Agenda item

Report of the Divisional Director, Strategic Commissioning.

The Sub-Committee received a report of the Divisional Director, Strategic Commissioning, which set out the Council’s performance and work towards advancing equality of opportunity, and helped evaluate the equality of service provision.  It also considered whether that work was benefitting local communities in Harrow and looked at ways work had been undertaken to eliminate unlawful discrimination and promote good relations between the different communities in Harrow.

Following a brief overview of the report by an officer, Members made the following comments and asked the following questions and officers responded accordingly:

·                     How did the Council monitor whether work carried out as part of the plan was delivering benefits to the wider community – please give examples and evidence. 

·                     What action was being taken to improve the portion of BAME and disabled staff at a Senior level?  And what are the series of actions that CLG have taken to improve this?  Please give examples and evidence.

An officer advised that the Plan tried to bring together a number of different activities across the Council.  For example, 10 members of staff in Access Harrow had received training in the use of British Sign Language.  The DisabledGo website, which was aimed at disabled people, provided information, advice and listings of social events and premises.  The website had almost doubled the number of hits it received in 2017/18.  A number of other events, such as Holocaust Memorial day, were commemorated annually.

He added that officers on the Corporate Leadership Group (which consisted of the Chief Executive, Corporate Directors and Divisional Directors) acted as role models and championed initiatives such as Stonewall, Diversity etc.  The Council had also had discussions with CIPFA (Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accounting) regarding how to recruit staff from under-represented groups.

A Member asked what CEG, CRM and CLG and CCPH stood for.  He requested that in the future, all acronyms used in reports should be clearly explained.  This request was noted by officers.

An officer advised that CEG (Corporate Equalities Group), CRM (Customer Relation Management Software), CEG (Corporate Equalities Group), CCPH related to the SAP infrastructure which supported the MY Harrow account.

·                     What was the difference between the Corporate Priorities and the Corporate Vision?

The officer stated that  the Harrow Ambition Plan set out the overall direction of the Council, and as the Council was required to identify and work to achieve Equalities objectives under the 2010 Equalities Act, that these naturally sat underneath the Corporate Priorities.  However, he recognised that the way this was presented in the report could be made clearer and he undertook to clarify this point in future reports.

·                     Why had only 58% of staff undertaken the mandatory equalities training?

An officer advised that there was a rolling programme of training and staff were expected to complete the online training every 2 years.  Most staff based at the Depot did not have access to computers and would be offered classroom based training in the future.

·                     What reviews of policy had taken place and how effective had these been in increasing the number employees aged under 25?  What specific changes in that policy had been undertaken and actioned in the last 12 months? 

·                     Did the Council highlight career pathways in local government to younger applicants as part of its recruitment process?

An officer stated that recruiting younger staff was a challenge facing most local authorities.  Some professions such as social work and planning required a degree and other qualifications, which meant that not everyone was eligible to apply.  In some cases where staff had left or retired, their posts had been re-graded to a lower grade which had opened them up to younger applicants.  The Council was also looking to increase the number of internships, traineeships and apprenticeships that it offered.

·                     How long would it take to review and strengthen monitoring systems?  Had the policy team submitted a request to Sopra Steria to find out the costs?  If so how much were these costs; if not would such a request be submitted in the next 12 months? 

The monitoring of staff data was carried out through SAP and Sopra Steria were responsible for supporting any other IT packages which may need to be upgraded to support data collection as well as the actual software supplier.  However, it was not possible to compel users of My Harrow for instance to respond to diversity monitoring questionnaires and it was important to weigh up the cost and benefits of rolling this out.  It should be noted that a low response rate to the survey would provide an incomplete picture and additional investment would be needed to publicise the survey.

·                     Had work started in order to formalise good practice?

The CEG had undertaken this work, for example, the Council had signed up to the British Sign Language Charter; cross-council learning had been undertaken by the Children’s Disability Team; 10 staff in Access Harrow were trained BSL interpreters; best practice was shared with partners and other local authorities.  Staff from other authorities had visited Harrow to learn from it.  The principle of Social value had been included in the procurement process and the Council was making good progress in this area, albeit with minimal resources.

The Member stated that the Council’s commitment to fair trade, the minimum wage should be emphasised to existing contractors, and to new contractors at the pre-application stage.

·                     Why did Objective 3.1 still appear in the plan? 

An officer stated that this was an aspirational objective which had not yet been achieved and he would review whether this should be included in the future in the light of whether this was achievable.

RESOLVED:  That the report be noted.