Agenda and minutes

          The Minutes of the meeting held on 22^nd September 2011 were taken as read and signed as a correct record.

          The Sub Committee was advised that the Marriage Act 1995 and Civil Partnership Act 2005 allowed local authorities the facility to set fees for the attendance of a Superintendent Registrar and Registrar at a ceremony in an approved premise. In January 2011 the Sub Committee agreed to review its charges for non-statutory registration services each September for the forthcoming financial year.

          As part of the review of charges the following changes were proposed:

-                            the Service currently had two levels of fees for civil ceremonies taking place in a decommissioned room. It was proposed to amend this to one fee level as most ceremonies take place in the afternoon;

-                            increase the non-returnable reservation fee of £20 to £25 for the booking or subsequent change of time, date or venue for all ceremonies; and

-                            introduce a fee of £18 for telephone applications for copies certified certificates e.g. birth, marriage and death etc from 1^st January 2012.

          RESOLVED: That the following variations and the setting of new fees offered by Halton Registration Service as set out in the report be approved.

          As part of the Housing Stock Transfer to Halton Housing Trust (HHT) in December 2005, an agreement was made whereby for a period of 5 years HHT would deliver certain housing services on the Council’s behalf, the arrangement being capable of extension with the written agreement of both parties. The agreement expired on 4^th December 2010 and it had been hoped that it would not prove necessary to renew it due to different contractual arrangements being developed for the introduction of a new Choice Based Lettings scheme. However these new arrangements were still some months off, due to delays in agreeing the final technical specification for the sub regional scheme. The new scheme was now estimated to be introduced in April 2012.

          The Council had previously agreed that when the Choice Based Lettings scheme is introduced HHT would be the delivery partner (EXB98, 4^th March 2010). Therefore it was proposed that the current contractual arrangements be extended for a period of 18 months.

          RESOLVED: That the extension of the Housing Agency Agreement between the Council and Halton Housing Trust be agreed for 18 months for the reasons set out in the report.

          The Sub Committee was advised on the outcome and results of public and passenger transport tenders which were recently publicised by The Chest e-tendering procurement system. Members were advised that there was likely to be a saving to transport related budgets, however at this stage this level of saving could only be projected as new and emergency contracts needed to be taken into consideration. Currently from the overall analysis of results breakdown this projected saving from recent transport tendering and re-scheduling could be in the region of £53,585.64 for the remainder of this financial year or £77,130.86 as a full year total.

          Members were advised that feedback on the tendering process from potential tenderers was that the e-tendering system had been complicated. Therefore due to the low response rate to The Chest e-tendering exercise it was proposed to carry out further tendering in 12 months time.

          RESOLVED: That the Sub Committee:

1.               acknowledge those transport tenders that have been advertised for services on behalf of Children and Enterprised and Communities Directorates;

1.               acknowledge those transport contracts which commenced from the beginning of September 2011;

2.               acknowledge those tenders that have been advertised for supported local bus transport tenders; and

3.               confirm that they support the overall process.

          The Sub Committee was advised that the existing Term Contract for Highway Surface Treatments was awarded to Road Maintenance Services Limited (RMS) on 1^st April 2007. The Contract was for the completion of preventative highway maintenance measures including surface dressing, slurry surfacing and micro asphalt treatment to the carriageway and footway network. These activities were specialist and therefore outside the scope of the Highway Maintenance Term Contract.

          The contract was initially for a 5 year period with an option to extend the duration by up to 5 years by agreement of the parties. RMS had met all of the quality thresholds set out in the existing contract and their overall performance, in terms of quality, customer service and Health and Safety had been deemed to be excellent.

          In addition it was noted that negotiations with RMS had taken place regarding a potential contract extension and this had led to RMS offering a 5% reduction in the original contract base rates for the duration of the 5 year extension.

          RESOLVED: That the proposed 5 year extension to the current Term Contract for Highway Surface Treatments, making its expiry date 31^st March 2017, be approved.

          The Sub Committee was advised that the current contract for weather forecasting and data collection, utilising joint collaborative arrangements with Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester and Warrington Councils expired on 31^st March 2011. Subsequently Cheshire East and Cheshire West & Chester Councils had successfully let and awarded a contract for data collection which was won by Vaisala Ltd. In addition they had also successfully let and awarded a contract for weather forecasting, which had been won by the Met Office.

          The report proposed that the Council continues to utilise the joint collaborative arrangements for weather forecasting and data collection with the Cheshire Council’s and Warrington BC until 31^st March 2014. It was anticipated that the amount for 2011/12 would be approximately £15,000 based on the percentages used to calculate last year’s figures for the cost of the two contracts. This was a saving on last year of £10,000.

          RESOLVED: That the Sub Committee

1.               agree a 3 year (plus the option of a 1 year extension) contract, utilising joint collaborative arrangements, for weather forecasting until 31^st March 2014; and

2.               agree to subscribe to a 3 year (plus the option of a 1 year extension) contract, utilising joint collaborative arrangements, for data collection until 31^st March 2014.

          The Sub Committee considered a report of the Strategic Director Policy and Resources, which outlined proposals for the installation of alleygates between 21 and 23 Montgomery Road, Widnes. The Safer Halton Policy and Performance Board, having thoroughly considered all of the residents and other views put forward both for and against the installation of the gates, came to a unanimous decision that a recommendation should be put to Board Members for approval to be given to installation of the gates (Minute SAF4 refers).

   At its meeting on 21^st September 2010 the Safer Halton PPB was advised that between Montgomery Road/Cunningham Road and Chilton Avenue/Netherfield Road, there was a linear greenway. Over the previous 12 months there had been a considerable amount of Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) with 27 incidents being recorded by the police. St Georges Court (operated by Riverside RSL) and 23 Montgomery Road had been particularly affected. The complaints of ASB related to gangs of young people congregating in the area and throwing stones, fly tipping, leaving graffiti, firing pellets at windows, damaging residents’ windows and arson.

There was a non adopted alley to the greenway by these properties and local councillors had identified this as a key access point for the people who were causing the anti-social behaviour. This alley also provided access to the council allotments and was well used by the public as a route to the town centre, schools and places of work.

          The Alleygating operational group received the request to gate Montgomery in 2009-10. The Alleygate operational group decided, after many deliberations to take this to the Partnership Tasking and Co-ordination Group where all "responsible authorities" e.g Police, Fire, Council, Halton Housing, Riverside, Youth Service etc were present and all incidents and underlying problems could be assessed. The Tasking and Co-ordination Group developed an eleven point action plan to address the ASB issues and continued to monitor the incidents reported to the police.  Residents were advised to contact the police following any incidents so that T&C could fully assess the problem in this area. 

At their meeting on 21^st September 2010, the Safer Halton PPB agreed the eleven-point action plan to address the anti social behaviour and to the establishment of a  working group, including Members of the Safer PPB, to consider how to proceed with alleygating in the future.

          The report outlined the informal local consultation carried out in the area by the Council in October 2010 in order to gauge the views of residents in respect of an Alley Gating scheme being introduced at this location and the views expressed. It also included comments by Cheshire Police.

          In addition the Board noted the comments from the Council’s Highways engineers who had expressed a number of concerns about potential installation of alleygates between 21 and 23 Montgomery Road.

          It was noted that the response to the gating request between 21 and 23 Montgomery Road had followed the procedures applicable to alleygating applications which were  ...  view the full minutes text for item 46.

The Board considered:

(1)      whether Members of the press and public should be excluded from the meeting of the Board during consideration of the following items of business in accordance with Sub-Section 4 of Section 100A of the Local Government Act 1972 because it was likely that, in view of the nature of the business to be considered, exempt information would be disclosed, being information defined in Section 100 (1) and paragraph 3 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972; and

(2)      whether the disclosure of information was in the public interest, whether any relevant exemptions were applicable and whether, when applying the public interest test and exemptions, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighed that in disclosing the information.

          RESOLVED: That as, in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information, members of the press and public be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the following items of business in accordance with Sub-Section 4 of Section 100A of the Local Government Act 1972 because it is likely that, in view of the nature of the business, exempt information will be disclosed, being information defined in Section 100 (1) and paragraph 3 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972.

          The Sub Committee considered a report of the Chief Executive which advised on the outcome of the evaluation of tenders for installing solar panels on the Council’s buildings and which sought approval to proceed with a negotiated procedure to clarify maintenance contracts and final terms and conditions and the hosted offer prior to selecting a preferred supplier.

          RESOLVED: That

1.               approval be given to negotiate with tenderers under Lots 1 (Buying) and Lot 2 (Hosted) to clarify their maintenance contracts and final terms and conditions and the hosted offer; and

2.               subject to further negotiations the Chief Executive, in consultation with the Executive Board Member for Resources and Executive Board Member for Environmental Stability be authorised to approve a preferred supplier under Lot 1 and 2 of the programme.

MINUTES ISSUED:   October 2011

CALL IN:  October 2011

Any matter decided by the Executive Board Sub Committee may be called in no later than October 2011