The Cabinet Member Single Member Decision meeting on Tuesday 27 January 2026 was scheduled to consider revisions to fees and charges for CCTV footage provision and applications for Section 61 consent. The meeting was a virtual, single-member decision taken by Councillor Shantanu Rajawat, Leader of the Council and Cabinet Member for Strategy, Resources and External Affairs.

In-year Revisions to Fees and Charges for CCTV Footage and Section 61 Consent Applications

The meeting's agenda focused on proposed changes to the fees and charges associated with the provision of CCTV footage and the application process for Section 61 consents. These revisions were part of the wider Transforming our Community Experience (TCE) Programme, which aims to improve resident engagement with the council and identify financial benefits through service transformation.

The report pack indicated that the proposed changes were developed to recover the costs incurred by the council in delivering these services. This involved extensive modelling and benchmarking against industry standards and neighbouring authorities.

CCTV Footage Provision: For CCTV footage requests made by solicitors and insurance companies, the proposals included the introduction of a sliding scale of charges for conducting searches. This would start at £440 for a search taking up to one hour, £510 for searches between one and six hours, and £550 for searches exceeding six hours. Additionally, the existing charge for supplying CCTV footage was proposed to increase from £100 to £210. These changes were projected to generate up to an additional £107,000 annually, compared to the current income of approximately £2,000. It was clarified that these changes would not affect requests made by individuals under the Subject Access Request provision, nor those made by internal teams or the police for crime detection purposes.

Section 61 Consent Applications: The report also detailed proposals for new fees related to Section 61 consent applications, which are used to control noise and vibration from construction sites under the Control of Pollution Act 1974¹. A sliding scale of charges was proposed, based on the size and complexity of the application. This included a fee of £120 for pre-application advice, £200 for small applications, and £400 for medium applications. These new fees were expected to generate up to approximately £8,500 annually and were designed to account for the administrative costs and technical expertise involved in processing these consents.

The report highlighted that these proposed fee changes would be implemented in parallel with the rollout of new, digitised processes for CCTV footage provision and Section 61 applications, scheduled for February 2026. The council's Chief Financial Officer noted that the existing charging arrangements did not fully recover the costs of officer time, administration, and overheads, leading to a subsidy from the General Fund. The proposed fees were intended to align Hounslow Council with sector practices and ensure cost recovery for these discretionary services.