Agenda item

Consideration was given to a report presented by Matt Gladstone, Director of Commissioning, Policy and Performance, and supplemented with a presentation which provided an analysis of the Council’s current performance against the twenty-nine key delivery outcomes contained within the Corporate Plan.  This was a year end and/or current position based on available performance measures together with an analysis of progress on key projects and activities which contributed to the delivery of the plan.

As a result of service reductions the Council’s ability to deliver all the corporate plan objectives was high risk.  The potential for under performance as a result of budget reductions highlighted the importance of integrating performance, risk and financial reporting.

All of the twenty-nine outcomes and associated high level measures would be reviewed during this reporting year to ensure that they remained meaningful and relevant, taking into consideration any new or changing outcomes dictated by external bodies.

The presentation drew further attention to:-

·              The Scorecard.

·              The Changes in Risk Rating.

·              The areas of good performance and areas for improvement and recovery actions within:-

à              Making sure no community is left behind.

à              Ensuring quality education, ensuring people have opportunities and improve skills, learn and get a job.

à              Ensuring care and protection are available to those people who need it most.

à              Helping create safe and healthy communities.

à              Improving the environment.

·              Political Influences.

The Select Commission welcomed this report, but raised a number of queries, particularly relating to:-

·              Outcome No. 1 (Fewer children are living in poverty) – relaunch of the Early Help Strategy, its current and future success, the escalation of an outcome that had been a “red” (not meeting targets) concern and the discrepancies around the criteria used/target setting in the information contained in the report (pages 10 and 26).

·              Involvement of schools in the targeting of support to vulnerable families.

·              Outcome No. 21 (More people are physically active and have a healthy way of life) - the apparent increases in obesity levels and the reasons for this, alongside the delivery of effective treatment to more people.   A detailed overview was required of the initiatives around active lifestyles and obesity.  It was recognised that the reduction in benefits as part of the Government’s welfare reforms and low wages, may mean that fresh, healthier food is less affordable to many families on low incomes

·              Outcomes 18 and 19 (People feel safe where they live and anti-social behaviour and crime is reduced) - whilst this was “green” this may be due to people to under-reporting.  This still needed to be closely monitored.

·              Format of Performance Clinics and their effectiveness.

·              The need for a full assessment of targets and standards and their importance.

·              Outcome No. 20 (People are able to live in decent affordable houses of their choice) - how this could be improved given that it only related to Council owned properties and whether this should be “amber” rather than “green”.

·              The impact on the environment and the reductions to services such as grass cutting and weed clearance and whether consideration should be given to “meadow” planting.

·              Costs associated with children living in poverty, particularly the Troubled Families Initiative, the criteria used and the make-up of the 700 families.

·              Local Strategic Partnership involvement and promotion of new initiatives to boost the local economy, worklessness and job creation and the contributions from outside agencies, such as Job Centre Plus.

·              Improvements in the targets associated with litter in Outcome 25 (Clean streets) and also in performance for Outcome 14 (Vulnerable people are protected from abuse).

·              Promotion of the good news within the targets and as a result of the service reductions the ability to deliver all the corporate plan objectives remained a high risk, especially with the possibility of welfare reform.

·              Councillors’ surgery reports and how these factor into the performance and service delivery.

The Select Commission within its discussion suggested, as a means to taking forward the concerns, that:-

·              That the relevant Cabinet Member and Strategic Director to be invited to a future meeting to discuss action to address child poverty

·              To keep under review the reasons for the increase in childhood obesity.

·              The need to keep a close eye on an emerging anti-social behaviour issues not being picked up routinely.

·              The need to ensure that Performance Clinics follow a consistent format.

·              The possibility of the Self Regulation Select Commission being involved in the overview of the twenty-nine corporate plan outcomes.

·              Availability and timescales of the performance scorecard on the Intranet.

Resolved:-  (1) That the Performance Team be thanked for their hard work in pulling together the report.

(2)  That the current position against each of the Corporate Plan outcomes, ensuring implementation of the proposed interventions and corrective actions, be noted.

(3)  That any performance issues be kept under close review to prevent amber outcomes becoming rated red.

(4)  That the inclusion of year end information and first quarter 2012/13 information be noted.

(5)  That the Self Regulation Select Commission keep under review child poverty, obesity and active lifestyles and the outcomes relating to worklessness and job creation,

(6) That a further report be provided to the Self Regulation Select Commission on the format of performance clinics.

(7)  That Information be shared with Members around the criteria used for the 700 families, their make-up and costs associated with the Initiative.

(8)  That consideration be given to including the Self Regulation Select Commission in the review of the corporate plan outcomes.