Minutes:
Keith Vaz M.P. attended the meeting and spoke on several issues pertinent to the area.
i) Policing Issues
Mr. Vaz stated that it was fortunate that the Local Policing Unit Commander was based locally. Recently Mr. Vaz had accompanied a police patrol and had been impressed. As a result of this Mr Vaz stated that he intended calling the LPU Commander and the Chief Constable, as required, to his Government Enquiry Team on Anti-Social Behaviour.
ii) Management of Green Spaces
Mr Vaz stated that he was aware that some of the green space at Hamilton was managed by the City Council, some by Mainstay (Greenbelt) and the rest by the developer. He stated that, in his opinion the City Council should have responsibility for maintaining all of the green space, with a proportion of the funding provided by the developers.
iii) Social Centres
Mr Vaz stated that there was a need for additional facilities to be provided to make Hamilton a vibrant centre.
iv) Public Transport
Mr Vaz stated that for those residents living on Columbine Road the question was whether buses should travel along this road or not.
v) Stakeholder Meetings
Mr Vaz stated that he was of the opinion that the former stakeholder meetings that had previously been held on the estate should be continued.
Questions from Members of the Public
i) A member of the public stated that there were a number of problems with Greenbelt, the Land Management Company responsible for maintaining a large proportion of the green space in the area. It was further stated that it was understood that the City Council were able to take over the management of green spaces from developers after a period of five years.
A further concern was that was a shortage of primary school places on the estate and it was apparent that the number of children on the estate had been under-estimated.
The only doctors surgery on the estate had opened some 7 years previously, it was too small then, priority should be given to address this shortfall of doctor provision.
The largest land owner at Hamilton was Tesco and there was a need to extract from them the funding to provide the facilities that were desperately needed, outlined earlier.
Mr Vaz stated that regarding green spaces, the City Council could, subject to a number of conditions being met, take over the maintenance of green space but that this process could be much longer than five years. An alternative might be to form a grass cutting collective but should the view be for the City Council to take this work over then the process to achieve this should be started.
It was further stated that contact would be made with Greenbelt to arrange a meeting to discuss issues on Hamilton.
ii) A member of the public stated that in one of the national newspapers reference was made to Government proposals to speed up the granting of planning applications. As a direct result of this it was inevitable that the consultation period would be reduced significantly.
Mr Vaz stated that if there were strong feelings against these proposals then they should be opposed.
Note:
Councillors Potter and Sandhu disclosed personal and non-prejudicial interests as members of the City Council Planning Committee.
iii) A member of the public stated that they lived on Sandhills Avenue, opposite Hope Hamilton School, and that there were problems with cars parking in the vicinity of the bus stop.
Officers stated that colleagues in the Road Safety Team were aware of the issues and were looking to re-site the existing bus stop to the layby to ease the problems.
iv) A member of the public stated that a couple of years ago Hamilton residents had been promised a range of facilities but these had not materialised. Also those community facilities that were available to residents were too expensive to hire.
Mr Vaz stated that Tesco had originally proposed to provide a range of facilities at Hamilton. The City Council signed an agreement but since then Tesco changed their mind and the facilities never materialised. Gateway College across the footbridge had excellent facilities but these were not accessible.
In concluding Mr Vaz stated that it might be a good idea if the City Council identified one officer to deal with all Hamilton related issues, in effect creating one point of contact.
The Chair thanked Mr Vaz for attending the meeting and stated that, as a Governor of Gateway College she would be putting pressure to make some of the facilities at the College available to residents.
Regarding Community Centres, the City Council had been promised that these would be provided and they have not been. The Ward Councillors would continue to fight for more facilities to be made available.
The Chair stated that local venues available for hire would be encouraged to advertise more widely and include their charges.