Full Council, 14 October 2026

00:00:00Do that. Oh, my goodness. My children get to hear about that. That's actually worse than mine. So that's because everything's on shift. Wonderful. Thank you very much for your forbearance, everybody. We are now ready to start. Technology wizards have done their wizarding and we are ready to go.

00:00:44Councillor Goodman, please. Mike, thank you. OK, thank you very much, everybody. Welcome to this full council, actually planned full council meeting on Wednesday, the 14th of October, 2026. I am your chair, Councillor Eleanor Rylands, and I'd like to welcome all members of the public and all of you who are here and anybody who is watching online to our meeting. Right. Health and safety. In the event of a fire alarm sounding, there is no fire alarm planned.

00:01:14So please, would you leave the building by the nearest exit, which can be behind you? They're indicated by the green running man sign above the doors. Make your way to the rear of the car park over there and wait until the organiser of the meeting tells you it is safe to return. The meeting can be viewed live online on the council's YouTube channel and is being recorded and will be available on YouTube at the end of this meeting and for a long time hence.

00:01:39The agenda and papers have been published in advance on the council's website. Could I please request that councillors and officers, when speaking about items in the agenda, refer to the page and hopefully also the item number so that people can find their place because everybody's following on slightly different devices. Right, meeting good practice. Councillors Brown and Hughes, please. I can hear too much of you. Sorry. Please only speak at the chair's invitation.

00:02:07Switch the microphone on your desk and if you're not yet logged into your microphone, could you please do that now with your pass? And speak directly into the microphone and then switch your microphone off when you have finished speaking.

00:02:19Thank you. Because otherwise other people in the room can't hear. Turn any mobile devices to off or silent right now, please. If you've not already done so, log in. I know I would have said that one, but I'll say it again. If you're having trouble logging into your microphone, please ask Andrew and he'll come and help you with the other keys. If you are asked to stop speaking by the chair, would you please stop speaking?

00:02:41We're now going to start this meeting by doing a roll call and declarations of interest rolled into one, as you may remember. This will cover off items, both the roll call and agenda item two. And I'm going to ask our Democratic Services Officer for the evening, Andrew, to do the roll call.

00:02:56Over to you, Andrew. Thank you very much, Chair. Okay, Councillors, roll call and declarations of interest, please, from Councillor Arnott. Present and none. Thank you. Councillor Aurora bailey present no declarations thank you andrew and Councillor Brian bailey present no declarations thank you andrew Councillor Jess bailey present no declarations Councillor Barlow present no declarations I'm aware of Councillor Blakey present and no Mayor. Councillor Bloxham. Present, and no declarations.

00:03:49Councillor Colin Brown. Principal Burup. Present, and no declarations of interest. Councillor Chapman. Present, no declarations. Councillor Bethany Collins. Present, thank you, and no declarations. Apologies for my technical difficulties.

00:04:33Thank you, that's okay. Councillor Roy Collins. Present, no declarations. Councillor Olly Davey. No, Councillor Davey, thank you. Councillor Dumper. Present, and no declarations. I think Councillor Olly Davey is an apology tonight.

00:05:02Thank you, Councillor Dunper. Councillor Faithfull. Present, no declarations. Councillor Fernley. Present and no declarations. Councillor Fitzgerald. Councillor Gazzard. Present, no declarations, thank you. Councillor Goodman. Present and no declaration of interests. Councillor Anne Hall. Present and nothing to declare, thank you. Councillor Matt Hall. He sends his apologies, thank you.

00:05:40Thank you very much. Councillor Hayward. Present and no declarations, thank you. Councillor Heath. Present and no declarations. Councillor Hookway. Present, no declarations, thank you. Councillor Hay. Present, no declarations that I know of.

00:06:03Thank you. Councillor Hughes. Present, no declarations. Councillor Ingham. Councillor Jackson. Present, no declarations, thanks. Councillor Jefferies. Present, no declarations, thank you. Councillor Johns. Present, no declarations, thank you. Councillor Jung. Present, no declarations. Councillor Ledger. Senses, apologies.

00:06:42Thank you very much. Councillor Veen person nothing to declare thank you Councillor Mackinder present no declarations Councillor Mason present no declarations thank you Councillor Martin present no declarations thank you Councillor Mccone present no declarations Councillor Mccumb present no declarations thank Councillor O'Leary, Councillor Ollis Present and no declarations, thank you Councillor Parr Present, no declarations, thanks Councillor Richards, Councillor Riddell Present and no declarations Councillor Rylands, please Present, no declarations, thank you Councillor Wallace Present and no declarations, thank you Thank you, Councillor Westerman Present, no declarations Councillor Wilson Present, no declarations And Councillor Raig Present, no declarations Thank you very much, Members Over to you now, Chair Thank you very much, Andrew Oh, Councillor King Did you miss Councillor King?

00:08:21Am I needed tonight? Very much so, Councillor King I'm present and I have no that's okay thank you very much I had received or thought I'd received apologies from Councillor King but clearly not the case so apologies for that Councillor King very glad you're here right so moving back to agenda item one apologies for absence we have had some apologies in during the roll call Andrew can you tell us who has said they were going to be absent and then we'll take other absences from the floor thank you yes thank you very much chair so this evening we have apologies from Councillor Chamberlain Councillor Chubb Councillor Ollie davy Councillor Fitzgerald Councillor Matt hall Councillor Hartnell Councillor Hawkins Councillor Hunt Councillor Ingham Councillor Ledger Councillor Loudoun Councillor Wibley Councillor Smith and Councillor Rixson and finally Councillor O'leary happy to take any other apologies from the floor are there any more apologies forthcoming no I don't see anybody motioning at me thank you very much everybody right moving on swiftly to agenda item three which is minutes of the previous meeting

00:09:42We have got um theoretically we would have two sets of minutes we've only got one set of minutes in the actual agenda pack I think because we had two meetings uh the second one obviously was in part B so it wouldn't be very exciting but it will come to the next meeting yeah it was a technical issue meant that we ended up with two sets of the same meeting minutes does anybody have any amendments or questions or anything they would like to add to those minutes or are you happy to note them and move on I don't see anybody motioning at me so I'm going to presume that you're happy to note them and move on thank you very much everybody right agenda item four public speaking there are six people registered to speak tonight one speaker was unable to attend so there is a statement to read out in his stead which Andrew will do later I think are you going to do that last Andrew yes okay so we will take I will give you the list of the public speakers

00:10:32I'll just call you in the order in which you are in the agenda because it's simpler that way right first up we have mr. Nigel Humphrey and then following that will be mr. John Hamill so mr. Humphrey if you could make your way to the hot podium please and then when you're ready if you when you press the right hand button you get three minutes hang on a second there may be a a tech issue again I think andrew's coming to log it in I think it just needs logging in with a card don't worry your three minutes haven't started yet has it worked have you

00:11:34Pressed the button on it okay are you ready go for it at the full council meeting in april I raised various issues and concerns and stated that we, the public, were being ignored. EDDC, in response, stated we were not being ignored. Yet, nearly 2,800 objections to EXMO20 and Reg 19 have been ignored. And in February and May this year, I've sent emails to all SPC councillors asking specific questions, with follow-up emails in July, all ignored.

00:12:10I repeated my questions at the SPC meeting on the 22nd of September, but only some were answered. In addition to this, there were five speakers at this meeting, and not one of the points raised by these speakers was given the courtesy of being discussed at this meeting. Only advanced questions were answered, and then councillors were informed that only the report updates in the agenda could be discussed or commented on. So are we being ignored or not. On the subject of EXMO20, all we have asked every time is for this to be given a fair hearing, and we keep on being told that our concerns have been listened to and have been given careful consideration. But just look at the SPC meetings since EXMO20 was allocated in September 2024, and it is clear that this is not the case. The fact that SPC members have admitted at several meetings that they made a mistake by allocating EXMO20.

00:13:15Should speak volumes to you. Look at the video for the July 2025 meeting. On the subject of fairness, the report presented on the 2nd of September 2025 was not fair. All of a sudden any possible replacement for EXMO20 was restricted to Exmouth itself when it was known in advance that there was no site or sites that could replace it from Exmouth. Then we are told that to remove EXMO20 would be a significant change and would result in another 5,000 homes being added. There is no definition of what a significant change is and the significant change excuse is being used to retain EXMO20 without knowing what is and is not a significant change.

00:14:07Decisions should not be made based on unverified views. I leave you with two thoughts. This is an East Devon district plan, not an Exmouth plan. If sites are not suitable, sustainable or viable, then why are they allocated? They should not be included just because it helps with the numbers. Two, you will be asked to approve the draft Local Plan soon and need to be sure that it is sound and legally compliant.

00:14:36The plan is neither of these and should not be approved for submission.

00:14:40Thank you for your time. Thank you, [member of the public]. Next, we have [member of the public], and after [member of the public] will be [member of the public]. [member of the public]. So, [member of the public], please, would you come up? Acting on the advice of your supreme leader, Councillor Arnott, we recently attended a public meeting organised by David Reid.

00:15:20The sole purpose of the meeting was to give local people the opportunity to raise their questions, concerns and views about the proposed EXMO20 development. It was open, cross-party and focused on understanding the evidence. [member of the public] raised a question during the meeting addressed to you, councillors. He asked, if you cannot make a difference to our local community, what is the point of you being here? We have heard from SPC councillors regularly over the last two years that your hands are tied.

00:15:49There's nothing you can do. This is forced on you. And with one brave exception, not one of you has said no. I put myself forward as a Councillor To make a difference in East Devon. I am not just a conduit for local political expediency or government. A few of you did attend [member of the public] meeting, listened to the debate and engaged with your electorate. Yet all of you received an email from your legal officers instructing you not to attend because it might prejudice your impartiality when, or perhaps if, you had the opportunity to vote on the draft Local Plan.

00:16:24It seems to me offensive that Council of Employees, who after all work for you and me, question your ability to hear arguments impartially. partially. In fact, according to your own website, your duties as a Councillor Include supporting local partnerships and organisations to campaign on local issues. Either your officers do not know this is your role or they don't trust you. If you would have been prejudiced by attending [member of the public] meeting, you had better shut your ears now because tonight you will inevitably hear about EXMO20. And the last thing we want is for the Local Plan and EXMO20 to be voted on only by councillors who know nothing at all about it. What is happening to democracy here? You must know that we have garnered support from across the community against the inclusion of EXMO20 in the draft Local Plan. 2,900 comments were made against the site under Chapter 5 out of a total of 6,500. This level of community support has been totally ignored. In addition to the consultations, we have been running our own petition calling on this council to remove

00:17:33EXMO20 from the draft Local Plan. There are currently nearly 1,200 signatories. There are many weeks to go until the end of the petition. Will this also be ignored? The inclusion of EXMO20 has made the news on social media, in the papers, on the television, so your obligation to support local partnerships and organizations on local issues cannot be ignored. So now you all know, despite the attempts to suppress knowledge by your officers, presumably tacitly supported by your political leadership, you all know. And as a result, you are either all prejudiced or all able to listen to your constituents and do the job for which we elected you thank you councillors thank you mr matthew hart you're up next please um after mr matthew hart will move mr thomas hello good evening councillors so regarding the controversial EXMO20 site this december is not

00:18:50A deadline it's a choice continue with this failing plan or switch to one built on the compelling evidence to justify a sustainable level of growth for this district due to the falling housing target due to the falling housing target since the local draft plan was created based on 2023 data you would only need to justify a 10% reduction due to local constraints to get the figures currently proposed into the plan you have all the evidence this is by far the best way forward. Mr Freeman explains that the draft plan will have to sit in the inspector's queue for consideration, but needing to be adopted before April 2028 to meet the transitional arrangements.

00:19:33This is a high-risk strategy with questionable benefit. The plan should be revised and submitted under the new 30-month system. You are wasting time clinging to this ill-conceived plan, but you double down on your mistakes. The Habitat's regulations are about avoidance over mitigation. You have not considered geographic or scale of development avoidance of impacts. Instead, seeking onerous mitigation at six-figure cost to this authority, sorry to us, the public, while money runs dry for other services, all because you were too stubborn to admit you made a mistake. The consultants are stating you must consider avoidance. The inspector will look for evidence of this, but there is none. Exmouth is one of the least sustainable places for houses.

00:20:21And your spatial strategy provides no consideration of the internationally protected sites, EXMO20 must be removed. Mr. Freeman is always saying the evidence is coming, teasing you endlessly for two years now, so you never have any substantial time to act meaningfully. And when all this key information does magically appear at the 11th hour, where is the consultation with the public and the statutory and non-statutory consultees? There has not yet been a meaningful Regulation 19 consultation on a plan believed to be sound and legally compliant, as is your duty. I unfortunately had a bat die in my garden last week. I live just a stone's throw from the EXMO20 site. But long story short, it turns out that there is an 800 metre buffer to the heaths due to the red-listed Barberstelle bat. An extract from Exmo's neighbourhood plan regarding the EXMO20 area reads, much of this land lies within the 800 metres buffer zone between the Pebblebed Heath and Exmouth's built-up area boundary.

00:21:22Perhaps most importantly, this area is home to Britain's rarest mammal, the Barbastell bat, of which fewer than 5,000 are known to exist. Its presence is testament to not only the habitat of open grazed pasture, supportive of the insect and moth population on which it feeds, but also to the presence of ancient deciduous wooded areas in which they roost, can have nursery colonies, and hibernate. The bat is very susceptible to disturbance, loss of habitat, and light pollution. Could you please bring your remarks to a close?

00:21:47You're ignoring the evidence. It's your irresponsible behaviour, promoting destruction of habitat, which led to the need for the habitat's regulations. Go on.

00:21:56Thank you, [member of the public]. Vote for the knowingly promoting the destruction of this endangered species and their habitat. Very cute. Thank you. Happy Halloween, everyone. Thank you.

00:22:05Thank you. Oh, yes. It's done. It's done. It's done. It's done. Thank you. Okay, [member of the public], and then I will call [member of the public] to be our last in-person speaker. When you are ready, [member of the public]. You cannot support this draft Local Plan and conform to your Nolan principles. EXMO20 was included based on advice it had passed the important initial HELAA assessments. It didn't. That was a lie. After its inclusion, the evidence was changed to state it failed, but the site still remains.

00:22:44[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

00:23:17Councillor Olive told me that I should have used the complaints process, yet your complaints process advised me they won't deal with Local Plan matters and to use a Reg 19 consultation. I've had multiple councillors publicly allege defamation, Councillor Olive claiming slander, and your monitoring officer saying I've provided no evidence. Well, it's in the Reg 19 consultation, as you requested. Oh, but hey, as Mr Freeman stated, no one actually read it, only AI, in clear breach of gunning principles.

00:23:48[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

00:24:19[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

00:25:08You're not legally allowed to remove it if it is found to be true. You have to prove that it's a false statement. And so every time I say that I am... As a publisher we do not have to publish untruths. But I'm providing the evidence and substantiating every point when I make that statement. Right. If you've got something else you want to say, can you just finish quickly, please, and then we will move on to our last speaker.

00:25:39[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

00:26:05[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

00:26:53[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

00:27:59Beep! Broadcast to further brainwash you councillors. All this behaviour demonstrates this endless misinformation you councillors are subjected to and an ingrained culture of a cavalier attitude to following process and legislation. As the plan inevitably unravels, there are people in this local authority whose positions should become beep beep beep beep that's the East Devon district council we have to deal with councillors please provide accountability and stand up for what's right thank you thank you I welcome any questions at the chair's discretion there will be no chair no questions thank you um miss william it is over to you after that um intervention thank you when you're ready if you press the right hand button the red light will come on you get three minutes thank you good evening councillors my name is [name removed] and I'm a director of Sweetcombe Cottage Holidays an independent family-run holiday lighting agency based in Sidmouth we've been operating in East Devon for 40 years we represent over 160 properties across East Devon and work with more than 100 local housekeepers and trades people I'm speaking today in support of the motion mentioned later and

00:29:17To express my strong opposition to the proposed overnight visitor levy. I'm also speaking on behalf of our staff and each individual owner that we represent. Having been involved in industry discussions over the past year, I have serious concerns about its impact on our local economy. Firstly, I think it's important to clarify that this is not simply a tax on overseas tourists. It would affect British people staying in paid accommodation within their own country, whether visiting for family holiday, visiting friends and relatives, attending weddings or funerals, school or scout trips, or travelling for business, obviously subject to any exemptions agreed. Surely we should be encouraging domestic tourism, supporting British business and promoting more sustainable travel closer to home. East Devon is not suffering from over-tourism. As this motion highlights, visitor spending has not fully recovered and we should be encouraging more visitors, particularly outside the summer season.

00:30:11Affordability is already a significant concern. If a levy were introduced at, for example, 5%, that would mean an additional £50 on a £1,000 holiday without any additional income for the accommodation provider. With rising operation costs and inflation, businesses already face difficult decisions about increasing prices. An additional levy would further limit our ability to make necessary price adjustments without making holidays unaffordable. This is not necessarily new money entering our local economy. It could simply divert existing visitor spend away from our cafes, restaurants, pubs, shops and attractions, or discourage visitors from coming altogether. Our industry has faced considerably regulatory changes in recent years. Another tax would bring further administrative burdens, particularly for small independent businesses without any system in place to collect it. And what tangible benefits would East Devon actually see? Without guaranteed ring fencing or transparent distribution of revenue, how can we be confident that money collected from visitors staying in Sidmouth, Budleigh or Beir would benefit those communities? I would therefore ask, will the Council push for a full independent economic impact assessment before any levy is considered?

00:31:15Will accommodation providers be directly involved in decisions about the rate, collection, administration and implementation timescales before it's decided? And what guarantees would there be that revenue raised in East Devon would be reinvested locally and how would those benefits be measured? Finally, I urge the Council to support the motion and push for any decision to be deferred until we have meaningful evidence from comparable rural and coastal destinations.

00:31:40Tourism is vital to East Devon. We should be supporting its growth, not risking it through a tax whose local benefits remain unproven.

00:31:46Thank you. Thank you very much for your insight and your contribution, [member of the public].

00:31:50Thank you. Our sixth speaker is not here in person, so his statement will be read by our Democratic Services Officer. And it's [member of the public] who wants to talk about the Local Plan, I believe. Whenever Andrew is ready, he'll read it.

00:32:11Thank you, Chair. This is a statement from [member of the public], submitted in respect of SPC minutes contained in the agenda. Good evening, councillors. I read with interest Councillor Paul Arnott's letter to Prime Minister Andy Burnham, as reported in the Exmouth Journal. It would appear that the penny has finally dropped with EDDC that this Local Plan is unsustainable and inappropriate for the local area, given the lack of supporting infrastructure local residents have expressed concerns about the capacity of the road network sewage and drainage systems GP services schools and local other local services as well as the cumulative impact of further development across the wider area over several years despite this the council has chosen to proceed with an unsustainable Local Plan. The water case study, water cycle study, on its own should be sufficient evidence alone to wipe out the entirety of the Local Plan. Failures in the southwest water's sewerage infrastructure and continued spills into our waterways are undeniable. With the prospect of more long hot summers in years to come, even midway into October this year, we continue to face a hose

00:33:34Pipe ban with reservoirs still as low as 18 percent of that capacity furthermore the council has failed to deliver a viable Habitat Regulations assessment and air quality mitigation report despite officers stating at the spc meeting in november 25 that the Local Plan could not be legally signed without it in officers desperation to push through the plan officers then said at the september 2026 sp meeting that these do not need to be ready before adoption of the plan which is it aside from the infrastructure issues and despite the EXMO20 site failing HELAA with concerns regarding access and the impact of the Pebblebed Heaths spc continues to refuse to reduce housing numbers based on latest government figures and refuses to remove EXMO20 from the Local Plan on the basis of a figure as low as a 0.5 reduction in the number of houses being sufficient to be considered a significant change eddc have continued to ignore objections to the plan failed to respond to questions and concerns sent to them with councillors warned of meeting with their constituents by the monitoring officer leaving contact with David Reed MP as the only

00:34:55Avenue for the general public to raise concerns. So, Councillor Arnott, how can you contend that the Local Plan is democratically approved? As a member of this Stop EXMO20 Action Group, that certainly does not reflect our experience. This plan surely cannot continue in its current form and councillors must stand up and represent the views of their constituents. It's time to reduce housing numbers to meet the proposed local need, meaning that the highly controversial EXMO20 site can justifiably be removed from the revised Local Plan.

00:35:33And as I say, that was a statement read out on behalf of [member of the public].

00:35:37Thank you. Thank you very much, Andrew. Right, moving on from public speaking, thank you very much to all the members of the public who came to speak. to agenda item five matters of urgency there are no matters of urgency on this agenda agenda item six announcements from chair of council and leader of council I have no announcements please you have an announcement okay the leader has an announcement please so thank you very much chair just I think it is worth putting in the record that as all members will know I wrote a letter to the prime Minister that he will have received on Monday, I'm sure it was at the top of his pile, stating, and I want to put this on the record for the members of the public as well, you have to bear in mind that this council passed a motion of no confidence in South West Water. I'm very sorry. Can you hear that? Yes, so in relation to this council and southwest water this council passed the motion of no confidence

00:36:44In southwest water in I believe it was february 2024 so that's two and a half years ago and I can appreciate the fun that people have by saying the penny has finally dropped the penny has not finally dropped with relation to the members of this council and certainly not me in southwest water at a meeting with the check with the new chief exec of southwest water last week and expressed concerns about the at this stage what looks like implausibility of their future plans to provide infrastructure in sewage across the whole of East End and how which I then wrote to the Prime Minister this is affecting councillors confidence in passing a Local Plan when they are not assured as yet that southwest water will have the infrastructure in place when some of these sites come alive in particular that relates to the new town of malcoom so on that note I I see that you know there's an argument being put forward that we've got some option here about reducing housing numbers that just isn't the case if we could we would

00:37:53And I understand and appreciate the extreme upset that the EXMO20 people feel because I was that upset person in 2012 when I was part of a coach load of people who turned up at the Knoll to protest about a future development in the green wedge between Colliford and Seaton and for a while we prevailed we managed to knock it back on the 7th of September 2026 14 years later planning permission was given for that site to have substantial development on it and I'm afraid that is how things go and sometimes there is nothing you can do to stop it but fight the good fight now I appreciate the EXMO20 campaigners have fought a fight I don't think I'd be representing the membership in this room without offering back a smidgen of constructive criticism which is I'm not sure you've helped your case with the widespread accusations against officers and I won't take that any further but I think it's clear there are some things you can and should say in public and there are some things that you should not say and that has been explained to the campaigners and I don't

00:39:11Let's let's not go there again so yes the purpose of this was to announce that I'd written to the Prime Minister chair so there we go that is that is what has happened that's in the public one of no doubt a stack of letters this week well I imagine he's I don't know what he's gonna be doing with it he'll be thinking about waste paper bin just for your letters it is the first letter I have ever written as leader and this is year seven as leader of this nature okay thank you very much leader right moving on to item seven confidential exempt items there is one item of confidential or exempt business today which will be covered after exclusion of members of the public and the press and after the YouTube feed has gone down right agenda item 8 everybody there are questions on notice there are four questions on notice all of them come from Councillor Goodman Councillor Goodman submitted his questions and has had written answers to all of them they are all aimed at the portfolio holder for oh I always need to see this written

00:40:14Down corporate coordination and external engagement and as he is not here at the moment if you have any follow-ups I'm afraid they will have to be written so Councillor Goodman do you have any follow-ups to any of your questions yes I do please right fire away right the first one I think that the portfolio is slightly confused here because it is clear that the policy states that public in public sector the ai policies should be made known publicly and so I'm going us again the external auditors our external auditors reported in january the eddc's ai acceptable user policy and not been reviewed since june 2024 can the portfolio confirm if the policy has been updated because I'm confused at the moment whether or not that policy has been updated or a different policy we need some clarity but it should be public that is what is for local government thank you Councillor Goodman very clear question follow-up question do you have follow-ups to the other three no two of them I do okay um so on the on my next question

00:41:19Is it will be helpful to know is what qualified benefits have been achieved so far in staff time response time customer satisfaction or financial savings and what targets have been set over the next two years this is on talking about the benefit of ai and I think it's important for us to know that obviously the third question which is regarding uh agenda 13 and that's fine um but the last question regarding and I'm not sure this will be um john laden's but um this is regarding the 163 million pounds what um I'd like to be clear it says um that um the 163 million which was in the cabinet paper does this actually mean that edc's part of this is only five percent because if you add the two sums up that makes about five percent of the 163 million so are we saying that 95 of the other money is other councils in Devon and I think it's really important for our residents to know that thank you Councillor Goodman um obviously Councillor Loudoun is not

00:42:30Here to answer your questions um and he will as soon as he gets back I'm sure and they're obviously recorded for posterity now so they will be noted and submitted to him for his answers thank you right okay moving on swiftly wonderfully to agenda item nine um which is the reports oh goodness this is all the reports from meetings that have happened since uh the july meeting I think possibly some before as well um which don't have any recommendations in them does I know there's one called minute Councillor Bailey and I will get to you in a moment does anybody have anything they want to say about any of the others are there any questions on them um Councillor Faithfull thank you chair um I was actually going to bring you up on the previous agenda well the two from the chairs is it relevant to any of these sets of minutes planning strategic planning right okay because you obviously you can't talk in the leaders and chairs bit so this this if it's about

00:43:34Strategic planning you can do we're talking about sewage capacity but Wimbleball reservoir is down to 18 percent and we're still building houses and we should be taking more notice of strategic in the Wimbleball reservoir because we haven't got the capacity until cheddar cheddar is not gonna get built until 2036 and yes we're still building these houses and also I did want to ask the portfolio holder about are we any nearer the documents we need for the which which minutes does that relate to council faithful the water cycle study and the other documents that we need which set of minutes does it relate to him very strategic planning okay right um I'm going to get the leader to step in to answer your first question yes thank thanks chair perhaps Councillor Can can help with information on the water cycle study um so it's a bit of a funny moment to have this debate isn't it because we are technically looking at a set of minutes but I think Councillor Faithfull has raised what is in fact a current urgent question as well I think the status of Wimblepool is should really

00:44:54Worry us southwest water have already made a stage three request to government to consider whether there should be future water restrictions okay we need some rain we need some rain and I can't say any more than that at the moment it's a real worry in my discussion with Keith Hassel the chief executive of southwest water I flagged this real concern about water security as it is now so as as council faithful said cheddar 2 will come online in due course it needs hundreds of miles of pipe work to to connect it down here in the right way there is a clear argument that there should be a second reservoir in Devon and I pitched that to him um didn't fall on stony ground but it's a concern it's I'm not sure they're prepared to do it at the moment they're looking at um in order to provide our water supply potentially at desalination at some point in the future you know as if we're living in the gulf of oman and this so I think what councillor

00:46:03Faithful is saying is a concern not only as far as strategic planning, location, site identification in the future is concerned, Marlcombe Newtown, it is a existential risk to the lives we're living now if we're not very careful in future months and I'm sure we'll be hearing a lot more about this but my next monomaniac campaign will be give us another reservoir because we need it thank you leader um right does anybody else have any questions about any of the other sets of minutes other than the one that Councillor Bailey wants to call in uh yeah so uh Councillor Goodman first and then Councillor Roy collins please this is um regard to agenda item 13 uh well we're on agenda item nine right now counts yeah but this is all the this is all the uncontroversial sets of minutes I want to talk about the meeting issue which I was this is a minute so it's the minutes of the cabinet meeting of the 9th or 8th of 7th of October so is this not the is this not the place to bring

00:47:27Yeah, it's on agenda item 13, though, that's all. Right. So if you've got something to say about those minutes, then please do go ahead. Right. The point here is that over a year ago, this Councillor Endorsed having an internal group to consider the Constitution, and a number of improvements have been made. Yet a significant change in the number of meetings are proposed without any discussions with this group, and it went through Cabinet on October 7th.

00:47:54The paper was also written before the decision was taken regarding LGR, and the question is why do we need to make these changes, and why have they not had discussions with the constitutional group? All this would do is reduce transparency for this council. You've just got to look at one scrutiny alone. We'll have a 50% reduction in their meetings compared to 2024. Can I ask that this is not supported and a more thorough piece of work is done on the number of meetings for this council?

00:48:32Councillor Olive, yes. Thank you, Chair. I refer to part four of the constitution on the rules of procedure and specifically rule 26, which is pretty explicit that if members wish to discuss the minutes of the proceedings of committee, that a called minute slip must be submitted and I quote before the meeting I'd also highlight that the minutes of the meeting to which Councillor Goodman refers aren't actually on this agenda because the report that's being discussed was from the cabinet meeting which was held last week which is not on this evening's agenda for us to a minute right okay okay if we can take this back by the chair please that would be great it's not a matter for this item I'm going to call in our monitoring officer on this one thank you Yes, the correct place to discuss this would be under Agenda Item 13.

00:49:21So I suggest, obviously, the comments are noted, but that can be discussed under Agenda Item 13. Right. Okay, thank you. Bring this back later. Right. Does anybody have any more actual questions on any of these sets of minutes? Councillor Collins.

00:49:49Thank you, Chair. I'd like to talk about the water situation. here um which agenda item does it relate to please Councillor Collins I cannot get my ipad to work so I've got no agenda in front of me I'm sorry right can you can you have a look over somebody else's shoulder maybe if it's not about anything on the in the minutes then we can't talk about it but this in this item well I'd just like to say that um southwest water have sold off a great many reservoirs in Devon already and storage tanks.

00:50:24We've had trees sold in Hornetons. Councillor Collins, we get family applications for water tanks. Councillor Collins, we're not talking about that in this item. Well, other councillors were. Well, Councillor Arnott made an announcement in his leader's part that he is another councillor, but he's also entitled to a slot in the leader's section because he's the leader. Right. Okay. I'm going to move on from this. Sorry. I'm going to move on, actually. I'm going to move to Councillor Jess Bailey, who actually has called a minute and would like to discuss that. So, Councillor Bailey, over to you, please.

00:51:05Thank you. Thank you for submitting a card in the approved fashion.

00:51:09Thank you. I haven't called a minute before, but I've called this minute because it's very onerous and quite outrageous that East Devon has apparently fallen short by 21 houses being built over three years.

00:51:33Not our fault. And yet we as an authority have to therefore have a 20% buffer and grant permission for hundreds more houses. And that is not acceptable. I know that this has been brought to, I know we've had it at a Strategic Planning Committee, but I think it is so important that everybody should, like me, be outraged by this. And I think we should try and see, I think we should have another look at our records to see whether we can possibly find 21 more houses or additions or anything that could bump us over into the 85%.

00:52:21So we're not caught by this terrible and onerous provision. and I just think it's really, really, really unacceptable. It's not within our control whether the developers build those houses. We've got a really good record of building houses and granting planning permissions and allocating way more than other authorities and in the past also way more than our fair share, but that's another story. But I really think that this authority should try and push back on the additional 20% buffer. Thank you.

00:52:58Thank you, Councillor Bailey. It does seem slightly disproportionate, in fairness. Yeah. So, Councillor Olive, you wish to come in on this? I thought you might want me to, Chair, as the relevant portfolio holder. I'll start by saying, and I'm sorry, Councillor Bailey, I was put in mind of finding 11,000 votes for uh for president trump um on uh on that one um I I'm I'm happy to ask um ed and the team to take another look at the records I don't know legally how that sits um I know that that the the government uh issues um sort of the you know a bit like results day for a level students and the the government sort of issues those as as formal figures which it recognizes so it's while we provide government the sort of the underlying data um they're the ones who sift through it and sort sort of, you know, bang the gavel and come to a final decision. I'm happy to ask Ed to take another look. Well, not that it would be Ed, I've no doubt, but we can certainly take a fine tooth

00:53:58Comb through those. I would take a minute just to reassure members that the 20% buffer doesn't increase the housing number that we have to plan for in the Local Plan. That remains something that is fundamentally dictated by the standard method and the transitional arrangements, and if and when we get to the point of having adopted a Local Plan, whether it is this plan or the plan that we're drafting or another, the number that we are measured against becomes the numbers that are set out in that plan, provided that remains up to date, rather than the numbers that are set out by the government's sort of standard methods that are set out for the decision making process here. So it's slightly less terrible news than it sounds, if that makes sense but I'd share Councillor Jess Bailey's frustration it's a it's an appallingly designed test about which there is little to nothing that we can do and I remember us expressing similar frustrations when it was first introduced a couple of years ago by the then Conservative government there we go

00:55:05Mr Freeman I don't know if I've said anything incorrect that you would wish to pick me up on but no Ed is very happy thank you for raising this Councillor Bailey and as I say we will we'll do a check on those numbers again so mr. Freeman is a remark possible who knows we don't know do we sorry I've landed you in it do you know if that's a possible move apologies chair um I don't think it is I have already asked the team to look at the numbers and check but I think we only get one opportunity per year to input the data whether it can be corrected in a future year if there is an issue but I would reassure members that the data we submitted is checked, double checked and triple checked before we press send on it so I would be surprised if there's any errors in there but we will check just in case.

00:55:59Thank you for your minute called it's not a shorthand way of calling this is there thank you for your move Councillor Bailey thank you for calling in that minute and asking the question right Councillor Faithfull, I've got you on my list. Is it actually about one of these sets of minutes? I still haven't had my second question answered yet, that's all. Your second question? The documents, the water cycle study and all this stuff that we're waiting for.

00:56:30Councillor Olive. I mean, Chair, again, I'd refer to Rule 26 and Part 4 of the Constitution. Councillor Faithfull hasn't submitted a court minutes slip. That notwithstanding, after I've had my briefing with Mr. Freeman on Friday, I will circulate an update to all members on where those three documents are.

00:56:46Thank you, Councillor Olive. Right, moving on from that, thank you very much. If there are no more questions coming, then we are going to note these minutes and move on.

00:56:55Thank you. Right, moving on to Agenda Item 10, which is the Planning and Scheme of Delegation. I'm going to be inviting Councillor Olive back to present the report in a moment. It is pages 127 to 149 in your Agenda pack. There's a two-part recommendation. Councillor Olive, over to you to present your report, please.

00:57:18Thank you, Chair. I do occasionally wonder whether the leader would be better off calling my portfolio for being the Grinch sometimes, as I only ever seem to bring terrible news to Council. Chair, members, I'll start outright with a confession this evening. This is not a report that I would have chosen to bring you. most of the changes that are set out within it, changes to our constitution, come from the government's new national scheme of delegation, which is set out in the succinctly named Town and Country Planning Discharge of Local Planning Authority Functions, England Regulations 2026.

00:57:56In very plain terms, Whitehall has decided how a locally elected planning committee should work, and it has done so in a way that moves power away from elected members and towards officers. The presumption now set out in these regulations is that officers decide, and sending a planning application to committee is the exception rather than – no, not rather than the rule, because it has never been the rule, but it is very much an exception case now.

00:58:22And those exceptions are restricted by criteria now set by national government in a policy where the rails that lay the path for our planning system are increasingly also set uniformly by the Secretary of State. I make no apology, Chair, for saying that this is centralisation and it sits very uncomfortably with the principles of local democratic oversight that are dear to me and no doubt to many in this chamber.

00:58:46This was not, I would emphasise, done in silence on our part. The Government consulted and this Council responded strongly. That response was brought both to strategic planning and to Cabinet. We opposed many of the proposals and set out clearly why local accountability matters. The government, nonetheless, as they often do, pressed ahead. Tonight, then, is not a debate about whether we like these changes to the regulations. They are set out ultimately in law, which we have an obligation to follow.

00:59:17It is about whether we comply with them. We are ultimately legally required to, and the report is quite clear that there is no viable legal alternative. What we can do, and as I will outline what we have tried to do, is make sure that within the rules we have been handled, we have been handed, sorry, we protect as much local voice and accountability as possible. Firstly, just to give you a bit of an overview of the changes that the new regulations require, they sort applications into three groups.

00:59:47First, a set of applications that must be decided entirely by officers with no route to committee under any circumstances. This covers householder applications, minor commercial and residential applications, permissions in principle, non-material amendments, certificates of lawfulness, biodiversity gain plans, discharge of conditions, prior approvals and most reserved matters applications below a set size threshold. There is then a group of applications that may go to committee that can are capable of going to committee but only if they pass a test.

01:00:20This includes major applications, listed building consents, advertisement consents, works to protected trees, retrospective applications and reserved matters on very large schemes. For these types of applications, a designated officer, in this case the head of service, and a designated councillor, in this case the chair of planning or if they're not available or conflicted, the vice chair or the portfolio holder, must consider whether the proposal raises either issues of economic, social or environmental significance to the local area or significant planning matters having regard to the development plan and other material considerations as the test for whether the application proceeds to continue.

01:01:03Committee where these designated people disagree by law the officer's view succeeds there is then a third much smaller category of applications which are what the regulations refer to as linked person applications these are applications made by the council by a Councillor Or by an officer or by an entity they own or control they go through the same test the regulations also cap the size of committee. It must come down from the 16 members that our constitution currently sets out to no more than 13. Crucially I would emphasize we are not asking council to settle who sits on it tonight. The recommendation asks you to delegate that task to the director of governance who will work through the changes needed including political balance no doubt with the input of our group leaders as normal. Ward members and town and parish councils will feel the greatest change resulting from this imposed direction. We have kept the ability of ward members to see draft reports and to attend chair's delegations, but only for applications that are eligible to go to committee.

01:02:11[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

01:03:18Rather than the governments. You could, if you wish, choose to reject any of these, but in my view and that of officers, they are sensible, they reflect best practice, or they clarify what we already do. On the planning committee's terms of reference, we are proposing to remove functions that are already delegated to officers elsewhere or are not planning matters. We are also making it explicit that the planning committee can seek advice from Strategic Planning Committee on the interpretation of local planning policy where there is uncertainty or there is disagreement. On officer delegations we are adding powers that legislation and good practice now call for in relation to various administrative and financial decision-making processes and clarifying the delegation of some procedural decisions such as returning invalid applications and declining to determine applications. We are also writing into the Constitution the quality councils scheme under which a number of our town and parish councils effectively take advertisement and tree works decisions on our behalf. That arrangement has been running as those in this chamber will know much better than I for many years but a swap audit has pointed out that

01:04:30The constitution did not reflect it up to this point. This puts that right. Finally the code of Good practice for councillors and officers has been updated in three ways. Firstly, some clarification on the point that members should not be arranging formal meetings with developers, applicants or groups of objectives of objectors. Sorry, this is to clarify that where you feel a meeting would help to clarify the issues.

01:04:57You should be talking to officers about this who can advise you and where appropriate, organize that meeting, usually through the members advisory panel. that enables everyone present to be very clear that the discussion does not bind the council make sure that the meeting can be properly recorded on the application file and that that record is then disclosed when the application is considered I want to pause just and reflect on the reason for that a meeting that we arrange ourselves with any of those parties however well intentioned can very easily make it look like we have taken a side and it can put a decision at risk of challenge. Under the new arrangements with fewer applications reaching committee and each one carrying more weight, the integrity of our planning decision-making process matters more, not less. This change aligns the code with our pre-application service and the members advisory protocol. It protects the council, it protects applicant and objector alike, and it protects us as members the second change to the code of conduct is that where the committee

01:06:04Carries out a site visit only those members who attended the site visit may take part in the debate and vote on that application and the third is that where members are minded to go against officer advice they should consider asking for a deferral first that lets officers respond formally and properly to the points that are raised in debate to take specialist advice if needed and to bring back draft conditions or reasons for refusal for councillors to consider depending which way the debate is going. I know we've had a number of cases in recent years where decisions have had to be reconsidered after an appeal has been lodged because the original reasoning set out by committee could not be substantiated and that has gone on in some cases to cost the council significant sums of money. This change is about making decisions that stand up. To conclude then, Chair, colleagues, nobody in this chamber has to like the changes that are being imposed on us this evening by these regulations. I certainly won't pretend to, but we do have to follow them

01:07:08And we have to make a choice about how well we do so and how effectively we embed the principles of democracy into following those rules the changes we've set out this evening comply in the report sorry comply with the law in my view they keep a a reasonable amount of ward member and community involvement um against the provisions of the regulation which are clearly designed to eliminate those and they do a reasonably good job of tidying up some provisions that really needed some tidying up I therefore commend the report and the proposals to you colleagues and chair I propose the two recommendations as set out in the report thank you thank you very much Councillor Olive uh well now so we have a two-part recommendation in front of us um does anybody wish to second the recommendation then we will move to debate uh Councillor Hayward was willing to second it thank you very much Councillor Hayward right okay now we've had we're starting to build a little list of people who wish to speak um on our list first of all

01:08:08All is Councillor Brian bailey please thank you chair I just uh thank you todd for the explanation um I believe you said any large application would go to committee but what what is determined as large would it be extra 20 for example at 700 uh Councillor Olive so uh any major application can if it passes the test go to committee um there are those two elements in the test either that the application raises issues of significance in economic social or environmental issues or it raises and I'm desperately trying to find the wording significant planning matters having regard to the development plan and other material considerations so what major excuse me a major application remains that the potential for it to go to to committee remains subject to it passing those tests and the head of service and chair of planning agreeing that it goes to committee. I think I've got that right on time, Mr. Freeman, and not, I'm reassuring not. Okay, two seconds, go on. Thank you, two seconds. I don't wish to put you

01:09:31On the spot where I'm going to, no offence. In your opinion and [member of the public] opinion, Would Extras 20 qualify to be heard by committee? I'd rather think that you are rather putting them on the spot too much, but I'm happy to ask them if they feel put on the spot too much. Councillor Olive. I don't think that's a question that we can give you a reasonable answer to today, That's what I thought you'd say.

01:09:54Councillor Bailey. I also wouldn't want to give you an answer that might be interpreted as binding a subsequent decision made by somebody who isn't me far down the line.

01:10:06Thank you very much, Councillor Olive. Thank you, Councillor Bailey. Right, next up on our list, we have Councillor Alistair Bruce and then Councillor Mike Howe.

01:10:14Thank you, Chair. This is indeed a dark day for planning, particularly given that it's one of the jobs that we do which has such a profound impact on our communities. I apologise, Councillor Toad, if you've already answered this question. I was trying to listen carefully, but one of the things I was interested to find out is how much access an individual Councillor Has when it comes to a small planning application to officers because I've personally found it quite difficult even under the current situation to access officers for a not private chat but basically a chat to get some more background make sure I am not sure if that's a question that Councillor Olive will be able to answer Councillor Olive what are your thoughts it's it's not a question um that I think any of the changes in the report necessarily oh sorry I sorry I I was impersonating Councillor Ferney there I do apologize um which is completely frozen on um ed what do you think nice mr Freeman what do you think uh thank you chair um well I'm sorry to hear if officers haven't been available um officers are

01:11:25There at the end of a phone or an email if members have any queries about any applications just phone us email us we're here to help um so there are no restrictions on on members access to offices Councillor Bruce very quickly please I've had no restrictions when it comes to mr Freeman when it comes to access so I don't have an issue there thank you chair thank you very much Councillor Bruce thank you mr Freeman uh Councillor Mike howe please thank you very much chair I wish to table an amendment please um okay fundamentally I fully understand um the cabinet leader's position being his vice chair of course I would not as cabinet and strategic planning but fundamentally this takes a large portion of our experience in planning away from this council all members concerned and Councillor Bruce made the point very well. We're not guaranteed access to officers, although officers do their very best to make themselves available. Life is not as simple as we all like it. But fundamentally, officers, like everyone in this world, makes mistakes. And committee has always been that sanity check for

01:12:39Officers. And a number of times over the years, we've overturned officers' decisions, and we've been correct at appeal. There are various ones, including one that Councillor Olive was mentioning earlier, where we withdrew our objection, but the objection still was overturned at appeal, and the other opposers won the day without our help. So there are things like that that we need to be careful about. So I have three amendments, or two amendments and one request first I would like amend recommendation 3.1 to the words of the version agreed by council tonight or just agreed by council that's page 129 so that's replacing appended with yes okay with the version agreed by council uh how are we going to phrase that it's got to last it's got to be durable we'll think about that again well I mean anytime council amends it that's what you need to do it anyway so but then coming on to um page 138 uh amend 3.30.14 I wish again sorry sorry start again amend 3.30.14 3.30 can you tell me what

01:14:03We're looking at on page 138 okay thank you yeah a line in the constitution to ensure officers have spoken toward members that have been put in a that have put in a valid planning reason to support or object an application before making a determination ideally with the chair of planning also now this doesn't change what the government have said we've got to do but what it does do is allow us as councillors to put any final arguments before officers make that final decision it is a sanity check for both sides and I think formally we should make that and Mr Freeman has made it quite open his officers are available to have a discussion with Councillor Howe could I just interrupt you for a second please yes we're struggling to completely get get the legalities is what you're suggesting.

01:15:00So you're trying to make an on-the-fly constitutional amendment to the Constitution. So are you. So I am amending the Constitution, trying to be amended tonight. Right. Crumbs. It won't have been through the Constitutional Working Group. Neither is this.

01:15:20Councillor Olive, please. Could I offer an olive branch? Nice. Sorry, I happened upon that the other week, writing an email, and I've been looking for an excuse to use it ever since. Councillor Howe knows we had a discussion about this before the meeting, and I had a brief chat with Mr. Freeman about it as well, whose view hopefully I'm not about to misrepresent. I think we both fully understand and appreciate where Councillor Howe is coming from.

01:15:53He wants to make sure that there is a checkpoint, if you like, when we're getting to the point of a draft decision and we want to make sure that the views of the ward member and the parish council are properly understood in coming to that decision. completely understand we're coming from Councillor Howe. I've had examples in my own ward where a discussion with officers has cleared up what can sometimes be a you know a truncated comment that you put on an application because nobody wants to write 2,000 words when they're responding to a planning application and so we completely 100% understand where that's coming from. There is I think some hesitation from [member of the public] and from the officer team in imposing a sort of a blanket requirement for that colleagues will know there have been issues with the way that the Constitution is set up currently that mean when we come to do the existing three-day review of a of a draft planning report that where a member has replied to say I have no comment or

01:17:01I am supportive they still have to do a three-day review and I think in that respect there's some hesitation from Mr. Freeman in outright supporting what you've said, Councillor Howe. However, I would like to propose a compromise that I hope will get you what you want. Reflecting the fact that any amended wording should probably go back to officers for us to stress test it, can I suggest two things? One, that if the changes go through tonight, Mr. Freeman makes a commitment that an instruction will be sent to our officers tomorrow morning that where substantive issues are raised by members that planning officers are proposing to go against that conversation happens so a direction is given to our planning team to that effect and that we commit to coming back I'm going to look at Melanie's face to test this timeline in the new year with a suggested amendment to the Constitution to enshrine that so that we can make sure we have some wording that doesn't impose a blanket requirement that would be overly onerous and go beyond what you're

01:18:03Seeking to achieve there Councillor I'm sorry if that was a bit long-winded I'm trying to be diplomatic and helpful thank you council olive it was long-winded as usual as we go on our conversation I at this time I would have to say no I am willing to add the words all reasonable endeavors and within a limited time frame so officers are not hanging around forever in a day to make a decision but I don't believe we should be pushing this back with the impending change that's being made by government fundamentally already there were three councils that have rejected the government's position two funny enough in the prime minister's own hometown of greater manchester the third in bedfordshire now I know that is a risky situation to be in to put it mildly but they are taking a much stronger stance and one to be honest I would like to do myself but I don't believe it is the right way to do for this council or the population we serve Councillor How could I ask you please um before you before you pursue can you um send the your

01:19:07Proposed wording over to the officers please so we can actually have it up on the screen I think that might help because I think a lot of us are struggling with visualizing what you're proposing I will endeavor to do that but at the same time the wording changes are quite simple Okay. If you bounce it to Andrew, that would be really helpful. Thank you. I'll see what I can do. To finish off, though, I also ask that we write again to the Prime Minister.

01:19:33We haven't written to the Prime Minister. We've written to the Cabinet, to Government last time, but we write again, following Councillor Arnott's previous response, to follow up with this as well, saying this is unacceptable regarding these changes. it removes democracy checks and balance and open decision making from the public's view and that is my third recommendation to that but in the meantime I'll get that copied and pasted across thank you thank you so Councillor Howes just so we're sure you want to amend recommendation one and then add two recommendations beyond recommendation two I want to amend 3.1 yes the wording doesn't help us if we change the recommendation and I want to adjust the constitution attachment that is in here which is being amended without any other scrutiny anyway okay so if you can ping those words over that would be really helpful I think thank you right okay thank you very much for that Councillor How um next on my list I've got Councillor Are not Councillor Are not yes thank thank you chair uh while mike um taps it out there

01:20:50I'd just like to notwithstanding very sensible uh accurate comments made by Councillor Olive I do agree with Councillor How entirely and if his amendment um comes through on the internet as I understand it I've seen an early draft I'm happy to second that and the reason for that is because I do think every now and then we need to remember that we are this council is out we are the members we are horrific we're horrified by this but what's what's what what we're being required to do um and I think what Councillor How has done I think is a very smart thing a just to introduce an extra certainty around uh members having um officers having due consideration to members for sure there is that later point about whether that then goes into a constitutional or change after this.

01:21:41But I think we do need to vote to do this tonight. I think a letter is a really good idea. I think he'll be sick of letters from me, so probably it should come from Councillor Olive as the strategic planning portfolio holder, I would suggest. But other than that, Chair, subject to the view of the membership when they can see the amendment, I'm happy to second it.

01:22:05Members will know I'm always slightly uneasy about making potentially expensive changes mid-council. So I really am looking. I'm looking. No, no, no. If we can see the words, that would be fantastic. Notwithstanding what Councillor Arnott just said, I would like to see the words first myself to be comfortable. Do we have them? Okay, so there'll be a small delay. So I'm going to call somebody else to speak and that's Councillor Jess Bailey, please.

01:22:33Thank you. I haven't seen the amendment, but I wouldn't want it – I don't think to be watered down to reasonable endeavours. I think it should be perfectly possible for there to be a process where a planning officer notifies the ward member and there's an allocated or an allotted timescale within which that conversation can take place. So I don't want it to be kind of watered down and weakened and I'm also concerned about the deferral so the decision where where members dare to go against the officer's recommendation then there's subsequently a deferral because if committee feels a particular way it should be possible for those any reasons for refusal to be decided on the day it's a large contentious planning applications you often have a lot of people who are interested in those planning applications and it's not right that um uh that they get sent away and then it has to come back and in my experience there's quite a lot of pressure put on those planning committees to refuse applications when there's an officer recommendation for approval

01:24:00And I don't want to see deferrals and then more pressure put on councillors to refuse applications when there's an officer recommendation for approval. I don't believe that that's a requirement under the government's new rules so I don't think we should be changing it.

01:24:18Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Bailey. Next up to speak, because I don't think we have the words yet, The word that is not yet through is Councillor John's, please.

01:24:31Thank you, Chair. I fully support Councillor Howe's amendments to this, but I do have a couple of questions, not for Councillor Howe. Did this constitutional change go through the Constitutional Working Party is my first question. Shall I have that answered straight away? Yes, please.

01:24:51Councillor Jackson, please. No, it didn't. That's what I wanted to say when I raised my hand so you don't need to come back to me it's been largely driven by the legislative changes so it hasn't come through our group Thank you If I could come back with my second question please Hang on a second I'm monitoring officer who wants to say something as well or is it Andy?

01:25:23I'm assuming it's been through the planning committee, I'm just checking with Mr Freeman, it hasn't, it's come straight to council has it okay I mean there is no requirement in in for it to go through the constitutional working group so there is nothing within our constitution that requires that but obviously we will work into a very set um deadline in terms of of the the legal deadline for this so I'm assuming that's why it's come straight to council right thank you um thank you mel right uh vicky Councillor John sorry thank you um so my second point is earlier on you mentioned to Councillor How but to make amendments on the constitution ad hoc as it were that's exactly what we're doing anyway we're changing the constitution without the councillors having previously seen it apart from when it's come here except we've seen the papers we've seen the papers so that's why I wanted to see the words I fully appreciate that but what I'm saying is if it hasn't gone through the constitutional working party and it hasn't gone through planning what's the difference between

01:26:20It going through this evening with the slight amendments that counts to how it wants to put forward. So the difference as I see it is that actually these are changes that are being imposed on us from above and we have pretty much zero ability to withstand them and I think Mel's about to come in on this anyway. I also believe and I'm hoping Mr Freeman is going to nod his head yes sorry could you not talk please while Mel's speaking she's very quietly spoken already Jenny please. Sorry I also believe we've had a number of we've had member briefings as well haven't we to take members through the details so that was obviously preparing members for the fact that this item was coming forward. Thank you Mel. Vicky, Councillor John, sorry. Sorry I fully appreciate what everybody's saying and I'm aware that the government have put this forward and it's something we have to do. However as pointed out earlier the wording is our own so I fully agree with Councillor Howe's wording that the amendments should be made so that some of the power, what

01:27:23Little power we still have stays with the councillors we are the election we are elected into our positions to represent our areas the government are constantly banging on lgr etc about the fact that they want to devolve things down to the lower forms of the council which is town and parish councils basically so they give us with one hand and then they're snatching all away with the other so with what little power we've got we should do amendments to our constitution that means that councillors still have a say as Councillor How pointed out earlier there are various incidences over the years where officers who do a great job for the majority of the time don't know everything about a local area and that's the whole point of the councillors so I stand by councillors house amendments and if Councillor Armagh wasn't second it I would be doing so thank you very much Councillor Johns um Councillor Olive you want to come in please can I just take a moment to perhaps try and call this slightly and we we are fundamentally we are

01:28:22On the same side here I we 100% we want the same things I would reassure I appreciate it's not gone to Constitution working group but I know this has been through multiple rounds of drafting and checking and rechecking and advice from external bodies so you know respectfully that there is a bit of a difference between that and and you know Councillor How bringing an amendment tonight that hasn't been through that that same process however however I've I've proposed the original recommendations, and if councillors on the benches opposite and indeed the leader are happy with some wording that Mr. Freeman has drafted, then perhaps we can move this forward without needing to go through the rigmarole of a vote on an amendment.

01:29:10So Mr Freeman has suggested that we add language into the same section that Councillor Howe is referring to 3.30.14 which refers to applications that must be determined by an officer to stipulate that where officers propose to make a decision which is contrary to the view of the ward member on a minor or major application that they must have spoken to ward members and ideally also the chair of planning prior to making a determination. That is the wording Mr. Freeman has proposed. I believe it deals with the issue of councillors writing in to say I agree or I have no comment and precludes a constitutional catch that holds things up where there is no disagreement.

01:30:00So hopefully fingers crossed and I can never read Mike's face so we're going to have to, I suspect Chair, go to him for his view but hopefully that deals with the issue in a way that is satisfactory to Councillor Howe as well as to Mr Freeman and to the monitoring officer as well and I will ping that over to Melanie and to Andrew now as well. Thank you Councillor Olive. I would point out of course that Councillor Howe's amendment has already been seconded by Councillor Arnott and therefore we do have to debate it but if Councillor Howe were minded to accept any modifications and Councillor Arnott was minded to accept them then we could be talking about a different...

01:30:42I think I was saying Chair if Councillors opposite are happy with the wording that I've suggested then I'm happy as the proposer to just accept those into the recommendations which would obviate the need for a debate Councillor Howe I'm happy to accept his amendments on 3.30.14 we would still need to change 3.1 because that's reversed to the the appended version yeah and everything else and I would still like a letter to go to the pm so provided the other two buts are encompassed I'm happy to accept because it covers what my objective was anyway thank you Councillor Howe uh Councillor Olive just to be clear chair I'm happy with whatever revised wording that mike wants on 3.1 and and melanie is happy it was just to make it grammatical sense that that's that's totally fine and if mike wants me to write a ratty letter to mr burnham I'm quite happy to do that let me reissue I'm sure any one of us would do that um okay I see peace breaking out all over the place so Councillor Are

01:31:44Not are you willing to accept the accepted this oh gosh how am I going to say I'm going to fight this of the death. No, I can't accept it. Yes, of course I will. Okay, so, right, peace is indeed breaking out all over. I'd just like to thank Councillor Howe for being so grateful on this. So what we now need is for Councillor Olive to send over, please, wording to Andrew in a way that he can use quickly so that we can actually see it before we vote on it.

01:32:13Councillor Jackson, is it I was just going to ask for it to be read out, but if you're going to pop it on the screen It's going to be popped on the screen. I've been asking for that for a while, but it's going to be different wording from the one that Councillor Howe sent over now. Right. Councillor Hayward, please.

01:32:27Thank you, Chair. As laudable as this all is, with my clerk hat on, the inherent problem with doing this on the hoof is that you then have to change materially other parts of this constitutional document. that's the problem because then they become nonsensical so if we refer to page 139 and I've just noticed this from rereading this document page 139 of the terms of reference you have 3.3017 which begins if prior to a decision being taken the war member expressed the contrary view in relation to 3.3016 well first of all there are two 3.3017s in this document you can't have two so my suggestion would be this becomes 3.30151 that's a tiny semantic point but actually what's just been proposed by Councillor Howe seconded by Councillor Are not amended by Councillor Olive to be included and I'm still not sure where in 3.3014 it will be included I'm hoping for a form of words soon but that would contravene another part of this document and that's the problem we have either I personally feel this needs to be deferred because it's so complex what will end up

01:33:42With is a document that doesn't make sense we have a proposed and seconded amendment so um I'm not sure we can defer it we do have to debate it I'm afraid um mel no we can't we can't defer it because we've got a deadline um set by government to um adopt this so that I get that that that is part of this whole argument to do something that's unconstitutional and makes no sense because the government has set a deadline it should be dear government we can't do it in the time you've given us which is a common theme with us but otherwise you're going to have to be here till 11 o'clock at night going through this line by line to make sure that each part refers back to another part because there's multiple links that refer within it it cannot be done on the hoof I suspect what we've actually just done, Councillor Hayward, is we've just sent some more work to the Constitutional Working Group to tidy up later. And this is why

01:34:38I don't like taking amendments to really important things on the hoof in meetings. And I'm sorry, I know it's everybody's democratic right to do it, but it is such a complicated thing to do. And there are so many variables that it becomes a really... It becomes a Jenga tower. But if If Council is minded to go ahead with this amendment today, then there will be work for the Constitutional Working Group in tidying it all up later.

01:35:06And I really hope that people will get invested in the work of the Constitutional Working Group in order to help that process, because it sounds quite complicated to me. Right. Now, do we have a form of words pinged over? Oh, there's a form of words still being discussed. OK, in which case I'm going to go to Councillor Gazzard, please, who is next on my list.

01:35:32Thank you, Chair. Can I say that I fully support what Councillor Howe had to say. He is a well-respected person on the Planning Committee and he's got many, many, many years of experience. So I thank you for what you've said tonight, Councillor. But, I mean, we're in a real mess, aren't we, really, with all this. We don't really want to do it, but it's been imposed on us.

01:36:00My question is, Chair, I understand that other councils up and down the country have rejected all these proposals, and it seems to me that this has been brought to us at the 11th hour, and I'm really disappointed. I must say that I'm not in favour of deferrals if it does go through on a planning committee so that officers can take it away and bring it back because my question would be would the decision of the deferral be made and the outcome of that be made public to the general public I don't know whether it would be But I just think that we should write in very strong terms to the PM because he makes a lot of – he wants power to come back to the people and to councillors.

01:37:04Well, it looks like it's taking power away from both sets of people. So, at the moment, I can't support it, Chair. Thank you.

01:37:16Thank you, Councillor Gazzard. Thank you very much. okay so we did have for a short time a form of words and I'm hoping some apostrophes are going to be introduced into it because frankly it's setting my teeth on edge at the moment right I don't know about you but I feel like I've got a head full of spaghetti now oh Councillor Barlow thank you oh we have a form of words coming Councillor Barlow please speak your mind well I just wanted to agree with with the last speaker at the end of the day you know We deal with less than 100 cases on the committee in a year, on average, less than 4%.

01:37:54And I don't see really what we're going to say. And I think someone ought to write to the government and say, what exactly are you trying to do? All you're doing is upsetting the public. You know, when you go to one of these committees, I always try and argue against sometimes, just so that at the end of the day, the people in the actual hall, the people that have put in the application, feel like they've had a fair shell.

01:38:16And I think it's one of the important things we do is to make sure that people can go away and actually feel like they have been heard. And you don't have to like the result, but at the end of the day, at least you think you've had a fair share. And you're basically taking that away from the public. So I just wonder if you shouldn't defer and say, do you know what?

01:38:36[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

01:39:04I mean, I clearly have to advise members against that decision. Well, again, it's advice, isn't it? Well, we have expert legal advice in the shape of our monitoring officer, who is a lawyer. and has made her job of work for quite some time. I'm not allowed to argue with that, obviously. No, well, you are allowed to argue with it, but those are the facts. I mean, she has more legal knowledge in her head than we do, generally.

01:39:31[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

01:40:33Thank you, Councillor Howard. Of course, challenged decisions become quite expensive to the taxpayers of East Devon. Oh, could we have the words back up, please? They're just tweaking, I think, Councillor Bailey. Have we put in the second apostrophe after Publix? Many brains are working on this. Open decision-making from the Publix view. There should be an apostrophe in Publix. In 3.3, Andrew, please. Thank you. Chair, I wonder if it would just be worth Mr. Freeman clarifying the tweak that they've made to that proposed change.

01:41:26Right. Who's made the tweaks? So, Mr. Freeman has just suggested some extra words that perhaps he could explain. Right. So, I would rather that came from a member rather than an officer. Okay, very well, Chair. My understanding is, as has just been whispered in my ear by Mr. Freeman, that the current three-day review period for planning applications does not cover householder applications, i.e. effectively what this is doing is preserving the status quo by excluding householder applications.

01:42:02If this were to apply to householder applications, the extra volume of work for our householder teams would be enormous, given the proportion of applications that come through to our householder applications. So I'm happy to suggest those few extra words just to tidy that one up. This is turning out to be a very convoluted process. Right. Now, Councillor Olive has just proposed an amendment to an amendment to an amendment.

01:42:33The amendment that Councillor Olive has just proposed is not yet seconded, unless Councillor Hayward is willing to accept the amendment, because he seconded the last amendment from Councillor Olive. And then the person who actually proposed the amendments in the first place, who has accepted the amendments from Councillor Olive, will also need to accept the amendments. I'm getting there, and I am getting there, running it through my head.

01:42:59And then Councillor Arnott will need to as the seconder of the original amendments accept the amendments am I right? Could I just come in on one point? Yeah if I could just come on one point that they have spoken to ward members I'm just a bit worried that we can't get hold of ward members so is it notified or advised ward members I just wonder if we could type communicated in some way just so we can send an email if we can't get hold of the ward council I just don't want something that you can't comply with yeah so if we change it to communicated with right so who am I that's that told or is that the mic I've lost track okay Councillor Olive are you happy to accept that alteration I I personally I'm I'm happy with communicated with I I had um had a brief whisper discussion with mr Freeman about the issue of um things becoming impossible to achieve if we can't get hold of ward members um I think mr Freeman's view at the time of that

01:44:10Conversation was that we just try it and see how it goes and bring it back if we needed to um my my I I'm conscious that um I'm I'm happy with the wording chair if others have a different view um they're entitled to express it but in that case Councillor Hayward are you happy with the amendment to the amendment that you accepted earlier not really no um I mean happy with communicated with because that puts the onus on the ward member if the officer has communicated with emailed to say would you like a chat and they don't respond well that's down to the ward member so that is the proactive one just two things if I may these are the legal minutes of this council can we take out pm and put prime minister please because pm could mean anything and under 3.4 you've got to add at the end of 3.3014 we've now conflated two documents 3.4 is a recommendation in the report 3.3014 is a constitutional amendment to the terms of reference so if that wording could just be put even in brackets to delineate otherwise members

01:45:23Of the public could look for this and go it goes from 3.4 to 3.3014 there is nothing in this I think if you put to add at the end of 3.3014 of the Constitution, that makes it abundantly clear. And if we change PM to Prime Minister, at that point, I think we've done as much as we can. We all are pushing in the same direction. We all know we've been shafted by government.

01:45:45Let's just vote on this, please. I'm happy to accept the amendment. Yes, indeed. OK, Councillor Howe, we're happy to progress with these words. Sorry to be a pain. oh but I am going to be a pain okay communicated was not the intention discussed engaged was the words I wanted to see with that communication not just oh we've told them this is what the decision is going to be or anything else there needs to be the ability to discuss challenge etc we can't make their decision but we need to make sure officers are mindful of the local conditions and responsibilities we as councillors have and as such and knowing our patches we need to be able to make sure that it is not just a communicated it is an active discussion or response and reply that is understood and that is the fundamental difference I'm looking for here thank you Councillor How um Councillor Hayward with your constitutional well well whilst I applaud the sentiment again I have to defend officers if they reach out to ward members and a ward member

01:46:58Decides they're going to go off to katmandu india for six months um not saying council has because he joined himself but but we will run out of time but according to that wording there has to be some some tacit appreciation that everyone will try their best but if you hone it down to discussed with and the officer physically cannot discuss it then effectively the ward member go you haven't discussed it with me so therefore that doesn't apply it's just tying ourselves up in knots that we have to have some trust between the two sides otherwise we might as well all give up so we could discuss the semantics of it disc I think communicated with It sends the message of what Council Hour is trying to achieve, but if we change the wording, it just creates another legal loophole.

01:47:51And we don't need legal loopholes. We need consideration and collegiate working. That's just my view. And opportunities for feeding into the process.

01:48:00Councillor Olive, you want to come back on this specific? Yeah, could I just come in behind Councillor Hayward on that point, please? The current constitutional provision says where members and officers disagree, there is a three-day window on receipt of the draft report, and a member has three days to either respond or, tough, the deadline has expired. In my view, communicated with is in line with that, i.e. it is on the member to proactively participate in that process. They can't just refuse to participate and hold the entire thing up until they've had an opportunity to.

01:48:40I think my view would be it either needs to be communicated with or we need to pass the other provisions to comply with the law and defer, as I suggested earlier, so that we can come back with a more considered version after we've had an opportunity to hash out something that's slightly more nuanced and can better take into account these issues. That would be my view. Councillor Howe, Councillor Bailey might have a different one, but I think that's where I am, Chair.

01:49:09Right. Councillor Jackson, are you wishing to supply the constitutional aspect? I hear what Councillor Howe is saying entirely, and I hear what Councillor Hayward is saying as well. I take the point that communicated with could quite easily be taken as, I'm giving you notice that this is what I'm going to decide, and I think the intention is to have a dialogue. My suggestion would be to ensure they have actively sought to engage with it may be that there needs to be a time scale from that because otherwise there is no finite deadline and I appreciate the challenge that officers have in order to turn these things around within a timely manner so I don't know what time scale would be suitable in this instance and hope that our planning officers might be able to suggest that but that would be my suggestion which gives both the reassurance to have the discussion but also an acknowledgement that that only works if people respond thank you yes indeed and are not otherwise impeded from answering because um I am getting the impression from this debate that there is a lot of unquiet and we

01:50:24Haven't really come to an agreement yet on it um I don't feel like um there's broad consensus in the room over any form of words and actually what we're trying to achieve with this amendment I feel as though a Councillor How you want to almost make it compulsory for there to be a dialogue but I totally take the officer's viewpoint that sometimes a dialogue is not possible if somebody does not want to respond and a member could inadvertently hold up the process for quite a long time and actually time out decisions which is one of the KPIs that our planning officers are measured against so we're not getting any closer to a consensus at the moment on that um Councillor Jess bailey are you you have had your hand up for quite a while is it yeah I had it my hand up before you so you're calling other people to speak and I'd already asked to speak yes well but so I sometimes I have to take relevant portfolio holders I don't necessarily have to take people in order well I don't think that's very fair well it's that's the

01:51:26Way it is I'm afraid I won't bother speaking it's fine well please do speak now I've called you now okay I'm not happy I'm not happy that this we shouldn't be having this discussion like this in this forum it should have got what's the point of having a constitutional working group if it's something as fundamental as this doesn't go through it so that's my first point and my second point is communicated with that could just mean somebody leaves a voicemail message and then that the members in a meeting and they don't have a chance so it's not that difficult there must be a way that a member's given say three days and then an opportunity to try and speak within three days but I just can't believe that we're having this discussion the the rules are coming in on what the 1st of November this has to be done so why are we doing this at the 11th hour we've known about it for months and why did it not go to the constitutional working group with cross-party

01:52:27Discussion about it? Right, this is a question for Mel, I think. Thank you. I was going to make a suggestion which probably does tie in with what Councillor Olive's been saying but it seems to me that there's no dispute about the changes to 3.1 and the additional 3.3. I wonder if we amend 3.4 to say that a form of wording will come back um in relation to 3.30.14 to the next council meeting um because I'm really concerned that we're trying to everybody's got slightly different views um that could go via the constitutional working group that's absolutely fine because there would be more time and ability to do that so what I would suggest is that 3.4 says that um that a further report um to be presented to the next meeting of council regarding changes to 3.30 point 14 something along those lines but then what happens in the meantime so we we've got two issues here the first issue is that we have this deadline from the government on the two ones that were actually in the papers um and there is apparently within the room there's a desire to

01:53:41To amend that to make it uh to bring in extra um not checks and balances but extra input from board members um but we're not fully convinced across the room that we have the right form of words yet and we have been talking about this for a really long time so it seems like it might need some more time um so what I'm proposing to do is I'm willing to propose it from the chair actually that we do what mel just suggested which is that we defer until the next meeting which is only in December, Councillor Jackson, is there a constitutional working group meeting between now and then? Yes.

01:54:16Very, very soon, actually. Oh, it's very, very soon. So it could go to constitutional working group on Tuesday, and then the minutes will be ready for the meeting in December. And I just wonder whether maybe that wouldn't be a more, a less torrid way of coming to an amendment, which obviously we all want, but we're not quite agreed on the terms of it at the moment. And so everybody will be able to feed into that process in a much more sedate fashion.

01:54:40Whilst also passing the two bits that we have to pass or we end up falling foul of the law. So I'm willing to propose that from the chair as a suggestion if anybody is willing to support it or if my Councillor Howe are willing to defer his amendment.

01:55:00Thank you, chair. I mean, I will defer my amendment because we need to move on and come to the right speech. But what I did want to say is Councillor Jackson has again hit the nail on the head and the wording was perfect. I would have happily supported Councillor Jackson's amendment. That was the way it should be. She's evidently the right person to be chairing the Constitutional Working Group. Well, that's why I sit on it with her funny enough, but nevertheless I just wanted to praise her for some excellent words Thank you very much, Councillor Howe. And understanding the issue completely. Thank you very much, Councillor Howe So if, Councillor Howe, if you are happy that we do that, that we eviscerate your, not eviscerate, we pull apart your amendment from the existing recommendations and we send those to the Constitutional Working Group next week and then they come back in December, I think we'll have had more time to think about it and maybe more time to get the wording right.

01:55:53Provided we still include the letter to be sent to the Prime Minister. Which Councillor Olive has actually volunteered to do. I know, but it's just one of those things he's making a mistake, he needs to listen to it and he needs to correct his mistake. So if we leave that one in and then 3.4 we defer are you happy with that Councillor Howe? Yes and Councillor Arnott are you happy with that?

01:56:15I just think that Councillor Jackson did have it and I think she had it, I think she had the amendment and I think Councillor Howe has just said that and I I'm going to be awkward here we haven't actually taken a vote on the amendment yet that has been proposed and seconded and I would happily if Councillor Howe did accept Councillor Jackson's amended wording and go for it now.

01:56:46Wow, okay, right. Peace breaking out all over the place again. Councillor Hayward with my... May I respectfully suggest we've been going two hours now. The officers are desperately trying to unpick this in real time. Can I suggest that you adjourn the meeting for ten minutes, everyone going use their facilities, have a ten minute break, and have a round Councillor Jackson to just talk to the officers and then we can get it on the screen we all understand exactly the wording we're voting for and then it's clear there can be no afterwards I didn't vote for that I didn't understand but 10 minutes of not active debate moving backwards and forwards might just give that breathing space I'm happy to do that Councillor Olive do you have does it have to come before the break it can come afterwards chair but I think it's a point that needs making right okay 10 minute break then. Please be back in ten past. On the nose.

01:57:41Seriously, you can take the tops of my head. Mush, mush, mush. Is your brain mush? Even more so than usual. One minute please, one minute, or we'll never leave this place.

02:07:34That wasn't a threat, that was just a vague menace.

02:08:39Right, okay everybody, we really need to crack on or we're going to be here really super, super late. And I'm just conscious that we're keeping officers who live sometimes a very long way away from their homes. We all live a lot closer, thankfully. Right, now, getting back to the... If I can get back to the agenda. Where were we? We were in the middle of the planning.

02:09:04Item 10, I think, weren't we? We'll find it in a minute.

02:09:07Thank you very much. Barracking from the backseeds. Right, okay. so we had there was a tiny working group that happened during the break for a form of words do you want to speak Councillor Jackson yes so we had some brief discussions around wording that everyone might be mutually content with but an acknowledgement I don't know who's speaking but please stop please okay but that there needed to be an acknowledgement that anything that we did put in place would need to be legally sound so that we weren't facing challenge later on to planning decisions. So I think the mutual consensus is that a deferral is the most sensible and wise approach at this point. We do have a constitution working group on Tuesday, which means we can address this quite quickly. So I think that's where we are on that bit, although accepting that the letter and the other proposals still progress as per.

02:10:18Thank you very much, Councillor Jackson. So you see now on the screen the results of the mini-consultation, which we hope will be more secure in terms of its effect on the Council and what its effect will be on the rest of the Constitution, because it will have been through the Constitutional Working Group and had many, many pairs of eyes on it in a non-pressured environment. and Councillor Howe I'm sure will have been reassured to know that it's only next week that that will be heard. Right so we have in front of us an altered set of recommendations which includes Councillor Howe's first recommendation to alter 3.1 3.2 remains as it is in your papers and there is the addition of 3.3 and 3.4 which includes the letter to the Prime Minister in 3.3 and a further report to come to council on the 9th of december containing the wording which is below the screen at the moment which will be debated by the working group so if people are happy with that as a set of recommend altered recommendations um Councillor Bailey is it crucially come in now

02:11:28Yeah we go out for 10 minutes to so that you can agree the wording and then we come back after 10 minutes and it's completely changed and it's all going to be deferred and I'd like to know if that goes forward what happens to all those planning applications in the meantime under the government's new rules where there's nothing to protect world members there's no discussion and what was the point of going out for 10 minutes so do you want to come back in um Councillor Olive Councillor Olive so the suggestion is that as I suggested at the outset when this issue arose, that we take the deferral as is suggested on the screen.

02:12:09And again, as we suggested at the outset, Mr. Freeman, tomorrow morning gives a direction to the service in the spirit of what is being asked for, that where officers are moving applications forward that go against members' recommendations, that we give an undertaking to the membership this evening, that officers will be proactively engaging, discussing with members in the interim before that wording comes back to the 9th of December, so that the spirit of what is being asked for tonight is happening before we agree a final wording that doesn't either introduce legal risks for the authority or massively overburden the service, i.e. is proportional. I think it's a fair compromise, and I would hope members trust officers sufficiently to be happy with that.

02:12:58Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Councillor Olive. Before the break, Councillor Howe had almost agreed to a deferral, which the wording was agreed with you, wasn't it, Councillor Howe? It has been, but particularly the statement just made by Councillor Olive, that was the crucial bit that was missing until then, having that direction from Mr Freeman to his officers to say they will be engaging in the interim. So, you know, we need to move on.

02:13:27We've got to get through this. And we have a number of other items to consider. Yeah.

02:13:31Thank you very much, Councillor Howe. Councillor Bailey, I hope that allays some of your concerns. Councillor Bruce, is it quick? Yeah, quick. That's not what we agreed on, Chair. I'm afraid I'm with Councillor Bailey here. And, in fact, Councillor Arnott held the wall before we broke the 10 minutes because he was concerned about a deferral. And we all left the Chamber thinking that we would be coming back and voting on something that had been...

02:13:54Now we're asking for deferment. How does that work with our requirement to adhere to the law of the government? We're only deferring on the last item. So everything else is as it was before the break. 3.4 is the only bit, which is the constitutional amendment, the amendment to our constitution, which it was felt. That is the substantive chair. That's what we were debating mostly about when we left.

02:14:19We didn't have a form of words before we left that we could actually agree on. And that's what I'm asking you now. Do you agree with this form of words? I'm feeling like most people agree with the first three. The only bit that's being deferred is the bit that we thought maybe needed a bit more time and some more some more calm in order to talk about it.

02:14:41Mel wants to come back in. We have a motion on the table now, don't we? So, I mean, I don't know if there were any further members left to speak, but the best thing would be to put that to the vote and see whether members are happy to support it or not. Right, okay. So, unless any of the remaining people on my list have got a blinding desire to spend longer on this, I think I might just put this to the vote.

02:15:11Councillor Faithfull, is it crucial? Well, it's something I was wanting to say before we had the break. Can we just go back to what we had before on the understanding that we take it? So we make the decision now with the understanding that we take it to the Constitution Working Group. So we've got something now, and then we take what we review the whole thing again. I mean, that is basically what this is doing, Councillor Faithfull.

02:15:40This isn't. This is something different. It is. I mean, it's along similar lines, but we come with this thing, what we had previously. 3.1 and 3.2 are essentially unchanged from what you have in your papers. I'm saying that we vote on what was the original thing here and now. We've got the decision made now, and then we review it, review the decision that we've made. That's basically what this does.

02:16:07It's not, it's different. Well, I mean, apart from the addition of the letter and the constitutional amendment, go to the Constitutional Working Group, okay, it has got some additions, but it's not a substantial amendment of the Constitution beyond what is required by the law. I think we've talked about this quite enough, actually. I'm not going to take any more interventions, and I am going to suggest, really, Councillor Jackson.

02:16:34I just think it might be helpful. My suggestion was that perhaps Ed Freeman might be able to give reassurance to councillors who have raised valid concerns. It's one I raised in the intervening time around any decisions we make through planning in the intervening period before we've got that adoption.

02:16:56And I think should we hear it straight from Mr Freeman yeah I think it might be better Mr Freeman could you please give us your assurance that you will be doing a transitional arrangement on what's coming yes thank you yeah I mean I fully understand the points that are being made and as I said earlier you know we want to engage with members we want to hear the views of local residents and local members ensure that those are duly taken on board in our decision making so more than happy to commit to take on to to send an instruction to staff tomorrow that they must engage with members proactively on these decisions um in the meantime I think the issue is the details of the wording and making sure it's suitably legally compliant unambiguous we have been and are currently being legally challenged on whether a decision has been made in accordance with the constitution based on detailed wording issues in our constitution so we do need to make sure we get this right otherwise there could be legal consequences for us so I do think a deferral

02:18:00Would be the way forward but I can assure you we will honour the principle of what has been said tonight in the meantime to make sure that there are no decisions going out that you're not cited on and haven't been fully engaged in. I hope that will reassure members it has come straight from the I nearly said the horse's mouth but that sounded quite rude when I thought about it um it's come straight from the mouth of the head of service um and is on camera sorry ed um no I'm not going to take any more interventions I am actually going to um double check with Councillor Howard he's happy with the wording double check with Councillor Are not he's happy with the wording and then we're going to go to a vote the wording will be as it is on the screen now Councillor Howe sorry I was are you happy with the wording I'm happy with the wording absolutely Councillor Arnott, are you happy with the wording? Fantastic. Let's go to a vote. If you are in favour of accepting the wording as it is on the screen, well, as it was on the screen, as it is on the screen right now, would you please raise your hand now? And if you would like to vote against it, would you please raise your hand now? And if you would like to abstain, would you please raise your hand now? And that is largely carried. Thank you very much. I look forward to talking about it all again in December, which is less than two months away.

02:19:18Right sorry right okay agenda item 11 recommendation from cabinet finance report month 4 I'm going to hand over to the leader to present this report and its recommendations and John Symes is here to answer any technical questions if you have them thank you Mr Freeman leader over to you you are presenting this report yes and I'm accustomed as I am to present any kind of report to finance but the portfolio holder is not here tonight so therefore it falls to me so rather than confuse you with any financial knowledge I may or may not have I'll simply propose the recommendations involved and I suggest that any questions would be best put to [member of the public] you very much Leader. Right you have one recommendation in front of you that this Council approves the 2025 2026 prudential and treasury indicators and notes the contents of the review document right um the leader has proposed the recommend the recommendation who would like to second it anybody like to second it oh Councillor Jackson will second it thank you

02:20:28Right uh the count the motion is now seconded would anybody does anybody have any questions would you like to ask john simes any questions or no I see people's eyes getting very tired right if you are willing to move to a vote straight away then we're going to go to a vote straight away on that recommendation if you are in favor of accepting the recommendation will you please raise your hand now if you are against the recommendation would you please raise your hand now and if you wish to abstain on the recommendation you raise your hand now thank you that is largely carried thank you very much everybody right agenda item where are we agenda item 12 recommendation from licensing and enforcement committee now the chair of licensing committee is absent today unfortunately he's in the middle of an Ofsted at school so I don't is the vice chair able to recommend propose the report Councillor Bloxham thank you chair this is just a procedural report that was agreed at the committee in February as we

02:21:28Had temporary pavement licensing at that stage it's now permanent and so I just recommend the report as the recommendation as in the report thank you thank you very much Councillor Bloxham right so the recommendation is as it is in front of you that council approves the adoption of the draft policy with an amended start time for general opening hours in the policy of 9 a.m. Would anybody like to second that recommendation?

02:21:50Is that Councillor Barlow seconding? Thank you. It is. Right. If anybody has any questions, Mel is on hand to answer questions. Nope. Okay. Let's move to a vote then. If you are in favour of accepting that recommendation, would you please raise your hand now? If you are against it, would you please raise your hand now? And if you would like to abstain, would you please raise your hand now?

02:22:09And I think that was... Oh, no. Not quite unanimous. Largely carried.

02:22:13Thank you very much. Right. Agenda item 13, recommendation from Cabinet on local government reorganisation in Devon, government decisions and implications for East Devon. This is to be presented by our leader. Leader, over to you. Yes, thank you, Chair. Again, in the absence of Councillor Loudoun, I'll just propose these recommendations. With regard to Recommendation 1, it would be helpful to hear perhaps from the Monitoring Officer or perhaps from the Chair or Vice-Chair of Scrutiny, because I understand that Councillor Loudoun has had discussions around these changes to committee meetings, which, as I understand it, were acceptable to the Scrutiny Chair.

02:22:57I'm just popping along there, I think one of the reasons this has come up is that the Scrutiny Committee met on quite few occasions in 2025, but it's very much up for discussion. And the other is around the budget for transition, and that's there in your papers. Thank you, Chair.

02:23:20Thank you very much, Leader. Does anybody wish to second the recommendations? Is that you, Councillor Borough? Are you second? No, I'm not seconding. Is anybody willing to second? Okay, I feel like we have a debate on our hands then. Right. Councillor Blakey, did you wish a second? I do wish. Yes, please. Fantastic. We have a seconder then. Okay, thank you very much. So the motion, the recommendation is now proposed and seconded.

02:23:56Are there any questions? Does anybody want to say anything? is there any debate Councillor Borough please thank you chair as chair of the order and governance committee I am concerned that I haven't been consulted on the proposed reduction from 5 to 4 on the number of committee meetings I would have liked that time to consult with the section 151 officer and our external auditors about the time frame for things like getting our external audit approved, signed off, et cetera.

02:24:37I've not had that courtesy, I'm afraid. So I can't... Well, I will keep my powder dry for the rest of the discussion.

02:24:48Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Barlow. Right, Councillor Barlow, I think. Thank you, Chair. Again, I have also... I don't share anything, but no one's consulted as far as I'm concerned on any of these things. This is basically for LGR. We had to save time because the officers were going to be very, very busy doing LGR. LGR has been put on pause. We have been told by the government to stop and at the end of the day we are still carrying on with cutting them.

02:25:19Asset management. You run a lot of assets and you decide now that you're going to have instead of four meetings a year, I could accept if you were going to trim it to two or three meetings a year but you're going to go down to one. I just don't understand how we are supposed to, as councillors, to actually challenge us. It might be easier if you just made a suggestion, let's get rid of the councillors and just run it as cabinet and officers and get rid of us, because we're just inconvenient.

02:25:46So I really think BSCAP, ACID, and things like that, I just think that at the end of the day, you need to consult with us first before you just decide you're just going to get rid of them, because you don't think they're useful. You don't think that it's convenient. And at the end of the day, it's important that we check the assets at least twice a year.

02:26:06What did we say to do in January actually happens by July. Otherwise, you've got to wait until the following January to find out that you either haven't done anything, not that you're incompetent in any way at all, but at the end of the day, we want to know what's going on. And I don't think it's right, and I don't think it's fair. It's certainly not democratic. Yeah, and I'm annoyed.

02:26:30Okay, Councillor Arnott, will you come in on that, please? Well, I don't disagree with anything Councillor Barlow said. I'm not sure that this has been our finest hour. Just to confirm, I don't think these proposals have gone through the Constitution working group. It's not really. I don't know if it is in my gift, having proposed the recommendations to unproposed the first one. I just think, well, perhaps somebody might be kind enough to amend it and just have this referred to the Constitution Working Group.

02:27:05I mean, it needs to have, it's going to be meeting soon. It can't, it can't, it looks like it won't take long. It sounds like an amendment, Councillor Arnott. Sorry? It sounds like an amendment. Is it an amendment? Well, yes. It sounds like you're proposing an amendment. Yeah, I mean, ideally, it wouldn't have been me proposing this today, as you understand, because John's not here. But I would propose to amend one that the council refers the proposed changes to committee meetings to the Constitution Working Group.

02:27:36Mel. Please, Chair. As it was actually the leader that was proposing the amendments in the first place, it's in his gift to say that he wants to amend it. So we don't need to treat it as an amendment formally as long as the person who seconded it is also comfortable. I can't remember who that was. Councillor Blakey Councillor Blakey could you pick up on what Councillor Arnott was saying I did yes and I am very comfortable with it um truthfully I only seconded it to try and get the debate going thank you very much we thank you for that um right uh I refer to my instructions at the top of the meeting Councillor Goodman please yes I would fully support what the leader said it's such a shame it's taken such a long time because I wrote to the portfolio holder before this paper went to cabinet asking him to withdraw because it was written before we knew what was going to happen to lgr it's not been it's not is the leader quite right it's not our finest hour I think two

02:28:39Things need to happen yes it needs to the go to the constitution group but also I think the chairs of all that of all those committees and the group leaders should have some input into this because let's be frank if this went through this would reduce transparency of our council and that's the last thing our members want transparency is so important so I support one of these this is one of the problems with being buffeted constantly by massive change imposed from above um so yeah because by the time a paper is made things have changed again in a big way so um yeah sorry I think that's a really important point to make I don't know how many weeks it is since the government announced in July one thing, changed its mind later the sector was expecting some pretty definitive announcements tomorrow about OGR we're now told, I believe that there's not enough parliamentary time for the Secretary of State to do this tomorrow, so it is a shambles and this is one of the things

02:29:41I'm afraid that's collateral damage but I'm very grateful to those who supported the idea of let's let's get it right and bring it back in thank you right so leader you have actually amended your own recommendation haven't you and Councillor Blakey is happy to accept the amendment so is everybody clear what their vote what they'd be voting on okay fine okay right does anybody else want to say anything we have Councillor John's lined up thank you chair um so I as you were aware raised this at cabinet when this was first brought out when I found out that scrutiny which I chair was being reduced by two meetings a year and I had apology from both Councillor Loudoun and from the monitoring officer for that oversight so I'm quite shocked to see that audit and governance were also not advised of these changes so I think that the way that this is happening including what happened with the previous item we had should come to scrutiny to see how these decisions are being made without any of the outside councillors being

02:30:50Aware of it until it comes out like this because I think an awful lot seems to be slipping through the net it is entirely in your gift Councillor John to bring that to scrutiny absolutely so I thank I thank the leader for basically turning around saying no to this and it'd go back sorry sarah you have got so much work coming your way um but I thank the leader for doing that thank you yeah thank you very much uh vicky uh Councillor Jackson we're getting so close to getting to the end of our work list hey um no um Councillor Goodman's points well made and given the changes that have happened recently I think it it it's fair to bring that back for a second second thought and and hearing um Councillor Johnson's point and that That is a larger issue.

02:31:41I think it's absolutely right that the committee chairs are consulted on that before it comes to the Constitution Working Group. And then from there, we can look at their feedback alongside this review. My only caveat to this is if at the moment we're looking at a pause in LGR. And this has been drawn together with the understanding that LGR was progressing. And quite understandably, there needs to be additional capacity within our officer cohort to be able to deliver the things that they need to deliver.

02:32:19So when we look at that, I do think it's worth some consideration to the plan A, plan B, depending on what government's decision is thereafter. now it might be by the time we look at it we've got further we've got greater clarity but I do think we need to be mindful of those resources as well but happy to bring it back in to constitution working groups thank you Councillor Jackson much to highlight yet again the problem with making on the fly decisions at a high level and then imposing them on people without sufficient consultation right uh Councillor Is that jess bailey yeah Councillor Jess bailey please uh no that's fine okay thank you jess um Councillor Mike howe please I just wanted to speak again so I I'm actually happy with the leader's um decision I think it was bad poor practice following government's decision on planning to do exactly the same thing to this council on this but thankfully thank you very much leader for what you're doing right thank you very much everybody Councillor Burhop thank you chair um given that uh lgr is currently being

02:33:30Postponed recommendation two approves a budget of 500 000 for transition should that not be deferred as well yeah please leader do I mean yes but no but yes but no the problem is it's paused for review it's not cancelled it's not deferred as of today's date that's the problem with that that's why my feeling is we have to leave that in there for now at the point where it is theoretically cancelled or deferred for two years or something three years then I think we can say okay let's put that money back in somewhere else but if we don't leave it there so I doubt that um john or andy or anybody will be spending this actively now because obviously the work stream has gone right down for for this transitional work but I think we we will be it'll be a worry not just to leave it there like father ted resting in the uh resting in the account for another month or two right thank you very much leader so we have some amended

02:34:42Recommendations we have some sorry wait a minute wait a minute wait a minute who had the hand up first I didn't see Jess okay Councillor Bailey thank you um can I just ask um so are what are we spending on LGR at the moment even though it's been paused have we got ongoing costs are we have we got consultants contractors doing things that we're we're crumbs who who's better than the place to answer that one is it you tracy oh andy andy and andy wood's going to come in I think on this yeah thank you chair there is no huge expenditure at the moment um because of um uh you know if you go back to the original cabinet report it was really awkward to write I'll be quite frank and I think a lot of that's coming out now um the uh originally at the time of you You know, when it was first drafted, we were going full bore for elections in May 27 and establishing four new unitaries in 1st of April, 2028.

02:35:53And then, you know, just before it was due to be published, we had the 7th of September announcement that put things on pause. And there's still a huge amount of ambiguity there. You know, I suppose the fear factor is that we will have to reactivate a lot of that work potentially quite quickly, Even if there was going to be a confirmation of how that pause was going to resolve itself tomorrow, which it seems now unlikely that that is going to be the case.

02:36:18And it's the continued ambiguity and uncertainty we're trying to manage ultimately. But to answer the question properly, there is not all of that work in line with the government's direction has effectively been ceased at the moment. There is ongoing work to look at the underlying drivers to why we need to act that comes out from previous items around the mid-term financial strategy, around transformation, for example, and how we collaborate across the family within Devon.

02:36:46And it may be that that leads to further calls on budgets going forward, but at the moment there is not huge amounts of work being commissioned.

02:36:56Thank you very much, Andy. I hope that answers your question, Jess. Right, then Councillor Goodman, please. Yes, I want to agree with Andrew. I didn't know he was going to say that. I brought this up with Simon Davy two or three weeks ago, and I said, why are you doing this? What he explained, and I think he's absolutely right, is this money is not for LGR. It's for the lessons that we've learned from LGR.

02:37:21It should have been termed as transformation work. That work's needed to be done, but I think the wording was wrong in this report. It's transformation, not LGR. Always worth reminding members that it's actually a budget and not an actual spend as well. So it's just money put aside for a purpose, not an actual physical spend. So if it's not needed, it won't be spent. But if it is needed, it will be spent for the purpose for which we have designated it.

02:37:48Right. It's worth reminding people of these things sometimes. The budget is not a spend. Right. Does anybody have any more questions? That doesn't look like a plant at all. Councillor Barlow.

02:38:03Thank you. I just want to say, I question this in Cabinet, and we went to this quite a lot of detail. There was 1.3 million, not 500,000, 1.3 million, and the 500,000 was for this transformation where we're going to be working with others and looking at ways we can save money. Now, my way of doing things is when you come up with a way of spending, saving money, you would then normally apply and say, we're going to save a million pounds, and to do that we need £200,000, that's a good deal.

02:38:35But you're still saying you're going to put £500,000 in a pot to go and save some money but no one's quite sure where they're going to save it from and they're not sure if they are going to spend it or not going to spend it or what they're going to spend it on. So why are we giving money that you don't know what it's for? If it's going in a pot and it's not going to be touched, if LGR doesn't happen, then I'm all happy about that.

02:38:56But I would like that guaranteed that you're putting this £500,000 and the £800,000, £1.3 million in total, and you're not going to touch it unless we are told LGR is back on. It is a budget, Councillor Barley. Well, that's fine. Then can we just have an assurance that you will not spend it if LGR is not going to happen? It can't be spent for any other purpose. It can only be spent for the purpose for which we designate it, Councillor Barley.

02:39:22Transformation. What does transformation mean? I remind you that this item is in an item about LGR. But then read the detail, because it might be about LGR, but when we went through Cabinet with it, transformation kept coming up. It wasn't about LGR, it was about how we're going to work with other partners that we're no friends with. OK, so I think Councillor Arnott might have an answer.

02:39:45The thing is, this comes back to the same point. If LGR is back on, transformation of services, working with all the other councils in Devon is going to be right at the top of the agenda. We will be desperately, all of us, trying to work out how we're going to make this work around shared services. Also, if it were to come back with the worst possible solution, with the Mad Horseshoe, Extended Exeter, Plymouth and Torbay, the work to make services just even carry on would be enormous.

02:40:17That is transformation work. But if LGR doesn't happen, and this council wishes to pursue transformation work in another way, that comes back to us for further consideration, is my understanding. Councillor Hayward.

02:40:36Thank you, Chair. For me, the wording is quite clear. When we discussed this, the original wording was a budget of. We added in the words up to. Everyone here knows that up to can mean zero. if it doesn't need to be spent it won't be spent everyone in this room knows that there is not a room in this building with a big pile of pound coins in it and we are putting them in a pot it's a budget it's a theoretical budget line it doesn't mean there is someone going out and handing someone a bag of cash that's not how the council finances work we budget for possibilities we budget for expenditure if that expenditure is not necessary we don't spend it and thankfully If Councillor Hawkins was here, he would say the same thing. The second line within recommendation two, that up to 500k budget to be used to also support costs associated with exploring saving initiatives to be achieved through transformation and shared service opportunities by authorities working together.

02:41:37It's written here. I don't really see this needs any more debate. It's a budget line of up to, including zero, if that's necessary. And if there is no spend, it won't be spent. We do not have the luxury of spending money on things we don't need to spend them on in this authority. So, Chair, can I move that the vote be put, please?

02:42:00I am very happy to accept that. No, we're going to move on because we have so late already. Right. We're going to move to a vote now, I think. If you are in favour of accepting the recommendation, these two recommendations, would you? No, they've been presented as two together. Oh, of course. Yeah, sorry. We've removed that one, haven't we? Yeah, okay. Sorry. The single recommendation that is remaining on our recommendation list.

02:42:27Sorry sorry just to be clear chair I thought what we were doing was paragraph one is to refer the matter to the constitutional working group yeah yeah and then two yeah yeah okay so we do still have two recommendations the first one is that it goes it's amended um such as to send the changes back to the constitutional working group for further work um which is why Councillor Jackson was slightly slightly depressed because she gets a whole load more work next week or the following meeting. So that first recommendation is that the changes to the committee meetings go back to the constitutional working group. That is what you said, isn't it, Leader? And that's what Councillor Blakey supported. And the second recommendation is as it is in your papers.

02:43:11Is everybody clear what we're about to vote on? Okay. So if you are in favour of those two recommendations, would you please raise your hand now? And if you are against them, would you please raise your hand now? and if you wish to abstain would you please raise your hand now and I think that was largely carried thank you very much everybody right moving on to agenda item I'll find myself in a minute agenda item 14 which in your papers is pages 233 to 247 right who am I handing this over to oh yes This is Councillor Arnott in a very, very uncomfortable position, I think, because this is not his head of experience.

02:43:57Some members may know I took O-level maths twice, and I got a C on the second time. So, however, in the absence of the finance portfolio holder, I'm very happy to propose the recommendation that Council approves the financial strategy for 2027 to 2029. And John is here to answer any more questions. Yes, so John Syme can answer any technical questions. Obviously, don't ask the leader of those. Right. Does anybody have any questions? Would anybody like to second the motion first? Councillor Howard seconded. Thank you very much. Second running an auction house. Does anybody have any questions for John Syme?

02:44:36No are you happy to go to the vote okay if you would like to vote in favor of that recommendation would you please raise your hand now if you would like to vote against it would you please raise your hand now and if you would like to abstain would you please raise your hand now and that is largely carried thank you very much everybody okay agenda item 15 pages 248 260 in your agenda pack yet again falls to the leader to present this report which is the recommend the financial Monitoring Report and Annual Treasury Management Review for 2025.

02:45:09Leader. Thank you, Chair. The recommendation, Council, is that you approve the 2025-26 Prudential and Treasury Indicators and Notes the Contents of the Review Document.

02:45:20Thank you, Chair. Right. Is anybody willing to second that? Thank you, Councillor Barrett. Right. Any questions? Questions, obviously, for John Syme, not for the Leader, who has already given his credentials. I didn't do much better nope no questions okay are you happy to go to a vote right if you're happy to vote in favor of that recommendation would you please raise your hand now if you would like to vote against it would you please raise your hand now and if you would like to abstain would you please raise your hand now and that I think was unanimous wasn't it I think yeah thank you very much okay agenda item 16 recommendation from cabinet on the 7th October, the East Devon Local Nature Recovery Plan. Agenda pages 261 to 269. I have, bizarrely, Councillor Richard Jeffries is going to recommend this. Over to you, Richard.

02:46:11I'm not sure about the bizarrely bit, but... We haven't heard from you at all yet. That's why it's bizarre. All we've heard from is the leader. Over to you. Well, glad not to be the leader. I'm pleased to bring this recommendation for approval. The East Devon Local Nature Recovery Plan provides a practical and evidence-based framework for translating the ambitions of the local nature recovery strategy into locally targeted action that will deliver real benefits for East Devon's wildlife, landscapes, and communities.

02:46:40By identifying priority habitats, nature recovery networks, and the areas where investment intervention can have the greatest impact, the plan will help focus resources on protecting and restoring and connecting our most important natural assets. It provides a framework for habitat creation, restoration, and enhancement, supporting biodiversity recovery, climate resilience, and improved access to nature, whilst ensuring the biodiversity net gain and other environmental initiatives that will contribute directly to the wider nature recovery objectives.

02:47:09Objectives. Importantly, this is a delivery focused document. Through the use of detailed local ecological evidence and mapping, it will help guide projects, partnerships and funding opportunities towards those locations where the greatest environmental gains can be achieved. Initiatives such as the Wild About Seaton Master Plan demonstrate the potential of this approach to deliver long-term benefits for both wildlife and people. I particularly welcome the Community Nature Recovery Fund, which will provide practical support for community-led nature recovery projects across East Devon by offering accessible grants for habitat restoration, wildlife-rich spaces, ecological connectivity, natural flood management, or improved access to nature. The fund will enable local communities, schools, parish councils, charities, or landowners to play a direct role in delivering the objectives of this plan. Approving this plan will provide East Devon with a strategic yet practical tool to guide future investments, unlock external funding opportunities, and support a coordinated approach to nature recoveries across the district. I like to think of it as more, it gives us the ability to get more dormice for our dollar. Any other suggestions for how you could express that

02:48:23Would be great, and I therefore propose this cabinet recommendation. Thank you. More plovers for our pound? I have to say. We don't spend dollars here. Right.

02:48:37Thank you very much, Richard. Who is willing to second? Are you willing to second, Councillor Jung? I'm seconded. Okay, Councillor Jung is seconding. Fantastic. We have a proposed and seconded motion, recommendation. Are there any questions for the portfolio holder? Nope. Are you happy to move? Oh, Paul, Councillor Fernley, please.

02:48:57Thank you. it's just a quick one and I'm great to see this uh come forward um the recovery fund looks really exciting for local communities uh when is the plan to start that part of it if assuming the motion goes through thank you thank you Councillor Fernley Councillor Jefferies thank you for that thank you for that question um paul approached me earlier about this one and I am waiting for clarity on that but I'm wondering if any has andy has uh further clarity on time frames for getting mechanics in place. Andy Wood, head of place.

02:49:32Thank you, Chair. I don't have a precise timeline at the moment, but I will certainly provide one forthwith to the portfolio holder. One will be forthcoming, forthwith. There you go. Right. Fantastic. Sorry, who? Alistair, Councillor Bruce, please.

02:49:47Thank you, Chair. Just a question or a query, really. Will this grant encompass tackling invading species, be it seaweed or yellow-legged Asian hornets thank you chair thank you very much for that question close to the hearts of some of us uh Councillor Jefferies please I believe this question came up at overview and or cabinet before Andy can you remind me of uh the exact wording of how we put that yeah that's correct chair so I think there was a question around Himalayan balsam that was raised uh at the original meeting and it was confirmed that that would be within scope I'm asking for beekeepers in the area a yellow-legged hornet do we have them I should declare an interest at this point shouldn't I I think Chad the general point around tackling invasive species on the basis of preserving if you like an indigenous species that absolutely was part of what was covered generally in responding to the Himalayan balsam question that was used as to indicate the wider scope of the policy. Thank you, thank you Andy. Councillor Arnott, please.

02:50:55Yes, just to support Councillor Bruce's point there, at Cabinet I described Himalayan balsam as Japanese knotweed, so I know about as much about gardening as do about maths, but absolutely, genuinely, that Himalayan balsam thing is where we are horrific and if there's money available. Councillor Bruce, quickly. Just coming back on behalf of the honeybee, of course I have to declare an interest and other pollinators tackle Himalayan balsam as a great access at this time of the year to buffer their winter winter supplies so I'm in conflict with that one share sorry in favor of the Himalayan balsam oh dear there's ivy as well Councillor Bruce um right are there any more questions for Councillor Jefferies no are you happy to go to a vote on this right if you are in favor of adopting that recommendation would you please raise your hand now if you would like to vote against it raise your hand now and if you want to abstain raise your hand now and that was unanimous thank you very much the Himalayan balsam does not thank you right now agenda item 17 pages 270

02:52:00290 in your pack which is the employment and skills plan agenda I'm going to invite Councillor Paul Heywood to present and propose recommendations please as a cabinet I'm delighted to support and propose the adoption of the employment and skills plans the monitoring and compliance fee schedules set out in your papers the recommendations the reasons for them are set out here there's nothing more I can add other than perhaps taking a leave from Councillor Bruce and adding dealing with invasive seaweed to the skills plans that we can encourage people to come aboard and destruction of Asian hornets as well but the the it's a it's an incredibly worthwhile thing in this in recent years you know perhaps we've we had a we as a nation have just been more focused on academic skills and yet vocational skills the skills that build houses and deliver things which have been partially forgotten need to be promoted because that's where some younger people and some older people and this this covers both are better skilled and we need those skills so this is an incredible opportunity and I'm delighted that we've come on

02:53:16Board with it I did see a comment on some social media pages from our own promotional teams comms team which said how are you going to force developers to pay it well that applies to every single thing seal 106 we have officers we have enforcement officers to get this this is now policy I wholeheartedly support it and urge and commend it to council for adoption thank you chair thank you very much Councillor Hayward who would like to second are you are you seconding Councillor Bruce okay so we've got a duly seconded um set of recommendations are there any questions for Councillor Hayward oh Councillor Burhop please I know it's late um so I'll be brief um I have concerns I have to say that we are I mean it sounds like we're delivering this we're not actually we are forcing developers who are already stalling development and building to undertake yet more, well, contribution on behalf of the council, worthy as it is.

02:54:25And I commend the objective of increasing trades and skills in the area. However, we are overlaying yet more regulation on developers who are slowing down dramatically their building at the moment.

02:54:46Thank you, Councillor Barlow. Are there any more questions? Councillor Arnott, please. Yes, and I really respect Councillor Barlow's point. As it happens, and to my surprise, both Councillor Barlow and I were at the same meeting yesterday as was Todd and Andy of the Interim Growth Board for Malkoom and we heard from one of the senior figures at Exeter and North Devon College also represented in the room were MHCLG, Department of Trade and Homes England and they absolutely welcomed this with, you know, they couldn't shout it higher from the rooftops Because not only does it provide, you know, potential employment or rather skill resource for the houses and communities we need to build, but also it should help address the NEATS crisis as well.

02:55:45So I absolutely take the point that the Council of Barrow is making that if I was a builder, I would be going, God, yet another levy of some kind. but actually I think this MOU that's been signed between all the councils is a huge step forward and it has been recognised as being helpful by Homes England and that's important to us if we want to work with them and moving forward. Thank you Councillor Arnott. Any more questions? It wasn't so much a question as a comment. No okay are you ready to vote on it? Okay if you're willing to accept these three recommendations will you please raise your hand now if you want to vote against them raise your hand now oh one recommendation in three bids okay sorry okay one recommendation three bids and if you wish to abstain will you please raise your hand now and that is largely carried thank you very much everybody right I thought we'd already done seriously I'm losing the plot here okay so I thought we'd already

02:56:45I thought we'd just gone through it from 16 to 18 um agenda item 18 pages 291 to 307 committee allocations to 2627 which have as I understand been very widely discussed with group leaders um this is uh I think this is Councillor Jackson presenting this with um technical support from andrew at the end of the table uh uh yes uh thank you members um this does what it says on the tin we've had some changes to our political balance this uses the same methodology that we've used before um to then reapportion those committee seats um hopefully we can all agree to this it's been widely discussed um amongst the group leaders as the chair has stated um I hope that everyone can get on board and we can move forward thank you very much thank you so we've got a proposer who is willing to second this uh Councillor Dumper thank you very much Councillor Dumper right we've got three recommendations on the agenda on the table um which are all in front of you um are there

02:57:52Any questions for the portfolio holder uh Councillor Heath um yes just in terms of standards I think it's been agreed that I will take over from jess bailey so I just want that to be noted just for invitations to the center yes thank you so there are a number of changes to membership names in different committees and there were some blanks in the table that's in your pack those names have now been provided by the relevant group leaders so we will use the monitoring officers delegated authority to approve those rather than try and insert those into the document now on the fly we'll do that so on monday I'll issue a delegated decision just to confirm those final places but there's no change to the figures that are set out in the document pack before you okay so as as as is common instead of doing this name filling in in the middle of a meeting um we agree to give delegated authority to the monitoring officer to collect all the names and put them into the

02:58:59Right places uh Councillor Johns thank you um I understand where uh andrew has come from but I would point out that there are a few things so for example on the scrutiny committee um I'm down as the chair however it says independently awaiting nomination ian barlow has been on scrutiny for quite a while now and I'm not sure why he suddenly disappeared off off the screen It could be an accidental oversight, but then we can deal with that under the delegated powers of the monitoring officer.

02:59:34So if anybody spots anything anomalous that should or shouldn't be there, please do tell the monitoring officer and she will incorporate it into her calculations.

02:59:43Thank you, Vicky. Right, are there any more comments or questions? No, are you happy to go to a vote on this? right okay if you are in favor of the recommendations as presented in your report would you please raise your hand now and if you are against them will you please raise your hand now and if you wish to abstain would you please raise your hand now and that is unanimous thank you very much everybody right moving on I wish it were swiftly but it is not moving on we have the first of three motions on notice on community asset transfers I'm going to invite the proposal Councillor Brian Bailey to speak to the motion and then the second will be able to come in or maybe do his contribution. Brian, over to you.

03:00:23Thank you, Eleanor. On reflection, I'm not too sure where we are with this because when I proposed this, LGR was very much up and running, but now it's kicked into the long grass. However, I wish to continue if that's okay. My concern and lots of concerns of towns and villages and parishes is that if LGR was to revive and carry on, therefore this authority would be no longer and the towns and villages would be without the facilities provided by this authority, particularly toilets. So I was wondering if we could review the asset transfer to see if in the forms of time we could get a different attitude to it. At the moment you cannot, it's not allowable to transfer any assets to a town and a village that is generating income or or is of any value so my problem is and the problem with times and villages is how are they going to pay for these facilities when they're no longer provided by us or the new authority thank you thank you Councillor Bailey Councillor Brown you seconded this motion do you want you wish to

03:01:34Speak okay thank you right are there any questions any debate who Councillor Heath and then Councillor Barlow and then Councillor Hayward please and then Councillor Gazzard thank you chair early this year at an in-person LGR presentation two members of Cornwall Unitary Authority stated that there has been a balanced assets transfer of profit making with loss making this strikes me as a balanced dispersal and enables town and parish councils to more effectively manage their resources especially finances and just to give an example it's public toilets which tend to be loss making versus car parks which tend to be profit making thanks thank you Councillor Heath uh Councillor Barlow yeah I just want to say this council needs to save money and we can skirt around we can try and avoid it we can try and bury our heads in the sand but sooner rather than later we are going to have to make changes whether lgo happens or not is irrelevant our 151 officer warned us of this so if this is the case it makes perfect sense if you can save two million pounds to this council by giving away

03:02:43One million pounds worth of actual profit making assets but save two million you are still saving this council money so regardless of whether lgr happens yes this should be allowed yes you should be able to look at it and then negotiate I think that is a simple thing it should be allowed to negotiate and there shouldn't be anything that ties this council or any other council's hands to say you cannot look at something thank you Councillor Barlow uh Councillor Hayward please thank you chair um I mean I I would propose an amendment but unfortunately it would be deemed a wrecking amendment because it would completely substantively change the wording that might be acceptable but it would keep the nuance I think of what's here first of all I must add so the motion as listed from the word that to eddc should fail my personal view because it ends will be withdrawn due to the demise of eddc it's factually incorrect at this point in time there is no demise of eddc so the whole motion because there's no punctuation in it fails it's it's a

03:03:56False anomaly however I get entirely what um Councillor Bailey and and the seconders and supporters are saying. So my suggestion would be that council, EDDC, review the asset transfer policy and refer the matter to the portfolio working group for further review, because we're already reviewing the council's assets. The community asset transfer policy is quite clear that there is a staged process for towns and parishes, in fact, anyone, to seek a transfer of an asset, be that a transfer with a freehold purchase, a freehold consideration of a peppercorn.

03:04:42So there is already a process there, but it also sets out that the law that applies to this authority must ensure that this authority gets best value for an asset, whatever that asset is. So thinking they can be transferred for nil value is not going to happen. That would be legally impossible. But I get exactly entirely what you're thinking. You know, my day job involves working for a town council. And if there were a scenario whereby a town and parish believed that it could do a negotiated package of a liability and an asset, an earning asset, that would be considered. It will still be considered. So I applaud the nuance of this.

03:05:28I think the wording is wrong because it effectively is unconstitutional. It fails. But if the proposer, seconder and supporters were happy to just change the wording, The EDDC refer the matter of the asset transfer policy, whatever wording you think, to the Portfolio Holders Workings Group, myself, Councillor Barlow's on it, Councillor Goodman's on it. So we've got a nice cross-party platform to consider it. Then officers can prepare the policy, we can chop it and change it, and I think we'll all be in the right place to assist our smaller local authorities.

03:06:05Thank you, Chair. Happy to second if that's a proposal. Thank you, Councillor Hayward. Okay. Councillor Bailey, yes, I think. I think that's a good idea, and I'm very happy to go with that. Thank you. Wow. Peace breaking out all over you. Councillor Brown, are you happy with that? Okay, fantastic. So can you please put together a form of words? that um so perhaps that um eddc um agree to um yeah agree that the portfolio holders workers group working group for assets uh review the asset transfer policy um it's quite difficult doing this on the hoof but yeah stop just stop there did you get that Andrew okay fantastic we've got the words written down does everybody understand that okay so with that in mind it's been proposed and seconded because but Councillor Bailey and Councillor Brown accepted the amendment um so does anybody wish to say anything have you got any comments Councillor Gazzard at the back had his hand up I don't know which part of that that was about it was pre-amendment I'm happy, Chair. Can I just say, I wouldn't quite agree that this is a wrecking motion.

03:07:44I applaud the motion. It's done in good faith, and I was going to suggest that it be ousted, if it would be withdrawn, following any further discussions on LGR. But no, apart from that, I'm happy with the outcome, Chair. Thank you.

03:08:03Thank you, Steve. Councillor Bruce? I was simply going to second Council Hayward's proposal, Chair. Okay, so we don't actually need to anymore, though, because the proposal and second have accepted the amendments. But thank you very much for that show of support. Right, is there any more? Does anybody want to say anything? Has anybody got any questions or anything they want to contribute? Or are you happy to go to the vote on it?

03:08:24Okay, if you're happy to vote in favour of this motion, would you please raise your hand now? And if you want to vote against it, raise your hand now. And if you want to abstain, raise your hand now. No, that's unanimous. Thank you very much. And thank you for your collaborative work in achieving that. Right. Agenda item 20, motion on notice, local government reorganisation cost to local taxpayers, proposed by Councillor Goodman and seconded by Councillor Brown.

03:08:51So, Councillor Goodman, would you like to present your motion, please? Yes, thank you, Chair. Members, this is an important motion, not just for our council, but for many other councils in the UK. Labour set the deadlines, councillors incurred the costs, and local taxpayers must now not be left paying for Labour's changing the course. And it's also the potential loss of services this could have. The whole way this government has forced LGR on us and then suddenly stopped is unacceptable.

03:09:27No council should be bullied or blackmailed into local government restructuring in this way. It should not be imposed by top-down white or diktat or divided and rule in negotiations. Yes, some councils do wish to restructure, but this Labour government's process has been rushed and flawed. There has been limited attempts to gather consensus within the two-tiered areas. Local residents have not been consulted in a meaningful way. Devolution should be locally led.

03:10:04What is important is that any unitary changes should result in reducing costs that can be invested into services that our residents require. This country prides itself on democracy and transparency, which has been sadly lacking in this LGR process. Now, I understand, although the leader may be right, that I hear tomorrow the government may or may not be making an announcement. But if they do, I'm sure we will all agree that the process must be slowed down and there must be a clear timeframe with proper and open consultations.

03:10:42It is important to ask residents, do they support this and not have this imposed by Whitehall? And I urge the government that going forward, they listen to East Devon and other councils in the country and make residents and councils at the centre that delivers the right outcome for everyone. Members have today received a letter from Andrew Wood, which we all welcome, regarding the cost of LGR and seeking the government to refund Council's endeavour, with a total of £306 million, which, as I said, we will all support.

03:11:21The essential is that we have transparency over expenditure and could I just ask Andrew for this council to have a breakdown and separate the costs, additional spending, consultancy fees, existence staff time and outstanding contractual commitments. Can we please ask the government to confirm the eligibility criteria, claims, process and payment dates with a report back to councillors on what has been recovered and what remains outstanding? And I ask members to support this motion. Thank you.

03:12:01Thank you, Councillor Goodman. Councillor Brown, do you want to come in now? Oh, Councillor, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike. Thank you. I think it was all summed up in the letter that we was all sent around this afternoon from Andy Woods if you read that you've got the gist of what's going on basically Thank you Councillor Branson that's all you want to say? Okay, right so we've got a proposal, we've got a seconder is there any debate? Does anybody want to ask any questions? Councillor Olive, I see you first Thank you Chair I fully agree with the sentiments that Councillor Goodman has expressed. I don't think there will be a member in this chamber who doesn't, Mike, 100%.

03:12:50I do, however, also agree with Councillor Brown that the letter that's been circulated this afternoon addresses these issues, and I don't therefore think that it's a good use of the authority's time to debate the motion this evening and pursuant part four rule 11 in the constitution, I move that we proceed to the next item of business. Thank you, Chair. Okay. Right. Does that need seconding? Mel? Oh, dear. Mel's in shock now. I can't remember. Is it just in one of my discretions?

03:13:31Okay I I mean bearing in mind what's been said I don't think there is a person in this chamber who would disagree with it um and I do think that uh we can probably move on to the next item without needing a lengthy debate on this or any debate at all in fact because I think we'd just be saying how much we agree with each other just should we just so I'm just going to move it to the vote So the vote will be to vote on as it is in the motion.

03:14:04No, I think what Councillor Olive has just said... Oh, that we don't vote on it, actually. No, no, no, because the letter covers this motion. Well, no, no, no, you can shake your head, Councillor Goodman. It does. So that letter, by the way, is something that's been being agreed for some weeks between all of the authorities in Devon. It asks the questions. It asks for the money back.

03:14:26I just think this authority would look foolish to just do another one just replicate it when we've it's about to turn up um tomorrow in mhclg and I think that's what Councillor Olive was saying apologies I got confused because I was thinking that we're going to just put it to the vote so um if we want to defer to the next item of business then I would suggest that that second seconded. I think Councillor Borough, are you seconding? I am seconding. Right, okay, in that case we will move on to the next item of business and thank you very much, thank you very much. Okay, sorry, first time this has happened to me. Right, okay, so apparently we do need to put it to the vote, so if you are wishing to defer to the next item, would you please raise your hand now if you're in agreement and if you wish to vote against it would you please raise your hand now against this is against moving on to the next item and if you want to

03:15:43Abstain on that would you please raise your hand now I think we need to count don't we I think we need to count okay right well it's going to start that again and this time we're going to count can you make sure your hands are good and visible please if you wish to move on to the next item without a debate and without a vote would you please raise your hand now okay if you wish to vote against us moving on to the next item straight away would you please raise your hand now and if you wish to abstain on it would you please raise your hand now three abstentions I think four four abstentions okay so the outcome of the vote is that we move on to the next item um the papers I mean the motion is all there in public we we've had the part in our papers we all agree with you um but let's move on to the next item because otherwise we'll be here till 11 right um agenda item 21 emotional notice the overnight visitor levy which was proposed by

03:17:06Councillor Goodman um and seconded by Councillor Brown Councillor Mason unless it relates to agenda item 21 I'm not taking it um Councillor Goodman over to you please well for a start I'd like to thank alex for staying nearly three and a half hours to listen to this I congratulate you for staying. You have certainly done very well. This again is another important motion for the future of East Devon. Not just the negative effect on the hospitality sector, more widely the whole of the retail sector, events and leisure, and all could be seriously affected if the tourist tax is allowed to be implemented. Labour is proposing another tax on overnight stays and East Devon should be backing businesses that depend on those visitors.

03:17:56The tax, rather than bringing in money to East Devon, will have the opposite effect, and the real danger is that businesses will not survive. Members will know that we currently do not have the powers to bring in such a tax, but this could happen in the future, and we need to be united in our opposition to this tax. East Devon strongly supports its tourism industry through council-backed initiatives, strategic business networks, sustainability projects and regional funding. And was it not this council promoted coach-friendly status two years ago?

03:18:31We spend public money encouraging people to stay in East Devon. Why would we support a new tax that makes staying here more expensive? The hospitality industry has already been hit by soar in business rates and national insurance increase, or should I say Labour's job tax. Now they want yet another tax on top. This holiday tax will push up the cost of living and destroy jobs. Rather than increasing tax rates, we should be reducing them to support hospitality and the cost of living. It will simply be a further tax on British public and increase the cost of a family holiday. This could even encourage residents to go abroad rather than holiday in East Devon. Devon County Council cited a polling that showed that 39% of UK residents would choose a holiday abroad if domestic breaks became more expensive. This will not just impact hotels. The levy will apply to all short-term overnight visitor accommodation. This will include hostels, guest houses and even campsites.

03:19:39The UK hospitality industry strongly opposes the introduction of the local tourist tax, viewing this as a damaging blow to a struggling sector, in predicting a 5% tax would lead to tens of thousands of job losses and billions of pounds of lost activity. They point out that the tourist footfall might decrease, not just for the cottages, but for the restaurants, the attractions and the shops in the local area.

03:20:06This tax will also have a direct impact on Devon residents. By reducing tourists, this will lead to reduction in jobs, fewer working hours and the potential of job losses that will not be replaced. Visit Devon fear that adding a tax to the UK's already high 20% VAT threshold will price independent small-scale accommodation providers out of a highly competitive market. Some may argue that this could generate funding to protect national parks, maintain public infrastructure and improve public services.

03:20:42However, tourism boards emphasise that this would only benefit East Devon if 100% of the funds were directly invested back into the visual economy rather than being swallowed up by the general council budgets. I think we all know that with the current state of finances, this money will be used elsewhere and at the same time seriously affect hospitality and other sectors. Leader, can I ask you to come out against the introduction of this levy and following the example of our two East Devon MPs.

03:21:15Members, can I ask you to support this motion, oppose a levy and make clear that East Devon is open for business.

03:21:23Thank you, Chair. Thank You Councillor Goodman Councillor Brown you seconded this motion do you wish to speak Mike Mike I think it's all been said by Mike isn't it I mean I couldn't follow that up fantastic okay thank you very much Colin right who has anybody got over got on our list a council are not then Councillor Hayward and then Councillor Mason please yes so who couldn't disagree with the sentiment of that but the problem is the timing and what our powers are on this and the law of unintended consequences so in the motion I think Councillor Goodman leans heavily on the idea that the Devon and Torbay combined county authorities will have powers on this imminently that's not correct the government's consultation response published on the 10th of September said that if it was a foundation of strategic authority bear in mind it's likely to move up to a mayoral then it could look at doing a visitor levy but that enabling legislation hasn't been passed by parliament yet and if you look at what's going on in government at the moment

03:22:37[Passage not reproduced here. It contains allegations or strong criticism of named people or the council, made at the meeting. We don't repeat allegations; you can hear the passage in the council's own recording by playing it from this point.]

03:23:43Tourists themselves so quite understandably we're hearing understandably lots of noise in the hospitality sector and from my own house we do a bit of b&b I'm as interested in talking to those people who stay with us about whether they will be prepared to pay a quid or two extra as going into the pubs as going into the pubs my wife my wife does occasional b&b through the chair please Councillor Mason through the chair no it's not a pecuniary it isn't we'll make a complaint through standards if you want but it isn't so I think on that then I have I think I can think that there is some merit in some part of the resolution but I would like to propose some amendments chair if possible and I provided the amendments I can't stop you leader I cannot stop you leader so I've already I think provided the amendments to the officers they dovetail in with Right, I think maybe you should try to run them past councillors Goodman and Brown Well no, they need to see them first

03:24:50They need to see them first So those are the amendments So essentially that we note I don't know about anybody else but I'm struggling to see that Okay, well it's not very long, I'll read it out if I may chair What we do is we note that the strategic authorities will be responsible for administering the overnight visitor levy within their regions and will need to consult locally before introducing a levy that is those are the facts that we express the council's concerns regarding the introduction of an overnight visitor levy in Devon because we cannot under the legislation that's coming forward to do something just for East Devon that we call on the Devon and tour bay combined county authority to take those concerns into account should it consider the introduction of an overnight visitor levy applying within East Devon and then if you can go up please to the rest. Requesting the leader rights to the chair and constituent authorities of the DTCCA setting out East Devon District Council's position and asking that no levy be

03:25:59Introduced in Devon without East Devon District Council being consulted on their proposals. that council is and I have spoken to the Chief Operating Officer of the Combined Authority, that is as far as we can go and if we write anything else it will just be ignored the final recommendation there is to continue to work with the local tourism businesses East Devon Tourism Network and the Devon Local Visitor Economy Partnership and other and we already have those very powerful relationships thank you you can see that that's the original wording of item well whatever to increase overnight stays can you yeah uh extend the visitor season and grow visitor spending across the district now I'll be I'll be straight with you Councillor Goodman I in normal circumstances I I think I I would have liked to share these amendments with you beforehand I'll be very frank I think your proposal is entirely political here, so I thought we'd better do it just straight up in the council.

03:27:09Okay. I suppose, Councillor Goodman, there's no chance of you accepting these amendments, is there? Well, there's not very often, Chair, that I'm lost for words. But what we've just heard now, I am dumbfounded that the leader didn't have, first of all, the distancy, and I know the excuse he's given, to share it with me. And secondly, And he believes that I would accept it. And it's political. No, no. My motion was purely about the businesses in East Devon. That's what this was all about.

03:27:49He can use politics I did not use politics I will not use politics and I will not accept this that is and I am I'm sorry chair I'm appalled that a leader could do this tonight and to accuse me of making political gains and it is wrong it's a low ebb for me in this council. Okay and that answers my question um right so with that in mind we do need a seconder for the amendment uh Councillor Hookway is willing to second the amendment yes I'll second the amendment chair if I may and I'd just like to add that I think that I know Councillor Goodman's objections uh but we have to be pragmatic about this there's no point sending off uh letters and passing recommendations that they're not going to actually work We need to live in the real world improper and imperfect as it is.

03:28:43I would like to say that the paragraph six, if we can have paragraph six up, please, Andrew, is the most important one for me from the portfolio holder perspective, because we are continuing to work with the East Haven Excellence and the partners delivering the tourism network. That met last week. That had a very positive meeting. We are also chasing government grants. A government grant came down very recently known as the Hospitality Support Fund, which was looking for joint funding. There was a pot of £300,000. Officers have put that in, and the closing date was yesterday, so I can't give you any final result, but we'll keep you informed on that.

03:29:32So we are working very, very hard. At the present time, our tourism and cultural strategies are very supportive of tourism. I think the other thing that we need to say, I think he's right about VAT. VAT is way too high for hospitality business. It makes the country uncompetitive.

03:29:53People are already going abroad because of it and the other issue which we haven't mentioned and is critical and we are seeing hotels in particular closing because of this is high energy costs and if we don't draw the government's attention to that and keep going with that then I think we are not doing our a a real service to those so I would therefore like to support the amendment and think that is an effective way forward thank you thank you very much Councillor Hookway so we have an amendment as put up on the screen a moment ago which is proposed and seconded we're going to move to a debate I hope it doesn't take a huge amount of time but um I understand frustrations and concerns right so with that in mind we have got a list that's starting to build we've got Councillor Hayward on it first and then Councillor Mason thank you chair um so in the first instance of course I should declare an interest I um chair the audit and governance committee of the combined

03:31:04Authority so anything that did happen would ultimately be reviewed and scrutinized by that committee it hasn't happened and that's a key point um I'm also the economy portfolio holder so the economy of all east heaven businesses is very very dear to my heart um and I'm very grateful to the public speaker for for staying the course through a very long evening to to hear this debate um I'm going to try and remove the emotiveness from this and just deal with the the wording and some background to it and I applaud Councillor Goodman for the intense amount of research that's gone into this motion because it's factually correct the stats speak for themselves however there are some issues I have because it's been words have been used this evening such as a proposed tax it's not a proposed tax it's a consultation with very defined abilities to do it and and Councillor Arnott has alluded to that that the strategic um foundation authority would have to upgrade itself and then make a decision in consultation with all of its partners potentially

03:32:15That now means Plymouth um if and the consultation for members who don't know is ongoing so if you want to go online and have a look at that consultation you too can have an input as can your towns and parishes as to whether Plymouth joins them and as to whether this area should have a mayor. And those outcomes will be pertinent to this discussion. Councillor Goodman, you mentioned earlier that a potential tax could force people to leave the UK and go abroad.

03:32:47I went to COS earlier this year and arrived at the hotel to be suddenly presented with a bill to stay. A hotel tax applied to all tourists who visit Greece. I had no choice. I was 1,700 miles away from home, and it was, well, you're not going to get your room key unless you pay us. I mean, that's very unfair. But coming back to Councillor Hookway's point, VAT in Greece and Portugal and Germany and Spain for hospitality is 7%. So I personally would like all of our MPs, or whatever political affiliation, to work with the government, the Chancellor, to lobby for reduced VAT for hospitality.

03:33:27This government hasn't done it. The previous government, a conservative one, didn't do it. It tinkered, but it didn't materially change it. And that would help hospitality. It would give them the ability to push themselves. And then if VAT were at 7%, then a hospitality tax, a tourist tax, as in the US, a sales tax, which makes states vie for hospitality, vie for tourism through competitive taxation, could be considered.

03:33:57That's a national conversation, and it's not the nuance here. My only reservation, and it's not often that the leader and I disagree, but obviously I'll see how this debate goes. But it should be pointed out that in Somerset, across the border from here, and in Axminster, we're a bit closer to Somerset than others. an almost identical motion was put by the Somerset County Conservatives to the Somerset Liberal Democrats for this. The question was, can the executive provide reassurance that holiday tax would not be introduced locally? And in response, the executive confirmed that Somerset didn't have the powers to introduce it. That's it. They don't have the powers. And yet that was spun by the Somerset County Conservatives as Liberal Democrats refuse to rule out a tourist tax.

03:34:52That's not correct. That's not fair. They've said there are no powers to do it. But the headline is you're refusing. And that's the political element I really find disappointing because we're all trying to do the right thing in this chamber, all 60 of us, for our hospitality businesses who have been pummeled by COVID, pummeled by national insurance, pummeled by energy, pummeled by food costs, by a cost of living crisis. People have less money to spend.

03:35:22So actually, political gain, you know, gain and point scoring isn't helpful. It's not helping this lady here run her business. She don't care if political parties bicker. She wants to see positive affirmative action from us and national government because they set the rules on VAT. And they are asking us, can we? We're giving you an option. We're giving you a consultation. But East Devon can't. We don't have the powers to do it.

03:35:48So I applaud Councillor Goodman for bringing this because it's important. And if it's true in his heart, then I applaud that. I would be very cross, very upset if it's being done for political gain. Councillor Goodman, he said he's not doing it for that reason. So I take him on his word. But this does need some debate. some amendments have been put forward and I look forward to the further debate on this but for an economic perspective East Devon can't we have no powers other constituent parts of the combined county authority potentially could if it goes to that point in time but it's not at that point in time at the moment so it is a timing issue if at that point it was done I would wholeheartedly suggest this comes back because it will be relevant then but at the moment it's it's it's like any motion which says you should write to the Secretary of State and say that you can't gold plate pebbles on the beach.

03:36:44No one's suggesting you can. And it would be a terrible idea. So thank you, Chair.

03:36:50Thank you, Councillor Hayward. A reminder that we are actually debating the amendment at the moment, the motion as presented by the leader as an amendment. Right.

03:37:03Councillor Mason, you're next on my list. Thank you, Chairman. I did think I signalled first at the start there because you were telling me I had to wait. I just didn't know whether you wanted to say something about Motion 20 that we just moved over from. I was waiting I should get to speak before someone tries to stifle debate, stifle democracy. Nobody is stifling democracy, Councillor Mason. Please speak.

03:37:26Okay. 35 years ago, I got my first job at the World of Country Life. Like many of the Exmouth Community College, I went out and got jobs in the tourism industry. We worked at Sunny Bay, we worked as waiters, we worked as lifeguards, we worked in the craft shop, we worked in retail. So we became part of the 51,000 people in Devon, or 9% of the population here, who worked in the tourism industry.

03:37:53Many other friends end up with jobs at fish and chip shops on the seafront. They joined the 63,000 who are the 12% who are secondary employment through the tourism industry. It is important to our area. Whether we like tourists or not, whether we like tourism happening in our areas, we find them frustrating. It is a large employer. It is a large source of income. This year, I went back to the world of country life.

03:38:19The things I noticed, I don't think I need to declare an interest on pecuniary because if I can run a business, make money at the moment and still put amendments, I can obviously speak on this from 35 years ago, but we noticed there were less crowds. The biggest thing we did notice, the more people bringing their own picnics, more people bringing their own food in and their own drinks, there was less secondary spending.

03:38:40People weren't queuing up to use the ice cream kiosk. People were not spending the money because they had less money to spend. The secondary spend has dropped. That has hit a lot of people, and it has hit it hard. When someone takes away from the cake, the cake does not get bigger. It just means there's less cake for everyone else there who is waiting to have some.

03:39:02We've already seen that we are hit by VAT, which is a valid point that has been raised, and also hit by national insurance. But this could be the straw that kills the actual camel and not just breaks it back but wipes it out. It was mentioned about abroad. Salud, part of in Spain they brought in a levy which ranged between 90 cents to 5.75 euro per night maximum of 7 nights that resulted in a large tour company that has three letters to its name, pulling out of Salud, that had a 8 million pound drop for the local area that had a descent of event Valencia and they brought in the law to be able to do it recognize what was going on elsewhere and had reversed it within a year they recognized that their holiday aim to Benidorm the sort of kiss me quick cats would be killed people have choices where they go again people in the UK have choices where they go it's already cheaper recognized to go abroad than is to be in the UK which is a

03:40:12Shame we have great beautiful sites here we have a lot to learn about however it It is not cost-effective if you have a family who wants to have ice cream, who wants to have chips on the beach when it's so much more expensive here. It affects the businesses and the availability of our town centers. It's thought that 4,876 businesses rely on the tourism industry. Our town centers would not be the same if we didn't have the influx of tourists.

03:40:39Inland, away from nature reserves, it's Christmas as their main earning point, and they have to make their December, carry them for the rest of the year. Not so in our tourism-rich coastal areas where it is the summer months that see you through. You might not have anything coming through during the winter months. It's the summer months you need. This could have hit us, and it could hit things.

03:41:03I think it is important that we do go forward. We do vote this through. We have an outbreak of agreement, and it would be nice if this could actually be unanimous because that sends a clear message. it's a bit like if you send a letter to the government from one leader of a minority administration when you could wait for two days take it to a council and have unanimous from the whole council which would have far more impact and actually hits the Prime Minister than having it from just one man's opinion when he hasn't actually got the majority but there we go I think this is a chance that we could actually have a breakout of agreements here's something that is important I know from my childhood this was income I have a lot of friends who still work in the tourism trade they have found it very hard they're not rich they're not um sitting back being uh having the life of riley just counting the pounds they have to work for every single penny

03:41:53And to think how many staff they take on loath though I am to interrupt your maiden speech um we we do actually have two more another item beyond this so I would like the original motion ignore the amendment thank you right okay so that was you speaking against the amendment thank you and thank you for your maiden speech on this council right um and all you are obviously backing your original your original text um right next on my list please can you at this point of the evening only speak if you absolutely are saying something new and and not just agreeing with somebody else um Councillor Burrow please um again like to uh agree with the sentiment of this motion but I can't can't agree with the uh with with the motion in total. So I will be supporting the amendment as put by the leader. 60 countries have introduced this tax and I hear my colleagues opposite attestation that some areas have seen a fall in footfall. In other areas, there has been no fall. So academic studies in Italy, for

03:43:07Instance, have shown that the introduction of a per-night tax has not had any discernible effect on footfall in the areas. In fact, in areas such as Florence and Venice, footfall has actually increased during that time. Infrastructure has to be paid for somehow, and I have great deal of sympathy with the hospitality industry in this in in this area and nationwide I mean we are a nation of pubs and that is part of our culture and anything that we can do and I have to declare an interest because I do go to a pub from time to time anything we can do to support the hospitality industry in in this area then I'm all in favor of to the tune that I signed a petition, a national petition, to reduce VAT for the hospitality industry to 10%, and that petition was also signed by 400,000 other people, and that was actually presented to the government today.

03:44:09So practically, I think that's something that we should be campaigning for, and I said what can we do to influence government actually I've heard Councillor Barlow in the past say what good is this going to do this is not even a thing yet all right we can't we can't battle something that isn't a thing yet so what good is this going to do so I can't really support what the motion is I support what every everything that Councillor Hookway said lower v80 lower energy costs I'd even support um introduction of red diesel for hospitality uh business owners if that was uh if that was practical so um that's my my my point thank you thank you for reminding us that this is not yet a thing it's not it doesn't there's no no question whatsoever of it being introduced in East Devon anytime soon or if ever so it doesn't exist it's not it's only a project um at national level at the moment right Councillor Bruce and then Councillor Jung please thank you chair as with many debates in this chamber we appear to be

03:45:27Drifting off the substantive by quite a margin I think if you look at this all we're asked here tonight to do is to put down a marker in principle whether the thing itself exists or not that's what we're being asked to do and if that is the case I can't see any harm in doing that if it's not illegal to do it it shows support from this council in principle for something that may be coming down the line so essentially what is the harm of taking a vote on the first proposal thank chair there is no harm Councillor Bruce but we have a proposed and seconded amendment which we now have to vote on before we move to the the original text if that happens right if any nobody else has a burning desire to speak to the amendment I propose voting on that because it is nearly 10 o'clock and we still have one item to get through a very quick point Councillor Heath very quick Thank you.

03:46:30I'll hold you to it. There have been three models done, the Oxford economics modelling, the tax policy organisation and industry projections. And they all say that holiday or tourist tax will reduce visitor numbers and accommodation nights, though the scale of the impact depends on the model and the size of the levy.

03:46:48Thanks. Thank you very much. Right, I'm going to go back to my quick list and see Councillor Jung. Do you want to say something?

03:46:55Thank you, Chair. Yeah, I need to make two declarations. I used to work in the sector and street scene as a portfolio of street scene would benefit. So I can see some benefits in it. That is part of your portfolio. It's not a declaration. I support the amendment. I think now it's a stupid tax because most of it will go into administration. Which is not yet a thing, by the way.

03:47:26It doesn't exist. Yeah. And we definitely need to reduce the burden in this sector on the amount of tax that they have to pay. That's where we should be working and not thinking about something that might actually happen in the long term.

03:47:46Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Jung. A reminder again, it is not yet a thing. Councillor Faithfull.

03:47:53Thank you, Chair. I just want to come back at Councillor Burhop's comment about comparing East Devon with Venice. Venice have been having issues with cruise liners and all sorts of things, and they have actively been trying to reduce them because the city is sinking. So to compare East Devon with Venice, I'm sorry, is not really reasonable. We really do have issues that they don't have. OK, right. I'm going to start moving quite swiftly through the list of speakers.

03:48:25Councillor Arnott, you have your name on this list. Well, just thank you, yes, just to speak to the amendment at the point it was going to be moved. Well, now's your chance, Councillor Arnott. Well, OK, so just to say, my apologies to Council if... What I've been trying to do here is actually keep this alive. What I've tried to explain to you here, really, it was a it's a long set of proposals with a long pretext before it what I brought in today is the situation as it currently stands and what we could do so if we vote for the amendment it keeps it alive we're still offering a position that we need to be talked to we need to be consulted on when it becomes a thing it isn't a thing yet and you know unfortunately this has been brought forward as a motion prematurely so the amendment is intended to help to make sure we still have a credible voice going forward but that is not in any way to disrespect the what has been said

03:49:34From the well from everybody lay people but particularly from the tourism sector all of the excellent ideas around VAT that does seem to be you know a very serious thing indeed the duty for the entity that takes this up whether it's the combined county authority or the mayor will be massive consultation it will have to do it we will have a strong role in that and I've said it before I'll say it again the tourists will be asked themselves as well and we may be surprised by the answer or not or not but I just think tonight it's too soon to give a definitive no no no no no because it needs more thoughts I mean half of me have thought should we refer this to overview but actually I think we just need to deal with this tonight uh through the amendment thank you chair thank you Councillor Arnott I think that's quite a reasonable bookend for the amendment debate um I'm going to move to a vote on the amendment now because otherwise

03:50:34We'll be here till midnight and that's the one thing I want to avoid for all of us right you have the text of the amendment in front of you um is there any way we can tidy it up so that it's not all in red struck out or is it can people understand what it says despite the lots the masses of red striking out okay there's some more below the bottom of the screen as well which Angela will show to us in a minute okay I'm just going to leave you a couple moments to read through it so that you know what it is you're voting on do you want me to read it all yes of course of course uh can actually andrew could you read it up please because my eyes really aren't good enough yes thank you very much chair so the first recommendation in the amendment is that council note that street the strategic authorities will be responsible for administering the overnight visitor levy within their regions and will need to consult locally before introducing the levy

03:51:29Number two, that council express its concerns regarding the introduction of an overnight visitor levy in Devon. Three, call on the Devon and Torbay combined county authority to take those concerns into account should it consider the introduction of an overnight visitor levy within Devon. Number four, request that the leader writes to the chair and constituent authorities of the Devon and Torbay combined county authority setting out East Devon District Council's position and asking that no levy be introduced in Devon without East Devon District Council being consulted on the proposals.

03:52:10And finally, five, continue to work with local tourism businesses, the East Devon Tourism Network, the Devon Local Visitor Economy Partnership, and other partners to increase overnight stays, extend the visitor season, and grow visitor spending across the district.

03:52:30Thank you. Right. Councillor Goodman, sorry. On a point of order, really. And I don't know the answer to this, but in my previous council, when a motion was put that was substantially changed, it would be a completely new motion. Do we allow this sort of thing to happen in this council? It is either adding or taking away words, so it's completely acceptable. This is not completely changing the motion. It's not negatizing it.

03:53:03It's significantly changing it, though. it's still adding to or taking away words so I'm comfortable there is an amendment okay I think that answers your question Councillor Goodman yeah okay right so I'm going to put this to the vote now without further ado if you are in favor of adopting the motion as it is on the screen the amended motion would you please raise your hand now and if you are against adopting that motion would you please raise your hand now and if you would like to abstain on that would please raise your hand now and I think that is largely carried so that the the original text of the motion this becomes a substantial motion now which we now need to vote on don't we yes right it may seem absurd but we now need to vote on the motion as a whole which is basically the amended vote motion so if you are in favor of accepting this motion would you please raise your hand now and if you're against it would you please raise your

03:54:08Hand now and if you wish to abstain would you please raise your hand now thank you very much that motion is passed right okay now where are we as a form of words there is a form of words we have a part b people we have a part b right beth are you okay are you okay to do this okay so my vice chair is going to take over at this point I know you and me both colin if people could be polite enough, if they are leaving, please to leave in silence so that my vice chair can go through the form of words that is required.

03:54:45That would be very much appreciated. Councillor Jung, thank you. Go for it, Beth. With assertion. Okay, so, I propose that the press and public are excluded from the meeting on the basis that if they were present during the business to be conducted, there would be a likelihood of disclosure of exempt information within the meaning of Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972. so is this that there's a there's a proposal to move into part b is that seconded I think Councillor Olive seconded it first thank you if you are in favor of moving into part b at this point would you raise your hand now if you're against it would you please raise your hand now and if you wish to abstain raise your hand now thank you very much we are moving into part b in that case we will be turning off the feed to youtube yes so what's happening goodbye to everybody who's watching us online