Apologies were received from Councillor Ross Garrod (Merton) and Councillor Jonathan Cook (Wandsworth).

There were no declarations of interest.

RESOLVED: That the minutes of the meeting held on 6 June 2017 are agreed as a correct record.

The Chair briefly reviewed and discussed issues raised at the last meeting. The Committee discussed the ‘scores on the doors’ initiative and agreed that the requirement for premises to display their scores should be kept and encouraged and the Committee undertook to follow this up as a partnership.

The Head of the Regulatory Services Partnership introduced the report, noting that the report referred to London Borough of Merton fees only as these fees were sovereign to each Borough so could not be combined at the current time. The Head of the Regulatory Services Partnership advised that these were discretionary fees and noted that the Local Authority were unable to make a profit from these and could only use them to recover their costs. The Head of the Regulatory Services Partnership explained that Merton had not increased their fees for several years and therefore had now reviewed them with a view to raise the costs.

Members discussed the varying times of year that fees were reviewed and compared methods which the 3 Boroughs used to review their fees and charges. It was agreed by the Committee that it would be beneficial for Merton to review their fees annually to be in line with the other Boroughs within the Partnership and for all 3 Boroughs to review the process together to try and align them as much as possible.

The fees and charges were therefore not agreed as recommended within the report. It was agreed that a report would go to Merton Cabinet to review the fees and charges and to recommend to move the fees to be reviewed annually.

A verbal update to be given at the meeting

The Head of the Regulatory Services Partnership and the Assistant Director Public Protection provided a verbal update on the progress of the project noting that excellent work had been completed so far by both Officers and Members.

The Head of the Regulatory Services Partnership advised that the Project Manager had been released in August and therefore there was currently no project management support and officers were assessing the impact of this. There had been a project board set up who met fortnightly and focused on the key work streams – finance, HR, governance, ICT, assets and property and others.

The Head of the Regulatory Services Partnership gave an overview of staffing matters and the Committee raised their appreciation of all the staff involved in the process.