To receive any announcements from the Leader.
Minutes:
The Leader made the following announcements:
“Firstly, I am pleased to announce that on Wednesday 30th January HRH Princess Alexandra paid a private visit to the Sunbury Walled Garden to view the Embroidery collection.
The new combined reception is now fully reopened and most of the work to relocate staff into renovated offices in the East and South Wings are complete. Congratulations to Siraj and his team for delivering this.
The redevelopment of the Bugle is to all intents and purposes complete and we will be welcoming our first tenants in the next couple of weeks.
Despite the efforts of a few we are now receiving very positive Press coverage, a very fair and balanced article appeared in this Monday’s Financial Times and I was able to explain our rationale on BBC5Live This is Money programme this morning. We are anticipating further positive exposure shortly.
As mentioned at our December Council meeting, we are continuing to work with Staines Park Residents Association towards a “Fields in Trust” commitment for Staines Park.
Our Capital Strategy has been published and property investment FAQs have been added to the website and social media accounts to explain the reasons behind our ambitious, yet prudent, strategy and what is enabling us to achieve.
We have responded to Heathrow’s latest consultation on proposed changes to airspace and future operations. These changes will have an impact on the whole Borough, not just those towns and villages closest to the airport, and don’t just relate to a third runway: they include changes to existingairport operations including the potential for an additional 25,000 flights.
Our response to the consultation includes the following points:
· We oppose an increase in flights before the third runway is operational and interim measures that will result in newly overflown areas
· The Compton departure route, which results in low flying planes across our Borough, should be removed as soon as possible.
· A night-time ban should mean just that, except for emergencies; and fines for breaches of the ban should be used to compensate affected communities.
The consultation closes on 4 March 2019.
Comprehensive responses were also sent in respect of Surrey County Council’s recent consultations which proposed changes to five County Council service areas. Whilst we understand the financial pressure that the County Council is under, we will continue to look carefully at the changes to these services and make representations, where appropriate, to minimise adverse impacts.
Our Council has been working with partners to improve the CCTV coverage in Sunbury with new cameras being installed at Spelthorne Grove and Sunbury Cross roundabout. There are further plans to improve CCTV coverage in other parts of the Borough.
Clare Road shopping parade is the latest area to benefit from improvements following works to the shopping parades in Edinburgh Drive and Groveley Road. Works to improve Woodlands Parade, Ashford are expected to start soon.
As Members will recall we have been working on an initiative called “Every Ward at its best”; a project to deal with problem sites across the borough which could be an annoyance or an eyesore to residents and which would benefit from a fresh approach. The aim of the project was to help tackle these low level issues in a way that could lead to small but noticeable improvements to the Borough.
A Spelthorne restaurant owner was convicted of food hygiene offences and ordered to pay a total of £3,970 including fines, a victim surcharge and prosecution costs. We seek a high standard of food hygiene to protect our residents and will work to maintain this.
During the recent cold snap, the Council helped four street homeless clients into emergency accommodation, with an opportunity to explore ways to help them in the longer term.
The Council’s website has been refreshed to make it easier for people to find information that’s relevant to them and easier to view on mobile devices.
Spelthorne MP Kwasi Kwarteng took the Speaker’s chair for a lively common’s style schools’ debate supported by the Parliament Education Service.
We held a very well attended Budget Business Briefing at BP last Friday morning.”