Agenda item - Oral questions from Councillors

90.1      The Mayor noted that 15 oral questions had been received and that 30 minutes was set aside for the duration of the item.  She then invited Councillor Janio to put his question to Councillor Mitchell.

 

(1)       Councillor Janio

 

90.1      Councillor Janio asked the following question, “Can Councillor Mitchell confirm that the Transport solution for Valley Gardens will prevent private vehicles ‘Rat Running’ on the Western half of the scheme by the use of a ‘Bus-Gate’?”

 

90.2      Councillor Mitchell replied, “I can confirm to you that the introduction of Bus-Gates and their associated traffic regulation orders in conjunction with advance signing and lining have been designed to prevent private vehicles attempting illegal ‘rat running’. These measures will also be enforceable by CCTV.”

 

90.3      Councillor Janio asked the following supplementary question, “Can Councillor Mitchell explain how any private vehicle travelling north on the Old Steine will be prevented from entering the bus-gate, as the original designs did not include the means to do this?”

 

90.4      Councillor Mitchell replied, “The original designs have been altered taking account of further comments received and the designs will now incorporate this facility.”

 

(2)       Councillor Mac Cafferty

 

90.5      Councillor Mac Cafferty asked the following question, “Given your pro record of failing to oppose the budget cuts inherent to sustainable transformation plans and other attempts to privatise the NHS how can the residents of this city trust that you will oppose privatisation of the NHS in practice?”

 

90.6      Councillor Yates replied, “I will keep pushing for health & social care integration because it is the right thing to do for residents of this city. The right thing to do for people on other benches is to ensure that there is adequate funding so that we can deliver the best possible levels of public health, and the best possible lives and outcomes for the residents of this city.”

 

90.7      Councillor Mac Cafferty asked the following supplementary question, “In January this year in the new model of Care Reports to the Clinical Commissioning Group Board reported that there were plans to establish ‘Accountable Care Systems’ are you telling us that as Chair of the Health & Wellbeing Board you don’t know that these discussions are happening?”

 

90.8      We have seen the future of the NHS already in places like Nottingham chunks are being broken off and sold to private providers. This Labour Council will be equally implicated in the silent dismantling of the NHS if you do not speak out, you described yourself just now as an optimist, I put it to you that you are either niaive or ill equipped, or indeed both to oppose the dismantling of our precious NHS given your woeful track record opposing it so far.”

 

90.9      Councillor Yates replied, “The most important thing is to have a deeper understanding about accountable care organisations systems and multi-provider community partnerships, they have the potential to be incredibly positive ways of getting people to work together.

 

We believe that the public sector is best when there is greater co-operation. trying to find the best way possible because, until we have the next General Election, I cannot guarantee a decent level of funding for public services in this city other than straight out of the pockets of local residents. The difficult decisions we are having to take over Council Tax and additional funding and we have made sure this goes into Adult Social Care services.”

 

(3)       Councillor Barnett

 

90.10   Councillor Janio asked the following question on behalf of Councillor Barnett, “Many residents in my ward have expressed concern about the number of dogs and the packs that dog walkers are taking out in parks and green spaces. They are concerned for the welfare of dogs, children and elderly people when these dogs get boisterous or out of control, they often see dog walkers leave dog mess, usually because they cannot keep an eye on all the dogs under their control and they leave the parks without clearing up. The problem is particularly bad in Goldstone Park but I know that across the city residents are concerned. Please can you tell us what you are doing to tackle this growing menace?”

 

90.11   Councillor Mitchell replied, “A very pertinent point has been raised here. It is my understanding that there are nearly 200 dog walking companies now in the city and it is a largely unregulated industry. Dog control orders do make it an offence not to clean up after dogs and our Animal Welfare Team introduced a voluntary code for commercial dog walking companies to sign up to. We were the first local authority team to do this. The Scheme requires the companies to comply with Health & Safety Law, Best Industry Practice and the Animal Welfare Act. It also requires the companies to be fully insured. City Clean have placed warning posters in areas that have been heavily soiled, reminding dog walkers of their duty to clean up. Ideally what we want is for local authorities to be able to license these companies, but the Government’s position is that only the Royal Parks should be able to do this.”

 

90.12   Councillor Janio asked the following supplementary question, “Can you give assurances that enforcement officers will actually use the powers that they have and, will you send through the figures of the numbers in the last couple of years where action has actually been taken?”

 

90.13   Councillor Mitchell replied, “I will get that information for you Councillor Janio.”

 

(4)       Councillor Page

 

90.14   Councillor Page asked the following question, “I am particularly concerned about the dangerously low number of family doctors or GPs we have in the city. This first came to public attention a year ago when our health colleagues CCG themselves said, that there is about 1 full time equivalent family doctor to nearly 2400 people, which is almost twice as many patients per doctor as the rest of Sussex has and it is well above the national average. So, as the Chair of the strategic Health & Wellbeing Board (HWB) which brings together the CCG and Council representatives, can you tell us, in the last year what actions have been taken about this problem. Health Watch have raised it again recently?”

 

90.15   Councillor Yates replied, “This is something that the Health & Wellbeing Board have referred to the Health, Overview & Scrutiny Committee (HOSC) back in the Autumn of 2015, as a result of the issues that we had  initially when we first started seeing emerging issues around practises closing, and it is of great concern to the Health & Wellbeing Board and there have been a number of items and reports to the H&WB, information sent round to H&WB Members about what is going on, but this is an issue that we specifically referred to HOSC because we wanted some detailed work undertaken and we wanted a detailed review to make sure that CCG was aware and acting on this issue.

 

Part of this problem is a National problem, we have some local issues that are associated with this, the cost of housing, issues around the city, the number of our GPs that are getting close to, or choosing to retire from their practises at the moment and the difficulty recruiting. This is a national issue that a 20% reduction was applied to doctor’s training places back in 2010/2011. The fundamental outcomes have been that we have seen less and less people moving into the medical profession and unfortunately as a result of the pressures that are appearing in Primary Care these careers seem to become a lower and lower area of choice. However the final sign off the CCG have found an additional £100k that they are going to make available for practises to help with recruitment and retention. They are also now developing a more detailed base line assessment of each individual practises to help develop a link between work force capacity, skill mix and workload.”

 

90.16   Councillor Page asked the following supplementary question, “I asked what actions he had taken, the problem is still there and he doesn’t appear to be able to take action that really makes any difference to the health of residents of this city?”

 

90.17   Councillor Yates replied, “I think it is very important to recognise that all members of the H&WBB play their part through integrating and working collaboratively, establishing commissioning arrangements, supporting CCG’s decision to apply for and, subsequently, receive co-commissioning responsibilities with NHS England of primary care commissioning, and discussing how the budgets work together.  If Cllr Page wants to send a written question I can provide a detailed comprehensive list of what has been going on.”

 

(5)       Councillor Bell

 

90.18   Councillor Bell asked the following question, “We receive different money revenue streams from the Government and we receive for Public Health in the total of its administration £103,325,000 additional money, I am wondering why we don’t know about this and where it is being spent?”

 

90.19   Councillor Hamilton replied, “It may be necessary for me to send a written answer as this is much more in Councillor Yate’s domain than mine.  Since the year 2010 there has been a drastic reduction in lots of other expenditure. If we look at the situation with Adult & Social Care this is clearly a related issue, how much extra money have the Government given for that, a little bit. Lots of the grants we get come from other people, local enterprise partnership, Heritage Lottery Fund for example. If we take Capital grants specifically to this Council, in the last year of the Labour Government 2010/11 we got £54 million direct capital grants. In the current year we got £12.65m, although you have given us indication of where you are saying there has been a lot of extra money put, we all know that, if you take the capital and revenue together the reduction of funding to this authority is absolutely massive. We are £80 million a year worse off in revenue support work than we were in 2010 and that is not making allowance for inflation.

 

I will go to the appropriate officer and get a detailed response and send Councillor Bell the figures.”

 

90.20   Councillor Bell asked the following supplementary question, “The difference between the general revenue overall is only about £50 million. The interesting point is, the difference between the revenue and the capital, if you take the capital money received by this council since 2010 £238,352,000 and in 2015 is £125,717,000 so in total since 2010 this council has received £341,678,000 and since 2015 £229,042,000.  I would like a response on how this has been divvied up?”

 

90.21   Councillor Hamilton replied, “The last year of the Labour Government 2010 it was £54million if you brought that figure forward over eight years, with inflation as well, I am sure you would have got a figure far in excess of the figure we have been given by Councillor Bell.  I work by figures that are given to me by the officers so if you are saying this is wrong then you can obviously peruse that separately.  But the revenue grant received by this Council in 2010/11 was £189,638,000. In 2017/18 it was £105,871,000 so that feels to me that reduction of £84 million revenue grant since that time which is exactly the figure that I gave.”

 

(6)       Councillor Phillips

 

90.22   Councillor Phillips asked the following question, “What, if anything, has Councillor Yates done about the relentless 20% cuts plus more in-year to Public Health, for example to HIV prevention and Family Health Partnership for young teenage mothers, which will lead to more infections and serious conditions?”

 

90.23   Councillor Yates replied, “Public Health Funding is not additional money it is a pot of money given to us as a ring fenced fund, in order for us to undertake the public health duties that we took over in 2014/15 or 2013/14 when the Public Health Department was transferred across and its responsibilities from Primary Health Care Trust and came to us as a Local Authority.  The 20% in year cut so, £25million to delivery valuable services, delivering over £11 of value for every £1 invested in public health in preventing people becoming ill and having negative health impacts and there was a decision to pull some of that money back after we had planned on how we were going to deliver positive health outcomes for individuals in the city. So there are challenges in public health funding as well as the £84million of cuts that we have had to make from the revenue support grants. Those cuts are falling on public health as well as other areas. I am proud of the work that our professional staff in public health have done working in collaboration very closely with the providers of sexual health, drug and alcohol support services., the providers of a range of public health services across the city to identify ways to still try to deliver the outcomes of those services despite the cuts. We are having to manage services and deliver positive outcomes to people despite the range of cuts that have been undertaken. In terms of sexual health services we have the 20^th highest rates of new sexually transmitted infections in England, but in some sexually transmitted infections we are seeing positive results including a screening programme that is running which can help prevent long term reproductive health issues for individuals in the city is delivering positive results.

 

But regionally and nationally sexual health services are going to be re-commissioned soon and there is going to be a funding reduction applied to that recommissioning.”

 

90.24   Councillor Phillips asked the following supplementary question, “It would be beneficial if Councillors could focus on the question itself.  As a result of cuts, there is a one half day clinic per week which will be closed and there may also be a reduction to the opening hours of other clinics yet to be identified. Has Cllr Yates ever highlighted the damage being done or just simply managed the decline of services?”

 

90.25   Councillor Yates replied, “When we had the Chief Executive of Public Health England come down in January we highlighted the negative effect that cuts in public sector funding and especially in the public health grant was having in our ability to deliver the best possible outcomes for individuals in the city and that is absolutely what we need to do. We need to make sure that we deliver the best outcomes and I will focus on outcomes again. If we look at the rate of genital herpes reduced by 12.3%, the rate of genital warts by 0.4% rates of gonorrhoea have fallen since 2014 with a reduction in a single year of 27% and we are managing to see a reduction and a control of the re-infection rates. As one of the issues we have with individuals who suffer with gonorrhoea is that there is quite often re-infection and we have to deal with that. The biggest challenge we all need to focus on is how do we get our sexual health services as a partnership to work better together and we already in discussions working alongside the current providers of those services because the most important thing that we have done is to give them fair warning and forewarning of what the decisions are that we are likely to have to take in the future. That is what the four year budget programme did when it highlighted when re-commissions were coming up how the cuts were going to fall and it was re-forecast as a result of the Tory additional in year cuts again it gave even further detail of how that was going to happen and some of the benefits of doing that is that we have been able to say it made sense this year when we extended the contract for the integrated sexual health service, it was a 3 year contract with the option to extend for 2 years and we extended it for 2 years to give those services fair warning that some of the changes that they are going to have to make can actually be delivered and that a range of those organisations are going to be working together and some of the things that they are planning on doing in order to meet that challenge and still deliver the positive outcomes are around re-pricing the sexual health tariffs to actually demonstrate and take the approach that is in line with the approaches that London and other authorities have had to take.  Introduction of self-sampling so that people can actually sample in a cheaper and more efficient way and to deliver some back office efficiencies. Not a cut to front line service but a cut to inefficiency that is driven through the delivery model that was introduced 3 years ago and allowing them to take a decision that Brighton & Sussex University Hospitals Trust and Sussex Community Foundation Trust have agreed to dissolve the partnership that existed and to transfer through TUPE and using the TUPE regulations the Sussex Community Foundation Trust staff to transfer over to B&SUH’s Trust.”

 

(7)       Councillor Wares

 

90.26   Councillor Wares asked the following question, “With recent committees and reports on PSPOs why did the Labour Administration keep quiet on the existence of the County Borough of Brighton 1954 and Borough of Hove 1990 Byelaws and the benefits they would bring?”

 

90.27   Councillor Daniel replied, “The report was about PSPOs not byelaws.”

 

90.28   Councillor Wares asked the following supplementary question, “If you are aware of these byelaws, and knowing they are more powerful in protecting every open space and park in the city, by virtue of offences such as antisocial behaviour, camping and unauthorised encampments being a criminal offence, why is the Labour administration not using them?   Especially where such places are not protected by PSPOs and Section 61a Powers are not available?”

 

90.29   Councillor Daniel replied, “We have 3 options open to us:

-       PSPOs which are limited to certain pieces of land.

-       Section 61 and 62 are the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, and

-       A set of laws which are Byelaws.

The more modern laws have been worked through in partnership and, also take account of other laws that came in subsequent to byelaws. You can implement byelaws but you still have the same resource implications, and issues that you have implementing any of the other powers that we have. We need to identify an offender, get witness statements, and need the police to assist and be available if there is a confrontation. In relation to unlawful encampments, the need to ensure all appropriate checks are undertaken, which means welfare checks, which incorporates the Human Rights Legislation and our requirements as a local authority. We had a very good opportunity just some weeks ago where this could have been raised in committee, could have been raised in chairs and been incorporated in that report. I always welcome opposition contributing to the Agenda.”

(8)       Councillor Littman

 

90.30   Councillor Littman asked the following question, “Are you at all concerned that cuts in funding to City Clean have been allowed to the point where they can no longer keep the city clean?”

 

90.31   Councillor Mitchell replied, “I deeply abhor all of the cuts that have been made to all council’s by this Tory Government, not least to basic services that everybody relies on and, where we have a situation where adverse weather can prevent such challenges to a service. However last year we did put in additional resources, which mean that we now have additional loaders and drivers and more recently we have put in a team of staff to support the City Clean modernisation programme. The objectives of the modernisation programme are to implement processes to allow our customers to contact the service in a better way, more quickly and effectively. To establish clear lines of accountability supported by effective performance management to create a culture that will benefit customers and officers and support new ways of working. To provide assurance that the service is meeting its health and safety requirements and identify opportunities to deliver savings in a way that will generate income ‘Spend to Save’ opportunities. The current project, being undertaken by this small team, to give an idea of the work that is currently going on:

 

-        A roll out of communal bins

-        The roll out of wheelie bins and there is more detail of that in your addendum papers in response to Cllr Wares questions,

-        A round restructure

-        Our garden waste scheme is proving more and more popular and this will necessitate some changes to that

-        Commercial Services work is underway to review the commercial operations within City Clean

-        Public Conveniences – a report is coming to the Policy, Resources & Growth Committee in July seeking authorisation for the use of capital funding already agreed toward public toilet refurbishments

-        Dedicated support is also being provided in relation to procurement and HR

 

It is anticipated that this programme will work through for the forthcoming year and this will support and modernise the service.”

 

90.32   Councillor Littman asked the following supplementary question, “As Councillors, we all owe a massive debt of gratitude to the staff of City Clean for their tireless and diligent work. We find ourselves in a situation where our email inboxes are full of complaints about uncollected refuse and recycling, our streets are full of overflowing rubbish bags put next to communal bins which haven’t been emptied. One local vicar in my ward is quoted in the Brighton & Hove Independent as saying most Sundays for me begin in the early morning clearing up the rubbish that has overflowed onto the pavement over the w-e so that people can simply be able to walk along the pavement.  Can I ask how Councillor Mitchell can claim that she is getting the basics right?”

 

90.33   Councillor Mitchell replied, “I think my previous response actually demonstrated that we are concentrating on the basics and combined with good enforcement we know that this service will improve.”

 

(9)       Councillor C. Theobald

 

90.34   Councillor C. Theobald asked the following question, “The worst part of the A27 for litter seems to be from Hollingbury to Hove, especially on the south side. The Government last April announced that it would change the law so one no longer has to prove the individual responsibility but it can be the vehicle owner and also to increase fines for littering. Is there a way of preventing the litter being discarded on the highway by the use of cameras for example?  I feel there must be a way of doing something about this rubbish and I believe a lot of it possibly comes from the back of lorries, especially the large pieces of plastic we keep seeing. What is needed is prevention. Please can the Council look into this?”

 

90.35   Councillor Mitchell replied, “The Government’s Litter Strategy did allow for Councils to fine people and indeed passengers in cars as well as drivers where it was proved necessary in court that litter had been thrown from a vehicle on to the verges alongside major roads. Unfortunately what the Government didn’t do was to provide the necessary funding to allow for this evidence to be gathered in terms of the cameras that would be needed. What we are looking at is some signage that could be placed alongside these roads to remind people it is an offence to litter. The written response to Cllr West’s question highlights that we are still waiting to hear on Highways England to give us permission to clear these verges on both the A27 and the A23.”

 

90.36   Councillor C. Theobald asked the following supplementary question, “I wonder if anyone has actually been fined by Brighton & Hove City Council?   I look forward to an improvement as it must cost a lot of money each time it is cleared up. A few cameras and fining people could help the situation.”

 

90.37   Councillor Mitchell replied, “I thank Councillor Theobald for her comments and I look forward the situation being in a better way, but we would need the resources to do it.”

 

(10)    Councillor Gibson

 

90.38   Councillor Gibson asked the following question, “Will Cllr Meadows commit to ensuring and if necessary bringing forward expenditure so that the legacy of her four years won’t be that we didn’t use the resources that the Government had made available to us in order to tackle what is a very serious housing crisis in the City?”

 

90.39   Councillor Meadows replied, “You are quite right the officers are predicting that it is going to take us five years to reach the HRA borrowing cap however, if there were Green and Conservative Group support at Housing Committee when we have new developments coming through I am certain we could spend the money a lot faster, but we need your support to do that.”

 

90.40   Councillor Gibson asked the following supplementary question, “Will Councillor Meadows quote now publicly that we will use the available resources we have in the next year?”

 

90.41   Councillor Meadows replied, “We spent £12m on Brookmead, £14m on Kite Place, almost £7m on Hobby Place, if we have only spent £3.5m per year over the last 3 years my calculation is that is only £10.5m as you can tell from my previous response we have spent far more than that.  I will state again that I am very keen to build more social housing in the city, we are all aware of the housing situation in our city but I need your support to do that.”

 

(11)    Councillor G. Theobald

 

90.42   Councillor G. Theobald asked the following question, “When visitors arrive at Brighton Station and the walk down Queens Road to the seafront they will be greeted with graffiti everywhere and street furniture covered in stickers. However, since I raised the dreadful state of the city centre with the Chief Executive on 22 February and, by tabling this question, I am pleased to say that some of the long standing graffiti has very recently gone, although there is still a considerable amount in our streets all around us.

 

Councils place great stock on being responsible for place setting with parks. If you agree with me that a clean and tidy city encourages visitors to come here businesses can prosper and residents be satisfied, can you kindly advise me what steps you and your colleagues in administration are taking to take the lead in cleaning up our city?”

 

90.43   Councillor Mitchell replied, “I agree with you that graffiti is a scourge that blights towns and cities. This council works very closely with the police but, getting the required evidence to fine or prosecute is always difficult. The council removes all graffiti from public property, works with utility companies in relation to cleaning street furniture. Supports local community clean up campaigns, runs graffiti removal days with local businesses. I have instructed officers to prepare a city wide graffiti strategy but strategies are only as good as the finance that supports them, and in this case, the relevant powers will lay with planning enforcement, but for those of you who attended workshops is extremely under pressure. The draft Strategy will come to ET&S Committee in due course. We have also been running and are still running high profile anti-litter campaigns including on the beach. We have also been running ‘Tidy Up Team’ campaigns in our local parks and I hope that you might be able to join in one of those in your ward. In relation to Place Setting, we have put funding in the budget to enhance the visitor welcome and sense of identity for the city, plans are under way for public art and the public realm linked to events. This activity is to be carried out in conjunction with local organisations and communities. On a wider note, of course we are working with our partners on the Economic Strategy and the Visitor Strategy, all aimed at boosting this city and promoting its unique identity.”

 

90.44   Councillor G. Theobald asked the following supplementary question, “Why can’t the Komedia say to promoters if your event is fly-posted around the city we will no longer have you appearing at the Komedia?”

 

90.45   Councillor Mitchell replied, “It is a good suggestion and I think all promoters need to adopt that type of strategy.  Our officers do work with organisations such as Komedia to remind them about this and their responsibilities. We will continue to do that maybe we will be able to learn through the production of the strategy from other towns and cities that might be more successful at this than we are.”

 

(12)    Councillor Mears

 

90.46   Councillor Mears asked the following question, “Can the Chair of Housing reassure Council that all front doors in blocks are compliant with Fire Safety Regulations including fire risk assessments?”

 

90.47   Councillor Meadows replied, “I believe you are referring to Masterdor. We have been in contact with both the manufacturer and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government for further information and we are tracking developments of the testing  commissioned by government that are being undertaken.   As soon as results are known we will review these and if necessary plan and take appropriate action related to the councils stock and consider what information needs to be shared with other landlords / duty holders in the city.

 

As you know though we are moving forward very clearly with our sprinkler system ahead of any other developments that the government may be bringing forward and we have done a lot of work on our own stock.”

 

90.48   Councillor Mears asked the following supplementary question, “Can the Chair of Housing confirm that the fire risk programme is up to date for tenants and leaseholders as per the council’s policy.  Yearly in high rise in an exact 12 month cycle and three yearly are for others, as stated on page 5 of the Fire Safety Policy?”

 

90.49   Councillor Meadows replied, “Following the Grenfell Tower tragedy all of our blocks in the city were re-inspected with East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service (ESFRS) to ensure that no high rise council blocks contain the aluminium composite material (ACM) of the type found at Grenfell and as an enhancement to our existing annual fire risk assessments, all Council high rise blocks received an additional precautionary joint fire safety check by council surveyors and ESFRS. Information on cladding, insulation, and fire safety checks that has been published online and in order to provide extra re-assurance to yourself and to tenants and leaseholders  we also commissioned an independent survey to double check (seven) blocks with a rain screen cladding, confirming that the materials used were not an ACM material type panel. The Council have always reassured their tenants and tenants tell us that they feel exceedingly reassured by the fire safety assessments being carried out on their blocks and we are continuing to work in partnership with ESFRS in collating responses to government guidance, requests for information and keeping post Grenfell inductions under review.”

 

(13)    Councillor Nemeth

 

90.50   Councillor Nemeth asked the following question, “Given that the administrations proposed rise in annual charges for beach hut owners has now been cancelled entirely due to notice letters not being sent on time will the accompanying sales tax of 10% now be cancelled for the same reason and through the fact that it has been ruled unlawful through the beach hut contract not actually containing provision for a sales tax?”

 

90.51   Councillor Robins replied, “A review is being undertaken on the procedure of implementing the revised transfer fees and the report will be brought to the Tourism, Development & Culture Committee for Members to consider the issue.”

 

90.52   Councillor Nemeth asked the following supplementary question, “Bearing in mind the stress and anxiety that has been caused by this whole exercise, made worse by a staggering 67 beach huts being broken into in the past two weeks, might now be a good time for the administration to reassure beach hut owners that a more co-operative approach will emerge going forward.”

 

90.53   Councillor Robins replied, “We will be writing to beach hut owners and I am sure you would want me to inform you before we inform them.”

 

(14)    Councillor Miller

 

90.54   Councillor Miller asked the following question, “Would Councillor Robins confirm that Brighton & Hove have indeed invited Channel 4 to relocate 300 of their 900 staff to a base in Brighton along with 12 other cities nationwide and the resulting growth in high paid jobs and retention of business rates in the office they will occupy for our city, its residents and the city council?”

 

90.55   Councillor Robins replied, “Channel 4 is expected to invite pitches from cities across the UK to host its second headquarters next week. It will be keeping one in the capital and has agreed to move hundreds of staff out of London to create enhanced regional presence in three new ‘creative hubs’ in the nations and the regions with the locations for the new hubs being confirmed by September. The plan includes a commitment to spend half of Channel 4’s £700m annual programme budget on shows made by TV production companies based outside London by 2023. It is estimated that its plans to create 3000 new jobs in the creative industries outside London. A dozen cities and regions across the UK have been lobbying to provide new homes for Channel 4, including Manchester, Liverpool, Sheffield, Leeds, Norwich, Nottingham and Glasgow. Several of these have strong arguments and have already benefited from the BBC’s move to decentralise. Publicly owned, but largely funded by advertising revenues, Channel 4 has not been keen to move out of the capital, which is the home of the majority of the advertising companies. Its advertising operation will remain in London and the move will focus on production. It will be looking for a regional base which can provide access to a skilled workforce, with good national connections and the potential for a significant infrastructure and production facilities.  Brighton & Hove does not have a well-established television and film centre and its proximity to the capital and the cost and availability of premises in the city suggest it would be unlikely to bid successfully against the cities who have already declared their interest.   However, Brighton does of course have a well-developed creative sector, it continues to be a popular filming location, and the local digital and media sector is well-placed to build on developing interest in convergent media, so there could be opportunities locally to take advantage of the current national debate concerning the need to increase regional production regardless of the outcome of the relocation process.  Officers will keep a watching eye on developments.”

 

90.56   Councillor Miller asked the following supplementary question, “I think that is a no, but in national press reports it has been suggested that Brighton & Hove has declared an interest in doing so. It is unfortunately to hear Cllr Robins down play the capacity of our city to provide these much necessary jobs in what is a booming creative economy in our city. In all the press reports, as you say, Brighton seems unlikely at the moment because of such atone to get such a relocation compared with other cities. Therefore what more will  his administration and officers do to support Channel 4s relocation to our city for example identifying and appropriate office or spaces that they can film and will Cllr Robins ensure all necessary officer resource is allocated to the bid released a couple of days ago, not next week, to ensure Brighton & Hove becomes a front runner for Channel 4’s relocation.”

 

90.57   Councillor Robins replied, “Councillor Miller seems to be far more advanced in this than I am don’t think I played down Brighton, I said that it’s close proximity to London, and cost of relocating here may be a hazard and that is being realistic.  I did also say that officers will be keeping a watchful eye on this and if it becomes feasible that we can come forward with it then we certainly will.”

 

(15)    Councillor Peltzer Dunn

 

90.58   Councillor Peltzer Dunn asked the following question, “When was the B2066 in Hove last fully re-dressed?”

 

90.59   Councillor Mitchell replied, “The B2066 runs from Boundary/Station Road in Portslade to A259 at Roedean. I have made a guess that Cllr Peltzer Dunn is most interested in the New Church Road section. Some stretches of the road have been re-surfaced at different times, others have mastic asphalt coatings. The Tesco section and the Lansdowne Place to Montpelier Road sections were resurfaced a few years ago, the Palmeira Square area was completely re-built. Within this years’ maintenance budget there will be further works carried out of sections of the road following surveys by the Council’s highways and engineers. I will ask officers to contact you with dates as to when this work will be undertaken.”

 

90.60   Councillor Peltzer Dunn asked the following supplementary question, “I asked “when was the B2066 in Hove last ‘fully’ redressed”.  I accept her assurance that they will be inspected and priorities obviously have to be met but at the moment Church Road Hove has areas where it is in a dangerous state and it endangers pedestrians, cyclists and motorists.  I therefore ask her to for assurance that she will instruct officers to take appropriate action?”

 

90.61   Councillor Mitchell replied, “Of course I will.”