Agenda and minutes
Venue: Conference Chamber, West Suffolk House, Western Way, Bury St Edmunds, IP33 3YU
Contact: Christine Brain: Democratic Services Officer
Email: democratic.services@westsuffolk.gov.uk
Items
No. |
Item |
234. |
Substitutes
Any member who is substituting for another
member should so indicate, together with the name of the relevant
absent member.
Minutes:
The following substitution was declared:
Councillor Sue Perry substituting for
Councillor Andrew Martin.
Councillor Phil Wittam temporary substitute
for Councillor Don Waldron.
|
235. |
Apologies for absence
Minutes:
Apologies for absence were received from
Councillors Beccy Hopfensperger, Aaron Luccarini, Andrew Martin,
and Don Waldron.
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236. |
Minutes PDF 133 KB
To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on
20 July 2023 (copy attached).
Minutes:
The minutes of the meeting held on 20 July
2023 were confirmed as correct record and signed by the Chair.
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237. |
Declarations of interest
Members are reminded of their responsibility
to declare any disclosable pecuniary interest, other registerable
or non-registrable interest which they have in any item of business
on the agenda, no later than when that item is reached and,
when appropriate, to leave the meeting prior to discussion and
voting on the item.
Minutes:
Members’ declarations of interest are
recorded under the item to which the declaration relates.
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238. |
Announcements from the Chair regarding responses from the Cabinet to reports of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee
Minutes:
The Chair informed members she attended
Cabinet on 19 September 2023 and presented the Committee’s
report from its meeting held on 20 July 2023. As per the minutes confirmed above, the Chair
updated Cabinet on the Committee’s consideration of its work
programme and suggestions for scrutiny; and request for an update
on Modern Slavery and CCTV at West Suffolk Council, which were
noted by Cabinet and on the Committee’s agenda for
tonight’s meeting.
On 21 August 2023 the first Quarterly Scrutiny
Meeting with the Leader of the Council and the Chairs/Vice-Chairs
of both Overview and Scrutiny and Performance and Audit Scrutiny
took place. A number of items were
discussed and as you will see later on under the work programme a
new item has been included for the Committee to receive at its
November 2023 meeting an update on the progress of the Grass
Cutting Review by the Cabinet Member.
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239. |
Public participation
Members of the public who live or work in the
district are welcome to speak and may ask one question or make a
statement of not more than three minutes duration relating to items
to be discussed in Part 1 of the agenda only. If a question is asked and answered within three
minutes, the person who asked the question may ask a supplementary
question that arises from the reply.
There is an overall limit of 15 minutes for
public speaking, which may be extended at the Chair’s
discretion.
Minutes:
There were no members of the public in
attendance on this occasion.
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240. |
Western Suffolk Community Safety Partnership Monitoring Report (April 2022 to March 2023) PDF 187 KB
Report number: OAS/WS/23/012
Council Davis from Babergh District Council
will be attending to present the report as the Chair at the time of
the reporting period.
Richard Baldwin from
Suffolk County Council will also be attending to provide support in
terms of the County overview of community safety.
Minutes:
[Councillor Birgitte Mager arrived at 5.05pm,
during the consideration of this item.
Councillor Andrew Speed arrived at 5.07pm,
during the consideration of this item]
It was the duty of the Committee, as the
Council’s Crime and Disorder Committee designated under the
Police and Justice Act 2006, to scrutinise the work of the
Partnership.
The Committee received report number
OAS/WS/23/012, presented by the Councillor Davis from Babergh
District Council as the Chair of the Western Suffolk Community
Safety Partnership (WSCSP) at the time of the reporting period, and
the Council’s Cabinet Member for Families and Communities,
Councillor Donna Higgins.
Councillor Davis explained that the report
looked back over the previous year’s work of the WSCSP for
the period April 2022 to March 2023.
During that time, the WSCSP had continued to meet and discharge its
statutory duties by:
-
Carrying out an assessment of crime and disorder in
the area;
-
Delivering a three-year plan and action plan to
reflect the priorities of the partnership; and
-
Undertaking Domestic Homicide Reviews.
The WSCSP action plan was reviewed throughout
the year and where appropriate was updated to reflect emerging
issues and trends. Based on the
outcomes of the partnership discussions the following priorities
remained as a focus for the WSCSP:
-
Criminal exploitation;
-
Violence against women and girls;
-
Modern slavery;
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Hate Crime;
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Prevent; and
-
Anti-social behaviour.
He then wished to thank all officers for their
work on producing the report and during the year.
The Committee considered the report
in detail and asked questions to which comprehensive responses were
provided by Councillor Davis and officers. In particular discussions were held on the meaning
of “Channel”; PREVENT; modern slavery and where the
main criminal exploitation hubs were across Suffolk.
In response to a question asked about
what the WSCSP was doing in addressing right-wing radicalisation
and gang culture, the Committee was advised that the WSCSP
continued to organise lectures in schools and to other various
groups. The 18 September to 22
September 2023 was PREVENT action week to raise awareness and
online information was being provided for teachers and parents to
raise protective factors in further education. The Police were more involved in gang culture,
which was not an issue in West Suffolk.
In response to a question raised
regarding how local councillors could help, the Committee was
advised it was about awareness raising and the more awareness
raised on the issue of radicalisation and gang culture, the
better. Also at a local level, West
Suffolk Council sat on the PREVENT Group. A broad range of training was available, which
Councillor Davis advised he was happy to share the training
packages with Councillors.
In response to a question
raised on the allocation of funding and whether the WSCSP was
getting better or worse, the Committee was advised it was improving
year on year and carried out a needs assessment each year, and a
breakdown on budget could be provided.
However, it was explained that funding received by the
...
view the full minutes text for item 240.
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241. |
Modern Slavery Update PDF 233 KB
Report number: OAS/WS/23/013
Minutes:
The Cabinet Member for Families and
Communities presented report number OAS/WS/23/013, which had been
an item in the Committee’s forward work programme since
November 2020, and had not been considered during that time due to
the fact that local authorities were awaiting further guidance from
central government relating to the preparation and publication of
Modern Slavery Statements.
In September 2020 the Home Office had
announced that changes would be made to strengthen the Modern
Slavery Act 2015, including new reporting requirements for Modern
Slavery statements. As of August 2023,
this guidance had not been published.
Organisations were therefore being advised by government to
continue to report under the current requirements.
To support councils to meet their duties, in
early 2023 the Local Government Association (LGA) published
guidance and a matrix which sets out the ideal standards in local
authority modern slavery provision.
Appendix A attached to report number
OAS/WS/23/013, provided an assessment of how the council measured
up against these standards. Members
were asked to note that the LGA guidance was written to support
unitary and upper tier authorities, as well as district
councils. Therefore, in some instances
Suffolk County Council was the more appropriate lead authority,
with support from West Suffolk Council.
The Cabinet Member reassured the Committee the
council was making good progress against the LGA criteria, but
there was a need to update training.
The Committee considered the report and asked
questions to which responses were provided.
In response to a question raised about
engaging with town and parish councils on modern slavery, the
Cabinet Member advised that forums were held with parishes, and
this could be included on their agendas as well as providing them
with the LGA link to enable town and parish councils to carry out
the exercise themselves.
The Chair of the Committee suggested the
working group set up in November 2020 should be disbanded at this
point, and if it felt necessary in the future the Committee could
establish a working group, which was agreed as sensible way
forward.
There being no decision required, the
Committee thanked the Cabinet Member for Families and Communities
for presenting the update on modern slavery and agreed to disband
the modern day slavery working group.
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242. |
CCTV at West Suffolk Council
A presentation will
be given by the Cabinet Member for Operations, which will provide
an overview of the council’s CCTV service, including the
services provided, staffing, costs and income, incidents, arrests
and equipment, (including Hikvision cameras).
Minutes:
The Committee received a presentation by the
Cabinet Member for Operations, which provided an overview of the
council’s CCTV service, including the services provided,
staffing, costs and income, incidents, arrests and equipment,
including Hikvision cameras.
The CCTV service was responsible for
monitoring over 700 cameras across West Suffolk and some in
neighbouring areas. West Suffolk
Council had 557 fixed cameras in Brandon; Mildenhall; Newmarket;
Haverhill and Bury St Edmunds. These
were located in parks; car parks; housing accommodation; sports
pavilions; bus stations; toilet blocks; leisure centres; depots;
town centres; West Suffolk House; Mildenhall Hub and West Suffolk
Operational Hub. Three mobile cameras
had also been purchased that could be deployed to areas with an
identified crime or anti-social behaviour issue.
It was reported that 99% of all cameras were
made by Hikvision and the other 1% by Axis. Hikvision was the biggest CCTV manufacture in the
world. It was believed that Hikvision /
Dahua was used by approximately 73% of local authorities; 35% of
police forces and 63% by schools in the UK. Hikvision cameras had been used by West Suffolk
since 2017.
Hikvision was used because it was a
technologically technically superior product; HD quality and
optical zoom ability; and was much more reliable compared to other
manufactures that the council had used.
Hikvision also offered there own encoding format which had reduced
the council’s data storage requirements by up to 50% and were
significantly cheaper than their competitors.
None of the council’s cameras were
directly connected to the internet and were all on a closed network
behind firewalls and VPNs. The systems
had been penetration tested by the council’s third-party
ethical hackers within the last year and had passed the
hacker’s test. Central servers
storing data were vulnerability scanned on a weekly basis and
patched monthly. The council adhered to
the Government Surveillance Camera Code of Practice; secure system
installation; storage of data and General Data Protection
Regulations / Data Protection.
The Committee was reassured that West Suffolk
CCTV security protocols were continually monitored, with security
software updates applied and considered safe. Existing camera technology represented best value
and Hikvision was currently certified by the Information Commission
Office as safe to use. There was not
Government policy on the use of Chinese surveillance
equipment. It would cost the Council a
significant amount of money to replace all CCTV cameras, estimated
to be in excess of £1.5m. There
was a potential risk of loss of third-party contracts if new
cameras were required due to increased costs. The current situation was being monitored and if
there were any changes to legislative policies the Council would
act upon them.
The missing patch that the BBC had referenced
in a recent Panorama documentary was applied to the council’s
systems at the end of 2022 by the council’s CCTV maintainer
after being identified by the penetration testers. Under the council’s contract the CCTV
maintainer was responsible for ensuring that all cameras were
patched as soon as updates were released. Any system would become ...
view the full minutes text for item 242.
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243. |
Suffolk County Council Health Scrutiny Committee - 12 July 2023 PDF 113 KB
Report number: OAS/WS/23/014
Report to be presented by the
Council’s appointed representatives on the Health Scrutiny
Committee.
Additional documents:
Minutes:
The Committee received report number
OAS/WS/23/014, presented by Councillor Sue Perry, substitute member
on the Suffolk County Council Health Scrutiny Committee, on behalf
of Councillor Andrew Martin.
Attached at Appendix 1 and 2 of Councillor
Martin’s report was a summary of topics discussed at the
Health Scrutiny meeting held on 12 July 2023, being:
-
Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation NHS Trust Mental Health Services
Provision; and
-
NHS dentistry provision.
Councillor Perry also updated the Committee on
the Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Trust mortality rates over the last
five years, focusing on reported deaths, which was more difficult
for mental health. A report was
published in July 2023, and had been referred to the Health
Ombudsman which had now led to a statutory public enquiry taking
place.
The Committee considered the report and
requested that it be kept up to date on progress with dentistry
provision.
There being no decision required, the
Committee noted the contents of Councillor Martin’s
report from the Health Scrutiny meeting held on 12 July 2023.
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244. |
Suffolk County Council: Police and Crime Panel - 14 July 2023 PDF 120 KB
Report number: OAS/WS/23/015
Report to be presented by the
Council’s appointed representatives on the Police and Crime
Panel.
Additional documents:
Minutes:
The Committee received report number
OAS/WS/23/015 and Appendix 1, presented by Councillor Mike Chester,
one of the council’s appointed representatives on the Suffolk
County Council Police and Crime Panel.
This was the first time the Committee had
received such a report from the Police and Crime Panel and was a
way for Committee members to make comments, as appropriate for the
appointed representative to then
present back to the Suffolk Police and Crime Panel for its
consideration.
Councillor Chester set out the context and
role of the Police and Crime Panel which was there to act as a
critical friend to the Police and Crime Commissioner.
He went on to explain the Crime Panel on 14
July 2023 scrutinised the effectiveness of the Police and Crime
Commissioner (PCC) functions by review actions he had taken under
objective 4 of the Police and Crime Plan 2022 to 2025, “work
in partnership to improve criminal justice outcomes and enhance
community safety”.
The Committee considered the report and update
from Councillor Chester and asked questions to which responses were
provided.
In response to a question raised on the
turnover of police officers which was increasing, Councillor
Chester advised this issue was discussed at the Panels meeting in
July, which it would continue to monitor.
There being no decision required, the
Committee noted the contents of the report.
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245. |
Cabinet Decisions Plan: 1 September 2023 to 31 May 2024 PDF 156 KB
Report number: OAS/WS/23/016
Additional documents:
Minutes:
The Committee received report number:
OAS/WS/23/016, which informed members on forthcoming decisions to
be considered by the Cabinet for the period 1 September 2023 to 31
May2024.
The Committee considered the Decisions Plan
and did not request any further information on items contained in
the Plan.
There being no decision required, the
Committee noted the contents of the 1 September
2023 to 31 May 2024 Decisions Plan.
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246. |
Work programme update PDF 113 KB
Report number: OAS/WS/23/017
Additional documents:
Minutes:
The Committee received report number:
OAS/WS/23/017, which updated members on the current status of its
rolling work programme of items for scrutiny during 2023-2024
(Appendix 1).
The Democratic Services advised the Committee
of an amendment to the Committee’s work programme for 9
November 2023, in that the Cabinet Member for Leisure was leading
on the Grass Cutting Review and not the Cabinet Member for
Operations, which the Committee noted.
There being no decision required, the
Committee noted the update and the disbandment of
the Modern Slavery Working Group.
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