Agenda and minutes

None.

A contribution was received from a member of the public which can be accessed via the live stream. Cabinet Member Catrin Maby wished to follow up on the issues raised outside the meeting.

Cabinet Member Catrin Maby introduced the report, delivered a presentation and answered the members’ questions with Colette Bosley, Matthew Lewis and Hazel Clatworthy.

Key questions from Members:

• Do we keep a record of the trees removed, hedgerows lost, and trees fallen per year, and do we record Tree Protection Orders that have failed? Are there plans to have a hedgerow strategy?
• When is the dark skies policy likely to happen and what we are doing to protect the dark skies in the meantime?
• Would it be best to separate ‘climate emergency’ and ‘nature recovery’, and describe ‘nature recovery’ as an emergency, because applying the term ‘emergency’ to everything doesn’t necessarily lead to the best planning and approach. It can confuse people and we need to take people with us and use our influence and distilled knowledge to inform people.
• The concern around electric vehicles is whether we are clear about the true nature of carbon emissions and the use of rare minerals in the production of the batteries for EV’s leads to an entirely separate, but extremely important, set of questions, which is concerning if we pin our actions towards net zero solely on the use of electric vehicles.
• There is also the concern that Wales is being described as one of most nature-depleted countries on earth – tied to the UK being described as such in the 2023 State of Nature Report. The language used is somewhat apocalyptic and there is a danger in describing everything as disastrous and catastrophic, in terms of whether we will actually take people with us in terms of addressing the issue. We need to encourage and support residents and businesses and that's the bit that needs to be much stronger in this strategy because whilst this isn’t about giving financial support, it is about doing everything possible to support residents and businesses to move in this direction and we know the scale of what 100,000 residents can achieve, as opposed to a council, so surely putting our efforts into that may well be much more productive than some of the other things. England also has a greater amount of urban concentration than Scotland and Wales, so could they offset some of the effects of urban sprawl? 
• It’s vital that we understand what we can do, what we have control over and are clear about that, for example bats and dark skies, the fact we have a Site of Special Scientific Interest bordering Monmouth, so we must ask ourselves whether we are really paying enough attention to it and what plans we have for it in future. We also have examples of dates and times when some of our buildings have lights on, wasting electric, when not needed and contributing to lighter skies, such as Monmouth Comprehensive School car park and building lights being left on and Raglan depot too, so these need to be addresses. ACTION: Councillor Lucas to send details through to Councillor Maby and Ian Hoccom.
• The importance of flora  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

Colette Bosley delivered a presentation and answered the members’ questions with Cabinet Member Catrin Maby.

Key questions from Members:

• I was interested to review the forward plan objectives. Monmouthshire isn’t just like any other part of the country, it’s an area of outstanding beauty and one of the UK's finest rural counties, with key market towns benefitting from 360-degree transport links, so the recognition of this as a starting point in the objectives section of the report would be helpful.  It may well be that a better set of objectives would embed biodiversity, because whilst it is a term frequently used, explaining what it means in real terms could provide as a starting point for us to reference that Monmouthshire is already one of the most outstanding and beautiful parts of the country. We want to ensure that residents and school children in every part of the county develop their engagement with nature and a greater emphasis put on embedding biodiversity in real terms could be better referenced to recognize what an extraordinary part of the country we are in and it would help to provide that ‘distinctiveness’ that you have referred to as being difficult to achieve.

Chair’s Summary:

Thank you to officers and Cabinet Member for presenting the report which clearly has the Committee’s support. The feedback provided is for the officers and Cabinet Member to consider, namely, that Monmouthshire is one of the most outstanding rural counties is not recognised in the objectives, and that a way to embed biodiversity might be to develop residents and schoolchildren’s engagement with nature.

Leader Mary Ann Brocklesby introduced the report, Marianne Elliott delivered a presentation, and they answered the members’ questions with Deb Hill-Howells and Craig O’Connor.

Key questions from Members:

• Caldicot food bank need is growing, I am interested in the concept of community food and how to upskill residents and bring people together to perhaps use council lands as allotments – acknowledging the very successful community allotment in Caldicot.
• I am interested in the new Severn View care home which has a community allotment, the ethos being to bring the community in to facilitate and to provide a social element, emphasising that food is not just about nutrition. How can we support local residents to access council land and facilities? Where and how can this happen?
• In terms of the ‘Cook along club’, the local primary school had its first session this afternoon and there was a significant interest from parents.
• In reference to Free School Meals (FSM), the school meal budget and lunch food being wasted is a key concern – is there feedback as to why there’s waste? Is it children’s choices or nutrition?
• In relation to the uptake of FSM registration, could the number be compromised by residents or carers having to register online? Not everyone engages with social media, so could this be better facilitated via word of mouth? Parents have asked how to register if they don’t have the ‘Scoop system’ – could there be more options for relaying the message to parents?
• If pupils are registered for FSMs, is there an opportunity for grant fundings for uniforms?
• Is there a way to improve supply chains locally so that schools and care homes can be supplied with meat – 70% of sheep sold through Raglan market are sent to England to be processed as there is no local processing plant?
• There is a difference between what residents would see as words and actual actions…. “Monmouthshire stands out for” and “local can be seen as Monmouthshire, Gwent….”. I don’t’ feel that Llandudno for example, is ‘local’. We need to be more specific and in real terms, local should mean local and be defined as such. We need to separate out Monmouthshire from the rest of Wales.
• In terms of Climate Change and Nature Recovery, I recognise the importance of taking residents and businesses with us and this strategy clearly depends on their support, but the contract recently awarded to a milk supplier hundreds of miles away cuts directly across statements of ethical and local produce.
• I am pleased to see the new hydrogen electric vehicle is now serving meals on wheels to residents.
• Osbaston School: they are feeding back all of the good things that they do about food sourcing, which is brilliant to see – there are very good things and conversations happening but we recognise we have a long way to go.
• Can it be confirmed whether this local food strategy would have materially impacted the original decision to award the school milk contract to  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

As discussed at the last meeting of Place committee, a number of items on the work programme have had to be deferred to later in the year. As no reports will be ready to be scrutinised at the next meeting on 23^rd May, this will need to be cancelled. Petitions received will go to the July meeting.

Noted.

The minutes were agreed, proposed by Councillor Thomas and seconded by Councillor Lucas.

This meeting will be cancelled. The next meeting will therefore be 11^th July 2024.