The Chairman welcomed all to the meeting.

To receive any apologies for absence.

No Apologies for Absence were received.

To receive any declarations of interest.

No Declarations of interest were received.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: Order of Agenda to be changed.

The meeting will commence with a presentation by the Chief Constable.

Any questions by Panel Members that have been submitted in advance of the meeting will then be considered and answered.

The Police and Crime Commissioner introduced himself and gave his last presentation to the Panel as he was retiring at the end of the municipal year. Anthony Stansfeld informed the Panel of his role and responsibilities including holding the Chief Constable to account for policing, developing and publishing a police and crime plan and explained scrutinising, supporting and challenging performance, were just a few of his duties. Anthony Stansfeld informed the Panel that Thames Valley Police were the largest non-metropolitan police force covering three major counties serving 2.3-2.4 million people, being the fourth largest police force. The presentation covered strategic priorities from the Thames Valley Police and Crime Plan 2017-2021 such as prevention and early intervention, vulnerability, police ethics and reform, serious organised crime and terrorism and reducing re-offending.

Anthony Stansfeld highlighted that £2.7 million was spent on the community safety fund providing councils to help deliver crime reduction, prevention and support services, nearly £3 million supporting victims of crime across the Thames Valley and £199K awarded from the Police Property Act Fund in 2018/19 to charities and community groups who assist in reducing crime and reoffending.

Anthony Stansfeld went through the 2018/19 crime performance headlines and the call response performance.

Questions asked by the Panel included the following:

Parish Councillor Pat McDonald asked how many officers had been lost since 2010? Anthony Stansfeld responded that 690 officers had been lost. Councillor Price asked about the 101 response time and the aim being to respond within two minutes. Anthony Stansfeld responded that the shorter the response time, the better it was.

Councillor Bowden commented that no fraud figures had been included in the presentation, were these recorded? Anthony Stansfeld confirmed that the figures had not been reported in the figures shown. The Serious Fraud Office was seriously underfunded. However £16 million had been spent with Action Fraud. All monies went back to the Treasury and not to the force. Councillor Bowden asked if the figures could be extracted from Action Fraud and feed back into TVP. Parish Councillor Margaret Lenton asked what was being done about the elderly losing smaller amounts of money and was advised that a large amount of preventative education was being done to seek to reduce the number of incidents.

The Chief Constable, John Campbell, QPM, gave a presentation to the Panel. John Campbell reported that TVP had maintained neighbourhood forces and then went through the priority outcomes 2019/20, call volumes, it was reported that as of 10 July 2019, the average time to answer 101 calls was two minutes and 45.6 seconds. John Campbell reported that 23 officers had been assaulted during use of force incident in the borough. Six officers had been spat at in the borough and two officers had been exposed to blood borne virus risk in the borough. John Campbell explained the key crime areas in detail and went through the reasons for the change.

The LPA Commander Superintendent Colin Hudson went through the ‘local issues’ slides explaining that many burglaries  ...  view the full minutes text for item 17.

To receive an update and summary of progress of Braywick Leisure Centre.

Julian Bullen, Project Development manager, went through a short background for Members reminding them that there would be a ten lane pool, 200 gym stations and many other new and increased facilities. The schedule was on programme and progressing very well. The roof was in the process of going on. Julian Bullen informed the Panel that once the centre was weather tight then a more confident completion date would be known. The roof was expected to be completed December 2019/January 2020. The project was on budget. The new Braywick Leisure Centre would be using 75% less energy than the current Magnet Leisure Centre. Braywick Leisure Centre car park would include electric charging points. Julian Bullen advised the Panel that the team were already planning the transfer from the Magnet Leisure Centre to the Braywick Leisure Centre, 2020 would be 45 years since the Magnet opened its doors. The hoardings would soon be removed along the Braywick Road to open up the site from the road now the building was well advanced. so people could see the development progressing.

ACTION: Add to next meeting agenda for a further update.

To agree the minutes of the last meeting held on 10 June 2019.

Councillor Price asked for clarification on whether a further update from SportsAble in January 2020 was necessary as one was given only at the last meeting. David Scott informed the Panel that the update at the last meeting was almost six months overdue and a further update was required in January 2020 to inform the Panel of where the funding was being used in the second year of their Service Level Agreement for funding for 2019.

RESOLVED Unanimously: The minutes of the meeting held on 10 June 2019 were approved as a true and correct record.

To consider the report.

Nikki Craig, Head of HR and Corporate Projects, updated the Panel on the Annual Complaints and Compliments Report.

Nikki Craig reported that the annual report covered the period April 2018 to March 2019.

Council’s are required under statute to produce a report for adults and children’s complaints, but not on complaints relating to corporative activities, however the Royal Borough’s annual report covers all services. 

The council’s complaints process was made up of various stages depending on the type of complaint, with the complainant being able to take it to the local government and social care ombudsman if they remained dissatisfied once the councils process had been exhausted.

In 2018/19, overall out of over 1600 contacts made to the council’s compliments and complaints team, 437 were progressed as complaints.  Of these, 63 were for services covered by this O&S with 25 for communities, enforcement and partnerships and 38 for library and resident services.  These combined made up 17% of the total complaints progressed.

Themes of complaints were self-selected by the complainant with the main reasons in 2018/19 being ‘lack of action’ (we did not do what we said we would do) and ‘requiring help, intervention or guidance’.  These scored similarly to ‘attitude or behaviour of staff’ and ‘failed to follow timescales’.

Timeliness in responding to complaints had improved for the council from 51% in 2017/18 to 64% in 2018/19. Performance for these two services in responding within timescales is higher than the council average with Communities, enforcement and partnerships responding to 76% of complaints within timescales and libraries and resident services responding to 87% of complaints within timescales.

In relation to outcomes the council upheld or partially upheld 67% of all complaints; CEP upheld less than the council average at 52% and library and resident services upheld more than the council average, at 87%.  Learnings were taken from complaints upheld and partially upheld with some examples detailed in the annual report (p39) Table 15.

If a complainant remained dissatisfied, they could complain to the LGSCO.  Of the 44 complaints and enquiries escalated to the LGSCO, none were for library and resident services, 4 related to CEP, two of which were referred back for local resolution and two were closed after initial investigations.

Finally, the council had seen an increase in compliments from 456 in 2017/18 to 555 in 2018/19.  Of the 555, 73 were received by CEP and 225 were received by library and resident services including compliments for community wardens, registrars and libraries.  Examples are detailed in the annual report (p40) in table 17.

The Panel made the following comments:

·         The name change had allowed residents to complain and give compliments.

·         Councillor Price asked if our performance could be compared to other Local Authorities to measure performance. Officers would look into this for next year's annual report.

·         Councillor Bhangra asked what the turnaround time was for an enquiry/complaint to be resolved. Nikki Craig informed the Panel that the council policy was that these should take no longer than ten  ...  view the full minutes text for item 20.

To Consider the report.

Anna Robinson, Strategy and Performance Manager, outlined the main points from the report. The red and amber measures were discussed. The Panel commented that the report was a lot easier to understand, actually seeing what was going on but the graphs were still unreadable. David Scott informed the Panel that the amber measure, (CEP_2) No. attendances at leisure centres, that it was anticipated this would be back on track by the end of the current quarter.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That the Panel noted the report, noted the 2019/20 Strategic Performance Framework in Appendix A, noted the 2019/20 Q1 Communities Overview and Scrutiny Panel Performance Report in Appendix B and requested relevant Lead Members, Directors and Heads of Service to maintain focus on improving performance.

The Chairman thanked Anna Robinson for all her hard work in RBWM and wished her all the best in her new job.

To receive a progress update on the implementation of the integrated Hostile Vehicle Mitigation (HMV) measures capital programme.

David Scott, Head of Communities, Enforcement & Partnerships, informed the Panel that first site works would begin on 23 September 2019 and would be completed in time for the Christmas events. The public engagement events carried out were very positive. The final detail was still being finalised about the opening and closing of the gates at the top of Peascod Street and the installation on Victoria Street had been adjusted. The subsequent installation of Phase 1 works were planned to be completed by end of March 20202.

ACTION: Included pictures from David Scott

ACTION: Highways to respond on why there are temporary traffic lights on Victoria Street.

Post Meeting Note: These lights are in operation during the day to facilitate the crossing point whilst the building site is in operation and to protect the public whilst site vehicles were entering and leaving the construction site to the south Victoria Street at the corner with Sheet Street.

David Scott informed the Panel that Phase 1 was to protect the guard route. The Panel were informed that the side panels to the removed Peascod Street gateway would be preserved and stored to re-use at a later date in a suitable location.

To Receive a presentation on the work of the Community Wardens.

Chris Nash, Community Protection Principal, gave a presentation to the Panel about the work of the Community Wardens. Presentation Attached.

ACTION: Community Wardens to meet their Ward Members.

ACTION: Chris Nash to provide contact details of Community Wardens to Ward Members.

ACTION: Local Community Wardens to keep Members and Parish Councillors posted of things the Community Wardens were doing in their local areas.

Parish Councillors were very complimentary about the community wardens and their presence in the community.

Councillor Price asked if performance could be measured. Chris Nash informed the Panel that there were two metrics, keeping the residents safe and keeping the residents feeling safe. All regular police meetings were attended and we had the same priorities as Thames Valley Police.

The information could be captured.

Councillor Price referred back to Councillor Davies' original request of CCTV verses Community Wardens, Chris Nash explained to the Panel that it was a joint effort, both worked hand in hand, the Control Room would capture an incident and the CCTV would then take over and monitor the incident and liaise with the Police as necessary.

Panel to consider the forward work programme for 2019/20.

The Panel discussed if a task and finish group needed to work closer with the community groups to provide more service. The One Borough Group was an excellent example. The Panel felt that it should know what groups there were and work more closely with them. David Scott suggested that this be discussed at the One Borough Group at their next meeting in December and bring back to the January Panel.

ACTION: One Borough Group views and details to be reported back at the next Panel