Audit and Governance Committee - Tuesday 25 July 2023, 6:30pm - Feedback Tab - Start video at 0:05:53 - Tunbridge Wells Borough Council Webcasting
Agenda
Slides
Transcript
Map
Resources
Forums
Speakers
Feedback
Votes
Speaking:
Agenda item :
Start of webcast
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
1 Chair's Introduction
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
2 Apologies for Absence
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
3 Declarations of Interest
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
4 Notification of Visiting Members wishing to speak (in accordance with Council Procedure Rule 18):
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
5 Minutes of the meeting of the Audit and Governance Committee dated 14 March 2023
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
6 Future Work Programme as at 14 March 2023
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
7 External Audit Plan 2022 2023
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
8 Strategic Risk Register
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
9 Value for Money Progress Report
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
10 Internal Audit Report and Opinion 2022 2023
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
11 Urgent Business
Share this agenda point
Agenda item :
12 Date of Next Meeting Tuesday 19 September 2023
Disclaimer: This transcript was automatically generated, so it may contain errors. Please view the webcast to confirm whether the content is accurate.
good evening and welcome to the first audit and governance committee meeting of the municipal year on Tuesday, the 25th of July 2023.
I'm Councillor Mark Monday and I am the Chair of this committee before we get into the agenda items, please give your full attention to the following announcements from our Clarke Mrs. Murray,
thank you, Chair and good evening everybody in the event of the fire alarm ringing continuously, you must immediately evacuate the building at walking pace officers will escort to be the most direct available route, and no one is to use the lift
we will make our way to the fire assembly point which is by the entrance to the Town Hall Yard car park and months away and once outside a check will be made to ensure everyone has safely left, no one is to re-enter the building until advised that it is safe to do so.
this is a public meeting and proceedings are being webcast live online, a recording will also be available for playback on the council's website shortly afterwards,
can I remind everyone to use the microphones when speaking the red light indicates the microphone is on and any comments that are not recorded for the webcast will not be included in the minutes of the meeting.
you should all be aware that any third party is able to record or film council meetings unless exempt or confidential information is being considered, the council will not accept liability for any third-party recordings.
it is very important that the outcomes of the meeting are clear at the end of each substantive item, the Chairman will ask whether the matter is agreed in the absence of a clear majority, or if the Chair decides a full vote is desirable, a vote will be taken by a show of hands, Members should raise their hands to indicate their vote when called and keep their hands up until the count has been announced. Members requesting a recorded vote must do so before the vote is taken. Thank you Chair,
for the benefit of the recording, we are now going to take a break Roku.
thank you, Chair, or expected members here this evening, Councillor Alan
prisons,
Councillor Barrass, prison Councillor Frances
present
Councillor Sankey,
present Councillor White present, Councillor McMillan,
present Councillor Munday present.
Mr. George Turner, Independent Member.
present. Sir Edward Elliott, independent member, present and parish representative Councillor McConnachie prison.
thank you expected officers here this evening Gouffran Ahmad
Broun, William Benson.
Lee Collier.
present.
present.
present.
present.
present.
so, for the benefit of the recording, Councillor Lynstone is not present at the moment.
members of the committee should be familiar with the process, but for the benefit of any members of the public, who may be watching or like to explain a couple of things, committee members have had their main agendas for ever week and had the opportunity to study these and ask any factual questions of the officers ahead of the meeting
when coming to substantive items on the agenda this evening the relevant officer will first set out their report. we then move into member discussions and debate.
1 Chair's Introduction
2 Apologies for Absence
apologies for absence until we have any apologies for absence,
we've had apologies from Councillor Barry Edwards this evening Chair.
3 Declarations of Interest
and a declaration declarations of interest members of the committee should state at this point of the have any declarations of interest related to any items on the season's agenda to any Members have any declarations to make.
4 Notification of Visiting Members wishing to speak (in accordance with Council Procedure Rule 18):
notifications of persons registered to speak
at this time, we note whether any members of the public or any visiting members of the Council have registered to speak sieving. Do we have any such persons,
no registered speakers this evening, 2
5 Minutes of the meeting of the Audit and Governance Committee dated 14 March 2023
minutes of the meeting of the audit and governance committee dated the Tuesday, the 24th dry Tuesday, the 14th of March 2023
Members are asked to confirm that the minutes of the previous meeting or a true record of the proceedings, may I remind members that only matters for discussion is the accuracy to members have any comments
Chair, we had to have one amendment that was requested for
under the external audit of value for money report, March 2022.
and the point for should now read, it was acknowledged that Tunbridge Wells Borough Council had received 13 clear audit reports, which was considered a remarkable achievement, it was considered that the Tunbridge Wells Borough Council plan agreed at Full Council, needed to have priorities, costs and timetables set so that it was set up so that it satisfied auditors and resulted in continued clean reports.
thank you, the motion is to agree the minutes, subject to the amendments suggest given out or we agree agreed.
thank you Chair.
6 Future Work Programme as at 14 March 2023
the future work programme as at the 14th of March 2023. the Committee's future work programme, as set out on pages 13 and 14 for reference since publication of the work agenda, the work programme has been updated to show upcoming risk register owners, and the members
are asked to note the following
this evening we have William Benson, chief executive and Paul Taylor of change and communities to discuss risks 8 7 and 10.
19th of September, chorus hone planning will be discussing Risk 6, and, on the 28th of November, Gary Stimson, head of planning, health and environment will be discussing risks, three
sites Head of Housing, Health and Environment
occur budget.
on the 14th sorry, on the 12th of March 2024 Lee, Corea, Director of Finance Policy and Development will be discussing risks 1 and 2.
these risks topics can be changed if members want to bring other risks to the committee
members are also asked to take note of the following dates of upcoming upcoming training sessions,
statutory statement of accounts on the 22 of August 2023 at 6 p.m.
The role of internal audit during November 2023 and the role of external audits during March 2024.
are there any comments or questions for now?
thank you, the motion is to note the work programme, are we agreed?
the motion is carried.
7 External Audit Plan 2022 2023
external Audit Plan for 2022 23, the report starts on page 15 of the agenda, Ms Brown, a report, please.
thank you, Chair, Ms Brown, is not here, but I'll be representing Diddy in this meeting
well, our plan basically outlines our audit strategy for the financial statements without re 2 23,
the significant risks Debbie have identified for audit purposes comprised of BP valuation relate to land building, beat bench in relation.
are amendment over out of control and
other expenditure completeness
we have set out although all the procedures that we intend to perform in detail in the report?
we will be majorly testing the in case of PB and pension, we'd be testing the assumptions made by the value and actuaries in arriving at a valuation, and we will be challenging those where necessary. for other expenditure, the major procedure would be around testing of the cruel and urgent conditions near the end to ensure those have been recorded in the correct period
our materiality has been
set out on page 31 to 33, and that we have determined as 2% of the current year's gross expenditure
in terms of the logistics, we are currently performing the audit on the final financial statement, we performed our planning procedures in the month of April,
and now we we are started over confined, financial statements from 3rd of April and audit is under way, currently
I just want to tag Jane for providing a decent quality of account.
and yet on vehicle G bring on it, and we'll be reporting our findings on in the next Audit Committee that due on 19 September.
these were the highlights from my side if there are any questions,
I'm happy to take those.
thank you, Members, any questions or comments.
Chair, for the benefit of the recording, Councillor Lidstone has just joined the meeting.
Castle list, and do you have any decoration declarations for this meeting?
and apologies, my lightness.
OK, recommendations are set out in the report point one that the Committee consider and agree the annual audit plan for 2022 23 or we agreed.
that motion is carried.
8 Strategic Risk Register
item 8 strategic risk register report states starts on page 43 of the agenda, Mr. Benson, your report, please.
thanks very much, Mr. Chairman, so, as was said earlier, I'm here with my colleagues, so I've got Paul Taylor to my right and Nick Dufton at his right. I think the usual form is for
leading officers to make a brief presentation. I think that's usually oral I've got a few slides that I thought might be helpful to accompany it and then we're very happy to take any questions that might arise from that. So if you're happy I could crack on,
please do
so hoping that the
technology is going to work.
he said, expectantly, Deputy, we go, so I'm gonna start if that's OK, just because we've got a couple of additional officers present, I'm going to start with Risk Gates
and I don't expect you to be able to read that, but it is. This is the just the reproduction of the risk that that's in your agenda pack and what I'm gonna do is it's gonna be a sort of joint presentation, so I'll start off asking Mr. Taylor, just to lead through the initially slides, then I'll pick them up and then we'll take questions.
thank you, Chief Executive,
so just a bit of context, first of all, really before we dive into the detail of the risk and the mitigating actions,
I don't want to dwell in this particular slide, but just to highlight the it's a national issue, recruitment and retention is something that's affecting not just our sector but it is it is a national issue and a number of different sectors are grappling with the same challenge in front of them next slide, please.
very specifically the LGA, the Local government Association, recently undertook a survey at the end of last year and the conclusions are on the slide, eight out of 10 councils struggling to recruit staff pressure points in a number of areas adult social care, perhaps not surprisingly planning officers again perhaps not surprisingly HDV drivers know a number of councils run their own waste contracts and that's obviously had a specific impact for them. environmental health officers, building control officers, you could extrapolate that really through just about every section within the council, I suspect, so a challenge for everybody, everybody grappling with the same issue in the sector next slide, please,
but focusing perhaps specifically on Tunbridge Wells Borough Council, I think there's a geographical element now to the challenge. facing us, whilst nationally there is 1.3 million more vacancies and applicants, that's changed just recently gone down slightly, but the challenge in the south-east is is probably a little bit more acute number of reasons for that I suspect
the perhaps the pay issue that is shown on that slide to the right. but also the proximity to London, the way that work-life balance says changed post COVID, much more flexible working options are available to people, geography, not such an issue next slide, please,
so we've looked at our own data and we've broken down our own data
and some things have changed something's happened,
main changes really.
all round the split between male and female employees. the number of people under 25 has decreased slightly, however, those aged between 25 and 30 has increased slightly, and the number of people aged 55 and over has increased reasonably or significantly, and that was in the tail-end of 2022, and we do look at this data fairly frequently we look at.
our retention rate and we scrutinise that as a management board, interestingly, we employ 8% more staff than before Covid, that's largely due to the Amelia and some other, perhaps smaller changes to the staff numbers that we actually employ next side please.
and then looking at that data in a little bit more detail.
we talk about the vacancy factor fairly frequently, which is a snapshot in time, and we run about 85% capacity
staff turnover has been broadly consistent, except for the Covid use, which hopefully is illustrated in the table to the right, I've highlighted the core videos, where you can see that's dropped that dropped significantly in line with most other local authorities, our turnover is probably on the high side and that's partly due to some of the geographical issues and the pay challenges that I've mentioned previously, but you can see even going back to 2014 15 we had a turnover rate of 25%. and currently I think we're running at just around 24%, I've broken down those figures a little bit more, we've looked at a period in time there from 2022 to 2023, and you can see that 59 staff left and we've broken down the reasons why those staff have left we've broken down the number of years staff have been with us and you can see that also in the smaller table to the right
next slide please.
and that's just
more recent refresh of the data we've looked at the data by quarters quarters 1 through to 4, and you can see that in quarter four, the turnover seems to be picking up, as I mentioned, on the previous slide for 22 23 the overall annual turnover figure was just over 24% so analogous with 2014 15 really next side please, William
so a couple of observations really in terms of the qualitative data, were a relatively small organisation, and that means, unfortunately, we can't offer everyone the growth and promotion that they want. It's becoming increasingly important to staff, understandably that they can understand where their career is going and they get the development and support opportunities to progress their career.
It's much easier to grow in a larger team with a well defined hierarchy. We don't have really a significant number. Larger teams probably plan in, and parking are probably our largest teams.
We are, I think, more active in moving people out in the probationary period so that first six months and we have a significant percentage of staff who don't reach the level we need or were not right for them. You know, it's a two-way street. We've started to challenge ourselves on that particular point recently. To think Well, actually, are we as effective at recruitment as we thought as we should be, so maybe there is a tendency in in the challenging times to just try and fill the vacancy, and perhaps in a we need to look at our recruitment process in a little bit more detail, and that'll come out in subsequent slides excluded. Please don't tell me it is yes, sorry,
thank you, so that's the the quantitative staff, I thought I'd talk a little bit about the qualitative staff and our response to it.
so the first point is quite obvious that once upon a time we used to have a long list, we used to have shortlists the shortlist now pretty shorts,
and sometimes we get no response
we on a fairly regular basis now we have candidates who just don't turn up and they that can either be because their current employers here that they've applied and try to sort of cross their palms are silver. to keep them, or sometimes people put in multiple applications. It feels a bit as if, alongside us interviewing the candidates, they're actually interviewing us
and some of the things that we used to be able to offer that I think gave us an edge over other employers things such as flexible working, that's no longer the case. That's ubiquitous, and it's something that that people expect and for us with with London just up the road. I think people now, once upon a time, they used to sacrifice a London salary for the ability to be able to work
more locally. Now if they only have to be in London, one to two days a week there, they mean, obviously they can take the London salary
and not have as much time travelling on the train and not spending as much money on it.
So things we're doing to respond to that. First of all,
a very strong emphasis on recruitments, working closely with the manager in question and H are the some strong messages that have come from candidates, an H R and and advisers
you really need to get the speed
of your recruitment process, sorted candidates are going to work up, wait around
the pause talked a little about the data, we're also looking at our website, I think the you know probably once upon a time it was a little bit staid, we're having a look at what some others are doing in the marketplace and we're trying to emphasise not just you know what the job entails, but what it's actually like, working here and talking to recruitment consultants, that's the sort of the key question for candidates, what will working in for Tunbridge Wells Borough Council and be like for me,
pulse, talked a bit about data and where?
gathering as much as we can and analyzing it, we're trying to do more with their exit interviews, we can't compel staff to do that, but we're trying to change the way in which we undertake them to make them less onerous and to kind of get the response rates up
that's gone back one.
also, we are adapting to working in a hybrid environment. Members will be will will recognise that we've reduced our occupation in the Town Hall by two thirds
unnecessarily, that's meant that not everyone can be in every day, and we have said to people that we
expect them to be in two days a week
and what we're trying to do is to, from a learning and development perspective, look at how we can deliver that in a hybrid environment, and there's lots of examples on that slide
where we've had multiple staff members participating at the same time as these watch parties we've got through.
pep, talk and and so on.
one of the things that's really important young candidates in particular, is a kind of an assurance that they're gonna be able to progress within the council, and when Paul talked earlier about some of the pattern over figures, some of that derives from the fact that people come here, they grow and they go on to better things, and I think you could look at that as being a failure. I think you can also and look at it as being a success that we sort of bring people in we we allow them to grow as much as they can within the organisation, but we also recognise that we can't hang on to everyone
we are trying to do more
to kind of use, training as a reward we're giving people vouchers, and that they can use not just for formal training but for the personal development as well. and I think there are some really nice examples, as you look across the exile or as you look across the organisation of one particular services bringing staff in, just to give you a couple of examples there, Environmental Health, they tried to kind of wrap the team around new employees and they might have a day in which people in Iran who deal with noise nuisance or pollution control or food or whatever it is, and Planning are using their technical team, the registration team is the sort of talent pool for planning and I think of the last eight people that we've recruited into the planning technical team, seven of them have moved up to do other things so as a result we're actually over-recruiting in that area so that we can continue to draw on it without
sort of limiting the front end of planning applications and another really important thing is is this year and as part of our appraisals for reasons I'll explain in a minute who has much more of an emphasis on trying to understand and where people sat within the organisation where they wanted to go and how we can support them in that.
pay is another really important factor.
and we
so one of the things we did this year was, rather than having contribution related pay, we put both the cost of living allowance and the the the pot that we use for contribution pay into one and sort of cumulative pots.
and as a result, you can see that this is the sort of the benchmarking we undertake. So what we do with pay is our pay policy is we pay at the market? Mid points for public and not-for-profit organisations within the south-east, excluding London,
and you can see in the main
are pay is within that hatched area, which is the competitiveness zone.
You can see that one or two salaries lie outside that that's almost invariably hard to recruit or retain posts that attract a market supplement. Just to say it's impossible to keep track of this
every time we kind of undertake one of these reviews and benchmarking exercises, people have already moved ahead of us, so it's a bit like running to keep sail
I think one of the most important
factors we have that allows us to recruit and retain people is actually a culture,
we're an incredibly familial organisation
staff,
you know very sociable.
we do an awful lot to communicate with staff, I undertake regular staff briefings east being personal, it's kind of a combination now
we've had lunch and learn events where staff will talk either about things they're doing as part of their professional work or private interests we've
I used to sort of go on.
my regular meetings with the comments, conservatives actually on to the Commons, and we do that now with staff more generally, lots of kind of ways in which we can give small Frank used to staff to recognise
you know success.
We were one of the slight challenges we have is that because it's public money, as distinct from the private sector, we can't spend taxpayers' money on things like Christmas parties and so on, so we staff themselves have set up a sort of an organisation that manages that we've got a staff band, we've got staffed, cricket team
and that really really matters to staff, and I think importantly we're back in the office, I think we've gone from being holding the office to wholly at home and I think the pendulum is beginning to settle somewhere in the middle
and for those of you that haven't seen
the sort of refreshed town hall
we've you know in retreating to a small area of the town hall and saving money we've invested in trying to make it a more pleasant working environment so pre COVID it was a fairly common occurrence for me to come in and find buckets on the floor, catching kind of water coming through the roof, and it just wasn't a pleasant working environment, I think now it's a place where staffer are proud to work and, interact
one other thing, it's probably worth mentioning. on parcel, we
sort of
we historically used to participate in the best companies survey we now, because it's there's a cost associated with it, we sort of kind of run it. in parallel,
I don't know how familiar you are with best companies is that it's the Times best companies to work for is where it started from and what they do is they manage engagements
and put simply, if you tracked the Times Top 100 companies to work for it's historically always outperformed the FTSE 100 because you know it's that old adage about staff being your most important resource so, that's something we pay close attention to, and we can see on that slide the various factors they'd measure,
so leadership used to be the most important factor, it's now my manager
and most people tend to leave their manager out rather than the organisation, so we've put an awful lot of energy and effort into supporting managers to be the best they can be.
and that involves both sort of training and development and sort of working with them on a variety of things and alongside pay, we're also looking at non-pay rewards. We're reviewing our appraisal system and we're going through all of our policies and procedures, and one of the things we've talked about, both here and within cabinets, is the people Strategy,
and since we last spoke we've done a lot of work on that.
The issue with the people Strategy is, it really needs to follow the Council's corporate strategies and we've as was mentioned earlier on, we've we've agreed the Tunbridge Wells Borough Council plan that building a better borough plan that runs out next year, but work is already underway to put together a new strategic plan and we will ensure that both of the people strategy is the people I mentioned of that and the medium term financial strategy track that one and deliver that,
so I won't spend a huge amount of time on this the these the themes.
and then we've done some work with managers and staff on the kind of values and purpose which which are really important, so what we've done just in the last
few slides is in your packs, we set out some of the mitigating actions to address this risk. and we've tried to Red, Amber, Green.
so I would say, in terms of
clear organisational objectives, we're well on track with that, we've got the
that the focus on five of the 31 projects and we're moving towards a new corporate plan that is really important, we were due to have refresh that in 2020 that that fell fell to Covid the the pandemic,
in terms of the HR strategy and the review of pay and non-pay benefits,
those are very much in flight, we have a draft and we have regular conversations and discussions at management boards and to ensure that we've got the right resources in the right place to the extent that we can,
as I've mentioned where supporting managers,
and moving moving down lots of work on recruitments. where it's appropriate, we, you know a particularly for sort of extraordinary things or kind of short term pressures, we make use of the external capacity and to try and mitigate where there isn't any internal capacity.
we make good use of both
partnerships and community a great example today we've had you know, it's we're being judged for Britain in Bloom, and it was really nice to see representatives from businesses, voluntary and community organisations, friends and so on.
and then we've there are a couple of new things I thought I would just mention that we're looking at, so one is,
I think, there's a bit of a shifts
with regards to
young people and universities and I think some young people are questioning.
the cost of, if not the value of degrees. So we're looking at the potential to make greater use of degree, apprenticeships
and actually allowing people to and learn through some sort of talent, academy and at the other end of the scale. I think we quite often see yes, it's one of the things that's happened as a result of Covid is, I think some people called it the great resignation, where a number of people have just decided they wanted to completely different things
or to cease work altogether, and I think it's been our experience that staff,
you know kind of enjoy going off to you know, look after the grandkids or travel or whatever it is. They want all the gardens, whatever it is, they want to do, but I think there then comes a time where they are kind of missing. You know the sort of purpose and the
you know the kind of stimulation that comes with work, so one of the things we're looking at is whether, when people leave, we can
sort of ask them if they want to keep in touch with us and then where we have particular bits of work we would look to package them up in flexible ways such that they could be done
in you know short bursts or part time over a period of time and then to use that sort of bank of staff.
you know if the if they were interested to to support us, so that's I'll call it a day there on the slides and unpowered, and then I can come back to the other risks, but maybe we can take questions on this first.
remember so many questions.
Councillor Sankey.
thank you.
I wanted to ask some questions about the the hot-desking and how that works, because I'm on
having a little office, I sit in myself, I don't understand,
so could you explain to me how it works in theory and in reality, and I guess what I'd like to know is if you are someone that wants a desk that you use on a regular basis how would that work and are we helping those people?
so what we've done is you know, it was a given that we were reducing off at present, so we no longer have the luxury where we have one desk per person we.
I've got just over 90 desks within the new space,
so we undertook a lot of engagement with staff, and one of the clear messages that came back was that people didn't want wholly
sort of hot desking environment that people actually derived.
sort of benefits from working with colleagues, so as a result, the majority of the space has been given over to team bookable spaces. So what will happen is teams,
we've worked with teams to allocate them one or more sessions per fortnight, so some teams are in more frequently, some are in sort of less frequently and they have the ability as whole team, so you you might have under a Head of Service, for example, finance parking procurements,
but they can all be in as teams and they can have their team meetings where there are kind of younger people they can learn from one other. We then also have other space we have t, we have individual bookable space and we've got three different types of spaces again in response to staff feedback. So there's a slightly bigger, slightly noisier area where people you know can take calls and work as they would, and then we have focused space which isn't sort of monastic, but it's
you know what it is. There are fewer distractions and on top of that we have a number of meeting rooms, touchdown desks and sort of bolt holes that people can go to and as regards how that works in theory and in practice. people book space, we've got a an online booking system.
they can put for a whole day half a day
and they'd come in, we haven't allocated specific desks simply because it doesn't optimise space, and I think one of the benefits we have from people working together is cross fertilisation, move teams and ideas and as part of introducing it to to ask about the kind of practice as well as the theory.
we've
surf in the early days every desk, a QR code, we're encouraging people and feedback, we looked at that most recently today and talking to staff. on Monday and Wednesday we're still in the pilot stage, so we said we would pilot it for six months, but we we are not resting on our laurels and where we get feedback, we make adjustments, so you know one of the big things that came out was the some needing blind boom, the blinds out people talked about noise dampening, we've done that people talked about in his adjustments, the IT kit, so we're we're kind of adjusting as we go and I'd say in the main, it's been overwhelmingly positive and the feedback we've had, both from the kind of surveys we undertake and the discussions we have with staff, has been very well received.
thank you I was does actually my second question was I've heard about the suggestions box, so obviously is on cure, I was going to ask before I asked that, or
just how
long must the lead time on booking a table, so I'm slightly obsessed with this because I can't get my head round it
how long how far in advance can you book or do you have to book, can you book for tomorrow can you book for six months' time is it worked like that?
and so, in terms of looking to the future, there is that there is a kind of lead in periods you can't just block, but I think it's for weeks, but I can get back to you on that, but you could book for tomorrow if there was an available space.
almost invariably there is, if there isn't, there's a button, people press that say I need a desk and what we would then do is we would look to find them desks either with another team, if they're under occupying a room or the space over in the Amelia or in other parts of the council's estate.
thank you and then just back to the suggestions box.
he kind of answered it, but I'd like to know where are the results of that published as accessible as it's something that Members are going to be privy to?
no, so so that's something we use with staff,
the most common themes raised
in the most recent.
the move, the most recent sort of session, is.
concerns about staff, not booking, and you know just taking desks without having booked
people taking calls in focus rooms, a lot of it is just really around etiquettes,
the what else have we got people, you know vacating meeting rooms on time or if they booked a morning slot vacating them on time?
more adjustable chairs more bins in the pan, tiles washing up sponges, it's it's that sort of thing, so we you know, we.
and we respond to them.
where we can immediately, so we don't wait, we just do.
by Pantiles whom in the room the pantiles, not on the pantiles.
thank you to.
councillor Lister,
thank you, Chair, and interesting hot desking debate actually.
my father used to work for a local authority Woking Borough Council and by the time he left he cited hotdesking is one of the chief reasons why he didn't enjoy the the role as much, but that said I
work in an organisation where we've always had hot desking, and it's it just sort of second nature to me, so I think it's interesting, I imagine you get people who have a foreign for and against and also again interesting William the
comments that come in the feedback box around your office etiquette that's also been something we've noticed in our office around some taking calls at the desk is that OK and I sort things is sort of learning to run alongside each other again.
where are we with the co-working contract with with Town Square,
and the reason I sort of ask is, you know, I'll be interested to hear if there's, if that might be? impact on
our staff from that, both positive and negative, from sharing the building with Town Square,
OK so, in terms of where we are we
there are, we've made reasonable progress in recent weeks so we've had planning circa consent was cleared on the 19th of July. We're working with them on fire risk assessments, they have been
out procurement to kind of secure
people are gonna come in and sort of make over their space-filler sending a we spent a bit of money in our space and are making the was good carpets.
the you know and furniture, and so on.
they are out to recruitment now I think it might even have closed for the person that's going to manage the building and we're making good progress with illegals, and we should be looking to get that sorted. in the next few weeks and the last time I spoke to them, we were due to meet them today, but they've
there's been a sort of bereavement within their office, so they weren't able to make it, they were hoping that they would have some show space open in September.
so that's the date working we're working towards in terms of benefits for staff,
I think there'll be plenty of benefit, I think they're looking to kind of, have a sort of cafe downstairs that staff will be able to avail themselves of,
I think, just having people in the building I think having the ability to, you know connect with other local employers.
You know just I think that that can only be a good thing for staff,
Councillor White.
what am I supposed to ask them about the apprenticeship schemes, I think that's a fantastic idea and I think you're completely right that not everyone wants get university these days and is looking for other options, I just wondered if there was more of a bit more detail ran out and a bit of a timeline of when that might sort of get started.
so we haven't really worked up the detail of it, yet it's something that we are going to do as part of the actions for the new people Strategy. We do take on apprentices anyway and I think the slide that William put up shows that we had five. We are trying to encourage managers to take
apprenticeships on, and that's something actually probably in the last year or so we've seen a bit of an uptick for, as William explained, what we're trying to do is with trying to extend the size of the pool that we're fishing in, so we want to develop a scheme that is both flexible for people at the start of their career, but also make sure that it gives them the support and training they need, because what we don't want to do is bring in people as they start their career, not be able to give them the training that they need. So one of the things that Nick will be doing in here charting when we look at the actions from the people strategy is how we can support those people that we bring in on apprenticeships, give them a really good experience and, as William said, if they do leave the organisation at least then they leave the organisation and hopefully go on in local government and develop their careers, so we're at a very early stage but our thinking is that we need to make sure we get those principles right, because we want to give those people a very, very good experience and at the minute, in certain areas we're under such pressure, it's very difficult to introduce that at the minute when managers are focused on delivering the service and have perhaps not as much time as they would like for the training aspects but we will work on that.
and just to add a couple of things to that. So first of all, I think there are some really nice examples the you expect HR to be leading by example, but within next area we've got been a fantastic apprentice and you know such as the sort of quality we brought someone in behind her, some of the biggest services, I think, a slightly more adept at dealing with this just because they have the capacity so with Environmental Health we have an apprentice there and planning their what, as part of the announcements made this week by the secretary of state, they're looking set up as a national scheme and that we can look to participate in as well
is it related or Councillor Fox was going?
Councillor Frances.
the you might say I've got a question in two parts, but I'd just like to ask the first group, I couldn't always see all of the things on the slide, because some of the smaller went.
propulsive three things, he said that the age average pre and post COVID was the same, the length of service average
time pre and post COVID was was was similar very similar, and there was a higher number of older people is, did I get all of that right?
it was I in his chair.
so I think the first two points right, I think the age profile is slightly changed, there are some some ups and downs, I think we'd view younger people more, I mean, actually, if you look at the two age brackets it's entirely possible that over the four years people have just stayed and they've gone from being in the younger age bracket into the middle age bracket.
OK because if there's an increasing number of older people 2 to make the averages work, then you have to have an increasingly number of younger people, because otherwise the average time
of
of service and the average age wouldn't be the same, so each it would indicate that the profile of the council staff instead of being,
a regular across all of the ages is is now coming to, we've got more people at the beginning and the end of their career rather than an average across the whole thing, and then you if, if that's so, then
what is it about people in the middle of their career that is stopping them being
joining the council?
and people in the middle of their career are usually more interested in promotion and getting on, so that would bring you to the question is,
if you ranked all of the people in the council, the elite council employees, by pay.
all the people in the top quintile or the top decile,
is the movement into that area,
or is there not because if there's no movement into that area, people in their 40 s who are desperate to get on
will not want jobs here?
my question.
Thank you, so we so we've pay, we've got quite a lot of information on that. In terms of the you know, we'd cut it in all sorts of ways, by kind of gender, by grade by age. I'm not I'm not sure I've got I can find that, whilst I'm talking,
I think your observation is probably right that we are. We are seeing more younger people and I think we also do have a fair number of people who've worked here a long time. There's quite a loyalty, is quite strong here. I'm one of the things I do on a regular basis with the mayor. Is we have long service awards and and it is really kind of nice seeing people who
just enjoy working here and I think sometimes some of those people sacrifice promotions and I know some people are being actively pursued, but they do genuinely enjoy working here,
I think.
accuse remind me, was what was was there anything else in there that I?
it was just whether we we are when you are looking for new jobs and new people, you're offering them across the
or the whole financial Ranger of the people there, or is the only people coming in at the bottom in which case you'll only get young people,
the jobs are advertised at all grades and that, though, is the one thing I would say is one of
Mr. Taylor's slides mentioned that one of our kind of inhibiting factors is we're not huge organisation, so you know, whilst we have 300 staff they're doing 40 something different services and will have some departments, you know where there's any kind of one or two people, so one of the the kind of mitigations we've got is working in partnership, so if you take environmental health we work across three
although three councils or legal services, and what that means is, rather than being restricted to a small team in which you can grow, there's actually the ability to grow within the shared service, so I think that the shared services have brought benefits in terms of cost savings, but I think they've also brought benefits in terms of opportunities.
Councillor White.
thank you, and let's just a thought when you talk about any princess, whether you'd ever thought about having wearing an intern scheme as well, which is something we've done quite successfully at work, and it's just a way for us to introduce people to the industry or you know who might not have considered it before
again quite helpful with them getting people to
help him and work over the summer or whatever.
I think that's a really good idea, so we
everywhere I go, pick units, this isn't unusual to us everywhere, I go people talking about it, so
I was at the Local government Association conference and probably a quarter of all the sessions were on one of them is entitled fishing and paddles, it's a kind of real sector-wide issue but also talking to local employers, I think there are some similar challenges.
we also talked about about it as Ken chief execs, all public sector bodies, and it was really interesting. The Chief Fire Officer was saying for every time every time they advertised for a fine and they get 90 applications, because it said you know people know what it is and know what they're getting out of it and their reflection was that actually we did really incredible stuff. You know, we, house, people, you know over in the Amelia we deal with people who are you know fleeing domestic violence, we, you know, give children their first experience of reading and theatre. We do so many amazing things but it's just one, I think, partly because we were constantly in the cross hairs of you know the media, partly because we're such a centralised states, it's just not seen as being an attractive,
an attractive sector, so I've often been asked to go and talk to local schools and quite often when it comes to it no one signed up for the talks, people all want to learn about being lawyers or accountants or
and the just isn't so I think I think we've got a bit of a reputation problem as a sector.
absolutely, I think having internships is a good idea, we we certainly actively encouraged work experience, which I think is another way of doing it Channel 4 doing some virtual
kind of internships for 14 year olds, virtually no, maybe that's something we can explore as I think it is certainly a good idea.
thank you Chair.
thank you for the presentation, I'm kind of just to just wanna get them, I really like the academy idea in terms of what you are, what you're think we're doing in young people and I I think whether it's however heavy that comes in apprenticeships and academies, I think is a real opportunity because there are so many young people that have my experience now that especially having young daughters who are now lots of kissing, I think you know they want to go to university and I would really buy into that process having a right to have some concerns in terms of a couple of things where we were talking and Paul was doing his
during his presentation, he was talking about HR and saying that something is
not saying that any failings, but there was some issue sometimes, do we recruit too early, do we not recruit in time? Do we do what you know where we got it wrong, when how are we going about doing that?
if we haven't, if we, if we recognise that potentially is an issue, and we still don't have what I would call a
fully programmed people strategy.
and yet we are still talking about doing an academy and we drink in India. Youngsters. What I'd like to know is when all those pieces gonna be put into one document or one strategy that we can ask the Chairman ago actually reverted to going out, because it feels to me that we were going at it a little bit piecemeal we're trying to do which had a cover up of it here but under a bit there, because we are still doing our day-to-day services but not staff members are going back up, but there are still a number of complaints and issues about the service. That was, but it seems to me that without the HR issue being sorted in itself, the people strategy has come together and any academy, and will there be incentives for anything else? It becomes a kind of almost moot. They seem to be need to be joined up and more joined up. Thinking.
OK, thank you. So I think what we do is we constantly challenge ourselves. I think one of the things what you picks up on. There was Mr. Taylor made a point about us using the
probation periods, or when people join the council, there's a six-month probation periods, and within that six months we people are not permanent and we have the ability for being Adem to say you're not for us or we have the ability to say to them, you're not for us and I think I've always worn it as a bit of a badge of honour, the you know, I think in in in you know, when I first started in local government I got an e-mail after six months to be told you know what any pass to predation to be brutally honest and even though there was a probation and you know, I think in most places it's just something that happens automatically. I used to kind of think it was a really good thing that we had quite high bar because you know you're much better off resolving those issues in the early days when they're easy to resolve, then you are down the tracks, but I think the challenge we've given ourselves is
is a good thing at being a high level. Does that say anything about our recruitment processes. I think what we do, the whole time, is we challenge ourselves in terms of when it will all be brought together in kind of one coherent document that would be in the people strategy and I do think it's right that the people strategy follows our organisational strategy, that is just the way you would do things. It's unfortunate that the strategic plan
being we weren't able to to refresh it and review it back in 2020 and then we've had a change of political administration and we're now on track to do it next year again we probably we could have delivered a new strategic plan
in spring next year, but with it all out elections I think the collective judgment from kind of members and cabinet was that that was better done after the all out elections, so that's when we will you know, agree it so that it sits there kind of underneath that pyramid, but we're not resting on our laurels. In the meantime,
we're constantly engaging with peers where you know conforming with best practice. We're challenging ourselves, we're seeking feedback, we're seeking data and I think that's the right thing to do so at the I mean it might sound piecemeal, I think it's continuous improvement. You know we are
you know constantly looking at ways in which we can change and improve, but in terms of where it'll be codified, that would be in the people strategy, we have a draft,
you know, probably we could produce it, but I think the right thing to do is for the people strategy to support your organisational objective which we will have until next year.
thank you, Chair,
upon account of it upon a half, except that also a pile of dung, because because if I think of what this, where the Council is bidding in the last 20 years, and if I speak to people who worked if that period of time but the 84 80% of the services that were tried, it are still the services that are provided, they might be slightly differently in a disciplined in a different in the different in a different service level, because with 10 or more technology whenever, but we still collect rubbish so largely telephone people's was still housing, people were still doing environment health were still doing legal services restored without there is a number of though so I'm I'm I'm planning would be straight up there and in terms of planning and pole in your presentation you should 59 people left
in that period of time. Can I ask how many of that was in the planning, but how many of those people that group within the Planning and Enforcement Group do you know by any chance offhand, and I don't know off the top of my head, but we do have that data so I could provide that after after the meeting and if you're if you're interested,
but it does tend to be a fairly high tune in planning.
Yes, I can provide that data for you
because it seemed to me that, obviously, when it from what for my experiences, that we lost our head of planning and then all of a sudden, there's a whole fall out from the back of that.
You know, as an indie age, as a an organisation of surely we've got to be aware of our heads of department are gonna be so key because obviously they drive that onwards and we need to keep those people close and we need to know what their their future ambitions are and the fact that I am planning to pay admin. Three-quarters of his Department has appeared. At the same time, I know it's not important. It is to a somewhat frustrated thing. I think that could have been foreseen,
and so that's something I think we again I'll get back to us throughout our best, I think age our need to be doing more, but being more proactive. Secondly, I'd I, I would also ask do HR look at each department and say Well, look at me in this in this group we have a start. We have a retention team of retention of 85% in
each department, but in that in that we've got a retention department retention of 33% or whatever it might be, do HR take all that type of research,
so if I come in on that, so it's the first of all I think you're right, if you look at the kind of spread of services we deliver, it's broadly stable, there are some new things you know the you know media Scot, that's a new service we've taken on, we've we've taken on responsibility to run the library, but I think the way in which services are delivered or delivered is fundamentally different. So you mentioned planning
planning is in a constant state of flux. You know, it's a just this week we've had a whole raft of new announcements about that. You know the green belt about concentrating in a development in on brownfield land we've had we've got a new bill that you know so hung up in the Lords, we've got reviews of National Planning Policy Framework, there have been more changes to planning in the past decade and I think that would have been probably in the previous century it's been an absolute constant changes, the same with housing so so we're living you know if you Google, you know a minister announces you know. the biggest change in a generation you'll get millions of hits, because it's just constantly what's happening, so I think we are whilst.
the services in general housing planning, environmental health are stable, the way in which they're delivered is anything but in terms of change, in planning to my recollection and knowledge, when the Head of Planning left one member of staff left and she went to work for the Planning Inspectorate for a lot more money,
and
because there was a notice period, I think when people leave it does spread a little bit of kind of anxiety because it's the unknown you know who you're going to have come in and and and but it's about a time. she left the new head of planning at Cameron and she said that she was a bit almost a bit sad to, she was leaving because he was very good and so on, so I certainly wasn't two thirds or three-quarters, I think we do lose people from planning on a fairly consistent basis just because there's a sort of rampant and sort of high-paying
you know private sector that we compete with in terms of the data I think there is both.
in a quantitative data, but I think also kind of what HR do, is they're just kind of embedded in the business, so they're having regular conversations with people, they're holding exit interviews, and I think there's a kind of spider sense as to when things are kind of right or wrong and again we've had examples of where we feel that managers on sort of passing muster.
the that we look to move them on, and I think there have been some some recent examples of that, so we don't for a second underestimate. You know, I said it in my presentation, the importance of management,
and it's something we take very seriously indeed. Could
I just can come in as well, perhaps just to add one and answer the specific question about, I think it's about succession planning. So recently what we've done this year is we've looked at our appraisal process and we've changed it to focus on succession planning, really picking up your point, Councillor, that we need to know where people are on their career journeys, we need to look at them as individuals and to see if we can develop those opportunities for them, so we don't lose them. I think we have to accept that we will lose a percentage of people because we are a small organisation, but the focus now in the appraisal process is very much about development plans, so we're trying to put them in place managers are working hard with HR to have those development plans for those staff. So whilst we might have a lot of churn, hopefully as we get churn, we can see people moving up through the ranks, so that's the focus that we'll be pressing on with as we put together our people strategy, and you asked about a date for the people strategy, we've got a first draft, as William said, we're hoping that we will have a final draft in February, many of the actions that we're talking about today will be in the action plan, it will be short on words, but it would be big on actions because it's those actions, not the document itself that are going to make a difference.
independent member.
thank you.
I was going to add an extra question if I can just play, so that
was going to take 2 February. together
so we set out to Sydney building a better borough plan, a number of stages in the process first stage was to research best practice we've completed that
the second stage was to work on our values, refresh our values and our purpose, we've completed that the third stage was to develop a draft we've completed that, but the next stage is to engage with staff to make sure that there was values, the purpose and the actions actually resonate with staff. we also want to make sure that it works and it comes together in step with DEL developing the new corporate plan because, as William pointed out and is shown in one of the slides, there is a link between the medium term financial strategy, the corporate plan and the people strategy, so we just want to make sure that those objectives align, which is why we're trying to work lockstep with the corporate plan really.
thank you
and then the the question I was going to ask it's been touched on a little bit around the womb already, but the presentation showed that over a third of leavers have had a tenure of less than two years, I don't know how that compares generally but in my experience I'd be a little alarming.
and it's really good that there's been reflection on that, and it might be the you know, filling vacancies rather than leaving them open and just wondering if you have a plan
to tackle that with your gonna, be, however,
increased risk appetite for leaving vacancies open
or whether you're considering it you know whether job applications or attracting the right people, whether it's a cultural misfit or a disconnect between skills and expertise that you need and what's being offered
and then whether
you considered the impact that that's going to have on.
people who are already working here
and training them up training people
up there, they're going to leave
or having a vacancy, that's open, I'm also mindful that you said the
the style survey, the the the the best employers, the
whether that's still a robust process given you've come out of the the original network on that site.
thank you.
yeah, there's a lot of questions after, I think perhaps if I work backwards, so in terms of best companies, I think that's a good challenge is that robust and is that still relevant? I think my answer to that would be we carry out a number of pulse surveys with our own staff, it's it's part of an ongoing process just to make sure we understand people that work for us, they need to know their requirements. we put that information together with the information we gather from exit interviews. So whilst we look at the national picture, we look at best practice through best companies. We're also looking at our organisation, we're also comparing with our partners. I think you might have seen a one of the slides that I referenced made stones to an offer, which is around about 25% as well. It's very difficult to get granular data from other local authorities. There is a and LGA survey which gives you some general trends, but it doesn't tell tend to drill down into the specifics so we're looking at all the sources of data we are. We do have our own survey, so we're not just following the best companies process which, as you say in a may, need revising in itself
I forgotten the other questions I'm sorry
so
so I think one of the questions you are asking was around the sort of tan I have within the early days and I think that I think a lot of that is linked to Covid, I think the I think now we're back in the Town Hall
you know when we were living lives on teams and zoo. you know, I don't know when, the last time anyone had a laugh, you know, you know, kind of exchanged pleasantries, it's just a bit of a sterile thing, one of the things I do is I meet with every single new starter who joins the organisation,
sorry, I've met with a couple today. and you know it may be, you know, it's one challenge would be people, wouldn't sort of tell you to speak truth to power if you know that, but the
you know, I think I I think I I'm reasonably approachable and I speak to every single new employee. and the feedback I get overwhelmingly is that people really, I mean it might be, you know, I invite Nick something, I'm an exam any two months in, and you know, you've worked for a number of organisations, they may think he's you know here biased and went to speak truth but bit people do in the main say that they really enjoy working here when you ask people what they like about working here, overwhelmingly people would say the people
that there is a really good a spry, decor, I think staff are you know helpful, open accessible,
I'm sorry I think I think Covid really had a bearing on that but Kirby ruined it asked Nick if he wants to sort of say anything as a new starter.
yeah, absolutely good evening, thank you for allowing me to come and listen to this and be part of this.
two months in I am the HR manager and I'm delighted that it's attracting so much attention and yes, I've got lots on my plate, lots of things to.
getting involved in, but to come to the question that as a new person and just delighted with the culture in this organisation, I've been in many places where it takes you ages to get through someone's door here you can catch anybody you can contact anybody can make an appointment to see somebody and they're there or you're bumping them through them down the corridor and you have a chat and you have a smile, everybody seems to have a smile on their face and will be happy to smile and help you. I have never come across that in all the organisations and I've been working as an HR consultant but a long term
ha ha invokes Anders as a self-employed person, this is by far
in the last 10 years, the happiest place I've ever been in to see people. Yes, we have some issues and some people who have memories aren't as happy as haters, but the ones I'm desperately getting hold of are the ones who are very encouraging, and it's very good support. I'm getting so far
Councillor Sankey.
thank you Chair, I just wanted to jump back on this date, the the people Strategy HR strategy, it was just this to this February, on the 11th of June, F and G, we were all told it would be ready by September, that's quite a difference just wondering why that is.
if I may, that was a draft report to first start coming through the approval process, and that's also referred to in item 9 as well, first published report were draft in September.
thank you.
Councillor Harrand,
thank you, Chair, William much was discussed about the plans, Parliament and also the high turnover, but I was interested to know what what Kanye attracts means that while I,
what is the
career career structure, the so the the career pathway has not a word, some is our local boards.
board and profession that brings them in, like they come from externally, the Land Registry or or they are always there, one in in house that broadly, is what tracks them to the wall.
I think it's a variety of things, I think, probably more than anything else, it's our reputation.
and we've we've had staff here that have come from other to inner other
councils and they actually live in the town where the council is based, but they can commute kind of up to an hour to come here just because it's it's a better place to work, so I think there is is quite a small well planning and the and reputation I think really does matter.
what I would say, on planning you know again, going back to the announcements that have been made this week.
in some places, planning for an absolutely terrible state, you know there are enormous backlogs.
and I am involved in a sort of a sort of sounding board of chief execs on planning, and you know this pot of money has been announced to try and
tackle some of those backlogs. Backlogs always come down to people. You know, it's you know how you know whether or not you've got the people in the people and processes, and I think whatever members' concerns might be about planning, I think if you look at our performance you know whether it's majors minus others, we're doing very, very well, relatively relative to elsewhere in terms of career paths, I think the
well, you know we just cannot compete with the private sector on
on on money,
but what we
can do, I think, is give people an opportunity to make a difference to be know where they live and in the local area, and I think in the in the kind of younger end of people's careers and the example I gave so one of the new starter conversations I had I spoke to a couple of people one
was formerly sort
of worked in the office at a school.
and you know that they said that you know, they'd never thought of working for a local authority, they knew someone who worked here, who'd spoken sort of well a bit about it.
I was really enjoying it, another person I spoke to Kate with had actually
joined the planning,
technical team and
the reason they joined,
was they knew that their seven predecessors had all moved on to start on the runs, you know towards becoming a plan, so I think reputation really does matter and speaks volumes.
Councillor Barrett
thanks,
you raised a dynamic problem which has been the images of career development and the limited size of services or the departments to grow.
he also mentioned that one of the mitigations for that is shared services with Mid Kent.
does that imply that there is more revenue for more combined services and, if so, which of the services is most likely to be effective,
combined, as well as give us the autonomy to make decisions and and a freedom where decisions in the future?
so I think shared services is certainly a mitigation. I guess one of the reasons you know for that. You know sort of point about people in the middle that Councillor Francis identified is that if you have kind of long servers, there's kind of fewer places for current newer entrants to CAMHS. They need to go elsewhere to grow
in terms of shared services. That would really be. You know, a matter for members. We have a
council representatives that sits on the Mid Kent services boards.
We do periodically look at other opportunities for sharing services, but that would really be a political decision based upon. You know, kind of appetite for sharing services and potentially kind of trade-offs with
you know, sovereignty and local decision making so, but it would certainly, I think, in any report we brought we brought on shared services alongside the cost savings that would certainly be in the mix as a potential benefit
any further questions before you move on to the next risk.
if it's possible, just excuse.
police,
so the other two risks that attributed to me, so one is a risk 7 and which is council accessibility, and I think this is really a political risk with a a political resolution, and I think there has been quite a bit of movement here
so we've as it says in the mitigations cabinet of holding a number of meetings across the borough and as part of that there have been questions and answer sessions we've increased consultation and engagement and there's a borough-wide survey that's only just closed as an example there, but lots of others
we are, I think we enjoy good relationships, we've got no
parish councillors round the table who can sort of confirm or deny this, but I think we've got good relationships with both Parish and Town Councils and the Town Forum and civic and amenity groups and voluntary and community sector organisations and businesses.
and I think that last point is really important, which is as part of the move towards the implementation of the Local government Boundary Commission for England review, whose we are, you know, we've got the opportunity to look at our political structures and governance arrangements and see if we want to make any changes so I wasn't planning to dwell on this because it's green
and it's pretty much at where we want it to be, so I'll pause briefly if anyone's got anything and if not, I'll go on to the next risk.
OK, I've learned when to move on quickly.
it sets the risk, 10 is sorry, sorry, I was too quick because I
sorry probably wrong for him, but just a quick one, I mean I agree with you in terms of I say, as I see it is great, but you do have any concern in terms of the fact that where we do go to public consultation that some of the times have been there we get the answers but sometimes the political the political side don't do need to take account of something else to come out of that.
I think that's probably the same or don't want to sound very Yes, Minister, but I think that's probably more a matter for kind of members than for officers, I think what I would say is that the
decision maker you know that sometimes a consultation can be in one dimension and you know decision makers have to take decisions based on you know in three dimensions and according to a variety of different sometimes competing
you know priorities or challenges.
Councillor, thank you,
thank you, I'm kind of following up from what Steve just said,
would the consultations, our the questions, how do we come about the questions, that is that from a political side or offers officers steering those? and if the officers do, we have someone that's specifically trained in that department because nervously, there are some some some issues or they have been Bishoo's had been raised, and really we need to be kind of making sure we are on point with us.
so think it depends, and I am sure Councillor Frances is going to jump in here for getting this wrong, I think, with the the borough wide survey we very much drew the questions from the the the old BVPI survey, that's going to ring a bell with you which was the best value performance indicator and a huge amount of work went into that so we pulled the questions for the borough wide survey on that.
aside from that, I think it varies on a case by case basis.
so what we're saying is that the so it can vary between the politicians creating the questions, but is there not an officer that goes Hang on a minute, yes, there are some rules and regulations we need to follow here.
and you can't just ask those you have to have this one, and if there isn't that, do you think that we should now be having? a more rigorous format for putting consultations forward and making sure that the questions are.
get more and more
of a kind of the same each time where we're always following the same
agreed schedule, that's the right phrase.
so I think as officers we'd always seek to provide advice on.
the sort of the format of the questions and making sure that they are
sort of fair, intelligible,
interoperable at the word and.
I mean re.
it it does vary, mean some say, I guess it's
some questions, you will want kind of data you can use other times, it just might be to seek a sentiment,
we do so many of these things, maybe I should go on a sort of portal and have a look I mean certainly where it's a large scale
sort of meaningful
consultation. A lot of thought goes into the questions and I gave the example of that in the borough wide survey that's going on at the moment. Similar things would hold true for kind of planning and other major pieces of engagements, but until now happening on budget survey or whatever.
We will work closely with the portfolio holder and try to be as consistent as possible. We also use a surveys as a process for helping educate the public locum finance is maybe not the easiest thing to navigate, but each year we tried to build up that information, so there's links to the side and those that want to can drill down further, to understand the services and to build up that that knowledge and data, but with the roads results. If we get a stronger support from the results, we now run the right direction. When responses Did we look into that to see what questions were people struggling with and each year? It's an iterative process to make sure there's further engagement because of the whole purpose of the consultation to get as much engagement as you can, from the public, to help them understand what we're trying to achieve, and hopefully, get a sound budget, at the end of the process.
I think
that's a really important point. Sometimes it is the question is what is the purpose? So when I came to the Town Hall last week, the you knows you came to the UK, the stairs were 2 8 0 boards full of love hearts and the economic development team had been a pub in the park. Saying to people, what do you love about Tunbridge Wells, and you know, I'm not going to per second pretend that it's in any way in is something you can hang your hat on, but I think it was really nice to get a sense of engagement and people thinking about it and so on, so it really depends on what the purposes
in the main danger now of going into the bank chair, but I just kind of one final question is is if
if we wanted to do, I think there are two different types of of consultation, there's the kind of that, the the yearly ones we do regarding the budget, and I know we're trying to do it like a borough wide survey, but then there are the the policy specific ones.
how would we go about ensuring that we have a framework and a policy around those consultations to make sure that they are built rigorously each and every single time is that something that this CAB can can put together today, or is it something that we need to move on, I'm sorry, I'm I'm asking for advice on that.
so this isn't a Cabinet Advisory Board, this is so that all its own yeah, so that that is something that would be within the locus of this committee certainly be something that Overview and Scrutiny wanted to look at, they could do that, we do have a consultation and engagement strategy and that provides an overall kind of rubric by which we would consultant engaged, so I think if you will interest in looking at this I think the most appropriate committee would be the overview and scrutiny committee.
thank you, and I'm sure that's now going to be in the minutes Chair, if you could note that for me that'll be great, thank you.
10%
Kate and Leaf the final risk was Risk 10, which is entitled demographic and service change. and I think it's really addressing two things, so it's a one is.
demographic shifts within the borough population as a whole and the second is
changes to service requirements, I think arising in particular at this time from the cost of living crisis, so if I just deal with it in those two
kind of brackets the dealing first of all with the
what sort of demographic changes I imagine this risk is driven by concern.
arising from the most recent census, which showed that our growth had been anaemic, I suppose, be the word for it, nor point 2%.
and if you look at the results of the census,
you know that there are, you know, there's a growing number of older people and a reducing number of younger people, so really that that the way in which that can be kind of managed and addressed is going to be through our planning policies and development management approaches, it is literally a question of building more homes building more, appropriate homes, it's also ensuring that we have
you know, a borough that's attractive, in terms of
you know, the services we provide, the leisure facilities available, you know countryside to walk around the shops, we've gotten, and so on.
I think one of the things we've got benefits, as there is our schools, we've got in a very high. equality schools, with what you know, strong reputations that I think and play a role in drawing people here and the second half fit, which is around changes in demand from services arising from the cost of living,
I think really.
this kind of response to that lies predominantly with central government, we just don't have the resource to
be able to manage that, but
within the kind of parameters that we can, we certainly take advantage of any funding opportunities that are out there, the mitigation mentions the household holding support fund,
there was another as another example I can give you that I became aware of today, which is there are broadband vouchers that are being issued for people who lack the means to access fast broadband, and we've been working with Kent County Council and with local housing associations to ensure that there are pushed out through housing associations and we've had the highest take-up in Kent and I think that kind of testifies to the work that staff are putting in to do that and I think the other thing
that we try to do is to work with.
Parish and Town Councils, the that the voluntary and community sector, and I think if you look at our response to Covid and homes for Ukraine, I would contend that it's unparalleled within Kent and I think that the way in which that's been delivered has been working through third parties in I can see you know Councillor McCormick is over there
we are enormously lucky
with the sort of quality and calibre and dedication and commitment of both Local representative organisations and and the voluntary and community sector, so I think we get a lot more out of.
you know our response than would otherwise be the case with without them, and I should add to that you know, organisations like
the community advice centre in palate word, citizens advice Bureau narrates all the various other organisations, the food banks, food larders and so on we work with,
any questions.
OK,
I've got under each of those points, I think, recommendations that were made or comments under eight and people.
internships, people strategy, succession planning and associated flight risks sums up all topics of conversation and under sort of the Councillor availability was the recommendation that we put overview and scrutiny structure and maybe through.
conformity of the questionnaires that the various issues
Councillor Mr.
Mejac, can I ask a question about one of the reasons it hasn't come up yet before we take a vote, if that's all right,
sorry, I was waiting for a moment just I noticed that and perhaps this is one for Lee the only movement in the risk register if I'm reading this correctly is on risk to
sorry this one, even shortfall of government funding has gone from red to amber.
can you enlighten us, please lie as to why this is reduced?
you're absolutely right, and I reduce that risk down just by virtue of the fact that the government has given us forward guidance that next year settlement is likely to follow the settlement for the current year, so I take that as no further risk that we need to perform because we're already managing the current settlement so that was the basis for reducing down that risk.
thank you.
any other questions.
OK, then, the recommendations set out in the report does the committee consider and notes the strategic risk register and your arrangements for managing the risks.
sorry, you were in the process of before, but these came in off of just going through the notes, can you just confirm those again for us, please,
yeah sorry, yeah yeah, it's she'll just to
wish we all know what we're voting on
and yeah things so. under a state which was the people,
I think
anywhere she had any recommendations there, but no the broad topic, your conversations were around internships to change perceptions, potentially start them, younger people strategy and a succession planning and then associated flight risks, so any key people that are white need to leave and how do we mitigate that under 7?
was the recommendation that we put over to Overview, Overview and Scrutiny, the borough questionnaires and surveys to make sure they
nice to have a common structure then,
and no recommendations or comments, really on 1.10?
everyone agreed with that summation.
thank you.
9 Value for Money Progress Report
the motion has been carried so under the value for money progress report report starts on page 68 of the agenda Mr. Courier, your report, please
thank you Chairman. So this report provides the Committee with a progress update of how the Council was working to address the improvement recommendations in external Water's value-for-money conclusions. There are two main reviews form the annual Audit Letter, the first is a statement of accounts and there are no issues with that, but the value for money conclusion, the auditors made three improvement recommendations and they are the first one is that the council should put together a corporate plan and, by way of a progress update the initial corporate plan was approved by Full Council on the 1st of March, and that is appended. The second improvement was that the Council should develop a savings plan and a progress update is that a draft savings plan has been produced. It's appended to the report, it's already been considered by the Cabinet Advisory Board and will go to to Cabinet on on Thursday, as we debated. The third recommendation was a people strategy to be produced and the draft first draft that is expected in September. So in conclusion, the purpose of this report is to demonstrate to the auditors and to the public that the council was taking seriously the recommendations to bring about improvement and add those key corporate documents ready in time for the next inspection. Thank you, Chairman
any questions.
OK, thank you on that basis, then I would recommend that we consider and note the progress of the addressing the improvement and recommendations from auditors value for money conclusions are we agreed?
motion carried.
10 Internal Audit Report and Opinion 2022 2023
the internal audit report and annual audit option for 2022 23. the report starts on page 97 of the agenda, Ms Wood, would you report please?
thank you Chairman,
so this report, the internal audit report, an annual audit opinion for 22 23.
he said there are three strands to this report.
the first is the annual Audit opinion that's contained within the report, the second is a summary of the work completed that supports that opinion, and the third is the statement of conformance with the Standards, so the most important part of this report is my annual Audit opinion, so in previous reports to the committee that I've outlined to you progress on delivery of our audit plan and provided updates as to the likely opinion that I'd be delivering and I'm pleased to present a positive opinion to the committee today.
so I'm just going to read you a section of my opinion, which I think is important, that we capture for the public as well, so in my opinion, Tunbridge Wells Borough Council has adequate and effective management, control and governance processes in place to manage the achievement of the objectives,
so this opinion will feed into the annual governance statement which
accompanies the statement of accounts which will see at a later date.
in my report, sections 15 to 28 to 27 sorry detail, the audit work that's been delivered, you'll say on section 15, all of the audits that we've completed that form into that opinion, and you'll notice that there were
there was only a partially weak report on one of them and there have been no critical risks identified and three high risks identified that we're working with those audit with those managers to ensure that they get the recommendations are included.
the table on
point 22 details, risks and actions that have been followed up from previous years.
of those actions that have not yet been completed.
I have a list of what they relate to for your information, so the one low risk in
risk that's not been implemented yet is on planning enforcement.
there is also one medium risk in planning enforcement,
two medium risks in building control,
one outstanding risk Medium Risk on public consultations, one of facilities management, one on budgetary control, one on procurement, so you'll see that they've got quite a broad range of services and but we're working with those Heads of Service to ensure that they get implemented as swiftly as possible.
so all of the audit work that has been completed has been delivered following the public sector internal audit standards
also included in this report for you, Annex C, on page 50,
Annex C
of the report on page 108 to well 13,
details the results of the audit work that has not already been presented to this committee
Annex D
reconciled audit plan that was approved by this Committee back in March 2022 with the work that's actually been delivered.
that's on page 118 and you'll see from that that we have completed a huge chunk of that work,
there have been a few audits that have been postponed to this financial year
and Annex E.
detailed information relating to the Mid Kent audit team,
so I'm happy to take any questions, anybody's got any.
thank you, members, any questions or comments.
Councillor Rahman, could you give me a bit more detail about the enforcement to one suitor mentioned by the force?
on when planning thank
you, I wondered if it may come up, please bear with me, I may have some information I can share.
so.
yet a Planning Enforcement the lowest recommendation relates to procedure notes for new starters, I think, actually practising quite nicely with what we were saying about staff retention and making sure that they are they're aware of what's going on.
and the medium risk recommendation. I don't have to hand on what that is, but I believe it is a follow up on some of those
procedural notes and the approach.
to delivering that, it's been results.
resource issues are the reasons why they haven't been implemented, that's the reasons why they are still outstanding at this moment in time.
to make sure there is a risk, as I understand a resource issue has been a major issue for enforcement for a while period of time or a banal kind of get ready by you've got a major missing, I've got a high risk because I think for some it's one of the things that we as a as a as a as a borough council need to be seen to be doing the right thing by enforcement.
when it went when people are breaking the rules, there seemed to be that there is enforcement, or at least some some sort of action takes place on, I'm slightly concerned, we've got a medium risk, I think, is a bit of a high-risk.
the risk itself wasn't about the resources.
the reason the risk hasn't been, the action hasn't been implemented is due to resources.
any other comments, Christians.
Kasimpasa
might be a bit
much 34 acres last all last stone port you raise, I mentioned safeguarding as having a
was last done in 2016 2017 and was a week and you were raised that wasn't one of our party members, waste that with you and I come to, where we were with the can, you would call
I can and I can give you an update
safeguarding audit is in this year's plan,
so it was approved at their March meeting and my auditor has started some work on that we're doing safeguarding audits across all three of the three of our partners as well, so that's a piece of work that we'll be doing and that will be done that hopefully over this summer.
Councillor Liston
enjoyed, given the debate we've been having about consultations, what can you advise us, what the risk medium risk was on consultations, please Catherine.
I can, and I think this may
chime with a few of you, the risk was relating to ensuring consultations, follow a consistent practice.
interesting.
I guess perhaps we obviously attempted action from this evening's meeting, but perhaps we could have discussions with the officers on that and see if, if it may well be something that's in hand already, and we don't need to necessarily bring before meeting
potentially,
yeah, it's certainly something that we're in the process of following up with Department so.
regardless of the
the where it's raised and what committee is raised and we can feed back, and we can hopefully bring a positive conclusion to that so that we might not need to progress it as as far as beverage scrutiny committee or we can share with the Overview and Scrutiny Committee the findings from this audit report that was undertaken,
I thank you for any other questions.
independent member Elliott,
thank you.
on paragraph 22, he's got the table of outstanding actions,
I opening balance of 18 medium and 19 lie
more low ones, have been handled the medium
by Ted risks that because that's low hanging fruit or just because they've been prioritised over the medium ones,
I think that's probably a fair synopsis, and quite often the below respond that easier to just to tick off their small changes that require little effort. I think are more often than not the medium recent, certainly where there are high risks. Obviously they weren't in the previous years, but there have been three identified from the last year.
We do tend to try and
accompany actions and recommendations with timeframes that we would like them to be completed in. It's not always possible. You know there are. There are many reasons that things are deferred, but I think in terms of some of those medium ones that have not yet been actioned. Primarily, it's resource related issues as reason why they're not implemented
thank you.
any further.
OK.
do we have any recommendations from that I think we'd already had already discussed, so
the recommendation set out in the report that the audit and governance committee note the Head of Audit and Partnership opinion put one or two, that the audit and governance committee note the work underlying the option, so the opinion and that the Head of the Audit Partnership assurance of its independence completion
in conformance with the proper standards,
yeah
sorry combined to ask that we have Councillor Liz Townsend, Katherine's question and answers just noted and highlighted.
but you could say I'm going with this, but if we can't let it be grown, it's
all gonna be reported at minute, thank you.
we agreed
a great degree motion is carried.
11 Urgent Business
item 11 urgent business. I can confirm there's no urgent business for this evening
12 Date of Next Meeting Tuesday 19 September 2023
item 12, the date of the next meeting is the 19th of September 2023,
the meeting is now closed and thank you for your attendance,
thank you, Chair
- 1 Chairs Introduction, opens in new tab
- 2 Apologies for Absence, opens in new tab
- 3 Declarations of Interest, opens in new tab
- 4 Notification of Persons Registered to Speak, opens in new tab
- Minutes , 14/03/2023 Audit and Governance Committee, opens in new tab
- AG Work Program as at 14 March 2023, opens in new tab
- External Audit Plan 2022_23, opens in new tab
- Appendix A, opens in new tab
- Strategic Risk Review June 2023, opens in new tab
- Appendix A, opens in new tab
- VFM Progress Report, opens in new tab
- Appendix A, opens in new tab
- Appendix B Draft savings plan 22_24, opens in new tab
- TWBC Cover Report - Internal Audit Report and Opinion 2223, opens in new tab
- Appendix A, opens in new tab
- 14 Urgent Business, opens in new tab
- 15 Date of the Next Meeting, opens in new tab