Agenda item

To respond to any questions received from Members of the Council in accordance with Procedure Rule 11.2.

The deadline for receipt of questions is 5pm on Tuesday 10 October 2023.

49.1    Councillor Austin had given notice of a question to be put to the Portfolio Holder for Planning and Economic Development in accordance with procedure rule 11: “Waverley Borough Council recently disclosed that it is the third worst performing Council in the country for staff turnover in its planning department. The national average for District and Borough Councils is 16%. Waverley's planning team currently has a staff turnover of 47%. Our partner Guildford Borough Council follows close behind at 40%. Would the Planning Portfolio Holder please advise of the actions being taken to improve the staff turnover issue and also confirm the current numbers of interim/agency staff versus full time members of staff in the Waverley Planning team?”

49.2    Councillor Liz Townsend responded: “I'd like to thank Councillor Austin for her question which highlights a national crisis in planning officer retention and recruitment across the country the politically independent Local Government Chronicle who reported this information last year received replies from 276 councils and amongst those who responded only one in 10 Council planning departments were fully staffed and a quarter had a staff turnover rate of 20% or more.

49.3    London and the home counties were reported to be the worst affected as Waverley has one of the highest housing costs outside of London it is also not difficult to see that this could be a barrier to attracting planning officers whose skills are easily transferable our figures which include the high turnover of contract staff could be seen as having a distorting effect on our final figure it is also difficult to draw too many parallels across the councils who responded without inspecting the source data to ensure that permanent and contractor staff were given equal weight when calculating total turnover figures the article quoted reasons for the difficulty in attracting planning officers quoting the combination of low numbers of new entrance to the planning profession and the loss of many older highly skilled professionals through retirement or moves to employment within other sectors or fields from our experience private sector salaries can exceed those afforded by the public sector and these major factors remain difficult for the council to counterbalance.

49.4    However, in anticipation of a continued recruitment issues you'll be aware that this administration secured an additional budget of £350,000 to fund a series of initiatives to improve the planning service some of these measures are aimed at recruitment campaigns in addition to improving planning officer roles and enhancing fulfilment levels and creating a more positive environment.

49.5    In the meantime given the national crisis around the shortage of planners and competition for candidates between the public and private sectors, the Council like many other councils across the country expects turnover to remain high and in the interim period to rely on temporarily covering vacant posts with able and experienced contractors whilst we run our recruitment campaign for permanent positions and investigate potential apprenticeship opportunities and in answer to council Austin's final question there are currently 44 posts within the planning service of which 14 posts are currently covered by contract staff”

49.6    Councillor Barker-Lomax had given notice of a question to be put to the Leader of the Council in accordance with procedure rule 11: “We welcome that Waverley is working with Woolmer Hill Sports Association to enable the community to enjoy the pitches at The Edge. We welcome too the progress that is being made on re-opening The Hall at The Edge. Further to the meeting arranged by Jeremy Hunt with Waverley’s leader, plus Tom Horwood of Waverley Borough Council and Tim Oliver of Surrey County Council, will the Leader now confirm: 1. That the hall at The Edge will re-open this calendar year? 2. That the community clubs, who have done so much to raise funds for The Edge, will be given the right to enjoy the sporting facilities at and in The Edge? 3. That Waverley will work with the community clubs to find long term solutions to the financial viability of The Edge, such as disability funding?”

49.7    The Leader of the Council responded:  “I would just like to correct one part - the meeting with Jeremy Hunt and the Leader of the County Council - I arranged those meetings which is why they were held here, just as I arranged the previous meeting with the Leader of the County Council the last time we hit an impasse with the County Council, now I flag this not to be petty or pedantic but because I want to be clear how many times Waverley has had to intervene to break through some of the issues at play here some of them real but many of them created by the problematic interventions of politicians at all levels.

49.8    It is collectively our hope that that is the case now we're aiming for the end of November at the latest, subject to the continuation of those relatively smooth discussions with the owner of the building. Now we've actually received the heads of terms from Surrey County Council to look at today at 4pm, so that is the absolute latest update that I can give right now and obviously I welcome the progress that's been made and want to thank our officers for the hard work that they have put in in getting this dealt with in a short space of time and for pursuing the County officers to make sure these things have been done properly.

49.9    As to your second question, it will be a commercial building and so all the community clubs will have the right to use it subject to the usual conditions of the use of a leisure centre, there won't be any restrictions on that.

49.10  Finally, on your last question we've obviously been looking at all these things as we go and I've made every effort to explore as many types of funding streams as possible but I do want to take this opportunity to actually thank you because acknowledging the financial viability of The Edge is actually a question that requires a solution is something that I've been struggling to get certain individuals to do, in fact I was in the deeply surreal situation of having to remind the Chancellor of the Exchequer that Council Services cost money to run and so it's good to see at least one political associate of the Chancellor actually accept this reality in public.”