Agenda item

The Council undertook its annual funding rounds for strategic and neighbourhood CIL between the 9 March 2026 and 17 May 2026. During this funding window 5 Strategic CIL bids and 15 Neighbourhood CIL bids were received.

In accordance with the Epsom and Ewell CIL Spending Protocol (March 2025), all bids received have been subject to an initial stage 1 assessment. Only the bids that passed the stage 1 assessment were then subject to a stage 2 assessment by the CIL Member Working Group.

Following this process 5 strategic CIL bids (totalling £4,258,000 of strategic CIL funding) and 8 neighbourhood CIL bids (totalling £668,871 of neighbourhood CIL funding) were recommended to receive funding by the CIL Member Working Group in June 2026.

Following consideration, the committee resolved with 6 votes for and 1 abstention to:

(1)        Approve and ratify the funding recommendations of the CIL Working Group for each of the bids set out in paragraph 4 of the report, subject to the deletion of the wording “to replace unsafe stepping stones” from the summary provided for Strategic Project 3 – New Footbridge across the Hogsmill River.

In response to a question submitted to the Chair in advance of the meeting by a member of the committee, the Chair informed the committee that a report regarding Hook Road Arena would be presented to the next meeting of the Full Council.

The Chair left the meeting for the duration of the item and did not participate in the debate or vote on this item. The Vice Chair chaired the meeting for the duration of this item.

The committee received a report presenting strategic and neighbourhood Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) bids that had been recommended for approval by the CIL Member Working Group.

The following matters were considered:

a)              Correction to typographical error – Appendix 1: The Head of Planning Policy and Economic Development informed the committee of a correction to the first page of Appendix 1 to the report. The text “£144,000 awarded to fund the cost of the bridge and a 20% contingency.” in the MWG Funding recommendation column of the table was corrected to read: “£144,000 awarded to fund the cost of the bridge including a 20% contingency.“

b)              Correction to typographical error – Table 3: The Head of Planning Policy and Economic Development informed the committee of a correction to table 3 of the report. The bid request and MWG funding recommendation for Ebbisham Sports and Social Club’s Facility improvement and sustainability project was corrected from “£13,622” to read “£13,662”. This correction also amended the total neighbourhood CIL spending listed in the report from “£668,871” to “£668,911”.

c)               Clarification of table 1 of report – New footbridge across the Hogsmill River. The committee noted a clarification to table 1 of the report, that the proposed new footbridge across the Hogsmill River was not to replace the stepping stones.

d)              Strategic Project 1. In response to a question from a member, the Head of Planning Policy and Economic Development informed the committee that Surrey County Council had provided funding for an earlier stage of the project and had identified that match funding may be available from Active Travel England.

e)              Strategic Project 3 – amended wording to paragraph 4 of the report. The committee agreed to amend the wording of the summary of Strategic Project 3 (New footbridge across the Hogsmill River) in paragraph 4 of the report to “Construction of a new footbridge across the Hogsmill River to provide a safer, more inclusive river crossing.” The committee also agreed to amend the wording of the MWG funding recommendation for the project to ““£144,000 awarded to fund the cost of the bridge including a 20% contingency”

f)                Neighbourhood Project - St Martins School playground development. In response to a question from a member, the Head of Planning Policy and Economic Development informed the committee that he would highlight the recent removal of a playground facility from Wallace Fields school to the applicant.

Following consideration, the committee resolved with 6 votes for and 1 abstention to:

(1)        Approve and ratify the funding recommendations of the CIL Working Group for each of the bids set out in paragraph 4 of the report, subject to the amendments to the wording of Strategic Project 3 – New Footbridge across the Hogsmill River which are detailed in bullet point e) of this Minute (above).