Agenda and draft minutes

Apologies were received from Cllr Hudspeth.

None.

10.05

To approve the minutes of the Strategy & Partnerships meeting held on 10th January and 17th January.

Minutes from 10^th and 17^th January were agreed.

Cllr Turner asked what follow up there had been on Cllr Newton and Cllr Brighouse’s requests for further information on the Customer Service Centre raised at the last meeting.

Huw Jones explained the volume of calls that the centre now handles and welcomed Members to visit the centre if they wished.

ACTION – JL to follow up action with Mark Peet.

None.

10.10

Huw Jones Director of Environment & Economy will update the committee on issues from the Directorate relevant to their remit.

Huw Jones (Director - Environment & Economy) updated the committee on issues relevant to its remit:

• He highlighted that work is continuing to improve the services offered via the Customer Service Centre; this includes videos to help customers complete online forms.
• The Strategic Corporate Asset Management Strategy has been approved. It focuses on how to maximise the return from our assets and create a more integrated approach to property use in the future.
• Beef has been withdrawn as a precaution from all catering provided through the Property and Facilities Contract. Huw explained that as much food as possible was sourced locally and requirements around this were set out clearly in the contract with Carillion.

10.25

Councillor Hudspeth will present the latest financial monitoring overview report for the County Council.

Lorna Baxter (Deputy Chief Finance Officer) presented the report as Cllr Hudspeth had been called to London.

The committee queried why there were a number of underspends highlighted in the report, including in relation to pooled budgets. Lorna explained that the underspend was similar to this time last year and reflected the phasing of savings set out in the business strategy with some being achieved earlier than planned. Variations may seem significant but they are in relation to very large budgets (for example adult social care) therefore are very small proportionately.

Cllr Brighouse suggested that it would be helpful to present the risks of a budget not being spent alongside the financial information so that the variations and underspends could be better understood.

Cllr Newton asked if it is likely that there will be more pooled budgets, and therefore more potential for underspend, as partnership working increases in future?

Lorna explained that in future pooled budgets are likely to managed in a more joint way, and work will be done to determine how to share and assign risk in this context.

The Committee noted the report.

10.40

Alexandra Bailey (Research and Major Programmes Manager) will present the report which headlines the progress the Council has made toward the Corporate Plan priorities for the period between October to December 2012.

This report, together with any comments to note by the committee, will be presented to Cabinet on 19^th March.

Claire Phillips (Senior Policy and Performance Officer) and Alexandra Bailey (Research and Major Programmes Managers) presented the report and highlighted that this was the committee’s opportunity to feed in comments prior to Cabinet in March.

Members queried performance in relation to a number of targets highlighted as amber. There was discussion around the tracking of NEETs (young people not in employment, education or training) as the information suggested the Council seemed uncertain about precise numbers. Claire and Huw explained that there is a cyclical nature to the data as information feeds through about the courses young people have enrolled on. Tracking outcomes for NEETs is something that officers are keen to improve.

Cllr Newton asked how performance on the 365 Alive campaign was calculated.

Alexandra Bailey AGREED to share the methodology with Cllr Newton outside the meeting.

Cllr Sanders suggested that Oxfordshire’s performance on road safety appeared to be falling behind other authorities.

Huw Jones explained that Oxfordshire has very good performance however the rate of decline in the number of incidents has slowed down. Actions are now focused on more difficult to impact issues such as behaviour change.

Alexandra Bailey AGREED to go through the figures in more depth with Cllr Sanders.

11.00

Peter Clark (County Solicitor) and Alexandra Bailey (Research and Major Programmes Manager) will present further detail on the proposals for changes to the council’s governance arrangements.

The Committee is asked to comment and endorse the proposals prior to Cabinet and Council.

Peter Clark (Head of Law & Culture) presented a short report with further detail on the proposals for future governance arrangements as discussed by the committee at its January meeting.

Cllr Lindsay-Gale explained the issues that had been raised by the Conservative Group in their consideration of the proposals. These focused on being clear about the independence and standing nature of scrutiny committees and their Chairmen and greater flexibility about the numbers to be involved and the number of cabinet advisory groups operating through the year.

Cllr Sanders queried the proposal that Portfolio holders act as Chairmen of the Cabinet Advisory Groups.

Cllr Brighouse spoke in support of this proposal as the buy in of the Cabinet member is key to enable the advisory group to really influence policy development. Cllr Turner also expressed support for this arrangement and stated his desire to see the opposition involved as Chairmen of the scrutiny committees.

Some concerns were raised about the future scrutiny of adult and community services. Peter Clark explained that in future there will be a focus on issues that require further in depth investigation due to performance concerns, via the Performance Scrutiny Committee rather than trying to look at everything. If there is a specific policy matter Cabinet will consider the need for a Cabinet Advisory Group.

There was discussion about the proposed localities Alexandra Bailey highlighted that localities have been revised with an aim to keep the number of members similar in each area and be broadly coterminous with division boundaries. Locality meetings will be a key feature of the future governance arrangements and an opportunity for members to receive information on service developments in a more meaningful way related to their local area.

Following discussion a number of amendments to the proposals and areas to be investigated further were agreed ahead of the paper being taken to Cabinet:

-       More clearly state the independence of Scrutiny; the fact that committees will be standing committees able to appoint their Chairman (based on the principle of best person for the job) and will be able to commission their own sub-groups should they wish.

-       The relationship between the School Organisation Stakeholder Group and the Education Scrutiny Committee to be investigated further to ensure clarity of roles.

-       Constitution to include flexibility around the number of members to be involved in each Cabinet Advisory Group, 7 is an indicative number, but groups could involve more or less according to the issue.

-       More clearly outline that no more than 5 Cabinet Advisory Groups at any one time is the proposal, rather than 5 in a given year.

-       There will be a presumption that Cabinet Advisory Groups will meet in public with flexibility for meetings to be occasionally held in private according to the issues under discussion.

It was agreed that Peter Clark and Alexandra Bailey would re-draft the paper on this basis.

11.25

The Committee will receive presentation, from Alexandra Bailey, explaining the purpose and approach to the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA) in Oxfordshire. This follows the committee’s interest in the JSNA at its October meeting. The item is an opportunity to explore how the JSNA will provide an evidence base of need and outcome that could be used to challenge partnerships in future.

Alexandra Bailey explained the purpose of the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA). It is a broad partnership document not just health and social care related, however its findings will be used to help refine the Health and Wellbeing Strategy. Alexandra highlighted that by working in partnership new areas of data have been discovered or data gaps, for example around the opportunity for the health sector to strengthen the data on veterans in the county.

Members highlighted that data sharing through locality meetings would be helpful.

Members were alerted to changes that have been made to the Data Observatory and the way in which the JSNA feeds into it.

The Chairman referred members to the Military Champion update from Cllr Mitchell which had been circulated to members. This Military Champion update was endorsed by the committee.

The Committee thanked Alexandra for the update on the JSNA.

11.45

Martin Tugwell (Deputy Director Strategy & Infrastructure Planning) will present an update on the Strategic Corporate Asset Management Plan as discussed at Cabinet on 29^th January.

Martin Tugwell highlighted key aspects of the SCAMP which formed part of the budget papers presented to Cabinet in January. There is renewed emphasis on working collaboratively a new Collaborative Asset Management Group met for the first time this month.

Reducing energy costs and making the best use of our assets are key priorities. Looking for opportunities at a locality level is also a priority and conversations are on-going with a number of district councils.

Cllr Sanders asked if the council was taking a short term approach and could potentially need to buy new assets in the future. Martin explained that each case is individual and the council looks to use assets as a catalyst for other development and regeneration where possible.

Cllr Newton asked for more information on the spread of council properties across the main property types set out on page 62 of the committee papers.

Martin Tugwell AGREED to provide more information and circulate to the committee.

Cllr Lindsay-Gale thanked the committee for their work over the last year and explained that if the proposed governance changes are approved this would be its last meeting.