Agenda and minutes

There were no substitutes declared.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Rona Burt and Nigel Roman.

Members of the public who live or work in Forest Heath are invited to put one question/statement of not more than 3 minutes duration relating to items to be discussed in Part 1 of the agenda only.  If a question is asked and answered within 3 minutes, the person who asked the question may ask a supplementary question that arises from the reply.

A person who wishes to speak must register at least 15 minutes before the time the meeting is scheduled to start.

There is an overall limit of 15 minutes for public speaking, which may be extended at the Chairman’s discretion.

There were no questions/statements from the public.

Report No: OAS/FH/18/009

[Councillor Ruth Bowman arrived at 6.07pm]

The Chairman of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee wished to thank Chris Garibaldi (Director of the National Horseracing Centre for Horseracing and Sporting Art) and Peter Jensen (Chairman of the Home of Horseracing Trust) for giving the Committee the opportunity to visit the National Horseracing Museum and for the opportunity to scrutinise the Project.

The Committee then received Report No: OAS/FH/18/009, which provided information on the background to the scrutiny exercise to review the Home of Horseracing Project, now referred to as the National Heritage Centre for Horseracing and Sporting Art, which proposed two objectives for this review:

1.   To carry out a routine post implementation scrutiny review of the Council’s involvement in the Home of Horseracing Project, a year after its official opening; and

2.   To review the National Heritage Centre’s future plans and how the Council can assist in their delivery as a partner.

It was proposed that this piece of scrutiny be carried out over two sessions.  The first higher priority session being carried out at this meeting, and involving external partners would look at:

a)   Whether the Council’s involvement in the project had resulted in the desired objectives?

b)   What role the Council could have in supporting the National Heritage Centre’s future plans for growing visitor numbers, in the context of the wider Newmarket Vision?

Once the capital project was formally closed down, a second, internally focused scrutiny session would be held to look at any learning that could be applied to future Council projects.

At this session the review started at 5pm with Scrutiny members being given a tour of the facility and at 6pm the formal Scrutiny Committee commenced with a presentation from the National Heritage Centre and discussions took place between the Committee and partners to explore the following main issues:

1. How had the capital project achieved the original objectives set for it by the partnership?

2.How had the National Heritage Centre performed in its first 18 months against its original business plan?

3.What does the National Heritage Centre’s new business plan say?

4. Where does this fit into the Newmarket Vision and the Council’s strategic plan?

5. How would the Council be involved in taking this forward, and what specific assistance does the National Heritage Centre need?

The Committee received a detailed presentation from Chris Garibaldi which included information on the context of the project; project partners; where the capital came from to fund the project; work carried out by the three existing charities; key achievements (including being shortlisted for the 2017 Art Fund Museum of the Year within a few months of opening, and winning Suffolk Museum of the year 2017); visitor numbers; admission tickets; repeat visitors; where visitors came from; gift aid collected on tickets; visitor spend and what it was worth to the local economy; special exhibitions; National Portfolio Organisation status from the Arts Council; fund raising initiatives; the importance of volunteers in running the site and with over 9,000  ...  view the full minutes text for item 218.

It was proposed by Councillor Brian Harvey, seconded by Councillor Simon Cole, and with the vote being unanimous, it was

          RESOLVED:

That, under Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the press and public be excluded from the meeting for the following item of businesses on the grounds that it involves the likely disclosure of exempt information as prescribed in Part 3 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972.

The Overview and Scrutiny Committee considered the financial information contained within the new business plan for the Heritage Centre which was circulated to members of the scrutiny Committee.  As this would require the detailed discussion of the finances of a third party, the Committee felt this follow-up conversation to the published information should take place in closed session, since the Heritage Centre was an independent body. 

In particular discussions were held on commercial revenue and financial projections and budgets (income and expenditure) through to 2022, to which comprehensive responses were provided.

Once the discussions were concluded in the private session on the new business plan, the meeting then moved back into the open session, where the press and public were re-admitted and the Committee then voted on the recommendations contained within the report (see Minute Number 218 above).