Transcript

So this meeting is being live streamed and we welcome all who are observing this meeting online. If any members of Cabinet, I think Dr Mayor Bramble might be joining the meeting remotely, I need to remind you that you are not counted as being formally present at the meeting and may not vote on any items under discussion. I will, however, welcome your contributions. Decisions made this evening will be published after the meeting. Decisions made this evening. I'll just very briefly do an introduction to the meeting to acknowledge this is our last Cabinet meeting of the year. It's been a really busy, really challenging year. I know many of you have just worked incredible hours to deliver the work of this Council. We're still delivering great things in this Council, but also to be open to scrutiny and to be held to account and to deliver some of that scrutiny and challenge that is necessary in a democratic Council. I would like to flag what pleasure it was to host the Hackney Design Awards this month. Absolutely incredible achievement, some of the buildings that we've produced in this BoA, and a real pleasure to recognise how many of them are with the ethos of community-led design, young people's voices, sustainability, the environment at its core, with really fantastic results. And also a series of children and family hub launches that have had the pleasure to attend. There'll be one in January as well for Woodbury Down, which I'll make sure you're all invited to. And moving into 2025, I know it'll be another challenging year, but we're all committed to ensuring that Hackney's people, their needs are met, and that I will continue to uphold my priorities of tackling the housing crisis. Combating poverty and inequality and building on Hackney's position as a climate leader. I'll go to item one. Do we have apologies for absence? I know I've received apologies from Councillor Nicholson. I think that's it, everyone else is here. Thank you. Item two, declarations of interest. Do members have any interest they wish to declare? Item three, urgent unrestricted business. I've not been made aware of any urgent items of business. Item four, notice of intention to conduct business in private, representations received, and response to such representations. I understand there have not been any representations received, and there are no exempt reports or appendices to be considered. Item five, questions, deputations. One deputation has been received from Heather Mendick relating to the redevelopment of 55 Morning Lane, that's the Tesco site in Hackney Central, and it's been approved by the deputy monitoring officer for consideration. The deputation text was published at agenda item five in the papers, and a total of 15 minutes has been set aside for us to hear and debate the deputation. This includes a brief introduction from Councillor Garbett, five minutes for the deputation leaders to set up the issues, five minutes for cabinet to question the deputation leaders and debate the issues, and five minutes for the cabinet lead member to respond, which in Councillor Nicholson's absence will be me. A timer will be in operation, and I will warn you when you have one minute left, try not to be distracted when I say one minute left, because I know it can throw you a bit. So I'd like to start by inviting Councillor Garbett to briefly introduce the deputation leaders. You may remain seated if you're comfortable. There we go. Thank you. This is a really important development, and what happens here matters to people, matters strategically for our borough. So it's really disappointing that this isn't being heard at full council, so that board councillors are able to be involved in the discussion. The focus of this deputation is on process being taken, and how people are or aren't being engaged, and which should be the interest to all councillors, as this is about how we work jointly planning and developing with residents. This project continues to require the level of scrutiny, just due to the cost of the site, the opportunity it offers, and the things that have been promised since 2022 that haven't happened, which you'll hear a bit more on later, and also because of the delays resulting in Tesco now operating rent-free on the site. And this has all fostered distrust of residents, not helped by the lack of acknowledgement and the council narrative of the co-design and community work that's been going on for five years. So now you get a really valuable opportunity to ask questions of the great mocked campaigners who've been working for over half a decade on this, and you have real expertise here this evening on how the site can be used and what residents really want. So I hope you use the opportunity to ask questions. Thank you. So can I call the first? Yeah, Heather. Yeah. I think they're coming as a group. The lectern there and the microphone there. Is this? Okay. Hello, I'm Heather. I'm here with my colleagues, Liz and Andy from Morning Lane People Space, MOPS. MOPS is a community group which has been for five years working to make sure that whatever is built on 55 Morning Lane meets the needs of local residents. We've done the only significant engagement to find out what people want. We've done it via surveys, public meetings, social media, thousands of conversations and tens of thousands of leaflets. We've brought a deputation back in 2022 to full council. And we did that to say, you need to come clean about what happened with the developer, Hackney Walk Limited, about that deal. Because of the lack of trust, because of the secrecy, the rejected freedom formation requests, because of the fact that Hackney Walk Limited have a bad track record with the derelict and disastrous fashion hub. In response, Mayor Phil Glanville said that there will be openness and transparency going forward. And he said that there will be co-design between the council and the community. Unfortunately, that has not happened. And that is why two years later, we're here again. So for example, let's look at the appointment recently of the architects. Residents, all of us, we were represented by three members of the Hackney Central community panel. That panel is controlled by the council. It is top down, and it is unrepresentative. None of the TRAs in the area have a single voice on that panel. And we still don't know who are the three people who represented us, what they did in that process. It's completely secret. There's no accountability. We've asked you for your red lines, and all you've said is we need to get that £60 million back. That makes no sense unless you tell us the timescale for that. It's meaningless without telling us how much you've got already. For example, the payments from Hackney Walk, the payments from Tesco. Finally, we had a vision workshop about a week ago. That vision workshop asked people what they want to establish that people's top priority is cheap housing, cheap shopping, a.k.a. a big supermarket there, and council homes. This is not surprising, because we've done this work for years with a great evidence base. It would have saved a lot of time and shown respect and trust for local residents if you respected that grassroots bottom-up planning, rather than trying to inadequately reinvent the wheel. You've got a brilliant opportunity with this site to do very excellent civic engagement and co-design. There are three ways Hackney can do this. Nurture honesty and transparency, help build mutual trust, and do shared decision-making and share power. Honesty and transparency. If you look at the meeting that we held in September, 70 people from Trelawney Estate in a room, council officers presenting, promises of a website, buzz in the room, and then radio silence for two months. What do we get then? A web page with a brief, inadequate summary of a process. How are you using your consultant climate labs? Where are you using your community stakeholders? We are here and have energy and experience. This is a quick win for Hackney, combined with offline communication and social media to engage more people. Second point, mutual trust. You have an opportunity for building mutual trust in a key site, right in the middle of Hackney, by your council officers sharing information with us, sharing knowledge with the community. So financial viability is a huge area. Co-design viability with the community. Social impact assessment. How can we develop this? You could take any of these areas, one of them, and have a process where you could look to codify, using the community expertise and supporting people to be involved in a process, and not just assuming people can access a workshop over a couple of months on a Saturday morning. Why are you leaving in terms of shared decision making and sharing power? Why are you leaving the architects to talk to Tesco? Why not create a space using existing forums that include residents and tenants and groups like Tesco, to have discussions, to talk about what needs to be done? Why not communicate? Why not share? Why not explore shared decision making? Talk with us about decisions are going to be made and how. Why not do that kind of essential basic civic engagement? It will be a cabinet decision about whether to sell the site. What a defeat if we do. One minute if you want Liz to speak. Thank you. How will the community be involved in that decision? Should it be left to you rather than the residents and a full council? This is a prime site and a vital opportunity to shape a town centre with local residents. It demands co-design. People care deeply about this site. We need you to work at honesty and transparency, Hackney, building mutual trust and finally sharing some decision making. Thank you. OK, do anyone in Cabinet wish to ask any questions with MOPS? No? So I will respond to the statements that you've made and also summarise, I suppose, my engagement in the last two meetings. So I came to Trelawney and engaged in the MOPS-led event, which I thought was an extremely friendly, well-chaired event with food laid on, which is always a help. And it was really a good exercise with flip charts to see all the proposals put forward from the community. One of the things I would query, as you sort of saying about radio silence since then, because my understanding from that meeting was that the ask was to meet again before the end of the year, which was what we then undertook to do. So that's when we had the workshop organised in the first week of December that you referred to at the library. And that was the first opportunity for Climate Labs to come forward and set out their perception of co-design. Again, I felt that there was an opportunity there to set out the timeline. I think one of the key sort of things that you've asked whenever I've met with you is for acknowledgement of the work that MOPS has put in. And within the slides presentation that they produced, I felt that they did present a timeline. No, because they did talk about when you first engage with your community engagement and representation. OK, well, that's something we can look at. I think for me, it's really important that this succeeds as a co-design process because we are going through so many tough challenges. If we don't have a good model for working with the community, then, you know, we're really up against it. And so to work with an expert group like Climate Labs does offer a really good chance to see how ideas can come into the room and be taken forward in terms of recommendations. There was also an attempt to be really transparent in terms of constraints. There was a slide setting out the constraints in terms of, as you've sort of described, making back the money that we put in. I can hear the questions that you've raised today about how we elaborate on that, and we'll take that away. The constraints in terms of the relationship with Tesco and their rights, I guess, in terms of, as a supermarket, what they can and cannot do. And other constraints that will be set out, we can amend the website in order to make sure that's all fully covered. Members of the community panel, as I understood it, were involved in the procurement of the architects, Levitt Bernstein. And the engagement specialist Climate Labs were selected actually following a process in which I'd understood Morning Lane people's space and council officers had agreed a list of external consultants who'd be approached by competitive procurement. And these were a group that you had put forward, is that right? Climate Labs? This was one that you'd supported. Well, it's just a yes or no. We were the people who put Climate Labs on the shortlist. In fact, the only two people who bid were the two people we put on the shortlist. That could not be a community consultant were it not for MOPS. It would actually not even have been a tender for a community consultant were it not for MOPS. There's no need to. Yeah. So the end output will be an early stage design feasibility study, RIBA one stage, that will inform a cabinet decision in summer autumn 2025 on whether to proceed with the redevelopment of the site at this point in time. If the decision is to proceed with the redevelopment, it's only then that detailed designs will be prepared. We'll be able to give an outline timeline for development, including further key decisions that will be made. We've committed in our Hattie Central Town Centre strategy to bring accountability and co-production to the project to build that sense of community ownership in the final form of 55 Morning Lane. We will continue in this vein. So I'll review the website and follow up with you with any further questions that you want to send to me on the back of this deputation. I thank you all for your time coming here tonight. I've got three questions submitted by members of the public that were approved by the deputy monitoring officer for inclusion at this meeting. The constitution allows for a maximum of 15 minutes for all questions. So if we're unable to hear your questions today, we will ensure that written responses are provided. Our first question from Dr. Elizabeth Horton. I understand Dr. Horton is unable to attend and has asked their question to be read out in their absence. The question is, what assessment has the council made of Peabody's response to the Dalston Lane fire of 5th of June 2024, in particular the support given to displaced residents? I'll invite Councillor Moema to respond. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mayor Woodley. And I want to thank the questioner for their question and sad that she's not able to be here today. So I just really want to reiterate this council's commitment to the safety of all of our residents and in relation specifically to Dalston Lane. The residents of the Dalston Lane block affected by the fire in June were initially evacuated to hotels, have been staying with family and friends. Peabody, the landlord, responded on the evening of the fire with multiple staff attending the scene to provide assistance to their residents, including respite on the night. The mayor, speaker, board councillors and local MP have also offered casework and casework support and attended site visits where misunderstandings have taken place. These have since been discussed and built upon. Peabody has provided access to emotional and financial support from the start and have been in regular contact with each household. The repairs to the buildings are underway, but it's going to take some time before residents can move back home. Peabody confirms that they're looking at an autumn or winter twenty twenty five timescale before residents are able to move back in. Peabody have been working to find suitable long term accommodation in the meantime. They have temporarily moved several residents from the hotel into other Peabody homes locally and have arranged temporary private lets for others. Of all thirty six households, there are still a small number staying in holiday, sorry, in hotels or holiday let apartments. And Peabody are working with them to find a more suitable temporary accommodation. Peabody states that the individual circumstances and needs of each household is a primary consideration when finding suitable temporary accommodation and that they use a similar approach to the council. All furniture and personal belongings have been removed from the flats so that works could commence. These have either been placed in storage, moved to residents' temporary homes or, sadly for those items that were damaged, have been disposed of. Peabody have worked through this process with each household individually. Council officers are in regular contact with senior officers at Peabody. Damage to the block was significant, as we all know. When it comes to moving people, Peabody face exactly the same challenges that Hackney Council does when trying to find emergency and urgent accommodation locally. And this is only exacerbated by the housing crisis we are all facing. Indeed, Hackney Council has experienced exactly the same challenges with moving households and undertaking major repairs to its own stock. Peabody states that their tailored support to the affected households will naturally remain in place for as long as it's needed. In the meantime, general and public queries are directed to the Peabody contact centre or via the team here at Hackney Council. Officers remain in contact with Peabody and work to provide any support and advice as necessary. Thank you. As Dr. Horton's not here, there'll be no supplementary. Thank you very much, Councillor Moema. I'd now like to ask Claire Battagino, who's here with us in person, to ask her question as published in the agenda. Would you like to come and use the microphone, Claire? Sorry, I'm struggling to hear again. It's essentially just to read out the question as submitted. There's not a problem with me speaking, there's a problem with me hearing. As falling roads have prompted the closure of primary schools, will the Council offer those buildings which are located on quieter roads as alternative accommodation for schools and nurseries like North Wall, Princess May, Mossborne Parkside Academy and Rooftop, whose locations currently expose their pupils to high levels of harmful pollution. Thank you. I understand Councillor Yeung is going to respond to this as it's essentially a question around air quality. Councillor Yeung. Hello, thanks for your question. First of all, I just wanted to note the significant interest in school closures amongst residents and also in air quality, both of which are really important issues. We are at the moment considering potential uses for closed primary schools, and at this time there's been no decision made about that, but we're looking at all options. There's a formal consultation process around that. If the Council was to decide to let out any particular property, it would do so via a transparent marketing process. So the strategic property team have said that you can look at available outsole properties on our website or contact the property team directly. There's an email address and a phone number which we'll share in writing with the minutes. But just on the air pollution question more broadly, particularly as it relates to schools, Hackney operates a very extensive, and I know that you know this because I've seen you publish some of the data, air quality monitoring network, which includes monitoring at many, many schools throughout the borough. And that monitoring data is then compared to the air quality objectives against which we report as a council under our duties under the London local air quality management. So we're really aware of the state of air quality across the borough and particularly where it's close to schools. The annual mean concentrations of nitrogen dioxide are below the 40 micrograms per cubic meter target at all schools in the borough. I'm not suggesting that this is in any way good enough, but they are at that level. And we've also seen a decrease in pollution levels over the years. So the risks to children's health from exposure are reducing, as I say, not by enough, but they are reducing. Hackney is leading the way and has led the way with the school streets initiative. And it now has a total of 49 school street schemes in place, including in the roads around Northworld, Princess May, Mossborne Parkside Academy and Rooftop. So there are school streets around there, which obviously are aimed at improving air quality as well as safety and accessibility of the schools. There are initiatives in place to encourage parents and pupils to get to school using more sustainable modes of transport, to discourage engine idling by those who do use cars and other motor vehicles to take their children to school. The focus, we think, needs to be on reducing emissions. And I know that you agree with that. But we'll also work with the GLA on its school filter program to ensure that those schools where air pollution concentrations are the highest are considered for installing air quality filters in classrooms. So thank you for your really imaginative suggestion. And obviously it's something that we'll take into account, you know, along with other suggestions in looking at how these buildings are used. Do you have a supplementary directly related to the original question? Is it on? I'm just wondering if my follow up can be to what Sarah actually said, you know, in terms of the mitigation, in terms of the policies, whatever you want to call them, school streets, which in those particular schools we know are on the side roads, not where the displacement is happening, and those schools have particularly high levels of pollution. And also, is it coincidental that they also have extremely high levels of free school meals? It's over 50% in Mossbourne. We managed to put a bus gate on Stoke Newington Church Street. I don't disagree with that. It was protecting those children. But why have we, in other ways, compounded the issue for the children at Northwall and Mossbourne and Rooftop? And air filters, Sarah, are not going to do it. It's a nursery for years. Children need to be outdoors. They need to play. You know, filters are not being entered. Nor are green screens. I'm sorry to say. Just to say, of course, that we want to reduce emissions overall. And that is our overarching aim. It's been quite starting to start before. Are there more blacks? I'd now like to ask Matt Albro, who's here with us in person to ask our final public question as published in the agenda. Hi again. We only spoke a few weeks ago with Councillor Joe Walker. Thanks for meeting some of the residents on some of the roads really suffering with the displaced traffic. We discussed this a few weeks ago, so you've had a chance to figure out a response. But for everyone else. So we were looking at what was being done to stem the increasing number of HGVs travelling through Hackney on certain residential roads. Specifically, Dawson Jones, Dawson Lane, Graham Road and Bulls Pond Road. And the health and wellbeing of people at risk are big increases. Thank you. Councillor Young. Thank you for your question. And I mean, just to say, I know I also owe you a more detailed response just on your road, on Bulls Pond Road. And so, I mean, your sustained advocacy for a greener borough is really important. And the approach to main roads, main, you know, I think what I call main residential roads is also something which is really high on our list of priorities and will be an important part of developing the new transport strategy, which we started to develop and which we talked about before. Heavy goods vehicles do contribute to pollution. They also contribute to road danger, to congestion and to the kind of wear and tear of our infrastructure. But we recognise that they're essential for the national and local economy at the moment. We don't have another way, another simple way of transporting the goods that we rely on into London, into Hackney. And around the city. So we recognise that managing heavy goods vehicles on our roads has to balance the problems they create with the need to move goods around. And that requires regional and national coordination. So, yes, it's something we need to think about in Hackney. It's also something that we work with the GLA Transport for London on. And it's also a question for national strategy. And I think it's important to be aware of all of those pieces in the puzzle, I guess. HGV movements in the UK have been reducing overall. I know that's not your experience on Boar's Pond Road. But in London, there were 88,000 lorries crossing TFLs in the London Cordon in 2014 and 59,000 in 2022. So that's quite a reduction overall. In London, the London lorry control scheme controls the movement of heavy goods vehicles over 18 tonnes maximum gross weight and Hackney are active participants in this scheme. So we are looking and recording, you know, what we've got coming down our roads. And in recognition of the need to carefully manage traffic that does have an essential purpose in the borough, including commercial traffic. We've published a plan for main roads, which I know you've seen is called the technical note, main roads technical note. And that's a temporary measure, really, because we are, as I said, in the process of developing our new transport strategy for the next 10 years. So this will be an important part of the work that we're going to do in developing that transport strategy. And we're starting to do that now. And a really key part of that will be our engagement plan, which we'll publish early next year. So a core feature of the strategy is to reduce traffic dominance, especially in residential areas. And residential areas do include main roads. Our commitment to this is, we feel, contributing to reducing overall traffic, with national comparisons showing Hackney to have amongst the lowest levels of increase post-COVID. So looking at Dawston Lane, Graham Road and Boar's Pond Road, all of these locations will benefit from the work we're currently designing for implementation as soon as the resources become available. And all three of these roads have permanent traffic counters. None of these so far suggest higher than average HGV counts, but this situation will be monitored. And a priority for us and also our partners in Islington, which is obviously the other side of Horse Pond Road, will be to support health and wellbeing for the people of this area. So this is very, very much work in progress, as you know, and I hope that you'll continue to advocate and contribute to that process. Thank you. Do you have a supplementary? Well, yes, I guess the main thing is just to just to be clear, there is no, I mean, I understand that Hackney is part of the puzzle and there's a lot of interested parties, but there's nothing currently that Hackney Council is doing to stem the rise in HGVs. Just to be clear, that is the case, because we first discussed this with Councillor Burke, Councillor Coburn, going back to 2021. So here we are coming into 2025 and still nothing. So we hear a lot of why warm words, but not very, very little action. And Islington, I don't think, we still don't know why they didn't turn up at the workshop earlier in the year. Sorry, it does need to be a question. Sorry, Matt. So just to be clear, Hackney has done nothing to stem the increase in the HGVs. So I haven't got a huge amount to add, but the, I mean, yes, no, Hackney is taking action to look at HGVs, to reduce HGVs, but also to reduce the emissions from the HGVs that use our roads. So we're part of the scheme, the GLA schemes, we're part of the London, the London lorry control scheme. You know, we're also, the work that we're doing to, to reduce the overall amount of traffic in Hackney and reduce traffic coming through Hackney as opposed to to Hackney affects HGVs as much as it does any other vehicle. So there are quite a number of policies that we have, which should be working slowly to reduce HGVs. But I completely agree, there's more to be done. Thank you. In addition to questions we receive from members of the public, I also receive questions from Councillor Garbet and Councillor Turbet de Lough. And I will take these questions during the respective agenda items. So moving to item six, unrestricted minutes of the previous meeting of cabinet. Do cabinet have any comments they wish to make on the unrestricted minutes? Can we approve the minutes? Thank you. Item seven, unrestricted minutes of the cabinet procurement and insourcing commitments. The minutes of the CPIC committee held on 4th November will be considered at a future meeting. Item eight, the overall financial position report. Following years of underfunding from the previous central government, it is no secret that Hackney, like many local authorities, is facing severe financial challenges. Decisive action is needed to protect our essential services and ensure long term financial stability. Despite these challenges, we must ensure that our most vulnerable residents are protected. This report sets out the state of play for transparency and accountability. I would like to invite Councillor Chapman to introduce the report. Thank you, Mayor. I am pleased to report that this month's OFP shows a reduction of the overspend reported in November of £1.2 million. I think, in noting this, thanks to our corporate leadership team and the Budget Recovery Board for the efforts they are putting into controlling spending, which is beginning to show welcome results. However, the financial position remains serious, with predicted overspend in the current year still approaching £37 million. Firstly, in thanking our senior officers, it is important that we continue this work to bear down on costs as much as possible, an important contribution to helping us bring our budget back into balance. Secondly, as the Group Director points out in the report, the Council will need to dig into its reserves to balance the budget, both in respect of the current financial year and the next. And while we welcome the likely additional government funding for 25-6, in future years, we are still facing unprecedented demand for social care and homeless prevention services. So we continue to face some tough decisions ahead. I commend the report to Cabinet. Thank you. Are there any questions or comments from Cabinet? No. Can we move to the recommendations as set out in the report? Can you affirm verbally and also a show of hands? Great. Thank you. Item 9, Capital Update and Property Disposal and Acquisitions Report. This report provides an update on the progress of our capital programme, as outlined in the 24-25 Budget. The proposals demonstrate our ongoing commitment to fulfilling our manifested pledges and achieving the objectives set out in the Council's strategic plan. There are key investments in several vital areas that will benefit both our staff and residents. And I'd like to invite Councillor Chapman to introduce the report. Well, also unlucky. We have an IT provision in the report. Despite difficult times financially, the Council still maintains its capital programmes in support of vital Council services. This report asks for approval for a range of capital projects, from the mundane-sounding but crucial air-handling system for Youth Justice Centre, which, you know, one level sounds very sort of prosaic, but on another level, it's vital to keep the building going and includes a whole load of other measures to support frontline services, including the provision of devices for frontline staff in social care and across the Council more generally. So I commend the report to Cabinet. Thank you. Any questions or comments from Cabinet? Okay. Can we move to the – move the recommendations as set out? By hand as well, please. Thanks. By hand as well, please. Thanks very much. Item 10 – Sustainable Procurement and Insourcing Strategy. This report highlights the Council's ongoing commitment to insourcing contracted services, bringing them back in-house wherever possible. We've achieved significant success in this area for the past four years, although we could always go further. This strategy not only allows us to better manage our resources and improve service quality, but also reinforces our dedication to creating a fairer and more sustainable hackney. Thank you to Council Chapman and all the officers who've engaged in this important strategy. I'd like to invite you to introduce the report. Thank you, Mayor. I'm really proud of our Labour Council Sustainable Procurement and Insourcing Strategy that has delivered so much for us since its inception 2018. This includes over 100 electric vehicles and 47 charging products across multiple sites in the borough. 100% renewable energy from our energy suppliers. More than 200 local people have received employment skills training and over 50 additional apprentice places have been created. And I think probably the flagship that all services and works contracts that Council now let pay at least the London living wage, which I think has been a major achievement over the last six years of the policy. And, of course, in addition, we've over 400 jobs been ensorced. Mayor, I spoke earlier about our difficult financial situation. In these times, it is even more important that we use our procurement power, which is some 400 million pounds a year, to achieve not only value for money for our residents, but to maximise the social value that our contractors provide. Also important is to restate our commitment to insourcing. While the financial circumstances of the Council make this increasingly difficult, the benefits of doing it ourselves, for both staff and service users, must be fully evaluated in considering how services are provided. More generally, among the many important changes in our modernised and updated policy, is for the first time having a mandatory social value element in the assessment of tenders, and an abolition of the minimum value of contracts where social value will apply, both of which will have a really big effect on the amount of social value and the quality of it that we can call it in our procurement. It also sets up a framework for establishing targets and measuring success, and also it builds a base for further engagement with our partners, and I'm particularly thinking of the VCS and our staff in that. I think it's a really important set of developments that, as I said earlier, modernises and updates our policy, and I'm really quite pleased to be able to present this to Council. Cabinet. Thank you. Any questions or comments from Cabinet? Councillor Pallis? And then Councillor Williams. Yes, I really want to commend this report. I think it very much shows how Hackney Council is in the vanguard of councils in this country, in very much pushing the envelope in extremely difficult times. If you look at our commitments around social value, it would be hard to find another council who is proposing what we're proposing. If you look at our commitments around how we're looking to support social enterprises, the VCS sector, co-ops, this again is another innovative chapter in Hackney's long history of supporting social businesses. And if you look at how we are going out there into the community, about Meet the Buyer events, about looking at contract readiness amongst basically our local businesses, and looking to promote local jobs, this exactly shows the difference that the Labour administration can make alongside a Labour government. Thank you. Councillor Williams? Thank you, Councillor Chapman, for bringing and delivering this report tonight. It's incredibly important for jobs and skills outcomes for residents. It's been a long-term commitment of this administration to ensure that we deliver those opportunities, quality jobs for residents. And it goes to show what can be done across the council when we work together and not just in silos. So I really appreciate the strategy that you brought here tonight. There's a lot more work that we can do with our contracts to ensure even more outcomes for residents, ensure that they have access to jobs in the borough where there is still high levels of need and inequality. So I really appreciate the work that's been brought to this. Thank you. Councillor Chapman, did you want to respond to Cabinet remarks? You don't have to. I just want to thank my colleagues for their endorsement and support of the program. I look forward to working with you all and officers and unions and the VCS and implementing it. Thank you. I'd like to invite Councillor Garbutt to ask her question. Thank you. I fully support a lot of the comments that have been made about how important taking a kind of social value approach is, especially in times of continued austerity. The question that I've got is just about how, I mean, I'm really grateful to all the officers who've put this strategy together and the opportunities to feed in along the way. So I want to ask how partnership work with unions and community groups worked in developing the strategy, particularly genuine partnership in all key stages of the implementation strategy, just elements that weren't as clear in the document. Thanks. Thank you, Councillor Chapman. Thank you very much, Councillor Garbutt, for your question. And thank you also for your contributions during the workshops when we were developing the policy. The Council has engaged in an extensive consultation process for the sustainable procurement and insourcing strategy involving both internal and external stakeholders. This process will be extended to include relevant external partners, including the voluntary community sector, as the Council develops the implementation plan after, I'm assuming, approval tonight. The trade unions provided important strategy on key areas such as the Council's commitment to reviewing existing service contracts for potential insourcing, payment of the London living wage across contracts, and trade union recognition rights in contracting activities. The Council will continue to work with the trade unions to address these points and incorporate them into the implementation plan and the operational procurement processes. Concentration with community groups has been mainly through Hackney Community and Voluntary Sector, the organization HCVS, which I'm sure you're familiar with, and the feedback from this organization has influenced the strategy. HCVS have made it clear to us that they see an important role for the VCS, particularly in health and care provision, in which they play a central role, and we plan to develop this work further during the implementation of the strategy. Community inclusion in the decision-making process is already part of our existing operational procurement process, and it's our intention to develop this further as we implement the strategy. We specifically want the community to be involved in the conversation on how we deliver wider community benefits in our contracting services. Thank you. Do you have a brief supplementary? Is there a timescale for the implementation strategy? It sounds really good that those people are being considered. It's just, yes, particularly making sure that they're involved in that bit around procurement decisions. But yeah, just a timescale on the implementation. Yeah, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. Yeah, there's an implementation plan for the report. If not, it's certainly available. Thank you. If that's satisfactory, can we move the recommendations as set out in the report? I'd like again to ask Richard over hands as well as verbal affirmation. Hands up. Thank you. Item 11, garden waste charges. Last year, we joined many neighbouring boroughs in introducing a charge for garden waste collections in order to pay for and maintain the service for those who want it. Over the past year, officers have been reviewing the policy, and this report provides an update based on the feedback we've received from residents, which includes introducing concession charges and one-off collections to ensure we can go further to support those residents who need that extra help. I really appreciate your work that the officers and Councillor Young have put into this report. Would you like to introduce it, Councillor Young? Just briefly to say, in light of the other reports we've just heard today, I don't think anybody needs much explanation of why we need to be charging for those services, just the cost of those services that legislation allows and supports us in charging for. A charge was introduced, a new subscription service was introduced at the beginning of this year for garden waste, and actually that trial has gone really very well, and this in part answers some of Councillor Garbett's questions, but we've actually been really encouraged by the number of people who signed up for the service, 6,500 people have signed up, and that's been very successful. It was a trial, and we've been monitoring that throughout, and now that we've reached the end of that period, and also have taken the responses and the evidence that we've gathered through the scrutiny process as well, and had quite a lengthy scrutiny session on this. The team have developed a series of amendments, as the Mayor mentioned, these include keeping the charge the same for the next year, introducing a concession rate, a 50% concession rate for those on benefits, but also bringing the service to estates, where there hasn't really been a proper garden collection service on estates, so we're really bringing the service to estates, and allowing people to book one-off collections, because not everybody needs their garden waste collected all the year round. So these sorts of changes, we think, will really embed the service. Not everybody wants to use the service, that's absolutely fine. They can mulch or compost their waste, they can take their waste to one of the waste and recycling centres, there are other options, but as this service beds in, we expect to see a sort of, you know, we expect to see the kind of numbers settle, and have much more clarity around what percentage of the population in Hackney actually want or need to use a service like this. So I really just commend the work that the team have done, they've really looked carefully into this. They've had quite a large number of enquiries about the service, but actually only 50 complaints in total. So there hasn't been that much widespread concern around the service, although there have been questions about how it's going to work. I think that's all I want to say in introducing, I know there are a few questions. Thank you. Are there any questions or comments from Cabinet? No? In that case, I'd like to invite Councillor Garbutt to ask their questions. Thank you. Yeah, I would, I think Councillor has preempted what I'm going to say in terms of it going well, because obviously at Living in Hackney's Scrutiny Commission we heard around the reduction in the tonnage, and also the increase in people dumping and, you know, burning or putting in the black bin their green waste. So my questions are, 70% of residents haven't signed up, what's the understanding of why they haven't? And will these changes make a difference? Why wouldn't the concessions put in from the beginning? And we still do seem to be overcharging compared to other boroughs such as Southwark or Camden. And can you explain why the decision was taken to stick with the charge given that comparison to other boroughs? Thank you. Thank you. And thanks. I've also put the answers into one. So, yeah, I mean, thank you for asking about this. And actually, many of these questions were raised and considered at the detailed scrutiny, Living in Hackney's Scrutiny session. So if you want really detailed responses, it's worth going back to that session where there was quite a full presentation and also some written responses. Can I just interject to say that we were shut down in asking questions because there was going to be scrutiny here. So we weren't able to ask all the questions we wanted because we were told scrutiny was going to happen. Okay. Several of the questions you've asked were asked at that session and answered. And so we really, actually, we introduced the service at the start of the year and we've had six and a half thousand households subscribe in the first year, which was more than we expected in the first year. So we don't expect 100% participation. We've never had 100% participation in garden waste even when it was free. So that's not our measure. Our measure really is in working out what the need is across the borough and ensuring that that need is matched by the service that we provide and recovering for the service where we can recover for the service and where people can afford and can't afford to pay for the service because they are on means-tested benefits such as housing benefit or the housing element of universal credit. There's a 50% reduction. We've also, in recognition of the way people use the service, not just affordability, but the way people choose to use the service, introduced one-off collections and one-off collections on estates. So all of these are in response to the evidence that's come back to the way from looking at how people are using the service. The team felt that the introduction of a paid service was always likely to reduce participation, at least initially. That may change over time, but initially we did see a reduction, as you say, and there was a reduction in tonnage overall. And that will be for different reasons. So for some people that will mean that because we've started charging for the service, they've started thinking about, well, what do I actually want to do with my garden waste? Maybe I'll compost it. Maybe I'll leave the leaves on the garden and let them rot in. So there are different options that people might opt for. And that also, you know, a small number of people might even choose to use private waste contractors. We don't know. Regrettably, in some cases, we have also seen sort of a version of fly tipping. So people putting that waste in their black sacks and we have education and enforcement officers who are then engaging with people when they find garden waste in black sacks. I had the great pleasure to go out with the waste team recently, and they're quite good at kind of kicking a bag and going, yeah, that's garden waste. We're going to knock on their door. That's quite a supportive process. So it's explaining to people that actually that's not the way to get rid of your garden waste and giving them the options to do that. Now, we expect to see over time that behavior change because, you know, we start with education and we would move on to enforcement. So people will try out different options. They'll work out what works for them. We've then monitored, reviewed and adapted the service since its introduction in order to address the ways people are using it, but also their feedback. And I expect to see changes in the numbers as time goes on. And as we introduce these changes, which are improvements to the service, we'd expect to see that sort of settle over time. So in direct answer to your question of why didn't we introduce the 50% rate right at the outset, the team wanted to introduce the service to work out what was working. And then as soon as they've worked out how people are using the service, they have chosen to introduce 50% cut for that concessionary rate. The other part of your question related to benchmarking with other councils. So something like nearly 70% of other councils don't have a concessionary service at all, but we wanted to introduce one because we thought it was the right thing to do. And we do benchmark against other councils, but we also need to develop the right service for us. The purpose of the charge is to recover the actual cost of providing this service. So we don't know why the cost of providing the service is less in other councils. We can guess. So for example, going back to the insourcing, we have a fully insourced service in Hackney, which means that everybody is receiving at least London living wage, mostly more. We also provide all of the back office parts of that ourselves. And so those are all on decent employment conditions. And that may or may not cost more than an outsourced service. We don't know. What we've done is costed our own service and then worked out what the charge needs to be in order to pay for that. Thank you. Unless there's a burning supplementary. Okay. I'm just conscious that the meeting is due to end at seven. We still have three substantive items. So just really briefly, please, both of you. I suppose just very quickly. Thank you for that. It's really comprehensive. What percentage would good look like? Or did you set out at the beginning of the scheme to get, you know, what was the imagined percentage of household? The percentage, I can't remember what the percentage was for the first year. I just know that it was quite a number less than the 6,500 who did sign up. We don't know exactly what percentage we're aiming for, but we're expecting it to sort of settle over this year. It takes people a while to realise what you're doing. Then it takes them a while to realise how they want to respond to it. Now we've introduced some more affordable and, you know, kind of options that respond to the way people use the service. We'd expect it to settle probably over this year and next. Okay. I'm going to move to the recommendations that set out in the report. Can I ask everyone in Cabinet to please show hands as well as verbal affirmation? Thank you. Thank you. Item 12, Hackney Preparing for Adult Strategy. This is a paper that I'm bringing to you tonight. And essentially it's to meet the growing need for special support in Hackney over the past year. We've invested in youth, early health services and additional resource provision for children with special education needs and disabilities. This paper outlines our strategy to support young people with CEND as they prepare for adulthood. It reflects our absolute commitment to ensuring that every young person in Hackney achieves the best possible outcomes. The transition from childhood to adulthood is pivotal and often a challenging journey, especially for young people with CEND. We want to help young people with CEND to achieve their aspirations and goals. We are lucky to have a wealth of support and opportunities available in Hackney. And the development of this paper not only identified key gaps in the system in discussion with young people, parents, carers and professionals, but we worked together to find solutions. And this strategy was therefore co-produced with those young people, their families and key partners. It's grounded in evidence and insights shared by those with lived experience. And it ensures that the voice of our community at the heart of this work. The Preparing for Adulthood Strategy provides a clear framework to deliver a coordinated, effective offer that meets the needs of young people and their families at every stage of their journey to ensure that young people with CEND have the tools and opportunities to thrive and achieve the best possible outcomes for the future. Are there any questions or comments from Cabinet on the strategy? No? I'd like to invite Councillor Terbeth Dulloch to ask their question. Thank you. Thank you, Mia Goodley. My question is just because it's given the sort of the urgency of the timeline, when it's happening, which is quite soon. It's really good to see this. It's really, really good. From the work that we have with residents, we know that some children with CEND don't often have the education, health and care plan that can take sometimes a very long time to put in place. In the worst cases, we have heard and seen of children with CEND that have been expelled, or have been excluded from the school without having that in place. Can you perhaps explain to us how do you manage, how do you plan to monitor this issue? From children with CEND not having their care plan, education, health and care plan in place? Thank you. Thank you. Completing education, health and care plans, assessments on time is obviously an important priority for the Council. We keep a performance dashboard monitoring this, and we're clearly keen to keep our children, young people in education, particularly those children with additional needs. The purpose of the preparing for adulthood strategy is to provide a really supportive framework with clear pathways so that all young people can transition on to successful adulthood. You'll know that in 2022, we launched our CEND strategy for the local area with four core priorities around outstanding provision and services, an earlier response, joining up some of our services, and preparing for adulthood. So a key aim of this strategy is to ensure that early intervention services are in place, and that children and young people's needs are met at the earliest opportunity. You'll know that we had a peer review and we undertook two additional work streams to accompany those four priorities to improve our entire CEND service. I have to say, we had a launch event for the guide that we've produced for preparing for adulthood. And it was amazing to have this kind of fair with so many organisations coming into the town hall, demonstrating the range of work, some which we're very close to in terms of supported internships and employment, and some that are completely in the third sector. And it was quite exciting to bring everyone together on that occasion. So I'm very grateful to everyone who gave their time to that. Do you have a supplementary? Thank you. Thank you. Item 13. Oh, sorry. I'd better move to recommendations. Can I move the recommendations to sit out in the reports? Please show hands. Well, a verbal affirmation. Thank you very much, everyone. Item 13. Gambling Act 2005 Statement of Principles. Thank you to Councillor Vajana-Thomas and officers for their work on this report, which sets out the Council's updated Gambling Statement of Principles as it's required under the Gambling Act of 2005. This will guide our approach to licensing and regulating gambling activities within the borough and reflects our commitment to preventing crime, ensuring fairness and protecting vulnerable individuals from the potential harms of gambling. I'd like to invite Councillor Vajana-Thomas to introduce the report. Thank you, Mayor Woodley. This report, as you've introduced, provides the Cabinet with relevant information on the Gambling Act 2005 and the review of the Harkney Gambling Statement of Principles following the statutory consultation. Under the Act Sorry. I pray that I will get through without this strike off. Under Section 349 of the Act, say that licensing authority must prepare and publish a statement of principle that it proposes to apply in exercising its function under the Act during the three-year period. So the current statement is due for review. So this is an administration exercise to ensure that we are in compliance with the Act. So we've gone out consultation and non-controversial issues in Harkney had a very few responses to that consultation, but we see the reverse statement of Gambling Act 2005 for Harkney from January 2025. So I recommend the report and the report is to recommend to full Council for approval. Thanks, Mayor Woodley. Thank you. Any questions or comments from the Cabinet? I'm very mindful of the time. No? I'd like to invite Councillor Terbeth Diluff to ask her question. Thank you, Mayor Woodley. Thank you, Mayor Woodley. Thank you, Councillor. My question is about related to our statement of gambling principles, which has a no casino resolution in place, which was agreed in June 2022. Given the long-term impact gambling addiction can have on residents, is it perhaps not about time we introduce or at least begin to consider a no gambling resolution for our borough, whilst also introducing support services for those, including rehabilitation and mental health support for people that are affected. Thank you, Councillor Terbeth Diluff. Thank you. Councillor Terbeth Diluff. Thank you. Councillor Terbeth Diluff. Councillor Terbeth Diluff. Thanks very much, Councillor Terbeth Diluff for your question. Just to say that the Gambling Act does not grant local authority powers to resolve to not issue gambling premises licence. The Act places a specific requirement for an authority to aim to permit the use of premises for gambling as long as the authorities think is reasonably consistent with the licensing objectives, which is different from what you mentioned around the no casino resolution. So, the Section 166 of the Gambling Act allowed a local authority based on the demographics and other local issues to pass a resolution not to issue a casino premises licence. So, it's not the same with the general gambling licence and Hackney Council based on that demographics and other issues has passed a no casino resolution since June 2006. And we have continued with that, renewed that every three years. So, that is why you mentioned 2022. So, the next one we're going to be, we're looking at that in 2025. So, that is the difference. That's why we're not able to pass a new gambling resolution. Thanks. Supplementary. I can really brief. Mayor, I do have a follow-up on this one. Thank you, Councillor Fajana Thomas. I mean, I'm funny, shocking to hear, but it's really helpful that you explain the no powers on the resolution as the one I was just suggesting. But I just then check just the last point. How do we, as a local authority, monitor that the three objectives are maintained and met? One of them is ensuring that vulnerable adults are not harmed or exploited in these gambling settings, which I can imagine is hard work, but it should be good to hear how do we do that as a local authority. Thank you so much. Thanks again. In relation to the objective, the three objective, as you said, preventing gambling from being a source of crime or disorder or being associated with crime or disorder or being used to support crime. We have worked with partners at the gambling commission, work with the police, HMRC, to clamp down on illegal gaming machines in the borough and betting terminate. These are considered to be supplied by criminal gangs, also in relation to protecting children and other vulnerable people from being harmed or exploited by gambling. By gambling, we undertake inspections, regular inspections at our license, gambling license premises, such as betting shops, adult giving centers, and pubs with betting machines to check that machines cannot be assessed by children. We also check that self-exclusion schemes and information on gambling addiction are in place in each premises, such as betting shops and gaming centers explaining to people the harm that gambling can cause. The licensing service is not aware of any specific evidence. I know there was a question you asked earlier on about the game care research, but officers have been in touch and they're going to arrange a meeting to understand the research further in the new year and whatever learning practice we can get from that. Thanks. Thanks. Be good. Thank you. Can we move the recommendations as set out in the report? Show of hands as well as verbal affirmation, please. Thank you, everybody. Item 14, Local Authority Housing Fund allocations. This report outlines Hackney's use of the Local Authority Housing Fund, a government initiative aimed at providing homes for temporary accommodation and refugee settlement. Having successfully secured funding in all three rounds of the fund, we are now in a position to allocate these much needed homes. We're proud to be a borough sanctuary and have welcomed hundreds of refugees, including those from Afghanistan and Ukraine. These refugee resettlement homes are intended to support communities that have welcomed new arrivals, ensuring that their generosity doesn't result in longer wait times for social housing. Thank you to Councillor Etty and to the officers who've developed the allocations policy. I'd like to invite Councillor Etty to introduce the report. Thank you very much, Mayor Woodley. This is a report with regards to, as you've said, regarding the LAHF 3, which is the Local Authority Housing Fund. And I can comfortably say a big thank you to our officers, because Hackney was seen as being eligible for the capital grant funding, and we actually got all the three. But for us to proceed in terms of getting this to deliver the homes for temporary accommodation for our as well as resettlement homes, as well as resettlement homes for those on refugee housing scheme. So we've had to amend our allocations policy so that we'll be able to accommodate them because some of it does not fit the criteria. And an example of that is one of our criteria is for residents to be in the borough in the last three years. And with regards to the allocation process, this will enable us to make sure that we carry out, will assist the council for us to deliver what the local housing fund commitment is, because we signed memorandum of understanding with regards to that. And we must bear in mind that Hackney has a long-standing reputation of being open and welcoming to migrants and refugees, especially those fleeing conflict in hope of a better life. And this is an example of what we stand for. So thereby, the recommendation is to approve the Local Authority Housing Fund, the allocations process, so that we'll be able to get these homes to do in terms of resettling them. And this will enable them, they won't be able to stand on our register for a very long time, you know, rather, because this is specific, and also to approve the use of this allocation process for those specific homes acquired with the funding. And the last, like I said, is the council existing allocation policy that we've amended. So I commit to report to the cabinet. Thank you. Any questions from the cabinet? I think you've raised your hand. Councillor Williams. Thank you, Mayor. Just wanted to welcome the allocation policy to ensure that migrants and refugees are provided provided tenancy support. As you said at the start and the introduction of the paper, this is work that supports our commitment to becoming a borough of sanctuary. And there's a huge amount of work across the council that is underway to deliver on that commitment and the motion that was passed not so long ago in this very chamber. And along with recent announcements, they're both really welcome positions that will include in the move, extending the move on period, which will help refugees and migrants make their home here in Hackney, a borough that has a long history of welcoming refugees and migrants. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? In that case, if we can move, the recommendations are set out by hand and verbal affirmation. Thank you very much. I think as there are no appendices, that brings us to the close of the meeting. And I'll see many of you again, I think, at the extraordinary council meeting tomorrow. All right. Thanks, everyone. All right. Thanks, everyone.

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