Agenda item

To include any announcements from the Chairman, Leader of the Council, individual Cabinet Members or the Head of Paid Service.

The following announcements were made:

Chairman

The Chairman reminded everyone present of the Chairman’s Civic Dinner which was taking place on 22 March 2024.

Cabinet Member for Planning and Housing

The Cabinet Member announced the 8-week consultation period to help shape the future of the District through the Local Plan. The Local Plan provided a vision for sustainable development across the District. The current Local Plan had been adopted four years ago.

An update on employment land, and gypsy and traveller accommodation would be included with the Local Plan.

The new Local Plan was set to run until 2041.

Leader of the Council

The Leader firstly announced a change to the allocation of Cabinet roles. The Leader was to take on responsibility for Human Resources from the Cabinet Member for People and Communities. The other change would be that the Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture would assume responsibility for Markets; this had previously been within the remit of the Leader.

The second announcement from the Leader was on the Deepings Leisure Centre. The Leader had received a letter from the Leader of Lincolnshire County Council offering South Kesteven District Council (SKDC) the freehold of the leisure centre. Also on this subject, the Deepings School and the Anthem Trust were yet to reach an agreement with the Deepings Community Interest Company. Still to be formulated was permission from the Department for Education to proceed in full, alongside a solid business plan. The Leader had drafted a letter to be sent to the Leader of Lincolnshire County Council and had also spoken to Sir John Hayes MP about a way forward for the project with the Department for Education. There was a further meeting on 1 March 2024 to discuss these matters in more detail. The Leader stressed that all groups involved wanted to find a solution to move the project forward.

Thirdly, the Leader spoke on the subject of waste collections in relation to the new roll out of separate paper and card collections. The Leader apologised to those who had experienced issues, but had engaged with the new scheme and read the relevant instructions, whilst urging all residents to adhere to the new way of recycling paper and card. Disappointment was expressed with those who had taken out their frustrations with waste staff and Council officers who were trying to make the new scheme work.

Finally, congratulations were offered to Grantham-born swimmer Freya Colbert who was crowned the new Women’s World Champion in the 400 metre medley at the World Aquatics Championships in Doha.

Cabinet Member for Environment and Waste (Councillor Rhys Baker)

The Cabinet Member outlined that since 2018 SKDC had worked with the Lincolnshire Waste Partnership (LWP) to implement twin stream recycling, building on previous legislation. New obligations had been placed on waste collection in order to ensure greater consistency.

Last week around 7,000 bins were rejected as the waste within was contaminated, which was around 20-25% of bins collected on those days. Call handling staff encountered abuse and threatening behaviour. Such conduct was unacceptable, as nobody went to work to encounter verbal abuse of threats. Line managers had been in contact with teams and had signposted support.

Senior officers and Cabinet Members had accompanied crews to explain the rejection of bins. The levels of contamination had been put in place through guidance from Lincolnshire County Council. Samples received contained contamination of 24% from Monday and Tuesday’s bins. Within 48 hours a mop up collection of bins had been organised, with final collections finished on Tuesday. Thanks were offered to the waste team for this.

Further routine sampling revealed 53% of waste was unrecyclable, contaminating a significant proportion of the remaining waste. Change was never easy, and many people had adapted, but the rebuilding of trust with those struggling to adapt with the new system needed to occur.

Physical and online resources would be updated. Lincolnshire County Council were being asked to give further training to waste operatives. Alongside this, the Council would instigate spot checks to raise consistency of recyclate. Members of the public were encouraged to contact ward members or go through the appropriate channels if they had queries on the new system for collection of paper and card.

Head of Paid Service

A way forward for St. Martin’s Park in Stamford was agreed at the extraordinary Full Council meeting held on 8 February 2024. Negotiations were ongoing but there had been a fruitful and effective negotiation held the morning of 9 February 2024. Any further updates would be reported through Finance and Economic Overview and Scrutiny Committee, Cabinet, and Full Council.

It was moved, seconded and AGREED to vary the order of the agenda to allow for the Budget for 2024/2025 to be heard ahead of the Council Tax Resolution for 2024/2025.