Minutes:
Councillor David Clarkson to Councillor Naomi Tweddle
Question
Many members of the public were disappointed by this Council’s failure to open the new Central Market as per the initial plans. How many stalls had been let out, with signed contracts?
Answer
This Council was committed to ensuring that the quality of the new Cornhill Market experience matched the fantastic renovation works that had been undertaken to this important heritage asset. Getting the right mix of market offer that could showcase what Lincoln and Lincolnshire had to offer, working with local, small, independent and mainly family run businesses and being responsive to their concerns, needs and timescales had indeed taken longer than expected and planned for but was a recipe for success not failure.
To date:
- Eighteen traders were in the process of signing contracts (six had been signed and were ready to seal)
- Five further stalls were under offer (going through pre-contract checks)
- The Council was actively talking to 20 businesses about letting space (including pop-ups)
- There was a large waiting list (although some of these were duplicates of stalls that had already been let e.g. coffee provision, cookies etc)
The Council would soon be making an announcement as to when the market would open.
Councillor Alan Briggs to Councillor Sue Burke
Question
What work had the portfolio holder recently undertaken in respect to the City Council’s PREVENT duties?
Answer
The Council continued to attend PREVENT steering groups where the priorities for PREVENT were assessed and agreed. Staff continued to complete PREVENT related e-learning when they joined the Council and this training was refreshed every 3 years. Face to Face training options were currently being explored for frontline staff. The Council was also introducing a venue hire policy to ensure that its buildings were not used for extremism, radicalisation, hate speech or other similar activities.
Supplementary question
Please can you provide details of the number of referrals made?
Answer
The councillor would be provided with these figures by an officer outside of the meeting.
Councillor Bill Mara to Councillor Sue Burke
Question
What investment had been made within the last year directly as a result of the City Council’s Social Value Policies with contractors?
Answer
Social Value investment from contracts over the last year was estimated to be in the region of £11.695m. However, it should be noted that of this £11.54m was not tangible and was derived from contractors engaging Local Employment, Local Labour, Apprenticeships and local Supply Chains. Approximately £157k had provided support to local residents of Lincoln by way of Food Bank Contributions, Community Engagement schemes such as working with local schools/community groups and Skills Days for Council Tenants.
Councillor Tom Dyer to Councillor Ric Metcalfe
Question
Could the Leader of the Council enlighten the Council with what the Labour party’s position was in respect to local government finance for the City of Lincoln Council?
Answer
The Conservative Government had made cuts after cuts in public spending, and more specifically to local government spending and it was anticipated that the Conservative Government would further cut local government spending in its forthcoming budget announcement.
Supplementary question
What was the Labour party’s position in respect to local government finance?
Answer
The Labour party was under no illusions on what it would inherit following the Conservative’s cuts to local government finance. Any incoming Government would have to consider in detail finances for local government and consider moving to a multi-year funding settlement.
Councillor Mark Storer to Councillor Bob Bushell
Question
Could the portfolio holder please update on what the Council proposes to do about the increasing amount of unsightly graffiti around the City?
Answer
The Council had in place clear arrangements with contractors for the removal of graffiti from its property. It also offered that same service to third parties.
Unfortunately, the street scene was made up of areas with numerous owners, including other public agencies and many private individuals, whose property the City Council had little or no influence over. The Council urged those agencies or individuals who had graffiti on their property to get in touch with the Council, and to work with it, to keep Lincoln as free of graffiti as possible.
The Council also had an increasing CCTV network, and would use this, along with any other information it could obtain, to continue to work with the Police to try to catch perpetrators.
Councillor Martin Christopher to Councillor Bob Bushell
Question
Could you tell the Council where it ranked in the best and worst Councils for recycling?
Answer
Although a simple question on the face of it, it was important to understand that there were many aspects to consider and bear in mind as context to the answer.
Clearly no two Councils had identical budgets or demographic issues, and each Council therefore had services tailored to try to meet these needs. Their collection systems would therefore vary, and what was workable in one area may not be workable in another.
Over and above this the County Council, who took the city’s recycling waste for sorting, set the criteria as to what they would accept as recyclable. Whilst broadly comparable across most areas of the country, things did vary, and this could also drive some variances.
To be clear therefore, the City Council’s role was to have in place systems to collect the materials, as directed by the County Council, that were affordable, and contributed positively to national recycling targets. This was why it tried to work closely with the County Council through the Lincolnshire Waste Partnership.
Mindful of these important issues of context the Council regularly assessed the city’s output against the stated performance of others, including what government set as our nearest neighbours. Ultimately high-level data was published accordingly.
For 2022/23, which was the most recent year for which verified national data was available, Lincoln had a recycling rate of 31.6%. The CPIFA Nearest Neighbour Group had a median of 31.4%.
The ‘All England’ median was 41.3%. However, it was not reliable to compare Lincoln against ‘All England’ for the reasons set out above, plus it should be noted that this included many unitary Councils who would be including data from HWRCs, which distorted their performance significantly.
Councillor Clare Smalley to Councillor Donald Nannestad
Question
With a huge number of people waiting for housing, and more and more people needing affordable homes turning to the Council, how many void properties does the Council currently have?
Answer
In General Needs (GN) housing at 14/02/2024, the Council had 53 in void (existing stock), the Council had other voids (34) resulting from buy backs and where it purchased additional properties to add to its stock as part of government incentives, they had to go into voids in order to be put into our lettable standard before the Council could add them to the stock. That was 0.6% of our stock being 53/7800.
As at 21/02/2024, the Council had 62 GN in void with 29 “others” that was 0.7% of our stock.
Supplementary question
Are you going to improve the time spent turning around voids?
Answer
The City of Lincoln Council was in the top 25% of other Councils, with some Councils taking over six months so the Council was currently in a good position.