Agenda item

Questions to the Executive Leader and Executive Members received under Standing Order 10(c)

Meeting of Council, Thursday, 22 January 2009 6.35 pm (Item 66.)

To deal with the following questions to the Executive Leader and / or other Executive Members, in accordance with Standing Order 10(a):

(i) To the Executive Leader, from Cllr Aspden

“What steps are being taken to promote environmentally sustainable job in York?”

(ii) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Galvin:

“In the light of the resolution at the Council Meeting of 25th September referring to a link road between Bishopthorpe Road and Sim Balk Lane, will the Executive Member please advise Council as to the progress made to date on the first part of the resolution i.e:

‘To aid the development of the Terrys Site, the Council instructs the appropriate officers to develop as a matter of urgency and in a timescale to inform any future planning application, an assessment of the need for, and effectiveness of providing, a Link Road between Bishopthorpe Road and Sim Balk Lane to the south side of the A64.’”

(iii) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Galvin:

“Will the Executive Member also advise as to when the report referred to in the remainder of the resolution will be presented to Council i.e:

‘Officers are therefore instructed to report to the Full Council as soon as possible addressing the potential for funding the Link Road, with a contribution from Developers and other sources.

The report should also indicate how any proposed future development allocated through the LDF process could contribute to the construction costs of such a link road proposal.

Such report also to investigate the possibility of constructing a new junction to the west of London Bridge to facilitate speedy access on to the A64 slip roads.’”

(iv) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Merrett:

“Would the Executive Member for City Strategy outline the progress on implementation of the council's Green Transport Plan and indicate the latest modal split figures compared to the starting base line, including a breakdown of the figures by department?”

(v) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Merrett:

“Can the Executive Member for City Strategy explain why requests for lighting column repainting in Micklegate Ward going back to at least February 2005, which were part of an extensive list of lighting columns agreed for repainting in September 2007, had still not been completed when this area of responsibility was recently transferred to Neighbourhood Services?”

(vi) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Merrett:

“Will the Executive Member for City Strategy inform Council what action has been taken since the last Council meeting to re-invigorate the stalled Carbon Management Programme and what steps are being taken to properly resource the need for data analysis to inform the implementation of the programme?”

(vii) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Potter:

“Will the Executive Member for City Strategy describe what progress has been made in respect of setting a target to achieve at least a 5% reduction in the Council’s energy consumption over the next 12 months?”

(viii) To the Executive Member for Children & Young People’s Services, from Cllr Merrett:

“Would the Executive Member for Children's Services explain comments in The Press, attributed to a departmental source, regarding the possible closure of a secondary school on the east side of the city. In doing so, will she outline the actual position on this issue and give assurances and/or advise when and how pupils, parents, staff and the wider community in the area are going to be told about what is actually going on, and outline when they will be involved in a meaningful consultation on any proposals to re-organise education in that part of the city and that they will be presented with genuine options and not a single fait accompli solution?”

(ix) To the Executive Member for Children & Young People’s Services, from Cllr Alexander:

“Can the Executive Member for Children's Services outline what progress is being made with regards to the Myplace bid and whether she is still confident of a successful bid for a major central facility for the City’s young people?”

(x) To the Executive Member for Children & Young People’s Services, from Cllr Alexander:

Will the Executive Member for Children and Young People’s Services confirm that she supports me in requesting the Chief Executive:

· Ensures that York secondary schools shows the film ‘Live Now, Drive Later’ to their pupils annually.

· Contacts every Council Leader and Cabinet Member for Children’s Services in the country to request that they adopt the ‘Live Now, Drive Later’' campaign, enclosing a copy of the DVD.”

(xi) To the Executive Member for Housing & Adult Social Services, from Cllr Horton:

“In respect of the empty property at 17 Almsford Road, Acomb would the Executive Member explain for my benefit and those of adjacent neighbours, without blaming others, her unfulfilled promise given at the last Full Council meeting on 27th November, 2008 "that the property should be available for letting within the next couple of weeks", especially noting that the property was further trashed between Christmas and New Year?”

(xii) To the Executive Member for Housing & Adult Social Services, from Cllr Simpson-Laing:

“Will the Executive Member for HASS explain how she plans to relaunch the idea of 'living above the shop' as mentioned in the recent 'Affordable Housing Initiatives' paper as a means to providing affordable homes in the city.”

(xiii) To the Executive Member for Leisure, Culture & Social Inclusion, from Cllr Holvey:

“Can the Executive Member give Council an update on the success of the smart meter loan scheme that has been recently introduced into the City's libraries?”

Minutes:

Thirteen questions had been submitted to the Executive Leader and Executive Members under Standing Order 10(c). The guillotine having fallen at this point, Members agreed to receive written responses to these questions. The questions and the written responses are set out below:

(i) To the Executive Leader, from Cllr Aspden:

“What steps are being taken to promote environmentally sustainable job in York?”

“I have asked for the Chief Executive to convene an “Eco Jobs Task Group” from the Council, York Science City and partners, in particular the Business Forum and Economic Development Partnership to examine how the city can create more locally based jobs based on environmental technology.

I would expect that this group will produces an interim report within six months, with a final report by September 2009 as an update to the Future York report dealing specifically with environmentally based sectors.”

(ii) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Galvin:

“An assessment of the need and effectiveness of providing a link road in conjunction with LDF issues is currently in preparation. It is anticipated that the report will be completed in order that it may be considered by Members in early Spring. This work includes an assessment of the volume of traffic that would be expected to use such a link together with the land use policy issues, funding and additionally will seek to address the other items relating directly to the regeneration of Terry's including sustainable transport and accessibility.”

(iii) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Galvin:

“Will the Executive Member also advise as to when the report referred to in the remainder of the resolution will be presented to Council i.e:

‘Officers are therefore instructed to report to the Full Council as soon as possible addressing the potential for funding the Link Road, with a contribution from Developers and other sources.

The report should also indicate how any proposed future development allocated through the LDF process could contribute to the construction costs of such a link road proposal.

Such report also to investigate the possibility of constructing a new junction to the west of London Bridge to facilitate speedy access on to the A64 slip roads.’”

Reply

“As for ii above”.

(iv) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Merrett:

Main Mode	2002 Baseline	2007 Mode Share
Car	31%	19%*
Car Sharing	6%	5% #
Cycle	16.70%	20%
Walk	18.20%	15%
Bus	11.00%	9%
Park & Ride	13.40%	16%
Rail	3.70%	3%
Multi modal~	N/A	14%

* includes pool car

# includes car passengers

~3 or more modes used to get to work

A breakdown of the figures by Department is not available

We continue to operate and maintain a pool bike scheme, offer free cycle training to staff, provide generous discounts on the purchase of cycles through the Cycle to Work salary sacrifice cycle loan scheme and provide paid allowances to staff for cycle use, amongst other initiatives such as the provision of bus season ticket loans and free Park & Ride passes to staff.

New travel plan initiatives over the last year have included:

· Relaunch of www.carshareyork.com <http://www.carshareyork.com> website and associated car sharing promotion to staff in June 2008. This website has a dedicated employer group for council staff through which they can match car journeys.

· Internal promotion of the council’s new all-operator bus route map published in summer 2008.

· Distribution of a new guide to cutting car use and encouraging the use of more sustainable modes of travel, entitled Are you Carwise in York?, to all staff in November/December 2007. This was part of a campaign to support the travel plan initiatives of major employers in the city.”

(v) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Merrett:

“The repainting of columns is interlinked with column replacement as it would be poor value for money to repaint a column that is structurally unsound and in need of replacement. As part of our new street lighting term maintenance contract we have a programme for carrying out structural testing of steel street lighting columns. Urgent works arising from this have been organised but detailed assessment of these results is still required to see how extensive the need for further structural replacement may be

Officers will complete the review of the structural testing results for Micklegate Ward and will provide more information for Cllr. Merritt about the works required and the way this relates to repainting of columns by late February. .

New street lighting columns are now pre-painted with a plastic powder coating making them very resistant to weathering and avoiding the need for on site treatments for many years.”

(vi) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Merrett:

“The Carbon Management Programme has not stalled. The pace of progress has been influenced by the Councils ability to fill staffing vacancies, which in turn has been dependent on the conclusion of the pay and grading review.

A meeting of the Carbon Management Board took place on 5^th December. A further meeting is scheduled for later this month and a progress report will be made to the Executive in March

One budget option available of next year could be the appointment of a data analyst. However with budget purse strings drawing ever tighter, it is likely that this work will have to be undertaken by reprioritising the use of existing resources.”

(vii) To the Executive Member for City Strategy, from Cllr Potter:

“A decision on whether to include a specific energy reduction target within next year’s refreshed corporate strategy has yet to be taken. One of the problems with doing so is the relatively large proportion of our total energy consumption which can be attributed to schools, the management of which is dependent on the approach of local governors.

The Carbon Management Strategic Implementation Plan identifies a number of projects /actions which would reduce energy consumption. SALIX funding may enable implementation of these. An update on implementation will be provided to the Executive on 3 March 2009.”

(viii) To the Executive Member for Children & Young People’s Services, from Cllr Merrett:

“I am fully aware of the comments in the Press surrounding secondary provision in the East of the City. The speculation generated by the media coverage is, in my view, unhelpful and I share the Director’s confidence that the comments do not originate from local authority offices.

Unfortunately this does not generate constructive public debate but often it generates a debate that is uninformed, premature and potentially unnecessary. It also brings with it considerable anxiety for young people and their parents about the future options for their schooling.

I am also very concerned about the debilitating impact such coverage has on the valued leadership and teaching staff who work in schools in this part of the city. They work hard and are totally dedicated to the city’s young people and their education.

As officers have publicly stated there is concern that the two key factors of a changing demographic profile and greater parental choices of schools as numbers fall, has resulted in considerable surplus places in the secondary sector. Schools receive funding totally on the basis of the number of actual students they have on roll. Surplus places therefore, directly reduce the level of funding a school receives and as a consequence the numbers of teaching staff and the breadth of curriculum that a school can therefore provide.

As a responsible local authority, we have a duty to respond to such a scenario and dialogue is taking place between officers of the authority and the leadership and governing bodies of the relevant schools.

I can totally reassure the shadow member and the wider public that if there are any specific proposals arising out of the current dialogue then these will be brought to EMAP for a full open discussion on whether to launch a public consultation – a consultation that would have to be reported back to the Executive Member before any decision making took place.”

(ix) To the Executive Member for Children & Young People’s Services, from Cllr Alexander:

“Cllr Alexander is up to date and well informed about the progress made by Mr Phil Bixby on the Myplace bid. He was in attendance at the recent meeting of the Young People's Working Group where Mr Bixby presented a report of his findings so far and then answered questions from Members. A bid will be ready by March 31st, despite the fact that the government has not released the deadline for this round of bidding yet. It will be a major central facility meeting the needs and wishes of young people.

Whether that bid will be successful or not will be in the hands of the government - not the council - but I very much hope that the government will realise that York has a great need for such a facility and not treat us as a 'leafy suburb' by rejecting the bid.”

(x) To the Executive Member for Children & Young People’s Services, from Cllr Alexander:

Will the Executive Member for Children and Young People’s Services confirm that she supports me in requesting the Chief Executive:

· Ensures that York secondary schools shows the film ‘Live Now, Drive Later’ to their pupils annually.

· Contacts every Council Leader and Cabinet Member for Children’s Services in the country to request that they adopt the ‘Live Now, Drive Later’' campaign, enclosing a copy of the DVD.”

“As a lifelong supporter of road safety measures, I am happy to promote the 'Live Now, Drive Later' campaign and associated DVD both to the secondary schools in the city (many of whom have already shown it) and to all other authorities in the country, via a letter from myself and the ChiefExecutive to Council Leaders and Cabinet Members for Children's Services.”

(xi) To the Executive Member for Housing & Adult Social Services, from Cllr Horton:

“I have not, and cannot, ‘promise’ that private properties will or will not be occupied. I can only pass on the information that the owner of the property has given to the Housing Association which is arranging for it to be let. The only lever that the Council has to influence the situation would be if it chose to withdraw any repair grant offer. Clearly it is a matter of opinion whether this would make it more or less likely that the property would be occupied quickly.”

(xii) To the Executive Member for Housing & Adult Social Services, from Cllr Simpson-Laing:

“The return to use, of empty space above shops, has been supported by the Council for many years. Officers are always seeking opportunities in this area as part of the bid to bring more affordable homes to the city. However it should be noted that not all conversions are likely to gain the necessary planning permission and indeed, as members will know, there was very high profile refusal of such a permission last year.”

(xiii) To the Executive Member for Leisure, Culture & Social Inclusion, from Cllr Holvey:

“Can the Executive Member give Council an update on the success of the smart meter loan scheme that has been recently introduced into the City's libraries?”

“The smart meter loan programme has been a great success so far. Within 24 hours of the scheme receiving coverage on Look North earlier this month, all 61 smart meters had been taken out and there was a waiting list to borrow them had grown to over 100.

Since then we have released more funds to purchase a further 125 smart meters to meet the demand.

Following the Look North coverage we also received enquiries from libraries and Local Authorities from across the region who wanted to adopt the scheme.”