Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Liz Blyth, Councillor Thalukdar and Councillor Halford.

Members are asked to declare any interests they may have in the business to be discussed.

Members were asked to declare any disclosable pecuniary or other interest they may have in the business on the agenda.

There were no declarations.

The Minutes of the previous meeting of the Heritage, Culture, Leisure and Sport Scrutiny Commission held on Thursday 30^th July 2015 have been circulated, and Members will be asked to confirm them as a correct record.

Matters Arising:

Item 9 Rugby World Cup

Councillor Barton informed the meeting she would circulate a piece that had been reported for Central News about the Rugby World Cup.

RESOLVED:

That the minutes of the meeting held on 13^th July 2015 had been circulated and were agreed as a correct record of the meeting.

The Monitoring Officer to report on the receipt of any petitions submitted in accordance with the Council’s procedures.

The Monitoring Officer reported that no petitions had been received.

The Monitoring Officer to report on the receipt of any questions, representations and statements of case submitted in accordance with the Council’s procedures.

The Monitoring Officer reported that no questions, representations or statements of case had been received.

The Head of Museum’s to provide a verbal update on the Festival and Events Review.

The Head of Museum’s gave a verbal update on the Festival and Events review ahead of the full report that would come to scrutiny in February.

The commission were informed that:

·       Previously Festivals and Events had been reviewed in 2012 which had resulted in a number of 3 year funding contracts,

·       The next review period had started and the initial report had gone to the executive in July scoping the review process,

·       The review was now gathering information and carrying out fact finding from the funded organisations,

·       The public would be consulted over a 3 month period and organisations affected in the review would have an opportunity to consult and the service was mindful of this being an effective review,

·       Festivals were the most popular area of the councils services,

·       The aim of the review was to ensure money was spent appropriately and scrutiny had the chance to scrutinise that process,

·       The review would be looking at events that took place each year rather than one off activities i.e. Rugby World Cup and Richard III would not be included in review whereas Black History Month had funding every year and so would fall into the review.

The Head of Museums informed the commission that the item would be available for full discussion later in the municipal year once more information had been gathered and consultations carried out.

The Chair concluded that it was important to ensure we celebrated all our communities and there may be a need to include new community events and to consider that those that are more established may be able to sustain their own events with less funding from the local authority.

RESOLVED:

That the Festival and Events Review be brought to a future meeting of the commission for full discussion.

Lili Tabiner, Great Central Railway presents a report outlining details of the project to include progress and funding information.

Bill Ford, Managing Director of the Great Central Railway will be invited to address the commission and respond to questions.

The Commission are invited to discuss and note the contents of the report.

The Chair introduced the item and invited Lili Tabiner and Bill Ford both from Great Central Railway (GCR) to address the commission.

Bill Ford delivered a presentation setting out the background and provided a brief overview of the project which included the following points:

·       GCR had undergone major development since 2008; there was a strong team of people behind GCR who had moved the concept on considerably.

·       Since 2008 GCR had raised £9.1 million and had the benefit of four generous stakeholders. The money raised was invested into the superstructure of the business over the past 3 years and GCR had begun a programme of expansion.

·       The first project “Bridging the Gap” would reinstate a 500 metre section of track in Loughborough to reconnect 2 sections creating a main line of 18 miles and a link to Ruddington.

·       The second project would see the new Heritage Museum built at GCR terminus, Leicester North. The Museum was a partnership between GCR, Leicester City Council, the National Railway Museum (NRM) York and Leicestershire County Council.

·       In May 2015 the museum was awarded a Round 1 pass from the Heritage Lottery Fund with £10m to be allocated after the successful completion of the Development Stage.

·       The vision was to change from steam to theme park and encourage tourism, in 2007 most visitors were steam enthusiasts but since then the “product” had been developed for families who now formed 80% of visitors. GCR intended to continue to develop the tourist trade and the museums location formed a natural Tourism Gateway between the City and the County.

·       An important design feature of the museum would be to see actual steam engines coming into it and this would be unique.

·       In total the museum project would cost £17.7m and once opened it was expected to: double the visitors to GCR from 130,000 to 250,000 each year, create an additional 10 full time jobs in GCR, support a further 700 jobs across Leicestershire and contribute £44m to the local economy.

Members discussed the project which included the following comments:

·       7 allotments had been “lost” to the development as the scheme ran at a 45 degree angle however once completed there would be some land at the side of the burial ground that would be reinstated as 12 allotment plots. It was noted that the project did not affect the cemetery or any burial ground at all.

·       GCR were looking at the whole of the railway as a living museum with the core at the terminus in North West Leicester and the project would be incorporated through to Quorn and Loughborough. There would be a link between the working railway and the museum which would develop the story of each station: Quorn (Wartime), Rothley (Edwardian) and Loughborough (Victorian).

·       It was anticipated there would be no disruption to residents living nearby when the project started, there was an existing access road but the project would also carry out a traffic impact assessment during the development stage.

·       GCR were in  ...  view the full minutes text for item 20.

The City Centre Director submits a report giving details of the economic impact of Richard III on the tourism and visitor economy in the city during the period from the discovery to the re-interment.

Councillor Clair, Assistant City Mayor for Culture, Leisure and Sport introduced the report which had been commissioned by Focus Consultants and funded through the European Regional Development Fund. The report covered the timeframe from the discovery of King Richard III (KRIII) upto March 2015 and deliberately did not include the reinterment.

The City Director outlined the details in the report and explained it was important to commission an objective piece of work which showed that overall the amount spent paled into insignificance when considering the amount it had generated for the city. The report excluded the 2 weeks of the reinterment as figures would have been distorted by the volume of people coming into the city during that period. The figures in the report were based on the best available data and used industry accepted methods to calculate outcomes.

Members were informed that some of the economic benefits to Leicester as a result of the discovery of KRIII included:

·       1012 full time jobs were created,

·       Total Volunteering hour’s 11635, this gave a value of £118,566. Volunteers played a significant part during the whole event, trip advisor described Leicester as a very friendly and welcoming city,

·       Visitors Numbers to Leicester showed an increase of 2.6% from 2012-2013

·       Retail businesses had increased by 4.42% between 2011-2014 compared to 0.31% in the region

·       Accommodation and Food Services businesses had grown 9.8% compared to 2.56% in the East Midlands

·       Arts and Entertainments businesses had grown 13.48% compared to 0.4% in the East Midlands

·       Leicester was emerging strong and visits to all city museums had increased 11%,

·       There had been an increase in hotel occupancy from 2014-15 of 5% in Leicester

·       PR value alone amounted to £12million

·       Long list of companies now interested in coming to Leicester i.e. IBM and Hastings

The City Centre Director concluded with a number of points:

·       The discovery of KRIII had raised the profile of the city in the eyes of the world.

·       Now the city needed to upsell and the next challenge would be to open a new hotel in the city as occupancy figure had reached 85%

·       New jobs had been created not all were necessarily permanent as that depended on trajectory, however tourism gave opportunities to people who were unable to work full time and those under 30 especially.

Members discussed the report and congratulated the team on the achievements throughout the project.

The ensuing discussion also included the following comments:

·       It was hoped that tourists would be encouraged to stay for longer rather than just visit for one day or overnight.

·       Visitors to the City were surprised by what was on offer, a lot still thought of Leicester as an industrial city and found instead a very diverse city. Trip Advisor comments were very positive and well worth a read.

·       In relation to sustainability, tourism led to the growth of different target markets. When KRIII was found it was unexpected, the council quickly put in place a plan and open days and the temporary exhibition at  ...  view the full minutes text for item 21.

Items for the work programme to be discussed and consideration given to scheduling future items.

A discussion took place on the work programme and the following points were noted:

·       Plans for Western Park Golf Club would fall under the remit of Economic Development Transport and Tourism Scrutiny and any “plans” would have to be considered under regulatory procedures in Planning and would be guided by the Local Plan.

·       Saffron Hill Cemetery – 1^st phase had completed and some progress had been made on the 2^nd phase with the Director of Enforcement and Local Services putting forward a capital bid.

·       It was agreed that a Joint Tourism meeting with the Economic Development Transport and Tourism Scrutiny Commission be explored.

·       Belgrave Hall – 1^st year evaluation to be brought to December meeting.

RESOLVED:

That the work programme be updated to reflect the above points.

None

To note the date of the next meeting:

Thursday 29^th October 2015 at 5.30pm.

The next meeting to take place on 29^th October 2015 at 5.30pm in Meeting Room 1, Ground Floor, City Hall.

The meeting closed at 7.29pm