Meeting of 11 May 2016
UPLOWMAN PARISH COUNCIL: MINUTES OF ANNUAL MEETING
Held on 11th May 2016 at the Village Hall, Uplowman starting at 7.40pm. Approved on 21 July 2016
Minutes taken by Mr R Hodgson, Clerk. Action points in bold.
- MEMBERS PRESENT
1.1 Present: Cllr T Milner (Chairman), Cllr R Branton, Cllr R Norman, Cllr K Baugh and Cllr S Floyd.
1.2 The Clerk conducted an election for the Chairman's role 2016-7. Cllr T Milner was proposed by Crr Branton, seconded by Cllr Floyd and elected unanimously on a show of hands. There being on proposal for the role of Vice Chair, Cllr Milner reminded his fellow councillors that should he not be available for any meeting then a Chair would have to be elected from those present at that meeting for that occasion.
- PROCEDURAL MATTERS & APOLOGIES
2.1 Cllr R Adcock had tendered provisional apologies as he was travelling and might not return in time.
- MINUTES OF LAST MEETING (17 March 2016)
3.1 The Draft Minutes of the Meeting held on 17th March 2016 had been circulated. The Minutes were agreed without change and were signed as a true record of that meeting.
- MATTERS ARISING FROM THE MINUTES
4.1 There was nothing that would not be covered by Agenda items.
- FINANCES
5.1 Current Balance: £5,793.10
Income since last meeting (Precept + 2016 TAP grant): £ 3125.31
5.2 The following payments were approved and cheques signed to effect the disbursements:
Community First Trading (Annual Insurance Premium): £180.21
R Hodgson (Clerk's expenses): £8.95
The clerk noted that he had forwarded an invoice received for work on the Hall picnic site to Mid Devon for approval and payment from Section 106 funds but not received a reply. He would chase this.
5.3 The Clerk read each of the Annual Governance statements to the meeting for approval. Each statement was agreed and the Statement then signed by the Chairman.
5.4 The Annual Accounting statement had been circulated prior to the meeting. Acceptance was proposed by the Chairman and agreed by all on a show of hands. The statement was then signed by the Chairman and the Clerk. The Clerk expressed thanks to Mr Clark, who had once more acted as Internal Auditor. The Clerk would now publish the statements and forward them for External Audit.
5.5 The Chairman had revised the Reserves policy to clarify that the amounts shown were of a general nature and not specific to the purposes shown. They were included to show how the total had been derived and to enable future revision if needed. He proposed that the policy be adopted, which was agreed unanimously.
- PLANNING/LICENSING APPLICATIONS
6.1 16/00189/HOUSE Uplowman House: swimming pool. Has been approved by MDDC
6.2 16/00326/LBC Uplowman House: Internal alterations. UPC had no objection
6.3 16/00351/FULL: Chillomene: conversion of reundant building. UPC inspected and had no objection.
6.4 16/00272/FULL: Church View, Uplowman, replace porch. Had been approved by MDDC
6.5 16/00318/HOUSE: Jasper's Green, Convert garage, has been refused by MDDC
6.6 16/00382/FULL: Widhayes, new cattle shed. Has been approved by MDDC
6.7 16/00503/HOUSE: Hatherlands: revised drawing of extension.
6.8 Review of procedures for dealing with Planning Applications: The Chairman had drafted a paper for discussion. He noted that the UPC procedure adopted in 2006 was not always followed and should be revised to increase transparency of the process. The Chairman said that a quorum of 3 was required to make a decision (as specified in the 2006 procedure) but this was not always possible to achieve. The alternatives, he suggested, were either to hold regular planning sub-meetings or to regard the outcomes of site visits as provisional, to be ratified at a subsequent full meeting. Cllr Branton said that the MDDC planners were unlikely to wait for a full meeting so the response would not, in the latter case, be truly provisional as there would be no way of changing it. As a number of councillors were not present, the Chairman proposed to continue the discussion at a later date.
- CORRESPONDENCE
A list of correspondence received and sent had been circulated. Attention was drawn to the following items of interest that were not covered elsewhere:
7.1 There was no significant correspondence to consider that was not covered under agenda items.
- HALL AND RECREATION ASSOCIATION
8.1 In Cllr Adcock's absence there was no report on the UHRA.
- EMERGENCY PLANNING AND NEIGHBOURHOOD WATCH
9.1 No report had been received.
- VILLAGE IMPROVEMENT PROJECTS
10.1 TAP funds had been received for work on the telephone box. Cllr McCombe had taken on this project and it was agreed that The Clerk would inform Cllr McCombe that funding was in place.
10.2 Photographs were needed of the goal posts in use. Cllr Floyd said she could arrange this. It was also suggested that the forthcoming dog show might be a good time to do this.
10.3 The new benches and picnic area had been installed at the Hall. The Clerk had forwarded the invoice for this to Mid Devon DC for payment under Section 106 and awaited a response.
10.4 The Chairman proposed that a Social event be held in April 2017. All agreed.
10.5 Good publicity had been achieved over the successful repair of the sign post. The Chairman commented that perhaps other local councils might wish to emulate this.
10.6 There had been no further development of plans to erect 'no parking' signs outside the school. The Chairman would contact the School Governors.
- STATE OF ROADS IN PARISH
11.1 Entrance to the Church: A request to assist with funding of this work had been received from the PCC. The Chairman stated that it was unclear where ownership of the lane in question lay; it was used by Uplowman Court Farm and by the Church. After some discussion it was agreed that this was a matter for the Church to undertake. The cost was not large and might be recouped from other users such as wedding and funeral parties. The Chairman would inform the PCC that UPC could not assist in this case.
11.2 A number of pot holes were noted, in particular that the surface of the bridge over the A361 link road is breaking up. There were also pot holes outside the Hall and near the top of Stoney Lane.
- DATE OF NEXT MEETING
The next meeting was scheduled for Thursday 21 July 2016.
The meeting closed at 9.05pm
Public discussion.
The Chairman read his Annual Report prior to the meeting, which follows below.
Minutes of 11 May 2016
Chairman’s Report on the 2015/16 year.
Time passes quickly and this is my fifth report as your Chairman and provides an opportunity to look back at the achievements of the Council. Once again I thank my fellow councillors for their support during a busy year, and especially to our Clerk, Robert Hodgson, without whom our task would be much harder.
Once again thanks to Des Hannon of Devon CC and Ray Radford, in his Mid Devon DC role, who attend most of our meetings and contribute to keeping us informed of other council matters.
Last May was an election year and I was pleased that everyone was returned unopposed, which also has a cost benefit. I was happy to continue as Chairman but we were unable to resolve the position of Vice-Chairman and that role remains to be decided.
Early in the year the Transparency Code 2015 was adopted by the Council which is another step to ensure that the public are able to know which assets we own, grants given and the contract conditions for any employees. It is important that the Council is open to scrutiny and later in the year we started to use a new web site and a new email address to be able to communicate with our Clerk. This will enable us to provide more information and to notify parishioners of events more easily.
We also started the process of reviewing our Policies and Procedures and now have new Procedures for Letting Contracts and, a first for local parishes in this area, a Reserves Policy so that we can explain why we maintain our reserves or contingency fund.
The year has seen us try to protect our heritage which is important to a Parish like ours. Plans have been agreed to refurbish the red telephone box and to use it as an information point, and these works will be carried out shortly when the weather improves. Alongside the telephone box we managed to repair the noticeboard to keep it going a while longer.
We were also please to find the funds, with the help of Des Hannon and Devon CC, to be able to restore the road sign in the centre of the village. Too often when these are damaged they are replaced with new signs that do little to protect the historic nature of the village. The publicity provided on this sign may provide encouragement to other Councils.
Earlier in the year we were informed by John White, Chairman of the School Governors, that the local Uplowman Primary School was to form a School Federation with Halberton Primary School, sharing a head teacher and a combined Governing Body. This went live in September 2015 and we wish it success. It is also hoped that the parking issues at the school can be resolved amicably, especially after the great effort and expenses that was incurred in providing a safer school path.
There has been the usual number of planning applications to be considered as a formal consultee. During the year we re-affirmed our policy that there should be no further development in the Parish, including on private residential gardens. This is to ensure that the character of the village remains rural in nature and recognises the limited facilities available.
We continue to utilise the very welcome TAP funds, based on £1 for each elector, on small projects and spent the last of the S106 money on new benches at the Hall. There was one large project undertaken which was a new tennis court for the village which was kindly funded by a local resident. It is already being used but with the warmer weather it should provide a wonderful facility for tennis players.
Trevor Milner (Chairman)