Agenda item

That the Council Plan 2017-23 be adopted by County Council for final publication by the end of September.

The Chief Executive introduced the report on the Council Plan 2017-23.  The Plan had been reviewed and updated to reflect the key priorities of the Council for the 5 year term under the newly elected administration.

The Plan had six priorities with sub-priorities, with the six priorities taking a long term view of the aims for the next five years.  The Plan had been presented to all six Overview & Scrutiny Committee’s, four of which supported with no comments and two supported the Plan but with specific comments which were presented to Cabinet.  A copy of the amendments to the Plan, recommended by Cabinet had been circulated to all Members prior to the start of the meeting. 

Councillor Aaron Shotton thanked all Members who had contributed to the Plan, including the views that had been made at the Overview and Scrutiny Committees.  Constructive comments from those Committees had been accepted by the Cabinet earlier in the day and were now recommended to Council.  He said the six key priorities were the key priorities based on social issues which were high up on the agenda of the administration.  At a time of financial austerity it was important to focus on the priorities.

Councillor Richard Jones commented on the first amendment around ‘Ambitious Council’ and said that during the meeting of Corporate Resources Overview and Scrutiny he did not mention any particular town and had requested that “especially for residential use” be removed which had been supported by the Overview & Scrutiny Committee.  He felt developers would use this high level document to fragment town centres to provide residential areas and asked that this wording be removed.

Councillor Jones also commented on the development of regional and local transport strategies and sought to ensure equitable spend across towns and not just Deeside.  He wanted a plan that forwarded the economic development of all towns and queried why the recommendations around this which had been put forward from the Overview & Scrutiny Committee had not been put forward.  The Chief Executive said the wording had been improved, on the first point, to de-emphasise housing; in the spirit of the Corporate Resources Overview & Scrutiny Committee the wording suggested multi-use development of town centres to support their vitality.  On the second point, there was a discussion on equitable allocation of resources across town centres, and as advised during the Corporate Resources Overview & Scrutiny Committee, it was not possible parity as much of the funding received often came from Government sources and were targeted to areas with specific characteristics such as deprivation. 

Councillor Attridge clarified that the priority to develop a renewed approach to supporting town centres and the specific wording around ‘residential use’ related to improvements to properties above shops in town centres.  The Chief Executive added that planning policy and the Local Development Plan would provide the safeguards against housing over-development.

Councillor Peers commented on page 34 on developing the Council housing growth needs and queried how the figure of 50 homes had been derived at and how did it relate to demand.  On the milestones and measure document he could not see the achievement milestone linked to the action plan for the development of council houses and asked that this be looked at.  On page 38, residential care and plans for 2017/18 and ensuring care home provision, he asked if the word ‘affordable’ could be added or was this out of the Council’s control.  On page 39, he commented on the risks to be managed within the Plan, particularly the risks to deliver social care which was insufficient and asked if there was a mitigation action plan if supply exceeded demand.  On page 40, Integrated Community Social Health Services and working with Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB) and asked if the Countess of Chester Hospital could be included within the 5 year plan.

The Chief Executive responded that the Plan could only contain aspirations where the Council had a high degree of control over and therefore priorities around secondary care and hospitals could not be added to the Plan and this also applied to the suggestion around including the wording ‘affordable’ within the provision of care homes.  Further discussion on how the risks around social care were being managed could take place outside of the meeting.  

The Chief Officer (Community & Enterprise) explained that the figure of 50 homes had been recommended following the local housing market assessment which identified the level of affordable, social housing needed.  The figures were based on detailed work around what could be delivered over the course of the next 12 months, including, the borrowing cap available through the Housing Revenue Account (HRA), known agreed planning applications and capital funding available through Welsh Government (WG).  There was a gap between housing needs and what the Council could deliver, therefore the Council was working closely with WG to make a strong case for the HRA borrowing cap to be raised.

            On being put to the vote, the plan, including the comments as amended from the Overview and Scrutiny Committees and Cabinet, was carried.

RESOLVED:

That the Council Plan 2017-23 be adopted by County Council for final publication by the end of September.