Transcript

Some young people in the, what do you call it, not the audience is it, gallery, public gallery, so nice to see you, I hope you find this interesting, here's hoping, and of course the city mayor, mustn't forget him, okay, have we any apologies? Yes, Councilor, what do you want to say? Oh yes. Councilor, what do you want to say? Okay. Thank you. Are there any declarations of interest? No? Only that I'm going to have to go after about an hour, I'm going to have to leave about half six. Right, okay, that's an answer. When we say, are there any declarations of interest, it doesn't mean to say, are you interested in the meeting? Which would be a different question. It means that, have you got anything that influences your decision, your personal interest? Okay, minutes of the previous meeting, are those an accurate record? A record? Are those an accurate record? Yes. So, matters arising. Councilor Mark. Thank you, Chair, apologies, jumped the gun. I, there is a task group being set up about the adventure playgrounds, but, and I know that there is a meeting set, but it feels really far away, because it's still a couple of months, isn't it, kind of towards the end of June. And so, I think, given the urgency around the situation, waiting another three months from that funding settlement to find the next one, it would be really great if we could bring that forward a bit and try and work better to find a sooner date, please. Yes, I had the same query, I had the same query, really. Apparently, it's quite difficult to find a date, but I think we have to find a date and not leave it till June. So, if we could go away and find something without another date. Thank you. An earlier date, I mean. Thank you, Councillor Marchman. Are there any other matters arising? Now, we move then to Chair's announcements. We've got a meeting coming up, haven't we? We've got an informal scrutiny on workforce representation taking place on the 14th of May at 5 o'clock. And then there's an informal scrutiny on the venture programs, which we are entitled to go to as guests, if we wish. And that's no date there. Okay. I think I've done minutes too early, haven't I? Questions, representations, and statements of case. None have been received. Petitions, no new ones have been received. Tracking of petitions. We have a report. The petitions, three petitions, Mark's as read. And updates are noted on the report. Anybody, any questions on that item? No, thank you. So, we have further updates on People's Way petition. And also on Oakland Avenue petition. And also on basketball courts on Victoria Park. If anybody's got no questions on those. In terms of Victoria Park, I'm told that developer contributions have been secured specifically for the purpose of providing a new full-size basketball court on Victoria Park. Which is great. Detailed design proposals for the new court have been prepared. And a planning application will be submitted in May. The new court will be constructed as part of the wider MAGA, I think is how you say that. Which is the multi-use games investment programme. Scheduled to be completed by the end of December 25 in time for Christmas. So, we will, that's going to be preceded with, which is good news. I think old people can play basketball as well, can't they? Or older people. Okay. So, we know the status of the petitions, which is good. We now have questions for the city mayor. We have a question from Youth Council Representative Mario. So, would you like to read that out, Mario? Thank you. I wanted to ask questions, haven't you? Yeah, two questions, yes. So, one, I wanted to know what the council is doing to improve social life for young people, especially teenagers, because there has been a growing interest in including more investment in venues, bars, and creating a safe nightlife in the city centre. Now, I don't want to offend any coffee drinkers, but there has been an increase in coffee shops and corner shops. Shouldn't we try to, kind of, locate resources more to improve spaces for young people? But spaces that would actually attract young people into the city centre. And with places like Hussbar growing, how are we making the city centre more appealing and competitive? That's it. Then, my second question is... Should we have one more side? Yeah. Okay. Okay, thanks, Mario. City Mayor. I'll turn that around here. Mario, I mean, thank you very much for asking that question on behalf of the Youth Council. It is something that I think you're very right to ask about. And I like to think we've got quite a lot of good things happening, but never enough. And we can always do more. I do want to say, just in advance of this, that one of the things that has most pained me over recent years is the extent to which Leicester and councils like Leicester have had to cut back on the number of people that we've got working with young people and for young people, you know, it's all right, you know, what happens during school hours and in schools and so on. But what we don't have anymore and what very few councils now are able to afford is what used to be called a youth service, people actually to work with young people outside. Now, obviously, you know, we do some things and the youth council's, you know, a very good example, but it's not enough. Never can be. Now, to talk about the actual things that there are for young people. You know, Chair, I mean, you actually referred to one of them, you know, one of the new things that's happening, that's a basketball thing at Victoria Park, but you also referred to the fact that that's part of the programme, the things across the city that we're doing to provide facilities for young people. We may not be able to provide people to work with young people and I very much regret that. What we can do and are doing is provide places for young people to come together for the most part to organise their own activities, sadly, because, you know, I'd like to have people working on there with them. But at least we have those places. And the multi-use games areas, the particular basketball court that you've talked about, are really quite, you know, a wide range of things. And just by coincidence today, I was down at Melbourne Street, which is in Highfields, where they were doing the formal ribbon cutting on the latest multi-use games area in that area. And I'm really quite proud of the fact that we've got that happening, that particular one, but also as part of a load of those that are being done across the city. But as I say, it can never be enough, but at least it's good. I think it's also important just to think about what can be done in the city centre as well, because the city centre is, of course, you know, somewhere where people can come together from different parts of the city, even if they don't have the facility in their area. And, of course, I think it's important that, you know, we do make sure that the city centre continues to grow the numbers of things that are particularly attractive to young people. And I think it's some of the things that, you know, we've seen coming over recent years. Bowling in Lane 7. A number of places now do things like Crazy Golf, which, you know, isn't just for young people, but, you know, quite a lot of young people enjoy it. And a whole range of, you know, axe throwing as well. Yeah, no, quite seriously, you know, it's all fun. You know, obviously, not just for young people, but of interest to young people. I know my own grandkids also enjoy coming into the city centre, because, you know, they're very much into games and things, you know, and having places to go that, you know, they can meet up with their mates and, you know, do e-games and so on. I think it's also important that we do, when we can, events that attract people of different ages. And the last weekend's events associated with the Old Town Festival were brilliant. And, I mean, you know, obviously, when we talk about young people, we talk about a whole range of different ages. But there were a whole range of different ages involved in building that cardboard forum, whatever it was. I've had a lot of fun doing that. And a lot of people had even more fun pulling it down and trampling on it afterwards. I'm not quite sure who did the health and safety, what sort of that. But it was fun. And I was pleased, even at my age, to join in and help them. So, I think the short answer, Mario, is I think we are doing quite a lot of things. But we, you know, can never do enough. Actually, one I've forgotten, actually, that I'm really very proud of, I'm really looking forward to, is the new skateboard park that we've developed on the corner of St Margaret's Passages near Abbott Park. And that was young people coming to see me, me particularly, a good few years ago now, because it's taken ages to get it developed. But that's near incompletion. It's state-of-the-art, and it's going to be fun. And, you know, I'm really, you know, very pleased about it. So, I can't possibly finish without mentioning something that I'm really looking forward to. Sadly, I'm only going to be able to watch. But I'm looking forward to doing so. So, as I say, I hope I've given a bit of a flavour of what we're doing. It is never enough, but I come back to fundamental. What I really do regret is that we don't really have what we used to have, which is a proper youth service, that people could be out there and help young people make things happen for themselves. And, you know, I look forward to the day when perhaps we might be able to rebuild the proper youth service to help make these places actually, you know, places where we can encourage things to happen. Thanks, Chair. That was a long answer, but it was, I hope, you know, one of the questions is... Can we have go-kart racing in the, you know, in the market area? You know, those little go-karts, small go-karts. You mean the sort of pedal ones? No, no, no, the ones with an engine on them. You can maybe have it. That's the head of the space that happened there. Yeah. Yeah. I see. You know, it's funny, didn't there used to be one just off Abbey Lane? There was, wasn't there? There was one out towards sort of Narborough, past Narborough. It's a very interesting thought. It's not one I've given much thought to, so I'm not going to make any promises off the top of my head. But it is an interesting thought. They're fun. Yeah. I'm just not quite sure how well they fit in with, at a time when we're trying to stop people using e-bikes. You can't stop an area and let them race around. It's an interesting prospect, Rachel. I mean, certainly, you know, sorry to keep going on about this, Chair, but actually the possibility of making things happen for the whole family, as well as for young people, in the area, in the marketplace, you know, does raise possibilities. Consider things like that. In the same way as we've done bike skating, for example, on Jubilee Square. Yeah. Mario, have you got any further questions on that answer? Do you want to move to your next question? Yeah, second question, yes, if I may. What specific plans are in place to protect and enhance green spaces in Leicester, and how will these efforts contribute to improving the overall quality and sustainability of the city centre? Yeah, again, I mean, thank you very much for this question. I'll try not to go on for too long, but I could do, because actually, I think we in Leicester are very, very, very lucky that in previous generations, long before even though it was around in the council. The council has invested in making some really special parks and open spaces in the city. We're a very tightly developed city. A lot of houses. But over the years, they set aside Victoria Park. It had been the race course, and then they moved it on and off the way. But very special park. Then they built what was the East Park, now Spinney Hill Park. That's why it's called East Park Road. The East Park, right? Then the Western Park. And then a whole series of other smaller parks across the city. And we've actually got, from generations before, for me and others here, a lot of very special places. What we've done in our generation is to look at some areas of waste land in the city and convert them into valuable public space. Two areas that, you know, you young people, you know, won't immediately appreciate it, were waste land. It's Aylston Meadows. A vast area, right? You know, down the riverside, you know, out towards Aylston there. That, would you believe, was landfill site. You know, where the rubbish was tipped. And just look at it now. You know, I mean, over the, you know, over the last couple of decades, you know, that's been totally transformed in something really special. Informal space, green space, and incredibly valuable. And at the other end of the city, again, you know, certainly young people, and probably quite a number of others won't perhaps realise it, but what we did was to take what was former gravel pits, was dereliction, in the area of water made. It was, honestly, I mean, I've obviously been around on time, but I can remember when there wasn't a single piece of green on there at all. And look at it now. Lakes, trees, wildlife, it's been totally transformed. And, you know, that's, I think, you know, very important because, you know, what we do need to do is to continue, despite the fact that we're a very tightly developed city, to try to find opportunities to make more green space, more usable space, and particularly, obviously, from the point of view of young people, more recreation space. The other thing I would just particularly want to pay tribute to, and this is before my time as city mayor, it was the work that my predecessors did to get some decent playing fields in the city. They used the Football Foundation, which is the FA's sort of charity wing, and used their money to transform a load of spaces into really high quality, in some cases, 3G, pictures across the city. And, obviously, that's very important. I could go on at a considerable length about the, you know, the green spaces in Leicester. But, I think, you know, it's just an opportunity, really, for me to say that, you know, some people, generation before me, were aware of the fact that it's all right giving people the roof over their heads, but they also need to give them a place where they can get out and breathe the fresh air. And we're quite lucky in the city and having some good ones. Thank you, sitting there. Are you coming back, Marion? No, it's all right, you're poised. OK, we've moved then to independent care homes in Leicester City. I believe, Lawrence, is that you? I'll just briefly introduce the report and take any questions. but I think we were asked on the basis to bring a report on the basis of the number of planning applications that were being received in particular for children's residential homes in the city. And just to talk about some of the process and controls involved in those homes. We did invite both the Department for Education and Ofsted to attend because in terms of the level of control that we have outside of planning, both in terms of the approval of new homes and their oversight and regulation. In most cases, other than when they are homes that are actually run by the local authority itself, we have no involvement. There will be some homes that we have a contractual relationship with because we contract with those providers for particular places. But I have to say over the last month or so, having received and commented on all of those that have come forward, I think if they maybe 16 or 17 that I have seen, there are only two of those that we have any contractual relationship or any knowledge of whatsoever. And in fact, most of them don't actually seem to be active care companies whatsoever. They are either private individuals or companies that are either recently formed who have been dormant for a number of years that are now putting forward properties to purportedly become children's residential establishments. I have to say given the history of some of those I'm unsure about whether that is actually the genuine intention of those funding applications and whether the motivation might exist but it seems to be in quite a number of cases it seems there's no history of running care companies and it seems that they are off a boilerplate agreement from a planning agent rather than anything more meaningful in terms of a business plan. So I think there's probably more to be seen than actually what we can see through the planning applications with some of these as well. What we have said we could do despite the very kind of limited influence we have is we have started to say particularly for children's about residential applications that we will start to put comments on from a children's social care point of view. You can say about whether you know those providers we can have a look at their histories in terms of the company's house and any experience they might have and we can reflect on within their planning statements around whether they seem to have the level of experience that you might expect to manage any risks that the children place there and any antisocial behaviour that might emerge given the fact that some of these children do have behavioural issues that sometimes take careful management not all do but some do and equally around some of their plans around things like shifts because some of them frankly have been unrealistic in terms of the fact that they don't have staffing numbers in their plans that Ofsted would need in order to register those places if they have three children single staffing is certainly never going to meet the Ofsted amounts and also about therefore the amount of traffic that might occur in terms of the number of staff they'd have to have what happens at shift handovers where they've got double staffing and visitors to the home which can be quite regular in terms of both family and professional staffing as well so we're trying to add in those comments and not all are reflective of material planning matters but I think help hopefully guide the planning committee in some of the questions they might want to ask when they're thinking about approval we're doing similar I think with some of the adult applications some of them are more straightforward and are kind of extension for example of existing facilities for rather elderly people or people with disabilities some of which are new and given their proximity or our knowledge of the providers might be worthy of comment as well so that's why we're trying to position ourselves in terms of the department to give more information although Ofsted and the Department for Education decide not to attend today if there are particular questions that we can't answer I haven't got an answer for within the council we can offer to write on behalf of OFC to DFB or Ofsted and ask answers to particular questions as well thanks very much thanks Lawrence councillor Batol chairs the children and young people's commission which this could have gone to but it's got wider issues so it's come to go thank you thank you chair Lawrence remember that we are having really detailed meeting about that planning and CYP and then decided that it's better that that can come to OSC because there's a departmental not only one department there are a couple of other departments involved so if we can sort out here my question is related like we discussed in that meeting as well that is there any scope for council to work with Ofsted the CQC and the placing authority as well to establish a shared tracking or notification system especially for those care homes who are operating in the city and this is mainly for reassurance for the local communities and also for the transparency point of view as well and the second is that is there any possibility that we can whistleblow about those care homes or those people to Ofsted or CQC is there any format or any way we can involve them I remember that we were discussing that probably we are going to ask Ofsted regional director or probably from CQC they can be a part of this OSC I'm not sure when we are planning to ask them to come here thank you thank you we did invite them for tonight and they both declined to attend so they were invited tonight but neither of them the basis that they declined on was that if they had to attend every single council who might want them to attend to answer questions they wouldn't be able to service it so it wasn't fair for them to attend here where they wouldn't be able to attend if everybody invited them so that was the answer for for both offerings but at the end of the day they are going everywhere to inspect all the organizations so no one there to checking their quality assurance that what type of quality assurance of services they are offering so probably if we can't challenge them directly is there any other way that we can involve other organization or probably Department of Education or some directors that at least I remember that once we asked them for those multi academy trusts as well that we were looking for that a lot of multi academy trusts are in Leicester operating but we were not having any data so we request regional director and she was rudely saying look the data is there you can go there and check the data so that at the end of the day they are responsible from Department of education so if they I wouldn't disagree we can certainly write to the Secretary of State in terms of the issues with DFE we have many trials with Ofsted they seem not particularly open to criticism and I think the question about who watches the watchers is a good one with Ofsted frankly so there seems to be little we can do but we can write with specific questions just in terms of escalation I mean we can escalate issues to both Ofsted and CQC but we have to use the complaints process the same as anyone else so we use that same complaints portal in order to raise matters with them we do have some level of cooperation but it's more in the fact that they will share information with us but the conduit back is simply through the process that everybody else has to use and we have some conversations around things like saturation so for example in care homes in a given area which we were looking at in planning terms the difficulty is and it's a bit paradoxical because Ofsted won't release a list for example of where care homes are on the basis to identify them might put children at risk from predators and yet at the same time of course through planning we identify exactly where children's homes are going to be registered and going to be so we have this kind of strange situation where we have those two things in parallel Ofsted will not release a list to anyone of where children's homes are so we never have a complete list I guess through our planning process we could have a look where approvals have been made but that doesn't necessarily mean that those homes are open or registered the other problem is the issue of course of people running unregistered children's homes sometimes awaiting registration because Ofsted can be quite slow in that process on occasion so it's not always that they are poor providers they are providers who are opening but are still waiting their registration but in some cases people do choose to run homes on an unregistered basis in theory open to prosecution from Ofsted but actually in reality very rarely if ever are because of the lack of placements in the market so there's almost a kind of a tolerance by Ofsted the fact that these homes continue to operate and in fact if they didn't operate local authorities wouldn't have anywhere to place children in some instances as well so again something of a difficult situation overall but we have said we will raise the saturation point and the idea that perhaps we could check the number of given homes in an area by super out area or similar so we can at least see what the saturation would be so we're going to raise that point with Ofsted and see if there's a way round that either by some kind of postcode check to give the numbers but we don't actually know how Ofsted configure their information and data so how possible it will be I don't know which yet but I'm speaking with planning around whether we can do something around that Thank you Lawrence for the detail related to the answer that you mentioned that planning department is already heavily involved so can we explore internally if we can't do anything externally like regionally or nationally is there any possibility that we can something locally any mechanism to push for more cross departmental collaboration in decision making especially when we are planning those care homes are there especially the planning meetings that we are having so social care or education related care planning those directors can involve and they can see that if there are any red flags are there so they can check in advance or earlier so internally if we can have any cross departmental collaboration that will be more beneficial yes and we certainly started that so you'll see through planning documentation now there will be a short letter with comments on from the social care department in relevant cases so we are putting something forward as I say the issue is the majority of those things are not directly material planning matters so we're providing context I would say in order for the planning committee to be able to ask more questions around those material items and whether there are anything within that kind of intelligence that we hold around those either the houses themselves or the proposed providers that might then lead into questions around for example the ability to manage social behaviour risk or traffic risk etc we've got councillor march councillor pickering on the internet councillor porter and councillor south and dina ok you'll get there eventually ok councillor march I think is next if you yes if you're happy to do that yes dina thank you as you mentioned in your report the local authority will not automatically be aware of all independent care homes operating in the city I just wanted to ask what's stopping Leicester from demanding mandatory registration for all care homes here I mean isn't anything that we can demand is something that I guess we would put to the Department for Education that we should take over the registration of care homes from Ofsted but the way it's been set at the moment both the regulator and inspector of children's homes officially is Ofsted and that's what the legislation gives them the power to do so as it is at the moment we don't have the those homes it's only related to Ofsted so it would need a change in the law and certainly we could ask the government to consider that but I how how does the council ensure that emotional distress and psychological needs of the residents are being met when placement is made outside the Leicester and what mechanisms are being put in place to track and maintain consistency across all care homes so obviously we've got a mixed picture here so we've got children who are from Leicester and who Leicester City Council have the responsibility for who live in Leicester and some who might live in care homes or foster care homes outside of Leicester and we have responsibility for those and they will have a social worker they will have an independent reviewing officer and they will have a care plan where the social worker will help deliver that plan along with whoever's caring for that young person or child through regular kind of contact and then the independent reviewing officer is being properly delivered and we'll see them every three months in order to make sure that's happening and we'll share a meeting with relevant people The other point I guess is around children who are not from Leicester so are the responsibility of a different council different local authority and are placed into homes in the city now all the responsibility for those children remains back with their home local authority so we don't have any involvement in the care or oversight of the care for those children at all where we do get concerns raised we can report back so I for example will on occasion have concerns raised with me which I will then write to my equivalents and the local authority and I will raise those concerns around the way that that child is being looked after but ultimately all the decisions around that care go back to that of the local authority and in fact we have no powers in order to say that they shouldn't stay here or that their care plan should be altered and they should be looked after in a different way Councillor March thank you good questions coming forward from our young people are always very welcome I'm trying to call me a cynic but I'm trying to work out what the game is is it a city specific problem is there a company or a set of companies that are going around and doing this specifically what's the game are they trying to test out how robust a planning system is are they trying to convert these get care and then make them into these medical facilities because that's the game they see at planning right they say it's a medical facility and everyone thinks oh great we need more dentists and GPs in the city and then it's another Botox planning place right and so I'm trying to understand what the potential long term usage of these would be if it isn't for short term and especially when they're taking housing out of the city and we need housing for everybody in the city we are in housing crisis so that's my first question and my second question is I guess around risks connected to lots of smaller unregulated unregistered care homes if somebody did move in particularly well it would be of course a vulnerable adult or a young person how long would it take at the worst case scenario for that to become known to us that they were providing that care even if they continued to be an unregistered establishment please so just to answer the latter question I think the question is around when it first becomes a noticeable problem and gets reported into some part of the council where we feel we can take action or at least raise it with for example Ofsted or CQC but if care homes can operate not known to us and equally local authorities should inform us when they place their residents either children or adults into the city but don't always so in truth we'll be hit and miss depending on the position that the local authority take in terms of what they notify us about and effectively community intelligence about the fact there's problems emanating from those units and how swiftly and how robustly the regulator might take action seems variable if I'm absolutely honest in some cases so it isn't entirely clear and of course we have very little in terms of teeth I know in some areas what is done by planning committee is that they offer time limited change of use for example so they have to reapply so at least there can be some look at how they are performed over a period so certainly I know sometimes maybe a year or two year is grunted in terms of changes but it lapses and then there's an ability to have a look at what's happened in the interim in those particular settings I'm equally interested in what the game is because I can't work it out it feels like there is one if I'm honest there's something more there are certainly two maybe three planning agencies seem to be recurrent and there are definitely forms of words in those that are identical in each of the planning statements that I've seen so there is definitely kind of a boilerplate type scenario that's being put forward in terms of I'm going to open a children's home there seems to be some of these seem to be care companies that have been formed and registered with Companies House that either may be dormant or very new which may be an intention to run a care company or maybe in order to give the veneer of one some of them frankly are people who you can see from Companies House history are directors of a number of companies often in unrelated fields small shops and supermarkets for example who are then seem to be moving into this market whether the intention is to get the registration and then try and sell them on to a children's home provider with the planning in place which I guess might attract a premium could be one of the motivations but I've got no evidence that's the fact and whether there are particular for example tax or planning matters that they're hoping to subvert ahead of it I'm unsure but there's certainly I think a question to be asked there but I'll be honest I don't have the answer to it Thank you they're really interesting answers and I guess that is all that is in our remit I'd like to suggest three recommendations coming out of the conversations we've had so far so my recommendations for consideration are something around recommending that planning considers increased use of conditions around time limited change of use in these sorts of applications and that planning looks at the pattern of applications for these smaller care homes to try and put together what that picture is and the third thing I think we should be interested in which is perhaps more for your department Lawrence is more around mapping and trying to get you know we don't need to see it as members or outside of your offices but actually mapping that picture so that we understand where children are obviously we know where our children are but where are everybody else's children just from a risk perspective it feels like somebody in this local authority should have that map please thank you Lawrence any advice on that recommendation we can certainly have a go I mean we can only do the best we have with the information that we've got for example often we get told that a child's arrived but they very rarely tell us that they've left again so we do end it with a really mixed picture but we can certainly do the best we can with the data that we have got and if we can find a different way of configuring a map so we can run reports and maps of it it would give us a better idea and similarly with the planning actually if we look at the actually completed planning applications and then have a look at saturation maybe there is a way so I'm happy to say I'd be happy with it as a recommendation it may take a while to implement because it might mean some significant changes to our systems and I'm happy to continue to work with planning colleagues as well around what we can do around the saturation picture as well in terms of what I think we need to be looking for it's more just an assurance that somebody's got it right that we know where bundles and kids are in the city even if they aren't left that would be really helpful yeah and I'd say we do our best we do know we're on an individual basis I think the kind of the mapping is probably we have less of that but we can certainly have a look at what we can do yeah I can foresee a situation where there's a public inquiry somewhere in this country about the conditions that children are placed in these some of these homes without proper concern by the local authority as to what's happening so it's as though we don't learn from history with regard to residential children's homes etc so I'll just note that I can't suggest any result but I think we need to be aware that this will create a crisis at some stage City Mayor yes sir I would just add to the very helpful suggestions that Councillor Marchion has made that I'd be very interested to know from our planners whether it is possible to give limited period approvals I've heard what what Lawrence said I think we've always been advised that it's no longer possible to do that but I think it will be worth finding out whether we can because I think it may well be something that would enable us to keep an eye on how any of these properties are actually being managed and whether we are actually reassured that they're being managed properly and children are being properly looked after within them I'd be very interested to follow that up with our planning colleagues and to find out whether we can just give them an indefinite but actually give them something that's limited period and it's capable of being monitored afterwards Council Pickering Thank you Chair I would just like to echo what Peter has just said because I think dormant care homes that are not operating actively are you know taking housing stock away from the city or the children's homes that could be put to better use but one recommendation that I would like to put forward I think it's what Ms. Barr was saying to start with about partnership working I just want to give you an example of what we had in Ayers Monsel it wasn't with a children's home but it was with a home that was run by the NHS with a woman who was quite clearly quite ill she needed two carers 24-7 and the way she communicated was by screaming and these screams went on night and day and really made the residents either side quite mentally ill to be honest so partnership working when it's like that I know it's not NHS it's not Leicester City Council so the ones that are City Council do get sorted but this took four years and our constituents the residents were really very ill but they couldn't even sell their homes because nobody would buy them so I really would like to recommend that we do a bit more partnership I mean I don't know how that even got passed as within planning as a care home because it just wasn't suitable for that person that was there nor for the residents so yes I would very much like to put that forward as a recommendation sorry I think we need to be focused on children's homes is what this paper is about is how I understand it am I got that wrong it is but it's also about NHS CQC as well and partnership working where we could work with City Council because it took four years to get a resolution they're moved now but it's taken four years okay well I think what we can best do is to ask the officers to look at the issues that are coming out in this discussion I think it needs to go back to children's social care at some stage because they're more involved in these issues and planning as well it's not only children it's planning as well I don't want to take a load of recommendations that perhaps aren't best looked at as a way of how do we deal with this issue but points taken Karen the next person that's on our long list is Councillor Porter sorry thanks very much I'd say that the main issue obviously after the welfare of children has to be the fact that local authorities up and down the country feel that they're being ripped off by the providers of this service I mean in Leicester City Council I think it's gone from a few million pounds a year to costing what six million plus maybe was it ten million or something last year I mean huge amounts of money you know for having children in care the cost of I mean whether it's children or we were told what one child was costing like a million pound a year to keep in a home you know so these are other issues and when you're saying about you know what's motivating it it's basically these people are where we say shopkeepers setting up dormant companies in order to get an uplift on a planning proposal is clearly the motivation because if you can get a normal say detached house maybe it could be worth 500,000 once you get a house like that you've got a child in it and you're getting a million pound a year that house could be worth you know it's got to be a million plus so you could double your money so that's the motivation behind it and I think even a couple of weeks ago maybe three weeks ago at the planning committee we had a speculative application like this where somebody came along it was in Hamilton to convert a four bedroom detached house into a care home and they didn't even have any knowledge of looking after children it was purely just to get the planning approval so that they can then flog it on so I think probably the issue with Leicester is that people who are doing these schemes see Leicester as a soft touch if you stick in a planning application in Leicester you're going to get it passed the planning committee will pass it I mean I objected to it because I thought it was going to cause a huge nuisance for the neighbours plus the garden was about the size of a trampoline I mean there was no way you could properly look after children with needs in a pokey little garden like that and they weren't allowed to go out so I think what we need to do really is talk to the planners find out what other local authorities do because I understand some local authorities have a blanket ban on them if one comes to a committee they will just refuse it and say go to appeal and so obviously people don't go I mean I don't know which local authority that is but I think it would certainly worth looking to find out what other local authorities do and then maybe we'll get a reduction and the only ones that will come forward are ones that are going to meet the highest standards which are really ones that aren't just set up in order to try and milk the system and let them make millions out of it so that would be my recommendation thanks council pickering have you had your question answered yeah so yeah sorry council sahur thank you I think for me what's missing from the report is data so it's the scale that's the problem and I know that the report was in conjunction with planning so they must have that data so I think it would be really useful to know how many apply how many are known to you which wards they're in if any of them have Ofsted because then we can have a real idea of the scale of it back on those points I don't know what data planning hold to be honest I know they might have something around change of use I don't know whether they can narrow it down to residential children's homes I would think they can I don't know in which we might be able to match it I think that's similar to the point that was raised by Captain March earlier around whether we can improve that intelligence around where children are and what might be registered and running in the city so it certainly speaks to plenty of colleagues around how they have their information and data and bring that together and see what's there so we don't hold data in that format we simply know around where the children arrive and leave in the city from other local authorities but I'm happy to ask the question planning colleagues to see what we can do there just in terms of things the time limited planning applications I know my previous role where we were opening children's homes there was one district council in Nottinghamshire that always pretty much gave time limited planning I'd say that there's some sharp practice in that authority so I'll check whether it was actually legal or not but nevertheless we'll go back and we'll have a look because it was certainly done on a regular basis so I assume it was certainly there's issues in terms of I guess the difference between planning and regulation of care because often I guess when you're approving planning for a care home or children's you're approving it not knowing what the nature of those residents might be so for example the woman who was making the excessive volume of noise I guess planners would never have known that and then it relies to CQC as the regulator in order to intervene in that and how robust they would be in doing that if the organisation and NHS in this case weren't particularly responding to that so it's difficult in terms of planning terms to know actually what the future will be in terms of the residents in terms of what's said and just finally just around sufficiency and profiteering yes there is big profit motives in the market we know some of the big care home providers both in children and adults are owned by hedge funds and money not only goes into hedge funds but goes abroad as well so we know there's a big picture of that in terms of that we've got sufficiency strategy for the city which actually came to the last children's scrutiny as well in terms of how we're developing our own homes internally and our intention to work with a not-for-profit partner in the future to develop the homes that we need for less the children and within the city so we do have a strategy to try and address that profiteering and there is some good noises from government in terms of being able to limit the profiteering but yes exactly what that looks like in the market as well. Can I just come back a minute? I think the data is really important because what we want to be able to do is track the changes so if we are changing planning or putting particular interventions in we need to show that it demonstrates that actually it's improving or not improving so I think it would be really helpful and obviously the report wasn't in conjunction with planning we know that that item is mentioned when it says the planning committee so I think it's really important that we get that information together. Yes I'm really happy to ask planning colleagues about that and I guess some kind of recommendation around what we're trying to achieve so we know what the parameters about success look like would also be useful in terms of measuring that data what are we trying to achieve and therefore through the data do we know if we've achieved it or not. thank you chair just just following on from the comments around working with the planning department there's nothing stopping us developing our own guidance in relation to this because when these applications and they have been coming thick and fast in the last year or so have appeared we have recently started showing the saturation and clustering within an area and the response that's come back from planning is at the moment we don't have no guidance in relation to that so they're just treating the application as it is. However we can develop our own guidance to reflect local priorities local circumstances and I think it's extremely important for our adult social care to make comments on those applications in terms of the track record of the track record of the companies that are applying pretty much all of the ones that I've seen are new new directors no track record they they normally get a manager to front it up who's got years of experience but they themselves haven't and I think we should explore everything because I've not seen one application that's not coming in front of planning that hasn't had strong opinions from the public and it seems like that we as a local authority have kind of gone along put planning to one side but also then turned around and said that it's an off-step matter and there's nothing we can do in relation to that because our hands are tied. There is one question I have in relation to that is if outside local authorities place children within the city and those children remain in that home once once they reach adulthood who's the responsible authority that takes over that adult is it the outside local authority or would that adult then automatically fall into the responsibility of say bless the city council because that is another important factor which can then determine how we develop our own policy and guidance because it's fine if they remain with the external local authority before all of a sudden we then have to look at housing and adult because they're homeless etc etc then that is just another local authority passing on their responsibilities to us as a local authority so there is a lot there and I think whilst our hands are tied because Ofsted don't really want to do anything about it we can probably look at developing our own policy in conjunction with a lot of the departments to explore all the avenues including time limited changes of use etc etc which then gives us time to look at what these applications are all about. Yeah thank you and yes certain granted planning colleagues have been saying that that's one of the things they will look to do about whether we can have some more internal guidance both in terms of ensuring of the fact that they are asking for commentary from within social care and education around the applications but equally around things like saturation because you're right at the moment I think Grant's view is that there is something that we could do around a saturation clause in terms of the number of care homes in an area but we haven't got any guidance that kind of supports that so I know that that's something that he's looking into at the moment. Just in terms of children placed by outside local authorities when they turn 18 those children will remain in nearly all cases under the Leaving Care Act and the responsibility of the placing authority. That said there's lots of complications within that as you say because despite that they may still develop housing rights within the area in which they're placed in time and of course the other thing that we have particularly in Leicester City is authorities from all over the country whilst they may look after children who we would call children from abroad seeking safety but unaccompanied asylum seeking children Leicester is a favourite place to place them because of the community links are strong here so we literally have children from all over the country looked after by other local authorities placed into Leicester who are effectively unaccompanied children who have been seeking asylum who reach adulthood and the issues around that particularly around no recourse to public funds no right to remain and removals are very large for us and are added to by the local authorities placing into the city. Councillor Osmond I just want to pick up some of the points I think there needs to be some sympathy in relation to our strategy where you've got in my ward I had a planning application that was put in for an empty property and that empty property was a detached property so the recommendations obviously were to approve that the residents all complained and all the rest of it I made representation and one of the reasons that I got from the residents for complaining about it was that the property had been emptied for about a year or so but the market value was lower and whoever was purchasing to develop that into a children's home was paying much much higher rate 100,000 more than the going rate so you know it just shows the incentive of premium going up in relation to that property itself and that wasn't the reason I went to object but I think colleagues on the planning committee saw some sense in relation to not only that application there was other applications that came in the last six months similar to those and I fully would sympathize and support the fact that we need to obviously look at the fact that if we're going to put one time limits that's one area we need to look at and you know the local authority becomes a I know I don't know whether we become a strategy consultee in relation to children services or some part of consultation I know highways have their say in relation to planning applications back surveys then you've got you know noise survey etc being carried out and it's only a change of use from is it cat c3 to cat c2 and that changes completely can I come in here chair I think there's quite a lot of planning questions and here tonight and then actually there is no officers here that can answer the question so actually would can I suggest that if we haven't been back to this commission or we come back to another scrutiny with these questions because I think otherwise we'll sit here and Lawrence I and Matt aren't going to be able to answer these questions to you tonight that's fine would that be in yeah yeah I think that would be useful and I know that it goes to education scrutiny at the same time but I think to take our views on board to be able to look at the issues around us being consultees in relation to these sorts of issues because it is important for us to have these discussions in relation to the sensitivity around looking after children you know I mean city mayor would remember beck inquiry and all the rest of it and we don't want that to fall into the city of leicester in terms of private homes could I ask any question before I go you know about the costs that have gone up have you got any idea of how they've escalated in recent years for the yeah that we're having to pay out yeah the placement costs yeah we have got the information I think it gets reported to children's committee already around the placement costs but we can share that information and I think it's normally in every one of the monitoring reports we talk about the average cost but we can definitely provide more detail and I'll get the last squeeze the children's squeeze report on it so is it roughly like about four or six million ground now currently or if you give me a minute I will quickly open the report and double check the numbers all right okay okay about 40 years ago local authorities particularly Warwickshire if a member of that case they closed all their children's homes part thing one and relied on fostering professional fostering intermediate treatment those sort of things and I think Leicestershire County Council as it was then did close quite a few children's homes so what's happened I'm not asking for an answer now but what has happened that makes us want to have lots of children's homes by private set on in the private sector to fill those gaps this I think we need to recognize that there's a potential crisis coming and I think it's important that we go outside of this committee commission with a proposal to have a real look at all the issues involved in this and talk to Ofsted and the care commission about what's happening because I don't think we can be just irresponsible I don't mean that on what they're trying to be responsible but leaving it so I can't put forward a recommendation that's specific enough but I think we need to have some sort of working group to look at all the implications let me finish I can see you wanted to come in a working group or whatever it's called a task group to look at all the implications of this in terms of children particularly and any lessons from that investigation that may affect other care for other people Catherine Cassidy I can assure you and I'm probably overstepping my mark with Lawrence here but the children's committee do get reports on this already it is very much corporate parenting gets reports on this it's very much something on our radar Lawrence and I talk about this on a regular basis I know it's something that the director of the children's services talk back to government about it is very much something that we all talk to and it is partly why because we know what's going on in the external market whilst we are trying to look and invest in our residential homes ourselves and we talk about it in budget reports we talk about it in the children's scrutiners as well so it is something that we are already working for yeah I think it's in the responsibility of members to scrutinize all that I think there's two things here and I think the first thing is that we should delegate those responsibilities but insist that children continue to scrutinize them and I think the second thing is that the stuff we've been talking about around this sort of silo between planning and independent care homes then that could maybe come back here once officers have had a chance to kind of pull some of that information together and perhaps what we need then at that point might be grant or his equivalent to come and answer those specific questions so then I agree it's such an important area but it should be followed up most of that through children so to delegate it to children chair I'm concerned that somehow we don't leave this in the ether waiting for a solution I think we need to find a way of delving deeper into this perhaps looking at some of the historical history of this whole system not in Leicester particularly but what have we learned if anything so whether that's for the Children's Commission I'll ask the advice of Councillor Batur whether they feel they can do this Chair to be honest we already started working on our high news block focus group that's quite detailed report of focus group we're already working on that it's quite lengthy document like new policies strategies some more money for send we're already working on that on top of that I feel a lot of questions being involved about planning a local our planner that how we can change our plan of policies or like Councillor Mohamed mentioned that if you're having any local our own guideline for those care homes but that is going to happen through planning not through CYP because then like Lawrence already mentioned we'll have a detailed discussion on that topic a lot of times we've been stopped by law by regulations that we can't do certain things like if those planners planning application have been successful they are care homes CYP School Commission or Lawrence or the Department we can't do a lot of things offset CQC they can do but as Lawrence mentioned that he already asked not only once twice they're not being respond like is a quite positive responding on that so I'm trying to understand that what exactly we can do maximum we can say that Lawrence can take back the information to planning department like Council Sahu asked about the data that what type of data we are having we are not having any information like Lawrence mentioned that probably due to confidentiality CYP our department they are not involved but probably planning department they are having more information so if they can informed and again it's not one as I previously said is a departmental collaboration not only one is probably two or three departments might be like Karen mentioned that care homes adult social care or children and young people and planning department or neighborhood as well because like certain people they are saying antisocial behavior a couple of other things so it's not only one department there are all as I said collaborative work for departmental that cross departmental work if you can work rather than only leaving with one CYP that your responsibility so I think it's better that we can leave it with that's my suggestion for OSC in overview select committee that after probably three months time or might be I think three months is more than enough that if we can ask planning department that if they can gather the data and we can have like the same type of small report that this is the data that many care homes that many children and these are the authorities outside authorities are flustered that they are involved and probably once more if you can contact offset or CQC and then we can discuss here that where we are right now rather than leaving the things there for one and then again as I said that we already have too many things in our plate to discuss and to complete the work so if rather than one if we can have like is a cross departmental collaboration that will be more useful through OSC I think it's really would be very helpful for OSC to ask some specific questions about the planners of the planners and perhaps three months period will be the program period for it to come back here but I think they need to know sorry they need to be asked what powers we have as they understand them what we know what we don't know and also as I was suggesting earlier on what others do and whether there are cases for us to adopt for them so I think particularly the you know potential limited term planning but I think it's a specific set of questions that are very appropriately asked by OSC and specifically asked of the planners and I think it would very much complement what obviously we've heard from social care perspective this evening I obviously I'm not in the position to move that chair but I hope that you know were that to be acceptable to the committee you might wish a minute that and make sure it comes back okay thank you City Mayor that's really good suggestion that unless until we are not having literature review if we have a proper literature review or data it's more easy for us that we can make a plan so first of all planning department they are having all that data probably that where the care homes are probably from last five years what type of care homes we have given at five years we can rather than can exactly if we can have a literature review first then that going to like collaborative with the data what type of things they are there and which authorities are involved and more importantly that is there any other local authorities in the country they already have done that type of work so probably we can learn from them and adapt some of those things I'm trying to get hold of what this the proposal is is is to pass it to children's committee if I might I hope this is helpful obviously I'm not in the position to actually move anything myself but I hope I might suggest to members of the committee that they may wish to specifically ask the planning section of the council to report to a meeting of OSC in within the next three months on their knowledge of the provision of children's home accommodation in the city by the private sector and what they know about where it is what they know about who operates it and what they understand to be our ability to regulate it from a planning perspective and when you've had a chance of a look at that you may then as a commission wish to take some further views I say it's not for me to move it but I hope that that might enable an appropriate minute to be taken if somebody were to move it okay so do we know what we're doing you do we know what we're recommending and we've got a proposal and a second yeah okay those in favor of that yeah okay thank you very much I just hope that we I just hope that we tackle this because I I for one won't want to see a public inquiry into how we're dealing with this because the private sector cannot run this by themselves an individual who wants to set up a home for children gets through planning or whatever and then there's well I dread to think what we might end up with in a few years time so I think that's a very helpful suggestion city mayor and councillor Patool proposed councillor marsh seconded and we've agreed that yes thank you very much I'd like to take a break now but I'm not going to okay we've got trained people who can take all this out and put it into sensible words okay thank you for that and thank you if you could pass on our thanks to your colleagues who've had to go in the middle of that yeah pass on our thanks to your colleagues who've had to go in the middle of that okay the next report is and thanks Lawrence for the report sorry corporate estate annual report that's Matt isn't it I guess that is chair but if I may I'm just going to give a very brief introduction to this the corporate estate is the part of our land and property portfolio that is not held for specific operational purposes that is held effectively as a public sector property company this isn't new it's something that we as a council have done for generations don't mind decades have done for generations and it is something that was done particularly effectively by the county boroughs the former county boroughs in our case it was made very specific under a local parliamentary act the City Buster Corporation Act of 1956 so it's you know it's very long established it has changed over the years a bit and I think it was incorporated when we became a domestic district as part of I think the same legislation that made that happen in the 1971 local government act but effectively it does mean that say we operate in the public sector with many of the principles of a private sector property company but of course we've always in that got an eye not just on the bottom line but on the public good and that's something that I think you know we're very proud of but it has meant not only that we have today a property portfolio and Matt will put the precise figures on it it's over a hundred million pounds worth I stress again before we get into it it's capital rather than property we do have a substantial portfolio but most particularly it brings us revenue and therefore takes pressure off our revenue budget because it contributes to revenue budget every year because it makes a profit but it does need as you would expect as any property company would do continued reinvestment sometimes in new property sometimes in maintaining the property that we've got and I was very keen that the council, councillors should be made aware of this because it used to be the case I've been around as a councillor for a lot of years that every year the property department and the various titles would do an annual report of the corporate estate and it would go to members and they would have an opportunity to you know to be updated on its performance for some reason and I haven't got a clue really why it just stopped happening a good few years ago now and probably you know 10 or more years ago and three or four years ago I said well look I think that this is so significant to the council that it ought to be brought as a formal annual report that you ought to see how it's performing you ought to see what priority is being given to it and you ought to see you know that actually you know we're getting a proper rate of return for this which is why we have this report in front of us this evening I would just say in terms of the corporate estate not only has it produced very significant returns over the years it's been very very well and very professionally managed by Matt and indeed his predecessors but it has also enabled us to do a lot of very worthwhile things in this city it was the corporate estate that made possible the development of Beaumont Lees Beaumont Lees was bought by the council all the farmland up there was bought by the council decades if not generations ago amongst other things with the prospect of one day building housing on it also actually the place where they could pump sewerage but that wasn't quite you know the main purpose but it was bought as an investment and it enabled us to develop Beaumont Lees similarly the council bought a big chunk of the Hamilton estate and it made possible the development of Hamilton together with Hamilton estate which was a separate private ownership we had about half the area and the Hamilton trustees had the other half but it made possible development and if you just think about what that means to the city that you know there's two very large areas of development it is impossible I think to under well it is very easy to forget about the corporate estate and not to appreciate just how much it matters to us both in terms of the income and the assets that are held but also what it is made possible in the city so I'm really just doing a bit of a lead in because actually Matt and his colleagues who are very professional obviously and the way in which they manage the estate are the ones who really ought to be giving the report I'm just in the warm up act thank you city mayor thank you chair yeah I'm really proud to present the figures actually it's probably November a year or two ago where we sort of presented them to OSC actually so the year report is for March end of 2024 the recommendation is to know the report and I'm happy to take any questions at the end but the report as you've probably seen in the documentation is 61 pages long of interest or a lot of the figures which I will talk to now in terms of performance the portfolio's growth yield year on year has improved it's currently at 7 so significantly improved over our benchmarks that we use the portfolio value as the city mayor touched on is over 100 million it's currently at 147.2 million pounds worth of value this has improved during the course of that year and has improved on some significant acquisitions such as the head of the industrial estate but also because of things like Haymarket Shopping Centre which we acquired back in 2019-2020 I think at 9.5 significant improvement on sort of acquisitions in terms of the actual sector the industrial sector continues to be the largest single sector that's just this is the amount of people that heard of the occupancy of the estate it's currently it was at 95.5% in previous years and we're currently retaining that same sort of bid between 95 and 96% occupancy retail remains challenging I'm sure you'll all appreciate the high street remains challenging in the city centre however the yields have remained high both in the city centre and in the wider neighbourhood and the shopping palisades that we have in the neighbourhoods as well one thing of note I'm sure we'll come as no surprise to you is that during the year of 23 has really increased to unexpected levels and that has impacted both us as a landlord but also our tenant and father as all as individuals as well in terms of gross income it's up since the last month time we presented here at OSC it's coming at 11.27 million and that's compared to 8.33 million in 2022 that's mainly due to a full year of performance at Haymarket Shopping Centre as I say that was a sort of key doing a structured police review programme that we're overtaking rents are moving in line with market rents the city mayor mentioned fair and equitable rents everybody across the city group looking at our market rents and new investments have also kicked in as well which is also supported the portfolio as well that's the sort of thing you're talking around on that side please we've also repurposed other assets as well you'll notice that we've reinvested something commercially let or external providers the estate in terms of its overall risk profile is 1.5 than you put it at the council I'm pleased to announce that debt has also reduced dramatically over the period as well the last three years we've seen it move from 3.2 million in 2020 where obviously couldn't challenge due to COVID rules etc etc but now we're in a position where we've got 49 million in pounds worth of debt so we've reduced that significantly obviously that's something we continue to tackle it's always a very concern to us the revenue for the estate contributes positively to the overall support in the council services as the city mayor mentioned the next one should come back to it that's right at the end of the tri-handle year we ratify the numbers the audit has a look at the overall figures and then we have to wait for the benchmark comparative because hopefully we'll get back into the same yeah thank you Matt and city mayor Mario I'll give you the first question yes sir thank you chair I just wanted to ask about like what specific initiatives are being implemented to achieve cost savings because obviously the costs are very high 5 million how do we kind of reduce those costs thank you so cost savings across the portfolio are always always a challenge now when we look at efficiencies that we can gain there's optimum sizes of portfolios so somebody might say well actually an optimum size portfolio is a value of a portfolio of say 50-60 million but actually when you look at modelling and you look across larger organisations maybe like legal and generals and big large institutional investment funds and they actually work on a larger scale portfolio and I think the difficulty and the challenge local authorities have is there's some poorly publicised local authorities that have actually invested quite heavily in assets over the years and maybe even not focused on those core services and actually invested more into an asset based property they almost become a property company and so when I talk about 1.5% of the net revenue being the risk factor in the council their percentage is significant 50-60% and whilst we'd like to grow the portfolio and we are growing the portfolio by acquiring more so we've got a bigger critical mass which means percentage wise the resource we can apply and everything we can apply makes an efficiency across the piece we have to do it really carefully as well because we don't want to invest outside the city first and foremost that's one of our key criteria we're investing in the city for the returns but equally as well what we don't want to do is grow too soon expose the council to a greater risk which would in turn to try and drive the efficiency in turn it would become a bigger headache and one that Amy certainly gave me a problem with that city I'm just going to add to that point that perhaps that may have come to it adequately but the fact is that we very deliberately and this is not just new but very deliberately with the corporate estate focused on stuff that we know about here in our city what we have just not done is what some very stupid other authorities have done is to splurge vast sums of money buying shopping centres or office blocks here there and everywhere up and down the country and they've got themselves in deep trouble with it you know this has been locally managed for the local benefit with a very much focus on you know what we know and what we're able to you know recognise is a safe thing to be doing and you know as a result of that it's obviously not only has it been well managed but it's also been able to be used creatively as assets I would just summarise this you know saying that in many respects you know this is not when we're operating this we're not operating as a charity you know it is commercial right but it's a commercial enterprise as it were with a public sector conscience behind it yeah you know and it's that balance that you know is very important in this yes you know it is done commercially but it's not done without an understanding that actually you know we're accountable to people of Leicester both for the money but also for how we how we use it just to finish on that question as well what are we doing to improve that so are we flipping we are looking at sustainable approaches so flipping things to different renewable resources in terms of utility services ambitious surveys that will inform different ways of getting more efficiency from the building and how it operates as I always that's my profession as well I'm saying the same questions thank you councillor Batool thank you chair thank you very much Matt for the report my question I have two questions I think it's better I can ask both might be interlinked with each other what are the tangible metrics and accountability mechanism for ESG claims and the second question is related to the social values that to what extent is the income generated from the corporate estate aligned with the council's strategic priorities specifically around supporting vulnerable communities and could any part of the state is in the better leverage for social value as well in terms of tangibles for ESG we look at across the piece around all of the benefits very easy for us to vote it depends on the sector and it's not one size fits all and I get this challenge a number of times and with every week because if I'm looking at a retail portfolio I could be looking at a shopping centre or a shopping mall or I could be looking at a high street I could be looking at a really popular street on a high street or I could be looking at a secondary market and there's a lot and there's a lot of different nuances for all of these different items which informs the decisions that we make around in details I do get challenged around why we've not left assets and why they're not occupied even though we've noticed demand and that's a difficult one for me to square off with a private sector installed head on but the reality of it is in order to get a vibrant city and a city that works actually there's no one to be letting units out that aren't going to complement a certain part of the town and we have to be conscious of that you do see instances where if landlords allow anything to be occupied any occupiers to access certain places the high street changes in the dynamic which is difficult to control and I do think we owe that to the city to make sure that we're getting the right type of occupiers in we're supporting those occupiers to accelerate through their sort of career journey whether they're the small business that's growing quickly or whether they're established business that just wants to hold the size of their asset in terms of the social and governance side we always ask for that detail when we're going through the review of when we're taking units on we market these units through different ways as well councillor it could be that we market them just to a private treaty sort of sale board open market or sometimes we even go to open bid and tender if we see the strategic need to do that and when we do that we actually would take the time care and effort to write specific objectives we'd look at so of course there's a commercial objective in there but there's also going to be a community benefit objective as well thank you and thank you for the detail you mentioned that there are different ways you're using so is there any specific methodology or tool is being used to measure and to monitor all those metrics that we are talking about that is there any specific methodology that you can share with us that you're using when you are monitoring or when you are evaluating that what exactly yeah I mean what I would do I'd probably suggest I could go back to the team and get an example of something that we've gone out to market with which has got the breakdown within it because that will give you a flavour of the nature of the ESG type elements that we cover off thank you Councillor Osmond I think I've got a few questions what is we talk about market bread what we have a responsibility as a landlord for business in relation to providing a service not only as an authority but as a business it's too in addition to rent obviously they would want to come back on that yeah I'll pick those up market rent is generally where most of the stuff if not all of the things in the corporate estate should reside it's fair it's equitable it's comparative across the whole of the city and you can adjust that around the rest of the country actually just to get an understanding of how we sit in the rest of the country in terms of service charges councillor there is no flat rate what there is is service charge code and what just to explain to in multi-let properties you've generally got a rent and you've got a service charge now the service charge is like pass-through costs really I'd probably call them so electrics if you're in a multi-let occupancy building there'll be electrics there'll be gas there'll be water there'll be maintenance items running costs electrics etc and they'll all need to have you'll perform part of the service charge and there'll be a pass-through cost that's recovered in arrears to the various tenants now generally speaking that's recovered in an apportioned basis so you'll either have a metered a meter for your electrics or water or you'll have an apportionment where your square footage is 50 square foot and and you'll pay an apportionment of the overall service charge so the service charge is not flat rate it is basically just a pastor of the costs associated with that building the other the other question you raised as council is yes yes and yes and so I apologise to any tenant that we've not responded to within a year that's just unacceptable simple as that yeah yeah exactly but what I would say with that is you know resourcing around here in terms of senior valuers and the property managers is difficult we have got the resource in to actually support it now which is good we haven't had that for for a while actually but the key thing for me is understanding where they are being able to respond to them in a timely manner and sometimes it's all about understanding of the lease obligation and this sort of moves over to your final question around what's landlord and what's tenant it depends unfortunately there's no clear line and it depends whether it's an internal repairing lease a triple net lease or a fully repairing and insurable lease and these different variances and even within there there may be something that's agreed with a lease that you'd think would be straightforward there might be something agreed within that specific with that tenant that's a slight variance to it so whilst it's probably not a simplistic response it all depends what you have to go back to is the lease agreement what you have to go back to is what's been agreed in the heads of terms what's carried over to the lease what two parties have agreed to pay for a building and pay in terms of service charge and then we just meet our obligations and what I would say is that the landlord I suppose in the corporate state is if we're not pulling our socks up and doing the right thing the market will tell me they will leave they will complain and I don't want that I want it to be 95 plus percent occupant or better and the reality for me is I want to resolve every single one of those disappointed tenants the flip side to it as well is ultimately it's their decision whether they want to stay and if they're not meeting their lease obligations as well I have to be fair and reasonable and adhere to the obligations within that lease and that might mean that if they're breaching their terms of agreement I have to let them know that accordingly thank you councillor march thank you chair and thank you for the report unlike other things that come here it doesn't it's not something I really know about right investing and making money out of it and all of that it feels like a bit abstract but I really like this concept that the city backs itself and invests here especially in our communities as a policy the questions I've got is that I think I was surprised to see that the running and management costs were the same as the net contribution of all of this work and that feels really high well not the same but so similar that really struck me as quite high and actually given some of the really tricky choices that we're making elsewhere is there scope to kind of reduce you know you've talked about efficiency and then that this portfolio makes a larger contribution towards that general fund so that feels like a level of maths that I can compute right and then the second bit is what would be the optimum size you've talked about this of the portfolio in your best to the best of your knowledge for us here and what would it look like between where we are now and where we'd like to be please thanks yeah so I've got big aspirations and whether we could get there or not it's a different matter but if I address the first element of it and I think it's really relevant because we're talking about efficiencies which is the same the gross income to the net income and where we go from there and I think at the moment we have we are in a position where I think you've rightly flagged we are spending a lot of money to run this portfolio we're in a position where we're spending a lot of time and effort to try and get everything correct so we are going through in great detail to make sure we're getting things in our housekeeping in better order than it maybe has been previously let's say so that's taking a little bit of time but in addition to that we've also invested in the CAFM system which is computer aided facilities management system it's a computerized system which will store a lot of data that means it's a lot more readily accessible for people to review things like leased data so for instance if we're sitting here if it's on the CAFM system I can log on now get that information now the efficiency is not significant i.e. we don't have to phone legal services and get them to go down to a basement in an archive in a building somewhere else to go and retrieve a lease docking so we can talk about a specific lease so the efficiencies of that are quite significant i think things around the utility services having different policies around that and being able to drive efficiency around the savings we can make through some of the utility services is important and i think over a period of time we can improve the efficiency the running efficiency without significant growth of the portfolio what i would like to say though and i've not said this in front of the city mayor before but i would love a portfolio double this size now whether that's achievable because i personally think a portfolio of circa 300 million probably wouldn't would have a better net to gross so we wouldn't have to grow the running costs in the same in the same with the same metric thank you matt oh no we're in i guess given all the other areas where we're now looking at efficiency i get that we're moving to a new computer system here i guess i'm also alarmed that we're still digging around in basements looking for leases when we're also talking about some of the really tricky decisions that we're trying to take and i i just don't understand why this isn't being because i'm with you like i think this is sensible i think this is smart it doesn't feel particularly risky and yet actually when we look at that number of the net contribution it isn't it's the same as the management and i bet it's not an easy job to manage all of that you know and it's often stressful or can feel really tricky and it just feels like um are we so my question is are we going to see something different in the next report which is already somewhere in the in the press and is that going to kind of allay some of my concerns that perhaps this should have been slide for efficiency before perhaps some of the other things that are now on the horizon thank you well it's interesting and there's no grand revere about the next one but we obviously got an idea of how the figures are going and in terms of producing the next set of figures which is great so i suppose one of the challenges we say as well when we look at assets it might be a case that we disinvest in assets as well so we take those hard decisions to say well actually whilst we've got great performance on these assets does invest in certain assets as well that could return a capital receipt which would be great and welcomed but equally would mean we get less income that it might improve our next gross performance so there's all these things we're looking that and the state that we're doing is it improving as quickly as it's like I probably say no can it can it improve I'd say yes and we'll fund in terms of next gross I think that'd be great because I'm not going to make fun to me but to be able to say well actually in comparison to our benchmark comparators for the local I think you're quite right it could do more thank you Councillor O'Neill thank you yeah I was just looking in the report and a bit on the Haymarket shopping centre I just thought it was really interesting what you were saying when we were talking about what we're trying to balance here with what we're offering in the city in terms of obviously we're not a charity but it's about how do we what are we offering to the city as well as yeah thinking about our investments so what my question is really is to do with obviously the Haymarket shopping centre with it obviously being different to the High Cross and obviously we were talking earlier today about our offering for young people within the city and obviously when we look at the space and we look at all the opportunities it could bring in further investment I suppose to say is that obviously that doesn't seem to be in our interest or what are the possibilities for the Haymarket shopping centre and at this moment what are our priorities there I think it's obviously a place with a lot of potential but is that in our interest and is that in the city's interest from your own perspective I'll let Matt answer the question directly but the Haymarket shopping centre was quite controversial but was an amazingly good buy it really was because obviously we've seen as Matt's described it a growth in the value of what we've got there but what we've perhaps not entirely reflected in here is the fact that by owning it we are no longer paying out the long lease that we have on the car park except to ourselves if you see what I mean but you know and similarly we are also no longer paying out to other people the very long term commitment that we have on the theatre you know because both of those are part of what we purchased and in a sense what we're now paying to ourselves and that's a much better deal than what they've thought and also I think the extent to which Matt and his colleagues have been able to get new users in there has been very encouraging and of course it also means actually now I think about it we're not paying out the rent on the sexual health clinic either which is a very important part of what we offer there which is pretty special to be able to offer something of that sort in a shopping centre you know I mean but done very cleverly I think in a way that gets the benefit of being in a shopping centre but doesn't embarrass people by you them being sort of you know spotted going in there or anything it's a very good balance I think and you know I'm almost impressed with that I'll let Matt answer the question more fully because I think there are questions about how we want to see that shopping centre taken still further forward because there is still space in there that is unused or underused it's thank you yeah councillor it's up to about 20% vacancy in the shopping centre at the moment and that predominantly on the upper floor actually the upper floor is not quite as popular and what we'll have noticed there as well we've got a bit of community use actually in one of the unicalls the price and benefits and I think I look at the shopping centre but I look at it across the whole of the city as well and I just think to myself well actually it sits well against the Highcross in the sense that the Highcross has got a different offer to the A-Market shopping centre A-Market basket shopping your price point's different it's got a lot of food traffic you know your Timpsons things like that you're not going to generally buy online are in that shopping centre so it always gets good football and it's quite resilient in terms of the weekly basket shopping type element but there are units vacant the constant challenge we get is around whether we I think it's right to challenge it Thank you Councillor Starhoof Thank you I've got three questions I'll just ask them one if that's alright first question actually tied into what Mario was saying and also what the councillor next to what one was also saying which is about a unit on Silver Street that was going to be or they hoped it to be a board going cafe so it really complemented it's quite unique in the centre it's a family run business it would bring in young people they've been working trying to work with the council for at least six months hadn't really got anywhere lots of emails back and forth trying to chase and then they were told that the council was considering alternative disposal options and it was taken off the market so they'd invested a lot of time and money into that had lots of conversations then been chasing the council for six months and then told actually it's no longer available and that was for a board game cafe so I'd just be interested to know your thoughts on that that would be helpful but it does play into what mario is that would be good the second one is about loads be lane I actually went there recently and I knew MPs had gone on the corner but I was really surprised to see Harlequin go who as far as I'm concerned has always been there and I've lived in this city all my life and they are both looking at this list council owned buildings so now we've got a run of six vacant shops along Lowsby Lane which used to be thriving independent oh I like that idea so yes I was just asking what's happening because the veggie place has gone and moved so it didn't look good last time I was there and I always looked it along that road yeah it's a great part of the city definitely not alone by raising that and to try and explain it from a landlord's perspective I would say we get the perfect storm unfortunately with the situation tenants decided to relocate their choice not a problem one point bus Harvey Prince had a personal issue which was completely sort of yeah exactly which was really unfortunate so all of a sudden we have this run of shots down one of our most prominent independent bring on a couple more as well so it's been a really tricky time for me to explain that how in addition to the fact that it's very easy for me to it's been a tricky period I don't do I shall look out for the changes and then the third thing is just you talk about 95% occupancy which sounds fantastic to me but it would be good to know sort of by particular areas because I think that might cover some you know you said like 20% were missing in the hay market I mean I don't know what you know low school lane is and market streets are pretty dire but there's pockets and I wondered if each could just have some visibility of that yeah I think we can go into there's maps and we know where we've got the vacancies what I would say is it's always a snapshot in time as one so this is March 10th period but we can you know we can look at that on it's on an asset by asset basis so thank you sitting there because I was talking earlier on about the areas of Vermont Lees and Hamilton as major successors of the corporate estate and Councillor Sahu has just reminded me of course that the area those particular shops that are in the ownership of the corporate estate are in the ownership of the corporate estate because they were bought by the council not for the corporate estate they were bought by the council in the 1960s with the intention of flattening the whole street and building a multi-story car park fortunately there was a change in administration and the council and the decision was taken to save them and looking back over a period of 50 years I've been enormously pleased that that was a small part in actually changing the direction and saving those shops but I'm particularly and this is the point about the corporate estate assets being used in a way that is you know very constructive in the city because when the council bought those shops in the 1960s then in the 70s we you know moved away from the demolition we freed up the backland you know their backyards and gardens and package that up to make what is now the St Martin's shopping centre and again I'm enormously proud of that because it came at a time when Leicester's city centre had been threatened by the proposed centre 21 four times the size of Fospal out there and that was lifted and the council packaged up that backland that it owned into the area that was made into St Martin's development and if you look at that what we set out to do and I think very significantly achieved was a development that was very much went with the grain of the buildings around it because the bit that faces in in St Martin's is almost entirely new build and yet it was built in the style of the area around it and of course it's now I'm by Shearer's property company but it was actually developed by Teasland's property company with funding that the council managed to achieve from the Basque Pension Fund working with the corporate estate to enable it very proud of that and it's just an opportunity really for me to talk about one of the many advantages of operating the corporate estate in which we do now and that is a particularly remarkable one because what that did was to provide the momentum that led to the Shire's shopping development behind the high street and again keeping the high street facades keeping the historic facades but developing behind it unlike most other places where they actually just built the modern facade out onto the street look at Derby for example which of course ultimately led to the development of the High Cross extension and the renaming of it so the corporate estate has had an important part to play in shaping that along with so many other parts of the city it's just another example of why it's such a good thing sorry Shire it's a bit of history lesson but I think you don't have to listen I'm sorry to waste it I'm sorry to waste your time Councillor Marsh I hope others might have been interested thank you and it's a lovely picture of you have you gone this famous picture of Councillor March in the shopping centre there was there's not any more oh gosh Councillor Adatia thank you Chair thank you for your report Matthew there's a couple of bits I want to touch on we mentioned the Haymarket it's got about 20 units available 20% the units are available when you let to a limited company do you take personal guarantees we look for some sort of security based against it so we want some sort of tangible guarantee some sort security that's going to give us whether it's a performance bond whether it's a parent company guarantee or we're back to the guarantor to provide the comfort and the vacant over their rent the only reason I'm asking that is during COVID I know one particular person had a unit in there not mentioning names literally COVID hit literally came back gave the keys back to the council no PG's anything which is not normal practice shall we say that might have been a one off but it could be then just looking at the key performance figures you mentioned gross income from 21-22 from 8.3 to 11.2 in 23-24 but if we nailed on the figures between 22-23 to 23-24 in fact there was a decrease of 190k which is acceptable on this kind of size of portfolio etc which is there but the running costs have just increased extortionately obviously 21-22 to 22-23 almost doubled 2.5 and then again for 23-24 it's increased by 13% which is 602 I know you touched on the utilities and that but what other means have we got to cut those costs because ultimately we're running this as a business the main aim is to maximise income and reduce your costs yeah so I don't think any of us were quite as aware of how much the utility costs were going to increase so whilst we could have made some provision for it that impacted us as a landlord now being sharper on recovery of service charge is really important for us as well actually on this point because there may be a period where as a local authority with any vacancies we'd have to cover off any service charge provision obviously being able to recover a fair service charge from each of the tenants is also really important so making sure that we are recovering service charges really important making sure we're recovering any sort of costs available really important making sure that we are investigating thoroughly any sort of opportunity to spend to save and by that we make capital bids into to invest into the portfolio and that will be looking at things like re-roofing an industrial unit rather than just re-roofing the industrial unit what we'll be looking at doing is increasing the installation values we'll be looking at increasing the thermal performance of that and in turn that will reduce the running costs of that asset and it's trying to do things like that where we're not just turning the wheel on it we're actually trying to innovate a little bit when we're trying to do alterations to the portfolio which will support it and then also as I touched on before if needs be making them tough decisions to disinvest in certain assets if it is proving difficult and costly to run is actually make that decision to disinvest in it and sell it thank you and obviously those running costs ultimately affect the net income coming in again there was a decrease of 14% of 794,000 between the two years but as councillor March did say it would be interesting to look at 24-25 and see which way the trend is actually going the other thing just to mention it would be interesting to have the figures for the portfolio size as well so at the moment you said 375 sites with 1,263 letterable units could we have the figures on the yearly basis as well going forward so we know what you're disposing of or what you're buying going forward that would be interesting as well I think it's all useful data I think one of the bits for me is what we include in the overall report because I think it's really important to have a great summary around how the overall performance is doing and the net return in terms of the millions that it returns but you're quite right actually underneath that there's the what have we acquired what have we disinvested in how has that affected the overall portfolio so I'll actually speak to the team and see how we can incorporate that into future annual reports as well thank you thank you we're asked to sorry thank you we're asked to note this report is that agreed and thank you Matt for a very full report and helpful response to questions and also the city mayor so if we can move on now to the final item which is our overview select committee work programme this is the last meeting of the municipal year and there will be new faces possibly but can I thank all the members over the last year it's been very I think very productive very interesting meeting and thank the officers for their contributions and the city mayor for his leadership in these issues so if we can note the forward plan and if there are any issues that people wish to raise on it if we can just add this element of care homes into the new year that within three months time yes thank you for Ed Cal who else was involved Jenny Julie sorry Julie and can we thank Mario for sticking with us but the young people have been very effective and they obviously work hard in preparation for this meeting with the help of our friends sitting over there so thank you for your contribution just seeing Mario sitting there and going for all this is what's he going to do in 10 years time be very interesting should come back and do a report thank you as well chair and you as well Ted thank you thank you so I wish you all the best where are we in the year we're in spring are we have a nice good weather next next early night