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Cabinet Member Question Time - Cabinet Member for Homes, Regeneration and Planning

Question Time with the Cabinet Member for Homes, Regeneration and Planning, Councillor Alison Butler.

Minutes:

Councillor Alison Butler, Cabinet Member for Homes, Planning and Regeneration, provided a presentation to the Sub-Committee outlining the work that had being undertaken within her portfolio.

 

The Sub-Committee was advised that some of the highlights included the following:

-Brick by Brick programme, development work was now underway

-The redevelopment of the Whitgift Centre, which has received sign off by the Mayor of London

-Completion of Phase 1 of the Growth Zone

-The Draft Local Plan has been determined as ‘sound’ by the Government appointed inspector

-Successful Gateway programme on Universal Credit

 

Members were also informed of areas that presented continuous challenges, such as:

-Provision of affordable homes, managing the housing crisis

-Meeting the targets set by the Mayor of provision of housing which has doubled

-The Delivery of Westfield within the set time frame

-Recruitment and Retention of staff to deliver services

-Concerns from residents on growth

-The aftermath of Grenfell, duty to ensure works carried out in blocks.

 

The Sub-Committee was further advised that the Council had been proactive in addressing these challenges. There had been extensive work carried out to ensure that all fire risks were up to date, programme of visits and works had been carried out with residents kept up to date on progress. Safety measures were also being looked into, such as the upgrading of alarm systems.

 

The Council had been working to determine its response to the requirements of the Draft London Plan whilst working to meet the housing demand.

 

There was also planned maintenance work and major renovations taking place on Council stock.

There had been improvements in engagement with private landlords as part of the Landlord licensing scheme and there had been a rise in the number of landlords registered with the scheme.

 

The Sub-Committee learned of the preventative work undertaken by the Gateway Service to prevent homelessness, which had helped many households and resulted in savings to the Council, with long term leases taken on properties to be used as temporary accommodation.

 

Members questioned the work around the provision of sprinkler systems in tall buildings and the safety of cladding, and enquired as to who would pay for any works. The Sub-Committee was informed that the Council had decided to meet the full cost of works in Council owned buildings in order for the work to commence without delay.  None of the Council’s buildings had been identified as requiring cladding replacement. 

In the private sector, the government had implied that the responsibility was to fall on the residents, The Cabinet Member had written to the government minister to dispute costs being passed onto residents.

 

The Sub-Committee was further informed that all Council blocks had been certified by the Fire Brigade as safe and issued fire safety certificates.

 

In response to Members’ request for an update pertaining to ‘choice based lettings’, officers advised that this had only been implemented in the last 9 months and although it was still in the early stages, the number of people using the service had been higher than expected. The service was open and transparent, which provided users with a realistic view of availability of homes in the borough. People on the waiting list were now able to make a more informed decision on either waiting for a council home to become available which would likely take a number of years or to address their needs through the private housing sector.

 

Members praised the Gateway service on the innovative homeless prevention work that had been completed since the department was set up in 2015.

 

The Sub-Committee learned of the Council’s commitment and work with partners to eradicate rough sleeping by 2020, by working to address the many issues that affected rough sleepers that was not limited to just their housing need.

 

Croydon welcomed the opening of CRISIS office in Croydon and Councillors had met with the office to learn of the work that they were doing and what further work was required to meet the campaign objectives.

 

In response to Members’ queries on how the Council would address the targets set by the Mayor of London’s draft London Plan, officers advised that they were still considering a response and were interested in how the GLA came up with the targets set. Those draft targets set a significant challenge for Croydon as well as other boroughs and the Council would investigate if they set a fair expectation. Croydon had worked hard to deliver its housing targets over a number of years by encouraging developers into the borough.

 

 

Officers responded to questions regarding density in the North of the borough and the impact that building of blocks of flats would have on local amenities, in particular office conversion to flats that had been granted under the government’s permitted development scheme.  As permitted developments, such schemes were not subject to normal levies and the Council had made representations on this issue.

 

The Sub-Committee questioned what was being done to ensure that the quality and maintenance of Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMO) were of acceptable standard. Members were informed that this was an area that was consistently being addressed. There were excellent HMO’s in the borough but there were also those that were poorly managed. There had however been a lot of work done to address issues through the landlord licensing scheme. As a result of the work on the draft local plan, the Council had been examining levels of saturation and identifying areas to prohibit conversions to HMO. 

 

In response to Members’ queries regarding the status of the redevelopment of the Whitgift Centre, officers stated that the Council, Government Minister for London and all officers involved were doing all the necessary work to advance the project. Council officers had been in regular contact with the CLP who were engaging well to ensure that the consent required for various aspects of the project were being sought. The council remained confident on the development. An internal board had been set up, all directors in the Place Department were involved and working to ensure that the town centre remained open and people were attracted and encouraged to visit Croydon during the period of redevelopment work.

 

In response to Members’ questions regarding the progress of the Fairfield Halls redevelopment, officers advised that the proposed completion of major building work was still on track for November 2018. The works were now in the intrusive phase of the complicated programme and had come across various difficulties such as asbestos. Officers had been in talks regarding phased opening of the building with the new operator, BH Live. The Sub-Committee requested clarity be provided as to when the building would be fitted out by BH Live.

 

Following the draft Local Plan Inspector’s comments, Members queried the policy on tall buildings, the robustness of the criteria on local green spaces and the implication of proposed changes to public houses protection.

 

The Sub-Committee was informed that the inspector was right on his comments for a place specific policy in Purley. In regards to local green spaces, this was a new designation that can be included in plan making and the planning framework to ensure that they are afforded the same level of protection as greenbelt areas.

 

Quantitative and qualitative considerations should be given to local green spaces. There had been work carried out with Public Health on the concentration of hot food takeaways in certain areas and the implications on health and wellbeing of residents. The inspector had aligned more in favour with the Council’s restriction on concentrations of these establishments in some areas. Officers stated that it was important that the community function of public houses was noted.

 

The Chair thanked Councillor Butler for the presentation and Councillor Scott and Officers for their contributions.

 

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