Agenda and minutes

Members are asked to declare any disclosable pecuniary or affected interests in respect of any matter to be considered at this meeting.

Any Member with a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest in a matter should withdraw from the meeting when the matter is under consideration and should notify the Democratic Services Officer in attendance that they are withdrawing as they have such an interest. If the Disclosable Pecuniary Interest is not entered on the register of Members interests the Monitoring Officer must be notified of the interest within 28 days.

Any Member with an affected Interest in a matter must disclose the interest to the meeting.  There is no requirement to withdraw from the meeting when the interest is only an affected interest, but the Monitoring Officer should be notified of the interest, if not previously notified of it, within 28 days of the meeting.

There were no declarations of interest.

There were no urgent items of business.

The minutes of the meeting held on 7 December 2018 were approved as a correct record, subject to the following amendment:

Minute 17: Fiona Slevin-Brown reported that John Lyle, Accountable Officer would be stepping down from the CCG, and a replacement was sought.

There were no matters arising.

There were no questions of petitions submitted for public participation.

There were no reports of actions taken between meetings.

To note any agency updates.

Mira Haynes, Bracknell Forest Council updated the Board on a number of issues in domiciliary care issues regarding home care providers.

Mira also informed the Board of challenges over the severe weather period, whereby Council care staff had needed to walk to see patients of commissioned home care providers. Bracknell Forest Council had asked its home care providers to provide their business continuity plans following the issues, and if no improvements were demonstrated, notice would be given to these providers.

Arising from discussion, the following points were noted:

·         The care of 50-100 people had been affected by the lack of business continuity over the poor weather.

·         Partners were asked to check their own contingency plans, and it was suggested that these should be brought to the Board for wider strategic planning.

·         It was agreed that the process of an organisation being ‘red flagged’ by the Local Authority should be formalised and communicated to Healthwatch.

·         It was recognised that the poor weather had prevented patients from accessing their GP appointments, which had been more problematic than staff being unable to travel.

Mark Sanders, Healthwatch advised Board members that an inspection report on Prospect Park was due to be released.  

Mark also commented on the need for proper communication approaches for changes to health services, as the public often were unclear about why changes to the NHS would benefit them.

Alex Gild, Berkshire Healthcare reported that Berkshire Healthcare was awaiting a CQC inspection and would advise Board members of the outcome.

To approve the Bracknell Forest Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment.

Lisa McNally presented the Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment (PNA) report on behalf of the Public Health shared team.

Lisa drew the Board’s attention to the main recommendations arising from consultation. It was recognised that the PNA was not required to address current commercial issues with pharmacies.

The Board noted concerns over the process for raising concerns about quality and accessibility of pharmacies, and agreed that these concerns should be raised separately with the chair of the Local Pharmaceutical Committee. It was stressed that a local definition of quality and expectation on pharmacies was needed.

It was commented that pharmacies should be considered as a health service rather than a transactional service. If patients could build a relationship with their pharmacist, they would be more likely to visit them with more general health concerns.

Having discussed the matter, the Health and Wellbeing Board

RESOLVED that the Bracknell Forest Council Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment (PNA) for 2018 be published on the Council website.

To note the change in relationship between Bracknell Forest Council and the Berkshire Shared Public Health Team, including the establishment of a dedicated Director of Public Health post for Bracknell Forest.

Gill Vickers presented the Management Arrangements for Public Health report which had been approved by the Council’s Executive on 23 January 2018.

When Local Authorities inherited the Public Health function in 2013, a shared public health team for Berkshire had been established. Whilst the service had been initially effective, it was now felt that Bracknell Forest would benefit from having its own public health team and Director of Public Health. The other Berkshire authorities would continue to use the shared team and strategic Director of Public Health.

The shared public health team would continue to be hosted by Bracknell Forest Council.

The Board welcomed the changes which were hoped to bring an improved, bespoke service to partners.

It was commented that communication of the new role would need to be clear about the financial savings realised and quality improvements. However, it was noted that residents should not see any change to their Public Health service.

The Health and Wellbeing Board noted the report and the changes to Management Arrangements for Public Health.