Agenda and minutes

Cllr A Fitch-Tillett substituted for Cllr C Cushing.

To receive questions / statements from the public, if any.

None received.

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee held on 17^th September 2025.

The minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 17^th September were approved as a correct record.

To determine any other items of business which the Chairman decides should be considered as a matter of urgency pursuant to Section 100B(4)(b) of the Local Government Act 1972.

None received.

Members are asked at this stage to declare any interests that they may have in any of the following items on the agenda. The Code of Conduct for Members requires that declarations include the nature of the interest and whether it is a disclosable pecuniary interest.

None

To consider any petitions received from members of the public.

The Chair gave a statement in response to the petition group, known as Preserve Our Woods, who were looking to restore access to the path known locally as ‘God’s Path’ in Pretty Corner Woods, Sheringham. The Chair acknowledged the corrections and viewpoints they had submitted in response to the Officers answers, at the meeting held on the 17^th of September 2025, but explained that the matter did not fall within the powers and functions of the O&S Committee. In addition, the Chair added that the separate complaint that had been submitted in relation to Pretty Corner Woods needed to go through due process and the Committee would be informed of its outcome. The Chair concluded by saying that the Committee encouraged officers and the petitioners to continue to maintain a dialogue with one another.

To consider any requests made by non-executive Members of the Council, submitted to the Democratic Services Manager with seven clear working days’ notice, to include an item on the agenda of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

There were no matters for consideration referred to the Committee by a member

To consider any responses of the Council or the Cabinet to the Committee’s reports or recommendations:

None received

Pre-scrutiny of the Homelessness Review

It was agreed by Members no presentation was required as they had all read the report, which was also available for the public to view on the NNDC website, so the Committee went straight to questions.

The ADPS confirmed they were required to carry out the review of homelessness as part of developing the new Housing Strategy. They were proposing as part of that process to develop a single year Action Plan due to the uncertainty over funding.

Cllr Fletcher asked why the Council was only able to recover a small proportion of the Housing Benefit (HB) paid out on nightly paid accommodation. The HSDM responded by explaining that when someone presents as homeless the first, and only, option at that point is a hotel as it must be ready to be moved in to at short notice. The Government penalised local authorities for using nightly paid bed and breakfast as a form of temporary accommodation (TA). To penalise authorities the Government would only payback a very small percentage of the accommodation’s costs. The HDSM explained this was one of the drivers, along with human rights, to the Council purchasing their own temporary accommodation as they wouldn’t incur the same penalties when placing households in this type of self-contained accommodation and would then receive the full amount of HB back. The ADPS added that the figure being paid back by government against nightly paid accommodation had not been reviewed for some time.

When asked by Cllr Bailey what would be the ideal number of TA sites to have be, the HSDM explained she was not confident in giving an exact number. The HSDM explained that by the end of this year the Council would have 32 units of temporary accommodation, five of those being move-on accommodation for ex-rough sleepers and the others being standard, self-contained, accommodation but that was not enough. She explained that typically the Council had 60 to 70 households to house each night. The figure, the HSDM estimated, therefore was somewhere between 30 and 70 but they would keep monitoring as they could see the effectiveness of having their own TA in that the Net costs to the Council had gone down and the quality of that accommodation and the support households received whilst in that type of placement improved their future chances. In an ideal world, the HDSM said, the number of TA’s needed would be zero but with homelessness being at the levels they were she could not see that happening in the foreseeable future.

To add to that the ADPS said ideally, there would be a more accessible and affordable private rented sector but there was not much that the Council could do to influence that.

The ADPS also responded to a question by Cllr Bailey regarding the average length of stay for a household that the Council placed in temporary accommodation.  She said that as some people, through choice may only stay one night and then leave and that  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9.

To update the Overview & Scrutiny Committee on the impact of the North Walsham High Street Heritage Action Zone initiative and learning from this, to establish a set of evaluation criteria, including baselines, that can then be used for similar projects in other towns in North Norfolk.

Cllr J. Toye gave a brief presentation on the report and took questions from the Committee.

Cllr Hankins asked what key elements had been learned from the project and said that bullet points highlighting those would have been useful in the report. Cllr Toye said the Council now had a baseline and from the data presented in the report could now monitor and use for future projects within North Norfolk town centres. Cllr Toye agreed to take the idea of bullet points onboard for the future.

Cllr Penfold felt a clearer distinction between project impact vs town centre health would have been of benefit and it was important that, if in partner projects such as this, the Council took away learning focused on discovering what the priorities of that partner were to help better understand it’s objectives and what it hoped to achieve and the impact their investment, as a partner, had. The EGM believed that the Council had moved on enormously since the bid for NW HAZ was made in 2019 and said officers had no real evidence at that time but that they did now have that data available for all towns. He added that they key was how that information was used in a meaningful way and that it might be better to distil that into a dashboard type of system rather than bullet points, as suggested. In terms of business cases and attracting funding, the Council did not have this data previously but did now and as a result was in a much stronger position going forward.

The EGM explained that the Council had a project management team and there was a requirement for officers to provide an evaluation framework before starting any project such as this, and the project management team had been set up as a  result of the learning gained from the NW HAZ when the Council recognised it needed to be able to monitor a projects impact better than it previously did.

Cllr Penfold said a report such as this should have perhaps had more focus on heritage, including the town’s stories and people, as this could be an economic driver and help with regeneration. Cllr Toye acknowledged this but said the purpose of the report was to assess how the Council monitored the effects of a particular project, the health and economy of the town, so if there was a heritage project elsewhere this would still help inform the Council of its outcomes. The heritage aspects of NW HAZ were covered in the previous report to the Committee. Cllr Penfold felt that heritage, and assessing the health of a town, also meant asking about a sense of place and wondered if young people understood their heritage which the EGM agreed with and took onboard but said it was harder, and less tangible, to monitor, whether it would be cultural or heritage. The EGM said when those local ‘sense of place’, be it cultural or heritage, events took place there  ...  view the full minutes text for item 10.

To receive, and consider, data collated from survey on mobile phone coverage across Norfolk and discuss how the Committee can best add value to the topic.

Cllr Toye presented the report on mobile connectivity and took questions form the Committee.

Chair recognised Mobile Connectivity was not within the gift of the Council but the lack of it was a source of inconvenience, frustration and potential harm to residents.

Cllr Fitch-Tillett felt that operators should be encouraged to share masts rather than just being for one mobile provider as well as being more creative in the masts they erect in designated areas, adding that masts could be disguised as trees.

Cllr Gray noted that it was important to know what success would look like and what outcome they were looking for as the subject matter was so broad. One option would be to have a mobile infrastructure action plan identifying areas of land the Council owned as to where masts could be housed for example. Cllr Gray also suggested, it may be more effective if the Committee could focus on a key matter of concern such as when trying to get obtaining access codes for defibrillators, as having no or poor signal in those instances could have tragic consequences. This approach would ensure the Committee focused on an achievable outcome and then this could be built on to gain wider successes.

The EGM did explain that the Streetwave data sources that were used could have slight imperfections as there may be roads and areas that the bin lorries, which carried the Streetwave technology, would not go down. It did get more granular the closer you focused into an area, but that was not always going to be accurate and it may just be a field or very rural area so it was difficult to pinpoint exactly where those no service areas were. The EGM manager also said the feedback from residents that the County Council had been obtaining, had over 1000 responses and he would encourage everyone to complete the survey to help provide a clearer understanding of where problem areas were.

Cllr Hankins welcomed the report and thought that it was important to get the providers in to tell the Committee what their plans were, the timings behind those, and what they intended to do to improve the signal in those rural areas with poor signal.  Cllr Toye thought it was important to look at that collectively rather than at each individual operator and to make sure they were working with the Shared Rural Network to provide better mobile service, regardless of which network residents were on.

Cllr Bayes, agreed that health providers and businesses, needed good mobile connectivity, and were the areas that the Committee needed to focus on and he queried if vacant church towers could be used to house mobile masts. Cllr Toye said they had been deemed not acceptable, technology wise, from the operator’s viewpoint but he would welcome that conversation, with them, as to why that is. Cllr Heinrich believed that the cost to get power to them to run the masts from would be a big issue as  ...  view the full minutes text for item 11.

To receive a written update on the budget setting and to consider how the Committee wants to feed into this process for 2026/2027 – including pre-scrutiny of key reports such as the MTFS.

Cllr Shires thanked the Assistant Director for Finance and Assets for producing the budget setting update which highlighted where the Council was in the process and the challenges faced. The biggest current concern was the delivery of the food waste collections. Cllr Shires felt that the Government had underestimated the cost of providing this service and the cost to the local taxpayer, as they had done with Local Government Reform (LGR). The Council was unsure what funding would be forthcoming to support food waste collection at this time. Cllr Shires said that the leader of the Independent Group had met with her to learn more about where the Council was with regards to budget setting and moving forward and her door was always open to talk to other Members should they wish to discuss this.

Cllr Boyle thanked the team for an excellent update, saying it was very easy to understand. Cllr Shires reassured Cllr Hankins that LGR had no impact on the 2026/27 budget, unless Government was to change the rules, but it would have an impact on the medium-term financial strategy as that forecast for 3 years ahead. The DFR explained that the one unknown was that the Council was expected to fund the preparatory work for the new Unitary authority and that model would not be confirmed until, most likely, mid-March. What the Council may do, was partly dependent on the settlement but it was proposed that earmarked reserves were established to draw on for the revenue costs for the closure of the District Council. Cllr Shires did explain the Council was not at the stage of producing any form of transitional financial document for the new Unitary authority yet, in answer to a query by Cllr Hankins, due to good practice, the Council had to budget with the presumption that the Council would still exist, in its current guise, beyond 2028.

The Committee noted the update.

Cllr Boyle offered her apologies at this point as she left the meeting.

To recommend to Full Council the Committee’s Annual report summarising its key achievements and highlighting any issues over the previous two years.

The Chair acknowledged the former O&S Chair, Cllr Nigel Dixon, who had steered the Committee with skill and aplomb during the period for which this report was written and the officers who had supported him so ably and to the current DSGO for preparing the report.

In response to a question from Cllr Hankins on whether the Committee wished to continue with the pre-meetings, it was agreed by remaining Members present to keep them as things stand. Cllr Gray found them a very good way to discuss topics beforehand and diffuse any potential differences. Equally, Cllr Bailey thought they were a great way to do some fact finding and helped in shortening the length of the meeting but would like to see more O&S Members attend those pre-meetings.

The Chair felt that having a substitute come in your place, if Members knew they were unable to attend the meeting, was important. The Chair also felt that the Committee could follow up the soft actions, such as engaging Members into the 1^st responder scheme, more closely. The DSGM agreed and the DSGO would look into how that was best achieved and feedback. The Committee agreed that those items of wider interest to residents should be followed up and reported back on.

The Committee agreed to RECOMMEND to Full Council that they note the report, affirms the work of the Overview & Scrutiny Committee, and considers the following concerns raised within the key issues section of the report:

·        An average of more than 1.5 apologies given every meeting with limited substitutes being sought needs to be considered and addressed by Members.

·        Now the new Scrutiny Officer is in place training needs should be assessed so that the Scrutiny Officer can best support the Members of the Committee in fulfilling their roles. Any training Members need to help them feel more confident in their roles should be encouraged.

·        Monitor the work programme and avoid slippage in key areas such as the Police and Crime Plan to ensure that there is no lengthy gap.

To note the upcoming Cabinet Work Programme.

No comments

To receive an update from the Scrutiny Officer on progress made with topics on its agreed work programme, training updates and to receive any further information which Members may have requested at a previous meeting.

No Comments

To pass the following resolution, if necessary:

“That under Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act 1972 the press and public be excluded from the meeting for the following items of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in paragraph _ of Part I of Schedule 12A (as amended) to the Act.”

The meeting ended at 12.36 pm.

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Chairman