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ITEM EN3

ENVIRONMENT SCRUTINY COMMITTEE –
15 DECEMBER 2004

Minutes of the Meeting commencing at 10.00 am and finishing at 1.10 pm

Present:

Voting Members:

Councillor C.H. Shouler - in the chair

Councillor Catherine Bearder
Councillor Mrs Dee Bulley
Councillor Julian Cooper
Councillor Andrew Crawford
Councillor Patrick Greene
Councillor Brian L. Hook
Councillor Biddy Hudson
Councillor Power
Councillor Leslie Sibley

Other Members in Attendance:

Councillor David Robertson (for Agenda Items 5, 6 and 7)
Councillor Brian Hodgson (for Agenda Item 7)

Officers:

Whole of meeting: D. Mitchell (Chief Executive’s Office).
Part of meeting: Director for Environment & Economy, G. Barrell, M. Elliott and D. McKibbin; J. Hydari (Resources).

The Scrutiny Committee considered the matters, reports and recommendations contained or referred to in the agenda for the meeting, together with a schedule of addenda tabled at the meeting and agreed as set out below. Copies of the agenda, reports and schedule are attached to the signed Minutes.

    53/04. ORDER OF BUSINESS

    AGREED: to vary the order of business as indicated in these Minutes.

    54/04. MINUTES

    The Minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 10 November 2004 were approved and signed.

    55/04. ROAD CASUALTY REDUCTION – BEST VALUE REVIEW

(Agenda Item 7)

On 25 November 2004 the Best Value & Audit Committee had agreed to refer the outcomes of the Best Value Review of Road Casualty Reduction to the Environment Scrutiny Committee for them to make any observations on the Review to the Executive.

Accordingly, Mr G. Barrell, Principal Engineer, Environment & Economy and Cllr Hodgson had been invited to give a presentation on the report.

Councillor Hodgson referred to the proposed Road Safety Bill which would increase testing for drink driving, 20 mph zones and penalties for offences such as driving whilst using a mobile. He further referred to the successful 30 mph zones around the County, the need for more 20mph zones around schools and the increasing demands from communities for 20 mph zones in general.

He asked the Committee to consider what the County Council could do to bring down the appalling death rate of 3,000 fatal accidents per year.

In response, Councillor Robertson highlighted the proposals set out in paragraph 98 of the report, particularly the further development of the Speed Management strategy to reduce congestion and consequently to reduce speeding and proposals for further education, training and publicity on road safety.

The Committee then considered the report, and the following issues arose from debate.

    • concern expressed over the high amount of accidents on A34;

    • serious accidents had reduced since 1996, but slight accidents had increased;

    • design of trunk roads: numbers of lay-bys per mile was excessive and parked cars had caused hazards;

    • motorcycles: oil at junctions created huge hazards for motorcyclists – road design issue?

    • recovery of cycle accidents – accurate?

    • should be using more speed reduction signs as have provided invaluable throughout the County;

    • concern expressed over dedicated cycle lanes causing complacency and therefore accidents;

    • would have liked an analysis of increasing tougher licensing laws – many road accidents were alcohol/drug related;

    • what was the County doing about educating people on road safety?

    • car design – critical questions needed for the future.

In response, Mr Barrell reported that accident clusters on the A34 were reported to the Environment Agency to highlight black spots; that some food vans had been removed from the A34 due to accidents; that motorcycle groups had been involved in the review and that road markings had also been highlighted as a problem; that cyclists disregarding the highway code was a problem and that many cycling accidents were not reported. However, officers were working with Hospital Trusts to obtain accurate figures and the police had recently had a blitz on cycling offences and were working with Cyclist Associations to improve the problem

He further clarified that car design had improved road safety along with improving visibility at junctions and speed reduction signs. 30 mph pilot in South Oxfordshire had reduced average speeds by 3 or 4 mph.

The Committee AGREED to endorse the report and additional recommendation of the Best Value Committee and to ask the Executive to write to the Chief Executive’s of the NHS Trusts, Primary Care Trusts and Ambulance Trust to seek their views on Road Casualty Reduction.

    56/04. INLAND WATERWAYS – DRAFT FINAL REVIEW REPORT

(Agenda Item 6)

The Scrutiny Co-ordinating Group had commissioned the Lead Member Review Group to lead this review on its behalf. Having collected a wide variety of evidence the review panel now presented its provisional draft report for consideration by the Committee. Councillors Mrs Bulley and Crawford gave a brief presentation outlining the process of the review and key issues and recommendations contained in the report.

The Committee then made the following observations to the Lead Member review Group:

    • the Local Transport Plan was in fact audited;

    • there was no acknowledgement of climate change in the report;

    • concern expressed over plans to commercialise waterways – could easily over commercialise;

    • concern expressed over the lack of funding given by the County Council towards the Wilts and Berks Canal;

    • towpaths along the Thames are in disrepair and often impassable for pushchair/disabled access;

    • accessibility for recreation needs to be looked at.

    57/04. TRACKING SCRUTINY ITEMS

    (Agenda Item 8)

    The Scrutiny Committee AGREED to:

    1. note the outcomes of their advice and recommendations to the Executive/Council as set out on the Addenda in relation to its scrutiny review of Air Pollution, the Didcot ITS Long Term Strategy, the Corporate Environmental Policy, Postal Buses, Rail Timetables and Cornmarket;

    2. nominate Councillor Biddy Hudson as an observer on the high level environment group to address the issues set out in the Corporate Environmental Policy Scrutiny Review;

    3. nominate Councillors Julian Cooper, Andrew Crawford and Les Sibley on the task group to scrutinise Rail Projects prior to the consideration of the Executive on 15 February 2005.

    58/04. FORWARD PLAN

    (Agenda Item 9)

    The Scrutiny Committee considered whether there were any matters relating to Environment & Economy in the current Forward Plan on which the Committee wished to have an opportunity to offer advise to the Executive before any decision was taken.

    No items were identified.

    59/04. REVENUE BUDGET AND CAPITAL PROGRAMME 2005/06 – 2007/08

(Agenda Item 5)

The Committee considered a report (EN5) on the revenue and capital expenditure proposals 2005/06 – 2008/09. It received presentations from Ms Hydari; Ms Elliott, Mr Collins , Mr McKibbin and the Director for Environment & Economy. Copies of the slides/background information tabled at the meeting are appended to the signed copy of the minutes.

Members of the Committee raised the following issues (shown in bold):

What savings could be made through alternative measures, such as reducing hours of street lighting between the hours of 2.00 am and 5.00 am by 50%?

Mr McKibbin advised that reducing the hours of street lighting had been investigated. There would be a very high cost to replace systems across Oxfordshire and savings would not be realised for 3 to 4 years.

Have officers looked at new technologies such as energy saving bulbs – green energy?

Mr McKibbin advised that Environment & Economy were trialing solar panels for isolated illuminated road signs.

Had materials inflation been accounted for in the figures?

Mr McKibbin advised that all figures were index linked.

Councillor Hook moved and Councillor Green seconded in relation to Annex 4 to remove the public transport allocation of £166k and Highway maintenance allocation of £200k leaving a balance of £64k and increase expenditure by £366k, balancing it by making a reduction of £159k and £186k and £21k of management of bus shelters leaving £5k.

The motion was put to the vote and was lost by 5 votes to 2.

The Scrutiny Committee AGREED to:-

    1. (i) agree the efficiency and savings proposals for Transport as set out in Annex 4 to the report, subject to expressing disappointment at the reduction in the level of highway maintenance;

      1. endorse with regret the efficiency savings proposals for Sustainable Development as set out in Annex 4 to the report; and

    2. endorse the relative priorities of its capital bids as set out in Annex 5 to the report.

in the Chair

Date of signing 2005

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