Agenda item

Report of the Divisional Director Partnership Development and Performance.

The Committee received a presentation from the Divisional Director of Partnership Development and Performance which detailed the Council’s approach to performance management.  During the course of the presentation, the Committee was informed of the following key points:

·                    the Council had seen sustained improvement in terms of performance.  In particular, Harrow had become a three star Council under the Comprehensive Area Assessment criteria and had previously been shortlisted for the Municipal Journal Best Achieving Council Award 2009 and the Local Government Chronicle Most Improved Council Award 2010;

·                    the Comprehensive Area Assessment had been abolished in June 2010, with the Audit Commission being disbanded and the roles of Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission likely to be reduced.  There was also a strong indication that the National Indicator Set would be significantly scaled back;

·                    the Place Survey and STATUS survey had been abolished and local authorities were being given discretion whether to continue gathering the data.  The future of Local Area Agreements remained uncertain;

·                    Challenge Panels between Portfolio Holders and Corporate Directors were used to review and approve the budget and delivery proposals for each directorate.  Once budgets and high level delivery expectations had been approved, a service delivery plan was drawn up which set out in more detail what would be delivered within the approved resources for the year;

·                    Improvement Boards were used to review and challenge performance on a quarterly basis to ensure that the Council was on track against its Corporate Plan commitments.  The Improvement Boards were attended by the Chief Executive, Corporate Directors and Portfolio Holders.  Performance was assessed across a range of areas including performance indicators, complaints, flagship actions, financial performance and workforce performance.  Any issues were reported to the Corporate Strategic Board;

·                    Cabinet received details of Council performance through the Strategic Performance Report.  In addition, the Performance and Finance Scrutiny Sub-Committee reviewed corporate scorecard performance on a regular basis;

·                    changes to the performance monitoring framework presented both challenges and opportunities.  Whilst the loss of a set of indicators with historic data would make it harder for local authorities to benchmark against each other, there was an opportunity to create more local indicators that reflected what was important to the local area.

Following questions, the Assistant Chief Executive and the Divisional Director of Partnership Development and Performance clarified the following points:

·                    it was acknowledged that there needed to be a balance between providing good customer service and spending money carefully;

·                    whilst data indicated that Harrow performed very well in comparison to other local authorities, the Borough remained one of the lowest spending Councils in London;

·                    targets were set on a yearly basis in consultation with Corporate Directors and Portfolio Holders.  Targets were always realistic and took into account the current economic environment;

·                    benchmark data was often only available many months after it had been obtained and, due to the rapid political and economic changes currently taking place, thorough analysis was required in order to make meaningful comparisons;

·                    if the National Indicator Set was reduced as expected, Councils would no longer have to collect certain data.  However, for some authorities, continuing to collect the data might be beneficial;

·                    with the abolishment of the Comprehensive Area Assessment and a move away from centrally imposed targets, some officer time would be freed up.  The exact amount of additional officer time available would vary from department to department and this would be reflected when directorates developed service plans and budgets.  However, the Council was not looking to scale back performance management.

A Member of the Committee stated that the loss of centrally imposed data requirements should be seen as positive and would allow local authorities to focus on issues relevant to the local area.  He added that there had previously been an over reliance on benchmarking.  The Member stated that moving forwards the Council should aim to involve more ward councillors in performance management, with all councillors provided with quarterly reports.  In addition, he suggested that Scrutiny Lead Members should become more involved in performance monitoring and that regular briefings should be provided.  Officers agreed that increasing the involvement of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee and the Performance and Finance Scrutiny Sub?Committee would be beneficial.

RESOLVED:  That the report be noted.