Agenda and minutes

There were no apologies received.

There were no declarations.

To approve the minutes of the meeting on 27 June 2018.

The minutes of the meeting on 27 June were approved as an accurate record.

MATTERS ARISNG

Pool of London Presentation - The Chairman referred to the challenge at the meeting that this item should have been taken during the public session.  Advice had since been taken from both the Comptroller and Town Clerk and the Chairman acknowledged that there had been an error of judgement on this occasion in considering this item during the non-public session as there had been nothing commercially sensitive to report.

The Chairman responded to concerns raised at the meeting that Members would prejudice themselves from voting on any future planning applications submitted by Northern and Shell relating to its site in the Pool of London.  The Chairman referred to advice of the Comptroller that Members had not precluded themselves from sitting on planning applications in future.

The Chairman also responded to the suggestion that Northern and Shell had been given a beneficial advantage in being allowed to present to this Sub-committee.  The Chairman drew Members attention to the note of the Pool of London Workshop on 20 April 2018 and highlighted the comment that an invitation had been extended to all attendees inviting them to present further ideas and policy proposals to this Sub-committee.  The Chairman stressed that Northern and Shell were the only organisation to come forward and this was the reason they presented.  The Chairman remarked that other organisations had also been offered the opportunity to come forward and confirmed that this opportunity remained open to them.

The Chairman remarked that he thought it important to clarify these points and also to allow it to be properly recorded that the item should have been heard in the public session.

Report of the Director of the Built Environment.

The Sub-committee considered a report of the Director of the Built Environment proposing draft policies for the new Local Plan and draft vision statements relating to the proposed Key Areas of Change.

The Director of the Built Environment explained that the remaining policies not yet seen by the Sub-Committee are the transport policies, which need to align with the emerging Transport Strategy, and the Area Based Policies, which would be informed by the discussion at this meeting. The Director of the Built Environment confirmed that both items would come back in September.

The Chairman explained that he would go through the report policy by policy and take comments.

Core Strategic Policy CS XX: Offices

A Member highlighted the reference to increasing gross floorspace and questioned if the focus should be looking at the net figure.  It was agreed that this would be reworded.  The importance of providing floorspace for SMEs was stressed and it was questioned how much consultation had taken place with the sector.  The Director of the Built Environment explained that no formal consultation had taken place, but the figure had been derived from GLA employment projections and discussions with colleagues in EDO and CPAT.  Flexibility was highlighted as being key with the option of sub-dividing floor space in large buildings to accommodate SMEs.  It was stressed SMEs will be included in the consultation phase.  It was also explained that assumptions had been taken in relation to the average density of desks within City offices, desk occupancy and vacancy rates and that there were a number of variables that contributed to the round number reached.

It was acknowledged that the 20 year time frame was a statutory requirement and that what had not been included with the report was phasing showing how much would be delivered in different

A Member expressed concern that paragraph 10 within the non-public minutes had not been included in the public section of the minutes.

After a discussion, it was resolved that the public minutes of the meeting on 27 June be amended to include the full non-public section of the meeting.

Resolved, that the public minutes of the meeting on 27 June be updated to include the full non-public section of the meeting.

There were no additional items raised.

The meeting remained in public session following the discussion during the earlier part of the meeting.

The non-public minutes were dealt with under item 5 during the public session.

There were no additional questions.

There was no additional business raised.