Agenda item

 

A motion was proposed by Cllr Tindall and seconded by Cllr England;

 

‘This Council notes that the introduction of Universal Credit has led to a number of circumstances which have had an adverse effect on the more vulnerable members of our communities.

It further notes that it has been necessary for the County Council to foster Holiday Clubs with the provision of food in order to ensure that disadvantaged children are provided for so as to counter unhealthy holidays and social isolation.

This council recognises that a greater reliance is being placed upon Food Banks and is aware that the Dacorum Food Bank is struggling to fulfil the demands upon it. 

Therefore,

·        The Council asks the Cabinet to make arrangements to support the continuation of the Food Bank by working with DENS to a greater extent, and

·        Given that the position of Coordinator of the Food Bank is of crucial importance, the Cabinet is further asked to make provisions in the Council's budget for 2020/2021 for financial assistance in the maintenance of this post. 

·        Further as a matter of urgency, the Cabinet is asked to make the necessary arrangements for the early commencement of this funding from 1st October with an appropriate financial transfer from the 2019/2020 reserves’

Vote

 

A recorded vote took place, full details of voting can be found in the minutes under Item 5.

 

Total votes for                   17

Total votes against  27

Total abstaining       1

 

Mayor declared the motion lost

The following motion was proposed by Councillor Tindall and seconded by Councillor England:

 

Councillor Tindall referred to the motion proposed and added that recent stats from DENS give the fact that benefit changes delays last financial year were 709 demand, whereas this year we have only covered 5-6 months of the year and already demand has overtaken at 753 down to delays in changes in Universal Credit.  The most staggering is the increase in demand child meals from 5 last year, to so far this half a year, 26 already.  So you can see the demand is growing and is expected to increase again this year. 

 

It is a matter of some worry and concern that the 5^th richest country in the world has such a demand for food banks in its local communities.  Feel every Local Councils should do everything they can to help.  There are no figures mentioned in this motion because we felt it appropriate for the administration to discuss with DENS what would be an appropriate amount to support the staffing of this.  Money should go to staffing as that is the area that does not attract funding.  The Councillor therefore asked everyone in room to support this and note the last paragraph that the funding starts from 1st October.

 

Cllr England seconded the motion.

 

Cllr Woolner referred to roll out of universal credit in Dacorum causing some issues with a large number of recipients becoming in rent arrears; it follows that this will lead to increased financial need and reliance on food banks.  Current research shows 52% average increase in food bank usage in areas that have had Universal Credit for 12 months, compared to 30% in areas that haven’t.  Dacorum should be providing more support to claimants and ensure that DENS is fully funded and able to cope.  The Cllr urged Council to support this motion.

 

Cllr Stevens referred to holiday hunger, something he has been talking about for many years.  The number of children on free school meals is something we should be looking into, number of children attending holiday programmes are very small numbers, believe need to build robust approach to how feed children during holiday times.  Need a coordinator to ensure a food bank runs well and urge members to support the motion.

 

Cllr England added that he hopes all Members can support the motion, although some things are decided by Central Government, we can appeal for a change of policy, in recognition that Universal Credit is not working the way it was promised.  Waiting for 5 weeks or more for food money doesn’t work when you don’t have any savings.  In Dacorum we can, as a Council, Show compassion and imagination and have to support food banks while it is still needed.  While this continues it is harming our community, we cannot look the other way.  So, let us take a strong position and take back control and use our management of change reserve, or other such reserve, to ensure our residents are able to manage change in their lives.  We declared a climate emergency, but for these people having the basics is their emergency.  If we want people to listen to the Council and participate in dealing with the climate emergency, we need more carrot and less stick.

 

Cllr England continued; lets support people to recover from their setbacks, we need people in hardship to find their change of direction.  The Cllr questioned if the Council has got its priorities right inside the Forum?  Why just refer people to a food back when we could take care of the other key building blocks; housing, health (particularly mental health) and homelessness, by bringing those functions more closely together.  If we are still looking at new locations for DENS, perhaps we could look at the physical and psychological distance between the Job Centre, the Food Bank and The Forum, where housing issues and the risk of homelessness we can all solve by improving collaboration.  While people of Dacorum are struggling to put food on the table for their children, we should be doing all we can to support early intervention. What DENS say they really need now is the resource of a coordinator for their food bank, this is of crucial importance, let’s show how Dacorum can be hands on in supporting local agencies.  I urge the Council to support this motion.

 

Cllr Griffiths responded that she was very surprised to read the motion when it came through on the agenda papers.  This Council has a very good working relationship with DENS, both Members and Officers are often at DENS.  Was therefore very surprised DENS had asked for something that had not been communicated with me.  Officers were equally surprised as they had not heard anything about this.  This motion implies DENS are about to lose their coordinator, that role is fully funded and they are not about to lose it.  They did have a dip in donations during August, which is often the case as people were away on holiday.  Ask any organisation, would you like some more money, there is very few that is going to say no thank you.  DENS desperately need volunteers to help them fundraise – the sleep out is taking place on 15^th November at Hemel School and registration is now open if anyone would like to take place.

 

The Cllr continued that this motion is an unlimited request for money and for it to start straight away, then through Portfolio Holder report questions this evening we’ve had requests for money to be spent on HMOs, more football pitches, more recycling bins and weekend emptying, rapid charging points, a survey of parking in Water Gardens.  No suggestions have been submitted on where this money could come from other than drawing down from our Change Management reserves.  That is change management within this Council so that we can deliver more services to the public and not spend the money on delivering a service as in back office functions.  Would also respond to Cllr England by pointing out that our Homelessness Team were the first Council in this Country to get a Gold Standard award for our homelessness policies and responded to the Cllr that his speech implies that we do not speak to or care about our residents, to which she objected.  Cllr Griffiths confirmed she would not be supporting this motion as she does not find any fact in it.

 

Cllr Pringle commented that she finds it rather concerning, this is a very serious issue which we know affects many people in this country and in Dacorum, taking it personally is the wrong approach when thinking about vulnerable members of the public.  It is a fact that food bank usage has increased not just throughout the country but also within Dacorum.  It coincides with the introduction of Universal Credit, a badly funded policy which takes money away from the most vulnerable.  11% quarter on quarter increase in food bank usage in the first quarter since the introduction of Universal Credit, followed by 44% quarter on quarter increase.  This government is pledging money on propaganda campaign urging us to get ready for Brexit.  Funding could be used this ends.  Poverty created by this government’s irresponsible social policy are impacting all areas of our communities.  Let’s not take this personally, let’s look at the people who we are here to represent and speak and for.  We are now urged to get ready for Brexit, the foodbanks will need to take care of the people in this society who are not in a position to stock pile and the coordinator will need to support with that.

 

Cllr Adeleke commented he has read the motion again and again, stating he does not have anything against charities and feels they are doing a fantastic job in this borough.  He commented that the Food bank is supposed to be supported by community generosity.  What this motion is trying to say is that we support one particular charity, but what happens to other charities? There are lots of initiatives to support charity and lots of ways you can support charities.  On that basis I will not be supporting this motion.

 

Cllr Maddern responded to the motion, commenting she is a huge supporter of DENS, very passionate about volunteers helping them and takes along Scouts, Cubs, Beavers to the food banks to help there.  The Cllr expressed her concern that, from what Cllr Griffiths confirmed, that this is a fully funded role, cannot see how it is lawful for us as a motion to fund something that is already fully funded, if that is right it does not make sense to me so I will not be supporting the motion.

 

Cllr Anderson commented that it appears National, Brexit and General Election politics are getting in the way, if this comes up at every Council meeting it will be very difficult to look at running local Council services for the benefit of our own citizens.  He confirmed that he is not able to support this motion as there has been no local established evidence that there is any problem specifically with the food bank, and no official request from DENS for more support.

 

Cllr Freedman commented that he spends most of his life trying to make the best use of various funds that have been given to charities, to inform the room, even when a charity is well funded, none of that funding can be guaranteed to go on long term, which makes the provision of services and long term staff roles very difficult.  In addition a lot of donations that are received will be reserved and restricted on what they can be used for.  A lot of central infrastructure costs are often over looked as insignificant overheads.  What this motion is trying to do is to provide some security on those costs so that DENS can be comfortable in its own security and future.  I support this motion.

 

Cllr Williams responded to the motion and expressed his concern on reading the motion that it implies the food bank is struggling to carry out its task.  The Cllr stated that the Council has a very good relationship with them and the thought they are struggling was a concern, so I rang the Chief Executive at DENS to assure them of our ongoing support.  DENS advised that they had not approached the Council, they had been approached to ask them if they could use more money, we will see what we can do, which I feel to be irresponsible.

 

Cllr Williams continued that we accept Universal Credit is causing some challenges.  With regard the County Council and holiday clubs, we were talking about ‘Fit, Fed & Read’, which is a scheme that has run for several years now, supporting some of the most disadvantaged families during the holiday period.   The Council recognises the reliance that has been placed upon food banks and is aware that Dacorum food bank struggle, when I spoke to them, August did have a pinching effect, the virtue of the holiday’s increases demands, but this is in terms of donations to the food bank dip.  That is in terms of donations, not the food bank struggling to operate which this motion implies.

 

The post of coordinator, which could be implied from this motion is a post that would be created to strengthen the food bank, is a post is already in place and funded.  This motion is suggesting we replace that funding with our funding and DENS are free to use the equivalent amount of money anywhere else in their service.

 

We might want to consider how much support we already give to DENS; we have been working for several years with DENS, the occupy a number of Dacorum properties to a rental value of around £115k per annum to which they pay rents between £0 and a proportion of market rent; in total they pay us around £24k a year.  Those properties to provide accommodation which in turn generates an income for DENS from the Housing Benefit they receive from the tenants they house.  They use the Paradise Depot to house the food bank, we do not charge them rent and we allow them to sub-let some parts of the building so they generate an income from that.  We work very closely with them through our Housing and Homeless services.  In the past, when they have had problems, particular problems with running a particular service, they have directly approached us and we have given them additional financial support to ensure the continuation of service.  I am confident if they were in a position where they were unable to maintain the service, one which we consider to be very important, they would approach us and we would look at what we could do to support.

 

Cllr Williams finished by saying that he does not feel it appropriate this matter should be brought together with Brexit and neither should DENS, a respected local charity, be used in a political motivated agenda that is not going to improve the service.

 

Cllr Wyatt Lowe commented she has been a Cllr here for more than 16 years and added that to imply that the virtue of caring about the weak the unfortunate lies on one side of the chamber is totally disrespectful to the members of this Council who have sat here year after year looking after the people in this community and doing that within the financial resources available, to the best of our ability to do the best that we can for them.  She added that year after year, at every election residents have come back and voted us in as they approve in the policies we carry out.  I will not be supporting a politically motivated motion.

 

Cllr Tindall responded that some of the comments in the chamber are quite surprising, as no where do we say anything about politics in the motion. 

 

Cllr Tindall continued that he heard or we were told about the fact that the food bank was struggling, I acknowledge the fact the Council does an awful lot, but this was a funding issue, and when I checked with to DENS, as I also spoke to the Chief Exec, they were concerned about the coordinator post because they have to gather together funds from various places each year to get enough to fund the post, which is always very tricky.  It is difficult to ask people to fund something that is a back office.  They are funded at the moment, but anyh of those bits of funding could disappear. The Cllr expressed; if this council is not here to help those in need, then what are we here for?

 

Whether or not it is lawful, I address that point from Cllr Maddern, it is lawful, it is not a question funding something that is properly funded at the moment, it is something DENS struggle to fund, and therefore it would help to cement that.

 

Cllr Tindall advised that the motion is split into two parts, one where it says we would like to look at the budget next year and then could we not provide some money from our reserves.  We are not just plucking a figure for funding out of mid-air, it is suggesting the Council discuss this with DENS to find out exactly how it would be best helped, that was deliberately worded for the greatest manoeuvrability so the Council can work to help DENS in the best way possible.

 

The Cllr advised that due to the level of comments coming from the other side, he would like to request a recorded vote, as it would appear people would like to express how they feel.

 

The Mayor moved the motion to a vote.

 

Voting:

 

Votes for                     Votes against              Abstained

Clllr Tindall                  Cllr Williams                Cllr Bassadone

Cllr England                Cllr Griffiths    

Cllr McDowell             Cllr Elliot

Cllr Claughton             Cllr Banks

Cllr Freedman             Cllr G Sutton

Cllr Allen                      Cllr Anderson

Cllr Hobson                 Cllr Su Mahmood

Cllr Uttley                    Cllr Birnie

Cllr Hollinghurst           Cllr Chapman

Cllr Ransley                Cllr Sinha

Cllr Pringle                  Cllr Beauchamp

Cllr Link                       Cllr Maddern

Cllr Barry                     Cllr So Mahmood

Cllr Woolner                Cllr Arslan

Cllr Symington            Cllr Barrett

Cllr Taylor                   Cllr R Sutton

Cllr Stevens                Cllr Timmis

                                    Cllr Durrant

                                    Cllr Rogers

                                    Cllr Silwal

                                    Cllr Bhinder

                                    Cllr Adeleke

                                    Cllr Hearn

                                    Cllr Wyatt-Lowe

                                    Cllr Guest

                                    Cllr Douris

                                    Cllr Riddick

                                                           

 

Total votes for             17

Total votes against      27

Total abstaining           1

 

Mayor declared the motion lost.