Agenda item

The Corporate Performance Report provides an analysis of the Council’s performance for the first quarter of 2019-20. The report, set out at Annexe 1, is being presented to each of the Overview and Scrutiny Committees for comment and any recommendations they may wish to make to senior management or  the Executive.

Recommendation

It is recommended that the Overview & Scrutiny Committee considers the performance of the service areas under its remit as set out in Annexe 1 to this report and makes any recommendations to senior management or the Executive as appropriate.

The Chairman invited each Head of Service to summarise the Quarter 1 performance for their service area.

Business Transformation

David Allum, Head of Business Transformation, advised that the main focus for this service area over the last quarter had been developing the business transformation programme, including the customer service project. With regard to the two outstanding service plan actions, he explained that he was still awaiting the outcome the ‘One Public Estate’ funding bid in relation the review of the council office accommodation; and work was progressing more slowly than anticipated on the IT systems for Building Control and Planning.

In response to further questions from the Committee, David advised that the Planning IT system that this action related to was a new back-office system, not the documents portal on the website. He was, however, aware of some issues with this system too and advised Members that the IT team was working with the supplier to address these problems. The Committee therefore requested an update on when these would be resolved. Members agreed that the IT issues in Planning needed to be prioritised, and the Chairman agreed to liaise with the Chairman of the Environment O&S Committee via the O&S Coordinating Board, to ask for more details about the time and cost implications for the delay in implementing the new back-office system.

Finance and Property

Peter Vickers, Head of Finance and Property, summarised the highlights for the first quarter of 2019/20. The final accounts had been approved and published, achieving the 31 July deadline despite a last minute change to the external audit team. The majority of KPIs and service plan actions were green; Peter advised that action F7.1, relating to the Agresso financial IT system, had been transferred to the Business Transformation Programme. The finance summary was showing an adverse projection due to a void property in the council’s investment portfolio.

Policy and Governance

Robin Taylor, Head of Policy and Governance, explained that the focus of Quarter 1 had been on the Borough, Town and Parish elections, as well as preparation for the European elections. The induction programme for new councillors had also been successfully delivered. The implementation of the HR Strategy continued well, with the digitisation of HR paperwork. The KPIs showed an increase in sickness absence across the whole organisation but Robin assured the Committee that steps were being taken to address this.

Members were very concerned by the trend in long term sickness and the Committee agreed that this should be highlighted to the Executive. It was noted there had been an increase in mental health related issues, and Robin advised that the council was currently delivering a number of health and wellbeing initiatives to help address this.

Cllr Davidson highlighted that absences could sometimes be linked to low morale. The Committee noted that a staff survey had recently been undertaken and suggested that this might provide some insight into reasons for absence. Robin advised that the results of the survey had been generally positive, but had highlighted some areas to work on. He agreed to bring a report to the next meeting, summarising the results of the staff survey and drawing out any links to staff morale and sickness absence.