Meeting documents

There were no apologies or changes in membership.

To disclose any Personal or Disclosable Pecuniary Interests

There were no declarations of interest.

To agree the minutes of the meeting held on Tuesday 29 September 2015 and the special FPR Committee meeting held on Tuesday 13 October 2015.

The minutes of the meeting held on Tuesday 29 September 2015 were agreed as a correct record, subject to Richard Ambrose’s attendance being recorded.

The minutes of the special FPR Committee meeting held on Tuesday 13 October 2015 were agreed as a correct record.

Public Questions is an opportunity for people who live, work or study in the county to put a question to a Scrutiny Committee about any issue that has an impact on their local community or the county as a whole.

Members of public, who have given prior notice, will be invited to put their question in person.

The Cabinet Member and responsible officers will then be invited to respond. 

Further information and details on how to register can be found through the following link:-

http://www.buckscc.gov.uk/about-your-council/scrutiny/get-involved/

There were no public questions.

For the Chairman of the Committee to provide an update to the Committee on recent scrutiny related activity.

The Chairman asked Steven Lambert to update Members on the Cabinet’s response to the Rent-in-Advance Inquiry.  Mr Lambert reported that the report was well received by Cabinet and the recommendations were agreed.

Mr Bendyshe-Brown commented that it was an excellent report and welcomed the review of the county council’s policy on the use of the emergency local support budget.  Mr Chapple went on to say that the Inquiry had been an excellent fact-finding exercise and suggested that the report should be shared with other local authorities.

To be provided with a briefing and update on the County Council’s approach to providing funding to voluntary sector organisations.

Attendees

Chris Walkling, Policy Officer (Voluntary Sector)

The Chairman welcomed Chris Walkling, policy officer for the voluntary sector and James Sainsbury, Head of Strategic Commissioning.

During the presentation, the following points were noted.

·        Voluntary and Community sector organisations (VCS) are not-for-profit organisations, charities and community groups.  This also includes housing associations as they are categorised as charities which explains why the volume of spend is particularly high.  

·        The paper looks at trends in funding to the voluntary sector and the Impact Assessment process which is carried out as part of the MTP (Medium Term Planning) process.

·        Regardless of whether it is a grant or a contract, the process is the same with a focus on transparency.

·        Recently there has been a change in standing orders and the threshold for going out to tender has increased from £50k to a new threshold of £173k which has had a significant impact on the voluntary sector.

·        There has been a trend over the last seven years with a move away from grants to contracts.  Contracts are more binding and can be monitored. 

·        The council is developing its social value and looking at how it impacts on the VCS. 

·        Bucks Learning Trust received a very substantial grant which has now changed into a contract so this organisation will not appear in the grants to VCS list in future.

·        209 vendors fit the profile of VCS organisations.

·        Equality Impact Assessments form part of the MTP process and the threshold for conducting an EIA differs as it is very resource intense.

During discussion, the following questions were asked.

·        A Member asked when decisions around cutting funding to a VCS take place and asked for reassurance that organisations affected by any funding decisions are given sufficient advance notice.  Decisions are made by the commissioners who know when contracts are about to come to an end and organisations would normally be given at least three months’ notice of any changes to their funding.  The annual budget scrutiny process provides an opportunity for decisions to be challenged.

·        Why is the Citizen Advice Bureau’s Money Advice Project listed under a number of service areas and does the funding relate to the same project? It is one piece of work where the total amount of funding is £50k, but it is jointly funded by the service areas.

·        How does the budget freeze which was announced recently affect the VCS?  The VCS budget is set at the beginning of the financial year and payment is made upfront to the organisations so there should not be any immediate impact on the VCS.  There are break clauses written into the agreement but the shortest break clause is six months.

·        How and when are local Members involved in the process around commissioning to VCS organisations in their own area?  Within the commissioning framework, commissioners are asked to consult with local members and there is training around engaging with local    members.

·        For the last two years, Members of the budget scrutiny have requested that there be more flexibility around the threshold for  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

For the Committee to consider a progress report provided by the Cabinet Member for Community Engagement on the implementation of recommendations that were accepted by Cabinet.

Attendees

Martin Phillips, Cabinet Member for Community Engagement

Chris Walkling, Policy Officer (Voluntary Sector)

The Chairman welcomed Janice Moore, Anna Colonesse and Chris Walkling to the meeting to provide a six months progress report on the crisis support inquiry.  It was noted that the responsibility for delivering on the outcomes falls across three different council service areas. 

There has been progress against most of the recommendations.  Some of the recommendations were going to be delivered through the Bucks Network and the county council can no longer provide secretariat for this forum.  This forum has been renamed to the Bucks Network Welfare Reform Group which is being chaired by Mike Veriyard.  A meeting is due to take place at end of November.  It was agreed that this would be the best vehicle for moving forward on the three recommendations. 

During discussion, the following questions were asked.

·        How much money has been provided to central aid and how many food parcels have they delivered to the rural parts of the county?  Central Aid has only just started delivering to the rural areas so it is early days but the parcels are put together by the  One Can Trust.  It is a work in progress.

·        Members asked to see a copy of the activity plan to promote Credit Unions.  This will be circulated to Members after the meeting.  Libraries are being used as part of the promotion plan.

·        Members asked for further clarification around how the subordinated loans will work and how the money will be recycled.  It was agreed to invite the Cabinet Member and Finance Director to provide a fuller response on this – either in writing or by attending the December meeting.

Action: Cabinet Member/Finance Director

·        Committee Members assigned a RAG status to the recommendations which will be attached to the minutes.

SEE PAPERS AND WEBCAST FOR FULL CONTENT

The purpose of this item is for Members to get an update on the County Council’s Digital Strategy.  

Attendees:

Matthew Cain, Head of Digital

The Chairman welcomed Matthew Cain, Head of Digital Strategy, to the meeting.  During the presentation, the following main points were made.

·        Great progress has been made particularly with the launch of a new system in the contact centre.

·        The customer journey needs to be fit for purpose and there needs to be a redesigning of council services to make them more digital.

During discussion, Members asked questions around the following areas:

·        Use of live chat;

·        Bringing together of TfB’s website and the council’s main website;

·        Devolution of services and maintaining a good customer journey;

·        Frequency of mystery shoppers to monitor the call holding times and the re-introduction of the name recognition service;

·        Lessons learnt from other authorities and what "good" looks like;

·        A Member commented on the recent excellent Member briefing on the digital strategy.

It was agreed to invite Matthew Cain to a Committee meeting early next year to provide a progress report on the areas mentioned above.

SEE PAPERS AND WEBCAST FOR FULL CONTENT

The purpose of this item is to enable the Committee to ask any questions in relation to the Quarter 2 Balanced Scorecard and Joint Budget Monitoring Report.

Cabinet will consider the Quarter 2 reports at its meeting on 9 November 2015. Members of the Committee are invited to watch the webcast of this meeting to hear the debate to inform lines of questioning. http://www.buckscc.public-i.tv/core/portal/home

Attendees:

Richard Schmidt, Head of Strategic Finance

John Chilver, Cabinet Member for Resources (apologies received)

The Chairman welcomed Richard Schmidt, Head of Strategic Finance and Kevin Wright from the HQ Business Intelligence team to the meeting.

During the presentation, the following main points were made.

·         The balanced performance scorecard and joint monitoring budget monitoring report Q2 were discussed at the recent Cabinet meeting.  The scorecard shows the council has an overspend position.

·         The council is experiencing considerable demographic pressures, particularly within Adult Social Care and Children’s Services.

·         The Future Shape restructuring has had an impact within the property services.

·          Overall, 44% of the council’s indicators are green, 25% of the performance indicators are amber.

During discussion, Members asked the following questions.

·         What will the impact of the recent budget freeze have on the scorecard?  The report was written before the budget freeze on non-essential spend was announced so it is not reflected in this but Business Units will be asked to report back on the implications.  By trimming non-essential spend, the aim is to bring the budget back on target.

·         A Member asked for clarification about the demographic pressures within children’s services and what is causing this.  The mix of the population is changing.  The increased media attention around Children’s Services puts more demand on the service and support agencies.  Staffing issues, in terms of recruitment and retention, have placed enormous challenges for some service areas and these areas are actively working to address this.

·         There is a gap between the strategic plan and the results of the Q2 ratings, why were the Cabinet Member’s not flagging these issues earlier?  At Q1, the financial overspend was emerging, but what is becoming apparent are the continuing pressures and some of these pressures are proving harder to find solutions for and alternative solutions are being looked into. The aim is to minimise the impact on performance.

·         Is the council in a crisis situation?  The budget freeze is about stopping non–essential spend rather than stopping essential spend. It is not a crisis situation.

·         Last year, the council was looking at a 4% shift in the budget into the areas which had an overspend.  With this current freeze on non-essential spending, will the budget be back in black by the end of the year?  The council is taking corrective action so that it will be "in the black" by the end of the financial year.  The council has a good track record of delivering against the targets.

·         In terms of the recruitment freeze, last year the budget scrutiny inquiry recommended a reduction of agency staff and an increase in permanent staff so how will the freeze affect the agency staff costs?  The officer was unable to comment on the exact reasons around the falls and the rise of agency staff but there can be some fluctuations between quarters. 

·         Concern was expressed about making people redundant and then bringing in agency staff to fill the gap.  In social care, progress has been made in recruiting permanent staff to avoid the use of agency staff.  

·         This issue will be discussed in  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9.

To note the Finance, Performance and Resources Select Committee Work Programme 2015/16

Members noted the work programme.  An update Crisis Support will be added to the December agenda and an update on the Digital Strategy will be added to the work programme for the March meeting.

Action: Liz Wheaton

The next meeting is due to take place on Tuesday 15 December 2015 in Mezz 2, County Hall, Aylesbury.

The next meeting will take place on Tuesday 15 December 2015.

To provide the Committee with a briefing and update on the pressures on the adult social care budget in advance of the FPR Committee’s budget scrutiny inquiry.

Attendees:

Mike Appleyard, Cabinet Member for Health and Wellbeing

Adrian Isaacs, Financial Director CHASC or

Rachel Rothero, Service Director CHASC

The Chairman welcomed Mike Appleyard, Cabinet Member for Adults and Social Care, Rachel Rothero, Service Director and Adrian Isaacs, Service Finance Manager. 

During the presentation, the following points were made.

·         Pressures on residential care costs have reached the point where the costs cannot be reduced any more. 

·         The Capita report made some recommendations which have already been exhausted so looking for alternative solutions.

·         New responsibilities under the Care Act. Care Quality Commission  point(CQC) for market oversight and Local Authorities for continuity of services if a provider / facility fails.

·         The care market seeing a polarisation between self-funders and Local Authority (LA) funded. LA’s are effectively competing with self-funders and Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCG’s). Limitations in the market are staffing availability. Biggest risks are linked to supply of nursing and care staff and financially the introduction of the national living wage and how this will be funded. New entries into the market are targeting self-funders. However Local Authority is still biggest purchaser.

·         New respite responsibilities driving up demand for short term placements.

·         Costs associated with using agency staff is still a major issue for the service.  More social workers and nurses are needed in the system.

·         Looking at alternative solutions to the housing problem – retirement villages.

·         The service has to find savings of around £5-6m of which some will come from the commissioning process.

During discussion, the following areas of concern were raised by members:

·         Nursing homes should be asked to contribute to the increased costs of care.

·         With providers looking to do things differently, will this have an impact on the quality of the service.

·         Concern over whether the service currently has the resources to deliver its future plans.

SEE PAPERS AND WEBCAST FOR FULL CONTENT

To consider the confidential appendix on financial pressures in adult social care.

Members discussed the confidential appendices relating to the financial pressures on Adult Social Care.