Issue - meetings

Notice of Special Urgency Notice

 Notice is hereby given that a decision will be taken by the Cabinet to enable the decision to be put to Full Council on 15 July 2020, on the following matter which the Special Urgency Notice (15.3 Exempt Exception and 15.4 Special Urgency Notice) has not been advertised 28 days prior to the date that the decision is required to be taken and the report has not been available for 5 clear days:-

HRA Budget for Purchase of Land or Property

The date by which the decision must be taken makes it impracticable to defer the decision to allow a complete 28 day period of the exemption notice to elapse. Therefore Rule 15.4 (Special Urgency Notice) of the Access to Information Procedure Rules will be applied and a decision will be taken by the Cabinet on this matter at its meeting on 24 June 2020, and then to allow a debate at Full Council on 15 July 2020.

The reason it is necessary for this exempt report from the standard requirements is that, firstly the report contains commercially sensitive information over potential acquisitions that the Council would like to make and, to enable the Full Council to take that decision the Cabinet is required to recommend such an acquisition. It is not practical to wait a further 28 days for the Cabinet, due the scheduled date of Full Council being on the 15 July 2020.

No protection of Call-in is being sought as the decision will ultimately lie with the Full Council.

Exempt Paragraph 3 – Information relating to financial and business affairs of any particular person (including the Authority holding that information)

The Cabinet Member for Housing presented report CH/190of the Head of Crawley Homes which sought changes to agreed budgets and delegations to enable the Council to purchase land or property for the delivery of housing within the HRA.

Councillors Mullins also spoke in support of the report.

A recorded vote was taken on the recommendations in accordance with the Council’s Virtual Committee Procedure Rules.  The names of the Councillors voting for and against the recommendations, along with any abstentions, are recorded as set out below:

For the recommendations:

Councillors Irvine, Jhans, Lamb, Mullins, and P Smith. (5)

Against the recommendations:

None.

Abstentions:

None.

RESOLVED

That the Cabinet recommends to ask Full Council to:

a)         agrees to change to the budget heading of Acquisition Buy Back of Dwellings toAcquisition of Land or Dwellings.

b)         agrees to change the budget heading of Purchase of Edinburgh House to Purchase of Properties.

c)         delegates joint authority to the Head of Crawley Homes and the Head of Corporate Finance* in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Housing and the Leader of the Council to purchase suitable land or property for the delivery of housing within the limits of the HRA budgets identified in 2.1 a and b.

*(Generic Delegation 8 will be used to enact this recommendation).

d)         amends the financial approval levels within the Constitution to ensure that they reflect the ability of the Council to purchase acquisitions efficiently within the agreed budgets

Reasons for the Recommendations

There are opportunities to purchase either land or property that would benefit the council’s ambition to develop affordable housing, but the process of agreement through Cabinet and Full Council means that the council is not able to act quickly and can lose out to other developers.

This will allow the Council to continue the delivery of dwellings funded from the HRA as part of HRA business plan and the Council’s RTB Receipts (one-for-one) funding programme and provide housing for Crawley residents in need from the housing register.