Agenda and minutes

There were no declarations of interest.

The Chairman informed the Committee that the decision taken by the Portfolio Holder for Environment on 20^th June, 2017, relating to the Garden Waste Subscription Charge 2018, was called-in and accepted in accordance with the provisions of Part 4 of the Council’s Constitution, Overview and Scrutiny Rules No. 13.

The proposer of the call-in, Councillor Jason Zadrozny was asked to address the Committee and outline the reasons for initiating the call-in process.

Councillor Zadrozny proceeded to outline his reasons for the call-in of the decision as follows:-

Contrary to Policy

The implementation of charges will dramatically reduce the number of subscribers to only 22,000 (less than 50% of households within the Ashfield District) on projections and we fear even less than that.  This will have a negative impaction on the Council’s policy to increase recycling against the 50% target outlined in the Waste Framework Directive.

It is also apparent that the introduction on charges higher than those previously forecast amount to a stealth tax and would be in direct contravention of the Council’s policies to enable strong and thriving communities by imposing significant financial burden on local residents.

In addition to this, Ashfield still has many areas which are high in the indices of deprivation and many families cannot afford these charges meaning they will send back their garden waste bins and again use the residual waste collection for their garden waste.  This will impact on the Authority’s policies to keep streets clean by increasing dumping and fly-tipping yet again.

Contrary to Budget

The MTFS does not present the budget options for this level of charging.  This is being seen as a windfall to prop up changing budgets and has not been done sympathetically on that basis.  It is incredible that the Council now wishes to charge Ashfield residents for a service that they are now forced to have because of the reduced capacity in the residual waste to make a profit in the region of £150,000 per annum.  There is no option presented to simply make the service run at no cost to the Council and there is no information to suggest that the increase in revenue would be ring-fenced to further improve this or other waste services.  Ashfield residents pay for waste collection through their Council Tax, making profit from them by making them pay in excess for the same service twice has never been present in any forward plans or budgets.

Budgeting incorrectly either way is still incorrect, irrespective if it is an overspend, underspend or draws in less or more revenue than forecasts predict.  The Council could have opted to be transparent in the first instance and highlight these changes in the MTFS.  They have either deliberately chosen to hide this plan or made the financial forecasts incorrectly as neither is at the level expected by elected Members and members of the public.

The charges raise from £22 (Direct Debit) or £26 to £28 (Direct Debit) or £34.  These are not forecast in the  ...  view the full minutes text for item OS6