Agenda and draft minutes

To consider the minutes of the previous meeting of the Staffing Committee held on 19 May 2025 and approve them as a true and correct record of the proceedings and to be signed by the Chair.

Resolved:-  That the minutes of the meeting held on 19 May 2025 be approved as a true and correct record of the proceedings.

To receive declarations of interest from Members in respect of items listed on the agenda.

There were no declarations of interest to report.

To consider whether the press and public should be excluded from the meeting during consideration of any part of the agenda.

The Chair advised that there were no items of business on the agenda that would require the exclusion of the press and public from the meeting.

To consider the report from the Chief Executive.

Consideration was given to the report which set out the proposals to appoint to the post of Director of Policy, Strategy and Engagement and other associated changes. The Assistant Chief Executive resigned from their post on 31st July, 2025. Since this date responsibilities of the post had been covered by the Strategic Director of Finance and Customer Services and temporary line management arrangements had been put in place through the Assistant Director of Legal Services and the Assistant Director of Human Resources.

The Assistant Chief Executive role covered the functions of Policy, Performance and Intelligence, Democratic Services, Neighbourhoods, Marketing and Communications, Organisational Development and Change, and Human Resources. The resignation of the Assistant Chief Executive provided the opportunity for the incumbent Chief Executive to take some time to review the effective operation of the Assistant Chief Executive’s Directorate in accordance with the new Council Plan, ensuring structures were designed to deliver outcomes for residents and deliver against the new Council Plan.

Postholders within the Assistant Chief Executive’s Directorate, alongside Strategic Directors, had been engaged in this process. Following this review, the Chief Executive had determined that significant strategic capacity was required to support Policy and Strategy and had re-designated the title of the Assistant Chief Executive role to reflect this. This had resulted in the request to retitle the Assistant Chief Executive role to Director of Policy, Strategy and Engagement. The role continued to report directly to the Chief Executive post and formed part of the Council’s Strategic Leadership Team.

The functions of Human Resources and Organisational Development would transfer under the leadership of the Strategic Director Finance and Customer Services (with the Head of Organisational Development reporting to the Assistant Director of Human Resources and their title expanded to reflect this) to create a cohesive Corporate Services function. On this basis it was proposed to retitle the Strategic Director, Finance and Customer Services, to Executive Director of Corporate Services, and for this role to continue to have formal deputy responsibilities for the Chief Executive in accordance with the terms of the Constitution.

As part of the opportunity to modernise the Council’s infrastructure and to support recruitment and retention of staff, in accordance with the Council’s ambitions as an employer of choice, it was proposed that all Assistant Directors be renamed ‘Service Director’ and Strategic Directors be renamed ‘Executive Director’. The exception to this was that the Director of Public Health would retain their existing title to reflect the national recognition for this title, and the new post reflected in this document (to demonstrate its direct alignment to the Chief Executive) will be titled ‘Director of’.

As per the Officer Employment Procedure Rules and Code of Conduct, Staffing Committee were asked to agree plans to immediately begin the selection process for the Director of Policy, Strategy and Engagement and refer the matter to the Senior Officer Appointments Panel. The salary for the post remained unchanged.

During the meeting the Chief Executive placed on record his thanks to Judith Badger, Strategic  ...  view the full minutes text for item 31.

To determine any item which the Chair is of the opinion should be considered as a matter of urgency.

The Chair reported that there were no urgent items of business requiring the Committee’s consideration.