Agenda and draft minutes

RESOLVED:

        That the minutes of the Ordinary meeting of the Council held on 27 February 2025, the Extraordinary meeting of the Council held on 19 March 2025, and Mayor Making and Annual Council held on 14 May 2025 be approved and adopted.

To receive any disclosure of interests from Councillors or Officers in matters to be discussed.

Note: Councillors are reminded of their obligations to declare disclosable pecuniary interests (DPIs), other registerable interests (ORIs) and non-registerable interests (NRIs) in accordance with the Council’s Code of Conduct.

Councillors Porter, Tod, Warwick and Williams each declared disclosable pecuniary interests in respect of agenda items due to their role as Hampshire County Councillors. However, as there was no material conflict of interest, they remained in the room, spoke and voted under the dispensation granted on behalf of the Audit and Governance Committee to participate and vote in all matters which might have a County Council involvement.

Councillor Pett declared a disclosable pecuniary interest in respect of agenda items due to his role as Council’s representative on the South Downs National Park Authority.  However, as there was no material conflict of interest, he remained in the room, spoke and voted under the dispensation granted on behalf of the Audit and Governance Committee to participate and vote in all matters which might have a South Downs National Park Authority involvement.

The Mayor referred to recent engagements and then announced his forthcoming charities events.  The Mayor then advised that he had written to congratulate the following recipients of King’s Birthday Honours:

Professor Sarah Greer - Vice-Chancellor, University of Winchester.  A CBE for Services to higher education.

Julie Dawes - Chief Nurse and Deputy Chief Executive, Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.  An MBE for services to nursing and the NHS.

James Graham Hatchley of Alresford - lately Deputy Chair and Senior Independent Director at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust.  An MBE for services to Fundraising in the NHS.

Wendy Elizabeth Ross of Durley - Lead Practitioner and Child Protection Co-Ordinator at St Christopher's Pre-School, Southampton. An MBE for services to Early Years Education.

Brian Cole of Bishops Waltham - On-Call Firefighter, Hampshire and Isle of Wight Fire and Rescue Service.  A BEM for services to the community in Bishops Waltham.

The Leader made three announcements.

The Leader firstly reported that Winchester City Council was the top performing district council in the country for climate change as Climate Emergency UK had recently awarded Winchester City Council a score of 68% for its performance on addressing the climate crisis.  The council scored particularly highly in the categories of buildings and heating and planning and land use which included a forecast 96% reduction in the council’s direct carbon emissions.  The Leader thanked everyone involved and thanked Councillor Learney for leading the work and for the support of other councillors and cabinet members.  He then asked that the Chief Executive thank officers for the great work undertaken in every area of the organisation.

The Leader next announced that the council had received gold accreditation from the Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance which was in recognition of the council's significant program of work to improve how it recognises and responds to domestic abuse.  This included embedding a victim centred approach to domestic abuse situations throughout council policies and spearheading a local partnership of organisations and staff training regarding responding to domestic abuse situations and creating a network of domestic abuse champions within the organisation.  Once again, the Leader asked the Chief Executive to thank the officer team for this achievement. 

The Leader then provided an update on proposals for Local Government Reorganisation.  Firstly, he advised that the Ministry of Housing, Communities, and Local Government had confirmed that the deadline for councils to submit proposals to establish new single-tier unitary authorities would remain as 26 September 2025 and that the councils in Hampshire and Solent were required to submit a proposal for the whole area. The proposal should be built on whole district building blocks and a strong justification must be provided if boundary changes were proposed.   

The Leader advised that that 13 Councils including Winchester City Council were working together on a five-council model – the Isle of Wight, plus four mainland unitary authorities. Three options were under evaluation and public engagement was underway. He encouraged everyone to participate, and this engagement  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

To receive and answer and questions from the public.

(Questions must be received in writing by Democratic Services – democracy@winchester.gov.uk – no later than 10am on Wednesday 2 July 2025).

There were no Questions before Council.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

That Council endorse the proposed town twinning agreement at the Appendix to the report as the basis for the twinning agreement between the city of Winchester (town wards) and Nizhyn City Council(Ukraine) and that the Mayor of Winchester sign accordingly.

Councillor Tippett-Cooper moved that the recommendations in Report CL175 be approved and adopted (seconded by Councillor Becker).

Following Councillor Tippett-Cooper’s introductory speech as proposer, a short video message was shown to the meeting from Mayor Kodola, of Nizhyn, Ukraine.  

Council then proceeded to ask questions and then debated the matters in the report.

AMENDMENT – Moved by Councillor Tod and seconded by Councillor Horrill:

 Changes to original Recommendation in Report CL175 in bold:

That Council endorse the proposed town twinning agreement at the Appendix to the report as the basis for the twinning agreement between the City of Winchester (town wards) and Nizhyn City Council (Ukraine) and that the Mayor of Winchester sign accordingly.

Council continued with questions and then the meeting debated the Recommendations in the Report (as amended) and at conclusion of debate, Council voted on the Amendment, which was carried unanimously.

Following summing up by the proposer of the original Recommendation before Council (Councillor Tippett-Cooper), Council then voted on the substantive motion (which was the Recommendation in Report CL175, as amended), and this was also carried unanimously. 

Following this, the Mayor invited the chair of the Winchester Ukrainian Cultural Association (WUCA) to address the meeting who thanked the council and the residents of the district for their ongoing support and then introduced the Kalyna choir who delivered a short celebratory performance.

RESOLVED:

That Council endorse the proposed town twinning agreement at the Appendix to the report as the basis for the twinning agreement between the City of Winchester and Nizhyn City Council (Ukraine) and that the Mayor of Winchester sign accordingly.

RECOMMENDED:

That Council note the annual scrutiny report for 2024/25.

Councillor Brook (Chairperson of the Scrutiny Committee) moved that the recommended minute of the Scrutiny Committee be approved and adopted (seconded by Councillor Horrill).

There were no questions or debate of the matters in the recommended minute and report.

RESOLVED:

That the recommended minute of the Scrutiny Committee held 5 June 2025 be approved and adopted:

That the Annual Scrutiny Report for 2024/25 be noted.

To receive any resignations from committees and to make any necessary re-appointments.

There were no changes to committee memberships for council to note.

The total time for questions and the answer and supplementaries thereto shall not exceed 40 minutes.

13 written questions had been received, 8 of which were heard at the meeting along with associated supplementary questions.  The questions received and their response were subsequently set out on the council’s website.