An unexpected dinner at Exeter College and a great presentation by the Chief Constable

I was invited at short notice to dinner at Exeter College today by a friend.  I had the great pleasure of sitting next to the Rector, Dr Frances Cairncross and we had a good discussion about Labour's housing policies in the City including the apparent contradiction of making development difficult by insisting on huge financial contributions to other housing and the push to get more and more students out of family housing so it can be released to the rest of the market.

The dinner was extremely enjoyable and it was good to talk a bit about local politics (at their instigation) with some academic members of Exeter's staff.  One College member was celebrating her fifth birthday as she had been born on February 29th, 20 years ago.  Actually I'd say it was her fourth as there was no leap year in 2000!

After the meal we were treated to an excellent presentation by the Thames Valley Police Chief Constable, Sara Thornton CBE QPM.  Sara had been the guest of The Rector of the College and was giving a talk to some students studying criminology.  The title of the talk was "Does it Matter if there are Fewer Police Officers in the Future?".  I was hugely impressed at Sara's strong sense of justice both for victim as well as the accused.  I thought her insights into what makes good Policing and how communities work were really fascinating and resonated very much with my thinking about Policing being about helping people to get it right as well as just catching and criminalising them when they get it wrong.  Sara also had great insight into targeting Policing where it will have the best effect.

Oxford University Living Wage event

I attended this event today at the invitation of the Oxford University Living Wage Campaign.  I must admit Living Wage is not really something I'd thought about before but the speeches from the panel I heard this evening were incredibly compelling.  There are aspects of the living wage that I'm slightly ashamed to say I had never really considered before.  The session felt a little bit like diversity training in that it completely moved me on from seeing a living wage as a burden on an employer to seeing it as a positive advantage, just as is paying proper attention to diversity by doing all you can to include as many people as possible.  It never really occurred to me that paying more money to poorer people is actually much better for the economy than paying it to richer people as the former will spend it locally whereas the latter may well squirrel it away in offshore tax avoidance schemes where it does nothing to benefit our economy .  There are the obvious morale, attendance, commitment and retention advantages of a living wage also.  If nothing else then to me paying a Living Wage is simply a matter of common decency and justice that all should be able to expect.

The event was held in the Exam Schools of Oxford University, and that's quite ambitious as the rooms are not small.  The panel was of the highest quality and the event was extremely well-attended with over a hundred people there.  This just showed me how important people see this issue to be, particularly in the light of housing and the cost of living being so expensive in Oxford.  A member of Oxford City Council, Van Coulter, made an excellent speech about the need for a living wage and reminded us that Oxford has one of the highest cost of living to average income ratios in the whole country.  He said it's like paying London prices on a West Midlands wage and I think he's right!  Van also made the excellent point that if people are forced to live on very low wages then they make compromises like buying cheap, unhealthy food, that ultimately shorten their lifespans and of course make them less efficient employees.

It's also great to hear about all the excellent work the Living Wage Campaign has been doing with Oxford University and its Colleges.  Some Colleges have already adopted a living wage and apparently discussions with the University are going well.  This pleases me as an employee of the University, although I must say not one who has any issue whatsoever with his own wages!  There were quite a few College bursars present as well as some college employees on lower wages and apparently some useful discussions were had after the main speaker event.

If you are interested in learning more about the Living Wage campaign the I recommend following @oxlivingwage on Twitter, emailing livingwage@ousu.org or if you want to focus on these issues during Lent 2012 from a Christian perspective then the Call to Change website gives more information about the Living Wage in the wider UK.

All said a first-class student-organised event about a massively important issue for Oxford that certainly got me thinking to an extent that not many things do!  What a far cry from the image students some East Oxford people seem to have that says they are "increasing to unbearable amounts already in this area and they do not need any further encouragement or welcoming into our community because they bring nothing positive" (See my previous blog post on this).

Neighbourhood Forum: Student housing and the Vision for the City Centre

This was a rather informal meeting but useful nonetheless.  It was good to see quite a few students present as well as someone from Oxford University's Accommodation office, a member of staff from Christ Church and Gordon Reid from City Centre management.

We had a good discussion about student hopes for the City Centre and the Wayfinding project that has been going on.  The signs have been tendered for and there is now a project to provide QR codes for them to give people more contextual information.  I reminded people that the excellent Mobile Oxford service from Oxford University also provides a lot of this information and that the Wayfinding project really ought to work in partnership with it.  QR codes are fine but there is so much more that mobile Oxford can do!

We then moved onto the issue of student housing.  We had a presentation about the HMO licensing scheme which was interesting and while there are many good things about it I do have concerns that it will have a drastic effect on an already short supply of essential housing for students and many other people in Oxford.  For example we heard how the council is using web sites that advertise house shares to track down and penalise landlords.  Wouldn't it be so much better to use council resources putting adverts on those websites to educate tenants and prospective tenants about the need to check for a license.  Wouldn't it be so much more positive to spend effort helping tenants get appropriate housing than assuming landlords are somehow bad and evil?

I've posted a lot about this so won't go on about it here but I do hope that the Council will sometime soon accept that Landlords are generally good people who are genuinely trying to do the right thing, and thus focus on education and support rather than pursuit and penalisation.

Licensing and Gambling Acts Committee

We met today as part of the regular meeting cycle.  We had a useful and impressive update on licensing activities from Julian Alison, our licensing manager and it was good to have a presentation from Inspector Katy Barrow-Grint of Thames Valley Police.  Katy is the new City Centre and North Oxford inspector and I was impressed at her commitment to partnership working with the City Council as the licensing authority.  I had raised an issue with her by email this morning and she had researched it thoroughly and had an excellent answer ready for the meeting.  I was grateful for that.

Another items on the agenda was the relaxation of licensing hours for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee in July this year. It means that on Fri 1st Jun and Sat 2nd Jun premises that are already licensed will be able to carry on those licensable activities until 1am the next morning if they currently have an earlier termination of licensable activities.

We also looked at some proposals to address some of the problems of late-night drinking.  The Government is currently consulting on a Late Night Levy (on clubs etc. to fund more policing) and Early Morning Restriction Orders (EMROs) that local authorities can use to to restrict the sale of alcohol in the whole or a part of their areas between 3am and 6am on all or some days, to address specific problems caused by the late night supply of alcohol in their areas.

The meeting took about an hour.

Central South and West Area Forum: Community-led planning

This meeting was held at St. Barnabas School in Jericho as we rotate around the area.

The main focus of the meeting was a discussion on community-led planning, both in terms of community work and planning in the development control sense.

The Head of City Planning attended and gave a useful overview of the Localism Bill and its provisions for Neighbourhood Plans.  We were referred to a short overview document (PDF) about Neighbourhood Plans too.

A good discussion ensued and I think some of the salient points are:

1. The localism bill seems to be more aimed at rural communities to allow them to plan for and authorise more development so it's not clear how useful it would be in a crowded urban area like Oxford.

2.  Councillors are very tightly bound by planning law and when we are determining applications it does feel more like we are serving those laws than serving the desires of our electorates.  If we refuse things when there is no planning reason we are likely to get the decision overturned by an unelected planning inspector and may get costs awarded against us as a local authority.  That has to be paid out of Oxford taxpayers' money so serves nobody.

I shall keep a close eye on how the Localism Bill develops.

Although the meeting was in Jericho it was a shame very few people from Jericho attended.  I do also question how sensible it is having a meeting in a cold primary school hall, where the chairs are more suitable for 5-11 year olds than adults!

Full Council: 2012-13 Budget and Council tax

This was a long meeting but a pleasantly constructive one.   It's the annual meeting where the budget is proposed by the administration and then the other party groups propose amendments which inevitably fall because the administration has a majority.  But we have to go through the process as it is a good chance for political groups to show their priorities for the City, especially in the run-up to local elections.

As we LibDems are not really a million miles from the Oxford City Administration on lots of issues we take the view that it's better to propose a small-ish number of sensible and properly costed amendments to the administration budget rather than wasting lots of officer time preparing a budget that we know won't get voted through anyway.  I'm pleased to say that our budget amendments were confirmed by the senior financial officer (the Section 151 Officer) as being financially workable and thus legal.   This was not the case for the symbolic mess that the Green Party proposed!  (Yes that is a political comment but this is a political blog!).

Our budget amendments were presented expertly by Cllr Mark Mills, our Deputy Leader, and the headline additions were:  Re-introduce democratic area assemblies; restore a full out-of-hours noise complaint service; 24 hour help service for all tenants (not just those in social housing); double the number of apprenticeships offered by the council; free parking for electric vehicles; and retaining the current Dial a Ride service.  There was more.  These extra costs would be offset by cutting councillor allowances; cut war councillor budgets; and delete proactive river bank work.  The budget was well-received by all present, including some clapping from the public gallery.  The Administration response was gracious and I appreciated that greatly.

There was time for the normal questions to councillors so I made sure I asked some more about the HMO licensing scheme:

My first was about a home with a couple "living together as if spouses or civil partners" and one other person.  The answer seems to imply discrimination against people based on martial status, which I thought was illegal!

My second question was clarifying if where a house, if classified as an HMO because it has 3 or more lodgers with resident landlords, needs to count the landlord(s) in the numbers in the HMO - the answer was yes.  This of course means even more expense for people just letting rooms in their houses to help make ends meet and to provide hugely needed accommodation for many people in our City.

My third was really just an observation that the council lets its own tenants (often vulnerable families with children) live in much worse conditions than it is now allowing private lets of non-vulnerable adults to live in.   The answer seemed vague but I think it was basically because the council has the power with HMOs but not with families - frankly I think that's rubbish as the Administration could do all sorts of improvements to its own housing that it lets to tenants if it chose to.

My final question pointed out the obvious paradox in the City Council at the moment whereby it pays landlords a £600 finders fee plus expenses for landlords with a two-bed house to let but that for a three-bed there are onerous HMO checks and fees of £362 plus £150 per year to pay.  The answer was that there is a shortage of two-bed properties in Oxford.  If the Administration thinks the current HMO scheme is going to do anything at all to improve that situation then frankly I think its members are bonkers!

The pocket park on Middle Fisher Row

I visited this area today on the request of the owner and operator of The Oxford Retreat as he is concerned about antisocial behaviour, drug use and damage to the rear fence of his venue.  I was pleased to have a Street Scene team leader with me to give advice on what might be possible.

The problem is that this little pocket of land, just behind Middle Fisher Row (between Park End Street and Hythe Bridge Street) is very badly lit an so tends to attract all sort of antisocial behaviour.  Drugs paraphernalia, broken glass and all sorts of other rubbish are found there by the street scene team most days.  The area also attracts people urinating or worse in the small hours of the morning as it is so much part of the light night entertainment area of the City.

You can see the damage to the rear fence of the Oxford Retreat in the picture - the apparently happens regularly.  There have been break-ins too.

I think there are lots of angles on this problem - lighting must help so I'll investigate that and it may be that a better fence needs to be erected to protect the fence that is the property of the Oxford Retreat.  I don't want to see the area fenced off but it might make sense to allow some community or commercial use of the area so it's bit less likely to attract problems.  Watch this space!  The first job will be to work out who owns the land.

City Council Management Practice Group

I was invited to this event by the City Council's Head of Law and Governance. He invited several councillors to give perspectives on what our specific roles require from the organisation in order to function optimally. The capacity in which I was invited was as a regulatory chair. I am Chair of Planning Review Committee and vice chair of the Licensing and Gambling Acts 2003 Committee so spoke about both those functions.  Other Councillors speaking were Stephen Brown (Scrutiny Chair), Val Smith (Executive Member), Dick Wolff (New Member).

My 5 minute talk was basically just a run through of all the things City Council Officers do that work well for me in my role.  I'm pleased to be in the position of not really wanting so much else as our Officers already do such a good job.

I said I would write a blog post with my main points so here they are:

1.  Councillors and officers work together but need to remember that we have different roles.  Officers are there to represent the council whereas councillors are there to represent the electorate, including those in their wards who didn't vote or didn't vote for them.  The quasi-judicial nature of regulatory work can be difficult in this context but is not impossible.  Members of the public often believe that councillors have more discretion in licensing and planning matters than we actually do and this expectation needs to be carefully and honestly managed.

2.  Councillors depend on reports from Officers, as professionals in their fields, so we have the right information on which to base our decision.  Reports are most useful when they are concise and balanced.  I think they should present arguments on each side of a decision, weigh them up and them make a recommendation.  They should indicate how strong the case is in the recommended direction and indicate any conditions that might be appropriate to impose to mitigate any negative effects of a decision in either direction.  Reports are for the purpose of informing members, not convincing them, although they will of course have considerable influence on members' decisions.

3. Site visits are extremely useful.  Planning decisions are much better made if Councillors have seen the local context for themselves and I've found it extremely useful when Officers have arranged access to the homes of local residents so we can get a first-hand appreciation of the issues.  Facilitated meetings both with applicants and objectors are also extremely useful and I'm grateful to Council Officers for providing these.  All that Officers can do and provide to help Councillors better understand the context within which they are making regulatory decisions is much appreciated.

4. Councillors are real people so have lives that are tied up in many aspects of Oxford's life as a City.  This can sometimes lead to conflicts of interest when making regulatory decisions.  Oxford has first-rate officers in its legal department and they have always provided excellent legal advice on what Councillors might need to consider when deciding whether or not they have a conflict of interest.  I am clear that it is the Councillors' job to decide if there is a conflict of interest, not the Officers', but also very grateful for the good legal advice that we receive on this.  It's also useful when Officers raise matters with us that we might not have considered - an example of this for me was a few night's board and lodging from a German Councillor in Bonn as part of the town twinning trip last year.  I hadn't considered for one minute that he might make a planning or licensing application in Oxford at some point!

5.  Planning meetings are often contentious as the decisions that are made have direct impact on people's lives and buildings are often in place for 100 years or more.  I like to make sure everyone at the meeting, including the public, is welcomed and knows who everybody around the table is and why they are there.  It's great that we have well-presented Officer reports that use modern technology to make things as clear as possible.  I also find it useful to clarify to everyone present that Officers are professionals and experts in their work whereas councillors are democratically elected amateurs who have the job of making the decision.  Sometimes people can start being nasty to officers if they are making a recommendation that is against what they want and I think it's useful as chair to remind such people that Officers as simply doing their job and giving their professional opinion.  They are not controlling councillors or making the decision so if anyone needs abusing (and actually nobody ever does!) then it should be Councillors, not officers.  I also made the point that if there are difficult issues in a planning application that are related to things that other authorities are responsible for then it's really useful to have those professionals along to the meeting- these can sometimes be from the highways agency or the highway authority (County Council).

6. Licensing hearings are a bit different to planning meetings in that licensing decisions are more reversible as they don't often result in buildings being erected!  I like to run licensing hearings in a conciliatory and constructive way.  While the process inevitably has a winner and a loser I think it's hugely helpful to run it as a conversation and make sure all parties feel they have had their say and been properly listened to.  I am extremely grateful to licensing officers for enabling hearings to happen like this.  Good legal advice is also essential to good licensing decisions and I'm pleased to say we enjoy that both during hearings and during the time when the licensing panel is in private to deliberate and make its decision.

7.  Council officers are hugely important in making sure that everything presented to committees and licensing hearings is properly evidence-based and has a firm audit trail behind it.  So-called evidence that is circumstantial, hearsay or conjecture about what might or might not happen if a particular decision is taken or not taken really is not helpful.  Such pseudo-evidence just confuses the decision and inappropriately raises the expectations of the interested parties about what outcomes might be possible.  We are very fortunate in Oxford to have Officers who are extremely pro-active in ensuring that responsible authorities and interested parties only bring substantial evidence that will stand up properly.

8.  Sometimes Councillors will make a decision that is against Officer advice.  That's right and proper and the way the democratic process works.  Such decisions though will often be the subject of appeals, which if allowed can cost the Council (and hence the taxpayer) a lot of money in legal fees.  it is thus vital that Councillors receive appropriate Officer support when formulating decision notices that are not what Officers advice.  I appreciate that this can be difficult of Officers as Councillors are effectively asking them to justify the position that is opposite to their own.  I am nonetheless impressed that planning and licensing officers are able to do this, in full respect of the democratic process and democratic right of Councillors to disagree with them.  Again, its a piece of Officer support for which I am extremely grateful.

9. Finally, council meetings and hearings would be pointless if they were not clerked and minuted accurately and efficiently.  Oxford has a great Legal and Democratic Services Team and I particularly appreciate the way minutes are always on time, always run past me as chair for checking (and perhaps minor changes) and published promptly.  It's also good to know that some Council Officers read this blog to make sure I'm not saying anything that might bring it into disrepute or cause difficulties that I had not anticipated.

There was not time for any questions but I was pleased to be invited to join the Council's managers for lunch and I had some more interesting discussions with several  I had not met before or did not know other than by email.

A good couple of hours!

Oxford Pride Residents and Neighbours information meeting

I was really pleased to be invited to this event today by the Oxford Pride Organising Committee, mainly because as the ward councillor it's important that I know what's going on in the area so I can make sure residents and neighbours are kept in the loop.  The secondary reason is that I was one of the main organisers of the first ever Oxford Pride back in 2003.  This year is the 10th Oxford Pride and I can't believe how quickly the time has passed.

[caption id="attachment_563" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Viewing the draft plans with Simon House project workers"][/caption]

All neighbours had been leafleted a few weeks ago by the Pride Chair so we were expecting a few to turn up.  Not many did but that might be something to do with the snow that's in Oxford at the moment.  It was great, however that two of the project workers from A2 Dominion's supported housing at Simon House came and spoke to us - they were incredibly supportive of Pride and very happy that it is happening this year in their immediate neighbourhood, Paradise Street and Paradise Square.  We talked about plans for the day and I was impressed at how well Mazz Image (Oxford Pride Festival and Event Coordinator) explained everything and how well organised Pride seems to be.  It's a far cry from those early efforts in 2003!

I hope Oxford Pride this year is a huge success and I'm looking forward to what will be a great day.  It's on 16th June and I'm touched that I've been asked to get as many of the original 2003 organisers together as possible to go at the front of the parade.  What fun!

Partnerships Training

This session was set up for councillors by two officers from Strategic Policy and Partnerships.

I found it useful to have an overview of how the City Council works in partnership with other bodies both at the City and the County level and there was some useful information about changes to partnerships since the change of government in May 2010.  In particular we noted:

•Scrapping of the Local Area Agreement
•Scrapping of the National Indicators
•Removal of statutory duty to develop a Sustainable Community Strategy (and therefore the need for Local Strategic Partnerships)
•Scrapping of regional bodies (SEEDA, GOSE)
•Introduction of Local Enterprise Partnerships
•Changes to the Health and Well Being Board linked to the NHS reforms

The Oxford Strategic Partnership has some new priorities, structure and subgroups also:

You can click the image to get an even bigger version.

I had no idea there were so many bodies involved in the Oxford Strategic Partnership.  They include:  Oxford City Council; Oxfordshire County Council; NHS Oxfordshire; Oxfordshire Community and Voluntary Action; Oxford University; Oxford Brookes University; Oxford and Cherwell Valley College; Thames Valley Police; Oxford Inspires; Critchleys; and Oxford Preservation Trust.

The one suggestion I made was that meetings of all the partnerships, which are public and published should be added to the Council's meetings newsfeed to get the importance of partnership working higher up on the agenda.