Agenda and minutes

Venue: Ponds Forge International Sports Centre, Sheaf Street, Sheffield, S1 2BP

Contact: Paul Robinson, Democratic Services  Email: paul.robinson@sheffield.gov.uk

Media

Items
No. Item

1.

Apologies for Absence

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2.

Declarations of Interest pdf icon PDF 129 KB

Members to declare any interests they have in the business to be considered at the meeting.

 

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3.

Public Questions and Petitions and Other Communications

(a)      To receive any questions or petitions from the public, or communications submitted by the Lord Mayor or the Chief Executive and to pass such resolutions thereon as the Council Procedure Rules permit and as may be deemed expedient.

 

 

(NOTE: There is a time limit of one hour for the above item of business.  In accordance with the arrangements published on the Council’s website in relation to meetings of the Council held whilst social distancing and other public health safety measures still apply, questions/petitions are required to be submitted in writing, to committee@sheffield.gov.uk, by 9.00 a.m. on Monday 4th October.)

 

 

(b)      Petition Requiring Debate

 

The Council’s Petitions Scheme requires that a petition containing over 5,000 signatures from individuals who live, work or study in Sheffield, be the subject of debate at the Council meeting.  A qualifying petition has been received as follows:-

 

          Petition

 

To debate an electronic petition containing over 40,000 signatures asking to let comedian, Roy Chubby Brown, perform at the Sheffield City Hall.  The online petition - Petition · Let Comedian Roy Chubby Brown perform at The Sheffield City Hall · Change.org- includes further information.

 

 

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4.

Members' Questions pdf icon PDF 705 KB

5.1      Questions relating to urgent business – Council Procedure Rule 16.6(ii).

 

5.2      Supplementary questions on written questions submitted at this meeting – Council Procedure Rule 16.4.

 

5.3      Questions on the discharge of the functions of the South Yorkshire Joint Authorities for Fire and Rescue and Pensions – Section 41 of the Local Government Act 1985 – Council Procedure Rule 16.6(i).

 

          (NB. Minutes of recent meetings of the two South Yorkshire Joint Authorities have been made available to all Members of the Council via the following link -

          http://democracy.sheffield.gov.uk/ecCatDisplay.aspx?sch=doc&cat=13165&path=0)

 

 

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5.

Notice of Motion Regarding "Stark Budget Challenge" - Given By Councillor Cate McDonald and To Be Seconded By Councillor Mike Chaplin

That this Council:-

 

(a)      notes that the Authority is facing an overspend of nearly £44million in 2021/22, caused by the continuing additional spending on Council services needed to respond to the pandemic, such as support for families and older people in need, and the sudden end of Covid-related funding from central Government;

 

(b)      notes that the single biggest financial issue facing councils throughout the country is addressing the social care crisis, and this pressure is particularly felt in metropolitan areas;

 

(c)      notes that despite the recent announcement from the Government to increase taxes to, in the words of the Prime Minister, ‘fix the crisis in social care’, it is far from clear how the Government’s plan will deliver on this;

 

(d)      notes, in addition, that despite the promise of additional health and social care investment, it is not expected that this money will be allocated locally, or that councils will be sufficiently compensated for the spiralling costs they have faced in the last eighteen months;

 

(e)      notes that for over a decade (since 2010/11), in setting its budget, this Council has had to absorb Government funding cuts, and meet increased costs from pressures such as inflation and demand for services, particularly in social care, amounting to £475 million, which has meant a 31% real terms decrease in the Council’s spending power;

 

(f)       notes that for all the Government’s talk of ‘levelling up’, Sheffield continues to suffer austere cuts above the national average, and believes it is the hard-working people and the most at need who continue to shoulder the impact of this shortfall in funding, with government cutting public services to the bone;

 

(g)      believes that since 2011, everything possible has been done to challenge government to provide a better funding settlement for Sheffield, but successive governments have failed to deliver, and have appeared ideologically driven to cutting public services and pushing the burden of responsibility onto cash-strapped local authorities;

 

(h)      believes that no Members in the Co-operative Executive entered politics to make austere cuts to public services, but contends the same cannot be said with certainty for members of the opposition parties, as in 2010 the Conservative-Liberal Democrat national coalition embarked on savage spending cuts to Sheffield - which were consistently defended by both of these parties locally, despite the damage it was doing, and continues to, for Sheffield and its citizens;

 

(i)       believes that enough is enough, and the Government has to take responsibility and give a fair financial settlement to local authorities, and that, for all their posturing, their levelling-up agenda is empty rhetoric which spectacularly fails to deliver what is required;

 

(j)       contends that due to the Government’s woeful financial settlement for Sheffield, the Council must enact schemes such as Voluntary Early Retirement and Voluntary Severance and make tough decisions across all council portfolios, including in core services, in order to ensure the Council remains financially viable;

 

(k)      notes that there is very little detail from Government about how local authorities will be supported  ...  view the full agenda text for item 5.

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6.

Notice of Motion Regarding "Energy" - Given By Councillor Tim Huggan and To Be Seconded By Councillor Martin Smith

That this Council:-

 

(a)      acknowledges that this Council has declared a climate emergency and therefore needs to be doing all it can to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote renewable energy; 

 

(b)      recognises that we are facing a sharp rise in energy prices this winter, in part due to the United Kingdom's reliance on fossil fuels;

 

(c)      notes that over 10% of Sheffield residents live in fuel poverty;

 

(d)      recognises that increasing investment in, and use of, renewable energy is one of the best ways to bring down the cost of energy supply to people's homes;

 

(e)      also recognises that increasing use of renewable energy will help Sheffield move towards achieving its environmental targets by reducing carbon emissions;

 

(f)       further recognises:-

 

(i)       that very large financial setup and running costs involved in selling locally generated renewable electricity to local customers result in it being impossible for local renewable electricity generators to do so;

 

(ii)       that making these financial costs proportionate to the scale of a renewable electricity supplier's operation would create significant opportunities for local companies, community groups and councils to be providers of locally generated renewable electricity directly to local people, businesses and organisations, if they wished; and

 

(iii)      that revenues received by such local companies, community groups or councils that chose to become local renewable electricity providers could be used to help improve the local economy, local services and facilities and to reduce local greenhouse gas emissions;

 

(g)      notes that the Parliamentary Environmental Audit Committee, as a result of its 2021 Technological Innovations and Climate Change inquiry, recommended that a Right to Local Supply for local energy suppliers be established to address this;

 

(h)      accordingly, resolves to support the Local Electricity Bill, currently supported by a cross-party group of 264 MPs and which, if made law, would establish a Right to Local Supply which would promote local renewable electricity supply by making the setup and running costs of selling renewable electricity to local customers proportionate to the size of the supply company; and that Sheffield City Council should work with partners across the city to make information accessible to private consumers and local businesses to access any such schemes;

 

(i)       believes that the emerging local plan should encourage the use of local renewable energy supply in any of its considerations; and

 

(j)       further resolves to write to local MPs, asking them to support the Bill, and to the organisers of the campaign for the Bill, Power for People, expressing its support.

 

 

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7.

Notice of Motion Regarding "Crisis in Social Care" - Given By Councillor George Lindars-Hammond and To Be Seconded By Councillor Sioned-Mair Richards

That this Council:-

 

(a)    notes that for over a decade central government have promised a white paper on social care reform – to provide a long-term vision and a financial package to resolve the current crisis in care – and believes that what has now been put forward is a huge, missed opportunity by this Government;

 

(b)    notes also that the Prime Minister claimed he will ‘fix social care once and for all’, and yet it is this Council’s contention that the recent announcements will make little impact in addressing the scale of the problems, in both the short and long-term and, once again it will be left on local authorities to pick up the pieces;

 

(c)    notes that the extra funding for social care is not even enough to deal with the immediate pressures on the system, and that social care is the single biggest financial pressure on this Council;

 

(d)    believes that the Government’s social care announcement could, in the words of the Local Government Association (LGA), create ‘a situation where the care sector ends up being worse off’ and will put more future pressures on councils, not less, as they may have to cover some of the costs of the cap, as the Government are likely to have under-costed, and it is highly unlikely that the Government will be able to move funding initially flowing to the NHS towards social care at a later point, as at no point in British history has money from the NHS been taken back out of it and redirected to elsewhere in the British state;

 

(e)    notes that much needed improvements to care sector work is still outstanding from government and believes that without proper investment and decent pay and working conditions the sector will never deliver as it should;

 

(f)     notes that in Sheffield the previous Administration invested £4.2 million into the care sector to enable Sheffield’s care workers to be given a pay rise and believes that such funding investment was not only the right thing to do, for the extraordinary effort of care workers throughout the pandemic, but that it also ensures a better service to the benefit of those relying on support; and

 

(g)    believes that the future of social care should be about building communities where people can live healthy independent lives, with a new deal for care workers, and with a new partnership built with families – so they do not put their own health and livelihoods at risk looking after the people they love, or to lose their home to pay for care – but that, sadly, the Government’s proposed reforms fail to deliver on every metric you could think of.

 

 

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8.

Notice of Motion Regarding "Doing More For The Armed Forces Community" - Given By Councillor Lewis Chinchen and To Be Seconded By Councillor Penny Baker

That this Council:-

 

(a)      thanks all members of the Armed Forces Community (AFC) who have sacrificed so much for the benefit of the nation;

 

(b)      understands that there is a moral duty on the Administration, and indeed on all Councillors, to do more to support members of the AFC;

 

(c)      notes the challenges which the AFC (including those who serve as a regular or reservist, veterans and family members of those who serve and have served) face in a range of areas such as housing, employment, finance, skills and health;

 

(d)      recognises the opportunities from an economic and social perspective of more seamlessly integrating veterans back into civilian life and improving support for all members of the AFC who may be facing a range of challenges additional to those experienced by the average citizen;

 

(e)      notes a survey conducted as part of Sheffield Hallam’s South Yorkshire Armed Forces Covenant Project – Mapping of the Armed Forces Community Across the Region (July 2018) showed that more than half of Armed Forces respondents were unaware that Councils in South Yorkshire had signed the Armed Forces Covenant and 53% of respondents had a poor awareness of specific support services available to them;

 

(f)       notes that the Community Covenant Annual Newsletter published on Sheffield City Council’s Armed Forces webpage is outdated, having been written in 2018, and believes that this is indicative of wider issues in communication with the AFC;

 

(g)      also notes that Sheffield is one of the only major cities in England who will not be hosting a City Poppy Day in aid of the Poppy Appeal for the Royal British Legion (RBL); and 

 

(h)      therefore resolves to request the Administration to:-

 

(i)       produce an Action Plan specific to the needs of the AFC in Sheffield within 6 months; 

 

(ii)       use the Action Plan to ensure Sheffield City Council progresses to becoming a Gold-accredited employer as part of the Defence Employer Recognition Scheme;

 

(iii)      provide appropriate training to Council Officers to ensure they are aware of advice, options and support available to the AFC, particularly in relation to physical and mental health, housing, employment, education and finance;

 

 

(iv)      be more proactive in applying for grants from the Armed Forces Covenant Fund Trust to achieve the aims in the Sheffield and South Yorkshire Action Plans;

 

(v)      become a leading regional partner of the RBL by engaging more with their fundraising and remembrance events at a city-wide level; 

 

(vi)      ensure the production of the updated Sheffield Armed Forces Community Directory of Local Support remains on schedule so members of the AFC are able to easily identify available support;

 

(vii)     routinely publish the minutes of the Sheffield Community Covenant Partnership Board on the Sheffield City Council website to enable members of the AFC and the people of Sheffield to see what action is being taken; and

 

(viii)    update the Community Covenant Annual Newsletter on Sheffield City Council’s Armed Forces webpage and increase the frequency of the newsletter from annual to semi-annual.

 

 

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9.

The Making of Dore Neighbourhood Plan pdf icon PDF 463 KB

To approve, with or without amendment, the recommendations in the report of the Executive Director, Place, published with this agenda, on the result of the Dore Neighbourhood Plan Referendum and to outline the steps to be taken in consequence of its outcome.

 

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10.

Updates to the Council's Constitution pdf icon PDF 248 KB

To approve, with or without amendment, the recommendations in the report of the Director of Legal and Governance published with this agenda. providing details of changes to the Constitution as a result of the establishment of Local Area Committees, Transitional Committees and the Governance Committee, and changes to the number and remits of Scrutiny and Policy Development Committees, in this municipal year.

 

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11.

Members' Allowances : Report of the Independent Remuneration Panel pdf icon PDF 258 KB

To approve, with or without amendment, the recommendations in the report (to follow) of the Executive Director, Resources, setting out the recommendations from the Independent Remuneration Panel on the Members’ Allowances Scheme.

 

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12.

Minutes Of Previous Council Meetings pdf icon PDF 605 KB

To receive the record of the proceedings of the meetings of the Council held on 16th June and 7th July 2021 and to approve the accuracy thereof.

 

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13.

Representation, Delegated Authority and Related Issues pdf icon PDF 189 KB

To consider any changes to the memberships and arrangements for meetings of Committees etc., delegated authority, and the appointment of representatives to serve on other bodies.

 

 

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14.

Vote of Thanks To Former Councillors

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