Agenda item

Any county councillor may, by giving notice to the Proper Officer by 9 am on the working day before the meeting, ask a question on any matter in respect of the Cabinet’s delegated powers.

The number of questions which may be asked by any councillor at any one meeting is limited to two (or one question with notice and a supplementary question at the meeting) and the time for questions will be limited to 30 minutes in total. As with questions at Council, any questions which remain unanswered at the end of this item will receive a written response.

Questions submitted prior to the agenda being despatched are shown below and will be the subject of a response from the appropriate Cabinet Member or such other councillor or officer as is determined by the Cabinet Member, and shall not be the subject of further debate at this meeting. Questions received after the despatch of the agenda, but before the deadline, will be shown on the Schedule of Addenda circulated at the meeting, together with any written response which is available at that time.

Councillor Jean Fooks had given notice of the following question to the Cabinet Member for Schools Improvement:

(1)‘Noting that Lower Wolvercote children will be given priority from September 2011 at Wolvercote School, what steps will he be taking to ensure that there will be sufficient places for all children living in North Oxford to be given a school place at their nearest school or at another within walking distance?’

Councillor Michael Waine replied that he and Roy Leach, Strategic Lead, School Organisation & Planning were meeting parents tonight. He and the Directorate were working in the context of the national picture and in a difficult financial situation. He had looked at the issue of site size and was working hard to find a resolution.

Councillor John Goddardhad given notice of the following question to the Cabinet Member for Schools Improvement:

(2)‘Is the Cabinet Member willing to explore all options available, including use of the school nursery, use of the adjacent Young People's Club and use of an on-site temporary classroom, to ensure that none of the 15 children living in Lower Wolvercote currently not allocated a place at their village school, that is the only reasonably accessible primary school, will be excluded from the school in September 2010?’

Councillor Michael Waine replied that all options were being explored. He was looking for a holistic plan for North Oxford and for Oxford itself. Facing facts there were a number of schools on restricted sites. He had to work within what the County had got.

Supplementary question:

Councillor Goddard asked the Cabinet Member to acknowledge that the access from the Wolvercote School to any other schools was less accessible than from other schools. It was an impossible journey to North Kidlington. He referred to accommodation being available on site and asked that all options be looked at and whether the Cabinet Member would make sure that all children get in.

Councillor Michael Waine replied that he was looking to a happy solution for the parents and the community. He referred to the changes to the admissions code and commented that the changes had only been proposed once this year’s process was already underway. It was not possible to change rules mid way through the process. He noted that not all 16 had chosen the school as their first preference. Eynsham was a second preference for one family. He added that his own daughter had not got her first preference and that any school in the country had to point out that a place in nursery did not carry an automatic place in the primary school.

Councillor Jean Fooks had given notice of the following question to the Cabinet member for Growth and Infrastructure (Referred to Councillor Rodney Rose as the relevant Cabinet Member)

(3)‘The County Council has recently announced that an extra million pounds is being made available to repair roads and pavements damaged by the recent bad weather. A share of this will be going to the City Council, on the basis of the number of miles of road, the proportion being the same as the proportion of the total miles of road in the county. This means that the city is only being allocated £65,000, as it has 6.5% of the total miles of road in the county. But the city roads are much more heavily used than most of the rest of the county’s roads. Indeed Cllr Hudspeth himself said at Cabinet on 9 March that roads would be more damaged by having more vehicles on them. Will he acknowledge that the formula is fundamentally flawed and adjust the proportion allocated to the city in accordance with traffic volume rather than miles of road?’

Councillor Rodney Rose:

‘We have agreed that we will provide an allocation to the city council on the same basis as we allocate our annual highway maintenance budget. This will provide about 6% of the additional money to the City Council which equates to approximately £72,000. As Councillor Fooks is aware the County Council is responsible for all of the major routes within the city which are the ones carrying the greatest levels of traffic. Therefore this is considered to be a fair allocation of funds.

Councillor Patrick Greenehad given notice of the following question to the Cabinet Member for Growth & Infrastructure

(4)‘The Chairman of Growth & Infrastructure Scrutiny Committee thanks the Cabinet Member for his e-mail of the 10 March 2010 relating to the fuller version of LPT3 Draft Policies. Will the Cabinet Member please ensure the comments made by the Growth & Infrastructure Committee meeting of the 10 March 2010, that have been listed and passed to him by officers, be given due consideration, particularly those relating to public consultation that is to take place in the Summer of 2010?’

Councillor Ian Hudspeth:

‘ I was happy to ensure that all Cabinet Members were made aware of the full policies. Thank you for the comments of the Growth & Infrastructure Scrutiny Committee which are included in the addenda for today’s meeting.

Supplementary question: ‘I was not aware that comments/suggestions by the LTP3 working group on policy statements were not immediately recorded in the draft policy statements but will be in future when other comments are considered.

May I go straight to Road Safety and Policy RS3 – ‘The County Council will use a range of measures to achieve casualty reductions.’ In the policy statements under this heading reference is made to urban 20 mph speed limits. The working group suggested this limit might apply to rural areas of the County outside schools.

I have received from the officer this morning the suggested wording for the policy statement which reads:

“Consideration of further 20mph speed limits, including:

-          in urban areas, if monitoring of Oxford’s 20 mph scheme proves of benefit in terms of meeting speed and casualty reduction objectives

-          in other locations where these can contribute to meeting other objectives, for example outside rural schools”

Therefore, my question to the Cabinet Member for Growth & Infrastructure is as follows:

When LTP 3 is signed off in 2011, will he consider a pilot project of introducing a 20 mph speed limit outside South Moreton Primary School in my Division which is on the rat run for traffic that has been requested by local residents and parents over a number of years now?

It is clear that by introducing 20 mph speed limits in the city it has raised expectations in rural Oxfordshire.’

Councillor Hudspeth replied that he would wait for the evaluation of the city centre scheme and could not give a guarantee for any particular scheme at this stage.