Agenda and minutes

Venue: The Town Hall, The Parade, Epsom

Contact: Democratic Services, tel: 01372 732122  Email: democraticservices@epsom-ewell.gov.uk

Items
No. Item

12.

Declarations of Interest

To receive declarations of the existence and nature of any Disclosable Pecuniary Interests from Members in respect of any item to be considered at the meeting.

Minutes:

No declarations of interest were made by Councillors regarding items on the Agenda.

13.

Minutes pdf icon PDF 111 KB

To confirm the Minutes of the Meeting of the Council held on 21 May 2019.


Minutes:

The Minutes of the Annual Meeting of the Council held on 21 May 2019 were agreed as a true record and signed by the Mayor.

14.

Mayoral Communications/Business

To receive such communications or deal with such business as the Mayor may decide to lay before the Council.

Minutes:

It was with sadness that the Mayor announced the passing of former Councillor John Garlick and former Councillor Pam Bradley. The Mayor and Councillor Clive Woodbridge paid tribute to their service to the Council and local community.

As a mark of respect, the Council stood in a minute’s silence.

The Mayor also made a number of announcements relating to noteworthy events over the past two months and to forthcoming charity events.

15.

Questions from Councillors pdf icon PDF 98 KB

To answer any written questions from Councillors

 

Note:  The deadline for questions was 8 July 2019 (the tenth clear working day before the meeting).


Minutes:

Six questions had been addressed to Committee Chairmen to which written responses had been provided and published.

Five supplementary questions were asked at the meeting and answers given by the relevant Committee Chairman/Chair.

The Mayor reminded Members that in future, questions submitted to meetings of the Council must be clearly presented in the form of a question.

16.

Chairmen's Statements pdf icon PDF 87 KB

To receive statements from the Chairmen of the Council’s policy committees, briefing Members on current events and issues relating to the relevant Committee’s area of work.

 

A period of 15 minutes will be set aside for Members to ask questions on the statement of any policy committee Chairman.

 

Minutes:

The Council received written statements from the Chairman/Chair of the Community & Wellbeing, Environment & Safe Communities, Licensing and Planning Policy and Strategy and Resources Committees.

Nine questions were asked relating to the statements and responded to by the relevant Committee Chairman.

17.

Appointment to Licensing Panel pdf icon PDF 86 KB

To seek approval to further appointment of members to the Licensing Panel.

Minutes:

The Council received a report from the Chief Legal Officer regarding the further appointment of members to the Licensing Panel.

Councillor David Reeve MOVED the recommendation in the report.

Councillor Clive Smitheram SECONDED the recommendation in the report.

Upon being put the recommendation was CARRIED unanimously.

Accordingly, it was resolved that the Council:

(1)          Appointed the following additional members to the Licensing Panel:  Councillors Liz Frost and Clive Woodbridge.

18.

Notices of Motion pdf icon PDF 82 KB

This report sets out notices of motions ruled in order by the Mayor in consultation with the Chief Legal Officer.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Council received three Motions.

Motion 1: “Climate Change emergency”

In pursuance of the Council’s Rules of Procedure, Councillor Hannah Dalton MOVED and Councillor Kate Chinn SECONDED the following Motion:

“This Council notes that the UK Parliament recently declared a climate change emergency and recognises the importance of continuing to respond to the environmental concerns highlighted by the on-going global and national debate.

Epsom and Ewell Council recognises the serious and accelerating changes to the world caused by climate change, as well as the importance of responding to these concerns.

 This Council also acknowledges:

·                     That bold climate action can deliver local social and economic benefits in terms of new jobs, economic savings and sustainable livelihood opportunities, as well as improved wellbeing

·                     That individuals cannot be expected to make sufficient carbon emissions reductions on their own and that society needs to change its laws, taxation and infrastructure to make low carbon living easier and enable behavioural change

Mindful of the role that local authorities can have in combatting climate change this Council notes that:

·                     Epsom & Ewell Borough Council, along with other local and regional authorities, has a role in contributing towards the achievement of national, legally binding targets

·                     Epsom & Ewell Borough Council has already started a journey when it comes to addressing the issue of climate breakdown through: carrying out its Green Infrastructure Study (2013), active support of local biodiversity and land management policies which help to mitigate the adverse impacts of climate change; introduction of Simply Weekly which has increased Borough recycling; supporting the successful bid for step-free access at Stoneleigh Station which it hopes will reduce car journeys and harmful CO2 emissions.

This Council therefore agrees:

(1)          “To establish its own climate change action plan, with targets to cut its environmental impact and steps to become carbon neutral.

(2)          To ensure that the plan is provided to the Environment and Safe Communities Committee and subsequently ratified by Full Council within the next 6 months

(3)          That regular updates on progress against the ratified plan are brought to the Environment and Safe Communities committee and provided annually to Full Council

(4)          To work with our partners across the Borough on environmental issues where that will help us individually and collectively to meet our targets.”

An amendment to the motion was MOVED by Councillor Liz Frost and SECONDED by Councillor Steven McCormick:

to amend the Motion with the addition of an extra bullet point as follows:

(1)          “(3) The climate change action plan is to be reviewed in full annually and updated or amended, if required, to take account of changes in legislation, new best practice, advances in technology or any other changes in circumstances”

(2)          The consequential renumbering of the existing points 3 and 4 to 4 and 5.”

Upon being put the amendment was CARRIED unanimously and became the substantive motion.

A second amendment to the motion was MOVED by Councillor Debbie Monksfield and SECONDED by Councillor Rob Geleit:

to amend the bullet point (1) of the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 18.