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ITEM SP3

  OXFORDSHIRE SUPPORTING PEOPLE COMMISSIONING BODY

MINUTES of the meeting held on 22 September 2006 commencing at 10.30 am and finishing at 12:55 pm.

Present:

Voting Members of Commissioning Body:

Supporting Officers and Members:

24/06. APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE AND SUBSTITUTIONS (IF APPLICABLE)

An apology for absence was received from Val Johnson (Lisa Watson attended as a voting substitute).

25/06. DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

There were no declarations of interest.

26/06. MINUTES

The Minutes of the meeting held on 16 June 2006 were approved and signed subject to Robert Evans being listed as representing the Thames Valley Probation Service.

Following representations from some Commissioning Body Members, Mr Welch undertook to ensure future reports would be as succinct as possible, given the necessity for a transparent audit trail.

27/06. ORDER OF BUSINESS

It was AGREED that items SP8(a) and SP8(b) should be taken at this juncture on order to give a budgetary context to the business being discussed.

For Decision

28/06. GRANT BUDGET REPORT

(Agenda Item 8)

The Administering Authority had previously forecasted a deficit for the current year unless the partnership agreed significant further savings. The report before the Commissioning Body (SP8(a)) forecasted a deficit of £766,000 should spending continue at current levels. The Administering Authority however, had forecasted a surplus of £3,000 if all the contract variations relating to last years’ strategic review were accepted by the service providers affected.

The Commissioning Body also had before them reports (SP8(b)) which showed the overall picture, client-group by client-group, the same picture broken down by client group and district for the benefit of the individual parties, and the list of the contract variations which had yet to be implemented.

Mr Welch undertook to provide a report to the next meeting that would give an up to date picture of the budgetary situation, together with a recast budget in light of the lesser than anticipated grant reduction.

Cllr Biles requested the Supporting People Team officers provide an explanation about why the variation to forecast figure relating to older people (West Oxfordshire District Council) appeared as £18,000 in the papers which were submitted to the Core Strategy Group, but £12,000 in the paper.

Ms Jennifer Barnes, Senior Management Accountant, would arrange the provision of a narrative to accompany the Grant Budget report in the future to give greater ease of understanding. She also undertook to ensure that headings would be put on all pages of the report for ease of reference.

It was AGREED to note reports SP8(a) and SP8(b)

29/06. REVIEW OF ANNUAL PLAN 2006/07: BUDGET 2006/07

(Agenda Item 4)

The Core Strategy Group at its meeting on 6 September 2006 considered a paper from the Administering Authority based on the latest forecast spending for 2006/07. The report was now before the Committee at SP4.

The Supporting People Team officers undertook to thank the providers on behalf of the Commissioning Body for the co-operation and commitment they had shown to the programme.

Mr Ferres undertook to submit an updated contract negotiation plan to the Core Strategy Group for consideration.

The Commissioning Body AGREED (unanimously) to approve the paper subject to the representative for West Oxfordshire District Council being satisfied with the explanation to be given in relation to the £12,000/£18,000 figure referred to in SP8 (Grant Budget Report).

30/06. REVIEW OF FIVE-YEAR STRATEGY AND ANNUAL PLAN 2005/06: FLOATING SUPPORT

• Plan for and minimise any potential disruption to service users
• Work in partnership with local providers to support them in preparing for any tendering exercise and facilitate capacity building activities to develop their ability to tender successfully
• Encourage the development of local consortia to build on local skills and experience and make reference to consortia within any tendering process;

• ensures that adequate time is given to managing the changeover and supporting existing providers to prepare for any tender process
• allows providers to bid for more than one contract (but not in the same District/City area),so that the minimum number of providers would be 2 and the maximum would be 10
• is expedited as soon as possible.

31/06. REVIEW OF FIVE-YEAR STRATEGY AND ANNUAL PLAN 2005/06: DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SERVICES

• provide support so as to ensure access to local housing and homelessness departments for local women at risk;
• support for women to access training and employment;
• formally making links with Children, Young People & Families Directorate;
• proposing a staff structure for agreement by the Supporting People Team and key stakeholders, that takes into account issues such as risk assessment, lone working and the co-ordination of telephone contact between local refuges to facilitate effective access;
• active links and development of working protocols with key local organisations eg. Police, substance misuse services, domestic violence champions, floating support services;
• establishment of a service user support group, including those who have moved on from a refuge, to facilitate peer support and mutual learning;
• re-emphasis of the need to keep occupancy at acceptable levels and liaise with stakeholders if this falls to a low level.

3. existing refuge providers should be supported through this process, so they are in a good position to prepare for and submit a successful tender if this is required;
4. consult formally with neighbouring Supporting People teams, to reflect the sub-regional and national nature of domestic violence; and
5. the Commissioning Body instructs the Oxfordshire Supporting People Team to implement the commissioning and procurement outcomes of the decisions in partnership with the commissioning partners and in conjunction with the Oxfordshire County Council Legal & Procurement Services.

32/06. REVIEW OF FIVE-YEAR STRATEGY: CROSS AUTHORITY ISSUES

(Agenda Item 7)

In Part F of the Five-Year Strategy the Commissioning Body had agreed the following:

A seminar to examine whether we should introduce a local connection policy for our direct access and homelessness services has been held in Oxfordshire during 2004. Oxfordshire is spending c£500k per annum more supporting people who move in to such services from out of Oxfordshire than would be spent if all those from Oxfordshire were accessing services here. It was agreed no local connection policy would be introduced at the current time as this was felt to have undesirable impacts for service users and service providers. It was also agreed to keep this under review as more data on cross authority placements is available and in the light of decisions by other authorities which may impact upon Oxfordshire’s ability to retain an "open door" approach.

The Core Strategy Group at its meeting on 6 September had considered a draft Reconnection Policy from Oxford City Council which was attached at SP7 for consideration.

The Commissioning Body AGREED to endorse the Policy subject to the inclusion of a representative of the Thames Valley Probation Service in the membership of the Reconnection Forum.

The following matters (Items 8-17) were submitted for information only.

33/06. SERVICES FOR OLDER PEOPLE

(Agenda Item 9)

In December 2005, during discussion of the strategic reviews of accommodation-based services for older people, the Commissioning Body had instructed the Core Strategy Group to explore options for standardised county-wide responses to, and procedures for, the issues set out in section 5 of the overview report.

Accordingly, the Core Strategy Group at its meeting on 6 September had approved a Project Initiation Document (SP9(a)) for a project to deliver changes in older people’s services together with a timetable (SP9(b)) indicating when each key item of the project needed to be delivered.

It was AGREED to note the documents outlined above.

34/06. SERVICES FOR PEOPLE WITH DRUGS PROBLEMS

(Agenda Item 10)

An evaluation of housing-related services for people with drug problems had been completed. This evaluation had been jointly commissioned from external consultants by the Oxfordshire Drug and Alcohol Action Team, Oxfordshire Supporting People and Oxford City Council.

A paper (SP10) that outlined the decisions taken by the Core Strategy Group at their last meeting in response to the report was before the Commissioning Body for noting.

It was AGREED to note the paper SP10.

35/06. COMMUNITY ALARM SERVICES

(Agenda Item 11)

At its meeting in December 2005 the Commissioning Body had approved the strategic review of community alarms services report and had asked the Administering Authority to implement the commissioning and procurement outcomes of the review, in partnership with the commissioning partners.

The Core Strategy Group at its meeting on 6 September had approved a specification for community alarm services (SP11) and discussion was still in progress with regard to the eligibility criteria and assessment process.

Ms Wareing reported that bullet point 2, paragraph 5.2, of the specification had been amended at the Core Strategy Group to read as follows:

‘Responsive staff available to respond to emergency visits within 30 minutes of the time the community alarm call is first received at the call centre’.

It was AGREED to note the Specification and the above amendment.

36/06. HOME IMPROVEMENT AGENCY SERVICES – PROCUREMENT UPDATE

(Agenda Item 12)

The process of implementing the decisions of the strategic review of home improvement agency services continued. The Commissioning Body approved the process for the implementation of decisions of the Strategic Review of Home Improvement Agency Services in October 2005. This process was still in progress.

The Commissioning Body noted a report (SP12) that explained what stage had been reached in the tendering process and set out the dates at which the remaining stages of the process were due to be completed.

37/06. NEW CLIENT RECORD FORMS REPORT 2005/06

(Agenda Item 13)

The Commissioning Body noted a report (SP13) that had been produced by The Administering Authority and analysed the information contained in the New Client Record Forms that Oxfordshire services had completed in the year 2005/06. The report highlighted what appeared to be the most important conclusions to be drawn.

38/06. SERVICE PERFORMANCE 2005/06

(Agenda 14)

The Commissioning Body noted a report (SP14) that had been produced by the Administering Authority and analysed the information contained in the performance workbooks, which Oxfordshire services completed in the year 2005/06. The report highlighted what appeared to be the most important conclusions to be drawn.

39/06. ANALYSIS OF QUALITY ASSURANCE SCORES FOR SERVICES 2003-2006

(Agenda Item 15)

The Commissioning Body noted a report (SP15) that had been produced by the Administering Authority that analysed the Quality Assessment Framework self-assessments made by service providers and those actually conducted by the Supporting People Team in the years 2003/04, 2004/05 and 2005/06. The report highlighted what appeared to be the most important conclusions to be drawn.

40/06. PERFORMANCE TARGETS 2006/07

(Agenda Item 16)

The Commissioning Body noted a report (SP15) that had been produced by the Administering Authority produced that drew attention to the new Grant Condition in the Supporting People Grant Conditions for Non-Excellent Authorities 2006. The report identified existing local authority performance indicators the Government had believed would reflect the effectiveness of the Supporting People programme locally.

41/06. DATE OF NEXT MEETING AND FUTURE MEETINGS

(Agenda Item 17)

The Committee Body was reminded that the next meeting would be held in Meeting Room 1 & 2, County Hall, on Friday 15 December 2006.

It was AGREED that the Friday 16 March 2007 meeting be rescheduled to Friday 23 March 2007.

42/06. VAL MESSENGER

in the Chair

Date of signing 2006

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