Agenda item

To receive the strategic priorities for the Resources and Assets Directorate.

The Committee considered a presentation from Graham Ebers, Deputy Chief Executive and Director of Resources & Assets, set out at Agenda pages 13 to 26. The presentation gave details of the Resources & Assets Service Delivery Plan for 2023/24. The plan gave details of service priorities, opportunities, risks and challenges for 2023/24.

Imogen Shepherd-Dubey, Executive Member for Finance, attended the meeting to provide a Member perspective on the Service Delivery Plan and the broader challenges facing the Council.

The presentation provided an analysis of key issues facing the different services within Resources and Assets, viz:

·           Finance – providing a strategic financial function and an enabling role to support service delivery across the organisation.

·           Governance Services – custodian of the Council’s constitutional, legal and governance arrangements.

·           Commercial Property – managing the Council’s property assets to meets strategic objectives and the needs of services and residents.

·           Sport and Leisure – creating physical active communities, reducing isolation and narrowing the health inequality gap.

Graham Ebers stated that value for money was at the centre of everything the Council did. Officers used data and insight to identify needs which were then ranked into priorities. Decisions were then taken with Members on the most cost-effective way to meet those priority needs.

In the ensuing discussion, Members raised the following points and questions.

What steps were being taken to improve business-case evaluation? It was confirmed that bid templates were being enhanced and managers had been informed that bids must be well developed before submission. Some business cases were good. It was a matter of bringing all bids to that level. Overview & Scrutiny had an important role to play in scrutinising business cases before final decisions were taken.

Members suggested setting up a small informal group to work with Graham Ebers on ways to improve the quality of business cases. This would focus on an improved template for business cases which would be reported back to the Committee in due course. David Cornish, Peter Dennis, Norman Jorgensen and Pauline Jorgensen volunteered to join this group.

The Governance Services section included an opportunity relating to fraud identification and recovery – was anything specific planned? It was confirmed that the Council had strong counter fraud policies. The data showed that this was a relatively small issue for the Council.

One of the risks for Governance Services was “Member/officer relationships leading to complaints and reputational damage. How big was this risk? Could the Council charge for handling complaints relating to Town and Parish Councils? It was confirmed that Code of Conduct complaints were handled by the Standards Committee. The majority of complaints were made by Members against other Members. Further consideration could be given to the point about charging for handling complaints relating to Town/Parish Councillors.

The Governance Services Opportunities included revisiting all-out elections. Council had made a clear decision on this matter, so why was it listed as an opportunity? It was confirmed that officers felt that the question of all-out elections should be reviewed again in a few years.

The timeframe for developing a new strategy appeared to be 6-9 months. This appeared to be a long time bearing in mind the pace of change in local government. A similar point was made about the decision making process for key decisions via the Executive and Council. It was confirmed that the Council Constitution was being reviewed with one aim being the streamlining of decision making. 2024 may provide an opportunity to review the way the Council operates following the all-out election.

Did the Council measure value for money delivered through partnerships with private companies? It was confirmed that officers maintained a strong focus on procurement and contract management in order to ensure that value for money was being delivered.

RESOLVED That:

1)     Graham Ebers and Imogen Shepherd-Dubey be thanked for attending the meeting to answer Member questions;

2)     The priorities, challenges and opportunities for Resources and Assets in 2023/24 be noted;

3)     An informal working group be set up to develop a model business case template, with a report back to the Committee in due course;

4)     the working group comprise Councillors David Cornish, Peter Dennis, Norman Jorgensen and Pauline Jorgensen, supported by Graham Ebers and Sally Watkins.