Councillor Hebb, Portfolio Holder for Finance and Legal, introduced the report to review the vision and priorities so that they better reflected the ambition of the Council and Thurrock. The aim was to make both more succinct and easy to communicate and to articulate the new focus and priorities. Feedback from recent consultations had given some clear opinions from residents on the most important issues for Thurrock and these had been used to focus on the new vision and priorities.

An initial draft of the proposed vision and priorities had been presented to the Corporate Overview and Scrutiny Committee and other stakeholders during November and December 2016 to which feedback had been used to focus on the final proposed version.

Councillor J Kent stated that he would not be supporting the recommendation tonight as he thought the process was to arrive at the priorities collectively and to give members the opportunity to take part in the process. He had only seen the report on the Corporate Overview and Scrutiny Committee agenda in December 2016 to which members had disagreed with the recommendations. Councillor J Kent questioned Councillor Hebb whether the report and the recommendations made by the Corporate Overview and Scrutiny Committee had already gone through Cabinet.

Councillor J Kent agreed that education had improved over the years and that this had been a measureable priority in the past. Councillor J Kent stated that education would fail if it was not a measureable priority and asked Councillor Hebb why this had not been included in the review.

Councillor Snell stated that he would not be supporting the recommendation tonight and that the report was full of unnecessary jargon and had not focused on anything in particular. Councillor Snell stated that the Council had been driving the borough forward well before the Conservatives came into administration.

Councillor Gledhill stated that he would be supporting the recommendation tonight and that the process of reports going to overview and scrutiny committees before Cabinet still stood. Councillor Gledhill stated that the Council should be striving for quality and had to move forward and in doing so listen to residents views.

Councillor Duffin stated that it was ironic that recommendations made by the Corporate Overview and Scrutiny Committee had been ignored by Cabinet.

Councillor Gerrish stated that he would not be supporting the recommendation tonight as he believed more work was needed to be undertaken in narrowing the ambition of the review and that all members should come to the same consensus.

Councillor G Rice stated that recommendations made by the Housing Overview and Scrutiny Committee had been ignored by Cabinet and that members should have been involved in the workshops and the consultation process.

Councillor Hebb stated that a report had gone to Cabinet where no opposition member attended to ask a question and that the administration cared and listened to their residents and the results from the surveys had been fed into the vision.

Councillor Hebb thanked Members for an interesting debate and he would take on board the comments made and proposed an amendment to the recommendation as follows:

“That we defer the recommendation to a working party to continue the piece of work already undertaken on refreshing the vision and to report back to Full Council in due course”.

The Mayor invited the Chamber to vote on the amended recommendation.

Upon being put to the vote, Members voted unanimously in favour of the amended recommendation, whereupon the Mayor declared this to be carried.

RESOLVED

That the Council defer the recommendation to a working party to continue the piece of work already undertaken on refreshing the vision and to report back to Full Council in due course.