The Board will consider a report on any updates received from MHCLG in respect of the Plan for Neighbourhoods including:-

-    Governance submission (and approval/feedback if received); and

-    Datapack & insights – including Zencity data.

Further to the decisions of the Board at its last meeting (Minute 59 of 20 March 2025 refers), the Board was advised that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) had been advised of those decisions:

“It was AGREED:

(1)   To note the overview of the new Plan for Neighbourhoods provided to the Board (which itself highlighted the changes that had been made from the position as it applied to the previous Long Term Plan for Towns programme);

(2)   to approve the full retention of the Board’s membership and governance structure to serve as the new Board under the Plan for Neighbourhoods programme, noting that Health and Education were already represented on the Board;

(3)   to amend the Clacton-on-Sea ‘Plan for Neighbourhoods’ area/boundary to include the mixed use development areas identified in the Local Plan to 2033 of Hartley Gardens, Rouses Farm and Cooks Green Farm (north of the Clacton Shopping Village); and

(4)   to authorise the District Council’s Deputy Chief Executive to submit the above decisions to the Government’s MHCLG by the deadline for confirmation of these matters of 22 April 2025.”   

MHCLG had also been advised of the Board’s adopted terms of reference and code of conduct policy and the authorised use of capacity funding to date and plans for additional spending going forward.

The Board was advised that, following the above submission, MHCLG had raised a question around the proposed revised boundary which was being taken as solely a mapping issue.  A revised map had been submitted to MHCLG with the assistance of Tendring District Council’s Planning Directorate. Once validation of the Board’s arrangements was completed by MHCLG the associated additional £200k capacity funding would be provided.

It was AGREED to note the position in respect of the submission of arrangements for the Board to MHCLG.

The Board was further advised that we were awaiting the “Clacton-on-Sea - local data profile” from MHCLG which would provide indicators for policy investment themes and neighbourhood demographics and deprivation information from a range of data sources collated together specifically for each of the Plan for Neighbourhood place.

The Board was also advised that MHCLG had commissioned a targeted survey through ZenCity to deliver statistically representative insights from the population of each Plan for Neighbourhoods place. This survey was live at the time of the Board’s meeting, and the question set was included in the report to the Board. This ZenCity survey was provided at no additional cost to Boards and was intended to supplement

community engagement data secured locally.

In the discussion of this item, the potential benefit of repeating the ZenCity survey at points during the delivery of the Regeneration Plan was identified to assess perceived improvements.  This would be raised MHCLG as to its plans.  On the same theme, there appeared to be some overlap between the ZenCity question set and previous survey work from a number of years ago around national indicators and, if this data was still accessible, it could provide for a comparison over time to this point.  Greg Myddleton undertook to look at this matter.

The limited number of questions in the ZenCity survey around health access locally was seen as disappointing.

It was AGREED that the “Clacton-on-Sea - local data profile” from MHCLG would be reported to Board Members once received formally together with the findings from the targeted survey MHCLG had commissioned through ZenCity.