To receive any apologies for absence.

An apology for absence was received from Councillor L Jones. Councillor Knowles was attending the meeting as a substitute.

To receive any declarations of interest.

There were no declarations of interest received.

To consider the Part I minutes of the meeting held on 12^th September 2022.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That the Part I minutes from the meeting held on 12^th September 2022 were approved as a true and accurate record.

Councillor Walters commented on the situation with new home bonuses, this was an area of potential income for the council.

Adele Taylor, Executive Director of Resources, said that there had been no mention of a new homes bonus from the government and this was unlikely until at least the local government finance settlement had been confirmed. She would let Members know once she was aware.

To consider the report.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That the order of agenda items was changed, so that the Corporate Plan 2021-26 Performance Report was considered first.

Rachel Kinniburgh, Service Lead – Strategic Policy, Performance and Insights, outlined the report. This was the second performance report which the Panel had considered and was reflective of performance up until 30^th September 2022. The report structure had been adapted following consideration of the first performance report, this included a clearer summary table of corporate plan goals. Work had been undertaken with the developer of the citizens portal to solve some technical limitations, these originally restricted the range of dates which could be showed to the user. There had also been an addition on operational focused metrics to the portal, these were designed to support the Panel’s interest in the corporate plan ‘a council trusted to deliver its promises’ objective. Officers had also improved the narrative given on the portal.

Considering the performance of the council, Rachel Kinniburgh explained that across the three main overarching objectives, there were six goals identified as areas of concern, with eleven were showing progress.

Councillor Werner had requested to see the benchmarking against comparable local authorities as he did not feel that the LGA benchmark was useful, he asked if officers had this information.

Rebecca Hatch, Head of Strategy, said that none of the comparable local authorities had done a resident survey which contained similar questions, therefore the data did not exist.

Councillor Werner asked how many local authorities were included in the LGA benchmark.

Rebecca Hatch explained that the LGA benchmark was a national survey of around 1,000 people over a selection of local authorities, this was a national average from a national survey.

Councillor Price said that she did not know what actions were being taken on the goals which were areas of concern, she felt that this should be part of the reporting mechanism.

Rachel Kinniburgh said that the action which would be taken had been included as part of the performance narrative, officers would consider how this area could be strengthened for future reports.

Rebecca Hatch added that the report allowed Panel Members to query how areas of concern would be addressed by officers.

Councillor Price considered that if a goal was unachievable due to officer capacity, this would be useful to know soon given that the budget setting process was underway.

Adele Taylor added that a lack of resources was not always a budgetary issue, it could be difficult to secure certain resources.

Councillor Sharpe commented on the central masterplan for Windsor and Ascot high street. These were two different areas of the borough, and it was unclear whether progress made was regarding Windsor or Ascot. There was a lack of detail on what progress had actually been made.

Andrew Durrant, Executive Director of Place, admitted that from the wording in the report it was easy to confuse the two separate strands of work and the progress that had been made. Later in the report, the goal  ...  view the full minutes text for item 27.

To consider the report.

Rebecca Hatch outlined that the report was a refresh of the context of the corporate plan, as it had been a year since the plan was adopted. The cost of living was having a widespread impact across communities, the council and its finances and meant that budget setting would be more challenging. There had also been a lot of change and uncertainty in central government and the council was awaiting direction in a number of different areas. More data had been gathered, in particular the residents survey, and the 2021 census data which had recently been released. Officers had been delivering against the corporate plan goals and it was now clear which areas had proved to be more challenging to achieve. The residents survey showed that overall the corporate plan was still appropriate, but there were five key areas which would be updated and strengthened:

·         Reflection on the cost of living increases and the work that was needed to support residents.

·         Increased focus on prevention.

·         Increased emphasis on reducing inequalities.

·         Strengthening links with partnership working.

·         Reflecting the decisions made in the budget through the corporate plan.

Councillor Bond referenced a piece of work on educational attainment which had been completed in his ward, he had been surprised by the differences in education between some areas which he knew well against the rest of the borough. Poor education and finances often led to poor health and Councillor Bond was pleased to see the council involved in partnership working with the NHS. On the equalities objectives, Councillor Bond felt that some of the objectives were more relevant than others. He liked the inclusion of socio-economic consideration to the equality impact assessments, which accompanied council reports.

Councillor Price was encouraged that there would be a greater emphasis on residents who lived in deprivation, she had a high number in her ward. On one of the outcomes, she felt that it was important to deliver both effectively and efficiently. Councillor Price said that the libraries provided an important service for residents, an individual had been using the library space to provide advice on legal and financial matters. However, residents now needed to pay to access this service and Councillor Price did not feel that this was right. It was important to ensure that goals in the corporate plan were not put up against the need for the council to generate revenue. On the equality impact assessments, Councillor Price also welcomed the improvements that had been made. Members needed training on what the assessments were saying so that everyone knew the implications. Members were corporate parents, Councillor Price asked if the impact of children in care could be included as part of the impact assessments.

Adele Taylor clarified that residents were not being charged to enter the library, a professional advisor had been using space at the library to provide advice to residents. As with any other individual or community group that used the library space, a small payment was required to cover costs.

Kevin  ...  view the full minutes text for item 28.

To consider the report.

Nikki Craig, Head of HR, Corporate Projects and IT, said that the council was only required to publish the data on complaints in relation to adult’s and children’s services. However, RBWM published the data that it held across all complaints. In the 2021/22 municipal year, there had around 1,500 contacts made with the team, this was a 30% reduction on the previous year. 399 of these contacts were progressed as formal complaints, which was a similar number to the previous year. The report before the Panel considered the corporate complaints, there had been less complaints upheld this year, slightly more partially upheld and more not upheld over the previous year. Learnings had been included in the report, particularly from service areas where there had been a high number of complaints. Where a complainant was unhappy with the response received, they could take their complaint to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO). This year, there had been 51 contacts with the ombudsman, with a number not progressing after initial enquires. Of the complaints to progress to a full investigation, this was a similar number to the previous year. On compliments, Nikki Craig said that there had been a slight reduction from 766 to 619. It was noted that the team with the highest level of complaints was also the team with the highest level of compliments.

Councillor Sharpe asked how RBWM compared to other local authorities.

Nikki Craig said that not all council’s published the same level of data on complaints, therefore it could be difficult to benchmark. She had been able to compare the LGSCO data with the other Berkshire authorities and Nikki Craig confirmed that RBWM was at a similar level.

Councillor Knowles noted that of the complaints submitted to the ombudsman, 71% were upheld. He asked therefore whether the RBWM complaints system was following the correct guidance, when such a significant number had been overturned by the ombudsman. Councillor Knowles also commented on the 20% that were happy with the remedy that had been offered as a result of the complaint.

Nikki Craig confirmed that RBWM was trending slightly higher than other authorities for complaints which were upheld by the ombudsman. The complaints to the ombudsman were regarding a wide variety of services and RBWM was trending slightly higher comparatively for satisfaction on the remedy to complaints made.

Kevin McDaniel added that some of the learning for officers from complaints came in changing the process as a result, this was not reflected in the statistics.

Councillor Price asked how learnings in one service area were shared with other service areas.

Nikki Craig explained that the complaints team attended service team meetings to talk through complaints. They could take the learnings from one team to another team, particularly where complaints were of a similar nature. Learnings were also shared at the Heads of Service meetings.

Councillor Price had found that it was better for residents to make a formal complaint as it led to a better outcome.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 29.

To consider the briefing note.

Nikki Craig outlined the briefing note, a suggestion had been made through the resident scrutiny suggestion topic process to develop an RBWM app. Over the summer, the transformation had been restructured to three different areas, community, adult social care and digital. The digital transformation team had determined that if work continued on the website to ensure that it was fully optimised to work on mobile devices, that would give the council the same results as a separate app. It was also worth noting the small size of the team and the resources that the team had available. The work on the website was connected to the customer journey project to ensure that all of these areas were joined up.

Councillor Price said that she was aware of some residents who would not use sections of the website where a password was needed. She asked why some areas of the website, for example the RBWM Together section, needed users to have a password to allow access.

Nikki Craig explained that the RBWM Together website was a separate entity to the main RBWM website. The main reason why users needed a password for this website was so that officers could ensure that one person was giving the information and that it could be tracked back. Nikki Craig said that she was happy to provide a further written response to Councillor Price.

ACTION – Nikki Craig to provide a further written response on the RBWM Together website, if appropriate.

Councillor Price felt that users should only be around three clicks away from what they were trying to find, this was not the case currently.

Nikki Craig responded by confirming that this was the aim, for users to be able to easily access what they were looking for on the website. Drupal was a public owned asset but RBWM could learn from other authorities and share their developments.

Councillor Price said that there was some customer journey information on the website that was out of date. She asked how easy it was for officers to update the information on the website.

Nikki Craig said that there was one person on the front end of the website who was responsible for publishing, but each service had individuals who were able to check content and send pages for approval. The final person was needed to ensure accessibility compliance.

Councillor Knowles said that through his own experience, he knew how difficult it could be when documentation and data was involved. A number of websites had a mobile friendly interface which then linked into the main website if further information was required.

Nikki Craig confirmed that the website was being reviewed to ensure that it performed as expected.

Councillor Davies was pleased to see that this was a priority for the council. Considering the report it tool, she found the maps to be a particular issue as it was based on roads and users were unable to report an issue in a park, for example, using the map  ...  view the full minutes text for item 30.

To consider the Panel’s work programme for the remainder of the municipal year and the scoping document produced by Councillor Price.

To include consideration of items scheduled on the Cabinet Forward Plan.

Mark Beeley, Democratic Services Officer, highlighted the scoping document on the equalities project which had been added to the work programme by Councillor Price. The Panel were happy with the proposals set out in the scoping document.

Mark Beeley also suggested that it would be useful for some Panel Members to assist in the drafting of the scoping document for the referral of air pollution performance to be considered by the People Overview & Scrutiny Panel. Councillor Davies and Councillor Sharpe confirmed that they would be happy to help with this outside of the meeting.

“That under Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the remainder of the meeting whilst discussion takes place, on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 3 of part I of Schedule 12A of the Act."

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That under Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the remainder of the meeting whilst discussion takes place, on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 3 of part I of Schedule 12A of the Act.

To consider the Part II minutes from the meeting held on 12^th September 2022.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That the Part II minutes of the meeting held on 12^th September 2022 were approved as a true and accurate record.