Issue - meetings

To consider the head of corporate services’ report. 

Cabinet considered the report of the head of corporate services, which set out the recommendations of the Community Grants Panel, following its meeting on 18 February 2020. 

The Leader invited a member of the public, who had registered to speak on this item, to address Cabinet. 

Mr Bradshaw spoke on behalf of Warborough Parish Council, urging Cabinet to override the Community Grants Panel’s recommendation, and increase the matrix scoring for his council’s grant application, thereby resulting in a grant being offered to the parish council.  He also urged Cabinet to review its grants policy and criteria. 

Councillor Caroline Newton also addressed Cabinet asking for a review of the grants policy and criteria. 

The Cabinet member for community services reported that this year, the level of grants applied for exceeded the amount of budget available.  Therefore, this was a competitive process.  The Community Grants Panel was praised for correctly conducting the process, following the current policy, and scoring each application against the criteria.  However, it was accepted that there should be a review of the policy and criteria.  It was suggested that the Scrutiny Committee should be asked for its views. 

Cabinet agreed with the recommendations of the Community Grants Panel and asked officers to commence a grants policy and criteria review and consult Scrutiny Committee as part of that review. 

RESOLVED to:

(a)      award a total of £319,317 in capital grants to the 11 organisations listed in appendix one of the head of corporate services' report and apply any specified non-standard conditions; and

(b)      transfer £319,317 from the provisional 2019/20 capital grant budget to the approved 2019/20 capital grant budget (cost centre A319) to fund these awards.