Agenda and minutes

To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on 2 February 2016 as previously distributed

The minutes of the Joint Budget OSC (Finance and Resources) meeting held on 2^nd February 2016 were confirmed by the Members present and signed by the Chairman.

To receive any apologies for absence

Apologies for absence were received on behalf of Councillors Barnes, Clark and Fethney.

To receive any declarations of interest

A member with a disclosable pecuniary interest or a personal interest in a matter who attends a meeting of the authority at which the matter is considered -

(i)            must disclose the interest at the start of the meeting or when the interest becomes apparent

and, if the interest is a disclosable pecuniary interest, or a personal interest which is also prejudicial

(ii)           may not participate in any discussion or vote on the matter (and must withdraw to the public seating area) unless they have been granted a dispensation.

A member who discloses at a meeting a disclosable pecuniary interest which is not registered in the Members’ Register of Interests, or is not the subject of a pending notification, must notify the Monitoring Officer of the interest within 28 days of the disclosure.

Disclosable pecuniary interests, personal and prejudicial interests are defined in Part 2 of the Code of Conduct For Members

[If a member is in any doubt as to whether they have an interest which should be declared they should seek the advice of the Monitoring Officer before the start of the meeting]

None.

An opportunity for members of the public to make statements or ask questions in accordance with the rules as to public participation

None.

None.

J Doyle explained the reasons why the premise charges have gone from £700 to zero. He said that this was an adhoc line that was used for the hire of halls for various things that Members wanted. This had not been used in the last 2 years and it was decided that it could be deleted without any impact.

The Chair requested that there be a target in which officers respond to action points and refer back to the Committee. All Members agreed that a target of 14 days would be set and all action points should be responded by.

Councillor Elliot – Portfolio Holder for Finance and Resources gave Members a brief update on the Quarter 3 Budget Monitoring report 2015/16. He referred to the budget and explained that there was an overspend of £225k in the General Fund; however they would expect to be on budget by the end of the year. He added that there was also a £7 million overspend on the Capital budget.

Questions:

Councillor Imarni said that she had noticed the slippage but it was good news as at the previous meeting Members were questioning certain programmes from last year

The Chair referred to page 6 and the £150k on Planning and Building Control and the no of vacant posts within the services. He asked if there was anything being done to control the number of agency staff being used within this service.

D Skinner said that there was a national pressure on managing building control staff. The local authority is in direct competition with the private sector and they can pay significantly more money than the Council can. The Council is not in a position to match the pay of the Private Sector. D Skinner went on to add that the Council is looking at ways to improve and offer options and opportunities.

Councillor Imarni referred to page 5 3.2. She asked the officer to explain what the commissioning of Liberata was and why this can affect the new homes bonus.

D Skinner explained that Osbourne’s look after the maintenance of the properties. Liberata reviews all of the empty homes within the borough, any homes that have been declared empty, then if any are found a percentage fee is received by them.

Councillor Tindall referred to page 9 line 172. He asked if this was capital rather than revenue and asked if this should be in the general fund.

D Skinner said that the 1.9 million is general fund capital.

Councillor Douris referred to the number of planning applications and said that this had increased over the last year and this also has additional pressures as the report confirms.

Outcome:

The Committee noted the forecast outturn position report.

Quarter 3 Performance & Operational Risk Register Reports - Legal Governance, Democratic Services, Commissioning, 

Procurement & Compliance; and People 

S Baker, Assistant Director - Chief Executives Unit introduced his report and offered

Members to ask questions.

Questions:

Councillor Tindall referred to page 12 line 10 £89k unmatched. He asked for the reasoning behind this.

B Hosier explained that the Council codes its expenditure using Proclass, which is a procurement classification structure used to support spend analysis. It was believed that the ‘unmatched’ figure of £89k was an amalgamation of expenditure that fell below the threshold that the Council uses to Proclass its expenditure. Total expenditure below £1k is not usually coded to Proclass.

Councillor Tindall pointed out that £89k was a significant amount and there should be some effort to code this expenditure.

B Hosier said that he would report back at the next meeting with an update with regards to this suggestion.

Councillor Ashbourn referred to page 6 and the sickness within the Council. He added that whilst this is an ongoing issue are the Council at the stage where they are getting to the root of the problem.

M Rawdon explained that the end of year sickness absence projection is around 10 days per FTE per year. Highlighting, that the work that is being carried out at present is having an impact and reducing the figures, so the Council is moving in the right direction. In terms of the causes of the problem, the team has carried out  some analysis on the different trends of sickness within the workplace. He added that there had been some interesting findings on their analysis and the Council are working with teams where there are higher levels of sickness.

Councillor Ashbourn asked if there was anything being done to help staff with motivation and inspiration within the workplace and if this was a major factor in why staff have so much sickness absence.

M Rawdon said that there was staff survey carried out recently to help them identify any issues in the workplace. We have recently launched a ‘Leading in Dacorum’ training programme to ensure managers have the right skills to effectively managing staff.

Councillor Douris mentioned that the sickness absence is a recurring problem and asked if the provisions that were put in place have not worked and why not.

M Rawdon mentioned that they never had a wellbeing strategy but they have a long term plan in place to target the issues they are faced with staff sickness. He added that they also now have a new sickness system in place which will hopefully identify the problem areas with the reporting functionality this has.

Councillor Birnie asked if there was a timescale to manage the sickness project.

M Rawdon confirmed that they have a 12 month timescale. They have set up a review panel to look at all the sickness cases and some controls will be in place to ensure actions continue beyond the length of the project. He  ...  view the full minutes text for item 23.

To consider passing a resolution in the following terms: That, under s.100A (4) of the Local Government Act 1972 Schedule 12A Part 1, as amended by the Local Government (Access to Information) (Variation) Order 2006, the public be excluded during the items in Part II of the Agenda for this meeting, because it is likely, in view of the nature of the business to be transacted, that if members of the public were present during these items there would be disclosure to them of exempt information relating to:

There were no amendments to be made on the work programme.