Agenda and minutes
Contact: Jon Pitt, Democratic Services Officer
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COVID-19 Local Support Grant Scheme PDF 624 KB Minutes:
This report provided details of proposals to use the Household Support Fund (HSG) allocation for Medway Council to support families with children, other vulnerable households and individuals from 6 October 2021 to 31 March 2022.
The report explained that this Programme was funded by the Department for Work and Pensions and was ring-fenced. The expectation was that it should primarily be used to support households in the most need with food, energy and water bills. It could also be used to support households with essential costs related to those items and with wider essential costs. In exceptional cases of genuine emergency, it could additionally be used to support housing costs where existing housing support schemes did not meet this exceptional need.
The report noted that the urgency provisions were set out in the Constitution (paragraph 2.2 of Part 3 (Responsibility for Cabinet functions) of Chapter 3 (Responsibility for Functions) of the Constitution).
The Chairman of the Business Support Overview and Scrutiny Committee agreed that the taking of these decisions was urgent and could not be reasonably deferred until the next Cabinet meeting on 16 November 2021, in accordance with Section 11 (Cases of special urgency) of the Local Authorities (Executive Arrangements) (Meetings and Access to Information) (England) Regulations 2012 and Rule 17 (Special Urgency) of the Access to Information Rules (Part 2 of Chapter 4 in the Constitution) as it was imperative that the Council took urgent action to support individuals and families in Medway in line with the Government’s announcement to implement the Household Support Grant.
Additionally, and in line with rule 15.11 of Chapter 4, Part 5 of the Constitution, call-in could be waived where any delay likely to be caused by the call-in process would seriously prejudice the Council’s or the Public’s interests. The Chairman of the Business Support Overview and Scrutiny Committee agreed that the decisions proposed were reasonable in all the circumstances and to them being treated as a matter of urgency and to waive call-in.
Decision:
Reasons:
Given the severity of hardship anticipated this winter and the lack of cost to the local taxpayer it is ... view the full minutes text for item 1. |