Agenda item

During 2018 the Challenge and Improvement Committee had established a member Task and Finish Group to scrutinise the effectiveness of services offered in maintaining rural public realm.

A delivery plan was approved and the work of the task and finish group resulted in a number of recommendations

Members gave consideration to a report which sought to update the Committee on progress of completed actions and on-going work to date following the approval of Public Realm Recommendations by the Committee on 29 January 2019.

Debate ensued and with reference to recommendation 2, namely “Establish a scheme or clear suite of tools/support that WLDC can    provide to parish/town councils to support local action on dog fouling, fly-tipping and littering.”, the Committee as a whole expressed concern at the levels of litter across the District, and sought indication of what enforcement powers were being used to tackle this issue.

In response, Officers advised that enforcement in respect of littering was particularly challenging, the Council did have resources allocated to concentrate on fly-tipping, considered a more serious offence, and outlined the tactics used to apprehend perpetrators.  Enforcement in respect of littering was more challenging particularly in the rural areas, as CCTV coverage was much more limited, so gathering evidence was difficult. Educating residents in respect of littering was considered the more favoured approach.

Members questioned whether dash-cam footage could be used, noting that the police were now making use of evidence captured via such devices.  Did these devices create an opportunity for the Authority to gather evidence and use? 

In response, Officers indicated of the need to be proportionate, whilst dash cams would maybe provide evidence in image form there would still be an amount of investigative work to identify the individual and resource and time required.

Whilst Members concurred that enforcement was a tool which could be used others were more supportive of the need to engender civic pride in communities, to educate and to support local litter pick groups, many of which had been established across the District.

It was suggested that a further action point should be to develop an effective enforcement procedure for Anti-Social Behaviour, including dog fouling, flytipping, littering, and inappropriate parking, which the parishes could make use of.   It was also raised as to whether residents or parish councillors could be trained to undertake enforcement action at a local level, and given powers to issue penalties. Communities needed to feel like they had more power especially as they were people turning out every six to eight weeks picking up litter only to face the same situation within months.  Communities felt like perpetrators were getting away with it.

In response the Chairman outlined the priority fly-tipping was being given by both the Lincolnshire Waste Partnership and the Police and Crime Commissioner.

With reference to the local enforcement of dog fouling West Lindsey did have in place a PSPO to enable enforcement action and in the past Officers from within the enforcement team had provided training to local residents in order that they could be certified to issue fixed penalties.  The number of tickets issued by such persons however was very limited because although they had received training catching the culprit in the act still remained a challenge.  This was something Officers were prepared to take away and see if further training could be offered as it had been previously and if there was desire and need in the community

In respect of parking Officers concurred this was an issue, Lincolnshire County Council had responsibility for parking enforcement activity, this was not within the enforcement capability of the District Council, nor was it generally within the enforcement remit of Lincolnshire Police. 

Officers undertook to prepare a guidance and information pack for Parish Councils covering some of the top issues affecting a number of parishes, explaining how to report certain issues and the options available to them.  This was welcomed. 

The issue of bird feeding was also raised by Councillors, who questioned why, if we know who was doing this, and we had images of the offence, no action was being taken and the situation was continuing.  The Council had invested heavily in CCTV and this should be being used effectively.  The town centre required more signage highlighting the offence and penalties. 

Officers advised this matter had been raised with enforcement and Officers undertook to provide an update to Committee of the action taken to date

It was suggested that maybe a Member Champ role needed to be created for this area and the leading group undertook to give further consideration to this

In response to Members’ questions as to which Committee was responsible for Enforcement overall, Officers advised it was this Committee.   Members suggested that enforcement was an area that was weak and could be beefed up and therefore requested a report that would allow them to scrutinise enforcement, understand the resource that had been applied to the service and assess whether more resources should be allocated. 

Officers reaffirmed the Committee was responsible for enforcement and did receive performance information through the performance and delivery reports, outlining where the service was either performing well or not so well (below target).  At the last meeting it had been agreed that an additional paper would be submitted to the Committee in respect of private sector housing enforcement in May 2020.  Officers advised that one of the challenges was that enforcement was such a large area covering a number of functions. It would need to be broken down into the smaller work streams to understand the range of activities and the individual services provided under the umbrella of enforcement.

The lead Director for the Committee undertook to take the matter back to a Chairs Briefing initially to consider how the request may be responded to and how such a report may be structured.

Members referenced that an Enforcement Audit had been undertaken recently and it was requested that the Monitoring Officer confirm when such an audit last occurred.

The Chairman of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee was present and suggested this was something that Committee could look at.  The Chairman welcomed the offer.

In response to Members’ comments and frustrations regarding the performance of enforcement, previous audit recommendations, and previous complaints from Scrutiny Committee, Officers confirmed that staffing levels have been increased over the summer, furthermore the Director was working directly with the Team Manager as to how to structure the team in order to deliver services better.  It was again stressed that each enforcement stream needed to be looked at individually, it was not possible to take them as a collective.  As referred to earlier this was something that could be further discussed at Chairs Brief, before bringing a proposal back to this Committee as to how the work may be approached with potentially then requesting the Overview Scrutiny Committee to further investigate based on the approach agreed by Prosperous Communities.

Again in response to comments made, Officers gave assurance the Authority had moved on in respect of enforcement and progress was being made. Members had no evidence before them that suggested otherwise. It was also confirmed that the worst performing work streams of enforcement would be looked at in the first instance.

Following much discussion on that basis it was RESOLVED  that: -

(a)      the actions completed and currently in progress for Public Realm Recommendations 1, 2 and 4 be acknowledged;

(b)      the planned actions in respect of Public Realm Recommendation 3 be approved;

(c)      the proposed changes to the Community Grants Programme arising from Public Realm recommendation 5 be approved;

(d)      the request to scrutinise enforcement be further discussed at the next Chairs Briefing, with a view to defining a scope and remit for this piece of work, taking on board the comments expressed during the debate, before bringing a proposal back to this Committee as to how the work may be approached.