1pm, 21st October 2015

at Ocean offices, St Austell

Minutes

Chair
Kathryn Pennington
MD of Westco /

Secretariat

Morwenna Milburn
Development Officer, Cornwall Council

Attendees

Name

/

Organisation

/

Contact details

Versha Koria (VK)

/

HCA

/

Andrew George (AG)

/

Cornwall Community Land Trust

/ Peter Moore / Cornwall Rural Housing Association /
Louise Dwelly / Cornwall Council /
Sam Irving / Cornwall Council /
Simon Jones / DCH /
Matt Ward / Coastline Housing /
Andy Boon / Aster /
Callum Turner / Tamar Housing Association /
Alan Green / Ocean Housing /
Sam Nicholson / Cornwall Council /
Justin Cartwright / Sanctuary Housing /
ACTIONS
Introductions and apologies
Apologies received from Chris Duggan, George Gillow, Jill Gregg, Jo Flint and Ryan Hosken.
Ian Hamilton sent his apologies and explained that he will no longer be attending as he is leaving his post.
Kathryn Pennington (KP) welcomed everyone to the meeting.
Minutes of the last meeting and matters arising
Presentation from IBEX Recycling – costings were circulated after the meeting.
Sub Group to consider RP capacity– not actioned as Chief Executives meeting on 29th October has superseded this and work within RPs is not yet complete.
Build Costs workshop – this was scheduled for 19th November however since the meeting this has been cancelled. LDw will update at next CHP.
Comments on the HoTs for CCFP2 are still welcomed by LDw. / ALL
HCA update
Paper circulated with minutes.
RPs are invited to speak to VK about potential brownfield sites for inclusion in the sites list for the Government’s new starter homes initiative. LDw confirmed that there is still a lack of detail around the policy implications of starter homes. CC has offered to work with the CLG in piloting a policy to be included in the Local Plan.
4. / Cornwall Council update
The Local Plan examination is due to re-convene in late Spring 2016 (April-May). An increase in the housing number for Cornwall is proposed. The Inspector dismissed the “aspirational” affordable housing target of 40% and 50% Cornwall wide. Instead he has proposed targets linked to the 5 value zones (50% zone 1, 40% zone 2, 35% zone 3, 30% zone 4, 25% zone 5). This is in line with the Council’s Strategic Housing Viability Assessment report. Policies 9 and 8 are generally retained but policy 9 on cross subsidy sites is likely to be tightened to resemble a more traditional exceptions site policy. Inspector’s comments are now considered a material consideration and so Planning Committees have been accepting lower percentages of affordable housing. There will be a re-consultation on the focused changes at the end of the year. Re-negotiations on some extant permissions are expected as a result of the Inspector’s view on targets.
Corporate changes – Interviews for the new Chief Executive are expected at the end of November. Michael Crich remains the Director for Environment, Economy and Enterprise and Trevor Doughty is the Lead Officer until a Chief Executive is appointed.
Team changes – Sam Irving has been promoted to Housing Delivery Manager and Sam Nicholson has been recruited as a Graduate Trainee Development Officer. The Housing Strategy/ALMO Client function (headed by Stacey Sleeman) has been moved to a different part of the directorate under Peter Marsh who is head of Commissioning and Asset Management. This is to reflect the fact that all the arms-length companies including Cormac and the ALMO have been into 1 group and commissioning services from the companies has therefore been aligned.
Capital programme funding for CCFP2 has been approved and proposed draft programmes (June 2015 version) has been circulated to relevant RPs. The £11m programme has been boosted by off-site contributions for priority areas where these have been accrued. So total resources for CCFP2 are £14.64m . The RPs’ commitment in principle to CCFP2 will need to be firmed up by the end of October and LDw will continue to liaise with them with a view to contracts being in place by February 2016.HoTs have been circulated previously and it will be important to receive feedback on these in good time.
Feedback from the Chief Executives of RPs’ meeting with the Council’s senior management to look at capacity issues in light of the recent budget announcements will be given by LDw at the next CHP.
Matt Ward raised an issue around s106 terms for rural schemes - parish cascades were causing issues with re-lets. LDw explained that the s106 captured adopted policy so if there was a proposal to amend the rural local connection provisions, this would need to be tabled through senior officers to a member based forum. The suggested route was to raise with Phil Mason / Nicola Stinson and a proposal could be brought through to Council’s Planning or Housing Policy Advisory Committees. It was important to note that rural schemes have a different planning status as they are generally granted permission on the basis of addressing local need. It was agreed that a working group be formed by RPs to look at this issue. Andrew George said that the Cornwall Association of Local Councils could potentially be consulted given their previous involvement in the development of rural local connection policies. LDw emphasised the importance of ensuring that tenure, mix and scale were well designed at inception to reduce the need to cascade out to other parishes . This required good use of housing need data.
ACTION Volunteers from CHP to form working group, led by Matt Ward. Feedback for next CHP.
Nominations agreement – draft was circulated. SI asked for comments as soon as possible. / MW
ALL
5. / Update on procuring rents matrix
LDw explained that this was not a priority for the Council to progress, given recent national policy announcements and the future of affordable rent in flux. It was also an expensive project - initial quotes from contractors were around £20 - £25k. In addition, Cllr Cole who is chair of planning policy PAC has formally requested a review of affordable rents in the new year.
It was agreed that the need for the rents matrix would be reviewed in 6 months. AG advised that Ocean were progressing a framework of valuers and a number of RPs indicated their interest in jointly commissioning this. LDw supported this approach. ACTION: AG to contact interested RPs to explore a joint commission. / AG
6. / CHP Pipeline Sites list
List was circulated to members prior to the meeting. LDw emphasised the importance of maintaining a dialogue between the Council and RPs in light of the recent Government changes to ensure that the list reflects RP realistic delivery capacity. ACTION – CC to prioritise the list and consult RPs to assess their capacity.
RPs will need to meet with the named enabler from CC’s Affordable Housing Team to go through their schemes. It will be important to establish timeframes by analysing the green coloured schemes in detail. RPs and enablers to meet before next Sites Group in November. / LDw
7. / Right to Buy
Raised by Matt Ward (MW) as there is an ongoing consultation by DCLG. RPs are reporting an interest from tenants as it fits in with aspirations for home ownership. Watching brief to be maintained.
9. / AOB
MW raised the point that 4 bed units to rent can be problematic and further work around scrutinising the affordability of tenants in need of these larger house types should be undertaken. HCA/Coastline has discussed the potential of increasing the capital grant in order to bring down rents on larger units as a solution. LDw advised that there was a continued need for larger and adapted dwellings and a perceived increasing reluctance amongst RPs to build them into schemes. It was important to understand RPs concerns so we could look at possible solutions. ACTION CC to convene a sub group meeting to look at issues and would involve management and development staff. Outcome to be reported to the next CHP. / LDw
10. / Next meeting
20th January 2016, 1pm at Ocean Housing Boardroom.