Agenda and minutes

          The Chair welcomed all those in attendance to the meeting and advised members of the Committees membership change that was announced at Full Council on 9 November 2022. He then took the opportunity to thank Councillor Madeley for her service and welcomed Councillor Bower who had replaced her.

          Apologies were received from Councillors Huntley and Warr.

Members and Officers are invited to make any declaration of pecuniary, personal and/or prejudicial interests that they may have in relation to items on this agenda, and are reminded that they should re-declare their interest before consideration of the items or as soon as the interest becomes apparent.

Members and Officers should make their declaration by stating:

a)             the item they have the interest in

b)             whether it is a pecuniary/personal interest and/or prejudicial interest

c)             the nature of the interest

          Councillor Bower declared a Personal Interest in agenda Item 6 [CCTV STATEGY AND POLICY] as he is a software consultant that provides CCTV software to customers across the district.

The Committee will be asked to approve as a correct record the minutes of the Corporate Support Committee held on 15 September 2022.

The minutes of the meeting held on 15 September 2022 were approved and signed by the Chair.

There were no urgent matters discussed.

To receive questions from the public (for a period of up to 15 minutes)

          The Chair invited questions from members of the public who had submitted their questions in advance of the meeting in accordance with the Council’s Constitution. The Chair confirmed that one question had been submitted. The question was asked by the Committee Manager on behalf of the member of the public and this was responded to be the Chair.

(A schedule of the full questions asked, and the responses provided can be found on the meeting’s webpage at: Arun District Council)

          The Chair then drew Public Question Time to a close.

This report sets out the proposed CCTV Strategy and CCTV Policy and it seeks the Committee’s agreement to adopt each document.

The Group Head of Technical Services provided members with an overview of his report, drawing members attention to the recommendation that was requesting members agree to adopt the CCTV strategy and the CCTV Policy. He then provided members with a more detailed run through of his report where he explained that the Strategy proposed a review be undertaken within the next 12 months to ensure that the Council’s existing CCTV systems are fit for purpose, identifying where hardware/software needs to be upgraded. He confirmed that the monitoring would be undertaken by authorised and trained Officers and data handling would be done using encrypted systems where needed and that automatic systems needed to be established to delete recordings after 30 days. All new systems would also require a data privacy impact assessment and that the Strategy and Policy would be subjected to a formal review every 5 years.

The Chair thanked the Group Head of Technical Services for his report and detailed introduction and then asked members for their comment.

One member raised a concern regarding the reduction of CCTV cameras, he stated that given the level of Crime and Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) that had been reported across the district, he could not support the request to reduce the number of cameras.  The Group Head of Technical Services confirmed and reiterated to members that the review of CCTV systems was only for those on Council estates, such as depots and buildings. And would not impact on any systems in the Town Centres or seafronts as these would be outside of the council’s scope as they fall under the responsibilities of Sussex Police. The member then stated that he felt more cameras for council housing blocks where ASB was a problem would be of reassurance to those living within these areas and would help residents to feel safe. It was confirmed that each individual system the council operates would be reviewed to establish if a lawful purpose exists for their use. Only where systems are found to not be lawful in its purpose would it be removed.

The Chair asked if it would be cost effective where cameras were identified to be removed, to leave them in place to act as a deterrent. It was confirmed that they could only be used for deterrent purposes if they were not working.

Additionally, it was queried if discussion had or would take place with the council’s insurance company to ensure that the financial risks of the removal of cameras had been properly considered. It was confirmed that the purpose of the Policy was not to reduce the numbers of cameras. It was to ensure that what CCTV we do have in place was right and proper and that the council discontinues use where it has identified it, to not be lawful. It was also confirmed that the Group Head of Technical Services saw no reason why discussions with the council’s insurance company would not take place.

The recommendations were then proposed by Councillor Roberts  ...  view the full minutes text for item 418.

This report updates Members on corporate performance indicators at Quarter 2 [covering July to September 2022] relating to this Committee.  The report is to be noted.

The Group Head of Organisational Excellence introduced her report and drew members attention to the additional information in the final column in Appendix A, where it highlighted the change in performance status each indicator and its quarter 2 performance marker.

The Chair then invited members to ask questions where it was raised that it was disappointing to see the figures had dropped for CP1 and CP2 and what action would be taken to improve these indicators. The Group Head of Law & Governance provided members with a detailed response that explained he now had budget to recruit a Resolutions & Complaints Manager and that the deterioration in the performance for these two indicators was as a result of not having this dedicated resource in place. He also advised that once this recruitment had been completed there would be changes implemented to the current complaints process that would streamline the execution of the complaints process.

The Committee then noted the updated.

          There were no updates for this meeting.

The Committee’s Work Programme for the remainder of the Municipal Year is attached for the Committee’s information.

There was a request from one member that the motion from last nights Full Council meeting that agreed to invite the Local Government Boundary Commission to undertake a review of the number of Councillors needed at Arun District Council and the warding arrangements for the district be added to the work programme for this committee. It was also asked if a review of the use of member iPads would be undertaken prior or in the run up to the Elections due to be held in May 2023 and would that review include consultation with members. It was agreed that an answer would be provided outside of the meeting. 

The Committee noted its work programme and its work for the remaining municipal year.