Agenda and minutes

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Contact: Felicity Foley, Principal Committee Co-ordinator 

Media

Items
No. Item

50.

FILMING AT MEETINGS

Please note that this meeting may be filmed or recorded by the Council for live or subsequent broadcast via the Council’s internet site or by anyone attending the meeting using any communication method. Although we ask members of the public recording, filming or reporting on the meeting not to include the public seating areas, members of the public attending the meeting should be aware that we cannot guarantee that they will not be filmed or recorded by others attending the meeting. Members of the public participating in the meeting (e.g. making deputations, asking questions, making oral protests) should be aware that they are likely to be filmed, recorded or reported on. 

 

By entering the meeting room and using the public seating area, you are consenting to being filmed and to the possible use of those images and sound recordings.

 

The chair of the meeting has the discretion to terminate or suspend filming or recording, if in his or her opinion continuation of the filming, recording or reporting would disrupt or prejudice the proceedings, infringe the rights of any individual or may lead to the breach of a legal obligation by the Council.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Noted.

51.

Apologies for Absence

Additional documents:

Minutes:

None.

52.

Urgent Business

It being a special meeting under Part 4, Section B, Paragraph 17 of the Council’s Constitution, no other business shall be considered at the meeting.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

It being a special meeting under Part 4, Section B, Paragraph 17 of the Council’s Constitution, no other business was considered at the meeting.

53.

Declarations of Interest

A member with a disclosable pecuniary interest or a prejudicial interest in a matter who attends a meeting of the authority at which the matter is considered:

 

(i) must disclose the interest at the start of the meeting or when the interest becomes apparent, and

(ii) may not participate in any discussion or vote on the matter and must withdraw from the meeting room.

 

A member who discloses at a meeting a disclosable pecuniary interest which is not registered in the Register of Members’ Interests or the subject of a pending notification must notify the Monitoring Officer of the interest within 28 days of the disclosure.

 

Disclosable pecuniary interests, personal interests and prejudicial interests are defined at Paragraphs 5-7 and Appendix A of the Members’ Code of Conduct

Additional documents:

Minutes:

None.

54.

Deputations/Petitions/Presentations/Questions

To consider any requests received in accordance with Part 4, Section B, paragraph 29 of the Council’s constitution.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Committee received a deputation from three representatives of the Hornsey Town Hall Appreciation Society – Clifford Tibber, Alan Midgley and David Winskill.

 

Mr Tibber presented the deputation.  NOTED:

 

a.         At the Cabinet meeting on 17 October, a petition had been presented with 2300 signatures, asking Cabinet to reconsider the decision to turn HTH into a hotel.  Since this date, the number of signatories had risen to 6660.  Catherine West MP had received over 1000 emails requesting that the decision be referred to full Council for a decision.  A third of the Councillors had called in the decision, and had requested it to be referred to full Council.  Mr Tibber requested that Overview and Scrutiny Committee could not ignore these, as these figures alone should be sufficient to trigger a debate at a full Council meeting.

b.         The award of a contract to an SPV which had not been part of the original procurement process was not appropriate.  The original bid for the contract was by Far East Consortium, but the contract had been awarded to a newly set up company by FEC, who did not bid for the contract.

c.         The GVA Options Appraisal Report had produced definitions for the minimum requirements of community use and access of Hornsey Town Hall:

-       Regular tours of / interactive tools for, the historic spaces, with specific guided events at least once a month (minimum);

-       The building must be open and accessible to the public for key dates such as for example St George’s Day and Armistice Day ceremonies;

-       The building must be open and accessible for London Open House;

-       Special ‘one-off’ community requests should be accommodated wherever possible; and

-       HTH and its facilities should be accessible to all, and accordingly a differentiated price list for facility hire should reflect commercial and community needs and affordability.

It was considered that these definitions did not provide for community use.

d.         It was suggested that HTH could continue to run as a community building, with the rents from businesses run from HTH being used to fund community events.  The car park could be sold, and the revenue made from this used to repair HTH.

e.         There had been no consultation on this, and the only information provided to the public had been what Cabinet had chosen to publish.  A request had been made in June to see the tenderer information, but the information had not been released.  This was referred to the Information Commissioner, who had confirmed that this information should be made available.

55.

CALL IN OF CAB 88: RECOMMENDATION OF A PREFERRED BIDDER TO SECURE THE FUTURE OF HORNSEY TOWN HALL pdf icon PDF 240 KB

a.         Report of the Monitoring Officer TO FOLLOW

b.         Report of the Director of Regeneration, Planning and Development TO FOLLOW

c.         Appendices:

-       Copy of Call-in (Call-in 1)

-       Copy of Call-in (Call-in 2)

-       Excerpt from the draft minutes of the Cabinet Meeting held on 18 October 2016

-       18 October 2016 Cabinet Report – Preferred Bidder to Secure the Future of Hornsey Town Hall

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Following an outline of the process for the call-in meeting, and the possible outcomes, the Chair invited Councillors Engert and Ejiofor to present their arguments for why they had requested the Cabinet decision to be called in and the alternative action requested.

 

Councillor Gail Engert set our her reasons for the call-in.  She presented a petition to the Chair, and read a number of comments made by the signatories.  Councillor Engert stated that as the Leader of the Opposition party, she supported the views of the petition that the proposals were not the right ones for Hornsey Town Hall.  The counter-signatories and Councillor Engert did not believe that other options had not been considered, and suggested that money in the capital budget could be used to renovate Hornsey Town Hall.  There were concerns that there would be a loss of public use, especially of the green space outside of the Town Hall.  Councillor Engert requested that the decision be referred to full Council to allow a vote by all members of the Council.

 

In response to questions from the Committee, Councillor Engert explained that her call-in did not suggest that the decision fell outside of the policy framework.  She stated that the Town Hall should be available for community use, workshops and start-up spaces for businesses.  It was felt that if the car park behind the Town Hall was sold off, then the capital receipt from this could be used to replenish the capital budget, if this money was used to refurbish the Town Hall.  The mix of arts and business space could then be used to finance the day to day running of the Town Hall, and provide for community use.

 

Councillor Ejiofor set out his reasons for the call-in which included that the proposed decision did not provide a sufficient amount of affordable homes, the procurement process had not delivered good value for money, there was no certainty with regard to the community aspect of the proposal, and that the decision was outside of the policy framework.

 

In response to questions from the Committee, Councillor Ejiofor stated that public access should mean public access and that the community offer in the proposal should be consulted on with the community to see if it was fit for purpose.  He was not opposed to the principle of the proposal, but it needed to deliver for the people of Haringey, and he did not feel that that this was the case.  In his opinion, and in the opinions of the 12 Labour signatories, not all options for Hornsey Town Hall had been considered.

 

The Cabinet Member for Regeneration and Planning, Councillor Strickland,  responded to the call-in.  He explained that Hornsey Town Hall needed to be restored and brought back to public use, and previous occupants of the building had found that the restoration costs had been so high that running the Town Hall as purely a community building was not viable.  A rigorous procurement process had been followed, and FEC had  ...  view the full minutes text for item 55.

56.

EXCLUSION OF THE PRESS AND PUBLIC

Item 8 is likely to be the subject of a motion to exclude the press and public from the meeting as it contains exempt information as defined in Section 100a of the Local Government Act 1972; Para 3 – information relating to the business or financial affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information).

Additional documents:

Minutes:

RESOLVED that the press and public be excluded from the meeting for the discussion of item 8 as it contained exempt information as defined in Section 100a of the Local Government Act 1972; Para 3 – information relating to the business or financial affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information).

 

57.

CALL IN OF CAB 88: RECOMMENDATION OF A PREFERRED BIDDER TO SECURE THE FUTURE OF HORNSEY TOWN HALL

Minutes:

The Committee discussed information pertaining to the exempt section of the report.