2023 Annual Parish Meeting

Minutes of Eagle & Swinethorpe Annual Parish Meeting, held on Wednesday 8th March 2023 at 7.45pm

Present Cllr Colin Campbell - Chairman, Cllr Jane Wallis – Vice Chair, Cllr Fulton-Sutton, Cllr Parkes & Cllr Chennells.

Rachel Popplewell - Clerk

Agenda Items

1.   Welcome 

Cllr Campbell welcomed everyone to the Annual Parish Meeting.  

2.   Notes of the Annual Parish Meeting held on Thursday 12th May 2022 to be approved as minutes.

It was Resolved to approve the notes as minutes – All Agreed signed by the Chairman.

3.   To receive the Chairman’s Annual Report.

Read out by the Chair. 

This is not an annual Parish Council meeting; therefore, Parish Council business will not be discussed, and no decisions will be made. I’m Colin Campbell, the outgoing Chair of Eagle & Swinethorpe Parish Council (PC). 

I would like to thank everyone that has taken the time to attend tonight's Eagle and Swinethorpe Annual Parish Meeting and I would like to thank everyone for the support that I have been shown during my time as Chair and the time I have spent on the Council.

I would also like to thank Councillors Thompson & Overton for their support at the monthly meetings. Also, fellow counsellors and Clerk, for your help and assistance throughout this last year. The PC currently has vacancies, although that could change with the up-and-coming elections.
 
The year started with the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations with me lighting the Beacon at the Struggler Public House and continuing the celebrations over the weekend which saw over 200 people on the High Street for the street party, thank you to the committee for all their hard work and organising such a great day for the community.

Unfortunately, the coming months brought the sad news of the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth. Thanks to Rachel, the Parish Clerk for her speedy organisation of the book of condolence, the situation only strengthened the relationship between the Church and the PC and brought together the people of the parish.

The PC continued working with the wider community, by asking the children of the school to design a new logo for the PC. We received some excellent entries, that everyone should be proud of, and it was a hard decision to pick the winner, so watch this space for the new logo.

The Parish has experienced relatively low levels of crime and the PC would like to pass on its thanks to PCSO Sarah Lingard and welcome PCSO Will Jones.

As a council, we have reviewed key policies and have agreed on a maintenance schedule for some of the streetlights. The playing field kitchen block discussions continue after the community engagement morning, which only saw a small percentage of feedback. Within the year the paths around the playing field have been improved and the planting of the Jubilee tree supplied by fellow Councillor Michael Chennells.

The website and Facebook page continue to grow and contain a lot of information that we hope will be useful to residents, providing additional ways to contact the Parish Council. 

Again, I would like to thank you for your help over the year and I wish you every success in the future.

4.   Annual reports from District & County Councillors.

Cllr Thompson – County Councillor

County Council Meeting 17th February 2023 

Council agreed a tax rise of 4.99% in total (this includes a 2% rise for adult care). Lincolnshire will still have one of the lowest council tax rates in the country. Despite the rise in council tax, and additional government funding, the council will still need to use a further £7.5m from its reserves to balance the books, based on current projections. The final budget included the addition of £8.7m to the development fund. The money for this will be drawn from the council’s reserves, and it will be used for projects that benefit local communities. There was also an additional £7m for road maintenance, meaning the highways budget for 2023/24 has now risen to around £93m. 

The budget also includes:

•   £275m for adult care and community wellbeing
•   £84m for children’s social care
•   £22m for Lincolnshire Fire & Rescue

Cllr Peter Overton – District Councillor

Annual Report from Peter Overton, North Kesteven District Councillor for Eagle

 

I have attended most of the Parish Council meetings at Eagle over the past year and contributed in a constructive way wherever possible. I congratulate the Chairman and all Parish Councillors for your commitment to your parish over the past year. Your village needs you. I also serve on the Trent Valley Internal Drainage Board and as Vice Chair on Whisby Nature Park Steering Committee.

As a District Council we have continued to put climate change and emissions at the centre of all our policy making. There are two main areas where the District Council has direct control over this; planning and housing. 

Planning Control is a major part of NKDC responsibility. Inevitably, as a District Councillor it is the field that occupies much of my attention and details of applications for Eagle are given below. 

The new Local Plan that becomes effective in 2023 has some bearing on construction standards and locations of development. How interpretation will remain largely under the control of officers, with oversight by those Councillors on the Planning Committee. I have campaigned on location and scale of both wind farm and solar farm proposals. I have been pushing for proper adherence to landscape and habitat protection and renewal associated with housing developments. I will be raising this matter on the scrutiny committee shortly. The public believe there should be much more emphasis on keeping what may be necessary constructions into an industrial setting and not industrialising the open countryside. This has been one area where I have made strong representation. 

Our second major responsibility is in social housing. The Council has a rented housing stock of some 3800 homes, some of which are new builds and are already up to good standards of energy efficiency. In keeping with our target of achieving net zero by 2030, we have been pressing for upgrading of this stock for energy efficiency as rapidly as possible. The Council had a slow start but is now making progress and has at least a clear plan for the next few years. In the past year, 70 houses, which needed most urgent attention, have been retrofitted and there is funding in place for a further 200 over the next two years. Thereafter a total of 100 per year should achieve a total of some 900 retrofitted houses by the deadline of 2030. 

My work in the Council

I have attended all six Full Council meetings at NKDC during the year. Much of the content is of little interest to the public since it often involves technical issues concerning the running of the council and statutory requirements. It can be viewed on live stream by any member of the public. However, I was active in promoting the following motions, not all of which were passed but did have an influence on the running and policy of the Council.

28th April 2022

Addressing fuel poverty within the district.

12th May 2022

Annual Council meeting at which structure of committees and appointments are made.

14th July 2022

Retrofitting homes to improve their energy efficiency will help tackle the cost of living, fuel poverty and mitigate against climate change. What is the Council doing to address the 609 lowest performing homes in energy efficiency, as described in the Anthesis report of last year? I have answered this in this report.
 
Presented the ‘Debate not Hate’ campaign which was initiated by the Local Government Association. We got full support on this motion, which addressed the thorny issue of inappropriate behaviour by Councillors, which is deterring good candidates from standing and existing councillors from remaining, thus undermining our democracy.

6th October 2022      

The “Mini Budget” announced by the Chancellor on Friday 23rd September. We noted that some 38 areas have special “Investment Zones”, and these did not include North Kesteven or Lincolnshire. We seem to have changed ministers and aspirations since then! 
 
15th December 2022

We proposed that nationally set housing targets should be abolished.

We have campaigned on this locally and nationally. The Government decided to withdraw the housing targets, but it is difficult to see how the replacement policy is much different. It continues to put pressure on local authorities to build houses, at a rate which we consider unsustainable in our rural areas.

26th January 2023

Motion in support of the Ambulance Service in North Kesteven. 

2nd March 2023

Call to action to keep our current level of PCSO’s in Lincolnshire.
 
North Kesteven District Council has long recognised the vital role Police Community Support Officers play in combatting crime and providing improved police visibility and public reassurance. However, official data continues to show Lincolnshire has the lowest funding support from central government per head of population of any police force area in the Country. And that despite ongoing and wide-ranging year-on-year acknowledgement that the national police funding formula remains unfit for purpose, change has yet to be delivered. The proposed cut to just 50 PCSOs seemed drastic enough but just recently announced is a further complete abandonment of neighbourhood policing in rural areas. We will be campaigning to get this policy reversed.

Summary of Planning Applications for Eagle during the 2022/3

Internal alterations to The Jungle, Harby Lane, Eagle Moor. Application withdrawn.

Works to Manor Farm, Eagle Hall Lane, Eagle Hall. Officer: Robert Cook Approved

Front extension to porch single storey rear extension and loft conversion, demolition of existing garage. Officer: Robert Cook 

5 Church Lane. Approved

Application to fell a pine tree at 30 Hilltop Close no decision given.

The Willows, Southern Lane, Eagle Moor. Change of us to livery stables and the erection of 2 stable blocks. Officer: Shelly Delderfield Approved

Hunters Moon, Eagle Barnsdale, rear extension. Approved

Erection of rear extension. 8 Lincoln Rd, Eagle. Officer: Cameron Richardson. Approved

White House, Eagle Lane, Eagle Moor, Equestrian Centre. Appeal dismissed.

Corner Farm Livery Stable, Harby Lane, Swinethorpe. Enforcement notice

Single storey extension at Harvest View, Harby Lane, Swinethorpe. Officer: Rebecca Unwin. Approved

Conversion of outbuildings to residential accommodation. Farm Cottage, Eagle Hall Lane. Officer: Tom Siddons. Application withdrawn.

Erection of porch link with above application. Approved

Conversion of existing buildings to form two dwellings. Village Farm 20 High Street

5.   Open Forum.

No questions or comments were received.

Meeting Closed 8pm.