Agenda and minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors C E H Marfleet, Mrs C A Talbot, R J Hunter-Clarke, Mr P Thompson (Church Representative) and Mr C V Miller and Mrs E Olivier-Townrow (Parent Governor representatives).

There were no declarations of interest declared at this point in the meeting.

RESOLVED

That the minutes of the meeting held on 28 January 2016 be signed by the Chairman as a correct record.

The Chairman of the Overview and Scrutiny Management Scrutiny Committee, Councillor P O'Connor advised the Committee that he had attended the February meeting of the Executive, at which the Leader had invited him to speak on the budget item, and take part in discussion thereon, as was the Chairman of the Highways and Transport Committee, Councillor M Brookes.  The Chairman believed that this meeting had been a promising start to better communication between Scrutiny and the Executive.

(To consider Call-Ins, should any be received)

The Committee was advised that no call-ins had been received.

(To consider proposals for Scrutiny Reviews, should any be received)

The Committee was advised that no proposals had been received for scrutiny reviews.  It was noted however, that the Value for Money Scrutiny Committee had indicated that one might be called for in the future with regard to the Council's property assets.

(To consider Councillor Call for Actions, should any be received)

The Committee was advised that no Councillor Call for Actions had been received.

(To receive a report from Tony Warnock (Operations and Financial Advice Manager), which invites the Committee to review, discuss and note the contents of the report, and consider any comments for the Executive prior to its meeting on the 1 March 2016)

Consideration was given to a report from Pete Moore, Executive Director of Finance and Public Protection, which provided the Committee with the last budget monitoring report for the financial year 2015/16.  The report would then be presented to the Executive for consideration at its meeting on 1 March 2016.  The report compared projected expenditure with the approved budget, and provided explanations for any significant over or under spending.

Tony Warnock, Operations and Financial Advice Manager, supported by Michelle Grady, Head of Finance – Communities, Steve Houchin, Head of Finance – Adult Care, Claire Machej, Head of Finance – Corporate; and Mark Popplewell, Head of Finance – Children's Services guided the Committee through the report and Appendix A presented, making particular reference to the following points; and responded to questions raised from the Committee:-

·         That the report presented was the second budget monitoring report for the year.  It was noted that due to issues with Agresso, normal quarterly reports being compiled in a different way.  It was noted further that the finance team were working alongside Serco colleagues to make sure that year-end figures were available;

·         That the Executive report detailed at Appendix A provided the actual income and expenditure for 10 months of the financial year, along with projections for spendings, and a comparison of the projections against approved budgets;

·         In summary the Committee was advised that the total revenue spending was predicted to be £7.738m less than the total budget, (which excluded the projected underspending on schools budgets).  The total revenue income was predicted to be £2.458m less than the total budget, as a result of reduction in funding. The general reserves were estimated to be 3.5% of the total budget based on current spending; and that the net capital spending was projected to be £22.883m less that the approved 2015/16 programme total;

·         Revenue Budget:- Particular mention was made to:-

Paragraph 1.5 Learn and Achieve £0.624m underspend.  It was noted that the majority of the underspend related to Home to School/College Transport as a result of a reduction in the number of entitled pupils which had allowed for contracts to be affected financially.  It was also highlighted that this was a difficult area to predict and that the level of underspend should be treated with some caution.

Paragraph 1.7 Children are Safe and Healthy – The Committee noted that there was a £0.128m overspend, as a result of an increase in the number of Looked After Children, some of whom had very complex needs;

Paragraph 1.13 – The Committee was advised that based on income collected as at the end of December for Debtor/Non Residential and Direct payments income was significantly higher than expected mainly due to Direct payment refunds through audits that had been carried out;

Paragraph 1.14 – That due to delays in the implementation of Mosaic the additional income derived from the review of the Contributions Policy would be delayed.  It was highlighted that for each quarter delay there was a predicted loss of  ...  view the full minutes text for item 67.

(To receive a report by Jasmine Sodhi (Performance and Equalities Manager), which invites the Committee to review, scrutinise and comment on Quarter 3 performance)

The Committee gave consideration to a report from Judith Hetherington Smith, Chief Information and Commissioning Officer, which provided Quarter Three performance data in the new style performance report against the Council Business Plan.

Jasmine Sodhi, the Performance and Equalities Manager presented the report to the Committee, making particular reference to the following:-

·         That following a report to Council on 18 December 2015, Quarter Three reporting against the Council Business Plan by exception would be presented to the Overview and Scrutiny Management Committee;

·         That the new style performance reporting used infographics that had been developed in consultation with members and had been introduced to scrutiny committees in Quarter One;

·         That it was intended that the new style of performance reporting was intended to be web based and could be viewed in a secure area on the Lincolnshire Research Observatory web.  Members were advised that a link to the relevant area would be emailed to all members of the Overview and Scrutiny Management Committee;

·         The Committee received a demonstration of the link available for members to access the data on the Lincolnshire Research Observatory website.   It was noted that the data would become publicly available in due course; and

·         That Overview and Scrutiny Management Committee would have an over view of performance; and would receive an exception report aligned to the Commissioning Strategies.  Details of commissioning strategies who had continued to perform well were detailed in Appendix A to the report presented.  Information relating to areas where targets had not been achieved in all three quarters and where performance had declined were shown in Appendix B to the report.

During discussion, the Committee raised the following issues:-

·         The Committee expressed support for the new performance data, advising that they had found the data to be more informative and easier to follow;

·         Clarification was sought as to whether on page 63 the 'Permanent admissions to residential and nursing care homes aged 65+ per 100,000 population' was weighted to the demographic of the area  or not.  The Committee was advised that it was per 100,000 people and was therefore not weighted;

·         Page 73 – Illicit alcohol and tobacco seized per operation.  A question was asked as to whether the target should be green, as more goods had been seized than had been targeted for.  It was agreed to look into this target.  A further comment raised was whether because of the information presented was there a need for more Trading Standards staff. Further comments raised were whether the target had been set correctly; and were the trading standards results reported to the police and licensing authority.  Officers agreed to look into the queries raised.  The Chairman agreed to take up issues regarding notification with the Chairman of Community and Public Safety Scrutiny Committee, Councillor Brewis.  A suggestion was also made for a presentation from Trading Standards concerning Alcohol and tobacco;

·         A request was made for a search field so that indicators could be found more easily.  Officers agreed to look into this request;

·         Page  ...  view the full minutes text for item 68.

(To consider a report by Nigel West (Head of Democratic Services and Statutory Scrutiny Officer), which invites the Committee to consider the content of its work programme and the work programmes of the Council's other scrutiny committees)

The Committee gave consideration to its own work programme as detailed at Appendix A, and the scrutiny committee work programmes for 2016 as shown at Appendix B.  During consideration of these programmes, the Committee received the following updates.

Overview and Scrutiny Management Committee

Nigel West, the Head of Democratic Services and Statutory Scrutiny Officer brought the Committee's attention to its work programme for 28 April 2016, at which the Committee would be reviewing the Review of Scrutiny Working Group – Closer working with the Executive.  Members noted that the first Scrutiny Review Working Group meeting was taking place later on in the day.

Adults Scrutiny Committee

Simon Evans, the Health Scrutiny Officer advised the Committee that the only change to the work programme for the Adults Scrutiny Committee, as shown on pages 90/91 and 92 of Appendix B was that the item on the Carers Commissioning Strategy and Services for Carers listed on page 91 for 29 June 2016 would now be brought forward to 25 May 2016.

Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee (CYPSC)

Councillor R Wootten, Vice-Chairman of CYPSC advised that further to the work programme for Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee (CYPSC) as detailed on pages 93/94 of Appendix B, that there was one further amendment to the work programme, which was that the report of the Lincolnshire Safeguarding Boards Scrutiny Sub-Group Update had been deferred from the 4 March to the 15 April 2016 meeting.

The Committee was also advised that at the next meeting of the CYPSC on the 4 March 2016, the Committee would be receiving the draft final report from the Grammar School Transport scrutiny review. 

The Committee also noted that there was to be a workshop for the CYPSC on Progress 8 and assessment developments in schools after the above said March meeting.

Community and Public Safety Scrutiny Committee

Councillor C Brewis, Chairman of the Community and Public Safety Scrutiny Committee, advised the Committee of the following changes to the Community and Public Safety Scrutiny Committee work programme, as detailed on pages 95/96 of Appendix B.

·         13 April 2016 – The Lincolnshire Association of Local Councils (LALC) item scheduled for April would now be likely to move to a later meeting date, once confirmation of a date had been received from Trisha Carter from LALC;

·         13 July 2016 – The Committee was considering an offsite visit for this meeting;

·         2 November 2016 – The Committee was advised that Tony McGinty, Consultant in Public Health had suggested the November meeting date as a possible option for a site visit and update with Greenwich Leisure Limited.

Other issues highlighted were:-

·         That a future Heritage Services pre-decision item was due to be considered at the 14 September 2016 meeting date;

·         That a policy on 'engaging with spontaneous volunteers' through the scrutiny process would be presented to the Committee in the coming months, as an outcome of the 'Barnes Wallis' exercise; and

·         That an item on the Local Welfare  ...  view the full minutes text for item 69.