Agenda item

Report to follow.

The Corporate Performance report will be delivered as a supplementary to ensure a up to date set of figures is included for Q2.

The Director for Strategy, Delivery and Performance, L Wade, introduced the report on corporate performance management. This was representative of the programmes of change and the amount of work being delivered across the Council. The initial overview report would have been delivered at the beginning of the financial year, however with officer’s focus on the Covid recovery response this had to be delayed.

The first part of the report related to the internal governance review and structure, aligning to the Stronger Select Committees. An internal officer governance structure had been established to focus on the delivery of the Corporate programmes aligned to the Stronger ambition objectives. Programmes would be led by a director enabling Corporate Performance management to be aligned with individual performance management.

The next part of the report was on corporate performance management, setting out the scope of the work and the scope of each of the programmes across the council. Officers had been working with the programme delivery leads to establish clear project briefs for each programme of work along with a roadmap and clear set of milestones to allow the measurement of delivery and progress. L Wade asked the committee if they would like to see the progress of all the programmes or just the exceptions.

Councillor Rackham said that she would like to see all progress not just the ones highlighted; it was important that the Committee scrutinised properly. Councillor Neville agreed with her. 

Councillor Bassett noted that there was a lot going on and with the changes with Covid and the impact that it would have. Was this timetable going to be drastically affected or were these dates reasonably firm. Members needed to look at everything, as they just did not know what was happening and that things were changing rapidly.

The Chairman agreed that it was important to have these reports for members to scrutinise.

L Wade drew the meeting’s attention to the three exceptions. The first was the Telecare project, which was now delayed due to Essex County Council withdrawing their initial tender process.

The next was the ICT restructure, this was delayed following the impact of Covid and the recruitment of an interim service manager. However, three team managers have now been appointed.

Thirdly, the impact on the Local Plan, due to the review of the Main Modification delayed document submission and as a result of the inspector’s capacity to review the report.

Councillor Neville asked about the Cyber Security review, would we be able to withstand an attack on our systems as Hackney Council had just undergone. The Director for Corporate Services replied that cyber security was kept under constant review; our systems were robust while letting our staff freedom to attend various virtual meetings and training sessions etc. She could not remember an incident where our systems had been breached.

Councillor Neville then asked about the Climate Change programme and how could members give their views on the climate change programme before it went to the Cabinet. He was told that officers would advise members on how this would happen. (Post meeting update: N Dawe would reach out directly regarding this).

Councillor Neville asked if there were any plans to bring any sustainable transport to the south of the district although it was quite well served by public transport already. He was told that his query would be put to the officers concerned.

Councillor Jon Whitehouse asked about the people programme items and asked how the recruitment of staff was going, what were the outcomes on reducing the vacancy rate and about reducing the use of agency staff. The Corporate Services Director replied that they could look at some KPI measures to include that sort of information.

Councillor Bassett noted that Essex CC had withdrawn from Telecare, did we know why; and what would be the cost implications of this as we were in the process of winding it down. He was told that the withdrawal was partly due to Covid and the results of that; officers would be asked for specific details to be put into the minutes. As for the cost implications the resources were still in place and being currently assessed. Part of the outcome was that a report would be going to Cabinet in January.

Councillor Bassett noted that the progress boxes in the sections for Members, Partnership working and Digital payments were blank, why was this? He was told that these related to later milestones and so any progress would not have happened as yet.

Councillor Bassett noted that under the customer excellence programme it said that Customer Survey completed and presented; where were they presented? He was told that an update was presented as a summary at the July Overview and Scrutiny Committee. The actions to be taken to address survey were already included in the Customer Strategy. If further detailed information was required, this could be obtained from Susan Lewis.

Councillor Bassett remarked that under the digital solutions to improve processes in the planning department – the timescales seemed a bit short to carry this through.  He was told that officers were trying to be ambitious with this looking at the minimum viable product in terms of how we actually implement this as part of a minimum first phase and were also looking for ‘out-of-the-box’ solutions.

 Councillor Bassett then asked what the first project of the newly appointed Climate change officer would be.  He was told that this would come out of the action plan that was presently being discussed.

Councillor Dorrell remarked on the digital solutions and shared councillor’s Bassett’s concerns over the time scales which was part of a long process. He noted that we were down to 2 suppliers and one was over budget; were they a long way over budget, as the Council was trying to avoid a situation where we only had one tender. L Wade said that we currently had two vendors who looked to meet our requirements. We were looking at professional service costs and also looking at how much we could do in-house. Councillor Dorrell asked if one of the two came in at way over budget, were we then down to just one again? He was told that it depends what they were offering, and it come down to either a cost solution or a strategic solution, as part of the evaluation process.

Councillor Rackham expressed concerns about Covid and how it would impact on us if we had another lockdown and how it would affect our corporate plans. A Small replied that our plans were as stated, but could be affected by events, and we would have to adapt accordingly. If we moved into tier two, then most plans would be unaffected. Most work was currently being delivered by staff working from home. The problem was face to face interactions. We will report back to this committee on any problems encountered.

Councillor Murray said that he agreed with Mr Small. He asked about the telecare offering and were we happy that we would able to carry on offering the telecare services until we got a new operator. He was told that was the case, we shall carry on for now and a report on costs and an assessment would be part of a report going to Cabinet. A fuller answer will be put in the minutes. (Post meeting update: confirmation that the TELECARE offering would in no way be impacted during the interim and a full report will be seen at Cabinet regarding costs).

Councillor Bedford commented that it was important that we kept our standards up for the telecare service and got assurances that this system was secure for us.  He went on to comment about the Local Plan and the Main Modifications, they have now been submitted to the inspector but there was a problem with the inspector having sufficient time to deal with them. But we trying to push it through. Finally, he asked for caution when discussing the digital planning solutions as this maybe currently ‘commercial in confidence’. But just to say that whatever system we will go for would be state of the art as our current system was about 25 years old.

L Wade then asked if there were any questions on the KPIs presented in the report. She indicated most had been directly impacted by Covid, she had also suggested some KPIs for 20/21 for future reference.

Councillor Jon Whitehouse asked about the proposed Diversity and Inclusion KPI, what would that consist off. He was told that currently officers were in discussions to recognise that we did need a KPI around diversity and Inclusion.

Councillor Bedford asked what the increase in household waste during Covid was. He was told that the figures indicated our targets from last year, and it did show an increase. Asked about the cost implications for the increase officers were unsure but said that they would find out and report back.

Councillor Bedford then asked about Leisure Management KPIs, we should get some feedback from the leisure management about how Covid has affected their business and how we could support them going forward. Officers had seen a pick-up in figures recently but now it has been going down as winter was coming and a second lock down was on the cards.

RESOLVED:

1.            The Committee noted the contents of the report and the scope of the corporate programme of work and associated benefits.

2.            The Committee agreed that all programmes and projects be report back to them and not just exceptional outcomes.

3.            The Committee noted the Q1 and Q2 performance of the KPI and agreed the recommended KPIs for 20/21 performance.