Welcom to this meeting of South Cambridge and District Council. My name is Councillor Peter Fane and I'm the Chair of the Council. My Vice-Chair on my left is Councillor Peter Sennford. Just some announcements. This meeting is being live streamed and recorded. We also allow recording by others filming and photography. Please, will all members ensure that their microphone is on silent? You should please keep your microphone switched off until I invite you to speak. If you're participating remotely, then when you're invited to address the meeting you can switch your microphone and camera on, but otherwise please keep them both switched off. Of course, members attending remotely should indicate they wish to speak through the chat message, and I would ask people not to use the chat for any other function. As usual, those present in the Chamber, if you wish to speak, please raise your hand and my Vice-Chair will note the order of speakers. When we move to report on anything, if there is not clear affirmation, we will take a record. I thought for a moment I was being censored by my own microphone. When we move to vote on any item and there is not clear affirmation, I will state that a recorded vote will be taken. Members in the Chamber will then vote electronically, selecting for against or abstain, and the result will be displayed on the screens. I believe this meeting is quarried, so we will proceed. Just before we proceed, I just want to take this opportunity to welcome to the meeting to our first meeting at Full Council, Pipa Togi, who is the new team leader on democratic services, and I'm sure members would take the opportunity to introduce themselves subsequently outside this meeting. I know that will be welcome. In one, apologies. Are there any apologies for absence? Thank you, Chair. We have apologies from councillors Earl, Garvey, Ripeth, Halings, Warren Green, Banda Venne, Jackson Wood, Banda Wire, and I think councillor Redrop is online, and councillor Bataisharia as well. Thank you for that. Are there any members who are participating remotely? No, I think these are Redrop. Yes, thank you. Item 2, declarations of interest. Members are required to declare the existence and nature of any interest, which affects or relates to any item of business. Council Lentel. Just to check that all officers here present are in compliance with the rules on declaration of possible or definite conflicts of interest. I've brought along a copy of our constitution just to be absolutely clear. Do you have a declaration of interest? I think members are aware of the rules on this, and certainly I would draw their attention to it as necessary. Thank you, Council Lentel. Right. Do any members have any interest which they wish to declare? Thank you, Chair. Just that I'm a member of the Grace Cames Partnership, and it is labelled on the agenda. Thank you for that. Any other interests which need to be declared? I would remind members that they need to keep their register of interest up to date, and to inform democratic services of any changes, and that if any potential conflicts of interest become apparent later in the meeting, then you should declare them then. Item 4, minutes of our last meeting of this Council held on 13 July. Do members have any amendments to these minutes? I'll ask our democratic services first whether there are any amendments. Any other members have been reported to us, Chair? Okay, in that case, I think my Vice-Chair to report suggests amendment happy to second, subject to the removal of the duplicates section one, apologies in the published minutes. So, I have, that's just a technical submission. One of the items that members will no doubt have noticed is repeated twice in the minutes, but I don't think we need to debate that. So, we have a seconder for my motion that we now approve these minutes. Members, are you content to take this matter by affirmation? Does anyone wish to vote against that or to abstain? Thank you. Council therefore agrees the approval of the minutes of the last meeting, as amended as a correct record. We now move to item 5A. Item 5 is announcements and I will start with my own announcements very briefly. As members may be aware, this Council was formed by merger of South Cams District Council was then with Chesterton Rural District Council on 1 April 1974. Therefore, next year will be our 50th anniversary. I think it appropriate that we do have an event to mark that. I'm proposing that Civic Affairs Committee, that I should work with Civic Affairs Committee to drop the nature of those proposals and bring them back to you. If anyone has concerns about that, they can either raise them with me or another member of Civic Affairs Committee or raise it now if you wish to. So, I'm going to take it that we're agreed on that. I have one other announcement I would like to make. Members may recall that a previous meeting it was my privilege to award a badge to my predecessor as Council Chair. It subsequently became apparent that the person who was Chair of Council in 2015 to 2017, I think, never received her badge. So, if members will bear with me for a moment, I just want to put that right and present a well-deserved badge to Councilor Sue Ellington. Oh, she's coming to me, Robin, coming to her. I would stress, this is not just remembering that she was Chair in those years, but also Long and Distinguished Service that we all recognise. Right, we then move on to announcements from the leader. Leader, do you have any announcements? Thank you very much, just a couple. I'm very pleased to have learned in the last few days that we have won a bronze award for our carbon literacy. I've got that right. Johnny Good, so that's excellent. Well done to all the team. Last Thursday, I was able, with Councilor McDonald and Councilor Mills, to attend the SME Business Awards, which was run by the Cambridge Independent. I think there was 22 South Cam's businesses there, seven of them won. We sponsored the Innovation Award, and that was won by Welchers Transport from Duxford. I think they won all sorts of things, actually. They were quite a team. So, it was a pleasure to do that, and we will continue to support local businesses in whatever way we can. Thank you, Leader. Are there any announcements from Head of Paid Service, item 5c? So, we then move on to questions from the public. I set out the ground rules for this last time. Do we have any questions from members of the public? We did have a question submitted and approved by Mr Daniel Fulton. Mr Fulton, I think, is not here, so we will submit a written reply to that question. Petitions, item 7. Do we have any petitions? I believe no petitions have been received. We then move to item 8. Item 8a is the report from the Civic Affairs Committee, which I will present as chair of that committee. The main item I want to introduce is to propose the adoption of the recommendations of the Civic Affairs Committee, which are on page 27 of your agenda pack. The recommendation to council is that council changes the constitution to allow the appointment of an independent member of the Audit and Corporate Governance Committee, noting that they should not have voting rights, that they should be on the electoral roll and within the Cambridge area, and that the recruitment process be delegated to the Audit and Corporate Governance Committee. You will, of course, have set out in your papers on page 33b, officer-led, and that the Audit and Corporate Governance Committee be authorised to make the necessary arrangements to recruit and select the independent member. Suggested constitutional additions come in appendix C. Before I call for a seconder, I just want to explain that this was a decision endorsed by the Civic Affairs Committee. It is a move towards the recommendations of SIPFA, as I think many of us will appreciate those recommendations. There should be two independent members, and they should have voting rights. That is not the recommendation that I am putting forward today. It would be one independent member with no voting rights and the other conditions are set out. So I now propose that. Do I have a seconder? Thank you, Chair. I second and reserve my right to speak. If I may, I'll take Michael Atkins as Chair of the Audit and Corporate Governance Committee. Thank you for coming forward there. Right. Does anyone wish to speak on this item? I think we have Councillor Stephen Drew. Councillor Drew. I'll try and do better. I did a cabinet earlier last week when I forgot how to speak. I am completely supportive of the recommendation this year, but I would like to propose an amendment at point A2. I would like to propose removing the word B on the electoral roll and replace with B resident. Do you have a seconder for your amendment? I do. I think I see Councillor Richard Stefford. Do you wish to speak on that? I won't. I am seconding the motion. You have of course still, we'll still have the right to speak at the end if there is a debate on that. Does anyone wish to speak on this proposed amendment? Councillor Richard Williams. Thank you, Chair. Sorry, my microphone is doing something odd. I was actually going to ask a question about this anyway, but it's more person with Councillor Drew's proposed amendment. I'm sure it's been looked at by civic affairs, but I was wondering if we could have an explanation as to why it says Cambridgeshire, because that could cut both ways. Is Cambridgeshire not south Cambridgeshire, but equally, if we limit ourselves to Cambridgeshire, are we limiting the pool too narrowly? I think that's a question to me as Chair of Civic Affairs. Can I come back to this amendment? I see we also have, I gather Councillor Heather Williams would like to speak on this. I think I can sort of respond to that. First of all, to the proposed amendment, I think actually it's a shame that that's amendment has been proposed. We at Civic Affairs actually went through a process of, we actually congerment to make sure that we could work across parties to ensure something that would work for everybody. To make changes now, I think means that was pretty pointless and quite clear that administration does not want political consensus on things. Otherwise, what was the point of doing what we did then? The reason to answer in Councillor Richards was originally we started off with South Cambridgeshire, because we wanted to make sure that the person had a stake in it, that they were local and that they would really understand the dynamics of South Cambridgeshire. Obviously, some people didn't feel that that was broad enough and the whole idea of Cambridgeshire was to open it out about a bit more. I think it's a real shame. I respect the political arithmetic of this council and the leader is sort of half smiling there, so she knows she's got the votes to get it through, but I think it's a real shame because actually having a voter and giving a voter of this area, someone that had a tangible link, because of course you can have and we debated this about the electoral role, you can have two homes, you can have different places, so I think you've made it weaker. You might think it's very clever what you've done, but I think you'll regret it later on. I'm next going to call Councillor Mark Howell just before I do that. I want to stress that we are debating the amendment put forward by Councillor Drew at this point, so the question asked me by Dr Richard Williams as to the Cambridge area. I'll come back to the end of this debate if I may. Councillor Mark Howell. Thank you Chairman. Chairman, the reason I think it'd be fair to say that I'm the one who pushed for this and we compromised on Cambridgeshire because I actually only wanted South Cambridgeshire, so I think that's what happened there. But the reason we said electorate is that the person's so to speak has got skin in the game. They are local, they know the issues. Resident was never really clearly defined. What is a resident? How do you define somebody's a resident? Is somebody who's staying here for a week or two a resident? I mean, so it was very clearly put it as electorate so that we could actually see who the people are and are they in the actual Cambridgeshire area, not visiting here, then actually coming from another part of the country. So that is why we very clearly went for electorate. It was no more than that to actually show the people that the decisions you're going to make in here or be part of the decisions that you're going to make in here will affect you or will be affecting people who are close to you by being in Cambridgeshire. So I'm asking if this amendment could be withdrawn because it was very clearly debated for that reason. Thank you, Chairman. Councillor, if I may, Councillor Williams, I'll take Councillor Drew first. Yes. Sorry, I will respond to that suggestion. I suppose the thing is, in Councillor Williams' point related to seeking to have cross-party support and engagement and working together is, of course, an entirely valid one. It's something we should at all times seek to do as far as it's humanly possible. And there are many, many things that we do as a council that are not politically contentious or anything whatsoever. The reason why I am proposing that electoral role be replaced with resident is that I think that the use of the phrase electoral role is exclusionary. There is no requirement on anyone who is a citizen of the UK to be on the electoral role. They are not reduced as citizens by choosing not to be on the electoral role. And there are many people who entirely rightly, entirely legally and philosophically correctly choose not to engage with the democratic process that the country has put in place. They are no lesser as citizens. Therefore, I do not think that when we are seeking to set up somebody as an independent member of the Order in Corporate Governance body that we should exclude somebody who happens to have decided that they do not wish to be on the electoral role. So, therefore, I think the reason why that is an entirely valid amendment to put in place is because it is much more inclusion and it much more respects the fact that people have a right to decide. So, I'm afraid I'm not willing to withdraw that amendment at this stage. Okay. So, I went back to Councillor Drew. So, you wanted to take up Councillor House. Invitation he doesn't. I then come to Councillor John Williams. Thank you, Chair. In addition to what Councillor Drew has said, of course, being on the electoral role for the purpose of local elections doesn't actually mean that you have your permanent address in South Cams. You can have a second home in South Cams, but a third home in South Cams and be on the electoral role for the purposes of local elections. So, pretty meaningless stipulating that you have to be on the electoral role to prove that you live in South Cams. I'd like to come back to Councillor Staunton. You reserved your right to speak at the end of the debate. So, if you would hold on, I have Councillor Dan Lentel. Thank you, Chair. Interesting. I think that the issue of not choosing to be on the electoral role has been very well dealt with by Councillor Drew. I just wonder whether being on the council tax register or something. I mean, the idea, presumably, is to have somebody who can demonstrate, as the phrase is, skin in the game. Is there no compromise available on the tax register or something similar, a phone bill with the local address? I don't know. It seems to me it would be much better if constitutional things were handled, not on party and other lines. Thank you. Thank you for that. However, I do have to say that the question is, as per the amendment, whether the words on the electoral role will be replaced with the words resident. I don't see others wanting to contribute. Councillor Richard Williams, did you want to come back again? Thank you, Chair. Thank you for indulging me. I do think there is an important point here. If the amendment is to say resident, I think it's incumbent on the administration or whoever is proposing this to give us some definition of what a resident is. The electoral role, you can prove it, yes or no. If you say something like vague like resident, we could, in theory, get involved in a very lengthy legal debate as to whether somebody is or is not a resident, because it's not defined. I think it's incumbent on those proposals to tell us exactly what a resident is. I think rather than have that discussion now, I'm going to come to Councillor Richard Stobart, who is going to second the amendment. Thank you, Chair. When this matter was discussed in audit committee, yes, these concerns are expressed. I'm not party to what happened in civic affairs, but the intent was that we found somebody with expertise and knowledge, and certainly knowledge of local matters. So we consider that to be very important. Something about this process is the recruitment process will be officer led. It will have a person spec and a job spec, and it would, I think, behoff the audit committee to seek to scrutinise those documents with a view to finding the right person. So I think trying to specify too closely who that person should be in their attributes, let's depend upon the processes that are already in place. So I think this change, this loosening up, if you will, of this requirement in the end, will be narrowed down and made more acute by the process I've just described, by a proper recruitment process, scrutiny by the audit committee. So I would say that what we've proposed is quite sufficient. It loosens a little bit, but it leaves the final decision to an acute and well-managed recruitment process. Right. Members, I think the time has come for us to move to a vote on this question. Do we, as proposed, replace the words on the electoral roll, on pages, I can't remember what page it is, with the word resident? I propose to take this as an electronic vote. Can we move to? Thank you. So give us a moment, and we will have an electronic vote on this question.  Please remember that if you're voting in favour, you're voting in favour of the amendment as put by Councillor Drew. If you're against that amendment, you vote and press red. Remembering, of course, to press the little button on the left first. Have all members who wish to vote now done so? Give us another moment. Have all members who wish to vote now voted? I think so. There may be one who wishes to abstain, perhaps press the yellow button if so. I will wait until democratic services declare the vote. So the vote is as displayed, 21 in favour of the amendment as moved by Councillor Drew, eight against three abstain. So we now move to the main proposal as amended. Do we have a Councillor Heather Williams? It's still on here, just so you know. So I will propose an amendment to the amended substantive item in playing those games in that there will be a definition of what a resident is included in the constitution if that's what we're doing. So are you proposing a definition yourself? Yes, a legal. So what definition are you proposing? I'm saying you're going to have to, it wasn't, I'll propose the residence. The amendment is that a legal definition, that can be delegated to officers or Liberal Democrats, a leader of a definition legally of a resident to be included so everybody knows very clearly constitutionally who can apply and who cannot. Thank you. That's a further proposal for an amendment. Since no specific wording has been put forward that means that this would be left to officers to draw up a legal definition of the word resident. But the effect of the amendment is that officers should be asked to do so to define the effect of the vote that we have just taken. I think the leader wants you to speak on that point. Okay, do we have a second? Do we have a seconder? Thank you, the leader. Could I ask a question of John Murphy, please? Is there such a thing as a legal definition of a resident? I haven't been given notice of this prior, but I thought there may be an agreed definition. I'm not sure if what's being sought is an agreed definition. Members, I do not propose to go into a debate now as to what the definition of a resident might be as the legal officer, as you've said, who's had no nature of that. Legal officers will address this subsequently. The nature of the motion as amended has now been agreed and I suggest we take by affirmation that we now ask legal officers to define exactly what we mean by that. Is everyone prepared to accept that? Do you want to speak a seconder? I would like to say a few words a seconder because I can sort of answer the question that was just but there are several legal definitions of resident which is the problem. There's resident for tax purposes, there's habitual residence for immigration and related things. So there are lots and lots and lots of different legal definitions of resident which is the problem with this definition of something vague like a resident. The Oxford English Dictionary tells us a resident is a long term person whose long term abode is in an area. What's long term? Six months? Five months? Ten months? Two years? Five years? Twenty years? Who knows? So that is why it is vital if we're not to potentially find ourselves in a legal wrangl in the future that we have some definition of what a resident is for the purpose of our constitution. Thank you for that. This is a proposal from the Civic Affairs Committee. We're clearly not going to be able to define today what a resident is. So my suggestion is that we leave it to the legal officers to come to a definition and that we as a council accept the recommendations of the Civic Affairs Committee on that because I do not want to debate on the definition of the word resident in this meeting. Is that acceptable? Sorry, as amended. Yes, the motion is as amended. Do you want me to repeat my statement? Can we take that by affirmation or do we have a point of order on that? Yes, the motion which has been seconded will be put, I'm suggesting that we take that by affirmation. The effect of that would be that officers come up with a definition of this because we simply cannot do that today. Is that acceptable to the move of the motion? That's fine and then we'll debate. Yes, we're voting at the moment on whether we define the word resident. Bear with me a second. Right, the motion before us is that the word resident, as in the motion as amended, needs to be defined. I am suggesting that that is something that having been proposed and seconded we can now take by affirmation and we then leave it to officers to define it. The question then is, is the officers definition of that word acceptable? And if the movers of the motion would agree, I am suggesting that the Civic Affairs Committee who put this motion before us be invited to approve the definition as put forward by officers. Is that acceptable to the movers and seconders of the motion? Can we take that by affirmation? Is any member opposed to that? Anyone wish to abstain? That is agreed. So the wording of the motion now is, as on your papers, except that item two is amended to say, be resident within the Cambridge area, that word resident to be defined by officers and approved by the Civic Affairs Committee. That is the motion now before us. We can now move to a debate on that motion as amended. Does anyone wish to, I think I have a seconder for that, don't I? Did I have a seconder for that? I obviously can't remember. I did. I had Michael Atkins. Did you wish to speak now or reserve your speech to the end? Your reserve to the end. Anyone want to speak on the motion as amended? Councillor Heather Williams. As I said earlier, it's a shame we've had to have all this to and throw. I strongly believed at Civic Affairs that it was the right compromise and conclusions that we came to. I haven't changed in my view at all, so I will be consistent and I will vote against. Thank you. Anyone else wish to contribute to the debate on this? I have no other speakers. Councillor Michael Atkins, do you want to speak a seconder? Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Members, for your discussion today. It's becoming increasingly expected that there is independent membership on the public audit committees. I'm pleased that we've found a proportionate way to incorporate this into our own structure. The recruitment of the person will be officer-led, but I'm very clear that the appointment will only be made if a well-qualified individual applies and accepts who can positively contribute to the existing efforts of the committee. I'd like to thank the current members of governance. It's certainly a reflection on them that we're bringing in this additional independence group. It's a very well-qualified, very able body already, and I'm sure this will only add to that. Thank you also to members of Civic Affairs for their consideration of this matter. Thank you. Thank you. I now propose that we go to an electronic vote on this matter. Those in favour are voting in favour of the motion as already amended and defined. So if you would press your blue button and then if in favour of the motion as amended the green button, the green or red button I should say. So if you're in favour of the motion as amended the green button if you're opposed to it the red button. Has everyone now voted who wishes to vote? We have one abstention, 24 in favour of that motion. Eight opposed. So that motion as amended is now passed. We then move on to item 8b which is the young people's task and finish group report to the scrutiny committee. This is the supplementary report which is in your papers and I will call on the lead member for communities to present this report and move the recommendations. Thank you, Chair. Yes, back in July 2022 full council unanimously approved a motion recognising that South Cams is a major growth area and that new homes will mean that a number of young people in the district will rise and it's important that the voice of young people is heard in the development of council's policies and in youth engagement in local decision making at the council. In response to this the scrutiny and overview committee commissioned an all party task and finish group involving councillors Graham Cohn, Stephen Drew, Sue Wellington, Helen Leaming and Richard Stobart with the objective of considering options for delivering the council's aspirations. Happily councillor Stobart is seconding this item and since he was heavily engaged in the work of the task and finish group it's appropriate for me to leave it to him to flesh out some of the detail of this at the important point that's coming from the work. So the report summarises the work carried out by the group and the cabinet recommendation is that this report and the seven recommendations shown on pages three and four of the agenda pack are accepted. Councilor Richard Stobart, if it's been indicated you might want to second this motion. Do you wish to speak now or at the end? Thank you chair, I would like to second the motion. If there is questions or comments maybe you should take those first but I will essentially present the the progress of the work and the some comments on the recommendations. Please go ahead. Thank you. So councillor Handley mentioned this important motion adopted by council last year and the task and finish group which was set up in the way that councillor Handley mentioned interpreted the goal set out in the motion to investigate and make recommendations on how we ensure the voice of youth in South Cambridgeshire is both sought and heard. Well the first thing we had on our agenda was to define youth or young people and the age range of 11 to 25 came out of our initial discussions that is if you will from the later stages of childhood through secondary education and into higher education, further education and employment. Now the numbers of young people that we're talking about in the 2021 census 25,400 in the district makes up 16% of the population. These are people residents who make significant demands on the services of the council and hence the requirement I think with this significant group of people going through this stage of life that their voice should be heard and should be reflecting on council policy. Now one of the things the task and finish group was acutely aware of is the need to focus on South Cam's business. Inevitably the discussions went a little bit wider but we sought to keep them on what South Cambridgeshire district council does. We're also aware of the backdrop important factors in play, the effect of COVID on young people, the growing awareness that smartphones have a deep influence on the life of young people, depression and mental health which in young people has received a lot of attention as a serious question and we still see in that 14 to 16 age group significant absence from school which began during COVID and has refused to go away. One of the things the group found was that it was very difficult to set up meetings to talk about young people's affairs. We did push very hard and we were grateful to the efforts of officers in setting things up. We ended up with I think a small but representative group of interview partners if you will and a very fruitful set of exchanges. Apart from external bodies we did talk at some length to the shared planning service and noted the quality and level of engagement that colleagues in the planning service have during youth engagement. So we took that to be something of an exemplar and we'll come back to that in just a moment. A few of the things we noted from the interviews, young people want to represent themselves so their voice does need to be heard, we need to listen. The lifestyle and culture is special and more complicated than we thought and that prompted the idea of as members and generally older people we need some training, some insight into what it's like to be a teenager, a student, a young adult. There's the COVID generation so just to give one little anecdote that Water Beach Action on Youth, the youth workers said you could distinguish those who had been suddenly projected into secondary education after having been through the lockdown period and that is a discontinuity in that group and needs to be thought about. There's worry about jobs and housing, there's detachment and disillusionment with the democratic processes and there's a very keen sense of place and a wish to help define it. There's concern about safety and the integrity of communities. That kind of mature comment on effect on communities was kind of unexpected. So these were the raw results and we had to work quite hard to turn the abstract into the specific. We did, thanks officers, thanks colleagues on the task and finish group. This was somewhat hard work but worth it. We did receive broad feedback and I think that some of the things that we hear and some of the things we'll continue to hear should go to other places, should go to county, should go to the combined authority but we should be careful to make sure that those who's expressed go to the right places. Concerned about the democratic process led to this second recommendation about talking to village colleges about talking about the democratic process. We felt the exemplary work of the shared planning service should form a pattern for other parts of the council's functions including possibly housing or business. So we've not reached an conclusion on that and that will be continuing work. We feel that reaching out to an education institution to host a meeting of SEAC, Environmental Advisory Committee, would help foster openness and a sense of working together with young people. So let's bring a committee to the place where they are as an expression of how we want to involve and then have a number of young people, perhaps through their colleges, perhaps through the groups that they associated with, bring some evidence for the committee to listen to. We had come into that bus service and public transport, of course we did and I think communicating that to the combined authority will be an effective way of those young people's voices being brought to bear on policy. Our young people form a very diverse group. I've mentioned Covid but the structure of that generation is quite involved and I think we can see a very effective contribution to our own diversity policy. Finally, members have a big role to play and already do. So the fact that we've said well we'd like members to do a bit more isn't meant to imply that members aren't doing a lot already but we hope to give some structure and support to members who wish to interact more and interacting with elected bodies, school councils, college JCRs and so on, I think will be very rewarding. So the report makes it clear that there's more to be done. The value of the report is in clarifying what that is and accepting these recommendations will perhaps gently nudge our culture and make us better able to meet the needs of this very important group of residents. I finished this by saying thanks to officers. I won't mention names particularly but the officer support was absolutely vital to reaching this result so I'm very grateful. Thank you. Thank you Councillor Stobart for seconding that motion and I call on others to contribute to the debate. No specific time limit but three minutes would be a good limit. I think I saw Councillor Cohn who's also of course chair of the scrutiny committee which was which this was a report so Councillor Cohn. Thank you chair. I'll just be very brief. I just wanted to thank Councillor Stobart for chairing the task and finish group. I endorse the recommendations that have been made. It did go through pre scrutiny and a lot of the things that were discussed at length in that meeting have now been adopted as part of that report through cabinet so I was very pleased to see that as well so thank you to the cabinet for recognising that. So yeah thank you for all your hard work on that issue. Thank you for that and I think we have Councillor Lentell first and then I'll come back to Councillor Heather Williams after that. Councillor Dan Lentell. Thank you chair just to echo the congratulations to all those involved in this. Page three asks officers to write to village colleges in south Cambridge here. Obviously in Oberon and Willingham we have a feeder secondary school in north Stowe which is not a village college. We also have the Martin Bacon academy on our doorstep and I just wonder whether this recommendation can be more inclusive. Thank you chair. I'm going to come back to Councillor Staunton at the end of this debate if I may with the indulgence of Councillor Stobart and then I'll ask Councillor Staunton another time. So it being clear that there are some questions which will need to be addressed it seems appropriate for us to refer back to the chair of the committee at the end. I now come to Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you chair and thank you for not merging my names. So first of all I'm very pleased that this has got to this point. Obviously it was a motion that I put to council some time ago. What I would do is reflect back to September 2019 when I first brought this motion. At that time I think it's fair to say I was unpopular with the administration for something I've said in the press and I feel that might be echoed again today and the leader said to me not today when the party lines voted it down so I took her advice and I brought it back because when I brought it back it was a different day, a different set of councillors and this time it went through so it just shows that sometimes you can make a mistake in the past and still rectify it in the future. I hope they learn that lesson more often chair. But I am pleased to see this. I think it is. Carry on please Councillor Williams. I've got a long way from the debate not hate campaign but the reality still doesn't quite work does it about respecting each other and I think it is important because what we do, many of the things we do are actually going to be future generations that have received the most impact so it is important that their voice gets heard and I would like to see more of them sat with us in the Chamber in the years to come and hopefully we will see the benefit of making sure that everybody has a fair say. That's not, I should emphasise it was never the intention to discourage others getting involved but we know that young people are hard to reach category and I very much look forward to seeing the fruits that this will produce. Just before I call the next speaker let me be clear that although we are having a debate on this there may be slightly different views. I have not seen anything to suggest there is disrespect across this Chamber for others views on this issue and I'd like to call councillor Dr Tumi Hawkins please. Thank you very much chair. I wasn't going to let this go without actually just acknowledging the fact that the youth work that the Greater Cambridge Shed Planning Service has been engaged in for a few years now has been held up as an exemplar in the way in which young people are being engaged in the district. I mean I say this a lot of the time whatever it is we're building now is not necessarily for us it's for our young people and as such it is important that we do hear their voice. In fact we were still hearing their voice as of yesterday when there was a careers fair at the Great Burning Bone and we had a stand there asking the five and six you know what they know about planning if they were going to be encouraged you know trying to get them to think about planning when when they're you know choosing what they'll be doing in the future so we're trying to catch them young. We also have now as I think you will realise the statement of community involvement which is out for consultation which has included engagement with young people so we have you know we do want to do this and we're glad to share the expertise that is currently within the Shed Planning Service and just to let you know the person who's leading it did win an award last year. The individual of the year award at the Fountain Education Trust inspiring future generations awards so there's a lot that we can share. Thank you. Thank you. Any other speakers on this report? Do we need to go back to Councillor Richard Stobart for any clarification on questions that have been raised? Regarding the question that Councillor Lantel raised about writing to village colleges I think it would be reasonable to broaden that out to all those in secondary education. That wouldn't be such a huge addition task and in fact I think that was the intent originally. Thank you. Members I think we've had a good if short debate on this. I didn't detect anyone in any way against the motion here and as Councillor Cohn pointed out many of the recommendations have already been taken up by cabinet on the recommendations of the pre scrutiny committee so I don't propose to take an electronic vote on this. I'm asking can we take this by affirmation? Any against any wishing to abstain that report therefore is noted and the council has agreed to the motion by affirmation. Council I'm proposing to take a break at three o'clock but let's move now to item nine. The report of the Camershire and Peterborough combined authority which is on pages 39 to 54 of your packs. The council's representatives on this are on the combined authority board, Councillor Bridget Smith, with Councillor John Williams, a substitute. The overview and scrutiny committee, councillors Judith Ripiff and Aiden van der Veier, not here today and the audit and governance committee councillor Jeff Harvey is our representative. Are there any questions for our representatives on the combined authority? Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you chair and so we have the meetings for July and August but obviously there was a meeting in September I believe of the board was there not. Perhaps the leader or Councillor John Williams can help us with that? Yeah there's always a delay in publishing the decision notices so the decision notices were available and the ones that have appeared in the packs so the decision notices for the September meeting will appear for our next council meeting. Did you have any questions in relation to that board meeting? I have in September if the chair will allow so there was the vote taken in relation to the member from this council that was representative of this council said that all options should be on the table included road charging. I was wondering if we could have clarification as to what was meant by that given what we later then had at the GCP. Leader I think you're going to refer that to councillor John Williams or I think was that meeting? Councillor Williams. Yeah thank you it was in relation to the local transport and connectivity plan which applies across Cambridgeshire and Peterborough not just Cambridge so the reference was made in that document to road pricing and I said that in respect of the whole of the combined authority area we should not rule anything out going for the future in respect of the whole of the combined authority area. Thank you. Do we have any other questions on that? Yes, councillor Dr Richie Williams. Chair my question was on a different point if that's okay. Although related to the September meeting obviously in the September transport meeting bus services have been discussed at the combined authority given that we don't meet all that often I think it will be useful for this council if we could get an update from our representative on the combined authority about the review of some bus services that's going on at the moment. What the council plans to do to argue our case? Councillor John Williams. Yeah the bus network wasn't raised at the board meeting we were dealing with the local transport and connectivity plan which is a strategic document not individual bus services that will be subject to further consultation by the CPCA officers as we go forward over the autumn and they will then be recommending a course of action to first of all the committee to the transport committee and then transport committee will advise the board in January. Sorry, Chair, we'll just come back on that. Apologies if I wasn't clear it wasn't the board I was referring to there sorry it was the transport committee meeting which I understand Councillor Macdonald attended because I saw him online attending it. I think it will be useful if this council could get an update on that bus review given that as I say we don't meet for two months and it will be useful for members to know now. Councillor Peter Macdonald. Yes, thanks Chair. As Councillor Williams will know I do represent Southcams on that committee and also double-hatted as a county councillor so discussing with county council colleagues. There haven't been any meetings yet with the officers working on the various routes that are being reviewed but we're hoping that that is going to happen very soon and I'll update him and the rest of the council when that occurs. Thanks. I see no further questions so we'll move on to item 10 Greater Cambridge partnership. Now we have no reports published in the pack there has been a draft report not draft minutes which has been circulating to members. Do our representatives on the GCP board have any comments they wish to make? Thank you, Chair. So the members will know that we had a GCP board meeting at which there was a lack of political consensus to which the board could agree to move forward so that was left with a decision not to proceed. Are there any questions for our representative on the GCP? Councillor Williams. Thank you, Chair. I attend to that meeting and it's no secret that I wasn't supportive of the plans but I would respect the honesty that Councillor Milnes shared and his dissatisfaction with the decision that was made. I appreciate there was not an easy meeting for him to attend and be at despite myself believing sort of a contrary view but it was noticeable that it was difficult and I respect that. The one thing I would like to ask though is from the Assembly we were not actually allowed to scrutinise the papers before they came to board and a statement in support of that was read out on behalf of Councillor Bridget Smith our leader so given something that scrutiny has been a something that was been very passionate about in the past could I ask is the leadership happy with the fact that the GCP Assembly was not allowed to scrutinise the papers. Does the leader want to comment on that? Not really because I'm not sure it's quite a case really because I think the recommendations are gone. I think the question was whether the leader is happy. The leader doesn't wish to respond to that. Councillor Dr Richard Williams. Thank you very much, Chair. This is a serious question because it's a question that's vitally important to everyone who lives in South Cambridge. The question is who is making decisions now on the GCP because we had a situation in the board meeting last week where our representative basically said that the making connections plan had been blown up by Councillor Haylings, the leader of the internal opposition who's not here today. Councillor Neth Shinga. Councillor Smith was not consulted on the letter that they published saying that they were in favour of light rail and ruling out the congestion charge so I think that leaves all of us who live in Cambridge or South Cambridge over the question mark really as to who's calling the shots these days. Is it the leadership of South Cambridge District Council or is it the parliamentary candidate for South Cambridge for the Liberal Democrats? Councillor Milnes. So you'll know from the early days of the establishment of the city deal with which the GCP is the point of body as a joint committee of the three councils and that decisions have to be taken by consensus among the voting members which are the three county members and without that consensus we can't take decisions unless we take them away and then bring back and vote in a majority but it was clear as I've just said earlier that there was no political consensus across those three councils which way to go. I see no further questions to our GCP board representative so I think then we'll move on to item 11 which is an update on the Oxford to Cambridge pan regional partnership report which is on pages 55 58 of your papers and I invite the leader of council to present this update report. Thank you the reports as in the papers. So are there any questions on this item? Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you. I feel like I was going to channel Councillor Nick Wright when he was here when he used to ask the leader what vision was she representing when she went to the Oxcamarch but I think I'm going to tail on what Councillor Ritter Williams said when represented here is it the council or do the parliamentary candidates have control of that as well? Peter did you want to respond to that? Yeah I mean it's a nonsense to suggest parliamentary candidates have any influence at all over the Oxford Cambridge partnership but or anything else quite honestly you know parliamentarians and parliamentary candidates have a free voice to say whatever they want and we have an MP in South Cambridge who almost on a daily basis says stuff that conflicts with his own political party which happens to be the government so you know they are free to do and say whatever they wish. On the Oxford Cambridge partnership it is a partnership it's a bottom up partnership I have you know it's now the board has now the board has now met I'm privileged to still be leading on the environment on that I think that's a knowledge that actually I've done a jolly good job over the last five and a half years to make sure that the potential for environmental enhancements is absolutely key to what the Oxford Cambridge partnership can achieve so you know this is collaborative work involving a large number of other councils of all political persuasions and you know I think if you if you've read the papers and you've seen the list of environmental projects there I think it's quite difficult for even the Conservative group to disagree with the virtue of any of them. I think we then have a question from Councillor Mark Howell. I think we then have a question from Councillor Dan Lentell. It's dangerous I should mention to move your hands in sight of the chairman but my apologies to Councillor Mark Howell. This is why it's a good idea not to go to an auction house with Councillor Howell. You'll come away with a hat stand that you didn't plan on bidding on. Chair what we're seeing with the Oxcam, I think another word to scan, what we're seeing with Oxcam is the same problem that we've got with the four day week and the same problem that we've got with transport policy which is it's not entirely clear why there hasn't been a full debate here, a proper vote here and proper overview and scrutiny of who is making the decisions and how the decisions are being made here and the leaders kind of given the gain away when she says oh what we're doing the ends justify the means and I have to say I don't think there's anything very liberal or democratic in that philosophy. Thank you. Peter did you wish to respond? I didn't hear a question so no. Well I don't, oh yes I see one more question. Councillor Dr Richard Williams. Thank you chair. I'd like to ask the leader a question about the data observatory that was set up. I mean it's quite an expensive project, it's a £175,000 budget according to the papers with a £50,000 set up fee or set up costs which is an awful lot of money to produce data on an area where there's quite a lot of data already so I would be interested if the leader could tell us what she thinks the value added is from yet another data observatory by the Oxford Cambridge region. So you're quite right there's a lot of data around but unfortunately that data doesn't all sit in one place it sits all over the place so part of the government's vision for OCP is that it facilitates inward investment so it facilitates the maximisation of the economic opportunities of those businesses that are currently within the region but also facilitates significant inward investment from elsewhere and if we're talking about people making substantial investment in the region you know they need access to the data from a single source in order for them to decide you know where is the best place for them to put their investment, what are the opportunities, what is the workforce availability, what are the supply chains that they can tap in to so I think it's about bringing all that bringing all that data together the money that's being spent on that has come directly from the Department of Health Department of levelling up local communities they've invested £2.5 million as an initial starter there all of this is under the auspices of very senior civil servants the board meetings always have senior civil servants from Duluck in them and will spend as far as I know has to have the sign off of of government as well I'm looking to Liz just to confirm that I'm right about that okay so you know money is not spent without civil servants servant approval and they and and I think you know bays are involved in this and all sorts of other government bodies and they absolutely see what the added value is as far as making sure that this country even these straightened times maintains its place economically on the world stage thank you I have further questions coming forward we encourage members to confine themselves to one question if they can but I see that both Dr Richard Williams and Councillor Dan Lentell would like to come back can I go to Councillor Drew first I've just asked the leader if she would agree with me that one of the things that always seems very very interesting about any discussion that is held in this council chamber related to the Oxford Cambridge regional partnership is that the opposition to the Oxford Cambridge regional partnership comes overwhelmingly from one group of councillors and the support for the work that she undertakes as a representative to the Oxford Cambridge regional partnership comes from another group of councillors and that somebody looking from outside might expect that the group of councillors who support the actions the government is taking in establishing the Oxford Cambridge regional partnership and providing funds and working to ensure that our two great centres of learning and our development of science and technology and the biotic industries and the transport links and all these things that are in place would the leader agree with me that it is very interesting to note that the work that is being done to support the government's work in relation to this comes from the Liberal Democrat administration and the opposition on every single occasion at this topic comes up with the ongoing criticism of the work of the Oxford Cambridge regional partnership and the questioning of the money it spends comes from the Conservative opposition who are basically saying that their own government's policy in relation to this is clearly wrong. Point of personal explanation. I'm sorry. Fair enough. We'll come back to your point in a minute. Leader, did you wish to comment on that? I'm not sure I'd detect the question there or a statement. It's a very interesting observation by Councillor Drew and I appreciate him making that observation. The whole point about partnerships, as we know from the combined authority partnership, from the GCP partnership, is about being a good partner and being able to work within partnerships because actually this, our own council here, stands to get a lot out of being a good partner, taking part in those partnerships. Councils are parochial and just hunker down within their own geographic confines. They will not flourish. We are recognised as a Liberal Democrat organisation here of being a very good partner who transcends the politics in order to maximise the benefit to this area from participating in those partnerships. Before we proceed to any further questions, I think Councillor Heather Williams has a point of personal explanation if you want to raise it. Yes, in relation to the comments by Councillor Drew because I fear he may have not quite heard me as he should have or accurately. I didn't say any comment about whether the Oxcam arc was a good or bad thing. I simply seeked to find out how the leader of the council is representing this council and the frustration over the years. That's been very difficult to come to any fruition and our job is to scrutinise how this council is represented at these bodies. No expression has been made. Councillor Heather Williams, thank you. I think we understand you feel you have been misrepresented or misunderstood. Councillor Drew is incorrect in his assertions of myself. Now, Councillor Dr Richard Williams, did you want to come back for a further question? Well, I did just want to come back on that point and I make no apologies for questioning £175,000 per year on data analysis in an area where there's already plenty of data. I would like the leader to come back to the next council with a more detailed explanation of how quite £175,000 is justified on data. It would be much better spent. The leader mentioned earlier environmental projects. We probably do agree on that. I'd much rather that money was spent on environmental projects than on data. Nearly £200,000. That seems an extra ordinary sum. Leader, I don't know whether you wish to comment on that or to come back on that. I will. It's about the will of Government. It's about the will of the Conservative Government. It's what they want. Mr Gove dictated that there would be an economic workstream and an environmental workstream. For the people leading on the economic workstream, which is not me, I've been quite clear that in order to set the foundations for the work they need to do, the starting point needs to be a data observatory. There is now a website, thank goodness, and all the minutes of all the meetings and all the information about the data observatory is all on the website. I would encourage Councillor Williams to go and have a look at the website, which will give you far more information than I can just do verbally. Councillor Lentell, you want to come back again? Yes, I just wanted to make my question clear, which is I agree with Councillor Drew, and I agree with a lot of what's been said about the Oxcam partnership. My concern is there has never been a debate in this chamber. There has never been a vote in this chamber, and it is, as has been made rather clear, hard to scrutinise what Members are doing on behalf of this council elsewhere, if it isn't clear what position they're taking and how and whom it is deciding it. So my question is, wouldn't it be better to have a proper debate about big policy areas before decisions are taken? Thank you, so just to be perfectly clear, the Oxcam partnership is not a decision making body, it absolutely does not set policy. It's not what it's about. My role on the board is to, as the lead on the environment work stream, that's why I'm on the board, because I lead on the environmental work, and I lead on it very well. So the Oxcam partnership will not be foisting any policy or any decisions on to any member council. It's a bottom-up pan-regional partnership. It does not set policy, it does not make decisions. Thank you, Leader, and Councillor Richards Stovart. Thank you, Chair. So I understand that the Oxcam, let's call it a proper thing, the Oxford to Cambridge Regional Partnership, is not concerned. Well, Leader, you've talked about, through your chair, Leader, you've talked about the environmental work stream. This is to be viewed alongside the Government's Green Finance Initiative, as I understand, which itself is very data intensive.  So unusually for the rural environment, or perhaps not unusually for the rural environment, it is data intensive. But I just wanted to add perhaps a comment and a question that the rural world is pulling in several ways in which the metropolitan world perhaps isn't. And one of those is towards supporting, if you will, development elsewhere by managing the countryside in a much better way, in a different way to the way it's been done in the past. And rural issues that I assume are coming under the regional partnership will include new approaches to transport and energy. Would the Leader might comment on the potential, if you will, coming through the partnership of development, supporting development innovations in those areas? So I think there's huge opportunities. There's going to be an all-partner conference, which will be held in Milton Keynes, on Friday 24 November. So I would encourage anybody who is interested to come to that. So it's very much in the initial forming stage. The chair of the board has just retired as the chair of Highways England, so has a background in infrastructure, as well as an enviable black book, actually. So it's always taken a very holistic approach. Whenever I speak on the environmental things, I say, this isn't just about green and blue space. This is about sustainable transport. It's about energy efficiency in houses. It's about renewable energy generation. So I think there's a lot of potential here. But it's very early days at the moment. The only thing that's really carried over from its previous iteration is the work which, Liz, myself, and very much the RSPB led on in creating the environment principles, which are going to have some additional work done to them to include such things as circular economy, which they didn't cover before. So, I mean, that's really what it's all about. And if you read the environmental principles, I think you'll understand that. Thank you, Llywydd. Now, I said a short while ago that we would have a break at three o'clock. Members will have noticed that we haven't. But I suggest we now take a short break so if we could meet again at 3.20, five minutes break enough for people, and we'll then resume with membership committees and outside bodies. Thank you. Welcome back, Members, to this meeting of the South Cambridge District Council. Council meeting. Firstly, a small apology that the Chairman is quite incapable of telling the difference between a five-minute break and a ten-minute break, and you all anticipated that difficulty. So, here we are again. We moved to item 12, membership of committees and outside bodies. Council is invited to approve the appointment of Councillor Richard Stobart as representative on the Rural Services Network and the appointment of Councillors Anna Bradman and Paul Bear Park as representatives on the A10 Ely 2014 Improvement Scheme working group. Councillor Bridget Smith to move the recommendations. Yes, I'm happy to move those recommendations. Thank you. Seconder, does anyone wish to speak to this item? Does anyone wish to speak to this item? No. So, I think no one wishes to speak on that item. Can we take that by affirmation? Any against? Any abstaining? So, we've agreed that. Are there any other membership changes that should be brought to the attention of Council? Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you, Chair. Just to note the change for our representative on civic affairs, Councillor Lina Nieto will become a full-time member of civic affairs, replacing Councillor Mark Howe and Councillor Mark Howe will become a substitute of civic affairs. Thank you for that. I don't think we need any vote, but we just note that. We then come to questions from Councillors. Item 13, and I remind everyone that a period of 30 minutes is available for questions, which includes questions which notice has been provided, as set out in the agenda, and if there is still time remaining for questions without notice. So, the first question is from Councillor Daniel Lentell. Councillor Lentell, would you like to put your question, please? Thank you, Chair. I'm happy for it to be on the order paper. Thank you, that's helpful. Lina, did you wish to respond to that? Thank you very much. So, the answer is categorically no, Councillor Lentell. It was the lack of cross-party agreement on the long-term vision that sunk chances of finding a solution at this time to congestion, air quality and a diminishing public transport system. Councillor Lentell, did you have a supplementary? Yes, I think that the notion that the residents, however we define them, of South Cambridgeshire should have been expected to pay to access their healthcare at Edinburgh's was almost, if not exactly, as disgraceful and immoral as any form of flat rate, regressive poll taxation. The question I would ask, given all the immense political damage that has been done to people who are not on the blue team in this county as a result of this omni shambles, is I told you so a question? No, okay, I don't have another question. You don't have a supplementary, but I think we note your sentiments. We then move to our next question, which is from Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you. Most of our officers work full-time and are contracted for 37 hours a week, and that equates to 7.4 hours a day. 100 of our officers work part-time, and their contracted hours range from 5 hours a week to 35 hours a week. We have a small number of people who are not contracted for a specific number of hours, but undertake occasional work for us for specific tasks. Councillor Heather Williams, did you have a supplementary? Yes, Chair. Can the leader please then give a total for the workforce the hours that are used and contracted for a day in totality, please? I can pause for her to get a calculator if she needs. I will have to give you a written response to that. Written response to that one, thank you. Councillor Graham Cohn. Thanks very much, Chair, as on the papers. Leader. The average hourly wage for our officers is £18.20 pence per hour based upon their contracted hours. Councillor Cohn, supplementary. Thank you for that answer. So, does that mean that the average cost to the taxpayer is a result is £134.68 per staff member that we're losing? Sorry, I don't understand the question. Councillor Cohn, could you rephrase the question so I don't understand it? Do you want to have another try, Councillor Cohn? Okay, no supplementary in this case. Thank you. Councillor Howell, I think he's no longer used to that, so we'll get a written response there. Councillor Sue Ellington. Thank you, Chair. I believe that any responsible manager would establish a plan B when introducing a new project. The four-day week is a new project which affects every member of staff. So, can the leader tell me what plans were put in place to revert to a five-day week should it be necessary, i.e. a plan B? Leader. Thank you very much indeed. So, I'll just start by saying that actually, you know, the data that has been collected and which is regularly updated on our website has been very supportive thus far, and I thank all our officers for all the efforts that they have put into adopting a very different style of work that has actually seen improvements in very many of our KPIs. So, there's been, because this is a trial, there's been no change to work as contractual terms and conditions. Involvement on the trial is entirely voluntary, and if one of our officers wishes to withdraw from the trial or the trial comes to an end, then they automatically revert back to their pretrial weekly hours. Did you have a supplementary question? Yes, thank you. Um, it does appear to me that staff members will have had opportunities to arrange things like childcare differently and travelling differently and various other things, but maybe the most important thing is what about new members of staff? Have they been made aware of the possibility within their contract that they will have to revert to a five-day week, or they may have to? Thank you. So, yes, of course. So, as a, you know, as a very conscious, anxious employer, new members of staff are fully aware that we are currently embarked just on a trial. They're on the beyond a five-day week contract, and they will fully understand that if the data doesn't support the continuation of the trial or something else untowards happens, then we will revert back to five-day working weeks. So, yes, of course. And the next question is from Councillor Tom Bywyd. Thank you, Chairman, as on the order paper. Thank you. So, in respect to the four-day working week, the only cost that has been occurred for reports is officer time in writing them, and officers write reports every minute of every day, and we don't specifically record the time spent on any particular type of report. The mystery shopper's exercise, which is something that we would have done anyway for the contact centre, was undertaken to support the performance information that this is provided, that is provided both to scrutiny and overview, and also to Cabinet. The cost of that was £8,800, and it highlighted the high level of service that our contact centre provides to our residents and our businesses, as well as providing useful feedback for further improvements, and that's something that we are going to embed into our annual work programme or our annual monitoring. But I should say that actually the mystery shopper exercise wasn't undertaken as part of or actually in response to the four-day week. You'll be aware there's been two staff health and wellbeing surveys in the last two years, and again this is business as usual. We do these regularly to provide both members and officers with valuable insight into the health and mindset of council officers, that we do with one for the health and mindset of councillors as well sometimes, and these are normally undertaken annually. However because of Covid, the surveys that should have taken place in 2020 and 2021 didn't take place. So the cost of the survey in 2022 was £13,794, and the one that we've just done in 2023 was £11,994. And so although these two surveys provided valuable information about the impact of the initial four-day week trial, they were categorically not commissioned specifically for that purpose. Councillor Byger, do you have a supplementary? Thank you, Jim. So the leader mentioned in her response that we don't record what officers do at their time. I was just wondering if we if she could provide further elaboration on that. So officers, they have a job to do, and their job will include writing reports on whatever it is in their service area. So we don't micromanage people to the extent whereby we need to record every 10 minutes of their time. They have a job to do and they do that job. Councillor Bunty Waters. Thank you, Chair. That's on the agenda paper. Thank you. Can Councillor Henry Bachelor take this one, please? Yeah, thank you, Chair. Firstly, thank you for Councillor Waters for adding a bit of variety to the topic of the questions that we've had today. I'm perfectly happy to answer one, not on the four-day week. So the answer to the question is £450,700 for one, so two lorries would be double that. Councillor Waters, did you want to come back with another question? Thank you, Chair. Yes, please. How far do they go? Do they go out to all the villages, rural villages, or are they very central? So technology is improving all the time. The first couple of electric bin lorries we had had a much shorter range. They could only go in and around Water Beach in Cambridge, but now the range is a lot better and they have been known to come out to Linson, for example, which is very far away. I don't know if they've made it to the far reaches of Gamlingay yet, but as I said, technology is improving all the time, so yet they are getting more and more range. Councillor Dr Richard Williams. Thank you very much, Chair. My question is as on the order paper. Thank you. Councillor Williams, you described as a four-day week experiment. It's a trial of an experiment. There's no direct cross associated with publicising or managing changes to bin collections as far as the four-day week is concerned. As I'm sure you know, the waste collection rounds are optimised and updated every four to five years. The exercise was due for the Greater Cambridge Shared Waste Service as it was last done in 2017-2018. So publicising bin collection changes as part of this is just business as usual, and that would be undertaken when new waste collection rounds are developed. The officer time spent in project groups and running workshops in relation to the four-day week since May 2023 has been 237 officer hours, and that equates to a cost of £4,313. The amount of time members of the communications team spend responding to inquiries about any policy is not specifically recorded because they're managing numerous inquiries about all sorts of things all of the time. Take them more time to monitor it than it would to answer the questions I imagine. Councillor Williams, do you have a follower? I do have a follower. I mean, I thank the leader for that, but I mean, come off it. I don't think you are writing to every single household in the district about changes to bin collections, and that was totally miraculously unconnected to the fact that we had a four-day bin trial starting.  The cost of sending a letter to every single household in the district is quite significant, and it was because of the four-day week trial. We all know that. We all know that because that's why the bins were, the order was messed up. So in Treplo, in my ward, people went three weeks for that, a black bin collection in Whittlesford. We went two, three weeks for that, a blue bin collection, so people had recycling all over the place. So, come off it. It's high time, I think, that this administration flagged down a cab and headed for real street and understood the strength of anger that there is out there about the four-day trial and the staggering cost to this council of this experiment that they are undertaking because experiment it is. We know the hundreds of thousands of pounds extra per year it costs to go to four-day bin collection because you can't simply do it with the same stuff and the same number of bin lorries as you do in a five-day week.  Leader, do you want to take that as a question or as a say?  I have given you the facts. Round optimisation has to take place every four or five years. You are well aware of the growth in our area and that the rounds have become less efficient and so it is a business as usual piece of work to do the round optimisation, which absolutely of course results in letters being sent to every single household, as I imagine it probably did in 2017-2018 when the Conservatives were running this council.  I am presenting you with facts and I think some lessons in courtesy are called for. Members, I don't think the word liar was used. I don't know whether Chancellor Williams would like to make a point of personal explanation. I am opposition. My recycle bin is grown new with letters from the Liberal Democrats saying how wonderful the government is because that's what oppositions do. Of course, they don't.  Then we move to the next question. It's from Councillor Peter Sanford. Thank you chair. My question is on the order paper. Councillor Mills will take this question. Thank you. Thank you Jack and thank you vice-chair for your question. So Action on Energy is a partnership scheme between the Cambridge Councils looking to access government and energy company funding for housing retrofit for our residents. However, we define those. There are fourth live funding streams. There's been a change. I think there was some realisation after hug one which is the home upgrade grant that we should make some changes to that scheme. They're currently undergoing that reappraisal. There's been a change in staff in between hug one and hug two. And I think some important learnings to be taken from that. The hug two, the home upgrade grant follows on from two previous schemes. So substantive, so sorry, sustainable warmth and hug one. And it's focused on off gas properties with an energy performance certificate D or below. So it's designed to bring housing up to a minimum standard C and preferentially more than that if possible. So it's a very useful scheme for our residents to take part in accepting that it was possibly imperfect previously but important learnings that have gone into this second phase. So, Councillor Samford, we hear that lessons have been learned from hug one and taken into help two. Do you want to ask a supplementary of that? Yes, please, chair. I only became aware of these schemes when I was approached by actually the mother of a resident who submitted an application under hug one 18 months ago and is still waiting for contractors to turn up to begin the work. They felt they were being bounced from pillar to post between the county, the district and the commercial contractor. I had a very productive meeting with Alex Snelling Day and her team who explained the situation as you've given us an overview and the improvements they're planning, which include a welcome back, a designated point of contact. But I would like to ask the leader if we can make sure this scheme is reviewed from time to time, scrutinised to make sure residents know where their application is and they aren't left in the cold, literally speaking. I'm more than happy as the lead member for environment to take that on board. I have regular conversations and meetings with our team including Alex Snelling Day. So I'll take back your comments and your particular case. I've also had something not dissimilar where an application seems to have disappeared into some unknown area. So there's clearly work to be done, but I know that the officers involved are very keen on making those improvements. Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from Council Lisa Ridwick, who is online, but normally we would say that we would take your question and give you a written response. Do you want a written response or do you want to put your question? I don't mind whichever is preferable from the normal practice is fine by me. I wonder whether the leader or possibly the chief executive would like to respond to this. I'm happy to take a question since Council Ridwick has taken the trouble to join us online. Thank you. Thank you very much for your question. We've already covered this to some degree. The answer is yes. The environment projects and programmes we've taken forward have been set out in the earlier report on the OxCam partnership and again there's more detail available on the website. There are a number of them that are significant in terms of helping us address the climate emergency and support our own doubling nature strategy, which of course is a strategy that's been picked up elsewhere. So one critical one is establishing a green finance mechanism to explore the opportunity for large landscape and catchment scale investment opportunities and I think that fits in very happily with our own emerging local plan and our call for green sites. Working across boundaries with partners such as local nature partnership to deliver our local nature recovery strategies and that's obviously sitting with the county council at the moment, but overseen by the combined authority. And then the first step in a South Midlands community forest, building on the achievements of the community forest of Marston Vale, which if you haven't been there is very, very worth going to and that's with a view of increasing the tree canopy coverage across the region and bearing in mind we're a region with fewer trees than just about any other part of the country and then investment in regionally significant environmental infrastructure while developing farming clusters and sustainable land management practices again highly pertinent to a rural area like us. So you know I think there's lots of opportunities and I thank you for asking the question, Councillor Redrup. Thank you very much, I don't have a supplementary. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Redrup. And the next question is from Councillor Richard Stomart. Thank you, Chair. So I've been overtaken by events here. There has been an announcement of December's Christmas Market, so I'm going to foreshorten it, my question. How is this year's Christmas Market going to build on the experience of last year's? Thank you. And I'm sorry that we slightly stymied your question by announcing the date. One of the reasons we had to announce the date, and I'm sorry to use the word Christmas on October 5th, was because we got so many inquiries from traders who came last year. We had about 70. We will have 70 again. Last year we did a short survey of all those that attended to ask them what they thought about the quality of the organisation and the attendance and also to get a rough idea of how much income they derived, and the answer was a total of about £25,000. So we feel it's worthwhile, both the community and the traders, and we hope to do it again. Thank you. Councillor Stomart, do you have supplementary to that? To generalise a little bit, how do these big events in general inform, well, help local businesses, but inform also South Cam's policy in regard to those businesses? Thanks. Well, as you know, the focus of the business team and the economic development is very much around SMEs. It's literally down to sole traders, or maybe two or three. The focus of the market was very much at that group of people. Some of them are complete startups. Two or three that attended last year's Cambor market was the first market they attended. It's an important exercise in pump priming the local economy, albeit from a very small base. Thank you. No other questions have been notified to the democratic services manager before the meeting. So we'll then move on to item 14, which is motions for debate. I'd remind members that the maximum period of 30 minutes is allowed for each motion to be moved seconded and debated. That includes dealing with amendments. And at the expiry of the 30-minute period, the debate will stop immediately. The mover of the original motion will be given opportunity to respond. So we only have one motion before us, 14A, which is the motion standing in the name of Councillor Heather Williams. Before I introduced this item, I invite Councillor Heather Williams to put her motion. I would draw members' attention to what it says in part 13.6A of our council standing orders. But as this motion seeks to determine an executive function that is the trial on the four-day week, I think it relates to, there will not be a vote at the end and the item will be referred to cabinet for decision. Councillor Heather Williams, did you want to put your motion? Thank you, Chair. Before I bring my motion that's on the order paper, I'd first like to bring a motion without notice to suspend the standing order 13.6A. Right. Well, before we proceed to that, firstly, do you have a seconder for that? Thank you. And I'm not going to, unusually, I'm going to ask our monitoring officer just to explain the consequences of such a vote where we two agree to it. Because I don't suppose we are all immediately familiar with 13.6A. Thank you, Chair. If 13.6A is suspended as per the motion without notice, that would mean that when we, when you debate the substantive motion, it would proceed and it would end with a substantive vote today. So, the effect of 13.6A is that it will be debated but there is no vote at the end. It is automatically referred and this motion without notice is seeking to suspend that to effectively invite you to debate and vote on the substantive motion today. Thank you. Just to remind members, if a motion seeks to determine an executive function, it shall, upon being duty moved, seconded and debated, stand referred to the cabinet to take the final decision and the proposal here is to suspend that. And we have a seconder. Does anyone wish to speak against that motion? Thank you. No, I reject that motion because this is a cabinet matter and it is right and proper that it is referred back to cabinet. Does anyone else wish to speak? Does Councillor Cohn wish to speak at the seconder? Just that I'm happy to support the motion as it stands. I don't see any others. I suspect, I suggest we move directly to a electronic vote on this. So, members, if you want to support the suspension of standing orders, then you vote green. If you want to reject the suspension of standing orders, then you vote red. Does everyone voted who wishes to vote? I think so. So, we have eight for that plenty against that motion. So, that motion is defeated and standing order 136A stands. So, at the end of this debate, there will be no vote and the matter will be referred to cabinet for decision no doubt taking account of this debate. Do you wish to propose your original motion in the light of that outcome? Councillor Williams. Yes, Chair. And in moving my motion, I will make as many points as I can because I realise I will have difficulty if the leader reaches for 13.6C to throw it out with no debate as she's already got her hand indicating chair as the deputy is eagerly trying to draw your attention to. But I do still at least get to move the motion. The four day week is something that affects every single one of our residents whether you're a Liberal Democrat, councillor, a Conservative councillor or an independent councillor. Every single one of our residents is affected by this trial. Also, the figures that were provided earlier, even if we base it on the original 470 members of staff mean that £3.3 million will be spent in 12 months on salary for hours not worked. That is a huge amount of money. Tax payers money, I'll provide the maths later, deputy leader if you need them. That really is such a fundamental decision to use and to take that the exclusion of all councillors I think is absolutely awful and I think it shows complete contempt for the majority 80% of residents in South Cambridgeshire. Now I reflected earlier on the fact that when I first came with my youth engagement motion it got voted down and later on it was decided that it was the right thing to do. I've been reminded by colleagues that in 2007 blue bins were introduced by this council and the Lib Dem opposition kicked up a fuss about that and it was an awful awful thing. Now would any of us be without the blue bins now so I hope you've had a change on heart because I don't think with the rest of your spending we could afford to replace them. North Stowe when it came to community facilities in North Stowe we said the proposal was not feasible and would not work that was originally put on the table and we said that the modular option was the best way to get things to North Stowe as quickly as possible. No no we were ignored again and then later on the administration had to accept that we were right and then we go back to it but how much time wasted how many residents went without for that period of time and then most recently congestion charge we've said that it's not the right proposal you said it's not the right thing to do we've been laughed at we've been told we don't care and yet then all of a sudden the proposals fall because the South Cambridgeshire Lib Dem group have a change of heart and a change of direction I appreciate that is not every single member of the Liberal Democrat group and that was made quite clear so I'm going to refer us now back to what I said when I gave my annual report when I gave advice to the administration to change course I asked you to change direction before it was too late I said that this council's reputation and the residents who live here could not afford to continue with what was happening reputational damage to this council is extremely high at present when I say that I'm a councillor of South Cambridgeshire as I did throughout our conference recently people instantly know of this and they instantly believe now that we are the joke council I don't want to live in a joke council and I am extremely concerned that all of this has happened with no consultation with residents and in fact that we have not been allowed a vote Democrat is in your party name and yet as an MP joked it doesn't feel very democratic around here does it so we were right about your engagement we were right about Norso we were right about the blue bins some of you at least agree we were right on congestion charge please don't play games you already allowed us a vote look at what is being asked for a report to come to council and for us to debate it in the normal way that should not be controversial it should not be controversial or ignored the fact that all councillors would want to have a say in how this council is being fundamentally changed and given that we now face potential financial penalties for doing it we've all seen the letters we all know what's potentially on the cards and yes again you're still not even allowing us at the next meeting to have a vote as whether it continues or not you need I'm afraid to listen on this I told you so we said earlier and I think actually in congestion charge completely completely right but it's not a nice feeling because I have pride for where I live I've pride for the residents I represent and people can shake their heads and laugh but at the end of the day every one of you will have to look your residents in the eye and if I appreciate cabinet administration you've made your decision but there's plenty of people in here that are not part of that cabinet it was very brave for councillor Brian Mills to speak in the way he did and I've shown respect to that last time people are on the Lib Dem back benches you have the opportunity to vote here if you want to I told you for your conclusions to your remarks to a conclusion I will do chair try and get some control of this if your cabinet won't you need to before all a complete laughing stock thank you councillor James I would just say that I haven't seen anyone laughing at what you're saying and that would be disrespect that would be let me make it clear that would be disrespectful if that were to happen I would seek to pick it up immediately I wouldn't like you to respond to that if you don't mind I would just leave it at that and ask councillor Graham Cone who I think is offered to second this whether you want to speak now or at the end of the debate I'm happy to speak now chair so I don't think we should be afraid of this motion I think it's perfectly reasonable to have a report at the next meeting I think it's perfectly reasonable for all councillors to have their say and a vote on this issue and I really don't think we should be afraid of this motion as it stands which is why I support it thank you who would like to speak on this I think I have both the leader and the deputy leader leader did you want to speak thank you so I'll start by quoting council Williams so every single one of our residents will be affected by our four day retrial every single one of our residents will be affected by the money we save currently standing at £760,000 every single one of our residents will be affected by the improvement to our services which are quite clearly cited in our quarter one performance reports every single one of our residents will be affected by us having permanent rather than agency staff every single one of our residents will benefit from us not having to manage the confusion of bank holiday mondays for our waste collection every single one of our residents will benefit from our vacancies attracting far more applicants for those posts of a much higher caliber in the past every single one of our residents will be affected by the increased hours in our contact centre and the web chat that we just launched every single one of our residents will be affected by the turbo charging of our transformation program especially in planning and should we decide to recommend that this becomes that we become a four day wait council there will be a there will be a consultation there will be a full consultation and there will be a vote in council and every single one of our residents will benefit and is benefiting from this administration being innovative in exactly the way that Michael Gove called for us to be at the LGA conference. I think next was councillor Hobro thank you chair so I wanted to draw attention to the facts that in the last few years there have been some very rapid changes in the way that businesses operate and this council competes in um as an employer in a highly competitive and changing jobs market in the Cambridge area which is very successful and has some businesses that compose some very high salaries we're accountable to our residents and taxpayers and we should constantly be looking for ways to improve the value of money that we provide to them this trial was proposed a year ago at a time when this council suffered from serious problems recruiting to a number of full time positions at that time we were spending £2 million a year on temporary agency staff for those positions many of which ought to have been filled by dedicated permanent staff and this was placing a significant burden on our taxpayers I suggest that it would have been negligent not to address this problem so this is a trial of a working practice that has been tried and tested and demonstrated significant success in the private sector if we as a public sector organisation don't adapt and offer competitive working conditions to our employees then we will not be able to attract and retain the talented and dedicated workforce that we need to offer value for money to our residents and taxpayers there was an initial three month trial of these new working conditions from January to March this year at which point the report was published since the initial trial was successful it was extended for a further year at which point I understand there will be a full report and a decision in full council additionally I understand there have been regular reports to the employment and staffing committee and all these reports are publicly available there has also been regular scrutiny of the whole process in the scrutiny and overview committee so far the results of the trial have been extremely promising the council's performance is measured by the key performance indicators has not suffered but continues to improve I understand that we've recruited permanent employees to around half of the positions that were previously vacant and this is not only saving over £700,000 per year for taxpayers but it's already helping to improve our services by bringing in more permanent dedicated staff I don't know about other council's experiences but I've already seen improvements on the ground in everyday case work as a result of permanent staff being in positions that they should always have been in so I believe that we should only pursue changes like this if they genuinely provide improved value for money for taxpayers at this point it looks very much as if this trial is delivering exactly that but we should allow the trial to be completed before we draw any final conclusions so I'm speaking in opposition to the motion as this trial appears so far to be successful but we should allow it to proceed unimpeded to completion and then review the results objectively once it's finished thank you thank you council Salianne Hart sorry thank you chair um firstly I'd just like to assure council that another four day week report will be presented to employment staff and committee ahead of its meeting on the 9th of November 2023 that's when the next employment staff meeting is and that report is available to all members secondly regarding this motion I believe to go back on a commitment to employees and and not see the trial through could be seen as a betrayal we've already heard that yet more hard to fill vacancies have been recruited to and significantly in planning and I've no doubt the offer of a four day week had a significant part to play in this and I'm just pulling my memory back so I think that the data in the most recent report to employment and staffing indicated this alongside the fact that people who are initially unsuccessful at interview will be more likely to to reapply for roles at scdc due to the four day week I know I'm certainly looking forward to hearing further updates on recruitment and figures associated with not having to pay agency staff alongside details on staff retention and if in November if not before and I'd really like to encourage members and and also members of the public to refer to the council's website page on the four day working week which is regularly updated and I'd also like to take this opportunity to say that I actually feel quite well I feel proud to be a member of a council that is so forward thinking to pour the four day week rug now from underneath the feet I think could lead to a real reduction in recruitment I'd like to remind members that there are still a number of hard to fill vacancies I think it could also lead to reduction in staff retention and performance and I wonder how can this council fulfil its duties to residents if they do not have enough skilled and experienced human resources in place the four day week trial therefore needs to be continued to march 2024 thank you next I have councillor Tom Beiber thank you chairman our country is a democracy and it's one of the oldest democracies in the world and we're a democracy for a very good reason because public government is far better when it's done for the benefit of the people and when elected representatives represent the people now we've had a very strange debates series of debates today we've had a debate about independent member of the ordinary governance committee and we had we were sort of treated to a whole discussion about how somebody wants to really be actively engaged in public life and why they've chosen not to be on the electoral role because it's very strange can I ask you to confine your remarks to the current motion if you would and each of us here represents our wards we represent people and our wards these are people who are going to be greatly affected by this we don't represent our party in the sense that we have to do what the government says if we're on the same party we represent our residents and our wards and that's what we're here for and there are certain democratic conventions now they may not be enshrined in rule 13 6a but there are democratic conventions that major decisions are taken by those who directly represent the people and the administration should not be seeking to hide behind various some you know minor points in the constitution in order to stifle democratic accountability having a public debate on a major issue that's affecting our residents is the right thing to do now of course i realized that full council can't make all decisions directly minor matters have to be delegated to various committees and done in other ways because otherwise we would have so many matters before us we wouldn't have time to consider them but this is one of the most important things that's happened as council for years for decades even you know we've had letters from government ministers we've had articles written in national newspapers we've had the BBC other forms of national media this has attracted an enormous amount of public attention to what this council is doing and given the gravity of all of that for our members representing people in our wards not to be able to have a vote on that is simply undemocratic thank you uh councilor brahmillans thank you chair the leader of our opposition implores us to listen um but who will we listen to shall we listen to her friends in tufton streets the taxpayers alliance or any of the other um interesting right wing organisations that emanate from from there or shall we listen to uh government ministers like michelle donnelly who repeated i think this idea that uh councils in the country were demanding seven bins uh per week collections or shall we listen to the data because that's imperative what do we want we want evidence-based policy when do we want it after peer review is a very Cambridge joke but on a serious point we are part way through a trial we need for that to complete and if it shows the evidence that you claim it to it will be clear and apparent to everybody that the trial has failed equally if the performance is maintained if the recruitment is improved as currently the data will evidence then we need to carry on and complete that trial and our reputational uh or the the claimed reputational damage that's the leader of the opposition presents will be shown by that data to be false that actually it's a very good idea to innovate to do continual improvement and to offer best value to our residents exactly as the current government asks us to do right chair could i give notice of a motion without notice please i think we've got to the point so i refer you to uh i 14d in the standing orders i think we've heard the arguments i think things are getting repetitive so i think this is the point at which we should vote to refer this motion to cabinet right uh you have a seconder the motion without notice is to refer something to the cabinet or committee if past the matter shall stand immediately deferred and shall not be further considered at the meeting i do not propose to take an extended debate on this motion however uh i already had uh counsellor lentel and counsellor williams wanted to speak do i have any others wanted to speak i emphasise that we are now debating a motion to take this matter directly to cabinet we are not any longer debating the substance of the motion but originally uh counsellor williams first thank you very much chair um in in that spirit um the leader just asserted in in moving this motion that there was no new information uh to be um put forward on this topic i would like to oppose a motion by pointing out that there is new information to put forward on this topic for example much emphasis has been laid in uh the case that the governing the administration has made about the supposed savings which was 300 000 500 000 700 000 it's very difficult to keep up but some of us some of us can take on the trouble to look at these numbers counsellor williams could we keep the substance of the motion we're now debating which is whether the matter be referred directly to the committee i am i believe i am by illustrating the fact that there is more debate to be had here and therefore i think it is not right to foreclose debate so for example i think it is perfectly legitimate that members are able to critique the data that is coming from the administration uh because some of the posts that you're claiming are direct savings of the four day week were actually filled before the four day week started and one of them was even filled before the four day week was announced so i think there's plenty of time for debate here about the spurious data that we're being given um to justify this policy i've looked into it maybe you haven't but some of those posts you're claiming were filled before the trial even started and as i say one of them before it was even publicly announced so please stop using figures that just do not bear any relation to reality and i think it is vital that we continue the debate and we are able to bring all of this out into the public domain we are debating a motion under 14d we are not debating a closer motion uh that would have been an option but that is not the debate we are now having so does anyone else wish to contribute to the debate on 14d i have councilor lentel i'm not intending this to be an extended debate and i would be most grateful if members would keep their comments to the point on this one the complaint is that this council isn't providing sufficient democratic input from all people i actually i'm in favour of the four day week i live the four day week i'm is i'm a full time carer i would like to have my say and i would have liked to have had to say about how i think different approaches to the four day week could have been undertaken that weren't simply about retrofitting four in seven working on roles designed advertised and built on a basis before it's on and councillor smith you are interrupting and it's extremely rude but what you are doing is politically reckless the the the complaint is that you are not acting in a democratic behaviour in a democratic way and you're responsive to shut down debate i mean open goals really councilor lentel i think the next contribution is from the leader thank you can i just propose remove this to the vote please because you know this the the debate that's that is happening now is not a debate about the the motion without notice it is deviating on to the the previous motion which rather defythe point that this needs to go to cabinet which is the right and proper place for it to happen i think we've had plenty of time to debate it i'm sorry now we're not taking another motion while we're debating this motion we're debating a motion under 14 d and that precludes us from moving straight to a motion a closure motion under 14 j so under 14 d councillor heather williams thank you chair we've already had it that we're not going to vote i think it's incredibly important there are people that have not had time to contribute to the to the motion the leader and council have had it that we can't vote at the end yet there are things that still need to be said and there are people that have not been given the chance to contribute um and when it comes to data after what we've seen how can we trust any so-called independent report that's put in front of us we have to be allowed to debate this in our own council chamber and i think and also can someone refer to be where the leader in the constitution is allowed to just cut off and interrupt anything she just doesn't like we had reached the point where there were only two further speakers both of whom we since heard from who wanted to speak to the original motion i therefore think that it is time for us to move to a motion i therefore think that it is time to move to a vote on the motion before us which is under 14 d to refer the matter now to the cabinet and if past this matter shall stand immediately deferred and should not be further considered at this meeting uh it's clear to me there will not be uh consensus on that so i propose to a move to a recorded vote on that um if you agree to the motion moved by the leader an electronic vote if you agree to the motion put forward by the leader then you will vote press green if you disagree then you will press red so on the question has everyone who wishes to now voted i think so a certain number of leftists right so the result is that the leader's motion is passed 19 votes in favour eight votes against uh the matter is now referred to the cabinet and there shall be no further consideration at this meeting i'm therefore going to move to the last item of business which i think need not to take us long item 15 chairs engagements and just to report that since our last council meeting i attended a royal visit to lower valley farm fullborn by his royal highness the ducum Gloucester i would draw members' attention to the work being undertaken led partly by the county council at lower valley farm which i think will be very important to this council as we have to make judgments on offsite biodiversity net gain on 24th of august i attended the mobile food hub in dexford duxford and would very much commend the work of that hub and i had the opportunity to speak to a lot of people who really did depend on that many of whom had been initially very reluctant to come forward um and had been persuaded and i think it's very important if i may say so for us as councillors to encourage those in difficulties not feel any shame or reluctance to come forward when they need help and on the 29th of september i visited the wing commander's welcome reception at raf alcumbri um a us airforce base which as members may know no longer has a runway but does evidently a lot of very valuable work and is a sign of continuing commitment by us airforce um i would only comment briefly that i was astonished by the number of mayors that there are in in this region all of whom i was very privileged to have met uh i think this draws this meeting of council to a close and the next council meeting will be held on 30th of november also at 2 p.m. thank you we close the meeting at 4 23 p.m. thank you