Apologies were received from Cllr Butler (with Cllr Fraser is substituting).

There were no declarations of pecuniary interest

The minutes of the previous meeting were agreed.

Verbal update

Cabinet member for Commerce, Leisure and Culture - Cllr Caroline Cooper-Marbiah

·         Expand library services to include online support and a customer app.

·         Heritage 25^th anniversary events

·         Monitoring idverde performance/greenspaces

·         Increasing income through park events

·         Open water swimming (information gathering stage)

In response to Panel Member questions, the Cabinet Member for Commerce, Leisure and Culture clarified;

·         The events at Eastern Electrics are still being investigated by Police and other agencies as part of post event analysis.

·         E-books and magazines will be available to download on the Library app

ACTIONS:

         i.            Ask Idverde to provide plans for each park (March 2020 agenda) if these are part of the contract specification.

       ii.            Request total cost to subsidise tennis for free for the borough

Cabinet member for Regeneration, Housing and Transport - Cllr Martin Whelton

·         Morden regeneration – Brexit uncertainty has had an impact but we are going to market in the spring

·         Delivery of 2000 new homes

·         Cabinet agreed civil penalties

·         Introduction of selective licensing scheme

·         Housing strategy

·         Ravensbury regeneration – High Path is the next stage

In response to Panel Member questions, the Cabinet Member for Regeneration, Housing and Transport clarified;

·         Redevelopment of Benedict Wharf is desired – Plans for 600 homes. Ongoing supporting infrastructure and community facilities are important.

·         Previous there was a low number of prosecutions over licensing due to resourcing issues. The introduction of civil penalties gives us a range of tools now. 

·         GDPR concerns – Many Councils don’t publish (including Wandsworth and Sutton). We have taken advice from the Information Commissioner.

·         Blue badges, crossovers – We have taken further consultation which will be provided to Cabinet.

Cabinet member for Adult Social Care, Health and the Environment - Cllr Tobin Byers

·         Air Quality & Climate change – Air Quality action plan, tackling idling cars, clean air zone

·         Cross Party Climate work - Decarbonise Council by 2030 and borough by 2050.

·         Waste and cleanliness of the borough – patchy performance, need to address challenges such as communal collections, prevent and deter fly tipping.

·         Forthcoming review of street bins

·         Make reporting easier for fly tips

·         Monitoring Veolia’s commitment to the improvement plan

In response to Panel Member questions, the Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care, Health and the Environment clarified;

·         With regards to the Veolia contract - There were insufficient resources and the break clause is in 2025.

·         Any contract not performing requires more monitoring so the Assistant Director for Public Space is looking at a restructure of the team to increase capacity.

Director of Environment and Regeneration introduced the report.

The Chair invited residents to share their experiences of the service.

Sarah Cheetham (Resident): Area is plagued with litter. Rubbish and broken glass encourages a minority to further add to it. Endless reporting has done nothing. Local groups are working to litter pick. What are the Council going to do?

James Leek (Wimbledon Union Res Association): More consultation is required. It would be helpful for Residents Associations to receive a structure of staff so they know who to contact. Online reporting needs to be improved. Telephone reporting is inadequate. More information is needed with regards to the side waste policy. Residents Associations are a huge resource and should be included in consultation work, including the upcoming work on street litter bins.

Mark Gale (Resident): I met with Scott Edgell on 09.08.19 yet drains are still blocked, collections missed, bins are overflowing, street cleaning bags aren’t collected and there are fly posters all over the borough.

Dan Goode (Merton Matters): The instinct of the borough was that outsourcing the waste service was a bad idea. Maintaining standards and providing profit to a private company while tax payers plug the gaps. There are residents that already pay for the service giving free labour to help clean it.

In response Scott Edgell, General Manager for Veolia, replied;

·         There is a forthcoming plan to address the side waste policy

·         Huge success in recycling rates

·         12% reduction in waste

·         Christmas trees are only collected for two weeks after Christmas

·         We are working with the Local Authority on enforcement

The Chair introduced the themes to be covered today which are bin collections, street cleaning and fly tipping, website and reporting issues, and finally misc. issues including communication, staff motivation, contract and performance monitoring.

In response to Panel Member questions about bin collections, Scott Edgell clarified;

·         Solutions for estates (including Eastfields) are being discussed. We are encouraging a culture of recycling

·         Side roads need more attention

·         I will speak to staff and crews to remind them they should not skip properties

·         Looking at producing guides with the Local Authority on recycling

·         Small blocks of flats have been assessed and work completed

·         The huge increase in recycling rates means more resources are required

The Director of Environment and Regeneration and the Waste Strategy and Commissioning Manageralso explained;

·         The cost of procurement was largely covered by a government grant

·         Garden waste subscriptions have increased from 6000 to 9000 and we continue to grow the customer base

In response to Panel Member questions about street cleaning and fly tipping, Scott Edgell replied

·         The system continues to learn from location data of street bins and fly tipping hot spots.

·         There are plans to improve in the east including Longthornton and Pollards Hill wards

·         In Merton we have two Environmental Managers, two foremen and a Contract Manager. Between them they undertake regular drive rounds and checks on staff.

·         Veolia plan to publish rotas to show work schedules and frequencies

·         SE will  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

The Assistant Director of Public Space introduced the report which is focused on delivering improvements, all of which are underpinned by the action plan.

In response to a Panel Member question, the Assistant Director of Public Space and the Waste Strategy and Commissioning Manageranswered;

·         Opportunistic fly tips can be combatted through education

·         We are working on a revised specification for Kingdom. The original contract was procured four years ago. The climate has changed since so we require an expanded remit. New contractor will be asked to liaise with Safer Merton.

A Panel member asked if there was any update on Planning Enforcement cases?

The Director of Environment and Regeneration explained the Council is committed to reducing the planning enforcement backlog by end of this year. One additional planning enforcement officer has started in their role and another is currently being recruited.

SP025 Debt owed- Arrows shows improvement. Historically our void rate has been better than target.

Work programme agreed.

It was noted that the October and February agendas have been swapped around.

This change has been made to ensure that the representatives required can attend both meetings and allow enough time for proper exploration of the topics in each.