Transcript

Good evening Councillors and welcome to the Community Services Committee meeting of 13th of June and a particularly warm welcome to our newly elected Councillors. Alex do we have any apologies for absence? We've received apologies from Councillor Killick who's attending on Zoom and he's substituted by Councillor Sue Farr and Councillor Lewis Sharp who's also given us apologies. Thank you Alex. Does any member have any Disclosable Connections of Interest? No. Thank you. We'll move on to the minutes of the meeting held on the 14th of March. The draft minutes of the previous meeting are set out on pages three to five of the agenda pack. Are you happy for me to sign the minutes as a correct record? I agree. Thank you. We'll move on to the minutes of the meeting held on the 23rd of May. The draft minutes of the previous meeting are set out on page seven of the agenda pack. Are you happy for me to sign the minutes as a correct record? We will move on. Thank you. Do we have any questions submitted understanding Order 30? No there's no questions this evening Chair. Thank you. We'll move on to item six of the agenda which is the safety review which is going to be presented this evening by Amanda Bird and Borough Commander Lindsay Watley. Thank you. Thank you chair and a warm welcome and thank you councillors. The purpose of my presentation is to provide an overview of community safety here at Tandwich Council. The first slide is just to put it into context with regards to the organisation which and where community safety sits. It sits in the community and partnerships teams under Julie Porter and you can see within that also is emergency planning and resilience community projects and the support for the Ukrainian families. We also cover apart from obviously community safety it's the partnerships and the relationships that we have across the district as well as across the county with partner agencies. Moving on just to put community safety into some sort of more formal context, as we operate as part of a two tier authority in Surrey under the section 17 of the Crime and Disorder Act there is a requirement to have a community safety agreement in place which is the umbrella agreement across the whole of the county and all districts and boroughs. And this sets out the responsible authorities that work together to identify and address those shared priorities and that cuts across the police, fire and rescue, probation, health to name just a few of the agencies. And this ensures that there's strategic coordination across the county with major issues such as obviously the COVID issue that we had over the past few years but also at more local level with regards to delivery of more operational and tactical issues that we have both here in the district as well as across the Surrey and the wider borders into the county. So it provides the governance and the feedback in which that we work locally in Tandwich. Next slide please. So under that there's a statutory requirement of all councils to have a community partnership board. And here in Tandwich we have one that sits as a sort of multi-agency forum. It meets four times a year with an agreed terms of reference and the attendees at that include obviously myself, Lindsay from the police, probation, health, the voluntary sector to name but a few agencies. And often we will invite anybody that has a specialist interest or something or a particular theme or emerging issues or risks that we are seeing or that we're encountering for us to particularly look and explore those issues in greater detail. It ensures that we have a partnership approach to reducing crime and disorder in Tandwich. And we are also have in attendance there a district councilor as well as a county councilor as represented on the board. And with that we also have agreed priorities. So we focus on those themes, these priorities which are detailed on the next slide that we review and discuss as part of the partnership. But in addition to that if we have more operational issues that we feel the need to discuss and look at problem solving plans then we will do so. So the current year includes but is not limited to as priorities protecting the vulnerable from harm, anti-social behaviour, strengthening relationships with communities and partners and serious organised crime and prevent. This list is not limitless. We do focus across a wider range of things but these are some of the things that we work in conjunction with the police and partner agencies to ensure that we have plans in place and we recognise who we work with on these particular issues. And as you will see when on the next slide this is just a few examples of partner agencies that we work with. Often there will be more specialist ones depending on the issues that we are actually working on but within those agencies will be specialist functions that we will work with, liaise with, invite into meetings to help us work on particular issues or risks that we are identifying across the district. And as you go onto the next slide this is just a broad summary of the community safety themes that we work across. Now some of these will be more like touch and I would say are about information sharing, awareness raising, ensuring that all council staff are trained and equipped to identify and spot the risks and issues that might be associated with some of these areas. Particularly those that are more operational of our staff that are out and about engaging with our residents and are more community based and they are more likely maybe to see some of the risks and issues associated with some of these. So some of it is about that training focus and others we are required to have policies and procedures in place in terms of how we would be working with other agencies on these particular issues but it gives you a flavour for the breadth of issues and themes that we work across within the team. This is just a flavour of meetings. I would say that the community safety partnership board itself is a shop window for many of the other things and other meetings that we either chair or work in coordination with the police and other agencies where more operational work would be undertaken. So an example is there you will see one of them is a community harm and risk management meeting that shot into charm. Lindsay chairs that every month and at that there are individuals who are either victims or perpetrators of crime where the problem solving is more required from a multi-agency perspective. So we will have adult social care, mental health, children services, targeted youth support, all manner of other agencies depending on the person that we are talking about and how we can either support them with the issue as well as look at problem solving. So it just gives you a flavour of the types of meetings that we actually chair and coordinate here in Tandridge. The next slide is just a flavour of not to give you too many statistics but just to give you an idea of some of the aspects where we are not necessarily directly accountable ourselves but we are involved with either with ourselves within the council or with partner agencies. Where we for example family support programme which is something that we contribute funding to and is operated by Riregate and Bandstead but helps to support families in need within Tandridge and in the past year they have supported 59 of our families. And pretty compelling as some of the other figures which is domestic abuse we contribute funding to East Surrey domestic abuse service, ESDAS and in the past year there have been 692 referrals from Tandridge and safeguarding referrals which Julie will come on to and give a little bit more of an idea about our safeguarding role. There have been 56 adults and 5 children that have been referred through the team here. So it is just to give you a flavour of some of the aspects of our work that we are involved in. Just to give you another aspect of our work is often you might well hear government will say about their priorities or aspects of community safety which you might well read about in the press or in the media. Often their intentions are then ones that have to be held to be accountable by local authorities and then filter down for us in a two tier council that we have to get involved in. So some of the ones to give you an idea, the review in the community safety partnerships, how they function, how community safety partnerships work with the police and crime commissioners office. So that's under review at the moment and we are expecting some changes in terms of the format and how we would be expected to work and report back on figures such as antisocial behaviour and how we would work with the office itself, the police and crime commissioners office. CERIS violence duty is another one where they are expecting councils to work with other responsible agencies like health, education and the police to look at the metrics for CERIS violence in various communities and work on plans and how we can actually work to minimise those risks and address the problems. Martin's Law, you may or may not be familiar with, which is as a result of the terrorist bombing in Manchester where the mother of one of the sadly deceased, Martin, she campaigned for greater focus on responsible agencies associated with events of various sizes, small as well as obviously large in terms of the first aid security around the events. So, again, there are things that in our team, particularly with our emergency planner, he would be responsible to looking at that when people are applying to put on events in the district. We are looking at individuals who need to be educated and there is some kind of status on that. A couple of highlights we have, a lot of our work is dealing with issues that are emerging or current across the district but we also try to work more proactively and two of the areas that we continue to work to try to work more proactively are frauds and scams. We have some really exciting stories. We are a marketing group which is the intention is to raise awareness of the risk of frauds and scams particularly for those that are digitally excluded because it is easy for all of us, all agencies to put things out on social media but we are very aware of the more vulnerable in our community who may or may not be aware of those issues associated with scams and frauds so we work across many, many agencies and we come together to look at the risks, the emerging risks and how we can actually raise awareness and we get out and try to do talks at various groups and we are always happy to try to talk to various agencies and other groups to see what they are working on and do things that can be implemented. So there are lots of groups that you are aware of that would benefit from having more of an awareness raising about frauds and scams. So we are very excited to be able to have a lot of people who are interested in the use of the term and give a talk and the other one is the working group which again is looking at youth provision where it does exist in town which where it doesn't exist and for us to try to work together with other agencies to look at ways of trying to look at opportunities where we can work with groups to improve the youth provision and celebrate where we do know that there are. There are many youth provision activities and we are interested in running and operating youth provision and identifying opportunities where we can try to work together and try to bring in as many specialist agencies as possible because it is not our area of expertise but we want to try to be that conduit for those interested or providing a networking opportunity for those interested in sharing opportunities for funding or access to other agencies. It is to be celebrated, the great work that is going on out there, we just want to do more to help the young people. The next slide is about safeguarding which I referred to earlier which I think Julie is going to take over. I will briefly touch on this because some of this you will find in the key performance report later on. Just to say that we had 61 safeguarding referrals received in '23/'24 and just to highlight the themes that we are seeing self-neglect is probably the highest, domestic abuse, psychological abuse, physical abuse, neglect and acts of omission. To give you some assurance we have safeguarding policies and procedures in place and we review those annually. All new staff are given online training and also councillors and then we also carry out specific targeted training on different themes. We have done domestic abuse, modern day slavery, frauds and scams and will be doing more this year to all staff. This is reinforced through team meetings and regular reports back to our senior management team. We have quarterly partnership meetings held between Surrey County Council and all the district and boroughs so we can share learnings and also share policy or procedure changes. A number of achievements throughout the year as well we carried out a safeguarding adult board annual assessment and we are still waiting for the feedback from that but anything we get from that we will embed into our policies and make any changes to our training plan. We are just about to submit section 11 which is the safeguarding children's board assessments which is a quite lengthy procedure and a lot of work goes into putting that through and again we will get feedback and implement that when we have that back. We have also done some work with staff on raising awareness of mental health across the Council and encouraging staff to use services available to them such as Able Futures, the Wellbeing Prescription and other links into mental health services. We also had an audit two years ago we just had a re-audit of that and that has been completed. Good evening I am Inspector Lindsay Whatley I am the borough commander who covers the borough of Tandridge, I appreciate it is the district when we speak in terms of the council but in policing we refer to it as the boroughs hence the difference. My role is to oversee the Safer Neighbourhood team but we work quite closely with the Neighbourhood Patrol team who are also the team that work in Tandridge providing the 24 hour cover within the Tandridge borough as well and our vision together is to make Tandridge the safest it can be so that local communities can feel safe and can thrive without living in fear of crime. I will introduce a little bit of my team. I have two sergeants and I have four PCs and five PCSOs that cover Tandridge and I have a further Youth Engagement Officer who is a PC who works with the schools and youths in the area. Alongside the Safer Neighbourhood team we have lots of different specialists that support us and volunteers as well. We have a Designing Out Crime Officer on the next slide. That is currently a vacancy, Simon has just left. I have recruited already and the new one starts imminently. Their role is multi-faceted in a way so they offer crime prevention advice… but they also work with planning and ensuring secured by design so making sure like planning of big developments are the safest they can be and we are designing out crime rather than building an estate or something that is likely to have issues in the future. We have Maria Ingram who is our Anti-Social Behaviour Specialist. She works with us and partners to offer strategic advice on anti-social behaviour where specialist interventions are required. That could be anything from acceptable behaviour contracts, community protection warnings, community protection notices, closure orders on properties, injunctions and criminal behaviour orders. She offers a wealth of knowledge and comes to many of our partnership meetings to advise all of us. We have Ian Samwell who is our Licensing Officer and works very closely with Ian, the Tandridge Council's Licensing Officer as well on all licensing matters across Tandridge. We have Casualty Reduction Officer Pete Hawkins who looks at the Casualty Reduction on our roads within Tandridge as well. And then there are many, many other teams across the force that support us. Like I said, we have a neighbourhood patrol team who provide 24-hour cover within Tandridge. We have a specialist domestic abuse team that deal with all intimate domestic abuse occurrences. We have a dedicated child abuse team. We have CID, the criminal investigation detectives, with 24-hour coverage. So if we have an incident that the neighbourhood patrol team attends that requires that investigative oversight, we've got 24-hour coverage of investigation as well. We have our uniform proactive team who are obviously proactive, they're out there doing our warrants and some of the things that involve going across borders and things as well. And supporting our neighbourhood patrol teams who are out there 24 hours a day, we have a dedicated neighbourhood policing investigation team. So they pick up the prisoners, so when NPT arrests your shoplifters, the investigation teams will process them through custody and then do the files and things to send them to court and that side of things. Thought I'd give you a little flavour of some of the crime data for Tandridge. So I've picked out a few different bits only because they're the ones that people tend to be affected more obviously to yourselves, but there are a lot of crimes that are probably less obvious to yourselves, like domestic abuse, child criminal exploitation and things like that which I haven't covered on here. But residential burglary, which I know is obviously has a huge impact on people. We have seen a very slight increase this year of 3.4%, but I would highlight that last year we had quite a huge reduction of 34.9%. So although it's a very slight increase this year, it is still relatively low and actually we've seen an increase in the number of burglaries that we're solving. I have got it written down that it's 9.5% of all burglaries sold, which is ahead of the national average. But actually that has just gone up again and I don't know exactly what it is, but I know we've just charged a couple more for Tandridge burglaries, which I'm pleased to say. Our vehicle crime, which includes all the theft of motor vehicles has reduced by 3.5%. And again, when you look at the national picture, vehicle crime is definitely going up. So I know it's only a small reduction, but we've been doing quite a lot of work around it. We've charged a number of people. So a slight reduction I think is positive, but we still got more work to do in relation to that. And theft shoplifting, you can see by the graph, there's quite a big increase there. We've actually increased our sold rate for shoplifting by 87%. And as a result, we've seen quite an increase in reporting of shoplifting, which we've been trying to encourage because we know it's been hugely underreported in the borough. And we've seen an increase of reports by 48%, which I see as positive because if we know more about what's going on, we can then deal with the offenders that are coming to our area. So that's just a little snapshot of what is going on locally. But like I mentioned the shoplifting focus, we were well aware that we were having an underreporting of shoplifting across Tandridge. And this is echoed across the force, I would suggest, and probably nationally as well, partly because I think we went through a phase of not dealing with low level shoplifting. And that has really turned around. We've got a new chief who's got new priorities and shoplifting is one of them. So as a result, my PCSOs have done in-person store engagement with all the stores in Oxford and Caterham and the plan is to roll it out to the other villages as well. It's just taken us a little time to get around because they've done it in person with every store in the town. We've had plainclothes patrols and one of those only a couple of months ago, they managed to arrest a shoplifter in Boots. We've issued seven community protection warnings to repeat shoplifters and three community protection notices to repeat shoplifters. And fairly recently, we were granted an injunction by the court to a local prolific shoplifter banning him from certain locations, which is a huge relief to the shops that were being targeted by him. And alongside this, we have identified and targeted two organised crime groups that have been hitting the borough. You have probably seen the reports of Boots in Oxford, which I know was shared quite widely. Really pleased to say that actually it was the local team that managed to identify one of the persons involved. And from that, we have linked them back to an organised crime group that are hitting Boots nationally. We've been working with Boots. Bedfordshire police force actually own them as an organised crime group and are dealing with this as a huge conspiracy now. And so we have passed our investigations to them, but the persons involved were also issued with community protection warnings not to enter the borough of Tandridge as well. That hasn't they haven't been charged with it as yet. And like I said, it is a huge piece of work because of the breadth of their offending. So that will be one to watch in the future, because I think you will have quite a good news story at some point to come. And likewise, Tesco's in Caterham and PCSO Henry Pielbrough has been working with Tesco's. We knew we had an organised crime group of females who were doing bulk trolley pushes out of Tesco's. They were hitting Caterham and they were hitting Hookwood, actually. Tesco's knew them. They'd been working on them for two years, but they didn't have any identification for them. We got the call that they were in Tesco's and Henry managed to locate their car and remove their car keys. So they weren't able to drive away and we arrested five of them. They are now in under investigation for 41 offences across the southeast and that is continuing to be progressed. Again, obviously collating the evidence for 41 different offences will take a little bit of time and it will be looked at as a conspiracy, which takes a little bit longer to build. But we've got that work going on, and then I thought I'd go through some of the other successes that we've had recently. In March we managed to charge four members, again, of an organised crime group who've been responsible for 53 high-value vehicle thefts. Many of those were within Tandridge. They were sentenced to a total of 12 and a half years. Some of these have worked that have been ongoing for quite some time and I would say, especially with the vehicle crimes and the burglaries, actually many of our victims will have been told those occurrences have been filed. We haven't found anyone, but actually through ongoing work we've identified people and then subsequently managed to charge them. In Whiteleaf, many of you would have probably seen, but in March 2024 we managed to charge two males with an attempt murder, who have both been remanded in custody following a vehicle that hit a male on a moped and then proceeded to assault him as well. And we've got two males who have been charged with conspiracy to burgle across Surrey, Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire, which included a series in Wallingham and Caterham. That is now three males. We've identified the third, and they have now been charged and remanded as well. Like we say, sometimes it can be quite slow burning, but it does get there in the end, but it can be quite a long process. And I know one in Caterham, which was having quite a significant community impact, was the keying of many vehicles in Caterham. We have arrested and charged a male for several criminal damages and he has got a community protection notice now not to attend certain locations within the Caterham area. There is still some work ongoing in relation to him, but there's some positive outcomes for those victims. And again, only earlier on this month, it was some proactive work that we had been carrying out, but very helpfully, our northern colleagues managed to stop a vehicle that we had the interest in. And we located one person in the vehicle and then subsequent searches, located two further persons, and we've charged them with 12 counts of thefts in relation to conspiracy to steal motor vehicles. Again, your keyless vehicle thefts, at least three of them were in the Tandridge area. We're still waiting to see how many more they're going to link to. I've got a feeling it is going to be quite a few more, but watch this space for that one, I think. And like Amanda has said, we did quite a lot of working with our partners. I won't go into what Charlie is, because you've already covered that one for me. But we have a Serious Organised Crime Joint Action Group, which is chaired by myself, and Amanda Kerr chairs with me. The members include Housing, Licensing, our Serious Organised Crime and County Lines coordinators within Surrey Police. And it's to bring partners together to problem solve serious organised crime issues impacting on Tandridge. And it's amazing what partners who are out and about in the communities, what information they hold. If they don't know what serious organised crime we're looking at, they might have that key piece of information that will give us that bigger picture that we really, really need. So it's a really beneficial meeting. Again, the Joint Action Groups when we have issues identified and we regularly hold cross-border meetings and we border three other police forces, which makes us a little bit vulnerable in that sense. We border Sussex, Kent and Met. So travelling criminals coming through our boundaries can be quite difficult to track down. So we have cross-border meetings with the relevant forces. We've got cross-border teams channels as well, where we share fast-time intelligence, which is really, really beneficial. So obviously some of our other boroughs within Surrey Police don't have those borders and they don't have that travelling criminality. But Tandridge has always suffered with that. And you can see that from some of the vehicle thefts and some of the burglaries that we have. Alongside that, we have the anti-social behaviour interventions. We've had two partial closure orders obtained in Dormansland in Caterham. Partial closures partially close a residential property for three months. That means that only certain people are allowed to reside within that property or even enter that property. That can be to protect that resident. It could be that they've got unsavoury persons visiting and they're vulnerable. Or it could be to protect the other. And it also can be to support residents nearby as well. But just to give you a flavour of some of the work that goes on. We issue anti-social behaviour warning letters to young people and adults. And again, this is a bit of a stepping stone in the anti-social behaviour legislation. It starts with warning letters and then we've got the escalations of community protection warnings. Community protection notices, which can be really, really powerful pieces of legislation. Once you get to a community protection notice, if they start being breached, there is a power of arrest attached to that. And we've used it with some young people, 17, 18, who are not local to the area that have been causing issues. And by issuing the CPN, we've had one breach, but actually since then we're not seeing them enter the area. And they were bringing issues to the area. So they can be really powerful pieces of legislation that we're using. Obviously being Tandridge, we do have rural crime. We've got a dedicated rural PCSO, Kerry Furlong. And she is also supported by the rural crime team, which has three PCs on for the more specialist advice as well. We've seen quite a big increase in sheep worrying locally. And she's distributed over 60 sheep worrying signs that are now all displayed in lots and lots of fields, probably near you. And she's beginning a roll out of additional rural security measures with farmers, gamekeepers and things. More recently we've had four persons charged with animal welfare offences in Caterham. And I had been really, really clever and put a video in my slide show. But IT has defeated me in being able to actually send it to Alex, so he's going to find it for me. But I've got a quick snapshot of a poaching arrest and charges following an incident on Christmas Day up at Titsy Hill in Oxford. Hopefully. Yes, yes, I can see that the guys in the red are very clear. One must be carrying a bag. One has potentially got a weapon there. So I'm hoping we can intercept them when they come to the next over. The walking through the woods. A long way from the top. Is three to one. Do it now. Yes, yes, that's good work. The rifle back in the woods. They were two males that have now been convicted of night poaching. They were from Brighton and Derby that decided to come and visit us on Christmas Day. So it's just some of the things that you probably don't see us doing. But rural crime, poaching and that side of things is just one of the other things that we are out there responding to as well. And then lastly, and like I said, we've got a new chief who started just over a year ago. He has very much made it. Surrey police's plan is that Surrey police fights crime, protects people and we strive to earn the trust and confidence of all our communities. We're here for everyone who needs us. And we put self service before self. As part of that, we were struggling, I would say, in our contact centre and people being able to contact us, especially on our one on one service. We've had a significant improvement in our contact centre. In January, Surrey was back in the top 10 nationally for answering 999 calls with 97.8% of them being answered within 10 seconds. And in February that's increased further. So there's been a real focus in trying to be there for people when they need us the most. And most locally, I've just popped our priorities on that. But we're continuing to try and improve our community engagement across the borough and continue to build our strong cross-border relationships because they've been really beneficial in tackling some of the more organised crime that is hitting us. Tackle serious acquisitive crime and bring those offenders to justice. Improve our domestic abuse performance. Increase the arrests and charges of offenders who are causing harm in our community and continue to use problem solving to tackle chronic and complex issues in the borough. Thank you. Thank you very much for an informative presentation. I particularly like the police camera action at the end. I didn't. I think it was causing a lot of problems. Any questions? But please be aware that they cannot answer any individual specific case questions. So I'll leave it. Councillor Sayer. Thank you, Chair. I wonder if Lindsay or Amanda or both would like to talk about this isn't an individual case. It's a general case about what's happened in this district over last weekend and what is continuing to happen. And there's a whole community who came in here on Tuesday night to talk about how they're scared to leave their homes. They're they're fearing intimidation and threats. And this is all to do with planning breaches on the continued over last weekend and continuing now. And there's a whole set of sites in the same area. And I wondered if you could perhaps for people who weren't here and also for any of that community community who may be watching tonight, who've seen that the community safety review is being discussed here for any of those people from Shipley Bridge or from Smallfield who are concerned. If you could just give us a quick rundown of what's being done to try and help them. Thank you. And like Catherine has said, it does relate to unauthorised and development on land. And it's not an unauthorised encampment. And some, unfortunately, policing powers don't exist in terms of like if you had a park that had caravans attend on it and it's an unauthorised encampment. We have policing powers. This is very much a development. So it falls under planning laws, which is where the council come in in relation to. We've had a residence meeting at quite short notice on Tuesday night with a lot of the involved persons. And moving forward, we are going to be setting up a joint action group with all the involved agencies to look at the best way forward and look at the most effective action and enforcement that we can take from all angles. Be it council, be it police, be it forestry commission. There's lots of different angles that can be looked at and including some of the more specialist sites such as other people such as Thames Water, UK Power, there's a lot of people. They need to come together to sort of fully understand what is going on there and what can be done at the location. So far, the council have issued temporary stop notices at two locations and they are looking to progress further enforcement down there. Councillor Gray. Thank you very much. First of all, I'd like to thank you very much indeed for your report and for all the hard work you do. I'm sure it often goes, you often go un-thanked, but so I am thanking you. So thank you for all your work. Something that I know that a lot of local shopkeepers are very worried about is shoplifting. We hear a huge amount about it in the national news. There were some statistics that you gave that I didn't understand and it's my kind of ignorance. I'm sure it's my ignorance, but I'm ignorant and inquisitive. And you said that instances of shoplifting being solved had increased by 87.1%. But I don't know what that means. I mean, does it mean that shops are identifying X number of shoplifting events and that you're finding criminals in 87.1% more of the reported cases? I don't know if that's what it means. And what does it mean for the stats of the instances of shoplifting? Are we actually impacting them? Are we actually reducing instances of shoplifting? So, I mean, it may be a fantastic statistic, but I just admit that I don't understand it. No, so our reports of shoplifting have increased, but I wanted them to increase, because we've done all this engagement with the shops, asking them to report it to us. If I hadn't seen an increase in reporting, I'd have been quite disappointed to be honest. So for me, that increase is quite good, because we need to know what's going on, because I know still, despite that increase, it's still hugely underreported. And I want to know those incidents, because actually, it then allows us to deal with those repeat offenders. We know that many shoplifters will go from one shop to the next to the next to the next. They'll go from Oxford to Caterham to Lingfield. They won't stop. There was a picture on my slide show of lots and lots of items that we seized only last week. I know, because they were sat in my office waiting to go back. They were actually from Eden Bridge. They were stopped in Tandridge, but they'd done all their shoplifting in Eden Bridge. They were probably on their way to do more within Tandridge. So for me, we have had an increase in reporting, but I've wanted the increase. But alongside that, we are solving more than we ever have done before, because prior to that, there was limited investigation going into it. We have got the neighbourhood policing team, investigation team, now they pick up shopliftings. The shoplifting is reported slower time, so after the offender has left and things like that, it will initially be dealt with by our telephone team up at headquarters, because they can take the report, they can ask for the CCTV, we can send out what's called a nice link, which goes out to people, and they can upload their CCTV to us. So rather than us previously having to go out, pick up a disk, bring it back, upload, they can do it all automatically and come straight through to us. From that, as a force, we're starting to use things like facial recognition, things like that as well, which is quite useful, especially if you've got someone who's not local. But as soon as we've got footage and stills of someone who's been shoplifting, it's shared on a Surrey Police portal with all other officers for identification. And quite often, you'll get identification because the local team will recognise them and things like that. And then following that, you'll get the arrest or voluntary attendee of them, and then subsequent charges and things, which are your solved outcomes, which is the increase that we've seen in solved outcomes. So despite the big increase in reporting, we're getting the same increase in us solving them, if that makes sense. Councillor Chotay. Madam Chair, am I allowed to ask a question? Thank you. Firstly, I have a saying in my vocabulary that the police, you saw that in Christmas time, they are the ones who are awake, so we can sleep in safety. So bravo to our police, basically. That's number one. Number two, I would like to touch on what Councillor Sayre mentioned, and I'm wondering, I'm sure you're doing it because, you know, it's like teaching granny to suck eggs. Would there not be any intelligence in terms of the kind of things that, before they happen, you have telltale signs, so that you could start to, how should, prowl around, if that's the right word? I would just say, like we were talking about Shipley Bridge, these persons own that land, so policing powers don't apply. I can't stop them from going on their own land, I can't stop them from building things on their own land, putting things on their own land. That's where planning permission and planning processes come in place, and that's where we're looking at unlawful development, rather than an unauthorised encampment, and that's where this sits, more so in terms of the planning side with the council, than with policing, unfortunately. But I understand what you mean. And in terms of unauthorised encampments, if we do get that intelligence and things, we do try and get out there and prevent things from happening, but it's not always possible. Councillor Sayre. Just following on from what councillor Chiotay said, it is a planning problem, and I think we all accept that here, however, the level of reported intimidation and threat, and the fact that the pub cannot open now at night, unless it takes bookings for food, the whole community is really under fear, and this is quite a large community. It's not just a couple of houses and it's all the way up a particular road, it's a whole set of sites, there's some more sites where it may happen, and there's, not that I've witnessed, but there's anecdotal evidence of people being threatened about whether they'll sell their home and if not, their lives will be made a misery. I mean, I find it astonishing in this sort of country, that people can live in that sort of fear, and nothing can apparently be done, and you know, any reassurance you can give, I know you set up a joint emergency team, but I'm not quite clear what that does, so any extra information you can give tonight, I think we'd be very welcome. So prior to the Joint Action Group, we've got a Core Professionals meeting next week, which has got Tandridge Council's Head of Legal, but also my Antisocial Behaviour Specialist as well, coming together to look at all the different options that we have got physically possible to us, looking at what legal options there are to establish which routes we can go down. There are difficulties, like we covered in Tuesday's meeting, in relation to confidence and being able to report to us, and then following things through to prosecutions and things, because I appreciate that people are fearful, and they don't want to put their names to things, which is one of the challenges that we're going to have, and likewise, through some of the conversations that we've had, there are options that we can put in place, but again, any breaches of some of those options would require residents then having to be witnesses to prove those breaches, and actually, that is again, putting them in a really difficult position, so we need to really carefully look at what is the best option that will protect the residents the most as well, and which is the best way forward, which is what the core professionals meeting next week, that's already been set up, is to look at, and I've even been in contact with the residents today, looking at some of the things we can do with them. Any more questions? No? Well, thank you very much for your presentation, and we look forward to receiving the next one later in the year. Right, let's move on to item number seven, which is Public Convenience Refurbishment Progress Update, and this is presented this evening by Catherine Decca and Julie Porter. Good evening, members. The report provides a progress update on the refurbishment of Twellett. Some equipment at Station Road, Oxford, were replaced, contractors have been instructed to refurbish Ellis Road and Godstone, similarly, the roof at Wallingham Green and Whiteleaf are being done. It also highlights some of the challenges officers have encountered thus far in delivering the project. Due to the age of the Twellett, when something needs repairing, it is a challenge to replace them, as they are no longer manufactured. Please note that under the Public Health Act of 1936, local authorities in England and Wales have a power, not a duty to provide Twellett for use by the public. Public Twellett are not a statutory service. There are ten Twellett within the district, the Agreed Capital Budget for 2023 to 2024, and across 2026 to 2027 is £803,000. The average expenditure to deliver this provision is £104,400 per annum, covering utilities, cleaning, maintenance, repairs and supplies. In the current financial climate, sustaining the costs of maintaining and replacing equipment and buildings at the current level is not feasible. Given the limitation of the capital and revenue budget, officers propose assessing sites using the prioritisation matrix with recommendations on rationalisation to come to the September Committee. Additionally, it is recommended that members authorize officers to initiate exploratory discussions with parish councils and local businesses to assess their willingness to accept assets transfer, so this could be included in any future strategy. I am happy to take any questions. Before I throw this open to debate, Councillor Trott, I would like to speak. Indeed, I would. Just a few minutes ago, we heard the word 'fear' in this chamber. I would like to talk, and I'm very emotional about this, because about five years ago I was sitting there and made a case for looking after and making the toilets in Wallingham, or anywhere else, but I'm here for Wallingham because I'm a District Councillor for Wallingham, to make sure that those toilets are not closed. Now, we've spent the money, and I see that the roof for that Wallingham toilet is being done. That money is spent, or it will be spent. In Wallingham, when you pass through, we have people, workers, who contribute to the economy something which the Government is trying very hard, and we at local level should be supporting that, so that if a builder or builders passing through, they don't have that fear that if nature calls, he, she, whoever it is, either has an accident in their car, or goes somewhere and begs and says, 'Can I use your loo to any business?' Exactly as you said, you don't have a statutory right to provide toilets, but please, please, please, somebody wake me up. In which country am I living? I am living in a country where the economy is good, and we are discussing toilets. It really shames me. And we now talk about going to businesses, pubs, and those places to ask them if somebody could do their natural process. Please help me understand this. For a man, and I'm going to be very direct, for a man, he could find a tree, perhaps might be fined, to do his business. But we also have ladies. And if you look at the demographics and the change of demographics which is taking place in Wallingham at a very rapid rate, I do not want to see the citizens of Wallingham fear to go out for a walk, which is healthy for them, in a beautiful, beautiful area that we live, with the worry that they will have an accident, a natural accident. I urge you all, please, we talk about managing our money properly, we can. But please do not touch, do not close the toilets in Wallingham or any other place, because the demographics are changing. Please remove those glasses of saving. That is my plea, again after five years. And I urge you all, for the sake of humanity, and to reassure me that I am living in a country where we don't talk about toilets. Please. Thank you, ma'am. Thank you, Councillor Chotay. Any questions? Councillor Farr. Not going to really start with a question, but I mean, I will say in part of what Councillor Chotay has been saying, I don't think Wallingham is actually up for closure, and I think the fact that we've done the roof sort of says we're perhaps we're going on it. And I don't think there's any decision tonight on closures. I think we've got some recommendations which don't actually involve it. But to come back to public conveniences, my actual, if you like, questions or comments, comes back to the conveniences maintenance expenses on page 21. It's probably just me not totally understanding what's being said by the numbers there, but I mean, bearing around the fact that the two, what I consider probably the busiest conveniences on the A22 and A25 have been closed and actually demolished. I looked at the figures between 21, 22 and 22, 23, and I couldn't quite get where the figures were coming from. If we look at wages and salaries with the closure of those two in June of 2022, they're obviously in the 22, 23 year, and yet the salaries have gone up by £8,000. I think, you know, if you look at water and you look at electricity, they've also taken huge jumps. So I was concerned particularly with the expense of repairs, which has taken a jump where I should imagine, I don't know whether it was included the actual demolition of that because that's nowhere mentioned. Obviously, we talk about the expense divided by four because it's a four year running total and arrive at the 104,000. I think it's less than that, but I would wonder if, and I don't necessarily have to have it now because it may be a little bit of work, quite happy to take it out of the committee and have a reply elsewhere. But I do have concerns as to how these figures actually stack up in relation to the fact that we closed two of probably the busiest public conveniences in the district during this period and yet the expenses have gone up quite dramatically. Thank you. Bernard, do you want to take that? I can answer a few of your questions, but not all of them necessarily because I don't have all the detail in front of me. To do with the, you mentioned the repairs, you're correct in saying I think the actual two toilets that were knocked down there, they were in that repair number. With that, the savings on the cesspools, if you look at the cesspool number, it's come way down because those two particular toilets had cesspool collections because they went on the mains. The actual wages, I'd have to look at that, but it could be there's just a portion of other management salaries and that's what's flip-flopped around, so it might not just be one person salaried again there. It might be just a portion as they say, but I can easily look at that. The average number is to try and give just a flavour of really the cost because obviously you're going to have peaks and troughs as you go through that. The water charges, the reason it went up so high was because we had a leak, sorry, the pun, but we did have some leaks in various toilets. We actually have had this financial year big credit come back on that and that can be seen probably in this year's numbers. So, yes, I agree that the profile is quite difficult to understand, but I can happily go through it further if you want, Chris, on that. Hopefully that helps a wee bit. Thanks, Rhona. Yes, it does help a little bit. Obviously, if you do take the cesspool charges which have dropped dramatically, if we're putting that totally down to those two public conveniences, it does in fact show how busy it was. I accept that the water may have been a leak, yes, that's fine, but I still found the fact that perhaps the charges, the wages and the rest of it, didn't sort of sit in line. So I wouldn't mind actually still receiving a little bit more of a breakdown from you. Please, if you don't mind. Thank you. Any more questions? Councillor Evans. Thank you, thank you, Chair. I'm with Councillor Ciotat here. I don't think this is a matter of money. I think this is a matter of thinking about our ageing population and our residents who value public conveniences. And I think every one of those public conveniences marked action for possible closure and maybe talking to the parish Councillors and sometimes not even talking to the parish council. I think that's completely wrong. It's not fair to consider closure of a public convenience just because it's used by a few more people. It's relative. You're saying you're going to judge every public convenience and the bottom, say four or five, are going to close because they've got less use than the others. Now, that's relative. They all have a use. And you will not find one parish council that says, yeah, OK, it's not used by as many people as Oxford or somewhere. So, yeah, we'll close it. We can't afford to do it ourselves. And there's very few restaurants or pubs that could take over something like that. I think in these areas, certainly I'm amazed at the recommendation for Westway that holds fates and carnivals on the common and has an enormous number of people using that at various times of the day. And it would be a disaster if that was shut. It's a disaster for families with young children. And it's a disaster for our ageing community and people waiting for buses along the Westway area. Unbelievable. And and the right answer to this, I know we don't have a statutory duty, but I think we have a responsible civil duty to our residents to provide a bare minimum of. Ability to go out and about without having to worry about finding a loo somewhere, and especially for the older community who are not happy to go into just walk into cafes without buying another drink, which is the last thing they want to do. Absolutely the last thing they want to do. So to me, you've just got to put more money in the budget. You've got reserves for things. Use it and just think carefully about what you do. By all means, talk to parish councils and they may well have some money. If something needs refurbishment. But, you know, day to day, I think, all right, it's not a statutory duty, but I think it's a duty that we should take on. No one else is taking it on. Somebody has to. And I think we are the right people to do it, whether or not it's statutory. Thank you. Yeah, thank you, Councillor. I just wanted to clarify for the purpose of tonight, what we are doing is setting the scene for members and saying, you know, we want to go and have these discussions. The appendix was clarifying what the review was done in 2022. And we are proposing that we're going to go and relook at everything. Work out, speak to people, find out what the appetite is. And then we will be having this difficult discussion or not a difficult discussion in September. But let's go away, do some investigation and really so that everyone is very clear what it's going to cost this council. If we continue to upgrade and maintain all the toilets in the district or are there other options? And that's what we'll come back in September for you to make those decisions. So it's really just sort of saying, are you happy for us to go and have those conversations? Do more work, look at a matrix that you are all really clear on and then we'll make a decision in September's committee. Julie's actually really done that. So, yeah, just just to be really clear, the appendix is from 2022. That is not those are not recommendations as it stands. It's just it was a set of work. It was some work that was done that we just wanted to make available to set the context. So there are no recommendations around that. The moment is about how we set our strategy moving forward. And particularly how we what we've not really concentrated on the debate at the moment, which is fine, but is around are prioritized for refurbishment as well as much as anything. Councilor Gray, I'm uneasy with the assurances we've been given. I mean, if the recommendations could be rewritten to reflect more closely what Julie said, then I then I might be happy. But the recommendations say, agree the refurbishment approach and the refurbishment approach is based on the content of the report. And the report includes a summary decision that the summary assessment of, for example, the toilet on Caterham on the Hill, that it should be closed. And I think that should be challenged. And the recommendation is based on that based on that report. So I think even if in your head it isn't, that needs to be clarified and that recommendation needs to be rewritten. I mean, I feel like a bit like channeling my inner kind of Ed Davey and pointing to my own personal experience. I mean, I am, you know, I'm not important, but I'm an example and I have a prostate condition and I'm also a survivor of many serious operations for penile cancer. I can't pee behind a tree, by the way. OK. And, you know, so I use myself as an example in this. I mean, I can talk about some of the local instances, although in a way that's my opinion on the local instances isn't so much the point. I mean, Station Road, Whiteleaf should remain open. Central location, its presence supports local businesses. The reference to alternatives in stations is not a goer and chosen. Well, if I dare say a level of ignorance about the situations there. I mean, there is room for discussion about the one in Whiteleaf Recreation Ground because there's a slightly odd arrangement. It's not a comfortable place to use after dark in the winter. And the adjacent building is owned by Tandridge District Council. So there's scope for common consolidation there. But we must engage properly with the village council and the community about that and get that right up front before we start making summary assessments of what's what. Without that knowledge, Perry's already spoken about the Wallingham one. So I won't go on about that. The case from On the Hill one is extraordinary, in my opinion. It's, I mean, the reference to it not being a central location is pretty damn central. I mean, depends how you define central. Reference has been made to events on the common, which are important one off occasions. But it's right by the major TFL bus terminal. And it's not just the users of the bus, actually, the passengers. It's the drivers as well who frequently use that toilet. If you stand outside the libraries I did this morning having conversations with my colleagues, you see bus drivers backwards and forwards to that facility. So it's constant use. It's also opposite the library used by all sorts of people in the community, including a lot of older people. And the library does not have a public toilet facility. It's also a power source. The toilet has a power outlet which runs the memory tree, amongst other things. So, you know, whatever you say, this report does contain a summary assessment that that facility is not viable. And that must be challenged by reference to the community, the parish council, et cetera, et cetera. Because that's not a robust decision. So I think the modus operandi is all wrong here. And I think Councillor Farr was complacent in what he said. I think Recommendation B should not go forward as it stands because it talks of agreeing the refurbishment approach. And I say no, because that contains a summary conclusion, for example, to close Wallingham and Caterham-on-the-Hill, which is not robust. So I'm all for a review of the viability of each existing public facility. I think the linkage between, you know, the matrix and the budgetary decision is nonsense. Because some within the budgetary envelope, some would have to fail no matter how good the case was. That's the problem. So I think this needs to be unpicked because the legitimate demands of communities to keep toilets open may exceed the budgetary ceiling. So this needs to be sorted out. There are ways through this. I mean, I know the council has budgetary constraints. It has reserves. It has service capacity funds. I can't use service capacity funds every time I want more money spent on something. I know that. But, you know, I feel myself that the approach to reserves is a little bit wrong, as I've expressed before. There are reserves. I don't disagree that we should be talking to parish councils. By the way, not only those parish councils whose lose are currently threatened, because I think those conclusions aren't robust, all parish councils that have lose we should be having a really proper consultation process with. I think the day-to-day running cost should stay with Tandridge District Council, but there may be fruitful discussions to be had about one-off injections of capital for specific projects. But the engagement with parish councils must start getting real and it must be properly run out, properly carried out. Otherwise it's going to be those small recycling facilities all over again where the consultation process was nonsense. And this is a much more serious issue than that. So, you know, I have no particular objection to Recommendation C. B, in my opinion, needs amendments. And the refurbishment approach, as outlined, should not be accepted. An open consultation process should lead this discussion. And mechanisms for keeping valued public services open should be explored. So that is my, these guys have been muttering all the time I've been speaking, so I'd be interested to hear what they want to say in contradiction of what I've said. But that is what I think about this situation. Thank you, Councillor Gray. I'm aware that Councillor Klein has had his hand up for some time, so if you take Councillor Klein, then Councillor Sayer. Thank you, Chair. With regards to Station Roadcar Park in Whiteleaf, obviously when the, here it says, I check availability of station toilets. Well, the station ticket office is only open certain times of the day, which means that when they go home, the toilets are closed, so there is nobody there to let people in and out of the toilets. So that would be one of the things. The amount of traffic that comes through Upper Wollingham Station, I would not like them to get off, get off the train and be peeing behind any of the trees there, because there aren't that many of them. So it would be a, it would actually end up being a cesspit. Whiteleaf recreational ground is a very interesting one. It says discuss with a parish council. Well, I'm part of that parish council and I can tell you we're not a rich parish council and there's no way that we could prop up toilets with regards to finance. And it says here also speak to the park cafe operator. Now are we talking about putting the toilets within the cafe? Are we talking about making some new toilets, which would be a new building adjoining the cafe? Are you going to make the cafe responsible for toilets in Whiteleaf recreational ground? We often hold events in Whiteleaf recreational ground and I feel that those toilets are very, very much needed. And as you can see, the footfall is very, very high. And to put them inside of a cafe, which it's not that you can't swing a cat, but if you had a very large cat, you probably could, but it's a very small cafe which has very limited facilities in there to add toilets within. And as I say, if it was to put them outside, who would be responsible for them? Would it be the cafe? Because it says here discuss with the parish and the park cafe operator. Thank you. Councillor Sayer. Thank you, Chair. I just want to say, and it may be right we should not have included this list. This is complete disinformation about Appendix A. It's out of date. It's not sensible. I mean, for example, look at Godstone Green Toilet's clothes, it says here. We've actually just spent a load of money on putting new ones in. I mean, the whole thing is totally out of date. I'm not sure it should have been included in this paper, but I mean, could we just actually realise that now and stop discussing what's in it because it's not correct? Thank you. Councillor Chai, then Councillor Winder. Thank you for giving me another opportunity, Madam Chair. I heard the word statutory requirement. Was I correct, Madam? It's not a statutory. There's no statutory need as to how many trees we plant. But why do we plant them? Because it's the right thing to do. That's the difference, ma'am. That's the difference. And that's the point I want to make. It's the right thing to do. Thank you. Councillor Winder. Thank you, Chairman. I'd like to thank Councillor Sayer for clarifying the situation with Godstone because that was a puzzle to me. There are no public conveniences in my ward and I have the A25 running straight through the middle of it. And it has caused problems for some of my residents, most notably Nutfield Parish Council with their cemetery. They attempted at one time to provide facilities for the people using the cemetery and had to withdraw it. But I would also like to support Councillor Chai and remind people that it's not just elderly gentlemen with their weak ladders and little children when we're taking our toddlers out for a walk, our little grandchildren now, but there's also a variety of medical conditions, not just affecting the bladder. I'm thinking of things like inflammatory bowel disease, where if you do not have access to toilet facilities, you find yourself trapped in your home. So thank you. Councillor Fong. Thank you, Chair. I mean all this goes back to a January 22 meeting, which perhaps started it, which is with this is the report that went there and was challenged at that time. At that meeting, it was decided there would be no further closures until a full meeting had been held to discuss what was being proposed and how it was going. And I don't believe that this is that meeting. I think we're going to have another meeting where perhaps we can get a decent update on the rubbish that's been presented because it was rubbish in January 22 and it's rubbish in June 24, I'm afraid. The fact that it's been included, obviously, is causing a lot of problems. The fact that the matrix doesn't have any information into it, also leads to loads of doubt as to what's going on. But this is an ongoing thing. It has been an ongoing thing for a fair number of years. And I think the point being made about the statutory details is obviously fine. But it is the way it's being presented in every other single district and borough in Surrey as a cost-saving exercise. We're not trying to save costs on this. I think what we're trying to do, from my point of view, through community services, is actually arrive at a sensible solution. There are some toilets which I recognise still need to be closed. We closed the first two on very good grounds, and that was what it was about. And that has led to a general review of the services we've got. I think at this stage we need to move on away from this report because this report shouldn't be there. We should have disregarded it. And I think that's the situation. It will come back, or something will come back at a further meeting, which will be a decision meeting as far as I understand it. This isn't a decision meeting. This really and truly was a pre-empt to that. Yes. Councillor, thank you for clarifying. I think that is the key, is we wanted to make sure that members were up to speed on what had happened before and where we were going to take this for the future and take on board all the comments that have been made tonight, is that we want to do a full, so that everyone is very clear on all the investigation that has been done in the past and then will be done in the future, so that we actually look at all the comments, we look at all the budgets, we look at some sort of matrix to say this is some information, and that's what we've come today to say, is that we will gather more information in the prioritisation matrix so that we've got absolutely all the information that you need to make a decision at the September. So apologies if that has caused confusion, but that was the point of this is what has been done in the past, it hasn't been discussed at this committee for a long time, and we want to make sure that everyone has as much information so that the decisions can be made in September and we will present options on each toilet for you to debate on. I hope that clarifies it a little bit more, sorry about that. I'm not on this committee, but hopefully thanks in advance for letting me speak. It's definitely a feeling of déjà vu when I was first elected in 2015, this was an item on the agenda, and I seem to remember a newly appointed Director of Place listing out all the public toilets in the district, recommending, and obviously I had an interest in Lingfield Ward, recommending the closure of Lingfield Ward, we're talking about in 2016. And the issue that was referred to at the time and is the underlying problem with our public toilets is that when they were refurbished at whatever point in time they were refurbished, they were refurbished with equipment that is no longer manufactured, and so they're unrepairable, and they've obviously not had the same level of maintenance. My two concerns are that if this council is then minded to start making decisions later in the year as to what they're going to do with the toilets, and one of the options going forwards is to then talk with the parish councils, I am very concerned that actually that is too late to talk to the parish councils, because the parish councils are starting towards the end of the year to look at their budgets and presets for the following year. So if the parish councils are minded to take on additional expenses, even if it's a one-off refurbishment or improvement programme or the ongoing running costs, now is the time to be talking to parish councils with regard to looking to the parish councils, helping the council, fulfil this non-statutory duty, which is an essential lifeline for many businesses, people travelling through the district, and for our residents. What I would like to do is to draw the council's attention to the minutes of the community services meeting of 18 January 2021, and it was resolved, and having been a parish council since that time, I'm not aware of this happening, a public consultation be carried out to assess the views of the public, the parish councils, and ward members on all existing public conveniences and their value to the community. Now that has not happened. That was agreed by this council in 2021. That building survey, building layout plans and detailed specifications for internal refurbishments, excluding obviously the A25 one, decommissioned so that detailed tenders can be put out, and that the public consultation should be brought back to this committee before the committee then decides what to do with the toilets. So this is something that the council had resolved to do, and has not been done. And I think it's really important that going forward, because public conveniences are such an important and integral part of our communities, that actually public engagement is a priority. And we need to know whether those people working in our communities, the rubbish lottery drivers who stop in Linkfield regularly and use those conveniences. So there are employees, there are residents that use the public toilets, and people who want to visit the district. We want this place to be a good place, not just to live and work in, but also to come and visit. So that was one of our objectives, isn't it? So let's see if the community services committee can actually revisit that recommendation. I don't know whether it wants to be put forward again tonight, whether someone on the committee might want to redo that as a priority, or whether it comes back to another committee to do a bit. So it's still fresh in our minds. Thank you. Councillor Mark? Thank you. Just one very quick question about when we come back to actually sit down and have a debate about these facilities, the asset prioritisation matrix, will the criteria on which these facilities have been rated be up for discussion, or will it be presented as complete? Because I just want to say I think it might offer some reassurance to committee members to know that, actually, we will be able to get into the nitty-gritty about each facility and what the value of them are. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, Councillor, the idea is that we come back with the information in that matrix for that discussion. I beg your pardon, Councillor Blackman? It's all right, Chair, it won't be a long one. I think we've had enough of that so far. I think I'm going to raise it above an individual toilet, because I don't have much experience on that. But I think what we need to look at very carefully is just how we do make the decisions. And if you look at it, you know, just from the perspective of us, is that toilet high usage or low usage, that's a bit misleading, because I suspect in many cases the toilets are in such a bad state that nobody's going to use them. So it will come out as low, poor, and you'll go, oh, we'll dump that one. That may not be the answer. We need to go much deeper in how we actually make the decisions of what to do with them. And I think that matrix, as it stands at the moment, ain't going to work. It needs to be changed. And I'm not the expert on that, but it needs to be changed. It's not deep enough. Councillor Gray. I agree with Councillor Lockwood. I think we should go back to the consultation with the parish councillors and the community as a starting point. We haven't got an agreed refurbishment approach this side of carrying out that consultation. So I think that's what we should -- that's my opinion about -- I'm not on the committee -- but what the committee should agree this evening. Yeah, I agree with Councillor Gray. I am on the committee, and that would be my preference as well. Thank you. Any more? Councillor Klein. So can we propose a public consultation? I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. I'm just conferring. Councillor Candon. 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Right, Alex is just writing a new recommendation, so if you'd just like to talk amongst yourselves. Councillor Candon. So just, I think, and we'll need a proposal and seconder for this, because I don't think we've got on just a moment, but so I think my understanding is that you are looking to remove recommendations B and C and replace recommendation B with, approve a public consultation to assess the views of the public, parish councils and ward members, on all the existing public conveniences and their value to the community. Agreed. Okay, do we have a proposer? Seconder? Thank you. Right, moving to the recommendations. So we need to have a vote on whether the proposal that Alex has just read out, which I will ask him to read again. So it's, the amendment is to remove recommendations B and C and replace recommendation B with, approve a public consultation to be carried out to assess the views of the public, parish councils and ward members on all the existing public conveniences and their value to the community. Are we agreed? I'm sorry? Can we have a show of hands, please? Any against? Thank you. Okay, right, we will go back to recommendation A, that the committee notes the progress to date. Sorry about this, I will get the hang of this in the end. We now need to vote on the new recommendation, which Alex will read again if you require. Just to explain, the first vote was to amend the recommendations, which you have approved. So this following vote is to agree the amended recommendations. So shall I have a show of hands on the amended agreed recommendation? Thank you. Any against? Thank you very much. Moving on to agenda item 8, which is the playground refurbishment progress, presented again by Catherine and Julie. Thank you, Chair. This report provides a progress update on the refurbishment of playgrounds within the district. Most of the works to date have been led by parish councils. Fellbridge parish council has secured a grant from the council and contributed towards the refurbishment of its playground, with work due to start soon. But there parish council and Wollinom parish council are in the planning stages of their playground refurbishment. A capital budget was agreed in 2020. The program was delayed by COVID and since then a lack of staffing resources has hindered progress. Ref Report numbers are at approximately 30 years old and the cost on average is 86,000 pounds per annum to maintain and repair. A recent condition report carried out by safe play estimated the refurbishment's budget amounting to over 3 million pounds. This exceeds the allocated capital budget of 981,700,000 pounds. It is therefore recommended that officers produce a playground strategy which sets out the strategic direction for the ongoing maintenance of assets and priorities for the refurbishment program. Additionally, the recommendation in this report will enable officers to initiate exploratory discussions with parish councils and community groups to assess their willingness to contribute to the refurbishment program and the ongoing maintenance of assets. The aim is to bring this strategy for adoption at the September committee. I am happy to take any questions as well. Thank you Katherine. Any questions? Councillor Winters. Yes, thank you. I am not sure, Katherine, if this will be for you or perhaps for Simon Mander. But thank you to whoever has provided a more easy to read version of Appendix A. If I can draw your attention to the Stitchons Lane play area, if you could explain what the recommended refurbishment cost of 57,750 is. Because as Simon is very aware, the parish council has raised funds to refurbish this playground and it is imminent. And of course it is also conditional on having the maintenance and insurance, Simon I am looking at you here, the maintenance and insurance all agreed. Because this is all imminent to go in. So I would like some clarification on that final column in Appendix A, what its significance is. Given that this particular playground, it is not actually Tandridge that is providing the funding for the equipment. Thank you and I will deal with that one. So, when I started off in my role, I was concerned that we did not have a proper capital replacement program for the playgrounds and safe play, who are our contractor who go out and inspect the playgrounds went out to each of the playgrounds and put together proposals on what it would cost to refurbish, including the safety area, the safety matting. And that was done on a light for light basis of the replacement of the same equipment that was currently on site. In terms of the insurance, we are still waiting back for details from Sutton Insurers who are London borough, Sutton who are insurers and I will be able to provide those details once we have got back that information from the insurers. So the costings were done on a light for light basis replacement. Just to give an overview of what the capital impact was and how we should actually be phasing any refurbishment on the views from our experts here who are carrying out the weekly inspections on which sites were needed to be replaced or refurbished first. Any more questions? Councillor Evans. Thank you Madam Chair. I would just like to say yes as a representative of Kateram Valley parish council, we would be very keen to talk to Townridge about the valley sports ground play area at Wightknobs Way. We had an initial consultation before the last election and they are eager to hear back from the officers that they had the consultation with. They haven't yet. Maybe we could, someone could start the ball rolling on that project. Thank you. Absolutely Councillor and that's what Catherine will start to do is just have those discussions as long as the committee are happy that that goes ahead. Thank you. Councillor Klein. Ah yes, with regards to the Whiteleaf recreational ground, I see it's £107,000. It continually needs an upgrade at that park and it's continually having problems where even the parish council are having to fork out money to do repairs, in actual fact money that the parish council doesn't have. It's a very poor parish council in comparison to most in Townridge. And one of the things we have been reporting continually is some of the wooden structures in Whiteleaf recreational ground which we actually wanted to get done before the summer holidays and I'm just wondering if there's an update on that, if this is the right place to raise it. I am due to see the parish council next week at some point and then we can discuss that further if that's okay. Thank you. Councillor Killick online. It's a bit of a delay now we need it, sorry about that Chair. We had a meeting with Catherine, Liz Lockwood-Dewley and Lesley Seeds at Jenners in Lingfield earlier this month, last month sorry, and we discussed a number of things, one was obviously the Skate Park which has been condemned. It was very, very popular, is popular with the kids, it keeps obviously people out of trouble, keeps people entertained. Along with that is the play area which has got swings and everything around, there's no fence to protect it from dog fouling or anything like that, I'm a dog walker, my dogs are kept under control, but there's some people when you walk around, they just go in there, they fail, it doesn't get picked up, it's not ideal obviously for children and families in that area. I think it's something that obviously needs to be addressed, looked at on both counts. Thank you. Thank you. Councillor Farr. Thank you, Chair, I mean playgrounds and the refurbishing of this has been going on again quite a long time. I don't understand some of the comments on some of the playgrounds, that's for sure. Certainly with a lifetime of 20 years, the one in Gosden was replaced five years ago and it now has two and a half years life left, so I would like a better investigation done on the proposed playgrounds. Obviously the play safe estimate of three and a half million pounds puts all of this basically out of reach of the council to do all of this work. So the first thing I'd like to query is how that figure was arrived at, what equipment we're actually talking about, can we have some form of breakdown really rather than just random figures which I think most members here are disagreeing with in their own area in one way or another as to how it was arrived at. The other thing that struck me was the actual cost of the inspections per year because the cost of the inspections to me as a parish Councillor and what we pay for inspections does seem to be a little bit over the top, so I'd be interested in any comments as to whether we've actually ever done any comparison, had gone out for a different form of contract with another contractor or whether we just stick with this once at all times for I think it was 97,000, I read I could be wrong, thank you. So on the playground inspections that is 45,000 pounds per annum across all the sites that includes weekly inspections, monthly inspections, yearly at height inspection, three sessions on each playground or area, including fitness equipment where they go around tightening up the nuts and bolts that they can and every year there's an independent inspection of those playgrounds. So I'm not sure about the 97 figure but the figure in the paper is around 45,000 per year. That is under contract currently and we are exploring opportunities within the procurement of the grounds maintenance contract for the open spaces to have the playgrounds inspections costed as an optional service, therefore market testing what we currently have out there. In terms of the rest of the, I'm just getting the correct appendice, sorry, in terms of the prices that SafePlay have provided or what Catherine has done has provided the summary against each site, there is a much more detailed set of information including inspections for making sites more DDA compliant, so that is a summary sheet which is fed in from quite a lot of more detail. So I cannot see why would that more in-depth detail cannot be shared with committee. Thank you Simon. Councillor Boggs. Thank you, I just would like to know if those inspectors of the playgrounds have a checklist or I only bought this up at our parish council, full council meeting last month or the month before, I can't remember, March it was I think because I watched an inspector go into the playground on our Plough Road site and he was literally in there 20 seconds. If I said 30 seconds I would be exaggerating. He had no clipboard, he looked at nothing, he literally walked in there, stood there, turned around and came out again. I don't see that as inspecting a playground and equipment. Thank you. Councillor Black. Yeah, I'm just looking at my particular ward and I'm not quite clear I fully understand it because there are something like, a lot of them are actually all in Holland Sports but that's not clear at all. So you've got Mill Lane Skate and Trim Trail and as far as I'm aware I think Holland Sports looks after the Trim Trail because I've heard them spending loads of money on it so if you added up the amount for Mill Lane and Holland Sports area it's hundreds of thousands and I think that's way over the top because as far as I'm aware they're spending a lot of money themselves on the football pitches. We've just spent like 20 or 30 grand. So this is I think not quite accurate and we really need to delve into the detail of each individual site a lot more to come up with some accurate figures. I would say that as far as I'm concerned this is absolutely critical that we keep all of these areas, these play areas, the muggers, the skate parks they are used very very much and we need to keep them going. Councillor Lawood. Thanks again for letting me speak. Another bit of déjà vu here, we did used to have a council policy where it was routine that playgrounds were replaced. It was sort of on a rolling program and I can't remember if it was, I think it was 10 years, it was a very short period of time when a considerable amount of money was being spent on a play area. So it was a formula that had to be adhered to and actually we're missing a trick here as a council. I think what we need to do is to look at our play areas and assess the need for refurbishment on those parts of the play areas or those particular play areas which are incredibly overused and wear out. For instance, the nets on climbing frames, they break very easily, they need replacement regularly because the wires are held on with bolts and the bolts snap because of all the movement. Whereas there are some play areas, for example, we have Meadowside listed. There's less than 80 mobile homes on Meadowside and a brand new playground was installed and whilst the children who live in Meadowside use it, it's not used by the wider community because it's very difficult to get to. There's no parking, so parents can't drive and park and use that play area. It's very much out of the way and so parents don't use it because they have to physically go and sit with their children because they can't see it from their homes. The children have to be watched and yet that was completely replaced and the comment that was made to me when it was replaced about five years ago was what on earth did they do that for? It was perfectly good enough, there was nothing wrong with it. Now we've got equipment the children don't want to use because it's not what they liked, it's different. So again, we're a bit out of touch with our communities and it would be a shame if we went down that route of replacing play areas on a formula basis but replace on need. And this brings me to the Lingfield skate ramp and I would just draw your attention to agenda paragraph 1.3, the capital budget in 2021 wasn't spent because of COVID. Now I do know that a capital amount was set aside for the replacement of the Lingfield skate ramp in that year and there will be a Councillor email from Nick Marklew to me on the system somewhere with that amount because that was guaranteed and the guarantee was that it was going to be ring-fenced. And reading through that paragraph further it says that it was carried forward because it wasn't spent. And there were unspent budgets that were amalgamated to the 24/25 capital budget. So what I would like to see and Catherine has been very kind and offering to look for it to see where that amount of money went because I would suggest and perhaps our finance officers might come back on it, if there was money that was allocated to an item and wasn't spent on that item, that's a significant amount of money. Does it not have to come back to the committee if you want to vary what you're going to spend that money on? Because as I say, it was allocated to the replacement. The parish council and the community are going to match fund and add to the pot because we know it's probably going to cost more than that. But the council did know that they had an obligation to replace that skate ramp because for the previous 20 years they hadn't maintained it once. And so that's something that I would like to see investigated that if there was a budget set aside for capital replacements, that's where that went. I've been told by other councillors, no, that's gone due to financial constraints in the council over the last 12 months. But that's a significant amount of money that was set aside for one item. And I remember seeing in the budget documents that came to this committee, Linkfield Skate Ramp itemized £76,000 or something like that. I did try looking for it today online but it's really difficult because I can't remember which meeting it was. But I do remember it being identified. So I think the committee does need to have a breakdown of the figures in that Appendix A because it's not a realistic reflection of the repair and refurbishment costs for some of the playgrounds. But certainly it's something that needs to be done. Okay. Thanks.

Thank you. I'll draw attention to paragraph 2.5 which says the procurement exercises commence for skate parks who have been selected as priority due to the extent of where the repair is required. That as far as I'm aware does cover Jennersfield Skate Park. In terms of the conditions report, I'll have a look at that again and have a chat with the company who are, yeah, carrying out the inspections and carry out inspections on behalf of other authorities to look at their figures again. And I'll pick up Councillor Boulton's comment regarding the playground inspection that she saw. All I can say on that is I get or service league gets a monthly report including photos of each item that needs attention. And we do get emails from Safe Play notifying us of things that need to be looked at immediately or cordoned off immediately. So they are quite responsive. But I will take Councillor Boulton's comments on board and I'll email you direct Councillor Boulton. Any further questions? Councillor Klein. Can I ask, are these figures here to just replace, refurbish? Because under the new Tandridge Access Group where lots of the equipment will need to be more than refurbished for people with disabilities, has this been included in the cost of this document? They have been, as Simon mentioned, they were looking at accessibility of planned equipment as well in that report. Part of the work they've gone out, they've looked at the sites, they've looked at DDA compliance of in terms of equipment, but also not just equipment, also accessibility of sites. So if we take the White Leaf one, it's not near the car park, et cetera. Therefore, there's a lot of work to be done to make it fully DDA compliant in terms of the site being quite a way up the hill as I call it. So part of that is looking at the whole site. It hasn't costed DDA compliance, but it has made suggestions, Safeplay have made suggestions on the sites that are best suited to become more DDA compliant, and that was part of the capital replacement program work that they undertook. Councillor Klein, you have a further question? I do. Just regards to the White Leaf recreational ground, as you know, it's quite far away, which makes it very unappealing for disabled access. Are there plans to move the play area to make it more compatible, or is it going to stay there and additions being made to it? Obviously, what my view would be is at the point where it needs a major refurbishment, that's the opportunity to talk to the parish council as well as other stakeholders about where it is actually placed on the site. So, for example, if you're talking about making a what I call a destination playground with a hub around it, i.e. other facilities such as the cafe closeness to toilets, the logical would be to move it nearer the entrance to where the other facilities are. I do not know the rhyme or reason about why it was located where it is on that particular site. But obviously it has struck me as a novelty in terms of us doing replacements up there where we've had to get people in to do work, to do safety -- bark replacements, et cetera. It is a very troublesome site to get to in terms of getting equipment up there. So, definitely it is one to look at to see whether actually there is a more suitable location within the area for it to be located. Any more questions? Okay, let's move to the recommendations on page 26. Recommendations A to C. Do you want me to take them individually or on block? Okay. Recommendation to committee A to C. Can we have a show of hands if we're in agreement? Okay. And against? Okay, you want me to read them out? Okay. Recommendation A that the committee notes the progress to date. Those in agreement? And against? Recommendation B, note the rollover of the 2023-24 capital budget and match funding pot for the playground improvement. There's an agreement. And Recommendation C, authorize officers to initiate exploratory discussions with parish councils and community groups to assess their willingness to discuss asset transfers, contribute to the refurbishment plan and the ongoing maintenance of assets. Are we agreed? Those against? Make your pardon. Moving on to agenda item 9, which is the review of the cesspool services. Simon will present. Thank you, Chair. This report provides details on a service review of the, and I'm afraid to say it, non-statutory cesspool emptying service currently provided by the Council and proposals for consideration for the future service delivery. For many years, the operational services have operated this service, emptying both from some commercial and domestic properties. Most of the current base is within the district, although it does offer the service just outside our geography for boundary. And by that, I mean, postcodes that fall just outside our district. Over recent years, the service has struggled to meet its budgeted income and the net service contribution has been overspent against budget. This has resulted in the general fund, i.e. cancer taxpayers subsidising the service as shown in the table on page 38. Three options were considered. Option one, carrying on with the service with a new lease vehicle. Option two, ceasing the service. And three, continuation of the service with the own tanker that we have. Clearly there are pros and cons of each option, but the salient points are that the service is not achieving its income budget and putting pressure on the general fund. A new lease vehicle would be an additional cost of £16,500 per annum, which will mean that more income will need to be generated, which as I say, isn't being achieved. It is a non-statutory service and we are the only authority in Surrey, Kent and Sussex to run the service. To be honest, in my research, I've struggled to find any others really apart from one authority in the Midlands who does run an accessible service. Clearly, withdrawing the service from loyal customers who are also residents could have negative implications. However, there are numerous other companies who provide this service and in times when the councils of vehicles have not been available, customers have had to go elsewhere to get their accessible empties. There is an opportunity here to move operatives and officers to other areas of the business to provide more resilience for street cleansing, grounds maintenance and waste. However, with additional risks, additional resources, more leadership investment in the service, we could attract more, more incoming potentially. However, that needs to be -- that would divert attention from other council services and given the current financial context, it is felt other areas of the council should be prioritised above the cesspool service. For the reasons outlined in the paper, it is officers' recommendations to cease the service, which is option two. I am happy to take questions. Any questions for Simon? Councillor Winton. I'm going to put my pedant's hat on here and the key implications where we are obliged to note equality, climate change, et cetera. It says that if we remove the two HGV vehicles, it would reduce vehicle emissions. Now, unless all our current customers went on mains drainage, that is plainly rubbish because obviously, if we choose to take the option of ceasing the -- to provide the service, they are going to have to use another contractor to get it. I remember the last meeting that we had where there was a very impassioned email sent out from I think the operatives when this wasn't an item on the agenda and the chairman quite rightly said this is not an issue, who were very concerned about withdrawing this service. Looking at the options, I think it is quite clear that we would eliminate option three. So any further discussion is whether we take the recommendation and cease the service or whether we decide to continue it with the leased vehicle. Any further questions? Councillor Lockwood. I would like to make a comment here, really. In terms of the sort of the climate change futures and considering the environment, we could do worse than writing to our customers who use this service recommending they go for biodigestors or whatever they are called, and to me, it is a no-brainer that it is costing the council money for a service that is benefitting okay, it is benefiting a few households, but actually, environmentally, it would be better that those households invested in biodigestors, because this sludge is pumped into, I know they take it to waste centres and empty it there, but eventually it gets into the rivers and whatever. So I think a greener alternative would be to encourage those customers to not want our service. We don't seem to have enough of them for it to be a viable service, and I think Mr Banda is absolutely right. We could utilise those staff very effectively elsewhere within the council. Councillor Klein. I totally disagree with that. There are people that actually have no alternative, and I feel that if you cannot afford alternative fuels or if you cannot afford alternative places and alternative means, I feel maybe that the council should subsidise some of these people, and if that means that the council has got to work harder to outsource itself so that it balances the books, then I am quite for that. Any further questions? The only point I would make is we are not the only provider of cesspool emptying in the district. There are private companies who come in and do the work when we have vehicles off the road due to damage, preventative maintenance schedules, et cetera, and we are unable to fulfil emptying. Customers are going to other private entities to get the work done, so we are not the sole provider in terms of cesspool emptying in the region. Councillor Black. I was just going to make the same point as Simon made is that he wrote it in his report that there are plenty of commercial providers out there that will probably undercut what we were trying to charge anyway, so I don't think we are really putting our residents in a precarious position at all. Councillor Gray. I think we should probably discontinue the service myself. I just wonder -- I don't doubt what is said about the presence of other operators in the market that can offer competitive rates. I just wonder if our presence in the market because it is subsidised is depressing the rates and if we would withdraw, will the rates of the private providers shoot up? Is there any evidence for that? I don't know. Obviously, currently at the moment all the private companies can see our rates online because we have to publish our fees and charges, so they can be in a position to undercut us anyway. How the commercial market will react to it. It is unknown. I suppose another salient point is Seven Oaks District Council were the only other authority in those three regions being Kent, Sussex and Surrey who were providing the service and they took the decision in just early 2024 due to financial pressures, similar to ours, to withdraw from the market and they made their point that there are other commercial entities out there that could provide the service. So I can't second guess how the commercial market will react. I know that there are more than two that go out there and do work around the district, so there may even be competition between those entities about taking our part of the market. I can't second guess how the commercial entities will react. Councillor Fong? As a user of these sort of services, I do on occasions go around and look at prices and I have never found Tandridge to be the cheapest in any manner or form. I don't know whether we do actually, if you like, subsidise the service, but we are certainly not the cheapest. I think it pulls us out. It may very well leave a little bit more competition amongst the many operators that are out there. I am quite in favour of, because of the cost of this service, actually discontinuing the service. Any further questions? Let's move to the recommendation, which is on page 37, that the review recommendation of option 2 be approved by committee. Do we have a show of hands of those in agreement? Any against? Right, let's move on to agenda item 10, which is the quarter 4, 2023/24 key performance indicators. Simon and Julie are going to represent. Simon, you are on mute. That was bound to happen at some point, so apologies. Performance report. Overall, the services are performing well. Street cleansing remains off target and has been for quite a while. It is a challenging target to meet on street cleansing for several reasons, including the number of street cleansing officers at the time the target was set has decreased. I think that that original target set in, well when I joined in 2015, was at 95%, and there's definitely a big difference between the FTEs then and currently now. With the smaller team, sickness has an impact on service delivery, as are our less operatives to carry out the work. We are supplementing that team currently with two temporary officers. Julie, do you want to pick up your bits? Yes, thank you. Just to highlight some of the key performance indicators that we've already mentioned earlier on in the community safety review, I won't go through the safeguarding once again, but just to highlight that we do keep an eye on the number of safeguarding cases, the number of nominations to the community harm and risk management, which Amanda and the inspector talked about, and then just to say that we are still continuing to work on the anti-social behaviour project, and we are hoping to recruit to a co-ordinator post in the near future, so we will be looking at the systems to report on that, hopefully by September. In terms of the risks, the trees remains a significant risk, mainly due to ash dieback, and the fact that we have been without a tree officer since last October. We have a new highly experienced new tree and woodland officer starting actually now near the end of July 2024, who will help improve the situation and be able to look at our woodland management with a different set of eyes than we previously had. So still a risk, but I'm confident over the time period that that risk will start reducing. I'm happy to take any questions. Any questions? Councillor Athens. Hello, thank you chair. I wonder if maybe, Simon, you could comment on the possibilities now that we're going to cease the cesspit emptying, whether there's any, presumably the people involved in that could help with the street cleaning, and possibly even the sale of the, I was going to say lorry, that's not the right word, but the sale of the vehicle could put some money to us. Maybe we could even have a second street cleaner again. I think, rightly, we need obviously the committee to have made their decision which they have done. We will look as officers at what the best options are to provide that resilience to the street cleansing team. And probably feels right to bring back a report at some point, I would say September, about how we will look to use those resources elsewhere. As I say, the three areas are really street cleansing, grounds maintenance, and then the administration of the cesspool service helping other parts out of the services, including waste. So it is something now that we've got committee's decision to go away and fully consider those options. Any further questions? No? Let's move to the recommendation, which is on page 45, which is to review and note the most critical quarter 4, 2023/24 performance indicators for this committee, and to review and note the most critical risks for this committee. Agreed? Thank you. All right, moving on to agenda item 11, 2023/24 budget out turn. We will pass over to Rona and Mark. Thank you chair. I would like to talk about the budget for 2023/24. Draw your eye to page 65 of the report. It gives you a table of the actual services and also the actual financial out turn. You will notice we had an annual budget of 4.5 million. We actually had an out turn of 4.2 million. Therefore we underspent by 334,000. What we have to bear in mind is that a lot of the items within the committee or the teams are demand led. Often we don't know what the numbers are going to be. For example, say fly tipping, you might have a splurge of fly tipping earlier in the year and then you might not have anything. So the numbers can change throughout the year. So just to bear that in mind, there is demand actually led. Unauthorized encampments were budgeted for that. Again, we didn't actually end up spending any of that money at all this financial year. So that was a saving as well. It is a big budget, 4 million pounds. Lots of activities are within that actual budget. One of the biggest items is the waste contract. You will notice on the waste contract or the waste spend, we actually ended up with a saving of 69,000. All the detail is in page 65 for the revenue budget. Then on page 68, I just want to draw your eye, there is a slight error in that two items at the top on the bottom table, the 148 and the 17, they shouldn't be in the green column, they should have actually been in the complete column. Apologies for that. So actual fact, everything was completed apart from the two items that were in black at the bottom, the 16 and the 10K, which we are going to carry forward and look at achieving those savings in the next financial years. Going on to the capital budgets, we slightly touched on this with the papers we have discussed regarding the playgrounds and also the toilets in that we haven't actually spent a lot of the capital budget in the last financial year, however that money is intended to be carried forward and used for this or future financial years. That is all I was going to say on the budget or the numbers, I am happy to take any questions for everybody. Thank you, chair. Any questions for Arnold? Excellent. Let's move on to the recommendations which are on page 57. That the committee's revenue and capital budget out term positions as at quarter four, M12, March, 23-24 be noted. Are we agreed? Agreed. Thank you. Moving on to agenda item 12, the UK shared prosperity fund establishment of a working group. Alex, you will present? Thank you chair. The committee in June 2023 agreed to appoint a working group to consider and recommend the allocation of the UK shared prosperity funding. The purpose of this report is to appoint a working group for the new municipal year. Group leaders have nominated the members listed in paragraph three of the report and the recommendation is that membership is agreed. Any questions at all? Moving on to the recommendation on page 71 that the membership of the UK shared prosperity fund working group for 2024-25 is shown in paragraph three, be agreed. Are we agreed? Agreed. Thank you. Moving on to agenda item 13, proposed change to the community services terms of reference. Alex will present again. Currently the responsibility for pollution control sits with this committee. However, there are several areas that the planning policy committee have responsibility for which closely align with pollution control. I have listed them in paragraph three of the report. The recommendation of this report is that the responsibility and the financial budget for pollution control be transferred to the planning policy committee by amending the terms of reference in the constitution and the purpose of that is so that the planning policy committee has the necessary oversight of the service to ensure a consistent delivery and approach. Thank you chair. Any questions? Let's move to the recommendation on page 75 that it be recommended to Council that responsibility and financial budget 2024-25 of 132.6 K for pollution control be transferred from the community services committee to the planning policy committee by amending the terms of reference for those committees as per the track changes shown at appendix A. Are we agreed? Thank you councillors. Item 14, you will be relieved to know that I have no other business. So I will now close the meeting at 21.45. Thank you.