Agenda item

To receive a report from the Corporate Director Community Health and Wellbeing.

The Sub-Committee received a report of the Corporate Director of Community Health and Well-Being, which set out information on the monitoring of projects or services awarded grant funding in 2014-15 and provided a summary of information provided byorganisations on the delivery of their services as part of the mid-year monitoring process.

The Chair welcomed the Portfolio Holder for Community, Culture and Resident Engagement to the meeting.

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

·                    Some of the outcomes set out in the Monitoring forms were not sufficiently detailed.  It was not clear how the grants would be used to achieve the outcomes set out or how these would be measured by the organisation in question or by the Council.  Why had this information not been more clearly defined and specified in the report?

An officer advised that a maximum of £5k was available per organization and most organisations received less than the maximum amount.  There was less specificity required for the small grants.  Some organisations had provided detailed outcomes for grant funded projects and set out who the proposed beneficiaries would be.  This information would be validated by officer validation visits to the organisations in question.

She added that the report had written before any of the validation visits had been undertaken.  Historically, a more complete version of the report would have been reported to the Grants Advisory Panel in December.  She added that the outcome based grants report was also submitted to the relevant Portfolio holder and to Cabinet.  Furthermore, officers were able to hold back or even claw back grants in cases where the organisation was deemed to be under-performing.

·                    Was it possible to differentiate between those organisations that were in receipt of additional funding from other sources and those which were solely funded by Harrow?

An officer advised that organisations were asked to identify other additional funding streams for their projects.  She added that the appendices to the report contained only extracts from the monitoring forms and did not go into full detail.

·                    Why did the extracts not set out which protected groups would be targeted by the organisations?

An officer advised that this level of detail would have been specified on the original grant application forms submitted by groups.

·                    Some groups appeared to be operating in neighbouring boroughs.  Surely this was unfair on Harrow residents?

The Portfolio Holder advised that there was an expectation that grants awarded to groups in Harrow would be used to benefit Harrow residents.  However, some groups had members living in neighbouring boroughs.  An officer added that Community & Voluntary Sector (CVS) organisations did not operate within borough boundaries, however, officers would expect to see evidence of delivery of services to Harrow residents during their validation visits.  The officer added that, in hindsight, she realized that it would have been more useful if the report had included both the original grant application forms, the SLAs and the complete monitoring forms submitted by organisations.

A Member stated that it would have been useful if the report had provided more qualitative data, flagged up those organisations that were under-performing and highlighted areas of concern.  This would have facilitated Members’ scrutiny of the report.  An officer undertook to ensure that this level of detail was included in future such reports.

·                    How did the Council benefit from the services and activities provided by the CVS as a result of council grants?  Did the Council refer residents to some services, such as translation services, provided by some of the CVS groups?  Several organisations seemed to provide similar services and there appeared to be duplication of services in other areas.  Why didn’t organisations group together to provide some services jointly in order to avoid duplication?

·                    It would have been useful to know whether particular services were best provided by the CVS or the Council.  This information could have a bearing on the amount of grant allocated, particularly in cases where services proved to be more effectively and economically provided by the CVS.

An officer advised that many CVS groups provided discretionary services, such as translation services and other types of services which were currently not provided by the Council.   She added that officers were in discussion and for example, encouraging larger organisations to commission smaller organisations to deliver some services jointly.

·                    The Chair stated that, in his view, the Scrutiny Lead Members needed a better understanding of the overall grant application and monitoring process.  He asked how much officer time and resource was available for the grants process?

An officer advised that there were 1.5 officers assigned to this area of work, however, the monitoring exercise was carried out jointly with officers from other council Departments.  She added that she expected the monitoring visits to be completed by January 2015.

·                    Was there a mechanism to refer victims of domestic violence to those CVS groups which provided support in this area?

An officer advised that such referrals were made.  However, the Council did not currently fund such initiatives, which were funded through other funding streams and existing SLAs.

RESOLVED:  That the report be noted.