The Committee were presented with the Annual Review of the Licensing Shared Service.    The purpose of the report was to provide Members with a copy of the annual review that had been conducted in respect of the Licensing Shared Service with Medway Council.

The Annual Review had been presented to the Operational Services Cabinet Committee on 20 March 2023 and it had been requested to be presented to the Licensing Committee to update on the progress of the shared service.

The Licensing Manager outlined key areas of the report and highlighted that:

·        The shared service began on 1 January 2019 with the team responsible for licensing functions for both Councils, outlined on page 1 of appendix 1 of the report.

·        The team became fully staffed in November 2022 enabling progress to be made with compliance and enforcement activities including fee collections and associated interventions following nonpayment.

·        In November 2022 a temporary staff structure (appendix B) was introduced with the acting up of 2 Members of staff.  The loss of 2 other members of staff in summer 2023 had impacted the team, resulting in a greater focus on statutory duties pending recruitment to the vacant posts.  These posts had now been filled with the previously acting up roles becoming permanent.  The current structure of the team could be seen in appendix C.  The restructure kept the same number of staff which was essential to manage the work of both authorities.

·        The Licensing department were actively involved with multi agency groups such as the Kent and Medway Regulatory Licensing Steering Group and the Safety Advisory Groups for both authorities.

·        Licensing Team members were all highly qualified having achieved professional licensing practitioners’ qualifications and had completed other training courses.

·        Debt collection and visits to licensed premises continued monthly to collect unpaid annual fees.  Enforcement and compliance had resumed, including visits to licenced premises and vehicle inspections at taxi ranks.

The Chair welcomed questions from the Committee:

·        Members noted that the reason the shared service was initially formed was to achieve financial savings but acknowledged that the report did not express how robust these savings were, especially in the current financial situation for both authorities. The Head of Community Protection advised there had been approximately £50K of savings obtained when the initial structure of the shared service was created, which had been retained. Since that time the number of staff remained the same, meaning no savings had been made in addition.  Every year under the annual fees and charges review process, the locally set fees were implemented for cost recovery.  Licensing was required to operate as a cost neutral function and could not collect surplus funds in the collection of fees.  The shared service offered a robust service, even during the pandemic there was no impact to service provided with no complaints received.  New burdens were frequently put on the team due to additional licensing regimes, which had been absorbed with no request for additional staffing.

·        Members asked whether the report would be presented to Cabinet and if so whether some financial clarity could be included into the review.  The Head of Community Protection informed Members the team would take that recommendation on board.

The Chair thanked the team for their work with the shared service. 

The Committee noted the report