Agenda and draft minutes

In accordance with Standing Order 12.17, resolved to amend the order of business for the meeting to move Motion in the name of Councillor David Mellen to become item 9 on the agenda.

Councillor Audrey Dinnall – unwell

Councillor Faith Gakanje-Ajala – personal

Councillor Sam Gardiner – personal

Councillor Sam Harris – personal

Councillor Helen Kalsi – personal

Councillor Zafran Khan – unwell

Councillor Farzanna Mahmood – personal

Councillor Sana Nasir – leave

Councillor Devontay Okure – personal

Councillor Nick Raine – personal

Councillor Sarita-Marie Rehman-Wall - personal

In relation to item 2024/25 Budget and Council Tax Resolution (minute reference 86), in the interests of transparency:

·  Councillor Leslie Ayoola stated that he is a board member of Marketing Nottingham and Nottinghamshire and Blueprint

·  Councillor Michael Edwards stated that he is a member of the Queens Walk Community Association Management Committee and Chair of the Meadows Advice Centre

·  Councillor Nadia Farhat declared a Sensitive Interest

·  Councillor Jay Hayes stated that he is a committee member of Bestwood Advice Centre

·  Councillor Angela Kandola stated that she is a board member of the Indian Community Centre Association

·  Councillor David Mellen stated that he is the Chair of the Bakersfield and Neighbourhood Community Association

·  Councillor Georgia Power stated that she is a director of Bestwood Partnership

·  Councillor Eunice Regan stated that she is a member of the Queens Walk Community Association Management Committee and Meadows Advice Centre

·  Councillor Matt Shannon stated that he is a trustee of the Renewal Trust

·  Councillor Adele Williams stated that a member of her family works for an organisation partially funded by the Council

·  Councillor Linda Woodings stated that she is a member of the Nottingham City of Literature Board

Social housing maintenance and repair

A citizen asked the following question of the Portfolio Holder for Housing:

Please could you explain why Nottingham City Council Housing Services has got progressively worse since Nottingham City Council took it back under its control? It was not a good service before, but now it's truly poor. There are never ending queues, not only to get through to the Repair Call Centre but for tenants also to get essential work done (if at all). There are not enough operatives, high sickness rates, and many other problems. This results in a terrible knock-on effect for tenants, and at the same time rents and service charges go up considerably annually (7.7% rent increase plus an added 6.7% service charge increase this year as well as other charges). As social housing tenants, we have no way of making our voices heard. I would please ask how and when Nottingham City Council will improve these matters, as Nottingham City Council is now fully responsible?

Councillor Jay Hayes replied as follows:

Thank you Lord-Mayor, and thank you to this citizen for the question.  The City Council recognises that the housing service under Nottingham City Homes needed improvement to deliver the standards that tenants and the Council expect, and therefore it was brought back in-house last year.  Since then we have developed a new housing service within the Council and we are currently implementing our service improvement plans. It will take some time for these plans to work and build up a good quality service that our tenants can trust. At the Executive Board meeting in February, the Housing Revenue Account business plan was approved and additional resources have been included in the budget for the next financial year to implement the service changes and improvements that are needed. The citizen mentions the rent increase. This rent increase is the maximum that is allowed under the Social Housing Regulator. This increase will be covered by the Local Housing Allowance and Housing Benefit for those who are in receipt of benefits, but there is also a Hardship Fund to support those who do not qualify for any help through our Tenancy Sustainability Team.  The Council is committed to engagement and an accountable service. At last month’s meeting of the Housing and City Development Scrutiny Committee I presented a report about the new Tenant Engagement Board. This Board is in the process of being set up. We will have tenants on Board, engaging with us as the Council, holding myself as Portfolio Holder and officers to account, helping us to improve the service and deliver a robust service for our tenants.  While the service is not where we want it to be and there are a lot of issues inherited from Nottingham City Homes since we brought it in-house, I can assure the citizen that officers are working incredibly hard in implementing new ways of working, improving the system and engaging with tenants and we will continue to do that so  ...  view the full minutes text for item 79.

Councillor Kevin Clarke presented a petition on behalf of residents about parking problems on Greencroft, Clifton, NG11 8FD and surrounding roads, and requesting the installation of a resident parking scheme or restricted line enforcement. 

Councillor Shuguftah Quddoos presented a petition on behalf of residents calling on the Council to immediately launch a campaign to secure direct support from Central Government in order to avoid any further cuts to jobs and services.

The minutes of the meeting held on 15 January 2024 were confirmed as an accurate record and signed by the Chair.

The Chief Executive made the following announcements:

I am pleased to report that the final legal step to establish the East Midlands Combined County Authority has been signed and made into law.  The Levelling Up Minister signed the regulations on 27 February that allow the new combined authority to be created. It means that residents across the area, including Nottingham, will get to vote for the very first East Midlands Mayor, with elections taking place on 2 May.  The new combined county authority is part of a wider devolution deal that will see the region benefit from a £1.14billion investment package, spread over a 30 year period, alongside devolved powers around transport, housing, skills and adult education, economic development and net zero.  This is an historic moment for the region and the extra funding coming into the area, alongside the devolved powers, will make a huge difference to the region, bringing in more investment in skills, jobs and housing. This is about improving local people's lives and creating new opportunities for our communities across the East Midlands.

I’d like to pay tribute to the fantastic talents of Nottingham actor, Samantha Morton, who last month was awarded one of the most prestigious honours in her profession. Samantha was handed the BAFTA Fellowship, which is the arts charity’s highest accolade and presented in recognition of ‘an outstanding and exceptional contribution to film, games or television’. Her credits span independent British cinema to Hollywood blockbusters, television and theatre. We remain incredibly proud of her achievements. 

Malcolm Townroe, Director of Legal and Governance and Monitoring Officer, will be leaving the Authority at the end of April, after 35 years service to the Council.  Malcolm held the role of Head of Legal Services for a number of years and during that time was involved in some of the Council’s larger development projects.  Since 2017 he has been the Director of Legal and Governance and the Council’s Monitoring Officer.  As one of the Council’s statutory officers, Malcolm has played a key role in promoting high standards of conduct and providing advice to officers and councillors.  I would like to thank him for his service to the Council over many years and wish him well for the future.

None

Local Government Funding

Councillor Samina Riaz asked the following question of the Leader of the Council:

Does the Leader of the Council agree that Nottingham needs emergency no-string funding from Central Government to enable us to maintain services for all our citizens as asked by the City’s MPs and would he thank Resolve Nottingham, a coalition of 140 city organisations, for their support for the Council in asking Government for additional funding?

Councillor David Mellen replied as follows:

Thank you Lord-Mayor, and can I thank Councillor Riaz for your question.  I agree with you. We certainly need someone to come to our rescue because there simply isn’t enough money in this Council to run the services our citizens depend on - not this year, not next year and not until we get the funding we deserve. Its not just this Council, but councils across our land. You’re going to hear this a lot today, but it bears repeating: this callous and cruel-hearted Government has brough local government in this country to its knees. I would like to be clear on one point right at the start – this is not a Nottingham problem. This is a national problem caused by a government that has failed to fix social care, caused massive inflation, and generated a cost-of-living crisis that has seen soaring rates of homelessness. A failure of Central Government, but for some reason the buck stops with us – Nottingham City Council, and the people we represent. We are the ones that must pick up the pieces of their broken Britain without the resources to do so.  I’m afraid, Lord-Mayor, that this is a bad day for Nottingham and for this Council, at a meeting has been convened to approve huge cuts to our services and put people who work for our Council out of a job. Years of Tory underfunding of councils has led us to this day - years of austerity, years of rising prices and inflation and years of a broken care system. So yes, we need a miracle right now and if that meant, Councillor Riaz, no-strings funding from the Government then I would certainly welcome it. However Lord-Mayor, I’m not holding my breath because with this government there is no such thing as no-strings funding. In order to balance our budget today not only do we have to make sweeping cuts to our services, we have had to ask the Government for exceptional financial support to fill the gap that continues to open up before us. It is not money, it is certainly not a bailout. All that we have had approved is the economically nonsensical permission to sell buildings and land and use that for everyday expenditure.  The £66.1million permission over two years we receive as exceptional financial support is less than the money we have lost each and every year in the last decade - £100million less a year than it was a decade ago.  Hundreds of millions of pounds of funding  ...  view the full minutes text for item 84.

Nottingham City Council joins with local councils across the country in calling on the Government to fund local government properly. Under the last Labour Government councils worked in partnership with Central Government to introduce Sure Start Centres, fund youth services adequately and reduce class sizes in schools.  Under the current Conservative Government councils have seen their grants from Central Government reduced in real terms. Nottingham has lost in the region of £100m from our Revenue Support Grant each year since 2013. Councils have had to meet increased demand for care for both adults and children, where the market for care that a number of Conservative Prime Ministers promised to fix, remains broken. The housing crisis has left urban councils in particular coping with increased demand from those presenting as homeless. Furthermore, the huge rise in inflation stimulated by the short government of Prime Minister Liz Truss has left councils with an inflated bill for goods, services, and staff wages. The government has relied on increasing council tax, rather than funding local services properly.

Nottingham City Council calls on the Government to:

a)  Address the funding crisis in care for both children and adults, regulating the private market to cap placement prices and to resource social care on a sustainable and fair basis.

b)  Implement the Renters Reform Bill and review all housing legislation, as well as investing in house building, especially social housing across the country. Councils must receive full receipts for council houses sold under the ‘Right to buy’ scheme and be fully funded for their duty to house the homeless.

c)  Uplift grants to councils to reflect the rate of inflation experienced over the last two years, as well as ensuring that councils have at least sufficient funding to meet their statutory duties.

We look forward to a new Labour Government when central and local government will work together to improve the lives of ordinary people.

In accordance with section 12.47 of Article 12 Standing Orders and Committee Procedures of the Constitution, time limits were not applied to speakers on this motion.

Councillor David Mellen moved the following motion, which was seconded by Councillor Audra Wynter:

Nottingham City Council joins with local councils across the country in calling on the Government to fund local government properly.  Under the last Labour Government councils worked in partnership with Central Government to introduce Sure Start Centres, fund youth services adequately and reduce class sizes in schools.  Under the current Conservative Government councils have seen their grants from Central Government reduced in real terms. Nottingham has lost in the region of £100m from its Revenue Support Grant each year since 2013. Councils have had to meet increased demand for care for both adults and children, where the market for care that a number of Conservative Prime Ministers promised to fix, remains broken. The housing crisis has left urban councils in particular coping with increased demand from those presenting as homeless. Furthermore, the huge rise in inflation stimulated by the short government of Prime Minister Liz Truss has left councils with an inflated bill for goods, services, and staff wages. The Government has relied on increasing council tax, rather than funding local services properly.

Nottingham City Council calls on the Government to:

·  address the funding crisis in care for both children and adults, regulating the private market to cap placement prices and to resource social care on a sustainable and fair basis;

·  implement the Renters Reform Bill and review all housing legislation, as well as investing in house building, especially social housing across the country. Councils must receive full receipts for council houses sold under the ‘Right to Buy’ scheme and be fully funded for their duty to house the homeless; and

·  uplift grants to councils to reflect the rate of inflation experienced over the last two years, as well as ensuring that councils have at least sufficient funding to meet their statutory duties.

We look forward to a new Labour Government when central and local government will work together to improve the lives of ordinary people.

Councillors debated the motion.

Resolved to carry the motion.

The meeting adjourned at 4:55pm.

The meeting resumed at 5:28pm.

Report of the Corporate Director for Finance and Resources and Section 151 Officer

In accordance with section 12.47 of Article 12 Standing Orders and Committee Procedures of the Constitution, time limits were not applied for speakers on this motion.

Councillor Audra Wynter, Portfolio Holder for Finance and HR, proposed the report of the Corporate Director for Finance and Resources and Section 151 Officer enabling Council to approve a 2024/25 General Fund revenue budget and set the council tax, which was seconded by Councillor David Mellen.  In proposing the report, Councillor Wynter made an administrative alteration to recommendation 3 section h)iv to read “following completion of h(i), h(ii) and h(iii) above…”  She also highlighted the following points:

a)  The Council is facing exceptional financial pressures, which are primarily a combination of demographic, complexity of provision and inflationary pressures across a range of services and also the consequence of an ineffective local government funding system.

b)  Officers have developed savings proposals using a ‘duties and powers’ framework but that is insufficient to meet the scale of the growth required to provide adequate financial provision to deliver the Council’s service obligations. 

c)  The Council has been granted up to £41m exceptional financial support from Government, which enabled a balanced budget to be put forward for consideration by councillors at this meeting. 

d)  The draft budget was considered by Executive Board at its meeting on 13 February.  Executive Board had concerns about the impact on the City and its communities, and did not vote to recommend it to Council.  However, the Council has a legal duty to set a balanced budget and, in line with an Instruction from the Improvement and Assurance Board, it has been presented to Council for its consideration. 

Councillor Adele Williams submitted an amendment.

The meeting was adjourned at 5:53pm to enable the Lord Mayor to obtain advice on the validity of the amendment.

The meeting resumed at 6:20pm.

The Lord Mayor stated that, having consulted the Section 151 Officer and in consultation with the other Statutory Officers, the proposed amendment was not permitted because the Leaders of all political groups had been advised that any proposed amendments had to be put forward for consideration by 28 February; but not withstanding that the proposed amendment would not have received sign off from the Section 151 Officer as it would have cut across his professional view of robustness of estimates and adequacy of reserves as expressed in his Section 25 Statement under the Local Government Act 2023 and it was also contrary to the requirement of the two most recent Instructions issued by the Improvement and Assurance Board. 

Councillors debated the proposals including making the following points:

e)  The Council is in an extremely challenging financial position and one of the root causes of this is central government policy and decision making.  The local government funding system is not fit for purpose, there is no national plan for sustainably funding adult social care and the use of exceptional financial support, which is not additional funding and has to be paid for by selling assets,  ...  view the full minutes text for item 86.

Report of the Leader of the Council

Councillor David Mellen, Leader of the Council, proposed the report seeking approval for a refreshed Strategic Council Plan, setting out the Council’s priorities until 2027.  The Plan had been refreshed following local elections in May 2023 and within the constraints of the Council’s financial position for 2024/25 and the Medium Term Financial Plan.  Councillor Audra Wynter seconded the report.

Resolved to approve the refreshed Strategic Council Plan 2024 - 2027, as set out in Appendix 1 to the report.

As the meeting was still in progress at 9:30pm, the Lord Mayor applied section 12.18 of Article 12 Standing Orders and Committee Procedures of the Constitution and required that all remaining items were proposed and seconded without comment and put to the vote without debate.

Joint report of the Chief Executive and Section 151 Officer

Councillor Audra Wynter, Portfolio Holder for Finance and HR, proposed the joint report of the Chief Executive and Corporate Director for Finance and Resources and Section 151 Officer asking Council to accept the Statutory Recommendation made by the Council’s External Auditor, Grant Thornton, in accordance with their powers under Section 24, Schedule 7 of the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014; and to agree a response to the Recommendation.  The report was seconded by Councillor Sulcan Mahmood, Vice Chair of the Audit Committee.

Resolved to:

(1)  accept the Statutory Recommendation made by Grant Thornton in accordance with powers set out Section 24, Schedule 7 of the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014; and

(2)  agree the following response to the Statutory Recommendation:

a)  The Council accepts the recommendation.  It also recognises the urgency to identify and develop further savings proposals in addition to those in its budget for 2024/25 to ensure its long-term financial stability.

b)  The Government has confirmed the Council can use exceptional financial support to balance its budget for 2024/25 up to £41m.  This support has been provided in the form of a capitalisation direction which enables the Council to fund revenue costs from capital resources.  The capital resources are required to be repaid from asset sales.

c)  In 2024/25 the Council is increasing council tax in line with the maximum permitted within the referendum guidance set out in the Local Government Finance Settlement of 4.99%.  It will further consider its medium term council tax strategy over the forthcoming year.

d)  The Council’s budget for 2024/25 includes a range of officer identified and developed savings which will be implemented.  The investment required to achieve savings has been included in budget plans.  The Council will develop further proposals and bring these forward for approval during the forthcoming financial year to improve its financial position to minimise its reliance on exceptional financial support.  These proposals will include demand management strategies, service reform, income generation and expenditure reductions.

e)  As set out in the Section 151 Officer’s Section 25 report on the Robustness of Budget Estimates and Adequacy of Reserves, the Council has set aside a prudent contingency and reserves in 2024/25 to manage the risks it faces.

f)  The Council will develop a comprehensive financial strategy budget methodology by end of June 2024 aimed at bridging the opening gap for 2025/26.

Report of the Leader of the Council

Councillor David Mellen, Leader of the Council, proposed the report informing Council that, since the last report to Council in January 2024 there had been one decision taken under the Call In and Urgency provisions of the Overview and Scrutiny Procedure Rules and no Key Decisions taken under the Special Urgency provisions of the Access to Information Procedure Rules.  Councillor Audra Wynter, seconded the report.

Resolved to note that the following decision had been taken under the Call In and Urgency provisions of the Overview and Scrutiny Procedure Rules:

Report of the Portfolio Holder for Highways, Transport and Planning

Councillor Angela Kandola, Portfolio Holder for Highways, Transport and Planning, proposed the report informing Council that, following approval by Executive Board in July 2023, the Pre-Submission Plan had been published for the legally required consultation period allowing representations to be made; and asking Council to approve the joint Nottinghamshire and Nottingham Waste Local Plan for submission to the Secretary of State.  The report was seconded by Councillor Michael Edwards.

Resolved to:

(1)  submit the Nottinghamshire and Nottingham Waste Local Plan – Pre-Submission Version, as set out at Appendix 1 to the report, to the Secretary of State with a request that the appointed Planning Inspector should advise on any modifications considered necessary in order to make the Plan sound;

(2)  note the summary of the main issues raised during the consultation on the Draft Plan Stage, as outlined in the Report of Consultation including a summary of the representations received on the Pre-Submission Version, as set out at Appendix 2 to the report, and how these have been addressed;

(3)  authorise the Corporate Director for Growth and City Development, in consultation with the Portfolio Holder for Highways, Transport and Planning, to consider, propose and publish any modifications during the examination of the Plan in order to deal with issues of soundness, typographical corrections and to compile and submit further supporting documents as necessary prior to or following submission.

Report of the Chair of the Appointments and Conditions of Service Committee

Councillor Neghat Khan, Chair of the Appointments and Conditions of Service Committee, proposed the report setting out the Council’s Pay Policy Statement for 2024/25, as required by the Localism Act 2011, including information on the pay and conditions for Chief Officers in comparison with the bulk of the workforce employed on ‘Local Government Services’ terms and conditions.  The report was seconded by Councillor Linda Woodings.

Resolved to approve the Pay Policy Statement for 2024/ 2025.

To note that

a)  Councillor Samuel Gardiner has been appointed to a vacant seat on the Licensing Committee

b)  Councillor Eunice Regan has been appointed to a vacant seat on the Audit Committee

c)  Councillor Sam Lux has been appointed to a vacant seat on the Communities and Environment Scrutiny Committee

The following changes to committee membership were noted:

(1)  Councillor Samuel Gardiner had been appointed to a vacant seat on the Licensing Committee;

(2)  Councillor Eunice Regan had been appointed to a vacant seat on the Audit Committee; and

(3)  Councillor Sam Lux had been appointed to a vacant seat on the Communities and Environment Scrutiny Committee.

1)  To agree to hold the Annual General Meeting on 13 May 2024; and

2)  To note the proposal to meet at 2pm on the following Mondays:

·  8 July 2024

·  9 September 2024

·  11 November 2024

·  13 January 2025

·  24 February 2025

Resolved to:

(1)  hold the Annual General Meeting on 13 May 2024 at 2pm; and

(2)  note the proposal to meet at 2pm on the following Mondays:

a)  8 July 2024

b)  9 September 2024

c)  11 November 2024

d)  13 January 2025

e)  24 February 2025