Agenda item

Members of the Committee are requested to refer to the separate report pack containing proposed decisions for consideration by the Leader.

 

The Committee considered the following reports on the Part 1 agenda for consideration by the Leader on or after 16^th September 2020.

 

(7)  RESOURSING THE COVID RESPONSE: COVID MANAGEMENT

  LDCS10151

 

The report provided an update on the paper “Resourcing the Covid-19 response: Contact tracing” considered by Members in June 2020.  Since that time Bromley Public Health were now also leading on elements such as development of surge capacity to ensure that support to professionals and residents could be maintained in the event of a second wave of Covid-19 and preparations for some of the contact tracing function to be devolved from Public Health England. 

 

The Chairman of the Adult Care and Health PDS (ACH PDS) Committee commented that it was an excellent report, however it may have been helpful to provide Members of ACH PDS with the opportunity to review and scrutinise the report as there considerable input which affected the ACH PDS. 

 

RESOLVED: That the Leader be recommended to

 

1.  Note that this assessment of the additional resources needed to execute this function is still subject to change in a highly fluid situation. 

 

2.  Agree to continue to delegate authority to the Director of Public Health, in consultation with the Portfolio Holder for Adult Care and Health, to incur expenditure as required to undertake the required duties. Currently the sum required is up to £237k (the amount previously agreed was £100k) as detailed in the report, however there is some expenditure that we do not yet know the cost of (such as surge nurses) , so in addition to the amount outlined in the report, an additional amount of £38,000 is requested as a contingency item. 

 

3.  Note that under the Health and Social Care Act 2012, Directors of Public Health in local authorities have a duty to prepare for and lead the local authority public health response to incidents that present a threat to the public’s health.

 

 

 

(9C)  TRANSFORMING PROPETY: CREATION OF A £30M DISPOSAL PROGRAMME

  Report HPL 2020/000

 

The report sought the Leader’s approval for the implementation of a programme of asset disposals with the aim of generating a further £30m of Capital receipts by 31 March 2023.

 

The aspects of this approval were:

 

1.  To agree to dispose of assets which are not core to the Council’s operations or which provide good revenue returns. 

2.  Such disposals will be achieved via open market transactions or by transferring assets to the Council’s Housing Revenue Account.at market value to provide additional funding for other capital schemes.

3.  All transactions will be at market value referencing the Council’s legal requirement to comply with S123 of the local government Act 1972 to ensure that best consideration is achieved.

4.  The majority of assets disposed of or transferred to the Council’s Housing revenue Account will facilitate Residential Development in the Borough together with Social Housing provision.

5.  The proposed Programme approach will require a thorough evaluation of opportunities including a rationalisation of the Council’s Operational holdings.

6.  All disposals will be subject to member scrutiny and Executive approval of each proposed transaction whether on the open market or to the HRA or a wholly owned housing company. 

7.  To ensure that the Programme is adequately resourced to deliver its objective within the set timescale.

 

The Assistant Director for Strategic Property provided an update on the minor amendments to the paper that had been circuited earlier in the day clarifying the resource requirements of the proposals outlined in the paper.  These included:

 

The resource cost of the proposal amounted to £1.24m calculated as follows:

 

a. Marketing Costs estimated at £150K pa,

b. Qualified Disposals Surveyor – 2 Year fixed term Contract £70K plus on-costs – assume £100K pa. 

c. Dedicated Legal resource for Programme – 2 Year fixed term Contract £65K plus on costs – assume £95K pa.

d. Operational Portfolio Surveyor - 1 Year fixed term Contract £70K plus on-costs – assume £100K pa.

e.  Agents Fee based on market testing estimated at 1.5% assume total £450K.

 

The Assistant Director of Strategic Property estimated that this was a budget estimate to provide an idea of scale however Officers would work to reduce that estimate.   The costs for staffing (outlined above) would not be full-time staff but would be 3-6 month time limited posts and the costs provided would be at the top end of the costings.

 

In addition recommendation 2.5 had been slightly amended to include reference to consideration by relevant PDS Committees.

 

The Director of Finance highlighted that costs needed to be linked to activity.  As such if there was not the scale of activity costs would be rolled back.

 

Members discussed the current state of the commercial property market as being in a “state of flux” and expressed concerns around marketing and selling property when the market was falling.  Whilst recognising that a target was helpful, a Member suggested that in the current market it could be more realistic to have an expression of desired outcomes rather than a target.

 

In response to a question concerning whether the Council’s policy of not undertaking routine property maintenance could impact on the value of the Council’s property portfolio, the Assistant Director for Strategic Property confirmed that all the Council’s properties complied with statutory requirements and the policy was to use resources carefully and where possible maintenance was undertaken on an invest-to-save basis.  Equally, the Council had an ageing portfolio and as the properties aged repairs became more expensive.  Part of the proposal before the Committee was to look at the operational portfolio in greater detail, taking decisions based on evidence from condition surveys.  This would assist in identifying any emerging maintenance liabilities that were of significance and enable informed recommendations to be made to Members.  The Assistant Director confirmed that it was the land that held the value rather than the actual building.

 

The Portfolio Holder for Resources, Commissioning and Contracts Management highlighted that the proposals were about the restructuring of the Property Division post Cushman and Wakefield.  The intention was to make the service more streamlined, commercial and independent by using resources as and when necessary.  The driver for the proposals was to provide affordable housing by firstly carrying out a careful examination of the Council’s property holdings that could not be used for operational purposes to see if any of the properties could be released; and secondly to conduct a root and branch review of the Council’s current property assets and identify whether they represented value. 

 

RESOLVED: That the Leader be recommended to:

 

1.  Adopt the proposal to create a £30M Disposal Programme.

 

2.  To note the process contained in the report as to the progression and identification of assets and how these will be reported to Members for decision.

 

3.  Delegate authority to award contracts via competitive tendering for the provision of a panel of Disposal Agents via the Crown Commercial Services Framework on an individual call off basis to the Assistant Director of Strategic Property to be exercised with approval from the Director of Housing, Planning and Regeneration and the Portfolio Holder for Resources.

 

4.  To note and approve the additional resources of £1.124m identified within the report at paragraphs 3.34 - 3.36 and to offset these costs against the capital receipts generated by the programme of disposals.

 

5.  To note and agree that all future Reports to the Executive and appropriate PDS Committees should contain a standard Property Commentary Section in the same way as Personnel, Legal and Procurement so that should there be a need for Property Commentary it can be provided.

 

(Councillors Dunn and Wilkins requested that their vote against the proposals be recorded)

 

Following consideration of reports for decision by the Leader, the Committee discussed a constitutional question concerning whether, six months after the Council’s Urgency Committee had agreed to implement the special arrangements for decision making currently operating in response to the Covid pandemic, the decision should be taken reinstate formal meetings of the Executive (albeit recognising that the current national restrictions in place arising from the pandemic would mean that meetings would be held virtually) in the interests of transparency and open decision making.  A Member highlighted that at the heart of the issue was a point about scrutiny as the public would not be aware of the emails that were circulating concerning scrutiny of decisions or the many discussions that were taking place outside of meetings.  It was argued that there was clear evidence that virtual meetings were far less time consuming and should therefore not take up too much additional officer time.

 

The Leader confirmed that at this point in time, given the pressure on Officer resource, every single item requiring an Executive decision was going to at least one PDS Committee for consideration prior to a decision being taken.  If the general view was that Members wanted to reinstate Executive meetings and duplicate discussions and debates on reports this could be done but Members needed to be mindful on the inevitable impact on Officer time.

 

The Committee noted that no decisions had been called in by Members in the last six months.  This suggested that Members were comfortable with the way in which decisions had been scrutinised prior to decision.  A Member also highlighted that now was not the time to review the current processes as it was likely that more Officer time would be required in the coming months to respond to the anticipated second spike in cases of Covid-19.

 

Following an extensive debate it was

 

RESOLVED that the Urgency Committee be recommended to meet in January 2021 to review ongoing decision making arrangement in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

(Councillors Bennett and Dunn voted against and Councillor Wilkins abstained from the vote having experienced technical difficulties during the debate)