Transcript

, Thank you. >> Hello, and good evening, everyone. Welcome to the 17th September, 2024 edition of the Environment Committee. I am Councillor Jamie Coakley, I am Councillor for St. Mary's and I am the chair of this committee. Here with me this evening is also Councillor Judy Gasser as the cabinet member for the Environment as well as Paul Chadwick as the Executive Director for Environment and Community Services. I will ask that other members of the committee including Councillors and Officers introduce themselves when they first participate in discussions and also if Officers want to present their reports. We have a relatively light agenda for today, so hopefully not a controversial one either. So we will start off just asking if there are any apologies. >> Thank you, chair. Apologies have been received from Councillors Anand, Belton, Dobres and Satters.

That's four apologies. Okay. So moving on to the agenda for tonight, we start off with the minutes and we ask members if there are any objections to confirming the previous minutes of the 6th of February as a correct record. No? Okay. I will take that as agreed then. Secondly, we have any declarations of interest. So do members have any declarations of either pecuniary or other vegetable or non-registrable interests? Councillor White. Sorry, Councillor White. I am a member of Community Renewable Energy, Wandsworth, who do have work with the Council by drawing no pecuniary or financial gain from my involvement with them. >> Okay. Thank you, Councillor White. Are there any other declarations? Okay. So we've received a request for a member to adjust the committee in relation to agenda item number 7, that's the Spinfield Park item via standard order 66 to make sure that he's not waiting around for the entire duration of the meeting. I propose that we reorder the agenda and allow Councillor Graham to speak as the second item. So that will be moved into item number 7 to number 2. Is that agreed by the committee? Okay. Thank you. So with that in mind, we come to our first substantive paper of tonight. So that is item number 3, which is the revision to the future arrangements with enable, leisure and culture. So starting off in this paper, again, this is not to do with enables contract extension, potential contract extension which will be discussed at the November committee. This is to do with the direction of travel including the potential insourcing of ten members of enable's team into the council. We have four deputation requests. So are the committee agreed to receive these deputations? Okay. Okay. So we've had a slight change to the order, so I think it's the first deputation is coming from Mr. Pisa Ramu and he is a member of Friends of Tooting Common and MAC. Thank you for joining us, Mr. Ramu. Your deputation speech can last up to five minutes and then afterwards there may be questions for you from the audience, but please press on the microphone and make a start. Thank you very much. This is a joint deputation from the Tooting Common Management Advisory Committee and the Friends of Tooting Common. We're very grateful for the opportunity to bring this deputation. In the time available since the paper was published, it has not really been possible fully to consult our members and other commons users, but we have the following points. In principle, transferring the work of monitoring third party contracts to the council as proposed could be appropriate as it would remove the current potential for duplication and overlap between the council and ENABLE. There are, though, a number of important points of clarification needed if the proposed changes are to be successful. The main reason given for the changes is to seek to ensure that the management of green spaces accords with the strategic priorities of the council. This is, though, not perhaps very specific and the paper does not explain why the current arrangements fail to achieve this. We wonder what specifically the council priorities are and how the proposed changes would achieve the intended results. Perhaps we could ask for clarification on these points. We note the intention to transfer 10 staff from ENABLE to the council. However, the paper is not clear what specific green space functions would remain with ENABLE. We think it would be useful outside this meeting and in contact between ourselves and council officers to clarify this and identify current work that ENABLE does and what would be transferred and what would remain. This is important in order to be clear how it is intended that management of green spaces would operate overall in future. We note in Para 4.2 of the paper that one of the officers transferred would have, quote, oversight of ENABLE delivery, so it would be helpful to be clear what delivery that's referring to. As just one example of the need for clarity on items of work, we infer from Para 4.9 that biodiversity as a topic will, at least for the present, remain with ENABLE pending further consideration. However, responsibility for biodiversity strategy will transfer to the council. We wonder how that interface will work. On the intention to transfer client management of the grounds maintenance and tree contracts, monitoring of these contracts will be a very important part of this to ensure effective delivery. It will be important that this monitoring includes, as at present with ENABLE, a regular and sufficient on-site presence on green spaces to identify any problems, and we are glad that at a very recent meeting the council confirmed that this will be the case. Can we also ask the council to confirm that the transferred staff will be proactive in developing appropriate solutions to problems and organizing these with the contractors? Related to this, can we be assured that the transferred staff will indeed work full time on green space contract issues and that this resource, once transferred to the council, will not also then partly be used for other work within the Richmond and Wadsworth partnership? In general, we would welcome an assurance that the changes will not reduce the expert resource available for Tooting Common and other green spaces. So there are a number of points where we think clarification is needed, and we think the committee will want to be clear on these points before deciding on the proposals. We also trust that communication channels will not be adversely affected by these changes. While we recognize that some channels may be somewhat different under the new arrangements, it will be important that Max and Friends groups are able to continue to raise issues about the management of green spaces and to receive satisfactory and prompt responses. We assume that the council will be promulgating these communication channels in due course. Any new arrangements need to work well, and whatever happens, the Tooting Common, Max and Friends group should be properly consulted on matters of policy as well as on general issues of delivery. It will be important that council officers as well as contractors attend the regular joint meetings. Thank you again for the opportunity to bring this to computation. Thank you, Mr. Rameau, and also congratulations on your exquisite timing. Now it's exactly five minutes. So just to start off, would any officers involved in this report like to respond to Mr. Rameau? Thanks, chair. Thank you very much for your deputation and for all the work you do on our common. Some of these subjects we touched on briefly, but I suppose the key for me is that we continue to have that dialogue, because some of the answers at this moment in time, they're not very easy for me to answer, and some of the responses and the ways of working going forward. We want to collaborate with the Friends and the MAC groups to make sure they're effective for the particularly local areas as well as more borough wide. I'm quite keen that those solutions are co-produced between all the different partners rather than me saying this is what we're going to do today, because that's how we're more likely to get buy-in and better understanding of the best solution. In terms of the key objective of the two parks officers that would come out of the enable and move to transfer to the council, they are directly related to managing the grounds maintenance contract. So that provision within the current enable contract will be removed, but the rest of the contracts around parks and open spaces will remain. So all enabled responsibilities, save for monitoring the grounds maintenance contract, will continue. And that includes, you asked yesterday, the provision and directing the Parks and Events Police as well. In terms of biodiversity, by virtue of the current arrangements that we have, when enable was created for very, very good reasons, all the expertise and strategic oversight of those service areas, including managing parks, contract managing parks and biodiversity and trees and things like that, all that transferred over. So the council now is wanting to, with our ambitions, to have the best green spaces and open public realm, want to be able to direct and shape that policy with its stakeholders, including the Friends of and MAC groups, to deliver the best parks that we can. And with that resource set in the strategic direction of biodiversity and parks and trees, we feel that will be the best place to be able to do that. On your question around being proactive and on-site monitoring, I explained to you how the monitoring and self-monitoring will be much better, more outcome focused, and that we won't lose that contact. What I can't say is the green space contract officers will only be doing green space stuff because we want to be resilient and we want our staff to be able to work across other disciplines as well. And we will need to cover holiday and sickness and things like that. So the whole client monitoring team, which Joe leads, will be available to make sure that the enable contract works, the grounds maintenance contract works, and all the contracts that we manage to ensure that the residents get the best services as part of the leisure and parks operations. And the last bit, I think, was around communication with the friends. Like I said at the beginning, absolutely that will continue. How we deliver that, I would like to speak to you all outside of this meeting once we know that the staff are transferring because that's not been agreed yet. And then we can decide how that might look like in the future. But we will do that in partnership with the friends groups and the MAC. Thank you, Mr. Eadie. And just because it slipped your mind, I'll introduce you as Matthew Eadie, our Director of Culture and Leisure. So thank you for your response. Do members have any questions to make to the deputation? Councillor Kirk. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Amell. Very clear. Could I just ask you kind of a supplementary question to I think this is sort of the third paragraph in the note we have here. With regard to monitoring third party contracts, you say the Council change arrangement could be appropriate and it would remove the current potential for duplication and overlap. So they're both kind of hypothetical, aren't they? Are you aware of any example where there has actually been a conflict or difficulty and something hasn't worked? No, I'm not aware of any. We're setting up the general position but not aware of any examples of problems. >> Are there any other questions? Okay. Well, thank you so much for your deputation, Mr. Amell. You can go back to the public gallery. And I can next call Mark Labov to the gallery who is a member of ones who have common friends in MAC. Oh, there's two deputations. Okay. So usual convention is for one person to speak with. You both wanted to chime in. That's okay. You still have a total of five minutes for your deputation. Thank you. >> Yes, we understand that, chair. Thank you. And thank you, chair. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Mark Labov and I'm the chair of the ones who have common management advisory committee. And with me this evening is Julia Bott who is one of the co-chairs of the Friends of Wadsworth Common. Thank you, indeed, for agreeing to take a deputation from Wadsworth Common on this very important subject. I'm going to make a few comments now. We understand and recognize that the contract negotiations that have been taking place with enable are of a sensitive nature and involve people's jobs. However, we have been disappointed by the lack of initial consultation on this matter with the various MAC and Friends groups around Wadsworth green spaces. We are at the same time grateful to Councillor Judy Gasser and Matthew Eadie for their time yesterday of the reassurances that they provided and the clarifications they provided to a number of our questions. We were also pleased to hear that the various Friends and MAC groups will be involved in the continuing discussions on this matter leading up to the what is now very important November committee meeting. We understand that this is the direction of travel meeting. It appears that the November committee meeting will be a meeting that will make all the big decisions about the enable contract going forward. However, we still have a number of questions and seek clarification on a number of matters. The paper notes that new arrangements will realize greater benefits to residents. That's what it says. But it's not clear to us what those benefits will be at this stage. If in fact they include a significant increase in events being planned on the green spaces, then we have concerns that this will adversely affect the nature of a common, which is not a part but quite a different animal. Our recent experience with Zippo's circus has shown only too clearly the damage that big public events can have on common land. We were also surprised that the paper does not contain any risk assessment of the proposed changes to be implemented. Picking up the point from colleague Peter Rabel, we are not clear how biodiversity services so critical to both the protection and the development of the common will be provided going forward is in particular the role of the strategic biodiversity officer who is being proposed will transfer the work for the council. But perhaps more importantly, Paris 4.8 and 4.9 of the paper raised the prospects of perhaps the entire biodiversity team transferring from enable to the council in April 2025, something we understand subject to be considered at the November committee meeting. We therefore seek assurances that the knowledge and expertise of enable's excellent biodiversity team will not be lost. We are moreover concerned about the potential impacts on the enable team from these proposed changes, potentially on their morale and forward commitments, and will not wish to lose the specialist knowledge that they have. Finally, we are not clear how the day-to-day relationships with the MAC and friends groups will work, and it appears that we will have three points of contact under the new arrangements. I'd like to close by just wishing to highlight that the enable officers we currently deal with on a regular basis are local, accessible, responsive, and professional. We feel the enable team is performing an excellent job for our green spaces. Our relationship with them is with the tenants of mutual respect and support and collaboration and cooperation. Many thanks, Chair. Thank you very much, Mr. Labov, for your deputation. Mr. Eadie, would you like to come back and make a response to the deputation? Yes, thank you, Chair, and thank you for your deputation. So I think some of the things were similar to the previous conversation, but I probably didn't clarify the biodiversity issue with the officers. So currently the Council has no expertise within the client function of the Council to be able to challenge and encourage enable to go further and set the strategic direction of what the biodiversity should be in the contract. It's all contained within the enable team. So the purpose would be that if a strategic officer came across, enable would still deliver the agreed biodiversity plan and action plan and deliver against our biodiversity strategy, but the Council would have the expertise to make sure we're pushing to go further and make sure it meets the Council's expectations. It also, I would hope, allow much closer work in alignment to our internal teams, like our climate team, our planning team, and things like that as well, because we'll be sharing offices, we'll be sharing meetings, we'll be sharing groups, and there'll be much closer connection. So I hope that gives you a little bit more comfort around the reasoning for that. In terms of the wider biodiversity team, I mean, that's a decision for November Committee. There's still discussions to be had with enable. They're very sensitive, as you suggest. This paper is just set in the direction of travel with that potential. While I say that, and we're talking about direction of travel, we're not looking to change the scope of what enable is delivering. We're not expecting huge amounts of events to change. That's not what we're expecting. This is the potential for an extended contract, and if we weren't extending it or thinking about going in-house, we would be going out to the markets to go through a competitive process. So where those staff and those services will be protected, either the extension continues to run the services, maybe with some modifications and improvements to the contract, and that's where we're going. We want to improve the delivery. We want to go further. We want to be more ambitious, and this is how we want to do it, make sure we get the best value for the Council and its residents. But if we weren't looking for an extension or bringing it in-house, those staff would move across to a new contract toward a Council. So while I can understand staff might be anxious because there's uncertainty at the moment, I'd like to assure people that the Council has huge ambitions for its parks, greens, open spaces and biodiversity, whether that's within ABLE or within the Council. And we want to speak to those staff and give them the reassurance, if that's helpful, because we value what they're doing on the ground as well, and we want to continue to benefit from their expertise and knowledge and commitment. I think we talked about the day-to-day relationship and management. Let's co-produce what that might look like. What does good look like? Let's do that together as a group, when we understand what the provision might look like and how the management might look. I think I've covered all of your questions. And in terms of realising benefits, hopefully it's more closer, more strategic working from the Council perspective, to deliver better outcomes, more collaborative, and harness the great work that ABLE do as well. Lots of these stuff are normal Council functions, ordinarily, but there's other stuff that ABLE do brilliantly well, like the community engagement, the events management, managing community facilities, providing access to our parks and engaging with our community and residents. All those things, if an extension is granted, will continue. Thank you, Mr Yee. Councillor Kirk, you have a question to ask to the sensation. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Mr Luboff. Thank you very much. It's very clear also. I completely share your sort of sentiment of praise of ABLE. It occurred to me as you were speaking, can you see any benefits, any upsides to what's being proposed? What is it that we're trying to fix here? Can you see, is there something in amongst everything that's proposed that you think that would be worth having? I think unfortunately, from our perspective, and I think Julia would agree with me here, that we don't think it is broken. We don't think things need fixing. But that's looking to our lens, you know, we have a very good day to day relationship with all the key teams within ABLE that deal with the parks functions. And particularly over the last few years, the people they have brought on board, people they recruited have been excellent, very committed, very passionate people, and very responsive. And at the end of the day, we're all volunteers, all of us on the MAP committee, the Friends Committee, we're all volunteers. And we like to have responses to concerns that we may have that pop up like the Zippo Circus. Now, members of the committee may not know, but we had a Zippo Circus event on Bellevue Fields, part of the water common. And they went on when the ground was very wet and soggy, and they basically destroyed that particular piece of ground. And that's the sort of thing that we want to try and protect the common against. So sorry, at the end of the day, I think we feel that we're happy with very happy with the situation at the moment. But I'll let Julianne say a few words. Thank you, Mark. And Councillor Cook, just further to your comment, so in our friends group, which we have over 800 members, we have an enormous number of people who write into us, who catch us on the common to say how amazing Wandsworth Common looks. And we have seen over the years we've lived here and under ABLE's tenure a huge increase in its appearance, in the rewilding, in the biodiversity, the habitat management, and in collaboration with volunteers who help the biodiversity team provide some manpower, which is very good for volunteers. It's very good for community engagement. So really echoing what Mark was saying, at the moment we can't see why there is an issue, but it's very interesting to hear Mr. Eadie and how important it is that biodiversity is to the Council, and I think I would say that we're all delighted that it is so important, and we would encourage anything that helps that. But we think the biodiversity management has been superbly done and been improving year on year recently. Thank you. Are there any other questions for either member? Okay, well, thank you very much, Beau, for your deputation. So then next I'd like to call Kate Allen from Forever Fish Ponds. Thank you, Ms. Allen, for attending and for making your deputation here five minutes. Thank you. I'm from Forever Fish Ponds, which is the recognized friends group for fishponds fields in Tooting. Well, fishponds fields are thriving. Before they were open to the public in 2021, they were sad, neglected and locked. Now they're a flourishing community space where sport, social interaction and biodiversity all thrive. And it's vital that future arrangements support the vision of fishponds as a place of well-being in the round. This is its unique gift to a densely urban part of Tooting and to its community. It's an oasis and a lifesaver. Getting balance in management of the space between sport, health and well-being and biodiversity has been foundational to the fields flourishing and flourishing for the community. And currently all these areas sit under one roof in ENABLE and we pay tribute to ENABLE for their vigilant work in balancing these priorities to ensure that the fields deliver their full potential for social value. And we ask the Council to prioritize this need to, as they conduct the review that's been referred to of where the further ENABLE services, including biodiversity and sports development, should be brought in-house. In all this, as others have said, a strong working partnership is absolutely key. And our partnership with ENABLE has been strong and positive. And we very much echo what others have said about the need for effective partnership and communication to be firmly built into future arrangements. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to make these points to the Committee. Thank you, Ms. Allen, for your deputation. And again, Mr. Eadie, would you like to come back to that? Thank you. Thank you very much for your deputation and for the work and your positive feedback about fishponds, fishponds. The things that we're proposing do not intend to compromise that. In fact, it's looking to build on the great work that's been done and be even more ambitious. And effective partnerships is going to be key to that. ENABLE will still be a really valued partner as part of the operation. Whether or not they're monitoring a grounds maintenance contractor or not being a strategic lead for biodiversity, the biodiversity team will still be delivering a biodiversity. ENABLE will be doing the work in sports and leisure and mental health and things like that. So we're trying to strengthen the partnership, explore more opportunities, and effective communication and partnership working, as you said and you've all said, is critical to that. And that's what we would like to continue and strengthen even further. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Eadie. Mr. White, you have a question for Ms. Allen. Thanks Kate, and thanks for all the work that you do for fishponds, who've really been fantastic in supporting the opening of fishponds much greater than it was previously. And I think you've done a great job as far as that's concerned. But is there any issues around the integrity maybe of some of the classes that are given? You know, maybe the women-only classes or anything like that. Is there anything that may speak for us? Well, the classes are going very well. There's a very enthusiastic set of people who come to a fitness class and there's a different one every day of the week and new ones are being added. And certainly it required some careful architecture to ensure that the women's class worked with security and privacy for the participants. And there are one or two little issues to count that arose that had to be addressed. But actually, ENABLE and ourselves and the class participants and the instructor have all worked together and good solutions have been found to all that. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Allen. Councillor Cook, you have a question too. Thank you, Ms. Allen. I find myself in agreement with Councillor White. It doesn't often happen. No, it's really pleasing to see how well things have worked since '21. So very, very good to hear you describe that. And the strength of the relationship with ENABLE. So that prompts you to ask a similar question to the one I asked the previous deputation. Is there anything you would point to that you think ENABLE don't do very well or that needs rectifying? Well, I think as with the previous speaker, it would never have -- we're happy with current arrangements and it wouldn't have occurred to us on our own to suggest changes to them. Thank you. Are there any other questions from members from Ms. Allen? No? Okay. Well, thank you so much for your deputation, Ms. Allen. You can return to the public gallery now. And our last deputation for this paper, we have Pat Gross. She is a member of Friends of Wandsworth Park. Thank you for coming, Ms. Gross. And again, you have five minutes for your deputation speech. Thank you. Good evening. I'm Pat Gross, the chair of the Friends of Wandsworth Park. As many of you all know, we are a volunteer organization and we've been working together with local residents for over ten years to preserve, protect and improve our hugely valued green space. I'd like to thank the committee for the opportunity to speak at this meeting because future management of Wandsworth's green spaces has a significant and lasting impact on our park and local community. We broadly welcome the recommendations in the report that have been clarified in our preliminary meeting and we're optimistic that the mixed arrangements to bring some services back in-house will vastly improve provision and delivery for the benefit of green spaces. What we seek to understand are the details behind the proposed changes as they relate to Wandsworth Park. Over the last decade, Thamesfield, St. Mary's, East Putney and Wandsworth town wards have seen significant housing development. We believe Wandsworth Park has not received adequate funding for such needed improvements to meet the challenges of the huge increase in park use from these developments. In fact, we do not believe this has even been adequately recognized. But trust me, we see it on the ground every day. How will the council ensure that funding, management and maintenance services go hand in hand to address the pressures on existing and future housing development? Benefits delivered by urban parks to local communities are well known. Wandsworth Park would like to continue to provide opportunities for -- Friends of Wandsworth Park would like to continue to provide opportunities for green prescribing, green social prescribing. Does the council plan to support these initiatives? Warmly welcome the borough council's commitment to improving biodiversity and thank ENABLE for the creation and maintenance of our beautiful wildflower meadow. However, there has been little to no communication about the benefits of an urban meadow. Residents have often expressed concern about loss of this space. And cricket teams regularly retrieve balls from the meadow by breaking the fencing, making the area look unsightly and abandoned. The reality is native meadows bear little flowering interest for half of the year. Managing public's expectations and educating them about the importance of biodiversity, how and why meadows look pretty for half of the year but drabber for the remainder can go a long way to ensuring success. What are the council's plans to work with the Friends of Wandsworth Park to further enhance biodiversity as well as raising awareness of the associated benefits? Wandsworth Park is home to more than 50 different tree species. And the park's tree canopy supports a healthy population of birds, bats and numerous pollinators. But our trees are under constant threat from climate change, soil compaction and diseases. Branch death is a very serious problem and residents are deeply concerned about the risk of branches falling. There is an urgent need to improve tree maintenance in Wandsworth Park. What steps will the borough council take to ensure significant improvements to the safety and the health of our trees? We are acutely aware of the challenges facing parks, funding, urban development, access and competing demands on park use. We want to know that diversity and inclusion including women, LBGTQ, those with disabilities and 50s plus activities will be brought into consideration of sport and fitness offerings in our park. And lastly increasing climate issues will certainly demand many new challenges. We want to know that this place is a significant part in your thinking and planning for the future. We're committed to working with you and supporting the borough council to deliver a truly responsive service to the priorities and concerns of local park users. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Ms. Groves, for your deputation. And for one last time, Mr. Eadie, would you like to make a response to the deputation? I'm not sure it will be the last time tonight, Chair, but response to this last deputation. So first of all, thank you, Pat, for all the work that you and the friends do and for your deputation. There was a lot of questions there about strategy, policy and development that weren't necessarily about the ENABLE contract or this paper. But be assured that I and we and the council are listening and we want to work with the friends and ENABLE to try and address those things. And there's some really exciting things that you're talking about, about how our community wants to be more engaged and made more aware of biodiversity. And that's one of the reasons why the council would like a strategic officer to drive this. It's also just not about the commons and the parks, it's about taking biodiversity really seriously in this borough and being a leading borough and council in London and the country. That's how important biodiversity is. And that will, I was going to say, ENABLE us to do that. So that's part of the clarity and the reasons why we want to do that. And diversity inclusion in our parks is music to our ears. We've just launched our Leisure Sport and Physical Activity Strategy. Inclusion is at the heart of that. And in 2025 is going to be the year we're really going to promote and support women and girls to be more active, volunteer more and things like that. So I welcome your comments and your feedback. As I've said to your colleagues, we will continue our dialogue. And when the arrangements are agreed, what they might be, we will work with you all to make sure we get the maximum benefit out of the arrangements that are agreed going forward. Thank you very much. We're very grateful for that communication. Thank you, Mr. Eadie. Are there any questions to Ms. Queras? Councillor Kirk? Thank you. Thank you for the presentation. And interesting to hear the very specific knowledge you have of the park. If this proposal hadn't come forward, would you have been thinking that there was something that needed to change? And would you say that ENABLE is an effective organization as currently constituted? Yes. I do think that there are issues, though. And last week actually had a meeting with Councillor Gasser because there are some serious problems that we're having with trees and with cricket balls hitting people. I mean, there's lots of serious things going on that are a response to I did meet with some people from the Council and ENABLE regarding issues. We were getting complaints from cricket balls by having moved the cricket wicket. And quite serious, dogs getting hit, children getting hit, people getting hit, walking along the river. And what happened last week was a bit shocking because the wicket was moved ten yards closer to the river. So it was like, wait, this is the response? I don't know why nothing was communicated as to what the way forward is. And by making the circumstance worse, it was very troubling. And how much money did it cost to move that? A little concerning. So. Thank you. Any further questions? Councillor Jeffries. Hi, there, everyone. And apologies for that. And Councillor Jeffries from Thamesfield board. You'll have to forgive me. It's not a question so much as just to recognize on as board Councillors, Mr. Brooks, and my appreciation for what the Friends do in Wandsworth Park. And I think just to reiterate, Pat, if I may, your point about the demand on the park from the significant amount of residential development that's been happening locally. I'm a beneficiary of that myself, but very, very conscious that the park is being used at sort of ever increasing levels. So I hope the department will keep that in mind as they progress these plans. We find it particularly concerning because there is a new 30 story building that is being built off B&Q and home based sites. Those are not even completely open yet. And Wandsworth Park is the nearest place. And Wandsworth Park is not accommodating this enormous increase in population. Thank you. Are there any other questions for Ms. Gross? No? Well, thank you so much for your deputation, Ms. Gross. You may return to the public. And with that, we've finished our four deputations for this paper. So now it's up to the committee to consider paper number 24-224, and that is this revision to the future arrangements with the navel, leisure and culture. I'd like to first invite Councillor Gasser to say a few words on this paper. Thank you. Well, I mean, good evening, everybody. And thank you very much to all the friends that came and spoke and gave us your views. And we are listening and we will carry on listening. We're going to be consulting you throughout this. And thank you to all the volunteers across Wandsworth that are helping keep our parks and our open spaces green. And there's loads of you. There's all the friends groups, the MACs, the Amenity Societies, the tree wardens. There's loads of people. I can't mention everybody. But thank you. This is how we do it, all of us together. And we absolutely appreciate that. And we will be taking this forward, listening to all of you. And I want to say thank you to enable the navel staff on the ground. You are doing a fantastic job. This paper isn't about decrying that in any way. We do think you're doing a really good job on the ground. Our parks are beautiful. This is about enhancing the relationship. This is about us working more closely together, aligning our -- we are -- our aims are aligned, but just can we work a little bit more closely together. And this is the way we're proposing doing it. So I'm going to hand over to Matthew, Mr. Eadie. But just -- this is -- I think this is a positive step. And to enable staff that may end up coming into the Council, I just want to say we value you. We will welcome you. We will be offering you the best possible terms and conditions, a good working environment, good pension. You know, I would like to think it's a good place to work. And you'd be very welcome. Thank you, Councillor Gasser. And so, yeah, passing on to Mr. Eadie for some more detail on it. Thank you, Councillor Gasser. And I echo those comments. So this paper is recommending the insourcing and transfer of 10 staff, as noted in 4.2. And setting out the progress we're making in developing an extension proposal with enable to be considered by Environment Committee in November. So if I give you some context into the proposed approach, currently, if we take it by lot one, currently the Council procures the grounds maintenance contractor. We pay the contract and then enable, then monitors that contract. And then we monitor enable who monitor that contract. There is you will hear a bit later in the agenda how we have redesigned the grounds maintenance contract to be much more outcome driven. Self-monitoring, more quality assurance with the additional benefits of paying the living wage and recycling within the contract. The Council is seeking to bring two offices across to make sure that we can develop and harness the potential of that contract and the additional resources that will bring while enable can continue to manage the parks on a day to day and operational level. But we will do that in partnership with the contractor when they're appointed and with the friends and Mac groups. In terms of the trees, trees are hugely important to this borough and we value them and their importance to our landscape. But we need to be better connected to our highways teams, to our planning teams, and be able to be responsive directly as this is another example where the Council procures the trees management contractors to and then enable, monitor those two contracts, and then the Council monitors enable who monitor those two contracts. So this is also about efficiency. And in biodiversity, you've heard me say how important this is to the Council. And we want to be able to have resources to be able to harness the potential, the appetite for us to go be with one of the best in class for biodiversity in the borough, not just in our parks and open spaces, but everywhere across the borough, including supporting residents and businesses, schools, trusts, the other voluntary sector. This isn't just about our parks and open spaces. And lastly, all the sports development resource and the responsibility for developing and delivering a leisure strategy was with the responsibility of enable. But over the last year, we the Council was gripped this because of how important it is. And at this last committee, the leisure strategy was agreed. So we would like a strategic officer to be able to make sure that we deliver on the promise of those actions and work with the whole partnership across the Council, not just a voluntary sector, but broader with the NHS and business and other key institutions in the Council as well. And at the moment, that resource is reserved to enable and the Council would like greater control, better oversight to be able to deliver the ambitions that we have. Happy to answer any questions, Chair. Thank you, Mr. Eady, for that summary. And with that, we can now open the floor to Councillors to ask any questions. So starting off with Councillor Cook. Thank you. Well, I barely know where to start, having heard the deputations. It's a remarkable achievement. I don't think I can remember in all the times I've been on this committee in one capacity or another four deputations. And I think it's a measure of the extreme concern that this paper has created. And there's a unanimity of message as well, isn't there, that people are basically saying. And it was my reaction to the paper as well was, well, what is the problem that we're trying to fix here? Because everybody agrees that ENABLE has basically worked very well. There are some absolutely superb people who, of course, came from the Council, set up as a mutual, who have done a fantastic job. Of course, there are going to be things that can be fixed. And I'm very interested to hear the ones with park examples. But I don't think the answer to any of them is to dismember ENABLE. I don't think that helps at all. Those problems should be addressed and dealt with. I'm sure they can be. And the fact that other places work so well, I think, should give ones with park people confidence that they can be. Just looking at the paper, what a contrast. When we set up ENABLE, the thoroughness of that exercise, the papers which were voluminous. And yet here we have a five-page, I must say very badly written, rather incoherent paper proposing something of really major significance. And the irony, because one of the complaints is about transparency. Yet it's very difficult to discern in here the sense of why you're trying to do this and what is the problem that you're trying to fix. There is virtually no example other than one reference to biodiversity. I'll come back to that. There is no example of what is wrong and what needs to be sorted out. So why are you doing it? Is it cost-saving? The figures that are in here indicate that no money will be saved. So presumably isn't that. Why break up a successful organization and scatter the pieces around if you want a strategic biodiversity input? And we can all agree on the biodiversity, the importance of that. And we've always felt that in the borough for years and years and years. And I think we're very high achieving in that regard. But if you want that, rather than breaking up ENABLE and moving the pieces around, why not hire that capacity? After all, this new administration has not been shy about hiring new people, has it? So why break up ENABLE? Strategic direction. Again, the irony. I don't detect in this paper any sense of strategic direction. And yet throughout, there is a complaint that, oh, we need more strategic direction. But you don't say what that is. I find it really completely baffling. And so, I mean, there's much more that I could say. But I would turn to Councillor Gasson and say, well, can you give me one example, just one example, of where there's been a failure of strategic direction and where what you are proposing is going to fix matters? One will do. I think it's more appropriate first if Mr. Eadie comes in to answer those questions that you've directed. So Mr. Eadie, would you like to come back on that? So I think the question was what is one failure? To be honest, I'm in a place where I want to build on strengths. And just hiring another biodiversity officer to oversee ENABLE to deliver that biodiversity offer is then creating duplication. So we want to harness and retain the experience and knowledge of what ENABLE has brought, provide some continuity, but also provide the ability to be able to connect even greater to a number of different things that the council are doing to strengthen the position and strengthen the potential delivery of what ENABLE does. This paper is mostly talking about 10 members of staff out of a significant cohort of staff. The services that ENABLE actually deliver will be affected marginally. The most significant thing, hello, the most significant thing is that they will not be monitoring the grounds maintenance contract. Thank you for that, Mr. Eadie. Councillor Brooks. Thank you very much. I've got some questions about the financial points raised in the paper. There's three of them, but I don't mind if you take them all together. The paper mentions one of the benefits of ENABLE being its ability to raise third-party funding and has a fundraising team to do that. I'd be interested to know how much third-party funding it has been raising and what the status of that fundraising team is at the moment. I'm interested in the VAT liability of ENABLE or the operations currently carried out by ENABLE if they're carried out by the council given it's currently a charitable company limited by guarantee. Will that change? And then on the concession fee, the paper makes great play of the hope that the concession fee will rise in the renegotiation. But is that a sentiment that's shared by ENABLE and how confident can we be that given that underpins the case that it's actually going to happen? Thank you. Mr. Eadie. So I think all three of those questions are questions that probably more would helpfully be answered when we've had further discussion with ENABLE. And there's a proposal because this isn't about the future of ENABLE today. This is about 10 officers. And I don't have that information around the amount of funding that ENABLE has brought in, but absolutely that's a benefit. The VAT implication, obviously the council has net VAT, so that's more preferable. And ENABLE will be subject to irrecoverable VAT, which they can't claim back. But again, we're drifting into what the rationale will be for a proposal, an extension proposal which will be considered at the November Environment Committee. If you're talking about the finances in the paper, if that's where we're leading to, the increase in costs, because we're still harnessing all the benefits that you've just talked about, because ENABLE will still be running all the services apart from trees, but that's just a labor intensive, there's no benefits from a charitable perspective for that, it's just people and people traveling around the borough, is the better benefits those staff will get. So better holiday sickness and also pension contributions, should they wish to be members of the local government pension scheme. But also one-off costs to get them set up, licenses, laptops, those kind of things. So that's the financial element of this paper, but the other stuff, I've given you like a flavor, I'm sorry I can't give you the information around the amount of funding that ENABLE has brought in, but they will be, that will perform part of the paper for November. Quickly, I want to come back on one of those points. Yeah, sorry, it's just that in your answer to Councillor Cook and to me just now, you're saying that this paper's only about the 10 members of staff, but we're being asked to endorse the direction of travel. So it is about the future arrangement going forward. So I don't really get how we're supposed to make a considered view of the future direction of travel without the information, it's a light paper. So I just don't see how it's a decision we can make with what is in front of us. Mr Beattie? So the Committee's not being asked to endorse the approach, the Committee's being asked to note that officers are working with ENABLE to develop an extension proposal, which we are and we're fully committed to, that will be considered by the Environment Committee. So we're not asking for an endorsement of the Committee, we want to let you know that we're working hard to get an extension and maximize the benefits of that partnership that it brings. So you'd confirm that the insourcing staff, that's separate to the extension that's coming in November? The insourcing of the 10 officers, the TREES team, that is for this paper. The extension proposal and all the implications around VAT and the funding that they bring and things like that, that will all form part of a rationale of why we would recommend or not an extension at the November Committee. Thank you, Mr Beattie. Councillor Osborne? Yeah, I've worked with ENABLE on various projects. I've always found them good, I've always enjoyed working with them and I think it's wrong to ask us where is the failure. Nobody's looking for failure here anywhere and that's not what this is about. This is part of a process. Since ENABLE or its predecessor were created, there has been an ongoing relationship, organic relationship with the Council, the Town Hall and its officers. And so sections of that body have been brought back into Town Hall control over the years, going back four, five, six, seven years in the history of this organization, not because of failure but because of belief that that was a better way of trying to achieve a strategic objective. For example, on the arts and stuff like that when it was changed, the relationship with it was changed. So that isn't the process here. We're not looking for failure in what's happened. I think it's significant that the response from the various societies that we've heard this evening has been positive about ENABLE by and large. If you add in some of the responses we've had that have not had deputations, it's perhaps a more mixed picture if you look at the stuff that's been sent to Councilors. But none of it is talking about failure. There is a suggestion sometimes I think about other problems. I think it's about cohesion and about connectivity and an ability to put together a strategic process and achieve a strategic objective. And I think that as a Council is what we are now focused on. And that is the whole point of this discussion. If we just look at some of the things which we may want to do in the future, if we look at biodiversity, for example, let's see where that's going to take us. But if you look at other Councils, other Councils are putting together wildlife corridors and greenways across the boroughs and so on. It is very difficult to see how that could be done from outside of the Town Hall when you need to bring in housing estates, you need to bring in relationships with organizations and bodies beyond the public sector into the private sector and so on. And all of those things are going to require a much more holistic and strategic grasp and the connectivity and connections and cohesions that I think most Councils would desire in this area of work. So it's not about failure. It's not anyone is saying this is broken and it must be fixed. It's about what do we want to achieve in the future and how do we pull it together. And that is, in this instance, the suggestion is that we require taking a section of what's going on outside of the Town Hall and putting it back, actually, into the Town Hall where it used to be in the old days, just as has happened a couple of times before with the history of this organization. So let's not try and make it about a fight or any condemnation or anything like that over at ENABLE. That's not the case. They're a great organization. But there always have to be organic changes in the way that ENABLE relates to the Town Hall. And that's what we're trying to put together tonight. And if some of the staff come over to the Town Hall team, they will be most welcome because we know that the staff that has set up already with ENABLE are doing a great job in so many areas. Thank you, Councillor Osborne. Councillor White. Yeah, I'd like to echo what Councillor Osborne just said. I think my own dealings with ENABLE have been quite positive. But within the summary here, there is -- I'm not sure whether I'm reading correctly here. So correct me if I'm wrong, Mr. Eady. But over the last two years, this council has lost a million pounds in concession payments. Is that true? Mr. Eady. So it's true insofar as the original contract required a concession payment of 2.7. But the ENABLE and the industry and the work that ENABLE do have been subject to disruption due to the pandemic, due to the filming strikes and things like that, which has meant that they've not been able to achieve their full concession fee. And the council has worked with them through those difficulties. We're hoping now that we've recovered. There's an appetite for people to do things, to attend events, to participate in sport. We've got a very exciting and ambitious leisure strategy where we want more people to do things. So we're hoping that the concession fee will grow as a consequence of that and the experience that ENABLE have gained through working in Wandsworth for a long time and through those really difficult challenges. So it is true, but it's been for reasons that ENABLE have been unable to control. Councillor Jeffries. Can I just clarify, though, that next year we expect to lose another half a million pounds? So next year the concession fee hasn't been agreed. So that will be subject to the negotiations that we're having now. Sorry, this year. Sorry, yeah, yeah. This year. So this year, yeah, it still will not be at the 2.7 million. The negotiations are ongoing for the future. We would like them to get back to the place where they were, where they did the original proposal, and they said that within five years they'd get to, or earlier than that they'd get to that. But this is what we're working out. And this is why this isn't today about who said what did, what's working, what isn't working. We want to work with ENABLE to get the best value deal and best outcomes for the Council. And that's what we'll continue to do. Officers will work really hard, and the ENABLE officers will work really hard over the next few weeks to be able to present something to committee for consideration in November. Councillor Jeffries. Thank you, Chair. And I think it's clear that Councillor Osborne didn't have any involvement in writing these papers. I think they would have benefited from some of his engagement there. I think off the back of that, one can perfectly recognise the Administration's desire to do this. That's perfectly within its purview. But I do have two sort of key questions which speak to an overarching concern just around the sort of policy-making aspect of this, and a concern that that might be a bit back to front, that we're jumping to the decision before we have run through the usual consultation. So my first question was just around stakeholder engagement. We've had a number of deputations this evening. We have had concerns expressed about wanting to be engaged in this process. There have been references to conversations with the cabinet member only yesterday and at the end of last week. The question, I think, comes that shouldn't we work out what good looks like first before we embark on this process? And the second question, again, similarly, shouldn't this decision form part of the audit that is being used to determine the contract extension in November at 4.4 and 4.5? It seems like there is certainly a case to be made for what the Administration wants to do. But it seems like it would be better to do that as part of a wider analysis and understanding of the contract overall so that we can work out what we want to extend and what we don't want to extend. Mr. P.D.? Thanks, Councillor. So we're in a position where we can't deviate too far from what the current contract is. So in terms of if we were going to engage and speak to people about, you know, what they'd like to see more of, there's only a limited scope that you can do, otherwise be challenged by the market in terms of how far we can go. But we did have a good discussion with the friends and the MAC colleagues yesterday, but we also did speak to them a couple of months ago as well to let them know as much as you can when you're in a negotiation with a contractor, that's a challenge we're in. We're trying to discuss and get the best value contract for the Council and you can't really have open discussions with third parties on how that's progressing and what we think the best delivery model is in the future. In terms of the audit, the audit isn't looking at the effectiveness of the model, it's looking at how the governance works, how the accounts are open and transparent and helping us understand how we can demonstrate the value that ENABLE bring but also the value that these contracts are bringing to the Council. So I agree it's really important to the long-term contract, because that will help shape and inform that, but for this, as the reasons I've already set out before, you know, the two parks officers will be monitoring a contract and that will just be taken out of the contract to allow ENABLE to do the parks management, the events management and all those kinds of things, the trees so we have better connectivity with other parts of the Council and better control and then you've heard the rationale for why biodiversity is really important and we want to strengthen the Council's resources and the ability to deliver and the same goes for the sports. There are still teams left there that will be doing the delivery of the work or the stuff that's already in the contract and any contract needs to be, has to demonstrate there was a continuous improvement and that will be based on engagement with the friends groups, with residents and things like that. ENABLE do much more than just the parks, they do events, they run lots of community sports facilities, they run our public halls. All the stuff that they do, I hope, and there is, continuously looking for improvements based on resident feedback and resident-centered services and that won't stop. Are there any more questions for Councillor Brooks? Thank you, Chair. Just on the points about transparency, which comes up in the paper, are there examples of when ENABLE haven't shared information the Council have wanted to see? Because tonight we've been full of praise for ENABLE. We wouldn't want to harm them reputationally. But claiming in the paper that they haven't been transparent or not shared information is quite a punchy thing to suggest. Is that the case? Are they not being transparent? >> So I'm going to try, I'm going to swerve that slightly because I don't want to be open in those conversations in a place where we are trying to work with ENABLE on an extension. Are there things that could be better? Absolutely. Are we going to look to improve those in the future for a negotiation and a new contract? Absolutely. And I'm sure, and they do, ENABLE tell us where we're not doing things as well as we could be as well. And that's how you strengthen a partnership about being honest with each other. And, again, this is what we want to not prejudice as part of a discussion with ENABLE. We want to address, be completely open and transparent with each other as good partners to get the best outcomes and the best service for our residents. So apologies, Councillor, I'm not going to share things that are between the partners and, you know, compromise our ability to deliver an extension. >> I think Councillor Gasser also wants to come on that. >> You do have the opportunity to have a private briefing with officers which you haven't taken up that opportunity at this time, I understand. May I react to that? I'm not quite sure what prompted that. I will do that. I will certainly do that. Thank you, Councillor Gasser, because I was just going to note that you completely, not for the first time, you completely ducked my question earlier and just handed it straight to Mr. Eadie. May I try again, could you give me an example of something that hasn't worked? I asked earlier for a concrete example of a strategic and if I may also address Mr. Eadie's comments just now as well. Again, I think there's things I will happily talk to you about in private but not in public. I think Mr. Eadie also mentioned one earlier. I think it was the biodiversity point, was it? >> There was no expression of any failures from enable. >> Yeah, no, it wasn't. I would go on and say that every relationship and partnership and service has the ability to get better and stronger and improve. What we're trying to do with enable is to work collectively to be able to meet that aim. That is not the outcome of this paper he's asking. We're asking for a few officers and a service to return so the council can have more control of strategy, get more closer work in alignment to other council services to give better services to residents, while still allowing enable to do 99% of what they already do. This is not compromising that. The only service that's coming out in this authority potentially is the tree service. The rest of it enable will continue to do those things and that dialogue will continue after this meeting, you know, to try and make sure we get the best value proposition for our residents. >> Thank you. Two things, if I may. A bit of gentle advice, if I might offer it. If you want to strengthen your relationship with enable, I would suggest the way to go about it is not to write things like they have not been sufficiently transparent, which is in paragraph 3.3. And as my colleague, Councillor Brooks, noted, that is a very punchy thing to put in the paper and when you were challenged on it, you couldn't substantiate it and if I was enable, I would be really unhappy about that because that's getting pretty close to an accusation. More broadly, nothing that I've heard in the last 20 minutes, half an hour or so, has given me any reassurance. In fact, quite the opposite. There is no sense of a strategic direction here. Cabinet member ducked completely my first question and just handed it straight to yourself. And I will return to the tree thing, to a specific area, albeit a large specific. I was astonished to hear you just say, and I feel uncomfortable doing this because I shouldn't really be having a go at an officer, I should be having a go at the politician. But when you said the trees are just people travelling around the borough, there's so much more than that. They are a hugely skilled team of people, which is why the trees of this borough are generally kept in such fantastic condition, all 60,000 of them, however many there are. And so, it really frightens me that you have misunderstood what the challenges are. There isn't something that needs fixing here. You're going to dismember, enable, you're going to do huge damage and I have to say, Councillor Gasser, it recalls the recent and ongoing shambles of the waste contract and heaven knows what this is going to look like in a few months' time if this is what you pursue because I think you're getting it wrong and I haven't heard a single thing this evening which gives me any confidence that you know what you're doing. Mr Eadie, would you like to respond to that? I don't recollect saying that. When I was referring to the trees, I was talking about the finances and I said that the costs were related to the trees team travelling around the borough, which they would need to do to be able to inspect trees. So, I didn't say that. So, I just want to be clear for the record. Well, let's check the record because we're all being... Councillor White. The tone of this meeting has gone down somewhat, hasn't it? I think attacking officers are working really, really hard. So, hang on, let me speak, let me speak, to work really hard to try and deliver the strategic aims of this council. The council has changed hands and you probably haven't got used to that, but it's happened and we have different priorities and the officers are working really, really hard to make sure that we deliver on that. So, I think that wasn't, I don't think that's really what happened there was really what we want. May I clarify that because as I hinted a few moments ago, I am profoundly uncomfortable at directing, well, I've got no choice because the cabinet member ducks the questions whenever I ask them. So, I've got no choice. Mr Ealy has done almost all of the talking so far in this meeting, which is very telling. The way it should be is either Mr Chadwick, who said nothing so far, or the cabinet member should have a grip of what is going on, should understand the strategy, the strategic direction she's trying to chart and she should have good grip of the detail and she should be able to provide examples. And so, when I ask a direct question, I should be able to get an answer, but he's immediately just batted across and so I'm in a very uncomfortable position for speaking directly to an officer, which it shouldn't be like that. I agree with that, Councillor Lecker. I mean, I do think I need to say that in my colleagues' defence and in my defence, I haven't actually said anything to this point, because in my view, my colleague officer, Matthew, has given you extensive answers, your all extensive answers to a full range of questions. In fact, I've not before witnessed such lengthy answers and eloquent answers in my view, covering many minutes and I do regret that you're so swiftly dismissing the points that he's made. You're right, though, that much of this now turns to the members' views. That's the usual order of events, isn't it? My colleague officers explain their position, members provide their overview and that's where we are now. But honestly, I think you have too swiftly dismissed the lengthy and eloquent descriptions of the position from my colleague. Thank you, Mr Chadwick. Let's try and keep the tone of this more inquisitive in asking questions of the officers. I think, Councillor Gasser, you wish to come in? Yeah, it's not acceptable that you talk to officers like that at all. Well, answer the questions. You asked me, you asked me what problems could I identify. You asked me that twice. I will tell you in private. I do not want to say anything like that in public. I'll have as long a meeting as you like in private with officers there and we can tell you. So you won't answer them in public? No. I think the answer has already been given that it's an ongoing contract negotiation. Well, I think it speaks for itself. I think the cabinet members should be able to defend a paper like this without too much trouble instead of pinging it straight to officers. And I feel very uncomfortable, as I said a couple of times, where we get into this one-on-one on an officer. It's not how it should be. And I am very, very conscious of that. You should have taken your briefing. There was a briefing offered. Nothing was offered until a few moments ago. No, no, no, no, no. That's that. No, no, no. You know it's not like that. When I was in your position, I used to get one automatic. That's not -- it was never offered beforehand. You just ask for it. You just say Mr. Chavitt, when are you available? I think an apology would help suit the matter. I can confirm that briefing was offered and the offer wasn't taken up. Please, can we make sure that queries are routed through the chair. Mr. Reedy, do you want to come in next? Yeah, I just wanted -- I mean, it's getting a little bit heated in here, isn't it? And I was trying to bring people back to the paper that more substantive discussions can happen about, you know, what the contract will look like and how the strategic nature or the operational delivery of the services looks like in a November committee. Today, we're setting that journey and we're also talking about bringing a number of officers into the council, a great employer, so we can be even more ambitious and deliver even more for the public and support enable with strategic direction and allow them to do the job that they're contracted to do. Okay. I feel like unless there's any more substantive questions for officers, I feel like now is the time to move for a vote, so the paper is now for decision by the executive, number 24-224. Do the committee agree to support the recommendations of the executive in paragraph 2? Please. You don't -- okay. So you want to take this to a vote? Okay. Sure. So we're taking a vote? Okay. So those in favor of the recommendations, raise your hand. And those against? So that's tied. Three votes for three against. As the chair of the committee, my vote is the tie-breaking vote. So the recommendations of the report are passed. So with that, we move on to item number two of the agenda, which was formerly item number seven, the petition response for the purchase of Springfield Park. We have received a request, understanding order 66 from Councillor Peter Graham to speak on this item. So does the committee agree to hear his speech? Yep. Agree? Councillor Graham, welcome to the committee. Just before you start your speech, I also want to note that this is -- this position is based on an existing decision that the council has made. There's no decision to be made as a result of this petition. And you've also had the opportunity to speak both at Environment Committee and at full council about this matter. So it would be appreciated if we heard more new information maybe regarding the petition and the council's response to that. You have five minutes. Thank you. And thank you for the opportunity to speak to you again. It was indeed -- it was last summer that I spoke to this committee in July when the council had the opportunity to buy Springfield Park for a pound. The petition followed immediately afterwards. I have no idea why it's taken this long for a response to be produced, particularly as it says almost nothing. It doesn't seem particularly respectful to the 1,131 Wandsworth residents who took their time to sign it. And I would expect the information at this stage given the time it has passed on, for example, the actual maintenance costs of running the park. Now it's opened. The 180,000-pound cost, which is still cited tonight, was indicative. It was purely based on averages. But now the park's open. What are the real costs so that we know what they are? It says nothing about the anticipated facilities for sports clubs a year on, including how much of the park the council expects to be fenced off. It says nothing about the operation of this new board. How often is it meeting? How many commercial entities have votes? Is the council as the sole voice for residents on that board actually being listened to? And it says nothing about why residents have been shut out. That wasn't the model that the planning documents envisaged, this commercial model with the limited company in charge. Why did the council permit the board and that company to be set up in that way rather than going with the original proposals? But on all of those points, there's no information whatsoever. More importantly, there is still nothing on what will happen when the current pot of money runs out. What has this board decided on who exactly will pay and how much it will cost them? The paper seems to imply that all of these questions are irrelevant because the formal window for buying a park is closed. But that was true last summer. The formal window shut a long time ago, but the developers kept the option to buy open because they themselves know that they may struggle to maintain a park of this scale in the long term, and they think the council would do a better job. For that same reason, the option to buy is still likely to be open and the paper doesn't deny it. The petition says the maintenance costs involved are no different from any other park, don't arise for five years, now four, and can be met easily, including by reallocating for other funding from the site. A pound buys land worth millions. None of those points are addressed. And I have to say, it's a stark contrast with your approach tonight to enable. With enable alleged uncertainties about a charity with a contract where there are no performance issues and residents are happy, apparently justifies higher costs of 75,000 pounds, probably far more, and bringing that under your control. But here, developers are to be left in the paper's own words outside the council's control with no information and residents both within the Springfield site and across Tooting, worried about what may happen next. You won't trust a charity that you think is doing a good job in our parks, but you sign Springfield Park over to property developers. One vote on a board guarantees nothing. Just this afternoon, we received confirmation of the mayor of London's hearings into the latest phase of the development of Springfield site. And despite this council's planning committee vote to reject building hundreds of units on municipal open land, the labor mayor is considering doing just that. The protections on land that this response implicitly relies on are not sacrosanct. We have a labor government now that wants to remove more of those restrictions on land, including explicitly the greenbelt, and has demanded more building in our borough. There are no guarantees. The petition says that the only way to ensure that our parks are run properly and are run for us and are secure for decades to come is for the public to own them. The response simply notes that the park is open, the council has a single vote's worth of influence, and the planning system has particular rules. That view is unbelievably short-term. Those things are true for now. The only way to be secure for 10 years, 15, 30, 50, 100, the only way to secure land is to own it. You know that. Developers know it. The hundreds of residents across Tooting who sign this petition know it, and you are choosing to fail them. Thank you, Councillor Graham, for your deputation. Do any members have any questions for Councillor Graham? Nope? Nothing? Okay. In that case, thank you for your deputation, Councillor Graham. You can choose to sit back in the gallery if you wish. Does no one have anything from the administration side to say to those residents who signed the petition? >> That will come as part of the response to the petition. >> There's nothing in this paper that didn't tell us anything we didn't know last year. >> I think he was given five minutes. Just noting that my residents and others in Tooting, including Councillor Gasser who signed the petition will be rather surprised. >> With that, we can turn to the paper, which as I noted before, it's not a paper for decision, it's noting the Councillor's response to the petition. Councillor Gasser, did you want to open? Yeah, absolutely. It's the most beautiful park. I was there about 10 days ago. It's wonderful. There's all sorts of people using it. Or the cross section of Tooting for communities, which is great. It's lovely to say it's great. It hasn't cost us a penny. So it's a real success story. But I take absolutely, I respect what your residents say and what they signed in this petition. I'm going to address it. They say, you say you want to ensure they run properly, run for us and secure for decades to come. I absolutely agree with that. It is still in public ownership. It is in the ownership of the NHS Trust. And this is the advice. Obviously, this was a big decision. Do we adopt it or not? You know, a year ago. I took advice from planning officers. The advice I got was the Trust will maintain ownership of the land. The social value prospectus and the Trust vision for using the park will create a community asset operated through a social value model to maximize social, economic and environmental impacts for service users, staff and local communities. I think that's a very good ambition. I'm part of that social value board. So is Mr. Eadie. We have influence on that. It was slow getting off the ground, I have to admit that's out of our hands, but we've met two, three times now. Things are progressing. We're talking about what the pavilion cafe is going to look like. It's going to be a social enterprise. I'm not sure who's going to be run by, but it's going to be very beneficial. Lovely asset for people to go and have a cup of tea. Also, it will be providing job opportunities for I don't know what group, but it will be very beneficial in that way. Enable to put together a proposal with us about what the sports offer could look like. We're talking about that. There won't be any fences I think you mentioned or gates or anything like that. It's open for everybody. This park 24/7, that's in the planning. People that know about planning will have to advise more about that, but that's in the consent. The sports offer, some of it will be paid for, but some of it will be subject to our access for all offer so that anybody who needs or wants to play sport, they don't get hindered by cost barriers. So it will be, it is already a beautiful community asset that everybody's enjoying. It will be even better and it will be managed in a socially aware way. I mean, I, for, I could not justify the risk of committing the council to this. There were risks because I don't know what the ongoing maintenance costs are. They're going to be, I can't comment on that, but there was a great risk. There is a risk around the sports facilities. We haven't yet got the planning commission. This council could have spent an awful lot of time and money applied for planning mission. I don't know whether we would have got it. I did not think that was a risk that I could commit this council to. So somebody else is taking that risk. So we are going to get a beautiful facility for free for our residents. Thank you, Councillor Gasser. Ms. Weezy, did you also want to comment on the paper or should I just open it to members? Okay. That's fine. I can open it to members to ask any questions. Councillor Brooks. Thank you, chair. I don't think anyone's going to dispute the intentions of the administration in wanting it to be a wonderful park at all. And I understand what you're talking about in terms of the risks that you wanted to avoid or mitigate against. There are risks, though, like Councillor Graham said, in not taking the decision in terms of factors that are completely outside the board's control, outside your control. So I just wondered if you had anything to say on those risks in terms of decisions taken by the government or by city hall when they're reviewing planning applications about building on metropolitan open lands. Because the risks weren't all one way. There were risks in terms of making the decision in the affirmative, which you chose not to do, but also in not doing it. I'm going to have to ask the planning guys about that. I don't know what the impact of the building decision would be. Mr. Calder can advise on that. Yeah, so Mr. Calder, would you like to come in and introduce yourself as well? Thank you, chair. I'm Nick Calder. I'm the head of development management at Wandsworth. In terms of the application that Councillor Graham and other councillors received notification of today, that's not within the demise of the park. That's on another part of the land, the former Diamond Estate, which is the south west corner. So it doesn't impact on the park itself. In fact, if that gets permission, they'll actually increase the size of the park. Any further applications on any part of the metropolitan open land will of course be subject to planning application which would come through the planning applications committee at Wandsworth and the GLA. The understanding that I have is that the metropolitan open land will be dealt with separately as the green belt and the relaxation that the government are talking about on green spaces because the metropolitan open land is so important within as a lung for Wandsworth and London as a whole. So each application will be taken on its merits when it comes in, but it's not for a sort of decision at this stage and indeed the legislation and changes haven't gone through parliament yet. Thank you, Mr. Calder. Are there any other questions from members? That's a lot lighter than the last one. So with that in mind, again, this petition response is not for decision, it is just to note it. So do members note the petition? Note the response. Yes, sorry, can I have a comfort break? Yeah, that's fine. It's been an hour and a half, so if other members are happy we could take a brief five minute comfort break. So we'll come back at ten past. Thank you. Thank you, everyone. The brief comfort break is over, so now we'll be going on to our next item in the agenda. So that is agenda item number four, which is the revenue budget monitoring quarter one paper, and I invite Mr. Moylan to provide an introduction on the paper before opening to questions. Thank you, Chair. Good evening, committee. My name is Alex Moylan. I am the head of finance and performance within the environment and community services department. So this report sets out the revenue budget forecast for the current financial year as at quarter one, so that's 2024, '25. Within all of the services within the remit of this committee, there is an overspend forecast just over 400,000 pounds against a net budget of 48, near enough, a million pounds, equivalent to just under 1% of the overall budget. It's still relatively early in the year. As I said, it's at quarter one, so there will be some volatility expected. The forecast by division is set out in paragraph two on page 14 and in more detail within the appendix on page 17. The drivers of the current forecast are set out briefly as part of the body of the report, and as well the mitigation actions where we are able to address costs or service pressures. Those are set out to bring the budgets as much as possible back into alignment. The largest single driver of this overspend is the expected value of the concession proposed by enable, which was discussed earlier on in this meeting. In particular, the economic conditions throughout the term of the contract to date have been rather unfavorable, and that represents the base concession of -- versus the budget that we have. I'm very happy to take any questions about any specific elements of the report. >> Thank you, Mr. Moreland. So this is a paper for information. It's now open in the floor to Councillors to ask any questions. Councillor Brooks. >> Thank you, Chair, and thank you for that. I just had a quick question on paragraph 8 on page 15 about the street cleaning and the increase in cost of 305,000 pounds. Can you elaborate on why that is? And it's a bit of -- this might not be for you in particular, but other officers can take it, but is this because the regular program has suddenly started performing worse and is requiring extra ad hoc street cleaning services? And if so, have you any idea why that's happening? Thank you, Councillor. So the -- it's probably worth explaining that the street cleansing contract is a rather complex contract. It has a base core element to it, and then there are multiple other variable or additional services as part of that. Some of the variable elements are driven by weather. For instance, you have a leafing season and you can have a very good leafing season for cleansing or a bad leafing season for cleansing, and therefore we have some variability in that every year. The element that -- the variable element that we're talking about in the paper is largely associated with additional cleanses or kind of rapid responses to remove things on the street that you don't want them on the street. It could be a dead fox or something along those lines. The -- part of the reason it has always been -- it's been a rather consistent cost pressure since the contract was established. There were some uncertainties about the extent of demand for the service, which does, as I said, vary the inflationary pressure for the contract for the last two years has been particularly high in the way that the inflation index would be calculated for the contract. We found elements of growth in that cost. But there is a significant amount of work that's ongoing across the team and with partners and contractor to manage this part of the service to make sure that we can better profile and formalize elements of the cleanses into an ongoing monitoring program. Thank you, Mr. Martin. Councillor Kirk, you've got a question. Thank you. Could I just maybe follow up on that? By the way, the fox -- I don't know if you're referring -- I don't know how many foxes you move every day, but I notified a squash fox just out here a few days ago and it's gone within the hour. So congratulations, whoever moves deceased foxes. Can I ask in this -- so paragraph 8 again, megaskips, do they -- where do they sit in budgetary terms? Are they in here? How are they budgeted for? I'm just curious. So the cost of management of megaskips sits within highways, operations and the street scene and so it's part of the -- it's grouped together as part of inspection and enforcement. Thank you. Are there any other questions for Mr. Martin? No? Okay. So again -- sorry, Councillor Jeffries, you've got a question. Sorry, just to add in a very quick one. So we've got the waste disposal income, I suppose, at paragraph 9. I'm just wondering, do any of the officers have any figures for the food waste collection usage across the borough? We can -- I mean, I don't have it to hand. I can very readily ask Natasha Epstein or the Director for Waste to provide that to you. It is to hand but not to hand right now, certainly. Thank you, Mr. Chadwick. Are there any more questions? Councillor White? Yeah, can I ask a quick question about the fact that we've had to add money to the contracts? I mean, for instance, the additional money for the rapid cleansing team, that -- I mean, it strikes me as something that should have been part of the contract anyway. I mean, why are we paying extra? Because there's more rubbish on the street, obviously. But I mean, why isn't that covered by the contract initially? So the specification of the contract, I wasn't involved in its establishment, but the specification is such that you can either have a -- you could have an all-encompassing contract that wouldn't have elements broken out into volumes, or you can have this contract which has core cleansing service and then multiple other elements which are variable in nature. I would imagine the argument would be that if you can drive down the prevalence of cleanses, then that saves both you and the contractor money. So it's advantageous in that perspective. Are there any other questions to Mr. Warren or any of the other officers on this paper? Sure. Mr. Chadwick? Can I just add? I mean, your point is well made, I think, Councillor. I think we would approach the new contract next time around in a different way that accepts your point, really, that rapid response is a core contract element, yeah. Thank you very much. Any final questions to officers? Okay. So this paper is for information, so is that noted by committee? Noted? Okay. Thank you. Okay. I had it on the next two papers. I just wanted to say a note that, as you would have -- as members would have gotten their agendas, there are sections of the paper that include information that's sensitive to the tendering process, so it's important that these things such as finances or the names of any of the bidders are not mentioned. As is part of an outgoing tender process, officers will explain this further as well. We have the option to also vote to turn off the public web stream and empty the gallery if you wish to discuss some of the private details, so if you do wish to get to that point, then we can do, but first we'll start on the substantive details that are part of the white paper. So this first paper, item number 5 is the contract for the provision of grounds maintenance services for Wandsworth, paper number 24-226. I believe Mr. Alastair wants to make an instruction on this. Could you introduce yourself and the paper? Good evening, Councillors. My name is David Alastair. I'm the assistant director for Leisure, and it's nice to be here tonight. So the report in front of you this evening seeks approval for the award of a new grounds maintenance contract. Within it, you'll see within 2A, B, and C, it's also to agree leases of various premises as part of that contract, and also to award an additional component of that tendering process, which is additional recycling in parks and open spaces. The contract is due for commencement on the 24th of February next year and is for a period of six years, plus an option to extend for a further six years beyond that. This award widens the scope compared to the existing contract, and it does reference it in the paper, but just to clarify, this now includes play, inspection, and maintenance, which is additional. It does cover London living wage or real living wage, which is the same figure in this case. It does cover that, whereas the previous contract didn't cover that. And then, as I say, there's the additional over the recycling in parks. To give context, this was a single procurement exercise, but it's across three lots. So one of those lots was the grounds maintenance contract for the London Borough of Richmond. The second one is in front of you tonight, and then there's a third lot, which is for the ones worth housing contract as well. Part of the process of going out as a single procurement exercise was to look at efficiencies, synergies across those contracts, and that's partly covered when we get to the issue on the goal paper. Some differences from the existing contract, and the first is that this is an output specification, which I'm sure you know, but if you don't know, you can ask me and I will try and explain that. But essentially, we would expect to see from that a result in increasing quality of the maintenance of our parks and open spaces. You'll see within the evaluation, there's social value is included in that and there's a commitment within this to work more closely with friends. We've heard a lot about working with friends tonight and working with, trying to understand, representing themselves, et cetera, and a lot more engagement, which I think is a really positive aspect of this award. You also heard earlier through the first item about this is a self-monitoring contract, which I can explain further if you need me to, and there's a number of benefits just throughout the actual contract. I think this is an opportunity to recognize and celebrate that there is a saving in real terms. We hope to see an improved quality and I'm confident of that. And then, of course, we have the wider scope. Just to touch on what the chair said about the goal papers, and let me try and explain that a little bit more. Because there's three lots within the process, there's three different governments, so there's three different committees essentially that have to award, and of course, they're not all happening concurrently with us right now. So one has already happened in the Richmond Borough, and then there's two more to come. As we go through, I would just endorse what the chair said around referring to bidder one and bidder two. Obviously, you can see the names in the goal paper, but if we can refer to bidder one and bidder two, that would be very helpful. Obviously, no financial figures. I'm just more than happy to take any questions. Thank you for that introduction, Mr. Alastair. Do we have any questions? Councillor Kirk. Thank you. I've got two questions. First is -- I don't need to name anyone. Should we be surprised, there are only two bidders. Should that be a concern? Should there have been -- sometimes you see five or six or whatever. Does it tell us something that the market isn't as deep as we might hope? It's a good question. I think the reality is there's only a relatively small number of people out there in the market that can compete on this size and also of this quality of contract. So, no, I don't necessarily take it as a bad thing. We did have a lot of sort of early expressions of interest, as in that they were asking for the information, but then as soon as that information was released, a number just didn't go through to the next stage. To try and reassure, I would say that the quality of both bids, I think, was really high quality. There were differences, obviously. There always are. There's difference in price and difference in approach, but both bids were actually very high quality. Could I add my second? Sure. I was just going to reflect. They don't necessarily know that there aren't loads of other bidders, but of course they do all talk to each other, don't they? So they probably know there are only two bidders. Second is on the self-monitoring, which slightly relates to our discussions earlier. I mean, we all know, human nature being what it is, self-monitoring can be flawed. So how do we know that's going to work? Who's actually going to hold them to account, check what they're doing? So on that one, I think maybe it's useful to explain the process behind that and start by saying that that self-monitoring process is in the specification that they tendered against. So we have set out our stall very early, saying this is what our expectation is. And when you respond to that, you know, this is the minimum. What else would you add to that? So the process will essentially be that we will expect on a monthly basis a number of reports from, I nearly said the name, from the successful contractor. So we know exactly when we get those every month. We know exactly what's in it. We have set that standard at this stage. And what it then happens, and they tell us when they went around and evaluated themselves, their own performance and all their KPIs, et cetera, we will then use officers to then monitor, who will be monitoring that contract, to go out and spot check. So there could be 50 sites that we want, or 50 things that we want to be looked at. And the day that that comes in, an officer will go out with, nearly said it again, with Bitter 2's staff and actually look at what that says. If they graded something as an A, our officer will then go, is it an A? Is it a B? And then they will be, you know, marked accordingly. So it's, again, to try and offer a little bit of reassurance, this is an established system, and has been in Richmond for a number of years, since 2012, this process. And to be perfectly honest, it's been refined as we went. But I would say that there's a lot of, I have a lot of confidence in this system and that it does work. Thank you, Mr. Salz. Mr. Eady, did you just want to come in? David's given a very good response, but I just wanted to elaborate on that a little bit further, that that is the primary reason why we requested two officers to support, to make sure that we have that robust monitoring. But also, the friends and the MAC groups who will be incredibly important about making sure the contractors do what they do, and it's very typical, and I'm sure this actually probably already happens, that you train volunteers to be able to understand the quality aspects of the contracts as well. And ENABLE will also play their role as part of the, you know, the people that are looking after our parks more generally to be able to spot things. And I'll be very interested to understand how the winning bidder will work with the community to make sure they're tackling issues right at a local level. At the moment, it goes through three stages. See, if they complain to the council, we go to ENABLE, ENABLE go to the contractor, the contractor respond to ENABLE, ENABLE respond to us, we go to the contractor. So it's trying to reduce that and get resolution at a local level, which is good practice and less frustrating for the resident. Thank you. Councillor White. Yeah, I wanted to take up the point being made about social value. I mean, where contracts value social value at 10% rather than, say, 20%, which other councils do. Doesn't this run the risk, as we saw in the legacy contract that we discussed in the last paper, the cheapness is rated too highly? And maybe it should be better balanced by increasing the social value if we don't take it in house where we have more flexibility and be more in control. I think it's a good observation. There is obviously within the corporate regulations around procurement, that's where the split starts about cost versus quality and then the 10% on the social value element. So that's essentially set by corporate standards. I think in this particular contract, that it's a very operational contract, if that makes sense. So the social value doesn't detract so much from it in this case, but it's not to say it wouldn't in others. And what I would also add is that by asking contractors who are essentially grounds maintenance contractors historically, by asking them to start and explore that social value, and that's happened over a number of years across London and the rest of the UK, it's making them up their game and making them more responsible and more reactive to local needs. So I think with every contract you'd ideally like to be able to shift some of those percentages and I think the social value could be higher, but at the minute we're bounded by the corporate regs on that. Thank you, Ms. Raster. Are there any other questions for officers? Okay. So we can now ask this paper as for decision for the executive or if there's -- if everyone's happy with the recommendations and they also feel no need to go into the goal paper, we can recommend it for approval here. So, yep, is that agreed? Cool. So item number six again is another tendering contract and we have Mr. Hinks to introduce this. This is the list enforcement contract award paper number 24-227. Councillor Kirk. >> Thank you. Just to say I would like to make reference to one of the -- yes, exactly. >> So you wish to go paper. We could make that. >> Okay. In that case we'll need to go to a private session. >> Would it be useful to hear the introduction first from the officers and then move into it? Okay. Yeah, that's fine. Okay. Are you happy with that? Yeah, that's fine. >> Okay. So Mr. Hinks, can you introduce the paper publicly and then we will need to turn off the webcast and clear the gallery so we're able to have a private discussion about the detailed nature of the contract. Thank you. Yeah, good evening. I'm Michael Hinks. I'm the inspection enforcement manager. I'm here to present the paper for the littering enforcement contract award. And I'm in a similar position to my fellow colleague Mr. Alistair that I can't go into the general specifics in the public forum. But I'll just give you some background before we move into that for the benefit of the public. Back on the 4th of October, 2018, the community services and open spaces overview and scrutiny committee approved the tendering of a new concession contract for the provision of littering and flight enforcement services in the borough. This was to complement our in-house inspection of enforcement officers. The period is up to two years with an option to extend for a period of a further three years. The current three-year extension ends in February 25. And this paper, a thorough procurement process has been undertaken by council officers to look through all of the tenders for the four organizations with the valuation weighting of meat, most economically advantageous tender, with a weighting of 70% price, 20% quality, and 10% social value, which has, like what's already been said tonight, is agreed by our procurement board. The proposal is that we'd like to award this contract to tender a D. It's clear from this organization's tender proposal that they understand the issues that local authorities encounter trying to combat flight tipping. I'm unable to name the authorities that they've worked with due to the procurement process, but they have worked with some other larger authorities. The latest death figures show that in 2022-23, that Wandsworth is the second highest authority in the country for issuing flight tipping fines. And we believe that this organization will be able to assist us in building on that success were they to be appointed. That's the end of my introduction. Thank you, Mr. Hinks. I'd asked the gallery to clear, but I think it's already cleared itself from the previous items. All that's left are councilors who are able to stay if they so wish. Welcome back, everyone, to the Environment Committee meeting. We're back now from a -- from entering a private discussion about the nature of this tender result. So unless there are any other questions, this is the litter enforcement contract award, paper number 24-227. So with that in mind, is the paper agreed? Agreed. >> Agreed. Thank you. So with that, we go to item number 8, which is the petition response to the Spoffield Road pocket park and playground facilities, paper 24-229. So we have Ms. Shearer who would wish to do an instruction on the report. >> Thank you, chair. I'm here to present the paper on the response to the petition from residents of Swoffield Road. This was presented by Councillor Paul at the full council meeting earlier in the year in March. The petition requested the creation of a pocket park with playground facilities to be located on council-owned disused land between Swoffield Road and Whitehead Close, backing onto the Brockle Bank estate. There is a correction in the paper that I'd like to note. In the paper, it states that the total area is 540 square metres. It's actually 509, because the eastern part of the land has been admitted and that came to 32 square metres. So the corrected figure, as I said, is 509 square metres. The land is held in the general fund and not the HRA, housing revenue account. In response to the petition, a feasibility study was carried out and three designs were developed and as referenced in paragraph 7, these designs formed part of the consultation exercise, which went live on 8 July and ended on 19 August, asking residents which of the three designs they preferred, with further questions on materials and features to allow for the preferred option to be further modified to include these requests. There was also an on-site drop-in session on Sunday 21 July, from 12 to 3, and as a result of that and obviously the consultation, we will be sharing the results of the consultation on our portal, and councillors will be given that information and the current preferred design with the amendments to further engage with local residents. So it's a good news story. We've got an area that will have a pocket park, as requested from the petition, and further developed with a further consultation. I'm happy to take any questions. Thank you, Ms Shearer, and Councillor Gasser also wants to weigh in on this. Just to back up what Ms Shearer said, this is a really exciting new project. We've identified this land which wasn't being used, it can be turned into a pocket park. We've started engaging with residents. There's more to do, we need to listen to the residents, our councillors will be out and about listening, there will be opportunities during the planning process, lots of engagement opportunities. We want to get this right. We want to do what most residents want to see there, and people have expressed concerns to me about the risks of anti-social behaviour, so we will absolutely be looking at how we prevent that happening in the evenings and at night. So yeah, really, really excited that this project is happening. Thank you, Councillor Gasser. With that, we can open the floor to councillors. So we will have Councillor Cook. >> Thank you. No, it's welcome. It's a good idea. I know the spot. Can I just be clear in the sort of the sequencing of the consultation which was just described, because I recall seeing the leaflet that went around several weeks ago, and it did look to me, my interpretation of it and that of the person who gave it to me was very much that this is happening rather than it's a consultation. Yeah, as I say, I think the thing is a good idea, but I was a little bit confused by the way it was pitched. Have I misunderstood something? >> No, it's consultation, as we do with most of our consultations, we give three options of designs, and we don't actually -- on this consultation we ask more questions on the features, on the materials, so that there would be more opportunity to actually, rather than saying I want B, I want C, you know, you can actually say, yeah, B is my preference, however, I'd like this additional material to be used. So we've actually, in a way, improved on that consultation by asking further questions. Thank you, Ms. Shearer. Councillor Jeffries. Thank you, Chair. And, yep, it's great to see the Council moving at pace with this. If I can be excused on this meeting to use it for -- to raise my own and Councillor Brook's own playground issues in Wandsworth Park. We have made really good progress this consultation over the summer at Ms. Shearer. We've had some really helpful dialogue. I am just very conscious that it is now years that we've been waiting for shovels in the ground. I know not all of those issues are within the power of the council to control, but I think just as ward councillors, and I know sort of increasingly residents would just love to know what the specific sort of construction timeframe is going to be just so that we can have something to work from, but if we could perhaps pick that up offline, that would be helpful. That will be included in the consultation results. You know, with all our consultations, we put it on our portal, given background and given an idea, an indicative timeline on when the project should be completed, and for this one, it's going to be early 2026. Thank you very much. Just a quick opportunity to clear something up. Again, on sequencing, was it the case that the principle of a pocket park and playground was established on Swafford Road before the petition was launched? Ms. Shearer, do you have -- are you previously on information? No, it came from that petition. Yeah, so that actually -- yeah, that came from the residents requesting it. Councillor White. Yeah, I'd like to share with the rest of the committee, I think it's a really good thing, and if you could briefly tell us what benefits are from a pocket park, but also other examples in the borough where we've put in pocket parks that work successfully and maybe overcome some of the problems that were told that there's going to be antisocial behavior and things like that. No, of course. Well, this is part of the administration's ambition to increase parks and open spaces, and obviously as a council, obviously this is -- and the residents want. So this is, in effect, our first pocket park under this regime, and, you know, we'll have health and well-being improvements, we'll have more community spirit, and just generally, you know, more play equipment and help for our residents. So, you know, it's a really good scheme, and -- sorry, I think, what was the question? [inaudible] I think on fears on antisocial behavior, that's obviously something that's come out of the consultation. So we are -- you know, there will be feedback on that. We have our parks and -- we have our parks and -- our parks police who will be able to inspect, who will be able to do patrols. We have a PSO, public space protection order in the borough, so there's powers that they can use for antisocial behavior. Thank you, Ms. Shearer. And also, there's also the planning process as well, because the law of reference is to design an out crime that will be considered by PAC. Councillor Osbourne, you had a question? Not so much a question, just to reinforce the positive feel about this pocket park in Spoffield Road. We have one in the ward that I represent in Tooting Broadway. It took, I'm afraid, Councillor Jeffries, many years to get there, but we do have one. It precedes this administration just, but it was driven by two of the local Councillors, Councillor McDonald and the late Councillor Andy Gibbons, in order to achieve it. It is a huge success. It is always being used, and the people who live locally are very, very pleased with it. Thank you, Councillor Osbourne. I second that as well. I'm sure all of us Councillors have walked around the area and found a disused area that we'd love to see, tend to be for green space in the sky, and I'm really glad that we've got to realize it for this area. Councillor Brooks. Thank you, Chair. Just to check that the funding of this pocket park won't impact any of the charges for leaseholders on the new development at all. No, great. Thank you. Mr. Eady, did you also want to comment? I was just going to add that building on the success of this is that officers within the climate team are exploring opportunities across the whole of the borough, and a pocket park might be just returning a very slither of land back to a greening and improving drainage and things like that. So it might not necessarily be a play or people to sit. It might be just bringing spaces back to life, bringing habitat development, improving biodiversity, improving heritage, public amenity and the look and feel of a place. And that work is being commissioned and is being delivered by the climate team, and I'm sure it's something that will probably come back to this committee at some stage for approval of a program based on those recommendations. So very exciting times ahead. Thank you, Mr. Eady. Are there any more questions to officers on this paper? No? Okay. So this is not a paper for decision. It's just asking the committee to note. So is this noted? Noted. Great. So we have one final item left for discussion. So this one is a bit more of an open discussion for our members. It is about potential topics for task and finish groups. I just wanted to quickly introduce this. So with the definition I've been given, task and finish groups are a chance for a group of members to get together and look at an issue which is of current or future interest to the borough and their residents. It usually involves putting together remit, organizing one, two or three evident sessions, meeting to agree the learnings and then putting together a short report, one or two pages with the main reflections, conclusions and recommendations. These could then be discussed at a future OSC meeting and forwarded to the executive. These task and finish groups are currently the concepts of them. It is a new concept that has been tried by the council and is one that we're looking to do multiple committees. At the moment it's currently in general purpose committee, which councilor Osborn is also chair of. So I was wondering if you'd also like to give a couple words a bit before we then open the discussion. Yeah, it's important to say this is a very new departure and we are breaking new ground and I think the honest truth is we don't 100% know where this is going to lead. It's a recommendation of our democracy review and the consultancy that came in and made various suggestions on to how we move forward. The idea is first of all to embark upon a type of extra scrutiny, improved scrutiny, which is common in other councils and works very well in other councils. And the intention is also to try and move away from the style of debate and discussion that we have in overview and scrutiny committees. Ultimately every decision will come to an overview and scrutiny committee, but the idea of a task and finish group is to try and have a detailed discussion across the parties with all councilors feeling that they are making a contribution to the discussion and to ideas about the way forward. Trying to avoid that sense in which ordinary backbench councilors might feel that well I'm on a committee, but here I am in the middle of some debate that's somewhat constrained by the timetable and the papers that are presented and the way in which they're presented and so on, to free councilors up from that. And I think to try and take out some of, forgive me for this perhaps somewhat loaded expression, but to take out of the discussion some of the perhaps grandstanding which all councilors attempted to indulge in in a public overview and scrutiny committee. The three that are suggested here are just suggestions but they're important suggestions. We already have provision in our planning arrangements for some environmental goals in a small way and this would be a way of expanding on that and coming up with suggestions and ideas from councilors across the board. We touched on the idea of green corridors or wildlife corridors in a debate earlier on and that's an important area that some councils are involved in. And if we take the one about, it's fairly urgent, about the borough's museum collection at the moment and try to look at a way of carrying forward what the council does with that collection without perhaps having, old hands will know that this was a controversial matter over the years and perhaps it would be good if we had a task and finish group because that might avoid some of the controversy on this matter, casting a shadow over a sensible discussion on the matter of what we might do with the borough's museum collection. The other interesting thing about that one, the third one on the list is that there is also, there is already a plan to try and use the council's children's centres to house mini museums for a bit of show and tell and so on for children and we already have a mini museum in the library across the road which is well supported and well visited in Wandsworth town and so they are possible uses, there could be other facilities, possible uses for the museum collection and we could have a task and finish group to look at that and dare I say it, which bits of the collection we might not want to necessarily hang on to. Thank you Councillor Osbourne and thank you for so expertly disguising which one of those you recommended. So again I want to stress that this is not about discussing the merits of a task and finish group, those discussions will be happening in general purpose, this is more if we are to go in this direction and we do end up establishing a task and finish group, which ones would you be interested in engaging with, which ones would you consider being a member with and then we can take all of this on and we can use that path that this is making process and seeing which one we start with. So Rex has given an excellent introduction on the Bowers Museum collection, did anyone else have any thoughts on either any of the points or did they also want to potentially introduce the topic of their own that we could consider? I think Councillor White raised his hand first, I will let him go first. I was just saying that Councillor Osbourne has probably left something out but I didn't mean that at all. The first one I think with emerging government policy over the planning as well I think it's going to be really really important and I think within the Borough of Wandsworth this is already a very very live issue and I think it must be, our concerns are very different to rural constituencies for instance, so I think that's going to be really really important because the opportunity to destroying some of our environment are quite strong. I mean the planning system is used basically to improve that so I'd be very interested in that. Thank you and as a fellow PAC member I also share that it is really a common interest of mine as well and it would be good to see if there are more ways that we can enhance our environmental goals by working with planning. So Councillor Osbourne you wanted to come back on a previous point? Yes just a very quick point. Some of them might involve more than people from a range of overview and scrutiny committees. So for example if you were looking at something that was using children's centres and libraries it might have people from children's committee and from this committee and conceivably other committees as well. Thank you Councillor Osbourne. Councillor Cook did you have a point? Thank you so just to be clear that the merits of this will be discussed at GP so in a sense a bit premature? Yeah it's premature but we wanted to have it that if it then gets approved at GP we then already have like a rough direction of travel rather than waiting for the GP decision and then sort of starting from scratch at the next committee. At least this gives an idea that when it gets approved then we can start moving quicker on finding an idea and getting these set up. And this would be an important sounding board. We are trying to break away from the idea that things are fixed in a particular overview and scrutiny committee. So okay you're right to ask you know who's going to be driving this, which committee would be driving this and that would be general purposes but we are very keen that other overview and scrutiny committees are contributing to the process which is why it's on the agenda here. And I'd also add that a very important feature which Councillor Osbourne has mentioned is that we want this to be cross party and so and try and take out some of the agro that you do sometimes getting these committees so which is why I wanted to open it open as well to the other side as well and for you guys to see if you had like particular areas of interest or and also you don't have to give it if you can't think of one right now that's also fine you can get in touch with us with an email if you think of a topic that you think would be a really good fit for this. Just wanted to get the ball rolling as possible so if there's nothing if you have nothing to add now that's fine and the doors going to be open if you want to get in touch with me or Councillor Gasser about it. Well I think for now that's probably all we're going to get just wanted to introduce this and get the ball rolling everyone can go home and sort of have a think about what they what they'd like to see and yeah if you all have the opportunity to shape this we're trying to make this as cost part as possible so please get in touch with your recommendations and with that I think that is the conclusion of business for tonight's committee so thank you everyone for your time ten past tens not too bad so thank you everyone and everyone on the public for watching thank you and good night thank you.

• Thank you. [BLANK_AUDIO]