Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Councillor Michael Turner.

There were no declarations of interest.

To hear questions received in writing by the Legal, Democratic and Customer Services Department by 5.00pm on Tuesday 25^th January 2011 and to respond.

There were no questions to the Portfolio Holder.

There were no questions to the Committee.

Report ES11004

Concerning the draft 2011/12 Budget for the Environment Portfolio Members considered proposed savings options. At its meeting on 12^th January 2011 the Executive requested that each PDS Committee consider the proposals arising from the report entitled “The Local Government Finance Settlement 2011/12 to 2012/13 and Related Budget Issues”.

Details of the savings options were reported to Members and the Director introduced the item. He referred to consultation with all Departmental contractors to look for savings, highlighted the renewal of the street Cleaning contract from 1^st April 2012, and referred to expenditure pressures within Environmental services.

In discussion the Vice-Chairman noted the potential cost for waste collection and disposal at each new property in the borough and enquired how this balanced against Council tax received for the properties. The Director offered to take this away for officer consideration.

Enquiries were made about the proposal to reduce the cost of allotments rented by the Council from landowners. The Assistant Director (Street Scene and Green Space) understood that this was connected to a removal of subsidy in some cases where the allotments were not on Council land. The rent of those allotments would then be a market transaction, where the Council need not be involved.

Councillor Kathy Bance asked about the scope for making further savings such as leaving road pot holes unrepaired. The Director indicated that without regular maintenance the highways asset would further deteriorate leaving a major repair cost for the future. Responding to a further question from Councillor Bance on waste costs for schools, the Director explained that schools would be charged total costs i.e. collection and disposal costs (schools were already charged for collection costs). The Portfolio Holder also explained that a number of secondary schools were likely to become academies and would then be expected to have responsibility for their own waste collection and disposal arrangements.

The Chairman suggested that the Committee’s Waste Minimisation Working Group could look at matters concerned with green garden waste and the future availability of caddy bags for food waste. Similarly the Chairman explained that the Highways Asset Working Group proposed for next year could include consideration of matters concerned with lamp columns.

The Vice Chairman enquired whether there was any further scope for back office savings. The Director indicated that significant management costs had already been taken out. The back office for the Department was small and a review had been requested with some savings already factored into the savings proposed. However it was not possible to foresee any further significant savings. The Assistant Secretary (Transport and Highways) referred Members to line 22 of the budget options explaining that one post proposed for deletion was concerned with contract monitoring. Although there was a degree of risk associated with the deletion (losing one post from a complement of four) the risk would be higher if the Department was dealing with a new contractor. Councillor Ian Payne felt that it was important not to cut back services if that  ...  view the full minutes text for item 86.