Agenda and minutes

The Mayor welcomed all those present to the meeting.

Apologies for absence were received on behalf of Councillors Alan Mason, Rita Rogers and Monica Stringfellow.

To invite Councillors to declare any Disclosable Pecuniary Interests or Other Disclosable Interests they may have in items on the agenda, and to confirm the nature of those interests.

There were no declarations of interest.

RESOLVED that

the minutes of the meeting of Council held on Monday 30^th June 2025 be approved as a true and correct record and signed by the Mayor.

The Leader presented the Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) Report which provided an overview of the outcomes of the options appraisal that had been carried out by Mutual Ventures.

The report and associated appendices considered two main options for LGR in Worcestershire:

·             Option A: One unitary authority for the whole of Worcestershire.

·             Option B: presented as options B1 and B2, considered the creation of two unitary authorities made up of North Worcestershire (covering Bromsgrove District, Redditch Borough and Wyre Forest District) and South Worcestershire (covering Malvern Hills District, Worcester City and Wychavon District).

Option B consisted of two variants:

·             Option B1 provided for two unitary Councils to be established across Worcestershire; North Worcestershire and South Worcestershire. It involved the disaggregation and transferring of all statutory and non-statutory services, functions and the operating model from Worcestershire County Council to the new unitary Councils and the aggregation and transferring of all statutory and non-statutory services, functions and operating models from the district Councils to their respective new (north or south) unitary Councils.

·             Option B2 provided two unitary Councils established across Worcestershire; North Worcestershire and South Worcestershire. It offered a shared service/hybrid model across both new unitary Councils, with specific services (i.e. adult social care, children’s services, education, adult education and transport) jointly delivered and commissioned. All other services would be delivered and commissioned by each new unitary Council, including prevention and early help. The exact arrangement would be determined during the development of any future full LGR proposal.

By way of background, Members were reminded that on 5^th February 2025 the Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution wrote to all the Worcestershire authorities inviting the Council Leaders in the area to develop a proposal for single tier reorganisation in exercise of powers under Part 1 of the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007.  The timetable imposed by the Government required interim proposals to be submitted by 21^st March 2025 and final proposals by 28^th November 2025.

At an extraordinary Council meeting held on 17^th March 2025, Members had agreed an interim plan that covered two main options for unitarisation: a single unitary authority for the county of Worcestershire or, alternatively, two unitary authorities covering north and south Worcestershire.

At that extraordinary Council meeting, Members had agreed the interim plan for submission and to further explore the options that had been identified.  On that basis, Redditch Borough Council, along with the Councils of Bromsgrove District, Worcester City, Malvern Hills District and Wychavon District, had agreed to commission consultants to carry out an options appraisal.

The company Mutual Ventures had secured the commission.  Members were informed that the aim of Mutual Ventures was “to make public services better, more sustainable and more connected to communities”.

The Government had confirmed that there were six criteria that were due to be used to assess any LGR proposal.  In summary, the six criteria required proposals to demonstrate:

1.          The establishment of a single tier of local government.

2.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 32.

To consider any additional items exceptionally agreed by the Mayor as Urgent Business in accordance with the powers vested in her by virtue of Section 100(B)(4)(b) of the Local Government Act 1972.

(This power should be exercised only in cases where there are genuinely special circumstances which require consideration of an item which has not previously been published on the Order of Business for the meeting.)

There was no urgent business for consideration on this occasion.