Transcript

I don't know if you get used to it or whether it's just settles as the note goes on. No idea. Are we ready? Are we ready? Do I go over it? Excellent. Okay, cool. So welcome everyone to this meeting of the Review and Screening Committee. So my name is Councillor Tabby Joy. I'm chairing the committee today. This meeting is being streamed live to the Chantlenboro Council YouTube channel. I know because I've just checked. If you ask a question at the meeting, you will be deemed to have consent to be filmed today. The possible use of these images and sound recordings of broadcasting and/or training purposes. So that's fairly self-explanatory. We are not expecting a fire alarm test, so if the alarm does sound, then please make sure that you make your way to the nearest fire exit, which should be over there. So we've received apologies from Councillors Nelson and Fyfield. And I'm not aware of any other further apologies or substitutions. So moving on to item number two from there. Just giving Council members the opportunity to declare any interest if they have any. Councillor Smith, are you suggesting anything? Or are you just screwing in? Cool. Just whenever anyone makes a movement, it feels like a silent auction. Okay, that's fair. So moving on to item three, the minutes of the last meeting. The minutes of the meeting of the 26th of February, they've been circulated with the agenda. So we'll all have seen them. I am not myself aware of any amendments, but does anyone have any suggestions? Well, good. I'd like to say thank you to Councillor Harvey actually for taking on that meeting. I super, super appreciate covering for me. I'd like to move now the members approve the minutes of the meeting held on 26th of February. So that sounds okay. Amazing. Thank you so much. Cool. So signing the minutes. Shall I just quickly do that now? Cool. Cheers. Thank you. I appreciate that. Cheers. Or at least tell me if you don't. Okay, cool. So item number four, public member questions, calls for action and petitions. We haven't received any of these. So if that changes, then hit me up. So item five, briefing from Councillor Haye, leader of the Council. This will also include the chat on our homes briefing as well. So yeah, if you're okay to speak, that would be amazing. Thank you so much, Councillor Haye. Thank you. Coming to my rescue, I just forgot to press the right arrow. Apologies. Yeah, it's a very brief briefing from me. This is a very brief meeting because we've just very recently had full council and I gave quite a detail briefing at that point. And thank you for allowing me to do the CBH transition discussion now. So last week I signed the decision form on the winding up. As agreed by full council, I would do at some point. It hasn't been submitted as yet, but the decision has been taken to wind it to put in that notice. So I've duly signed that notice and it will go forward in due course. Obviously you all know, I should have written this down because I had three things in my head. So the first of the transition project team, we met last week and which was a really good meeting. And thank you to John Rawson for coming forward as one of the board members and he specifically come to join that because his remit within Cheltenberg homes board is the audit and risk, which obviously is quite an important input to this transition period. So that's very helpful. And the other piece to just update is that the chupy process will begin this week for staff. The whole chupy process, it won't be complete for some months. I think it's July by the time it's complete, but the process has now started. And I know that our chief exec has met with all of the teams within CVH bar one at this current moment in time. So I'm happy to take any questions that anybody might have. But other than that, thank you. Brilliant. Thank you so much, Council. Hey, does anyone have any questions for that? Are we all good? Okay, cool. You're right, Ashley. You're briefing at full Council last week was super comprehensive. So that's a really helpful update. Thank you so much for that. Is there anything else that you'd like to contribute at this time? Or would you like to take the evening now? I think we're quite happy with that update. Thank you. All good? Okay, perfect. Thank you so much for that. Thank you for taking the time for us. So what we're going to do is we're still going to do a further update on the CVH/CBC transition, which, as Councilor Hay mentioned, is going to be winding up now that it's been signed off. So we're going to take that under agenda item 10. So that will be in due course. And feel free to ask the questions of that time if need be. So moving on to item number six of matters, refer to committees. So again, following up on full Council last week, members will be aware that emotional and special needs in schools was approved to Council on Monday 8th of March. So you'll remember that it was agreed that the leader was going to write to jump to Gloucestershire County Council for specific information. Upon receipt of this information, it was agreed that GCC cabinet member and relevant officers responsible will be invited to attend a meeting with this OVUN scrutiny committee. So I have actually received a request now from Councillor Clukos as cabinet member for safety and communities to invite Kevin McNamara, the CEO of the Hospitals Trust Meeting. Oh, yeah. That's a separate one. It is actually. Sorry. I should have noted that down. So we're going to be considering this one a little bit further. But yeah, for the meantime. Sorry about that. Yeah. Basically, for the meantime, we're just going to be awaiting further information. So, um, yeah. Shall we just leave it on for now? So when the information comes back from came to, then what would it get the invitation to that one? Yeah, that's true. This one is for you to consider whether you want to go ahead with that one. Amazing. Cool. And we can actually discuss that in chair's meeting as well, can't we? Yeah. I'll just draw it to the attention of the committee now and see whether they're happy with that. Okay. So I can just ask that. Just basically say that. Just say that. Tell the committee that you've received that. Okay. Cool. Okay. So sorry about that. Um, basically, we have actually received that request from councilor Clukas. So this is something for us to consider in due course. It's not an immediate thing. Um, basically, um, councilor Clukas has actually, um, requested as well, in addition to scrutinizing this or nurse, um, that we might be able to meet the CEO of the hospital's trust. Um, because we will probably have some questions relating to the panorama program with the maternity unit closure implications. We're all quite conscious of the fact that, um, access access to health care is like quite pressing concern for both ourselves. And, you know, our constituents. Um, do any members have any questions or recommendations suggestions at this time that you'd like to raise, because otherwise you will have an opportunity in their chairs meeting in coming weeks? Councilor Harvey, would you like to say anything? Yeah, I think it's fantastic that, um, that invites going out because the CEO and chair of the hospital's trust have changed. They are new people in post, so it would be a really good opportunity to meet the new CEO and the new chair. Um, and I, I, you know, I doubt very, very much when the members here will, will let ease with them. Um, of the previous ones in line, these, these ones, so I think that's a great idea. Um, as long as they come in an open mind and they're prepared to answer questions. Thank you. Hi, just a quickie. I've been told that some people are holding on at home rather than getting cost of bluster because they want their babies for each other. And obviously that's a risk, so I was, I was very risky. Yeah. I don't know for that, but that's what I was being told. I don't know the definite. Ultimately, we get so much information fed to us by people representing, so, you know, a lot of the time we are, you know, we're the customer facing role. Where people trust us with this kind of information, so it would be really, really good to have a bit of a conversation started up. So, um, the earliest opportunity to invite, um, members of the horse could be, um, probably around July. So, um, we can definitely do some prep work ahead of time. Um, if anyone has any questions or would like to participate in that, then, um, I'd be really interested in hearing from you. So, thank you so much. Is there any other questions or feedback at this time? Okay. Perfect. Okay. This is really exciting. Now we can move on to item seven on the agenda. So, um, CBC flood risk management overviews. So, um, you guys will have had a look at the reports. They were really exciting and very interesting. So we're having a look at the role of CBC in national and local flood risk management plans and strategies. So, um, the big floods in 2007, a lot of us remember those. Um, and we want to have a look at mitigation since that time. CBC role in flood mitigation and including biodiversity and nature based solutions, as well as involvement in planning process. So, I would really like to invite, um, James Moogridge, the flood risk and drainage engineer of China Barre Council. And James Blockley, the flood risk manager at Gloucestershire County Council to address the committee. Thank you so much for making time for us to come on today. It's really exciting to have you here. Um, we did have some really great questions with Councillor Chilin. Do you have any follow-ups or, um, other questions? Okay. Thank you so much for asking questions. That was so cool. Um, and again, um, really reiterate the value of asking questions ahead of time because it kind of helps to clarify the nature of how we hold discussions. So it does make a big difference. Um, does anyone have any questions to kick off discussion? Councillor TOOK, go for it. An apologies, I'm late with this. Um, I should have said it in advance. My concern is around sewage. Um, so in 2022, I understand that for 604 hours, sewage was poured into our rivers and I've understood that there have been improvements on the River Child. But I've heard nothing about, you know, the River Swillgate, Wyman's Creek, and so on. And those areas were taking a lot of sewage in 2022. So Wyman's Creek, which is near where I am, um, had 61 hours of sewage where people bought their dogs. That is, by the way, it's by the race cause poured into it. So I found your report really interesting and really good. I should say thank you. And I, you know, think it's great what you're doing in terms of the sustainable drainage strategy. But the sewage system has to be able to cope with it as well. And there's not much in here, probably because it's not CBC, about seven trends. And are they raising their game for areas apart from the River Child? So things like, you know, the Millstream, as I say, which is by the race track or Wyman's Creek or the Swillgate. Um, hi, yeah, so I guess, as you say, is mainly a seven-tran water issue in terms of sewage fills into the waterways. But that doesn't say that we can't help, and the sort of sustainable drainage systems and managing surface water can really stop those flows going into these combined sewers. Um, I suppose flooding of those sewers is part of their design. That's obviously something that is getting a lot of attention politically. Um, I'm not too sure what infrastructure upgrades seven trend are doing on those water courses. But there are certainly ways we can identify suds schemes to help reduce amount of flow going into those sewers. I don't know if you have anything to add. Thank you. Um, yeah, I mean, as James says, water quality, unfortunately, isn't something that comes under our remit. Um, as you say, we can help and we can guide. Um, but water quality is enforceable by the environment agency. So we don't have a direct remit. But what we can do exactly like James says is work with seven trends and the other water and sewage companies across the county to reduce the amount of sewage. We can reduce the amount of surface water that goes into the combined sewer network. Um, there's a couple of projects in the offing. We are looking at some outline measures in Cheltenham. Um, there's a big project that seven trend have got on their current, um, asset maintenance plan. Uh, which is not in CBC areas. Um, Ned Ridge, wastewater treatment works, catchment, um, where they're looking at quite extensive retrofit urban suds. Um, very similar to a big scheme they did in Mansfield. Um, and it's something that will continue to work with seven trend on. Um, we engage with them on a regular basis. We have a quarterly risk management authority meeting for seven trend and Thames water come along to. So we're really trying to push everything we can, um, to reduce the amount of surface water gains that combine network. I mean, ultimately, you know, the silver, but it would be to separate out the foul and the surface water sewers. But that's a massive, massive engineering task. And there just isn't the money available to do it. That's what we would like to do. That's what a seven trend would like to do. But we've got to work with what we've got. Okay, I think that was a slightly political answer you gave and I would disagree given the profits that the water companies make. Um, I'm also conscious that we're talking about flooding and the implications of flooding and it will cause people flooding their homes and so on. But the implications of flooding are also sewage discharged. And the taxpayer, the council taxpayer, us can do stuff to mitigate it and it's great we're doing it. But, you know, those very profitable water companies also should be doing something to mitigate it. So it would be nice to kind of monitor what's going on there because all the positive stuff you're doing with biodiversity gains and things, you know, if raw sewage is being pumped out, well, it defeats the object. And as I say, I think it's a drawing problem with seven trend and they could find the money and they wanted to. Okay. Thank you so much. Do you have a response for that? Do I think I'm happy to let that lie? Does anyone have any other questions or any ways anything you'd like to follow up on? Okay. Well, I have like a number of questions. I suppose you've probably been meeting quite regularly with seven trend because I think it's it is unfortunate because, you know, I think that this has become a big part of the national conversation. People are quite aware of, you know, like, sewage discharges. I suppose you probably have. Do you have an opportunity to talk about the sort of ongoing plans that you may be having with seven trend? Is that sort of like nature confidential in part at the moment? Or are you at liberty to discuss any further agenda plans of partnership that you'd have with them? Just try and help to alleviate some of the problems that come from it is a bit antiquated infrastructure really. So I do understand that there's only so much. I think a lot of it is sort of Victorian or like 50s and so. So I know that there's no real ideal way of kind of tackling it, but do you have a bit of an idea about how you may be working with other district councils to kind of work collaboratively with seven trend and kind of make sure that they're enforcing that practice or anything like that? Do you have anything about that? I can't give you chapter and verse on any firm plans because I don't have that information to hand. I'm not aware of anything that's currently reached design stage, for example, but the work in Gloucester that we hope to replicate in Cheltenham. In terms of working with seven trend through those quarterly meetings is the best way. Gloucester County Council did pull together. I think it was called restoring our rivers task and finish group, which was looking at exactly this issue. And you're absolutely right. It's not. It's their problem, so we don't want to do anything with it. It's very much a shared problem. The work that we do can only be within the remit that we've got, but that's not to say that we can't continue to work with them to find other opportunities. I know that's not a firm answer and it's not directly answering your question, but we just can't continue to do what we can. I think in some ways it kind of hocks back to the fact, you know, as councils we are very public facing. So people often trust us with kind of problems they're seeing very directly. And it is always a bit of a cop-out for us to just say, well, that's a private area and we don't have that much influence. I kind of feel like there are always ways that we can influence the narrative, so I really appreciate the work that you are doing. Do you want to? Just a quick comment. You know, there's absolutely no reason why the Borough Council can't directly call Seven Friend to account. Invite them to a meeting, you know, get them to do a presentation. There was a motion of full council a while ago and a motion was tabled to call for a flood summit, which is bringing together all of the main risk management authorities to discuss these issues, wider issues. That's going to be 23rd of May, which is essentially, I think it's kind of morphed into a kind of member's education event, more than anything else. Question and answers. So Seven Friend will be present at that meeting, giving a presentation. In terms of invites, I'm not too sure. I need to be guided by our Democratic Services Unit, because we're quite tight on numbers. But what I was hoping to do was to invite Borough Councilors that have a specific remit. So, whether they're the environment, portfolio holder or flooding or water, whatever. So invites of that will be going out sometime over the next week or so. So, that's the public facing side of things. We will continue to have the quarterly meetings that's backed up by an officer's only group, which primarily looks at planning, which is also a big issue with regards to connection to the public to a network of new developments. Yeah, we'll keep doing that. Thank you so much, sir. That's really, really helpful. Yes, perfect. Councilor Hoppe, would you like to speak? Yeah, thank you. Our cabinet members don't have a specific portfolio covering, flooding and so on. So, the best way to get into this... Sorry? You've got your... There you go, you see. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, well, Councilor Lewis can speak for herself. She's out over there. She would like to be invited to the meeting, though. Please, to be honest, that sounds like a really good event and I would really like to have where it's at. No, it happened just purely organically. That's perfect. Thank you so much, Councilor Lewis, for being here today and taking up that opportunity. That will be amazing. Thank you so much for giving us the background on that. Do we have any further questions from Council members as well about this? Again, literally any small movement. I'm just seizing up on it. Okay. So, I was also kind of wondering, specifically more about 2007, because those floodings, you know, like happened when I was a teenager and I still remember them quite vividly. I don't know if like there's been any potential discussion as well, the risk of that kind of occurring again. I know that there are certain areas that are outside Chantelborough Council's remit, sort of like Twigworth Tutsbury, sort of areas in Gloucester do come to mind. I really welcome the fact that you're having a full of looking at planning and I realize that there's been quite a lot of development occurring across the floodplains. Are you in a position to speak about that? And is there anything that we as a planning committee in Chantel maybe may benefit from learning more about? Is there any inclusion that we may be able to do learning more about that from both a Chantelham basis and a county-wide basis? Because also just the fact that there's the escarpment above us, you know, also like the fact that we are surrounded by fields as well. It can reduce our travel options and transport options. We have a lot of rain coming from the hills and sort of like coming down towards us. Is there anything that is all interconnected as one saying? Is there anything that we should be considering from a planning position since that's one of the most visible issues concerning floodplains I'm seeing? Yeah, so I guess first, the 2007 van was a really high magnitude flood event. Obviously our climate is already changing and the probability of that then happening again isn't as low probability as it perhaps was at that time and will only become more likely in the future. And in terms of planning there are opportunities, so obviously we've got the strategic local plan coming up and as a part of that it will likely be a review of what's called the strategic flood risk assessment at Chantelham. So that basically makes sure the planners are using the latest available data to guide development into the right areas that aren't at risk of flooding. And if those areas are at risk of flooding it has to follow a specific process to ensure that it's mitigating to that development itself but also not causing problems to areas downstream. Cool, thank you for that, so general recommendation is that we keep referring back to the strategic local plan, sorry, and continue to make sort of suggestions as we're going along as it's a very iterative scheme. James, would you like to speak? Thank you. Yeah, just to add from a county perspective to what James has eloquently said, our role as lead local flood authority, one of our roles is a statutory consultee to major development, so anything over 10 dwellings or one hectare or an output one hectares new gross internal floor space would come across our desk. The Borough Council's responsibility is for everything below that threshold. What I will say is we don't make a decision on whether or not a development, as James has said, is safe from flooding or will cause flooding elsewhere. All we can do is provide advice to the local planning authority, Chelten Borough Council, to say what we think about a proposal. We do take a robust line with major development. Whilst we can only say whether or not a development will, the surface water runoff arising from a new development, whether that is greater or less than the greenfield runoff rate, so the rate of surface water leaving a development before and after that development. Obviously, the way that they manage that will be installation of sustainable drainage systems. And whilst we can say yes, that drainage strategy doesn't increase the runoff rate, we do say, yeah, underground storage would work, but can you go back to your proposals and have a look at the potential for above ground storage, attenuation based and something that would have biodiversity benefit and immunity benefit as well as. Being much, much easier to maintain. That's a big part of our role. We've got 1.5 full-time equivalents working on that. One of the things I would say is building in the floodplain is something that I hear often. I live in Shoeksbury and I hear people talking about it all the time. We don't recommend to the LPA to approve any building in the floodplain. There are certain ways around that for critical infrastructure, the exception test and the sequential test. But if something is proposed in flood zone three, we would not recommend that it's approved by planning committees. So I think the building in the floodplain is a bit of a red herring. Okay. Did anyone else have any questions or things to raise? Okay. So thank you very much for clarifying that. I think also it's kind of, I mean, just the fact that, you know, chut them itself, like the chaltas river and how I think is a water meadow as well. So in some ways, like, I think inevitably, we're probably going to have some water run off and it's going to be where houses have been built in the intervening. So to be honest, like, I really appreciate your thoughts on it and just sort of seeing what best practice should be for us. Just about the working closely for our planning committee is really reassuring. I think that I'm fairly happy with that discussion unless anyone else has anything to raise. Okay. So generally, I think that's okay for a wrap up. Thank you so much for coming in today. I really appreciate it. Is there anything else that you'd like to tell us about or do you think would be of interest to us or used to us? Of course, yes, please. I was just thinking when you were talking about water quality, and I think there's groups that focus -- voluntary groups that focus on specific water courses. Friends are Gumstalk Brook. There's the Windrush group as well that carry out regular monitoring of their own water course monitoring CSOs combined sewer overflows, which is exactly what you're talking about. I'd recommend that as counselors, you work with your communities and see if there is any interest in setting up. Monitoring groups that could look at these issues. We could happily put you in touch with more established groups if it's something that you'd like to look into. But I'm all in favour of community ownership of flood risk and pollution. We work to set up floodwater groups and flood action groups. That's working within our remit, but there are groups out there that rattle certain water and sewage company cages in a way that we can't. The other thing I was just going to mention ever so quickly is, I know there's often a lot of confusion about the role of a lead local flood authority. I think it's important to say that the lead is a bit of a misnomer. If anything, we're a coordinating local flood authority. We don't have any jurisdiction over any of the other risk management authorities. We certainly don't have any jurisdiction over Cheltenborough Council, but we do work very, very closely together. All of the district teams and lead local flood groups and other RMA's effectively an extended team. We very much work together, shared goals. I really applaud Cheltenborough Council. After Jeff Bier left, the role was vacant for some time. Myself and my line manager had several meetings with various officers and managers at Cheltenborough Council trying to encourage the organisation to think carefully about resourcing the role. And now we've got 1.5 full-time equivalents, which is great. And I wish the other districts would do the same because district offices across the county are really, really struggling not just with the weight of minor planning consultations, but with the consenting and forcing activity that we delegate one officer for a district the size of Chewsbury. It's not enough. One officer for the district size of Strauss is not enough. 1.5 for Cheltenborough, you're getting close. Obviously it would be nice to have more, but I really applaud Cheltenborough Council for being ahead of the game with that one. Thank you. Thank you so much for that, because I think I'm just having a joint approach. I assume this is probably going to be a conversation that you'll be having this flood summit aimed at risk management. And actually just having a unified approach to flood mitigation. Like, again, we're all like a county. We kind of all fill in each other's gaps a little bit. So, yeah, just having a wider strategy. It's really, really cool to hear that Charlem is leading game on that a little bit, but you're right. Like Chewsbury horror is absolutely massive and it covers a wide area, most of which are somewhat undeveloped. We're all lands, so if there are opportunities being missed and things that we could potentially kind of advocate on or like try and see more accountability done on. Particularly since the boundaries between Charlem and Chewsbury are often a bit tenuous. So, if there's any way of kind of finding a way forward through that, that would be really amazing. And I really appreciate having this conversation with you so we can keep it in our thoughts. I think that should be okay, but thank you so much for bringing all that to our attention. I really appreciate it coming in. Thank you so much. Okay, perfect. So, I'm just going to move on to item eight if anyone's happy with that. So, this is covering the climate emergency action plan update, which I'm really excited about. We have received the local government associations recommendations now. We've compared them with the national picture and what else is going on. So, we wanted to have a look at the climate action plans that we have, the progress that has been made on them, and just how we're communicating our success, because that's like a really big deal about feedback, feeding back. So, I would like to invite Debbie Baker, who's our program mat director for climate change, and Macey McCann, who's our climate emergency officer to address the committee. So, I'm really, really happy you guys are here. Thank you so much for coming today. And also, we've mentioned the Councillor Lewis, who is our cabinet member for the climate emergency is here too. So, it's really great seeing you all here. Does any of the committee members have any questions? It'd be really great to hear from you if you have anything right now. Yeah, we're all good. Councillor TUCK, thank you so much. Hi, first of all, thank you for the report. Really appreciate it. I feel I should kind of name an elephant, which is in the room, which is all our old housing stock, and all our heritage buildings, which are very leaky, I'm sure, in terms of heat, and producing an awful lot of carbon. I know, I mean, I personally defeated a planning officer recently, who told me that we couldn't have secondary glazing in a 20th century building, and we've got 24 flats, which have now got double glazing, but I was told absolutely it couldn't happen. I'm told it can't happen with listed buildings in Cheltenham as well, but I'm aware that Christchurch College in Cambridge has got secondary glazing, the beautiful Nash Terrace, Cornwall Terrace, that looks over Regent's Park, grade one listed again, has got secondary glazing, and St Pancras Chambers, you know, the beautiful Gothic chambers, apartments, which sit over at King's Cross Station, they've got secondary glazing. So, can you talk me through what we're doing to make sure that in our beautiful buildings, we can move into the 21st century? I love heritage, I want to protect it, but, you know, this is important. So, just to put it into a wider context, retrofit of the buildings within Cheltenham makes up about 42% of our boroughwide emissions, so it is an incredibly important part of the strategy that we need to work on, and obviously within Cheltenham, in particular, as you point out, historic buildings are a very significant element of that. So, this coming year, we've got a project that we're putting in place to do retrofit streets, so it's a neighbourhood retrofit project, and we're using that to build our broader strategy and approach for the wider Cheltenham area. We have been looking at a number of approaches, best practice approaches, being used by other authorities, like Bath and West, where they put together energy efficiency advice, and historic buildings advice via the conservation officers, together at the point at which people apply for their listed building consent, that's one option that we're exploring. The other one, which is quite interesting, is something called a proactive development consent order, which is being used by Kensington and Chelsea, where they presuppose listed building consent with a sort of light touch sign-off, based on having produced very detailed advice to people applying for listed building consent alongside historic England. And that's quite appealing because it enables the Council to develop a really clear view alongside historic England of what ease and isn't possible, and obviously secondary glazing isn't just a contentious issue for Cheltenham, it is more broadly, and I think there's a lot of work going on with historic England to look at various ways in which that can be managed beyond sort of grade one listed buildings, which are obviously the most sensitive areas. So I think that's possibly an area that we are actively exploring, and we have a call in the diary to speak to Kensington about the approach that they've taken, and how they've gone about doing that alongside planning. So it is something we're very actively considering, although I don't have a solution to give you today. Call up Christchurch College Cambridge and say, How did you do it? I mean, these buildings, you know, are call-ups and pancreas chambers, because these are amazing, nationally beautiful grade one listed buildings, and they did it. Any other Councils have any questions there? Councilor Shelley? Thank you. My question is about solar panels and the potential for adding PV using roof space in children's industrial areas and car parks and such like. I think the county branch of the CPRE are very keen on this, and feel that there's probably tens of thousands of square metres of potential PV roof space in Cheltenham and will be really keen to support a survey and to see what the possibilities are in doing that. So thank you for that. I think that is something that we haven't perhaps explored as extensively yet as we could do. I think it's one of the areas where the strategic local plan and having a renewable energy. We've had the first stage report, we certainly need the second, and considering more broadly local area energy planning as a very fundamental part of our climate action plan. It is absolutely essential. We've obviously looked at the Council buildings, but yes, as you point out, there's very many more opportunities yet for us to explore, and hopefully that second report that we need to provide the strategic local plan will enable us to make a start on that. Thanks so much. That's really cool. Do we have any other questions or concerns, comments, suggestions? This is really cool. I just have a bit of a question about, let me see if I can run board. There's basically been some strategies within community crowdfunding measures. I'm really excited about the possibilities that we have available to involve community on our journey to climate zero and climate action. Basically, it's been interesting with Cotsaw District Council, because they've been working with SpaceHive to actually create a community fundraising portal. It actually raises funds for local energy projects, local climate and active travel measures or anything like that. Have you had any consideration of a sort of like community fundraising or avenues or anything like that? Thank you, Chair. This is something we have spent a lot of time thinking about, particularly very early on when I took over this portfolio, because one of the big sort of limiters when it comes to investing in retrofitting across Cheltenham is money. Bluntly, we all wish we had some more of it, slightly ominous camera vibe going on there. I've had some conversations with the folks at Cotsawards to try and understand how their scheme works. It has worked in really exciting ways, but there have been some very real pitfalls in terms of trying to manage access to cash and the verification processes for money and things like that. So it's not a perfect system. I've also had some conversations with some sort of community-based crowdfunding schemes. Those who do things like solar panels for schools where people are able to chip in for solar panels for schools. It's definitely really interesting. I think this year, our priority has really been getting the Cheltenham Green Deal, which I know many will be familiar with, which is our relatively low-cost finance scheme for businesses on Cheltenhamboro Council premises to retrofit their buildings. You'll all have seen the fabulous solar panels at Cheltenhamboro, Cheltenham Football Club, which I already liked. That has been our kind of, on the financing journey, our initial first project, getting the Green Deal up, running, real life projects happening. It's definitely something I would be keen to look at, you know, elections pending, of course, should things go in the way that I hope, on May 2nd, I would love to have a bit of a look at crowdfunding pieces, particularly for things like community-based projects, rather than the projects that we're focusing a lot of our energy on the moment, which are things like retrofitting our existing building portfolio, but things that can be sort of embedded within communities, because that's where I think you get the buy-in for crowdfunding. We have to say you can help fund this thing that will be at the end of your road. It's way more attractive than you can buy some light bulbs for the leisure centre, because we're buying light bulbs for the leisure centre at the moment. But whether somebody is going to be excited enough to get up and go, I'm going to give some money for some light bulbs for the leisure centre, compared to something that's very embedded and direct within their community. It's very much the case that with climate action in Cheltenham on the portfolio, we'll be doing some really interesting work, but we are definitely working outwards, starting with our portfolio, starting with our buildings, starting with the things that we have direct control over, and then working outwards, because when it comes to trying to get that net zero by 2030 figure, which we will get, I believe it can be done, the things we have the most control over, the things we have the most influence over, and the fastest routes for reducing our carbon footprint. So definitely something I'd like to look at, but it's on the road rather than something we're working on immediately at the moment. Thanks so much for that. Did anyone have anything they'd like to contribute to discussion at this point? Sorry, I keep checking and I just want to make sure I don't miss anybody. So to be honest, that's really welcome news, because I kind of feel like it's a component of the rich tapestry or kind of current engagement, also just the fact that it's really great that you've considered the tangible kind of options, because otherwise climate action is so abstracted. We don't want to distance people from it. Again, it's taking everyone on the journey, so that's really exciting. I was also wondering a little bit if you've considered some other measures of, I've been reading something really interesting lately about the Avon Needs Trees project, because they've basically been taking land around the Avon area, and like planting trees pretty much on mass, so it's a biodiversity measure, it's also flooding mitigation, it's like some sort of interest as well. So what's particularly interesting to me about it is that it's carbon offsetting, they have a scheme for local business owners to basically, again, it's that tangibility. It's approaching them and saying, look actually, you can come here for corporate way days, planting trees. If you are interested in carbon offsetting, then we will plant trees for you, and you can see the impact that it has. Has that been something that you've also had on discussion as well, because I think it's a really interesting idea? So tree planting is always a complicated one, it's another one of those things that I looked at very early on, when I took on this portfolio to understand what has actually happened to our previous tree planting projects, because you always think to yourself, how many of the trees are still alive, who's looking after them, what's the long-term strategy for tree planting, because the last thing you want is to stick some twigs in the ground, and everyone puts a thumbs up for a photo op on the trees dead within months, that's not the kind of investment that we at Shelton want to make when it comes to reducing our carbon footprint. So we have had a review of some of the previous projects that have happened that haven't been as successful as we might have liked, and so our conversations when it comes to tree planting have transitioned more towards our open green spaces, our parks teams particularly places where we've got friends of groups, because that's what enables the trees to be well maintained, well managed, they're on land that we have control over, parks as a team are fantastic when it comes to not only maintaining the trees, but also making the right choices for what kind of trees we should put where everything from some really nice fruit orchards that have been planted this year through to having a really good mix of trees for biodiversity, it's not enough to just put trees out, as I'm sure you understand, we want the right trees in the right places. I'm really interested in the issue of sort of on-street tree planting, particularly in areas which have a real sort of depth of green space, some parts of Shelton are gloriously green, others not so much, and I know there are some schemes where there's some initial projects for buying a tree in your road, but I know some counsellors in this room have done, some counsellors have bought some trees, which is very nice but possibly not within the price range of all of us, I can say myself. So it's something I'm interested in, but when it comes to tree planting we have been prioritising those well maintained, well managed projects, purely because the only way you can really carve an officer is if the tree survives, and that's easier said than done unfortunately. And have you considered having kind of more carbon offsetting schemes as well, sort of based in local action and tangible? Because I really appreciated the fact that you've had funding for Zeller as well for local organisations and businesses to use, but it could potentially be a bit more reciprocal, I kind of like the idea of a bit of a circular economy where we invest in our local businesses and they kind of reinvest in us. So it's kind of just this perpetual giving cycle. Is there anything, because I kind of feel like carbon offsetting, just like climate responsibility, something that is quite important to a lot of business owners now. So if there's some way we could have a mechanism in place to kind of make that self reinforcing, that would be really, really cool. I mean it's definitely something that we've seen a lot of, particularly with running the recent small business grants program that we've just run, which allowed us to give grants around £10,000 to a bunch of different, really interesting mix of different gentleman businesses and sort of community organisations that account of businesses. It's like GP surgeries, which I thought would be quite interesting one to try and fund. But the big thing for us with that project is that it's not just that we're giving people money, so they can do nice retrofits because that's really important. It's about how we take what they do, what they learn, the process they go through, the suppliers they work with, their experience of the planning system. And take that back into Cheltenham because it's really important, particularly in Cheltenham where we have lots of very similar businesses, like hospitality services, big one in Cheltenham. And how can we use schemes like our funding scheme to ensure that we have a really strong base of expertise, experience, ideas for how that business that might be similar to your business has retrofitted and met the more ambitious criteria we might have for climate retrofitting moving forward. We've had everything from matching up different dry cleaners who have found new approaches to being more sustainable, so we can share that expertise, a project during Faith Week to bring churches together. We're trying our very best where we're investing in small businesses in the community to make sure everything we learn and everything we do comes back into Cheltenham. I think that's very important. Councillor Chang, thanks so much. Yeah, I think that's great and I suppose having case studies is a key thing. So how are you promoting those, you know, the good ideas and what are the main mechanisms for getting that back out into the community. Thank you. So a significant proportion of that kind of work is done through Cheltenham Zero, which is our partnerships with our partners vision 21. On their website, they have a fabulous collection of case studies if you'd like to have a read, includes things like retrofitting heritage buildings, lots of really solid examples. The other place where I think people are often surprised to find it, but I think is really, really important, is in our climate SPD. For those who haven't read it, firstly, you should. It's a beautiful document. You can't say that often about council documents, but it is beautiful. But more importantly, it has some great case studies from people who have done what we are recommending. So where we can sort of situate advice in places that people are going to be looking for it, I think is particularly important. People often come to us. That's just the nature of the relationship between councils and everybody else. But being able to situate knowledge in places where people who are making difficult and interesting choices can find it is really important to us. Okay, thank you so much for that. That's really great. Do we have any councilor Smith? Go ahead. Yeah, I've just listened to what you've said. About the carbon footprint and preserving trees and things like this, what do we do in the sense of when development comes and they just start digging out the trees and pulling out shrubbery and all the rest of it. There's a project going on at the moment where there are three trees that are over 100 years old. They are just about to build some buildings and the access is over the roots of these trees. The plan is to mould as they call it through the road to put the drainage in, which will start disturbing the roots. As far as everybody's concerned, the tree surgeons say everything's fine, not a problem. But we're not looking at the longer future of what happens with the construction business lorries going over the roots. The building that's got to be carried on to put the buildings up, they're going to damage the roots. And these are three beautiful 100 year old trees. And they're the only ones in Cheltenham. There isn't another lot in Cheltenham at all. And they're what's only in trees. So, yeah, I just wonder what you feel about the carbon footprint of development. Trees within planning applications are always a really interesting one. I watch planning a lot recreationally more there's anything else. I'm not on the committee, it's just interesting, which is possibly a bad sign for my social life. But I do think our climate SPD, which you might have read, is really very clear in that development should be trying to deliver, and quite frankly should be delivering. Let's not pretend that we're giving advice. We are making an expectation here by a diversity net gain on site. And things like very well developed, mature greenery and that kind of piece really should be maintained to the best possible ability. I think one of my favourite examples of this that always cracks me up by bringing it up a lot when I go to climate events is that Cheltenham Borough Council believes this so much. In the Golden Valley, if you've been to the site, it's wonderful if you haven't been. There's this beautiful oak tree sort of centralised within the scheme. And our plan was always to build around it. We're going to keep it there, it's beautiful, you couldn't possibly take it down. The only problem being that once we finally got the route surveys back, it turned out they were growing in a different direction to where we thought they were. So Cheltenham Borough Council, in its commitment to keep this tree, changed the layout of the Cyber Innovation Centre rather than moving the tree. It can be done, and I think Cheltenham, as an organisation where we do build, does live up to those very high standards that we're setting for other organisations, like quite literally rearranging a building to make sure the tree can stay there. It's a slight gap, I think, between Cheltenham Borough Council's planning policies and our SPD, which are very ambitious. We set a very high bar, and we do expect developers to meet it, and central government who are a little bit wet. I think it's possible for us to describe it when it comes to enforcing these kind of terms within planning applications, and we all live in fear of the dreaded planning appeal. So it is frustrated to have that lag, but I hope, or we can only hope, a different administration in Westminster might be a little bit more optimistic and a little bit more ambitious to help make us a little bit more in line. But no, I completely agree with you. Where we can preserve beautiful trees like that, apps that you should be. Cool, thank you so much for that. Is everyone happy? Do you have any other questions or suggestions at this time? Can I take a go ahead? Alisha, sorry to put you on the spot. Can you talk through the recruiting of the colleges, don't we? Can you talk through what she or he will be doing? So I will firstly admit that this is not within my portfolio, it's within my very dear friend, Councillor Martin Hallard's portfolio planning is his terms, but I have had conversations with them about it, because wherever there's overlap. So I've spent a lot of time working with Ian, who covers parks and bins, and with Martin who covers regulatory services, so things like planning, we have a lot of cross-disciplinary climate conversations, as you might imagine. So the big thing with virologist is that some recent changes to Westminster legislation have required much higher standards and much higher delivery rates on biodiversity net gain on site. So a big part of the role of the person whom we hire for that role will be helping to develop things like the very exciting policy we agreed on at fall council about the nature emergency and having a nature and biodiversity SPD, very similar to our climate SPD. We always thought climate SPD, when we put it down, was a start on a road, it was never meant to be a final document that was going to stand the test of time, retrofit and climate was always going to change, and things like the biodiversity SPD are going to allow us to enhance it and make it better, because we're more than happy. It makes things better here at childbirth council, so a big part of that will be that work, along with biodiversity based work in the planning team. So it's going to be a really exciting project, and I know that whoever gets that job will be very, very lucky. Thanks so much, yep, definitely really keen to have an ecologist on site, that's going to be really great. So I think we're all good with that. I was just wondering, Debbie Maisie, I really appreciate you coming here today as well, is there anything else that you'd like to bring to our attention that you'd like to speak about? I'd really appreciate your thoughts, thank you. Yeah, I mean I suppose coming in from externally, the one thing I would say, is I think to help them in reviewing all of the progress today. I think to help them has made a really good start. I think the opportunity now is to really focus in on the big areas of emission and put in place sort of where barrow wide emissions are concerned of some really concrete strategies, and internally what we really need is a costed plan to address each of our sort of major assets, so that we know what it's going to cost to get those properties to the as close to zero as we can, so that we've got a really clear idea around what we have left to offset. We have given quite a lot of thought to all the various possibilities around our setting, and there are some really, it's absolutely essential though that when we get to that offsetting point, what we do is really robust, and it's countable, and it's something that endures. So we are making sure that when we get to as far as we can get what we have left, we do have a plan in place to mitigate that, that's effective and brings its own sort of wider benefits, and that goes beyond sort of having a robust approach to counting the offsets from countries. But I do think having spent six months looking at what Cheltenham has done, and the amount of enthusiasm across the council from everyone to try and make this a reality, it is really heartening, it's been a good start. Thank you so much for coming today, I know that you've been working super hard on this, and it does make a really big difference just having the integrative strategy. It really does inform every element of our work because the risks of it are so substantial, so it does make a really big difference, thank you so much. If we don't need to take any decisions on this, but we can make any recommendations or suggestions as needed, so we'd really, really like to be able to follow up on this with you in time to come. Again, like local election is going to be a bit of a concern, this is actually our last meeting before the collections, and I guess we'll see everyone on the other side, but you'll definitely be having a placeholder for the climate team to come in and talk to us so we can see what everyone's up to. And honestly just hear more about your great work, so thank you so much, this has been really, really cool. So I think we'll leave item 8 as is now, and does anyone want a bit of a break before we go into physical activity strategy, if we're okay to carry on as is, because we're making quite good time generally anyway, so we're happy to progress to item 9. [inaudible] You guys can leave now, sorry, I find this stuff all really, really exciting, I kind of do need to stick around, but yeah, if you want to go, that's really, really cool. Thank you so much for hanging out today, this has been really, really great. Sorry, thank you. Okay, yeah, let's talk about the Champion Physical Activity and Sports Strategy, so we need to input strategy prior to its adoption. I would like to invite Richard Gibson, Head of Communities, while being in Partnerships to address the committee. It's really, really great to see you today, congratulations on your recent work with Elida, and the grant funding for that, that's really, really exciting. Now the tree hit the press today, do any members have any questions for Richard just to kick things off? Perfect, Richard, if you're okay to give us a brief overview on what you've been up to and what this consists of, that would be great, thank you. Right, thank you, thank you Chair for that. I would spend too long going through the report because you've got it in front of you. I think there are lots of good reasons why the town needs a Sport and Physical Activity Strategy. Some of that are our own challenges as a council, we run, well, I don't know, I said we run, the trust runs, our leisure centre in Prince of Wales Stadium and both of those facilities do need investment, and we need to make sure that investment makes the best possible impact for the physical health of our communities. We've got pervading health inequalities within our town, both within certain cohorts, within our community, but also in certain areas when you look at the data. It's quite clear that certain cohorts aren't as physical active and are not sharing in some of the health benefits from sport and physical activity. We also have some challenges around access to physical activity. I was very surprised when I looked at the data from a bit niche I suppose, but from the Cheltenham Youth Football League. There are no junior football clubs serving the whole west of Cheltenham, it's staggering. All of our youth football teams, the chomp kings, their captain movers, same side, but some of those will play their matches over, say, at KGV. But there's no west Cheltenham owned junior football clubs and I think that's quite shocking for a ton of science. So there are challenges like that, and I think the strategy is also about helping communities meet their ambitions. You all know very well the work we did with Lechampton Rovers FC back last year in helping them realise their ambitions for the boroughs, and I think that's been an amazingly well-received project. Currently working with a group based out of Saracens FC about their plans for a new community in sport sub. So it's clear our communities want to do more, and I think that's where we want to be pitching a strategy. Back in July you might have seen there was a hyperlink within the report. We did take through to cabinet draft vision and outcomes for sport and physical activity, and that sets out our stall where in summary, I think we want all our communities to be healthy and active and enjoying the benefits of sport and physical activity. So we're now at this detailed bit, we've agreed the vision, the high level stuff. This is the detailed work that we're bringing through to cabinet on the second of April, and splits into two parts. We've got a built facilities strategy and a playing pitch strategy. And together those two strategies look at the kit, the physical kit that we've got to support our ambitions around sport and physical activity, playing pitches and the built stuff. But it looks at current provision, and looks at the quality of that provision, looks at, you know, is it in the right place? And then it makes assessments of future demand up to 2041, obviously using the latest demographic data. And we'll come out with a sort of position statement. Is what we've got already in terms of that infrastructure right and appropriate, and will it meet needs into the future? I think what we're looking for those strategies to do is to point out where we need additional investments into either our built facilities or to playing pitches. The covering report that I've tabled today just goes into those built, both those assessments into a little bit more detail. On page three you'll see some of those key themes emerging from the built facilities assessment. No surprise, Leisure Act Cheltenham is their top most in that list of issues that I think we need to resolve with. But again, a common theme is around the education sector. We are blessed in Cheltenham to a certain degree that a lot of our schools are providing a lot of our sporting provision, whether that's playing pitches or sports or very much our swimming pool provision is very much predicated on the, I think it's for independent schools that have swimming pool. Which is great, but the report is flagging up the real importance of community use agreements for that provision and the need to work with schools to continue to invest in that provision. If the schools aren't tied in, there's always a risk that a school may go well, we've got so much demand from our pupils. We're no longer making it available for community use and bang, there goes quite a lot of important provision. And I think there's also something there in the bullet points about working with our national governing bodies around sport and clubs and the people that enjoy sport to see what we can do to harness those ambitions and getting more investment into Cheltenham. I don't think much of this investment is necessarily going to come from Cheltenham or a council, it can come from national governing bodies like sport or sports council or from developer contributions. I don't know, there's probably not much to touch on the playing pitch assessment. I think there's a real deficit of artificial grass pitches, 3G pitches, we've only got one publicly accessible 3G pitch in the whole of the borough and that's all saints. I think looking at the data it suggests we should be having five, so there's a gap of around four. So there is something there for the borough council to do to steer that forward because we know how valuable artificial grass pitches are and almost if we have more artificial grass pitches, that would really help other sports because at the moment what limited access we've got tends to be dominated by football. So we know for sure, hockey, I don't know if there's any hockey players here tonight, but hockey players really lose out because you're not getting access to the right artificial pitches. And again, reference to developer contributions, what's going on at North West Cheltenham or West Cheltenham. So just in summary, the report is going to go through, the cabinet report is a bit more detailed, there is an appendix there that runs to 120 pages, feel free to have a look at that. If you want, and I think the idea of bringing this today was just to get your views on what's coming out of those two assessments and also as we move forward with the final strategy, how will you would like to get involved in that. So hopefully that's useful. So, Councillor Chillin, I think, and then Councillor Tuke, thanks so much. Thank you, Richard, it's really interesting and really interesting to hear you talk about the education schools and such like community use and that sort of thing. I'm particularly interested in accessibility for maybe disabled people too, because I was talking to somebody recently who said that disabled people don't want to go to a gym necessarily, you know, a normal gym like everybody else. It's important that there are special accessible facilities and where maybe some schools can provide that. How much can we support them to engage with the community and what for our planning processes to support the development of that whilst managing maybe neighbors who might have problems with. With a more open usage of those facilities, because maybe to do noise or whatever, you know, how can we support schools to make accessible their facilities, particularly for disabled people, whilst there might be an opposition or counterintuitive. So the details reports do look, obviously, disabled access is an important criteria that the consultants have looked at in terms of grading the quality of provision. So they have highlighted areas where disabled provision could be better. I mean, one of those is Prince of Wales Stadium, I think the disability access isn't great into the stadium, so that is something that we potentially look at. But the question of schools is interesting, isn't it, about how we influence schools? Because we, as a council, don't necessarily have powers or the ability to dictate what we have is sort of influence and our kind of democratic sort of mandate, I guess, through local councillors, the influence, and coalescing them in behind this, I think is going to be really important. So we don't, we can't force them to do things, but I think we can control and support and hopefully lead the way on what we're doing ourselves through that. Interesting Belmont school that you'll know really well has got some quite a lot of ambitions to be a sporting cover for disabled people, disabled younger people within our community and those plans look great. I don't know how far they've been tested in terms of planning considerations, but certainly the ambition is that. Thank you Richard. I've got three questions. I must admit I absolutely shuddered when you said artificial grass, because it is in terrible environment, it's terrible for birds and so on, and it doesn't help with flooding. So I would ask that it's used very judiciously and that we think about how to mitigate its impact, because we should be discouraging the use of artificial grass. The second question was about private schools. It seems to me that we're charitable status comes social responsibility. Those schools are setting, you know, their playing fields are setting empty throughout the summer holidays, I imagine, and so on. Are they really putting their weight in terms of, you know, being available for the less affluent communities of Chelm? My third question, sorry, so the first point is just to be having a little rant, I'm sorry about artificial grass, the second point is a valid question. The third point is private sector, obviously many people keep fit by using private sector gyms and so on. Are we working with the private sector, you know, to have more swimming pools, more gyms and so on, because many of us will use those private sector facilities? Thank you, Councillor. I mean, yes, the artificial grass pitches is an interesting one, isn't it? It's a conundrum. I guess for us to wrestle with, because we know there are so many sort of sport-related benefits from their installation, it really does increase the capacity of those new teams and, you know, new people to access sport, but you're right about the environmental considerations. I'm not no way an expert, but I'm sure I've read something where they are looking more environmentally friendly. They're probably not going to address all the concerns, but I do know that's a very live discussion going on. Are independent schools doing everything to support all our communities? I think it would be very difficult for me to say, I know there's something called channel education partnership, which brings together the independent schools along with the state schools, who have paid coordinator, and they are doing an awful lot of work to show how the independent sector can support the state sector and our wider communities. So there is work going on. I've gotten a gender item at their next meeting to talk specifically around sports and physical activity. So it's an area of interest for us, how we can work closely. I think, and again, it is around the mutual interest around this that we can foster. And then private sector gyms, we're not doing anything, we're not bringing together the private sector necessarily. I mean, that's not to say that we shouldn't or couldn't, but it's such a broad and diverse mix and tends to kind of stand and fall on its own two feet and private sector provision. It seems to be a real trend now for private sector gyms occupying sort of light industrial space, which is great and I'm sure the planners have, you know, have got that covered. I guess it goes to show how the private sector gyms are looking for gaps in the market, looking to find cheap space, looking to innovate, to address gaps within the market. I don't know whether we'll see those smaller sort of private sector operators investing in pools is another matter, but certainly I think you will continue to see the private sector innovating because I think there will see child as a relatively affluent community in this potentially money to be made. Thank you. Just a couple of questions. First one is, I listened to you talk about sports facilities for public related to schools and things like that. How do you feel about schools selling off land for development when they weren't talking about providing more and more facilities for sports facilities where we really need a sixth form school here that could go on that land and help out with business cleave and with Pitville. And I think it's a shame that this land has been put up for sale. The development was originally for 56 houses. Councillor Smith. Wait, sir. Sorry, straight up. That's not something for the remit of this. I was about the thought of selling the land, school and force instead of using it for sports facilities. Sorry. No, it's okay. I know you're quite new to this committee, but just to clarify, that's not something that's appropriate. Sorry. Thank you. Thank you. There's anyone else have any further questions about that, because I have a couple that have been just stating a little bit. That's okay. So, to be honest, I really appreciate the fact that we did a survey on user safety for women and girls and generally vulnerable people in public spaces. I think that it's really useful having a joined up connected policy on physical activity because so many people are on social activities. So many people are joggers in this town, cyclists. I don't know if you've been in a position to work directly with county council on highways to kind of ensure sort of safety. Have you been taking any measures on that that you may be able to talk to us about today? Thank you, Councillor Joy. Yes, we are. We've just closed the violence against women and girls survey. And that's given us some real useful information about how safe women and girls feel in our community, particularly in the nighttime economy. You're absolutely right. One of the issues we've identified within our initial work with stakeholders around sport physical activities that are feeling safe and how certain groups may not feel safe when they're exercising within the community. Now, I haven't personally addressed GCC about improved lighting, but that is something potentially that we could be looking at, I guess, as a council. Certainly we would want all our communities to feel safe when they're exercising. We've actually got a physical activity survey that closed last week, specifically looking at barriers. Now, I don't think feeling unsafe came out very high in those lists of barriers. It was more to do with costs of accessing physical activity and also access so getting to places to be physically active. But it is an issue that we are alive to. Can I ask them? So, aside from cost in terms of barriers to physical activities, did you identify any other areas for concern that you could tell us about today? Sorry, Councillor JOHN, I'm just referring to the cabinet report. So, some of those barriers, sorry, I've got the macro list now, so it's a majority, well, not a majority. 41% saying costs are a real barrier, 32% lack of time, 23% having to book in advance, 20% of a fifth around feeling nervous to start a new activity or go to a new place. Do you want me to, and then fifth, was getting places to be active? So, do you feel that there may be scope for, it feels like there's a bit of a correlation between a lack of time and a struggle in getting to places. So, in some ways, that kind of does feed into a bit of a roadway strategy. If people can save time just going out for a cycle instead of driving to the gym and then using a spend cycle and then driving back home. Just encouraging people to kind of take up cycling on the commute. I really appreciate a lot of the measures that CBC have been encouraging, like the Love to Ride campaign. And, you know, certain, like, I think we've been doing short-term measures on getting people included on things. Is it possible to use the website to kind of promote, like, exercise groups, because we've got a really successful park run group? Is there more outreach that we could do with community groups and help them to foster? We've also been really good at stuff like CBC often assists, like, they're picking groups and getting started. Those are really cool outreach stuff that we're doing as a matter of course. Do you feel like this may be expanded to groups to help promote them? I agree, Councillor Joy, I think what the survey is telling us, people want to be active within their communities. And I think the more we can do as a council, but also through our friends of groups and other kind of community organisations, the more that we can get people out and confident about being active. Being active doesn't mean dressing up in Lycra or joining a football team. You're right, absolutely right. It can be gardening. Can we just go for a walk or go for a cycle ride? There are many different ways. And I guess it's how we as a council can create those conditions for that to happen. As I said, we don't necessarily have lots of finances to throw at this, but it is around showing the way that community leadership, democratic leadership, working with those kind of community groups to encourage this to happen. In some ways, again, that kind of joined up approach. I really appreciated what we did with the climate change makers group at CBC, having 11 individuals who are involved with that, including my partner, actually, who had a really good time. It's kind of really nice how we kind of gave them the training, the oversight, kind of the self-determination to establish their own project. Do you feel like it may be feasible for us to do a similar thing with community sports groups where we give them safeguarding training, we put them in contact with each other so they can feed into each other's networks? It may be something that we could potentially target some budget towards and actually kind of do it as a collective experience. Do you think feel like that may be something that could be feasible? Potentially. I'm conscious of straying too much into the policy side of things. And I think that's something, I guess, for the cabinet to look at after the election. And this report that we're taking on the second of April is not the final strategy. There's going to be more work to be done in shaping, particularly around the plain pitch element, so that there will be another chance potentially for you as overview and screen-need committee to have another look at this. What we've got here is lots of data and findings from consultants. I think what you're asking Councilor Joy is, what's the nuance, what's the political overlay overall of that data and where are we going to prioritise as Council? I can't give you that at the moment. I think it needs a bit more work and that political overlay. I don't mean to put you on the spot, I'm really sorry. I think it's just one of these things where it's a really, really great and very comprehensive strategy. Just the five-page summary and the fact that there's hundreds of pages of work behind it. It does kind of give for any good scope, but I think you're right. We kind of do need to have a bit more of an intuitive and it's a more innovative system. And if policy is a solution to that, then I think that's a really good recommendation. And that's definitely given me a lot to think about. Do any Council members here have any other recommendations, suggestions or any kind of thoughts? Again, I kind of feel like I just opened my mouth and thoughts come out, so I don't necessarily want to help enable people to make the same mistakes as me. Are we all fairly happy with that or do we have any further queries? Cool. I think that should be really good. Thank you so much. I'm really looking forward to it. Did you say it was April that we're going to be able to have a second look at this? Yes. So the report is going to cabinet on 2nd of April. The papers have already been published last week. Have a look at those if you wish. And then I leave it within your -- it's your gift, I guess, to see whether you want to bring this back before the final strategy goes. Thank you so much. That's absolutely perfect. Thanks so much. And you are also free to leave if you would like to. Thank you so much. Cool. So I think now we move on to item 10. So with feedback from other scrutiny meetings attended. So we have the Gloucestershire Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee of 12th of March, 2024. So we have had an update from Councillor Bamford that's added a supplement to the published agenda. So I think we've had a look at that. We've also got the Gloucestershire Economic Growth ONS Committee. So for GCC and other current scrutiny committee, considering the terms of reference for new scrutiny committee in the Abbott City Region Board. So that's something coming up soon which I can do a quick summary of. Is it okay for me to just read this out because I think it's a bit, um, substantial. But if you want to, yeah, okay, cool. So this is slightly technical, so please bear with me, but it's useful just for general reference. So essentially what's going to be happening is the Gloucestershire Local Authorities have been working jointly together through membership of numerous boards, including Seven Vale. Where of ambitions and central Gloucestershire City Region. So in addition with the Gloucestershire Economic Growth Joint Committee, they've basically been participating together for several years just to review the joint working arrangements. And now it's been agreed by leadership Gloucestershire that the three boards in the joint committee need to be merged into a single forum under the name of Gloucestershire City Region Board, which then serves the whole of the County of Gloucestershire. Um, so basically there is a report that has been released in terms of the Art of Gloucestershire Economic Growth ONS Committee. And this is actually setting out the emerging form and function of Gloucestershire City Region Board. So essentially, um, this isn't something that we can easily look at today. Um, there's been a lot of work in the background, um, quite a lot beavering away and sort of just clarifying what the nature of its authority, in terms of reference membership and joint screening arrangements will be. So, um, this is something that in some ways kind of does touch on our work and just ensure, in to ensure, um, very good screening arrangements. The overall aims of the new board will be developing and delivering vision for the future growth of the economic success for the whole of Gloucestershire Economic Area, which is a good thing to coincide with the strategic local plan. The new board is going to be, um, providing an opportunity to establish a city region as a nationally defined area that is of a single economic functional area as well. Um, the city regions, including urban and rural areas with interrelated economic activity. So again, it's that joint of approach that's all too valuable. We should have the potential for increased success through coordinated interventions, which then benefit the home. Um, so we hope to meet significant growth aspiration and ambition, which integrate with and support the national and regional growth agenda. So that's basically coming from the top a little bit. Um, and this is kind of the reason why we can't particularly examine the Gloucestershire Economic Growth ONS Committee, because it's changing in its nature quite substantially. Um, so, um, following up from that, we've also got the Gloucestershire Police and Crime Panel from the 22nd of March 2024. So that was just a couple of days ago, and we're going to be adding that as a supplement to the published agenda. So that will be available for two of you, um, in due course. And I think that takes us on to item 11. So, um, unfortunately, Councilor Nelson wasn't able to be present tonight, um, but has sent her apologies. Um, and she was going to deliver a presentation briefly about the scrutiny task group, like, namely, um, the CBH, CBC transition scrutiny task group. Um, Claire, are you okay to give this presentation? Thank you so much, Claire is very good and kindly we doubt the report that Councilor Nelson has provided. Thank you, Claire. Thank you. So Paul Leo, Interim Director Housing and Transformation, gave a very swift update on the Transformation Project ahead of the project board meeting that afternoon. The main purpose of the PBM being to kickstart the project, given that the decision to wind up CBH is already be made by the leader, who I'm sure will tell us more. The overall project plan has key milestones, key dates, and covers issues, including transfer of assets, IT, finance, governance, people plan, and Chupi, and more. Target date for transfer is likely to be confirmed as the 1st of July. By the next meeting of the task group on the 19th of April, we should have oversight of the overall project plan. The question was raised around comms, CBH and CBC comms are already merged, and within that is a dedicated group responsible for transition comms for the duration of the project. We then spent the rest of the meeting going through proposed future governance arrangement. Claire Hughes, Corporate Director and Monitor Officer, gave us a comprehensive and clear presentation of transition and governance arrangements, including impact of regulations coming into force with effect in the 1st of April. She identified key areas where regulations have been changed, explained the various consumer gradings, which is a bit like an offset inspection. We covered the changing landscape, impact on tenants, and need for transparency. The current CBH organization and the emerging transition structure, including cabinet and member proposed involvement and responsibilities. It is proposed to set up a cabinet housing committee that will interface with tenant panel cabinet ONS and audit committees, or makes absolute sense. I'd like to take this opportunity to put on record the task group's thanks to Claire for putting this together and for clear explanations leading us through it. Thanks so much, that's brilliant. So that's a really good summary of everything been going on, but of course, if you guys have any further questions then please let us know. It's really good to take that on board. We have also already had the update from the lead on the CBH/CBC transition earlier in the evening, so if does anyone have any questions at this time, or happy to go on record? Perfect. So item 12 is the review of the scrutiny work plan, which has been circulated with the agenda, and taking it as read at this time, and also important to note the addition of the item related to the motion passed at council on special needs in schools, which we alluded to earlier. We don't need to take a decision at this time, but would anyone like to comment on the work plan or add any suggestions to it? Councillor TOOK. So no suggestions, and I think it looks great, just to kind of note on Bastille, we will have elections on May 2nd, and we will have fresh people coming in, and they may have their own priorities and different priorities. So I think that first meeting after the elections, we should really give them the opportunity to put their input in whoever it might be. That's genuinely a really good idea. It actually briefly mentioning item 14 is that our next meeting will be Monday 3rd of June 2024, which will be actually a dedicated member induction training session, so instead of actually having a particular agenda for that, we're going to be having an external trainer with all members appointed to the committee following the borrower elections, so actually I think that would be a really, really good suggestion, just ensuring that not only do members wish to understand scrutiny, the people who are actually on the committee, just the fact that they do have skin in the game, it would be really, really good for them to have the agency and the support in actually raising things that we can then scrutinise. This needs to be a collaborative process, again, is apolitical, and also everything feeds into itself. The fact that James earlier was mentioning that we can actually call seven trend and other agencies into account because they do affect our work, so I think it would be really, really valuable to do that. And can we make a note about introducing that, because I would really, really support that, I seconded a round of that. Thank you so much, that's perfect. So does anyone else have any suggestions for the work, because that was a really, really good one. Please have a think about it, and if there's anything else you'd like to see, then please let me know. And I think item 13, which I really much skated over, I don't think there are any other items that I determined to be urgent, so I would like to say at this time, with the elections going on, I wish everyone the best of luck. It's a very exciting time, officially in the pre-election period now. It's been an absolute pleasure working with all of you. Thank you for bearing with me as I chair my way through all this, and thank you to Democrats and senators who, of course, are amazing. So just putting that on public record, how great everyone has been, and thank you, I think. I'm happy to close this meeting now.