To receive any announcements from the Leader.
Minutes:
The Leader congratulated the Mayor on her appointment and looked forward to working with her to ensure another very successful year ahead. He also congratulated the Deputy Mayor on his appointment.
The Leader thanked Mayor Pinkerton for her outstanding work this last year and in particular for raising not far short of £50,000 for her nominated Mayoral charities. He was delighted to announce that Mrs. Pinkerton had kindly agreed to be appointed Spelthorne Borough Council’s Education Ambassador.
He congratulated all Members, both re-elected and newly elected. It was an honour to serve our Borough and he was sure we would all strive to serve with diligence. The Leader also commiserated with those former Members who were unfortunately unsuccessful in their re-election bids.
Next, he thanked Members for again showing faith in him and his leadership by his re-election as Leader of the Council and pledged his continued best efforts to meet the needs, expectations and aspirations of the residents of our Borough.
The Leader announced that he had decided in the short term, to have a consolidated Cabinet of just 6:
The Cabinet portfolios were as follows:
Cllr Tony Harman - Deputy Leader and Finance portfolio
Cllr Maureen Attewell - Community Wellbeing and Housing portfolios
Cllr Richard Barratt - Environment and Compliance portfolio
Cllr John Boughtflower - Corporate Management portfolio
Cllr Olivia Rybinski - Economic Development, Customer Service, Estates and Transport portfolio
The Planning portfolio was currently vacant but matters would be dealt with jointly by himself and the Chair of Planning.
The Leader then made the following announcements:
We have recently had public consultations on two of our planned housing developments, Ashford Hospital car park and Phase Two of Ceaser Court in Sunbury. Together these two projects would enable us to deliver over 140 much needed homes for our Borough, many of which would be Key Worker or Affordable homes. At the Ceaser’s Court site in Sunbury we have been negotiating for over 18 months with NHS Clinical Commissioning Group to provide a much needed new GP Surgery. These negotiations were ongoing.
The Council was recently successful in its bid for £60,000 from Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government to support efforts to support those currently, or at risk of, rough sleeping in Spelthorne. This grant would be used to fund a dedicated outreach and navigator service for the next twelve months, which would focus on working with our partners in the community to support getting rough sleepers off the streets for good.
Confirmation had now been received from Surrey County Council that there would be ongoing funding from 2020 for Family Support across Surrey and in particular for our high performing team who were assessed as “excellent” against all criteria in a recent quality assurance review.
Finally, he reminded Councillors that the closing date for responses to Surrey County Council’s consultation on their ‘Making Surrey Safer plan’ was Sunday 26th May. This proposed changes to the way Surrey Fire and Rescue Service operate in the county. Under the plan, it is proposed to cut night-time cover in Spelthorne to one whole-time crew, from the two whole-time crews which currently operate. This was of great concern and following discussions at our Cabinet on 24th April we would be writing to the County Council later this week with Spelthorne’s response to these proposals We have expressed our deep concerns over the reduction in night-time cover and a number of other proposed changes under the plan, which we believed would adversely affect Surrey Fire and Rescue Service’s ability to respond to emergencies; in particular high-rise fires and other large scale critical incidents which occur at night.
He urged all Councillors, residents and businesses in the borough, if they had not already done so, to express their views on these changes, which could affect their future safety.