Finance Committee
Oversees the council’s budget and spend and makes decisions on grant applications.
Macclesfield Town Council Finance Committee
Macclesfield Town Council Notice of Meeting
24th June 2022
To Chair Councillor Neil Puttick and Councillors Sarah Bennett-Wake, Alift Harewood-Jones, Mike Hutchison, Chris Wilcock and Fiona Wilson.
You are hereby summoned to attend a meeting of
Macclesfield Town Council’s Finance Committee meeting to be held at
Macclesfield Town Hall
on
4th July 2022
commencing at 7pm,
for the purpose of transacting the business shown on the attached agenda.
With thanks,
Laura Smith
Town Clerk
Agenda
Agenda of the meeting to be held on the 4th July 2022 at 7pm at Macclesfield Town Hall.
This meeting is open to the public, but space may be limited. Should you wish to attend please inform the Town Clerk.
Anyone attending this meeting is advised to wear a face covering upon entering and leaving the venue. It is advised that this only be removed when speaking at the meeting.
Anyone attending is asked to undertake a lateral flow test on the day of any meeting before embarking upon the journey to the venue. Please note that it can take up to 30 minutes for the true result to show on a lateral flow test. If your test shows a positive result, then you must not attend the meeting.
1 Apologies for Absence
To receive apologies for absence.
2 Declarations of Interest
To receive declarations of interests from members relevant to items under discussion at the meeting.
Public Questions
The meeting will be adjourned to invite comments and questions from the public.
The meeting will then be reconvened.
NOTE:
If you would like to speak during public session or attend the meeting in person, please email clerk@macclesfield-tc.gov.uk by 5pm Thursday 30th June 2022. Every practicable effort will be made to try and arrange your inclusion.
If you would like to submit a written statement, please submit your statement for inclusion and circulation to the committee to clerk@macclesfield-tc.gov.uk by 5pm Thursday 30th June 2022.
3 Minutes of the Finance Committee Meeting held on 9th May 2022
Action: To approve the minutes.
4 Updates from the Minutes
5 Grant Applications
5.1 Macclesfield Boys Boxing Club
Action: To consider the grant application for £1500.
5.2 Macclesfield Cricket Club
Action: To consider the grant application for £2000.
5.3 Cygnets
Action: To consider the grant application for £2000.
5.4 Just Drop In
Action: To consider the grant application for £1240.
5.5 Macclesfield Music Centre
Action: To consider the grant application for £2000.
5.6 Weston Community Centre
Action: To consider the grant over £2000 and the proposal in the attached report.
6 Grant Updates
6.1 Grant Update Report
7 Finances
Action: To note the following reports and recommend the Annual Governance and Accountability Return to Full Council 16th May 2022.
7.1 Internal Audit Update.
To note the report.
7.2 End of Year Figures and Reports
To note the following reports.
- Receipts and Payments.
- Bank Reconciliation.
- Income and Expenditure.
- Ear Marked Reserves Report.
- List of authorised payments.
8 Date/Time and Place of Next Meeting
The next meeting of the Finance Committee will be held at 7pm on 5th September 2022, at Macclesfield Town Hall.
Macclesfield Town Council Finance Committee Minutes
Minutes of the meeting held on the 4th July 2022 at 7pm at Macclesfield Town Hall.
In attendance:
Councillor Neil Puttick
Councillor Sarah Bennett-Wake
Councillor Alift Harewood-Jones
Councillor Chris Wilcock
Councillor Fiona Wilson
1 Apologies for Absence
Cllr Mike Hutchison.
2 Declarations of Interest
Cllr Sarah Bennett-Wake declared non-pecuniary interests in the following items:
5.3 as children that she works with are in performances that Cynet have put on.
5.4 as children she works with have attended Just Drop In.
5.5 as her wife is a member of Macclesfield Pride’s committee.
5.7 as children she works with have attended the Musuems.
Cllr Fiona Wilson declared non-pecuniary interests in the following items:
5.3 As she has discussed this project briefly with Kalini at the Rosies Plaques Museum event.
5.5 As she will be attending Pride as the Mayor of Macclesfield.
5.6 As she has briefly spoken to Emilly Gunnion about Roar activities.
Cllr Neil Puttick declared non-pecuniary interest in the following items:
5.6 As he has already heard of the project.
Public Questions
The meeting was adjourned to invite comments and questions from the public.
Kevin Bradbury spoke on behalf of Macclesfield Boys Boxing Club grant application, agenda item 5.1, to take a team of girls to boxing completion in Ireland – hoping to produce another Olympian, like Kariss Artinstall. The club has been going for over 20 years and is run completely by volunteers and they are proud to have turned the lives of lots of kids around. It is £2 per session or £10 month which works out 66p per session. They do a show once a year to fundraise.
The Sport requires lots of commitment, hard work to succeed which are great life skills for all those who get involved. There are 40 / 50 kids in the club.
Cllr Wilson praised the club and said she has recently visited the National Memorial Arboretum, where Kariss was honoured and how proud she was that Macclesfield had Kariss as an Olympian from a local club.
Richard Nash, spoke on agenda item 5.2, he is a volunteer coach at the cricket club spoke on how they help with 30 kids per week, and how women’s’ cricket and cricket for people with disabilities has really taken off. At present there is no designated area for those with disabilities to play so they want to use an area of unused land to create a safe and inclusive area. The club will fund as much as they can of the project, and they have match funding from private donations. It will be the only club in Cheshire East to have a designated area in the county for female and disabled people’s cricket.
Cllr Wilson asked about timescales for the project and Richard replied they hoped this would be Sep 2022 onwards.
Cllr Wilcock asked if it was just for people from Macclesfield and Richard said it would be open to anyone interested.
Kalini Kent spoke on agenda item 5.3 the Cygnets application. They are a youth group that have been going since 2010 and are applying for CIC status. They help young people with their confidence and their health and wellbeing. 1000’s children come through the doors since they started, and they meet every Saturday and are very inclusive. At present, they have no home, and have used St Michael’s church and King School and various other places as venues.
They have been offered the opportunity to take on 2nd floor of paradise mill which has been completely refurbished and they need to kit it out with the equipment as they can no longer use Kings school equipment.
Councillor Alift Harwood asked, where they delivered this program, Kalinin replied they deliver all across Cheshire East.
Cllr Wilson asked about projected income from ticket sales. Kalini said they keep the prices low, children £10 per week for rehearsals, all people in the group are volunteers apart from choreographer and musical director. The new space will mean they can generate income to put on performances
Cllr Puttick, asked about the plan for renting out the room, capacity will be about 60.
Faye Ronan from Just Drop In, spoke on agenda item 5.4. The grant application will fund their summer program called Mactivate, where they want to reach 20 children from underserved communities. The program aligns with the MTC priorities, keeping it local, linking in with the escape room, the parks and outdoors and will encourage children to access these areas once the program is over. There will be a celebration event at the end.
Cllr Puttick said encouraging active travel would be good also.
Cllr Wilson said that there will be an event in South Park for the 100th birthday on 13th August, and it would be great if participants could attend as the Town Council will be consulting on pavilion and their views would be very welcome.
Kay Lomas, treasurer of Macclesfield Pride, spoke in agenda item 5.5. The application is to hold a pride event for 2022. There is a pop-up shop, cinema film and a parade to name a few events.
On 9th July there will be an event in the town centre and the funding will go towards the cost of stage, lightning, printing, and performers. They have gained some sponsorship for the event. The charity has no reserves as such.
They have worked actively with local businesses and hope to increase their visibility and decrease negativity. Kay thanked the Town Hall staff for all their help and advice.
Cllr Puttick said we have lots of resources for groups and there needs to be more sharing e,g Art space has a stage, which have used before, but they had sponsorship to have a better stage.
Cllr Bennett-Wake said Macclesfield Pride have made a very large effort to get lots of businesses and pubs involved, and there is less negativity.
Cllr Wilson said the way Macclesfield Pride has developed has been very inspirational and the events organised have been phenomenal.
Emily Gunnion from Roar spoke in their application, agenda item 5.6. They are a CIC which aim to remove stigma of addiction, and this is their first community outreach project. All users decided on this project to reduce labels and stigma of addiction. The idea is to have a human library, where people can come and talk to people in recovery, linked with Artspace who have helped each person produce a piece of artwork which will be the icebreaker for people to speak to and learn about their story and achievements.
Funding is for the art therapist and materials they cannot source at Artspace.
Cllr Wilson asked how many individuals will be involved in the project which is 32 people. 30th July is the date of the event,
Cllr Harewood asked if they were new people to Roar, Emily explained it’s a mixture of people within the service and those who have moved on.
Natalie from the Silk Heritage Trust spoke on agenda item 5.7, and their application for an event on 10th Sep as part of Heritage open days. They want to involve the community and are focusing stories from people from Macclesfield. This fits with the MTC strategy, they are looking to have activities around the town to spread out the events and bring people around the town. It will include hop on/ hop off walking tour.
They hope by working together they will open the museum up to new audiences. The funding will help bring the wow factor, including paying for several artists and a theatre company and good props which could then be shared with other groups afterwards.
Cllr Wilson said this fits in together with the Town Centre Recovery Working Group plans and is future proof and will bring people into the town.
Mark Smith from Youth Fed came to update on a previous grant which was for a feasibility study for looking at what youth facilities are available in Macclesfield, agenda item 6.1. The feasibility study has not gone as well as they hoped, and they felt that in the aftermath of covid it was harder to get into schools and reach people. There were 38 responses in the initial response and only 50% said they would use a youth centre. They have now done a 2nd survey and had younger people help with the questions, they also want to do some focus groups in schools. They also consulted businesses but recognize they do not have much of a reputation in Macclesfield. They reached out to 50 businesses and got 12 responses, who all they said youth activities should be provided by local authority.
The next steps are to continue with plans for the land they own and work with Fermain club and look at doing pop up youth events.
Cllr Wilson, said she was very excited to give funding to the project, and the response has been very disappointing despite efforts made.
She agreed focus groups in schools were a good idea as they will hopefully identify the barriers of why they would not attend a youth club and what activities they may like to do.
Cllr Wilson also asked if the outcome was any different than they thought it would be at the beginning and that they may have gone in wrong direction and not targeted very well,
Cllr Puttick said Youth summit would be an excellent place to talk to people do they have a youth board who helped with the 2nd survey.
Cllr Bennett-Wake said that it was disappointing to hear that the questions weren’t right initially, and they had to be written again for a 2nd survey and only then were young people involved.
The meeting was reconvened.
3 Minutes of the Finance Committee Meeting held on 9th May 2022
Resolved: The minutes were approved.
4 Updates from the Minutes
There were no updates from the minutes.
5 Grant Applications
5.1 Macclesfield Boys Boxing Club
Resolved: The grant application for £1500 was approved.
5.2 Macclesfield Cricket Club
Resolved: The grant application for £2000 was approved.
5.3 Cygnets
Resolved: The grant application for £2000 was approved.
5.4 Just Drop In
Resolved: The grant application for £1240 was approved.
5.5 Macclesfield Pride.
Resolved: The grant application for £1995 was approved.
5.6 ROAR
Resolved: The grant application of £1990 was approved.
5.7 Silk Heritage Trust
Resolved: The grant of £1950 was approved.
5.8 SPARKS
Resolved: The grant of £250 was approved.
6 Grant Updates
6.1 Grant Update Report
The report was received and noted.
7 Finances
7.1 Spend to Date
Resolved: The spend to date (end of May 22) of £110,252 was approved for recommendation to Full Council on 25th July 2022.
7.2 Reports
The following reports were noted:
- Receipts and Payments
- Bank Reconciliation
- Income and Expenditure
- Authorised Payments
8 Debit card
Resolved: The proposal was approved subject to the following:
- The maximum amount allowed to be spent on the debit cards is £200 per item.
- The Vice Chair and the Clerk will ensure the policy and procedure is sense checked before issuing.
9 Date/Time and Place of Next Meeting
The next meeting of the Finance Committee will be held at 7pm on 5th September 2022, at Macclesfield Town Hall.
Meeting closed: 8.46pm
Chair: Cllr Neil Puttick
Clerk: Laura Smith