Agenda item

To consider any questions submitted by Members of the Council, in accordance with Standing Order 4.8.11 (b).

In accordance with Standing Order 4.8.11(b), three questions had been submitted by the deadline date for questions set out in the Council’s Constitution.

 

(A)      Union Flag to be flown outside all public buildings

 

Councillor David Levett to Councillor Martin Stears-Handscomb (Leader of the Council).

 

(B)      Percentage increase of the County Council precept

 

Councillor Sue Ngwala to Councillor Martin Stears-Handscomb (Leader of the Council).

 

(C)      Safety of women and girls in our communities

 

Councillor Clare Billing to Councillor Gary Grindal (Executive Member for Housing and Environmental Health) and Councillor Judi Billing (Executive Member for Community Engagement).

Audio Recording – 1 Hour 45 Minutes 30 Seconds

 

In accordance with Standing Order 4.8.11(b), three questions had been submitted by the deadline date for questions set out in the Council’s Constitution.

 

(A)      Union Flag to be flown outside all public buildings

 

Councillor David Levett to Councillor Martin Stears-Handscomb (Leader of the Council).

 

‘The Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport recently announced that changes in legislation allow the Union Flag to be flown outside all public buildings every day as "a proud reminder of our history and the ties that bind us" and has called on local authorities to routinely fly the flag.

 

Could the Leader of the Council confirm it is the administrations intent to follow that request and fly the Union Flag outside all of its buildings where it has the ability to do so.’

 

Councillor Martin Stears-Handscomb responded as follows:

 

‘Thank you for your question. Our joint administration’s view is that this should be a matter for a cross party discussion following the elections and we hope a consensus achieved – having taken account of views from our communities.

 

Our current practise, that we inherited from the previous administration, is to fly the Union flag on special occasions and I believe personally that has served us well.  If we are to make a change, members of all parties and staff colleagues will have their views on this, and they should have the opportunity to express them.  When this was raised by a member of our staff at a staff briefing, some concerns were raised which should be considered. 

 

Of course, since this question was raised, His Royal Highness Prince Philip has died. As soon as we heard of his death, I was in touch with the Managing Director and things were already in train to fly the flag at half-mast on all our buildings as a mark of respect as we all would want.

 

In the same way we flew the flag at half-mast when we heard of the death of Captain Tom.

 

Flags are flown at other times when we have good reason. That’s how we do it at the moment. It seems to us that any change to that is best handled by a local discussion and not by Government imposition.’

 

As a welcoming and inclusive Council I know this is the way we would want to take this forward after the election’

 

NB: at 1 hour 42 minutes the Managing Director advised that there was a potential issue with the YouTube live streaming of the meeting. In accordance with the Remote/Partly Remote Meetings Protocol, the meeting was adjourned briefly whilst the matter was investigated/

 

NB: at 1 hour 53 minutes the Committee, Member and Scrutiny Manager confirmed that the live stream had not in fact been interrupted and the meeting could there for resume.

 

Councillor Judi Billing raised a point of order in that Questions from Members was not a debatable item. The Service Director- Legal and Community confirmed this.

 

(B)      Percentage increase of the County Council precept

 

Councillor Sue Ngwala to Councillor Martin Stears-Handscomb (Leader of the Council).

 

‘Could the Leader of the Council explain why the percentage increase of the County Council precept shown on the Council tax bill sent out is shown as 2%, when the actual increase is close to 4%?’

Councillor Martin Stears-Handscomb responded as follows:

 

‘Cllr Ngwala is correct the overall increase for the County Council is 3.99%, this is made up of two percentage changes, which we are required by the Government to show separately on the bill.

 

One is for the part of the overall change attributable to the adult social care precept (2.00%) shown on the bill as Herts CC Adult Social Care Precept and one for the part attributable to general expenditure 1.99% - shown as Herts County Council on the bill and rounded up to 2.0%’

 

Councillor Sue Ngwala asked a supplementary question:

 

‘Would the Leader agree with me that this is misleading and rather dishonest?’

 

Councillor Martin Stears-Handscomb responded as follows:

 

‘Yes I do agree.

 

It is one thing for Conservative Councillors to vote against the 2% increase in North Herts, an increase forced on us by the Government, and then vote for a 4% increase at the County Council the next day. Perhaps that is all part of the ‘to and fro’ of local politics. But it is quite another thing to deliberately mislead the public on their council tax bills. Perhaps another example of when local government works to a higher standard than national government.’

 

(C)      Safety of women and girls in our communities

 

Councillor Clare Billing to Councillor Gary Grindal (Executive Member for Housing and Environmental Health) and Councillor Judi Billing (Executive Member for Community Engagement).

 

‘Following concerns raised with me about how safe women and girls in our communities feel, both within and outside their homes. Could the Executive Member for Housing and Environmental Health and the Executive Member for Community Engagement outline what is being done in North Herts to support women and girls locally?’

 

Councillor Gary Grindal (Executive Member for Housing and Environmental Health) responded as follows:

 

‘Yes if I can kick it off Chair. Thank you Councillor Billing for the question.

 

It shouldn’t really be a surprise to Members that questions are being asked by the public to Councillors about our response to the appalling statistics that emerged in the aftermath of the shocking murder of Sarah Everard. Clearly, there is a community side to this which Judi [Executive Member for Community Engagement] will address.

 

But if I can just focus on the area that covers off violence against women, and not just women because we partner with SADA [Survivors Against Domestic Abuse] which I know all the Members will be familiar with, whose role it is, across North Herts, based in Stevenage, to work and deal with cases of violence within the home, which is their main focus of attention. It is quite staggering that, when you see figures that 71% of female murder victims are killed in their home, the importance of the work that SADA perform can never be underestimated. In recent conversations with SADA, since the violence against women and girls campaign started in the aftermath of the recent murder, it was pleasing to note that SADA had not reported any spike around harassment crimes and it is not an area that they would normally cover. But in recognition of the importance of this, SADA have informed me that there would be an extraordinary meeting of the RAG, the Regulatory Authority Group, which will specifically be held to focus on women’s safety and what can be done in order to try and offer some sort of protection to women.

 

Following that meeting, there will be a media campaign which should hopefully be launched next week. At North Herts, we will be included in the posts shared that come out of that meeting.

 

So, I haven’t got any more that I can specifically say at this time but hopefully over the next week, we will see what the results of that particular extraordinary meeting were.

 

Also, we know that the Home Secretary declared that every woman should feel safe to walk the street and again we wait Government to see if there will be new laws introduced and I know they were looking at harassment crimes and certainly relating to sexual harassment’

 

Councillor Judi Billing responded as follows:

 

‘I will just very briefly add to that.

 

Shortly after the horrific death of Sarah Everard, there was obviously a heightened awareness of the sorts of issues of women’s safety which we should all be concerned about all the time but it takes an event like that for the emotions to come to the surface.

 

I know that questions were asked at the Letchworth Councillor Surgery shortly after that. In response, I have asked the Community Engagement Team to work with our Community Safety Team to look at what more we should be doing as a local authority to ensure the safety of women.

 

Interestingly, I was briefed by Becky Coates today for a completely different reason and the material we got from our annual survey on community safety in February and March, before this event, actually put women’s feelings of safety quite low on the reported issues that were coming through our survey.

 

We do know that this event has made people think really long and hard about their own situations, although sometimes there has been a regrettable politicisation of one family’s grief which I think is not always helpful.

 

We are doing absolutely all we can to look at what is going to be needed and to speak to women in the District in more depth than we normally do in just our annual survey of what really worries you.

 

As it happens, next week is also National Stalking Awareness Week and the Suzy Lamplugh Trust that some of you may know about their work, is doing a great deal next week that you can find online to see the sorts of stuff they are doing including, an online conference next Wednesday from 9 until 12 if people are interested in that. They have a number of fine speakers including the Domestic Abuse Commissioner.

 

So, there is a great deal going on and there is a great deal for us as a local authority to do with our duty of care for people and we will be exploring in greater depth what the women in North Herts think should be made available for them and making sure that we do our best to meet their needs.’