Cabinet Agenda Item 24(a)
Subject: Member Questions
Date of meeting: 16 July 2026
A maximum period of fifteen minutes in total shall be made available at each meeting of the Executive for questions from Members of the Council.
The questions included on the list of questions referred to above shall be taken as read at the Cabinet meeting. The question will be answered either orally or at the discretion of the Chair by a written answer circulated after the meeting. Officers may assist the Leader or a Cabinet Member with technical answers to questions. No supplementary questions shall be permitted.
The following written questions have been received from Members:
1. Councillor Meadows - 27. More recycling, less waste
6 new managers at a cost of £344,000 are being hired to look after 17 new staff. Surely the focus should be on front line staff. Paragraph 4.4 mentions there is scope to use existing assets to support future delivery - why are so many middle managers required?
2. Councillor McNair - 27. More recycling, less waste
Will any of these new managers be employed to respond to residents queries e.g. on the phone?
3. Councillor Meadows - 27. More recycling, less waste
Why is the lack of responsive website not a priority for extra funding?
4. Councillor McNair - 27. More recycling, less waste
How confident are you that rubbish can be collected every fortnight without fail?
5. Councillor McNair - 27. More recycling, less waste
Is a 5% improvement in recycling a) guaranteed and b) enough of an increase to warrant cutting residents’ rubbish collections?
6. Councillor Meadows - 28. Proposed changes to Hove Park School
Despite so much consultation, 63% of residents were still opposed to moving to one school site. Has anything been identified in how the consultation was conducted to explain the lack of change in opinion?
7. Councillor Meadows - 28. Proposed changes to Hove Park School
Why are there no mitigations given to residents’ concerns outlined in 3.7? Is the consultation just a tick box exercise considering that 63% of residents are opposed yet the move is still going ahead?
8. Councillor Meadows - 28. Proposed changes to Hove Park School
Why can’t the community have a say in the development of the land (paragraph 3.14)?
9. Councillor Meadows - 28. Proposed changes to Hove Park School
Why is there no estimate of the money to be raised from the sale of the land?
10. Councillor McNair - 28. Proposed changes to Hove Park School
Will the money from the sale be ringfenced for educational purposes? Or swallowed up in the general fund?
11. Councillor Meadows - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
The report mentions that 51 Afghan families have been housed. How many local families exactly are awaiting to be housed in the city and what more can they do to ensure they are housed appropriately?
12. Councillor Meadows - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
How many families have been on the waiting list for over two years or more?
13. Councillor McNair - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
What’s the exact number of households on the housing register (para 3.17)?
14. Councillor Meadows - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
3.19 mentions 51 homes ‘have been made available for families’. Is this the same 51 homes made available for Afghan families mentioned in 3.16? It is not clear.
15. Councillor Meadows - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
When downsizing, renting a three-bedroom house a tenant has occupied for many years may be cheaper for them than moving to a new one-bedroom flat. What is the council doing to mitigate the increased costs of downsizing?
16. Councillor Meadows - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
It is council policy that all voids are used for temporary accommodation. There has also been an increase of 230 households (para 3.4) moving into Temporary Accommodation for this year. How long is this strategy expected to last?
17. Councillor McNair - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
3.33 mentions the progress with tenant perception of the service. How many residents actually responded to the survey? What is the total number of residents eligible to respond?
18. Councillor Meadows - 32. Targeted Budget Management
Why wasn’t the HRA overspend mentioned in the previous Housing Strategy report in 31 above?
19. Councillor Meadows - 32. Targeted Budget Management
How can the council afford to give Whitehawk £1 concessionary fares if concessionary fares have been identified as a risk e.g. the increased costs for Compass which have risen by a third?
20. Councillor Meadows - 32. Targeted Budget Management
The council is borrowing over £500m. At what figure is our debt deemed unmanageable, especially considering the further borrowing required to fund King Alfed, Withdean Swimming Pool and libraries?
21. Councillor Meadows - 33. Asset Strategy
£55m is quoted as the figure to be gained from properties and assets, but there is no ballpark figure for valley campus. There must be a valuation. What’s wrong with the public knowing what the figure is?
22. Councillor Meadows - 33. Asset Strategy
Why is no valuation provided for 1-3 Bond Street? Or for New England House? Would you agree that not providing at least ballpark figures for valuations risks a lack of confidence in the council’s ability to sell competitively?
23. Councillor Hill - 32. Targeted Budget Management
Would you accept that part of the pressure on the care sector which has contributed to average unit cost of care being above budgeted levels is the government's increase of national insurance contributions? These costs are then passed onto people needing care and council taxpayers, with no compensation for councils and other public bodies that lose funding from this as initially promised. I would encourage the administration to use their power to lobby the government on this matter.
24. Councillor Hill - 32. Targeted Budget Management
Increasing complexity of need is also driving higher unit costs in social care. Can the cabinet member for adult social care detail provide detail on what she is doing to address the root causes behind the rise in these increasingly complex needs? A greater understanding of this is needed to move towards a prevention-based approach to adult social care.
25. Councillor Fishleigh - 33. Asset Strategy
The land in West Saltdean identified for disposal is designated as Local Green Space in the West Saltdean Neighbourhood Plan and our community has told BHCC multiple times it wishes to maintain and rewind the plot, however, BHCC has not helped with getting access rights from the farmer BHCC proposes to sell part of the plot to. How would the anticipated future use affect the LGS and will you commit to negotiating access rights as a condition of the sale?
26. Councillor Fishleigh - 34. Covenant on Plot 2 and 3 in West Saltdean
Do you think that the concerns of residents have been properly addressed in the report before you?
27. Councillor Fishleigh - 34. Covenant on Plot 2 and 3 in West Saltdean
Do you think that this report meets the requirements of the Notice of Motion?
28. Councillor Fishleigh - 34. Covenant on Plot 2 and 3 in West Saltdean
Do you accept what residents said that taking over the land doesn’t have to mean acquisition?
29. Councillor Fishleigh - 27. More recycling less waste
Recycling, general waste and garden bins continue to be missed on a regular basis in Ovingdean, Rottingdean and especially West Saltdean. How can residents be confident that reducing collections will improve the reliability of the service?
30. Councillor McLeay - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
The report states at paragraph 3.4 that the council has made progress with “developing Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans (PEEPs) with vulnerable tenants”. However, the new legal requirements for residential PEEPs in relevant higher-risk residential buildings came into force on 6 April 2026. Given the importance of these plans in protecting disabled and other vulnerable residents during a fire emergency, can the Cabinet Member please confirm whether all required PEEPs in relevant high-rise council housing have been completed in accordance with the legal requirements that came into force on 6 April 2026, and if not, how many remain outstanding and what is the timetable for completion?
31. Councillor McLeay - 31. Progress report about delivering our Housing Strategy
Paragraph 3.4 repeats the claim made in the Cabinet report of 14 May 2026 that only “two high-risk fire safety actions” identified through FRAs remain outstanding across the entire council housing stock. However, during a recent visit to Theobald House, I observed a number of serious fire safety issues that appear to remain unresolved despite being identified in successive FRAs (carried over from 2024 and 2025 FRAs). Can the Cabinet Member therefore explain how the council determines whether an FRA action is recorded as “outstanding” in reports to Cabinet – specifically, if a serious or high-risk issue identified in an FRA has not yet been physically remediated, but has merely been placed into a future planned works programme, is that action counted as complete or outstanding for reporting purposes?
32. Councillor West - 27. More recycling, less waste
It is a pity that it has taken the Administration so long to find enthusiasm for fortnightly residual refuse collections, the benefits of which have long been widely understood. Over a decade ago previous iterations of this Administration blocked attempts to introduce both fortnightly collections and food waste collections. Given the limited size of the flimsy door-step food waste containers, which are already attracting the interest of clever foxes, and the considerable amount of food waste still going into residual waste, will containers now need to be replaced with bigger ones with better locks?
33. Councillor West - 27. More recycling, less waste
It is refreshing to see the administration admit it hasn’t done well enough with its management of waste and recycling over the past two years. Clearly a lot of work remains to be done to improve the reliability of collections to gain public confidence ahead of further major changes. It is a staggering admission of failure that a further investment of £1.3m is required to realise this. Do the administration wish to apologise for their incompetence?
34. Councillor West - 33. Asset Strategy
It was hoped that with the development of the City Downland Estate Plan that the wide benefits of the public asset, the council holds in its trust, had finally been appreciated. I received clear assurances that the administration had no intention to sell land from the City Downland Estate, yet suddenly, without consultation, this is now proposed. There is no suggestion the proceeds of these land sales will even be reinvested within the estate. How do the Administration care to explain their betrayal?
35. Councillor Barton Ahmad - 28. Proposed changes to Hove Park School
The reduced geographical spread of secondary school provision in proposed changes is concerning, and, as demonstrated in the consultation process, deeply unpopular. How will families in Portslade and West Hove be supported with the closure of the Valley campus, not least with the increased journey length and car travel? How will active travel be encouraged and facilitated for these families making the longer journey?
36. Councillor Sykes - 32. Targeted Budget Management
The new TBM reporting format is confusing. Please explain the colour coding in Directorate overview and Savings Mitigation and Transformation tables.
37. Councillor Sykes - 32. Targeted Budget Management
Appendix 2 sets out newly identified risks totalling £17.1m which add enormously to in-year budget pressure. Rather than risks, many of these seem to be actual pressures that have crystallised either following global events (fuel, utility costs), or a re-evaluation of actual projected pressures some of which have increased massively. This all rings numerous alarm bells high amongst which are confusing risk with actual pressure (due to the different management response required) and the extent of under projection of pressures for example in ASC. Or is this merely down to a new presentation of TBM?
38. Councillor Barton Ahmad - 28. Proposed changes to Hove Park School
With the proposed disposal of the Valley campus, and building of a 3G pitch on the Nevill site (not to mention the increased car dependency), these plans have considerable environmental costs. These concerns are reflected by participants in the consultation. How will biodiversity loss and loss of green space be mitigated across both sites with these changes?
39. Councillor Sykes - 29. Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) Sufficiency Plan 2026-2029
Regarding B&HCC's implementation of government guidance on the Minimum Funding Guarantee (MFG) as applied to all DSG blocks, what is the current position /interpretation across all blocks, how does this impact on SEND funding if at all and has the Schools Forum been involved in discussing the MFG over the past 3 years?
40. Councillor Shanks - 34 Covenant on Plot 2 and 3 in West Saltdean
Can you guarantee that the money currently available for youth work through the collective will be kept the same or increased?
41. Councillor Shanks - 34 Covenant on Plot 2 and 3 in West Saltdean
How will schools be supported to take on new roles for send children with limited budgets?