To receive any apologies for absence

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Blundell, Howard and Walters.

To receive the minutes of the budget meeting of the Council held on 21 February 2023, the Annual Meeting held on 23 May 2023 and the Extraordinary Council meeting held on 27 June 2023.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY that

i)               the minutes of the budget meeting of the Council held on 22 February 2023 be approved, subject to the following amendment:

The beginning of Councillor Knowles’ comments at minute 132 to read:

Councillor Knowles asked colleagues to note that though in opposition all independent councillors were individuals and did not all vote the same.

ii)                  the minutes of the Annual Meeting held on 24 May 2023 and the Extraordinary Council meeting held on 26 June 2023 be approved.

To receive any declarations of interest

There were none declared.

To receive such communications as the Mayor may desire to place before the Council

The Mayor shared a series of images with the meeting to highlight activities he had attended since the previous Council meeting including:

·       visiting Filling Good in Maidenhead town centre for Plastic Free July

·       pulling the first pint at the Maidenhead Beer Festival

·       supporting the Maidenhead Branch Lions International celebration of 50 years in existence by planting a tree in Kidwells Park

·       joining the Green Room in Dedworth and encouraged colleagues to visit to find out more about its work

·       opening the Community Land Trust conference

·       listening to the Windsor and Maidenhead Symphony Orchestra

·       attending Rock the Rec in Dedworth

·       highlighting the local Reserve Units as part of Armed Forces Day event with Rotary Club

The Mayor advised that he had launched a new Mayor’s Twitter account where a picture of him in the stocks at the Windsor Museum could be seen.

a)    Thomas Wigley of Clewer East ward will ask the following question of Councillor K Davies, Lead member for Climate Change, Biodiversity and Windsor Town Council

At the Council meeting on 22nd November last year RBWM promised to install three new air pollution monitors.  Please can you provide a status update regarding their implementation and RBWM's current views regarding their intended physical location.

b)    Following legal advice this question has been removed from the agenda

c)    Tina Quadrino of Pinkneys Green will ask the following question of Councillor Werner, Leader of the Council and Lead member for Community Partnerships, Public Protection and Maidenhead

When you took office in May, you committed to a review of the Borough Local Plan. Please can you tell us what form this review will take and when we will hear the outcome of it?

d)    Andrew Hill of Boyn Hill ward will ask the following question of Councillor Bermange, Lead member for Planning, Legal and Asset Management

Given that the Planning Inspectorate found clearly that RBWM breached the Human Rights Act in the Nicholson CPO process, failing to treat legitimate concerns with even basic "respect", why did Council officers try to excuse this outrageous behaviour until the last minute, and how much do you expect the settlement of both avoidable judicial reviews to cost taxpayers?

e)    Andrew Hill of Boyn Hill ward will ask the following question of Councillor Bermange, Lead member for Planning, Legal and Asset Management

Does RBWM accept that members of the public should never be criticised by Councillors or officers, expressly or implicitly, for exerting their annual rights to submit questions and objections under the Local Audit & Accountability Act 2014?

The Council will set aside a period of 30 minutes to deal with public questions, which may be extended at the discretion of the Mayor in exceptional circumstances. The Member who provides the initial response will do so in writing. The written response will be published as a supplement to the agenda by 5pm one working day before the meeting. The questioner shall be allowed up to one minute to put a supplementary question at the meeting. The supplementary question must arise directly out of the reply provided and shall not have the effect of introducing any new subject matter. A Member responding to a supplementary question will have two minutes to respond).

a) Thomas Wigley of Clewer East ward asked the following question of Councillor K Davies, Lead member for Climate Change, Biodiversity and Windsor Town Council

At the Council meeting on 22nd November last year RBWM promised to install three new air pollution monitors.  Please can you provide a status update regarding their implementation and RBWM's current views regarding their intended physical location.

Written response: Thank you very much for asking for an update on this important issue, which is a priority for the new administration. The Borough proposes to implement the additional particulates monitoring stations in two stages. For the first stage, it will install an additional five relatively low-cost units to sample air quality at locations across RBWM for a one-year period. The Borough has engaged a specialist service company, which is undertaking some basic modelling to determine the best site locations for the stage one monitoring process and will also provide the low-definition monitoring and data management. This means that data can begin to be collected relatively quickly. The data gathered will then inform the second stage, which is the targeted installation of more expensive and sensitive sensors to gather more precise data. I will be very happy to provide more updates as the work progresses.

No supplementary question was requested.

c) Tina Quadrino of Pinkneys Green asked the following question of Councillor Werner, Leader of the Council and Lead member for Community Partnerships, Public Protection and Maidenhead

When you took office in May, you committed to a review of the Borough Local Plan. Please can you tell us what form this review will take and when we will hear the outcome of it?

Written response: As many of the residents know, we opposed the current local plan in every part of the process, but were outvoted by the Conservative majority each time.  We are now left with a Borough Local Plan designed for developers profits not for residents.  A Borough Local Plan which has sacrificed precious green belt land adjoining Maidenhead, Windsor, Cookham and Cox Green. 

The Borough Local Plan is now a straight jacket – a cage in which we have to operate – preventing us from achieving many of the things we would like to do.

Opportunities were missed by the previous administration to reduce housing numbers which they failed to take advantage of.

The problem is that we are where we are and that opportunity is no longer on the table.  

Were we to submit a new Local Plan under the current rules, changes in the national methods for calculating the housing targets would actually leave us having to find even more land to deliver more homes in the plan period.

However, we are expecting central government to publish a new National Planning Policy Framework in the autumn, which we hope will give us more flexibility when it comes to housing numbers, so when this is published and we have the details we will of course review what would be best to do with  ...  view the full minutes text for item 17.

Henry Perez of Datchet, Horton and Wraysbury Ward has submitted the following petition for debate:

We the undersigned petition the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead to provide a bus service to all main roads in Wraysbury keeping residents connected with vital services including Datchet Health Centre as well as our two local villages of Horton and Datchet plus Windsor Town Centre. The borough has current funding to support this inline with the Government National Bus Strategy, if not, the bus service should be funded by RBWM.

Full information about the petition, context and signatures can be viewed on the petition pages of the website.

The Constitution provides for a maximum time of 30 minutes for Members to debate petitions; this can be extended at the Mayor’s discretion.

a) The Mayor will invite the Lead Petitioner to address the meeting

(5 minutes maximum)

b) The Mayor to invite the relevant Cabinet Member to speak, including proposing any recommendation in the report

(5 minutes maximum)

c) The Mayor to ask for the motion to be seconded

d) Motions without Notice (other than those detailed in Part 2 C13 of the constitution) will not be allowed.

e) The Mayor to invite any relevant Ward Councillors to speak

(5 minutes maximum each)

f) The Mayor will invite all Members to debate the matter

(Rules of Debate as per the Constitution apply)

Members debated a petition requesting the council provide a bus service to all main roads in Wraysbury. The full wording of the petition was as published:

We the undersigned petition the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead to provide a bus service to all main roads in Wraysbury keeping residents connected with vital services including Datchet Health Centre as well as our two local villages of Horton and Datchet plus Windsor Town Centre. The borough has current funding to support this inline with the Government National Bus Strategy, if not, the bus service should be funded by RBWM.

Henry Perez of Datchet, Horton and Wraysbury Ward, lead petitioner, addressed the meeting. Mr Perez explained he and Graham Cribin represented Horton and Wraysbury residents. Their connection to the Number 10 bus went back to December 2017 and included involvement in submitting a petition, arranging two public meetings, the setting up Facebook group called ‘Replacement Number 10 Bus’, liaison with Courtney Buses now called Thames Valley Buses and the Borough representative Darren Gouch aimed at establishing a fit for purpose timetable and Route. He explained that before the Covid pandemic the number 10, which was funded by Heathrow, provided a reliable service with routes into Windsor, Slough and Heathrow. He said that in March 2021 they heard the disappointing news that Heathrow would stop funding the service and it stopped in April 2021. This left Wraysbury without a bus service operating via Welley Road the spine of its most populated area. Despite ongoing communications with the borough to stress the need for a regular or limited bus service, to date the village had not been provided with either. He explained that they were committed to achieving a regular bus service for the whole of Wraysbury linking their village to its neighbouring villages of Horton and Datchet. The three villages shared one doctor's surgery, one senior school, three ward Councillors and events on the village greens and other venues.

He continued that the request for a bus service was on behalf of the whole Community whatever their ages. Children living in Horton that did not qualify for school transport a bus would be a very valuable asset and anyone looking for employment would need to look beyond the three villages but would need transport to attend job interviews and work venues. Since covid many people now have to rely on offers of a lift by friends, family or charity but would prefer their independence. People wanted the opportunity to return to a near-normal life following the Covid restrictions and a bus service would help remove them from their current isolation and loneliness.

He stated that the list of reasons for a bus service were numerous and included shopping, sightseeing, attending sporting events, swimming pools, libraries, places of worship or just to have a break from the daily routines including attending the doctors. He asked that it was also an opportunity to obtain bus connections to other destinations.

He explained that they had made many  ...  view the full minutes text for item 18.

To receive any petitions presented by Members on behalf of residents.

(Notice of the petition must be given to the Head of Governance not later than noon on the last working day prior to the meeting. A Member submitting a Petition may speak for no more than 2 minutes to summarise the contents of the Petition).

There were no petitions submitted.

To note the report and consider the work of Overview and Scrutiny in the 2022/23 municipal year.

Council considered the report highlighting the work of Overview and Scrutiny in the 2022/23 municipal year.

Councillor Martin, Chair of Place Overview and Scrutiny Panel introduced the report which covered the work undertaken during the previous administration. She noted that the new overview and scrutiny panels had only met once and were currently investigating future topics for their work programme. She advised that all panels welcomed topics from the general public for discussion and that the action points and topics for future discussion from those initial meetings could be viewed on the website. Councillor Martin reported all those involved were looking forward to working with their panels, were keen to bring in genuine scrutiny and heightened transparency and more awareness into the public forum. She concluded that Overview and Scrutiny would ensure it challenged the administration and any contracts that had not been fulfilled to the high standard expected.

Councillor Del Campo seconded the motion.

Councillor Taylor echoed that they were looking forward to more transparency, taking on discussing more subjects and more working groups as well. Overview and Scrutiny were very keen to delve a little bit deeper and within the Panel she chaired, which was People Overview and Scrutiny. She thanked the previous administration’s Overview and Scrutiny Panel Chairs for their work. She thanked officers for their support and for promoting via social media that the public can give subjects for the Panels to discuss.

Councillor Moriarty commented that, as Chair of Corporate Overview and Scrutiny, he was keen to build a collaborative but positively challenging relationship with the Executive to create positive outcomes. He would welcome the opportunity to get into the critical thinking at an earlier stage and the important thing was ensuring that the public understand what panels are for and how they can contribute to them as they are here to support residents.

Councillor Amy Tisi asked the meeting to note that on page 3 of the annual report the previous membership of People Overview and Scrutiny Panel was listed and her name had been missed off. She requested that this was amended.

Councillor Price commended the change in layout and style of the report as it made what was a dry report more attractive to read and clearly laid out what each Panel was responsible for. She observed that the report was missing a critical reflection of what could be learnt by what had been done so this could be learnt from. There was no clear connection between what Panels planned to achieve and whether this had been done. She welcomed the quantitative data but there was a lack of qualitative data. She reflected that the report was poorer for not having been considered by the Panel and noted that there had been up to six months of not achieving much due to the election. She asked that this was not repeated in four years time. She concluded by saying that the clerk that produced the report should be commended for the new  ...  view the full minutes text for item 20.

a)    Councillor Larcombe will ask the following question of Councillor Coe, Lead member for Environmental Services

It is twenty years since the 2003 flood event and nearly ten years since the two 2014 flood events.  Datchet, Horton, Wraysbury and Old Windsor still have no flood alleviation scheme after Channel One was removed from the River Thames Scheme in July 2020.   Why is my area knowingly left at ever-increasing risk of flooding?

b)    Councillor Larcombe will ask the following question of Councillor Coe, Lead member for Environmental Services

The former administration passed a motion on 27/9/2022 to request that the Environment Agency resumes dredging of the River Thames within the boundaries of RBWM.  Another year has passed.  What progress has been made please?

(The Council will set aside a period of 30 minutes to deal with Member questions, which may be extended at the discretion of the Mayor in exceptional circumstances. The Member who provides the initial response will do so in writing. The written response will be published as a supplement to the agenda by 5pm one working day before the meeting. The questioner shall be allowed up to one minute to put a supplementary question at the meeting. The supplementary question must arise directly out of the reply provided and shall not have the effect of introducing any new subject matter. A Member responding to a supplementary question will have two minutes to respond).

a)    Councillor Larcombe asked the following question of Councillor Coe, Lead member for Environmental Services

It is twenty years since the 2003 flood event and nearly ten years since the two 2014 flood events.  Datchet, Horton, Wraysbury and Old Windsor still have no flood alleviation scheme after Channel One was removed from the River Thames Scheme in July 2020.   Why is my area knowingly left at ever-increasing risk of flooding?

Written response: Like you, I have vivid memories of the two more recent major flooding incidents in 2003 and 2014. In 2003 I was working and living in Old Windsor and remember well some of the properties nearer the river and some of the children in my class being flooded. In 2014 I was working in Egham and remember colleagues at work watching their homes in and around Spelthorne going under water on television whilst they were unable to get home.

The blame for the failure to deliver the Thames Scheme Channel 1 rests firstly with the decision of national government in 2011 to abandon national funding of flood alleviation schemes and to move to partnership funding of flood schemes with local authorities and the subsequent decision of the former administration of the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead not to fund their share of the partnership funding, despite partnership funding being their own government’s policy.

This cut to national funding of flood schemes and abdication of responsibility by central government for adapting to and protecting local communities from the consequences of global warming was galling as it sought to secure match funding from local councils, at the very same time as central government was also cutting funding to local councils.

The former administration’s failure to allocate the funds required of them by their own government to fund flood defences for Datchet, Horton, Wraysbury and Old Windsor, has meant the four villages have been deprived a once in a generation opportunity to be properly protected from Thames flooding.

During the same period the previous administration found many £millions to fund projects they were interested in, but which were of less consequence to the lives of local residents.

There was also at the time nothing stopping national government from funding the scheme, other than lack of will to do so.

The Royal Borough’s failure to fund its share of Channel 1 meant that River Thames Scheme Sponsorship Group decided in July 2020 to proceed without Channel 1. With a new scheme having to be started, the project process the Environment Agency must use to develop a project and achieve funding from the Treasury requires multiple business cases. This new project required this process to start again, with the first of the business cases, the Strategic Outline Case, going through the EA assurance process earlier this year. The project is now moving forward to Outline Business Case which is forecast to take approximately 2 years.

The £10million which was allocated by the former administration remains available and ringfenced and the Council and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 21.

a)    By Councillor Hill

This council agrees to reduce the number of signatures required for a petition to come to full council from 1500 to 1000.

b)    By Councillor K Davies

This council agrees to undertake a community governance review examining the issue of whether a new town council for the currently unparished parts of Windsor should be formed.

c)    By Councillor Taylor

We, as members of the council and representatives of the Borough, agree to make a conscious effort to increase our Social Media postings about local businesses and services, to encourage our residents to try new local services and venues.

d)    By Councillor Price

I propose that the Council adopts the following motion to apply immediately to all council meetings where part 2 is used due to legal restrictions or commercially sensitive reasons.

1)    From this date onwards all Cabinet and Full Council meetings that have to move into Part 2 have abbreviated minutes published after the meeting attached to the Part 1 minutes to reflect the decision made subsequent to voting. This will not reveal the detail or report at this stage.

2)    That a full explanation of the conditions that cause the information or report to be placed in part 2 is made at that time.

3)    If and when those conditions no longer apply – and at the discretion of the Monitoring Officer - the part two reports or information is then published in the minutes of the original meeting and a note made during the next Council or Cabinet meeting following this publication. 

4)    That these same rules are applied to historic Part 2 meetings, and that a periodic review takes place – subject to officer capacity and resource availability. The decision of the Monitoring Officer – in consultation with the Chief Executive - will be final in terms of any historical reports being released in this way.

5)    That this rule does not override GDPR, commercial or personal confidentially and any other legal consideration that would prevent release at any time.

(A maximum period of 30 minutes will be allowed for each Motion to be moved, seconded and debated, including dealing with any amendments.  At the expiry of the 30-minute period debate will cease immediately, the mover of the Motion or amendment will have the right of reply before the Motion or amendment is put to the vote).

Motion a) relating to the number of signatures required for a petition to come to full Council.

Councillor Hill introduced his motion explaining that when he first joined the Council only 1,000 names were required on a petition for it to be brought to Council for debate. He was seeking to get the number reduced again. He reflected that cynically the increased number was contrived to limit democratic debate and reduce resident influence. He considered 1,000 signatures as a tough number to collect and still required significant residents’ support. He asked the meeting to support the motion to have more democracy.

Councillor Bermange considered that it was important for the Council’s relationship with residents to have a strong petitions process and he was supportive of the straightforward motion. He considered that it offered a degree of equity for the remote parts of the borough. He recognised debates in full Council could not occur for every petition so considered it a reasonable balance. He observed that last summer there had been a change to the way e-petitions work. Previously the process had been simply to input an email address, details and validate it. This was now changed and required signatories to have an account. He stated that since the change the proportion of paper-based signatures had increased significantly and up to 86% of one example. He would be exploring the process with Democratic Services.

Councillor Reynolds commented that Councillor Hill had previously brought a similar motion, seconded by the Mayor. During that debate he had suggested that residents chose the petition route because the administration would not engage and would not listen. He stated that the new administration was changing and listening. He reflected that the only other view provided in the debate was the ex-leader of the Council stating that he did not support it. A closure motion was then put forward to close the debate before a vote was held in June 2020. He would be keen to hear what the members of the Conservative Group thought now about this proposal as in 2020 everyone in the group voted against the motion but the meeting was unable to hear their reasons why. He asked whether the Conservative members present still felt the same way or if they have changed their minds.

Councillor Taylor welcomed this motion returning for consideration. She considered that it was very difficult to gain 1,500 signatures. She asked colleagues to remember that not all residents were comfortable engaging with the Council as a lot of residents feel that the Council is not approachable or understand its processes. There will be residents who might have strong feelings about things just possibly don’t go down the petition route. She reflected that she personally had received more emails since the election and she was encouraged talking to other councillors who say they were receiving more emails, dealing with more casework and getting replies quicker and dealing with situations. She hoped that things that previously would have gone  ...  view the full minutes text for item 22.