Agenda and minutes

The Chairman, Cllr Jose Green, welcomed everyone to the first online meeting of the South West Wiltshire Area Board and invited Members and Officers introduced themselves.

Apologies for absence were received from:

·       Police – Inspector Gill Hughes.

To receive any declarations of disclosable interests or dispensations granted by the Standards Committee.

There were none.

To confirm as a correct record and sign the minutes of the previous meeting held online, on 16 June 2020.

Decision

That the minutes of the previous meeting held on 16 June 2020 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

·       Boundary Review – paper attached with links to plans

·       Tisbury Swimming Club Update

The Chairman made the following announcements:

Area Board Boundary Review

There were a number of changes proposed within the SWW Area Board Boundary.

·       There were no changes to the Mere area.

·       Nadder and East Knoyle would be renamed Nadder Valley.

The division would lose Barford St Martin, Burcombe and Fonthill Gifford and gain Wylye and the Langfords.

·       The Wilton and Lower Wylye Valley would be renamed Wilton. The ward would lose South Newton and Stoford and gain Netherhampton.

·       Fovant and Chalke Valley division would lose Netherhampton and gain Barford St Martin and Burcombe.

·       Tisbury division would gain Fonthill Gifford.

NHS Track and Trace

People were encouraged to download and use the app.

New ‘My Wilts’ App

A replacement reporting app had been launched which could be used to report issues in Wiltshire, such as:

·       Abandoned vehicles

·       Fraud

·       Weather emergencies

·       Fly Tipping

·       Dog mess

·       Graffiti

Over time more services would be added to ‘MyWilts’ making it simpler, quicker and easier to access services digitally.

Tisbury Swimming Club – Update

Cllr Deane noted that the club which was mostly run by volunteers, planned to extend the opening period of the pool and to do so, was required to find funding to cover the running costs. The Chairman praised the fundraising which had already taken place and suggested that the Board gave its support by agreeing to contribute to the shortfall, by means of a grant which would be made under CEM delegated powers, following further discussions with the Club.

Decision

The South West Wiltshire Area Board agreed to support the Tisbury Swimming Club’s extension to the provision of use, of an amount to be agreed by means of CEM Delegated Powers, in consultation with the Chairman, following further discussions to establish the amount of shortfall required.

This would be reported back at the next Area Board meeting as part of the funding report.

To receive any verbal updates from Partners and Community Groups present, including:

·       Police – Neighbourhood Teams

·       Fire & Rescue

To note the following written updates attached to the agenda:

a) Police

b) Wiltshire Council Items for Information

Note: Speakers are reminded that they each have a 3 minutes slot, unless they have previously discussed alternative arrangements with the Community Area Manager.

The Board noted the updates attached to the agenda and heard from the following partners who were present online:

Police 

Pete Sparrow – Wilton Area (Salisbury Team), spoke to the written report attached to the agenda.

Cllr Church – there was some concern in Wilton relating to minor damage to shops, low level crime, would like to know that the police presence could be increased in Wilton.

PS – Damage from catapults is a difficult issue to tackle as it was not against the law to carry them unless used as weapons. We have spoken to the MP to ask that that aspect of the law was changed.

Cllr Green – Nationally there is news on County Lines, was Wiltshire involved and were the gun licence renewal visits still taking place by police?

PS – Yes, we are very much involved and held a national operation last week with several warrants executed locally. I will find out about the gun licence renewal and feedback.

In response to an email regarding a feeling that crime levels had gone up since Lockdown had eased, Inspector Sparrow confirmed that although crime levels had risen to a peak in July, that they were no where near as high as they had been last July in 2019.

Kevin Harmsworth – Mere & Tisbury Areas (Warminster Team), provided an update, for his areas.

There had been a focus on theft from motor vehicles from beauty spots and have been working with the National Trust to see what measures could be introduced to prevent these incidents.

In Mere we have been dealing with low level antisocial behaviour in the street in Kilmington. Holding weekly partnership meetings to help minimise the situation.

We were also involved in the County Lines operation and continued to work with and support the Community Speedwatch schemes in the area.

Other work included supporting a national operation in modern slavery and exploitation, however we are not aware of any people within the area that were being trafficked.

Cllr Wayman was pleased to hear of the support for the Community Speedwatch schemes and reiterated a previous request for some data on the number of times that police attended to support a Community Speedwatch group and where.

Inspector Sparrow and Sargent Harmsworth noted that the data should be available. They agreed to liaise with the PCSOs for each area and then provide the data to the clerk to circulate.

Deputy Police and Crime Commissioner, Jerry Herbert, will present the Police and Crime Plan Update 2020/21 and the Annual Report 2019/20.

Jerry Herbert, Deputy Police & Crime Commissioner gave a presentation on the Police & Crime plan for 2020/21 and the Annual Report for 2019/20.

On the matter of Community Speedwatch, Jerry had also been out to support a volunteer team in Dinton. There should be a mobile enforcement unit available by the end of the year to help combat poor behaviour on the roads.

Questions and comments received included:

·       Police were in attendance for CSW in Tollard Royal, however they weren’t allowed to stay because they had no mobile coverage. Is the force dependent on mobile phones or was there a superior coverage? Answer: The airwave system worked on mobile technology and as a result generally the coverage was good, however there would be dead spots in some parts of the county. There was something called the emergency services network and improved coverage was being looked at.

Sargent Harmsworth noted that the Police radio system was going through an upgrade, one officer in Mere was trialling a new version. There were other options, but radio continuity must be maintained.

·       Had the nature of crime changed through the pandemic?

Answer: We watch the trends generally there was a significant reduction in overall crime, partly due to there being a reduction in personal crime reduced. We have seen a steady increase in domestic abuse, which was to be expected due to the nature of being in lockdown. There had been a rise in crime to children, which was only coming to light now that children were back at school. There was also an increase in cyber-crime and quite a lot of low level antisocial behaviour.

Inspector Sparrow added that in Wilton the only area of concern was around domestic abuse, everything else was the same or lower.

Community Engagement Manager to give a presentation on projects, initiatives and work from before lockdown.

Karen Linaker, Community Engagement Manager recapped on some of the projects and areas of work prior to the Covid lockdown, these were:

•        The launch of “Make A Friend Be A Friend” in Wilton and Barford St Martin was postponed – project to enable better engagement with older and vulnerable in the community

•        Began work to understand what eco-friendly projects and initiatives are operating locally

•        Employment fair at the Nadder Centre – would be picked back up when possible

•        We were about to run some flood warden workshops – these will be held online instead, from November

•        Ongoing focus on improving broadband connectivity

•        Ongoing focus to maximise potential of the Nadder Centre – Real Madrid football training camp did take place in August, hoped to return next year

•        Began to explore how to help young people facing mental health challenges – Youth Panel 29 Jan - look at how we may target this work whilst working with Seed 4 success – new mentoring service

•        Ongoing support for young people, including allocation of funds for positive activities

•        Ongoing focus on transport schemes via the Community Area Transport Group

•        Ongoing focus on the needs of vulnerable older people and carers – Group would get back together in October

•        Ongoing focus on community safety, including speeding and neighbourhood watch

Community Engagement Manager to give a presentation on work undertaken relating to the response and recovery programmes since March 2020.

Karen Linaker, Community Engagement Manager gave a presentation on the local response work around the pandemic.

·       From day one 24 village support groups in SWW were set up.

·       People had continued to respond with all of the services that had been set up, the Board was keen to thank everyone involved.

·       The Wiltshire wellbeing hub was set up – a multiagency initiative providing support, advice, food, and goods and facilities for the most in need.

·       In the South West Wiltshire community area, 514 eligible businesses for the help, 330 of which applied and were successful.

·       The Nadder Centre was open and would be brought back in to use for the community.

·       Public health was available on the phone to provide advice.

·       Emergency Plan – Broadchalke and Bowerchalke had joined up to produce one plan.

Larissa Tonkin from Wilton Help was currently under the umbrella of Wilton TC but had agreed initial funding to set up as a CIC.

Wilton help would be able to respond rapidly and had a virtual call centre which had received 1991 calls. Delivering 997 medical prescriptions, 597 shopping trips and 311 errands.

Angela Bridges, we support the view that the local level is sometimes the best way to identify who needs help. We are a small parish and were able to support our residents as we had a good group of volunteers.

Community Engagement Manager to give a presentation and facilitate discussion on how the South West Wiltshire Area Board’s priorities need to be updated and adapted in light of the pandemic and taking into account recently published ‘joint strategic needs assessment’ data.

Karen Linaker, Community Engagement Manager presented information gathered during lockdown and set out areas to focus on and how the Board may move forward in setting local priorities:

·       There had been a show of strong neighbourhood support for the vulnerable and more/new people stepping forward to lend a hand during the crisis.  How to keep that going for the long term?

·       There was now a greater dependence upon online communication, e.g. for home schooling/working, shopping, accessing GP appointments, parish council meetings, area board meetings, etc. Was this community area’s broadband capacity fit for that purpose? How digitally inclusive are we?

·       During the period where vehicle use was less, and more sustainable modes of transport prevailed.  How could we take forward these benefits?

·       Look at the impact upon our physical and mental wellbeing. Who amongst us needs help?

Karen ran through a range of notable findings under the headings of Health & Wellbeing, Housing, Children & Young People, Environment, Transport & Highways, Deprivation and Community Safety.

The Area Board was keen to know where it could help and where guidance could be directed. Members and community groups would need to go through an exercise to figure out which groups needed the support and where to prioritise work.

Once the priorities were established, there would be a series of mini workshop style events online.

Following the events, The Board would prepare the findings and proposals ready for the new Area Board in May 2021, offering a clear rationale for which priorities should be taken forward, how and by who.

A copy of the presentation slides are attached to these minutes.

Questions and comments:

·       There was a large amount of people in Tisbury that did not want to look at things online so the only way we have to communicate with them was to letter drop throughout the village. We did this and one particular document that springs to mind, was an info sheet with links on every line. So that was a no-go area. They want hard copies or emails to download the data themselves.

Answer: Yes, we have to get the right balance – we can draw on examples from elsewhere, there does have to be an element of in person flyer drop or phone calls.

·       I would like to thank Karen for her assistance in helping me to join this online meeting.

·       The local areas know the people that need the extra support, they do need some financial support to help provide that support.  It’s how we circulate the information that is important, a wider approach was needed, as there was no one system that would capture everyone.

·       The Parish magazine was a huge resource across the whole area. It was one way where we could provide the written word and ask them to respond.

The Area Board will receive an update from Seeds 4 Success regarding their work with young people over the past 6 months, and regarding their new youth mentoring service.

Jaki Farrell from Seeds 4 success gave an update. They had been working with young people across SWW and during lockdown had moved its sessions online using Zoom. This meant that they were not able to reach as many of their usual members, but the transition to remote sessions had been quite positive.

Lee Cherry was a newly recruited full-time member of staff. His main role was to set up and deliver a mentoring programme for young people.

Lee explained that he was excited to have been appointed as the mentoring manager. His initial plan was to visit lots of mentoring programmes around the country, but due to lock down that was not possible so he had been researching online.

Young people were sometimes in a situation where they needed some support, he noted that coming out of lockdown there may be more people that need quite a lot of support.

Mentoring was a reliable and trusting relationship, meeting one to one, face to face once a week to enable the users to chat about their strengths and challenges. The goal was to help individuals get over their challenges and to be where they want to be with goals and challenges. A mentoring relationship may last around a year, but was flexible, sometimes more, or less.

There were a lot of procedures and policies in place to ensure safety. As people come out of the imposed restrictions of lockdown, they would be more able to meet face to face again.

We are looking for people that are 18+ that have the time and enthusiasm to work with a young person, and preferably able to drive. It was estimated to cost £500 - £600 a year per person to mentor.

More information can be found online here: https://www.seeds4success.org.uk/

Jaki introduced Lucy who was in attendance to speak on her experiences.

I was a year 11 last year as we went int o lockdown. I missed the opportunity to take my GCSEs and was extremely bored, so was really grateful that Seeds 4 success moved their sessions on to zoom as that gave me something to look forward to. I am now in Year 12 and attend Shaftesbury School where I can now proceed with other things.

Questions and comments:

·       Would the mentors have a DBS check?

Answer: Yes all have the enhanced DBS, first aid and 2 referees.

·       Jaki, are you involved with any work apprenticeship schemes. The Government initiative called Kick Start required a group of 30 young people to take it forward.

Answer: I am part of the consortium of Building Bridges which was for all ages, where I am a partner. We were contacted by Kick Start and yes in order to make the 30 there was a partnership that would combine a group to get the required number.

To note the update from the meetings held on 26 February, and online on 9 September 2020.

To consider any funding recommendations as detailed in the attached papers.

The Board noted the report attached to the agenda and considered the recommendations as detailed therein.

Cllr Tony Deane noted that at the meeting on 9^th September, which was held online, there had been 19 people join remotely.

He stated that one problem with CATG was that we tend to be resource limited and not cash limited, and that only small schemes could be put forward.

It was reported to CATG that there was an issue with speeding in Tollard Royal. We offered to write to the director and to the AONB to look on their experience of similar issues in other parts of the county.

Decision

The South West Wiltshire Area Board approved the recommendations of the CATG as detailed in papers attached to the agenda.

The Board will consider the following funding bids, as detailed in the attached funding report:

The Board considered the funding requests as set out in the attached report. Applicants present were invited to briefly outline their project and answer any questions from Members.

Decision

Our Time Project, was awarded £3000 towards the Crisis for elder’s SW project

Reason

The application met the Community Area Grant criteria for 2020/21

Note: The applicant agreed to provide feedback following the project.

Decision

Mere Footpath Group, was awarded £480 towards the Healthy Mere walking website  

Reason

The application met the Community Area Grant criteria for 2020/21

Decision

Wiltshire Music Centre, was awarded £1500 towards Celebrating Age, Phase 2

Reason

The application met the Community Area Grant criteria for 2020/21

Decision

Wilton Men’s Shed was awarded £1260.43 towards the Electric installation project  

Reason

The application met the Community Area Grant criteria for 2020/21

Decision

Chalke Valley Football Club, was awarded £742.58 towards the under 14s kit & nets

Reason

The application met the Community Area Grant criteria for 2020/21

Decision

Semley & Sedgehill PC was awarded £1196.50 towards the SID project.

Reason

The application met the Community Area Grant criteria for 2020/21

Decision

Hinton Hall Management committee was awarded £2000 towards exterior repairs

Reason

The application met the Community Area Grant criteria for 2020/21

The next meeting of the Board is on Wednesday 11 November 2020, at 6.30pm

The next meeting of the South west Wiltshire Area Board will be held online, on Wednesday 11 November 2020, at 6.30pm.