The chair welcomed Councillor Peter John,
Leader of Southwark Council, to the meeting.
Councillor Peter John said the council’s
mission was to provide a fairer future for all, and to have
transparency and openness in its processes. It was important to
involve people in the difficult decisions which had to be made. The
council had faced a £34m reduction in its budget this year,
and was faced with a further £20m reduction next year and the
year after that. This meant that at the end of the three years the
council’s overall budget would have shrunk by 25%. The
council had put some measures in place to help voluntary sector
groups and young people in the borough, e.g. with the voluntary
sector transition fund and the youth fund. A £2m Olympic legacy fund had also been put
in place. There was also a pilot scheme in some primary schools for
free, healthy school meals. There had also been other developments,
for example the redevelopment of the Heygate Estate, a corporation agreement with the
company which owned the shopping centre, St Modwen, and plans for the new leisure centre.
Future challenges included further cuts; and
delivering these would be tough. However, the council was committed
to deliver on its promises, one of which was a 5-year programme to
make homes in the borough safe, dry and warm.
Responding to questions from the floor,
Councillor John said that:
- he would speak to officers about
alternative meeting spaces for the groups which currently use the
leisure centre, during the refurbishment. The new leisure centre
would be built on a smaller site to allow for a housing
development, so there were space constraints and not all facilities
(e.g squash courts) could be recreated,
but this would be looked into again;
- he would speak to officers about the
possibility of making the street names around Walworth more
reflective of the area’s Latin American community;
- the council was 100% behind the
market traders in East Street and Elephant and Castle. The latter
would be getting a new market square as part of the redevelopment,
and East Street was being resurfaced to make it more
attractive;
- the refurbishment of the Elephant
and Castle was a 15-year process that had started in 2010. New
homes would come on-stream in 2014;
- the demolition and refurbishment of
the Heygate estate would also take
place over that period of time. It would be tough to achieve the
council’s target of 30% affordable homes, in the light of
reduced funding from central government to housing associations.
The council would work on getting more capital receipts to offset
this, as had happened in the New Bankside development;
- charging 80% of the market rate for
rents related to housing associations and other, non-council social
landlords. Council rents would not be charged at this rate. The
council would, however, be facing the problem of people on Housing
Benefit in private rented accommodation not being able to afford
their rent anymore, due to the changes introduced by central
government;
- in terms of pub closures,
councillors would support local campaigns or initiatives for the
community to take over pubs threatened with closure. However, there
wasn’t anything the council itself could do, if a brewery
decided to close a pub;
- it was important to have free school
meals for all so that all children received good nutrition and that
the stigma attached to them would be reduced;
- voluntary sector organisations who
had lost or were looking for funding should contact Councillor
Mohamed, Cabinet Member for
equalities and community engagement,
and explore the voluntary sector transition fund;
- the council would try to enhance the
shopping centre and promote local people doing their shopping in
the borough, which currently only 20% did;
- in terms of the housing repairs
contract, Gerri Scott, the new director of housing, was addressing
this issue and was sorting out the contractors and the
department’s management structure. He urged residents to
inform the council, if they were dissatisfied with the service, as
this was an absolute priority
- local jobs were part of the
regeneration package and there was a commitment by the developers
to provide apprenticeships. These would be rolled out within the
next year.
The chair thanked Councillor John for
attending.
John Abbot, Project Director,
updated the meeting that the council were working with the police
in order to increase the safety of people walking through the now
mainly empty Heygate estate.