Agenda and minutes

To note the attendance at this meeting of any duly appointed Reserve Members.

Reserve Members may attend meetings:-

(i)                 to take the place of an ordinary Member for whom they are a reserve;

(ii)               where the ordinary Member will be absent for the whole of the meeting; and

(iii)             the meeting notes at the start of the meeting at the item ‘Reserves’ that the Reserve Member is or will be attending as a reserve;

(iv)              if a Reserve Member whose intention to attend has been noted arrives after the commencement of the meeting, then that Reserve Member can only act as a Member from the start of the next item of business on the agenda after his/her arrival.

RESOLVED:  To note that there were no Reserve Members in attendance at this meeting.

To receive declarations of personal or prejudicial interests, arising from business to be transacted at this meeting, from:

(a)               all Members of the Forum;

(b)               all other Members present in any part of the room.

RESOLVED:  To note that the following interests were declared:

Agenda Item 7 – Draft Revenue Budget 2012/13 – 2014/15; Agenda Item 8 – Information Report – Employment Procedures Monitoring; Agenda Item 9 – Employees’ Side Report on a DTL Collective Dispute; Agenda Item 10 – Management’s Response to Employees’ Side Report on a DTL Collective Dispute; Agenda Item 11 – Information Report – Half Yearly Health and Safety Report; Agenda Item 12 – Employees’ Side Report on Health and Safety Policy and Procedures and Ongoing Health and Safety Issues; Agenda Item 13 – Information Report – Management’s Response to Employees’ Side Report on Health and Safety Policy and Procedures and Ongoing Health and Safety Issues; Agenda Item 14 – Information Report – Follow-Up Actions.

Councillor Bob Currie declared a personal interest in that he was a retired Unison member and his son worked for the Council.  He would remain in the room whilst the matters were considered and voted upon.

Councillor Graham Henson declared a personal interest in that he was a member of the Communication Workers Union and he had a relative employed by the Council. He would remain in the room whilst the matters were considered and voted upon.

Agenda Item 11 – Information Report – Half Yearly Health and Safety Report 2011/12

Councillor Paul Osborn declared a personal interest in that he was a governor at Norbury School.  He would remain in the room whilst the matter was considered and voted upon.

That the minutes of the meeting held on 10 October 2011 be taken as read and signed as a correct record.

RESOLVED: That the minutes of the meeting held on 10 October 2011 be taken as read and signed as a correct record.

To receive petitions (if any) submitted by members of the public/Councillors under the provisions of Executive Procedure Rule 49 (Part 4D of the Constitution).

RESOLVED:  To note the receipt of the following petition which was referred to the relevant officer for consideration:

(1)               Petition Relating to Waste Services

Petition containing 69 signatures expressing concerns relating to the Dignity at Work Procedure within Waste Services.

To receive deputations (if any) under the provisions of Executive Procedure Rule 50 (Part 4D of the Constitution).

RESOLVED:  To note that no deputations were received at this meeting.

The Chair advised that a public question had been submitted but had been ruled out as it related to staffing matters, contrary to the provisions contained within the Constitution.  However as a sign of goodwill, the Chair had asked officers to respond directly to the questioner on their query.

RESOLVED:  To note that no public questions were received at this meeting

The Report presented to the Cabinet meeting on 15 December 2012 is enclosed. The Interim Director Finance will be conducting a presentation to the Forum based on this report.

The Interim Director Finance introduced a presentation to the Forum and stated that detailed consultation on the proposed budgets for each directorate had also taken place through the relevant departmental joint committees. 

The Interim Director highlighted a number of issues which included the following:

·                     this was currently one of the most difficult financial environments local government had ever faced and the Council were experiencing financial pressures as a result;

·                     tough decisions were required for the future.  However the Council had an excellent track record of transforming itself and minimising the impact on frontline services.  This was a key priority for the Council’s administration;

·                     the Council had responded to the national economic difficulties since 2007 by achieving £45 million in savings up until 2010.  Additionally the Council had also embarked upon phase 1 of the Better Deal for Residents (Transformation) Programme and agreed the objectives and principles for phase 2;

·                     some significant projects had already been completed as part of Phase 1 of the Transformation Programme and some were ongoing.  As part of Phase 2 of the Transformation Programme, the overall objective was to develop principles to understand what the Council would look like in 3 years time with 20-30% less resource.  It was important that any changes made to the Council made a difference to residents and recognised differences across service areas.  Building and developing quality relationships and engagement was also key to ensuring successful change;

·                     the Council were required to save £60 million over the 4 years of the Comprehensive Spending Review period.  The Transformation Programme had identified £30 million of these savings required.  The remaining gap at the start of this year’s budget setting process was £6.7 million for 2012/13 and a total of £31.2 million over the 3 years of the Medium Term Financial Strategy.  Since then the Government in their Autumn Statement had announced that there was likely to be a further 2 years of cuts which was likely to require £10 million per year of further savings to achieve in 2015/16;

·                     in the current year, £14.7 million of savings had been built into the budget.  Several risks had been identified when the budget was set, which were now coming to fruition.  These included the changing demography having a higher impact than anticipated.  A £1.6 million overspend had been forecast at the end of Quarter 2.  However at the end of Quarter 3, the forecast was that the Council were back on track.  Whilst there were still some risks being experienced, these were being successfully managed;

·                     a £1.4 million minimum underspend was being targeted for 2011/12 to fund potential severance costs relating to the 2012/13 budget proposals;

·                     £17 million of savings had been identified to date for the 2012/13 budget and Medium Term Financial Strategy.  However there were £5.4 million of new pressures in addition to the £6.4 million previously identified;

·                     the funding settlement had been better than expected for 2012/13 and combined with a number of other changes, the funding gap for 2012/13 was now  ...  view the full minutes text for item 74.

Report of the Divisional Director Human Resources & Development and Shared Services.

The Divisional Director Human Resources & Development and Shared Services introduced the report and explained that the report had been requested at the previous meeting of the Forum.  The key message arising from the report, which he acknowledged, was that there was room for improvement in terms of meeting timescales in employment procedures.  There were a variety of reasons for the delays encountered and the Divisional Director reported that the Trade Unions would be consulted on potential changes to procedures to improve performance.  It was expected that a further report on this subject would be presented to the next meeting of the Forum.

RESOLVED:  That the report be noted.

Report from Employees’ Side.

The Forum received a report from Unison expressing details of a collective dispute from Driver Team Leaders (DTL).  A representative of Unison set out the details of the issue as contained in the report and made the following points:

·                     in their view, DTL in the Waste Service section had not received any form of training over the last couple of years.  It was their view that documents in the report demonstrated that within the Public Realm Service Area, training had not been provided within Waste Services.  In their view this contradicted the Equal Opportunity Policy of the Council in committing to the personal development of every employee;

·                     in their view, Cabinet had agreed to reduce a tier of management within the Public Realm Organisational Structure.  As part of this 10 Assistant Manager posts had been identified for deletion.  However the original structure had contained 12 Assistant Manager posts.  Therefore there should still be 2 Assistant Manager posts within the new proposed structure;

·                     in their view, within the proposed structure 3 Team Leader positions had been created.  This had the impact of the existing DTL now having to report to other Team Leaders.  In their view there had been no consultation on this and amounted to a demotion.  The reason that they had been provided for this, relating to the pay scale of the relative positions, was not accepted;

·                     in their view a new Service Manager position had been created, whose reporting line was not affected and with no consultation with the DTL.  In their view everyone should have been treated equally;

·                     in their view, management had failed to follow proper procedures.  New DTLs who had been afforded training to acquire the relevant qualifications had been appointed and escalated to the top spinal point after a period of six months.  In their view this was unfair to incumbent employees.  In their view this had resulted in the service encountering financial losses and they disagreed with the explanation given that this was a local agreement;

·                     in their view, a full independent investigation had to be conducted into the dispute.  Many of the employees affected by the dispute were local residents and Members of the Forum had a responsibility towards them.  The DTLs should also be re-instated to their original relative positions within the proposed structure.

During the discussion on this item, representatives from Unison responded to questions from Members of the Forum as follows:

·                     in redundancy arrangements, relevant legal provisions had to be followed strictly.  The employer had to define the staff who were at risk of redundancy.  In their view this had not taken place in relation to the 2 Assistant Managers who had been given redundancy notices.  They believed that the notices had been revoked when this issue became apparent;

·                     in their view, Cabinet, when agreeing to the Public Realm Transformation programme, had only agreed to 10 reductions in terms of Assistant Manager posts.  As there had been 12 in the original structure, this meant that if the 2  ...  view the full minutes text for item 76.

Report of the Assistant Chief Executive.

The Forum received a report summarising the Council’s Health and Safety performance for the half year 1 April 2011 to 30 September 2011 providing an update of activities and giving information on outcome measures – training, audits and accidents.

The Divisional Director Risk, Audit and Fraud reported that generally the report was positive and assistance from the Trade Unions had contributed towards healthy partnership arrangements.

The officer reported on the following issues:

·                     there was a continued implementation of the two year improvement plan based on the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) Model.  This plan had additionally addressed the issues raised by the HSE in relation to asbestos and it had been satisfied with the progress made;

·                     there was continued roll-out of the Health and Safety e-self audit tool across the Council;

·                     the Health and Safety service was currently undergoing a re-structure to build a new in-house team;

·                     there was continuing development of Health and Safety policies and codes of practice to meet identified needs;

·                     one slight concern was the take up of health and safety courses across the Council.  There was also some concern at the performance of the Occupational Health Service.  This was an issue that had been raised with the provider.  The contract was up for renewal in September 2012 and the Council were currently working on a procurement exercise.

During the discussion on this item, Members of the Forum raised a number of issues, which were responded to by the officer as follows:

·                     there was currently one permanent member of staff and 3 agency staff within the Health and Safety team.  The proposed recruitment process would involve appointing 5 permanent Members of staff.  The manager’s role had been advertised first before appointing the more junior staff.  The entire process was currently on pause as there was a dispute to resolve.  The officer would advise the Forum whether agency staff were able to apply for these positions;

·                     the improvement notices served by the HSE had been provided to the Forum at previous meetings and was available for Councillors to view if they wished;

·                     an independent review had been commissioned as a result of the improvement notices to see if any improvements could be made;

·                     the 2 year Improvement Plan had been a direct response in relation to the improvement notices served and the independent review commissioned;

·                     the Corporate Director Community and Environment had led an officer group delivering a comprehensive work programme to improve health and safety management and risk management.  The group had its last meeting in December 2011;

·                     the outcome of the independent review had been discussed at a number of Committees previously;

·                     officers were confident that there were published documents which expressed the HSE’s satisfaction with the progress that the Council had made.  Trade Unions had been part of the interview process with the HSE when the improvement notices had been served;

·                     in relation to past asbestos issues, the relevant Portfolio Holder was provided with a number of updates to ensure that officers reported this  ...  view the full minutes text for item 77.

Report from Employees’ Side.

The representative from Unison explained that the management response to the report had provided detailed responses.  As a result he would meet with the relevant officers to try and resolve the issues reported.

RESOLVED: That the report be noted.

Joint Report of the Divisional Director Human Resources & Development and Shared Services and the Director of Legal and Governance Services.

The Divisional Director Human Resources & Development and Shared Services explained that there was one minor amendment to make to the follow-up action sheet reported.  At the time of writing the report it was anticipated at information relating to the Springboard Courses would be circulated prior to the meeting.  This had not yet taken place but would be done in the next couple of weeks.

RESOLVED: That the report be noted.