Agenda, decisions and minutes

At the Annual Meeting, Council determined that the Independent Alliance Group will chair this Committee. The Committee is advised that Councillor Rosetta Dolphin is the Chair of the Committee for the municipal year.

That the appointment of Councillor Rosetta Dolphin as Chair of the Committee be noted.

The Facilitator advised that it had been confirmed at the Annual Meeting of the County Council that the Chair of the Committee should come from the Independent Alliance Group.  The Committee was advised that Councillor Rosetta Dolphin had been appointed to this role for the municipal year.

RESOLVED:

That the appointment of Councillor Rosetta Dolphin as Chair of the Committee be noted.

To appoint a Vice-Chair for the Committee.

That Councillor David Evans be appointed Vice-Chair of the Committee.

Councillor Joe Johnson nominated Councillor David Evans as Vice-Chair of the Committee and this was seconded by Councillor Paul Shotton.  There were no further nominations.  On being put to the vote, this was carried.

RESOLVED:

That Councillor David Evans be appointed Vice-Chair of the Committee.

To receive any Declarations and advise Members accordingly.

None.

None were received.

To confirm as a correct record the minutes of the meeting held on 13 July 2020.

That the minutes be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chair.

The minutes of the meeting held on 13 July 2020 were approved, as moved and seconded by Councillors Sean Bibby and Chris Dolphin.

RESOLVED:

That the minutes be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chair.

To update on the latest position and the risks and implications for Flintshire and service and business continuity.

Noted.

The Chief Executive explained that the current situation was fluid. He and his Chief Officer colleagues would be ensuring that Members received short up to date verbal briefings at the start of meetings. He also commented that it may yet be necessary to reinstate the situational briefings which had been delivered to members during the first six months of the emergency.

RESOLVED:

Noted.

That the terms of reference, as agreed by Council and appended to the report, be noted.

The Head of Democratic Services introduced the report on the Terms of Reference of the Committee advising that all of the Committees have been changed as a result of the review.  The following Regeneration Services have been transferred to this Committee from the former Community & Enterprise Committee:-

·         Communities First

·         Economic Development and Tourism

·         Enterprise

·         Regeneration Partnership

·         Rural Development Plan

·         Visit Wales

The recommendations in the report were moved byCouncillor Paul Shotton and seconded by Councillor Sean Bibby

            RESOLVED:

That the terms of reference, as agreed by Council and appended to the report, be noted.

(a)       That the full set of immediate strategic priorities for recovery of the portfolio as set out in the report be agreed, together with the risk analysis and mitigating actions both live and planned; and

(b)       That a forward work programme for the Committee be rebuilt for the remainder of the 2020/21 Council year with recovery planning at its core.

The Chief Executive presented a report to provide the Committee with oversight of recovery planning for its portfolio areas as part of the strategy for the resumption of full democratic governance.  Feedback from each of the Overview & Scrutiny committees on the risk registers, recovery priorities and revised performance indicator targets for their respective areas would be reported to Cabinet prior to publication of a full Recovery Strategy.

A presentation showing the handover from response to recovery covered the following points:

·         Recommendations from Cabinet

·         Objectives of the Recovery Strategy

·         Response Objectives

·         Examples of local achievements in Response

·         Recovery - handover arrangements

·         Regional and Local Recovery Structures

·         Recovery Objectives - Services

·         Recovery Activities

·         Community Recovery

·         Council Plan and Performance

·         Democratic Governance of Recovery

The Chief Officer (Planning, Environment & Economy) went through the Community Recovery section of the report, which had been split into two sub-groups Economy and Vulnerability and Poverty.  He gave further background to the Sub-Regional Community Recovery group, which is a joint Public Service Board initiative between Flintshire and Wrexham.  Four recovery themes had been identified for action and he advised that this was Joint Lead for the   Environment and Carbon Reduction workstreams.  He gave two examples of what they proposed to do to help the Environment; Green Spaces which was to improve the quality, provision usage, accessibility to  promote green spaces and secondly Carbon Reduction to address the challenges of climate change at a local level.

The Chief Executive referred to the Council Plan that was refreshed on an annual basis but due to the emergency disruption, which kicked in mid-March, was not presented in April.  He explained that Cabinet had extracted from it and updated the key things that were essential to recovery between now and next Spring when the Council and its Services would hopefully be re-stabilised due to the massive disruption and produced a draft Council Plan attached to the report

Also attached was an updated version of the Key Performance Indicators relating to the two portfolios indicating where changes had to be made to ambition and targeting in year due to the interruption by the emergency or by some of the data that no longer applied.

The Chief Officer (Planning, Environment & Economy) explained the format of the report which was purely based on the Recovery of Planning, Environment and Economy together with 4 appendices attached.  He made reference to the 14 recovery objectives that were listed which were set in July 2020 some of which had already been addressed.

He reported that the bulk of the portfolio were not identified as critical services, although still working, with the exception of Trading Standards, Licensing, Environmental Health Functions and Food Safety Functions as well as Health and Safety who were assisting the establishment of PPE model which all had to continue.

He pointed out the risks:-

·         20 open risks spilt over Portfolio Management, Workforce, External Regulations, ICT & Systems; Portfolio Service and Performance

·         Specific Recovery risks shown as *

·         Number of red risks reduced by 20% since  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.

(a)       That the full set of immediate strategic priorities for recovery of the portfolio as set out in the report be agreed, together with the risk analysis and mitigating actions both live and planned; and

(b)       That a forward work programme for the Committee be rebuilt for the remainder of the 2020/21 Council year with recovery planning at its core.

The Chief Officer (Streetscene & Transportation) gave a presentation which provided background on risks had been identified.  Together with his Senior Management Team they had identified 47 different risks across Finance, Workforce, Property Assets, Governance/Legal, External Regulation, ICT & Systems, Service Delivery, Highway Policy, Fleet, Waste Strategy and Parking and Enforcement of which 2 had been closed but were reviewed weekly.  Moving into winter months new risks were emerging and would continue to be monitored. 

He provided further information on the following specific areas:-

Finance

ST09 – Market for resale of recycled material extremely volatile.  Reporting that there are huge swings in the prices they receive for plastic, paper and glass etc and unfortunately most of them are slipping creating a substantial pressure for business but also creating issues for staff in finding ready markets for the material. 

ST10a – Overall waste arising up by between 10 – 20% due in part to the number of people working from home, spending more time at home and not going on holidays resulting in waste not being taken elsewhere.  Tonnage is up which is  causing pressure in terms of additional gate fee but also more work for the staff when collecting waste on the side of the road.

Workforce

ST12 – Reduced numbers of frontline workers and contractors to deliver services safely due to increased sickness levels.

ST17a – Increased risk of ill health due to mental health and well-being, personal and/or family issues.

            Councillor Paul Shotton thanked Streetscene for returning to a more normal situation particularly on grass cutting in his area.  He advised that the Interim Supervisor had been in touch with Connah’s Quay Members to put forward their areas which were in need of a serious clean up similar to the one that happened in Shotton.

            Councillor Carolyn Thomas advised of a Recycling Campaign that Welsh Government were launching, working in partnership with Local Authorities called ‘Be Mighty Recycle Campaign’. She added there would be a lot of publicity about it to encourage people to recycle and get the rates back up again which would hopefully stop littering as well.

            The Chair asked a question about the second recommendation.  She questioned what would happen to everything else that would have been part of the Forward Work Programme.  The Head of Democratic Services advised that a member of his team had been identifying items which were in the Forward Work Programme of both the former Environment and Community and Enterprise Overview & Scrutiny Committees with regard to ongoing items which would be fed into the forward work programme for the Committee.  There would be an emphasis on recovery items but the forward work programme would also recognise that regular items do still need to come to Committee and also issues dealing with regulatory functions.

The Chief Executive added that thought was needed to be given about risks that the Chief Officer (Planning, Environment & Economy) and the Chief Officer (Streetscene & Transportation) had highlighted as they also figured in the immediate Forward Work Programme  ...  view the full minutes text for item 8.

There were no members of the press and public in attendance.