Agenda and minutes

ATTENDANCE: Martin De Rosario (MDR, Chair), Cllr Phil Larratt (PL, Chair), Barbara Barber (BB, Individual), Larry Barber (LB, Individual), Carl Weininger (CW, Northants British Polio Fellowship), Louise Musson (LM, Call Care), Debbie MacColl (DM, NBC), Michael Macleod (MM, NBC).

APOLOGIES: Beverley Mennell, Julie Davenport.

DM - The consultation about the future on Northampton is live.

CW - I went to the recent BBC event, will we actually be listened to?

PL – Yes it should be.

PL – Kicked off the governance review recently regarding parish councils and town councils etc. If you have a big unitary council, you will need something at the lower level in touch with the community. There is work to do with how to take this forward.

LB – Will this increase the amount of money that needs to go out to these councils?

PL – When it comes to readjusting council tax, this may be equalised when balanced with the rural areas.

CW – At the BBC event, they said that they might want to actually give more power to parish councils.

PL – We believe that the assets we have are best retained and maintained by the local area councils.

LM – If this happened this may help keep it secure for the community it is in, that a clause may prevent places being sold/built on etc.

BB – There’s a place between Bellinge and billing has a covenant so that it cannot be built on, how do places get this?

PL – This often happened around the 70’s, they aren’t that safe and they can be bought out and released.

PL – There is a council meeting on 29^th August where more will become apparent.

MDR – Is this a public meeting?

PL – Yes it is similar to the previous ones.

CW – What will happen to the Guildhall?

PL – It is a very important historically, we are not sure and there are still many issues that need to be sorted out such as NCC’s debt etc.

CW – I know the NCC are in debt but are they the only ones?

PL – Other councils nationwide may face similar situations.

Community info exchange – DM - Sat 18^th August – food fair, we are going to set up a gazebo and talk to people to help promote the forums. Ask the chairs to see if they could do a spot on the day, only has to be a short amount of time to gain a lot more interest.

CW – What is the footfall like here compared to the market etc.?

DM – It will be high on that day, there will be plenty of people coming to the food fair so there will be plenty of footfall.

DM – The Facebook page will now be changing, it will be closed so people can join and discuss. It will be going live in the next few weeks or so.

DM – looking to improve attendance with Facebook page and the food fest.

LB – Could we get Bernie Keith to promote it on the radio (BBC) on the day before?

DM – There will be a hate crime awareness this year too as well as disability awareness week.

DM – Highways is on here but I’m not sure why as I wasn’t the officer for the forum at that time.

PL – It may be to do with the bus station.

Forum members discussed what else could be added to the action plan or who could be invited to future forums.

Network rail would be good to get to the forum – there is only 1 lift in the Northampton train station – car park doesn’t link through. Could look at providing step free access instead of just 1 lift.

NCC/Angel Street could come in to talk about blue badge renewals at angel square or just a comment on why the system takes so long. Why is it not two tier for those who have ongoing issues that may never be resolved?

St Andrews for next agenda – communications department.

Call care for next forum.

Attempt to have someone from Societal and NCC transport in together.

Look at getting Digital Eagles in.

CW – Are the trains step free?

PL – They are not step free but the times I have used them they have been very good and helped with ramps etc.

CW – I think I will try Northampton next then as I have had issues elsewhere with access and steps etc.

DM spoke to the forum about possible plans for IDD 2018.

IDD will be on Monday 3^rd December. Trying to do something different this year. Promoting the ability of people with disability and have some people in to help educate people on certain things. One example could be a person in a wheelchair explaining day to day problems they face.

There will also be an “autism experience” that our frontline officers and managers may take part in to help understanding.

I am open to suggestions but anyone who would like to take part in the day and help people understand more, what it is like to live/work with visual impairment, hearing impairment, wheelchair/crutch/walking stick users and mental health etc.

CW – we have a meeting every month and one or two are wheelchair or electric scooter users who might be happy to talk to people.

DM – If they are happy to talk about their experiences with new people that would be brilliant.

CW – people need to be more aware of scooters etc. as they are silent.

CW – The bus sounds great, would be good outside but in December it is too cold to put it on the market.

Forum members spoke about how this could be an idea for another time in the year when the weather is better, this would be a good opportunity to promote the forum. The day doesn’t have to be in December necessarily, it may work better and then share the info in December.

LM - NBC is call care and NCC is Olympus care.

MDR – We would like Call Care to talk about their services at a future forum.

CW- What is the difference between Call Care and Olympus?

LM - Call Care is based at the Guildhall whereas Olympus’ call centre is in Peterborough.

LM – Several bus routes are being cut and this is hindering people getting to work etc. This will isolate people more and more as they cannot meet people and get out and about.

MDR closed the meeting.