that these values are incorporated into any future draft Corporate Plan, which will need to go through the new Policy and Resources Committee and Full Council for discussion/debate before any formal adoption.
Lastly, this is our final Cabinet meeting under the current structure, before we move to the Committee model of governance. I thank you for your support and look forward to this new chapter for Spelthorne Borough Council.