Agenda item - Public Involvement

To consider the following matters raised by members of the public:

(a)          Petitions: To receive any petitions presented by members of the public to the full Council or at the meeting itself

(b)          Written Questions: To receive any questions submitted by the due date of 12 noon on the 21 September 2018

(c)          Deputations: To receive any deputations submitted by the due date of 12 noon on the 21 September 2018

(B)      WRITTEN QUESTIONS

(i)            Network Rail Line Closures

22.1      Angi Mariani put the following question:

“It is widely acknowledged Network Rail Line Closures between Three Bridges and Brighton, scheduled for 34 days over weekends and the busy February half term, will negatively impact on the city; particularly our Tourism, Hospitality and Retail sectors.

As an Economic Impact Assessment to determine the potential financial loss to Tourism, Hospitality and Retail was not carried out by the council, and assuming there's been no representations to Network Rail for any form of compensation, what additional resources will the council now be providing to help mitigate losses to Tourism related businesses as a result of these line closures?”

22.2      The Chair provided the following response:

“Thank you for your question. The Council has made representations throughout the year to both Network Rail and Govia concerning the forthcoming rail closures, highlighting the potential impacts of the closures on local business. Our sentiments have been echoed by City stakeholders in their individual discussions with Network Rail.

As a government body, unfortunately Network Rail does not have the authority to issue compensation for potential loss of business caused through rail closures.  The Council’s Tourism and Leisure department have launched a marketing campaign ‘Breeze to Brighton’ aimed at targeting and increasing traffic from leisure visitors who are able to access Brighton via unaffected rail routes. We are investing significant resources in this campaign, which will promote the offers of businesses throughout the City, and are working with both Network Rail and Govia who have pledged to support for the initiative.

Furthermore, I have continued to press the case for tourism, including through representations to the city’s MPs and to the Secretary of State and as you know, there will be a meeting with Peter Kyle a week Friday to pursue the matter”.

22.3      Angi Mariani put the following supplementary question:

“Presumably the council may benefit from the rail line closures from such things as increased parking and I wondered whether the council had analysed such potential benefits and whether a proportion of such benefits could be used to aid tourism businesses further”

22.4      The Executive Director, Economy, Environment & Culture provided the following response on behalf of the Chair:

“The approach we are taking is to work with partners across the city including the Tourism Alliance to ensure we are developing a package of measures that promote the city particularly with the Breeze in Brighton Campaign. We are putting council resources into that. The issue with spending parking surplus is that parking income can only be spent of traffic management measures so it is not possible due to financial regulations to spend that income on something else. The other thing to bear in mind is that a lot of our parking spaces are well used and therefore there would not necessarily be an increase in income as a result of the closures although we cannot be certain of that”.