Agenda and minutes

Any Member with a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest or an Affected 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 Interest is not entered on the register of Members interests the Monitoring Officer must be notified of the interest within 28 days.

Councillor Mrs Birch declared an interest as the spouse of the Executive Member for Adult Services, Health & Housing. 

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 4 December 2013.

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on 4 December 2013 be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

Any other items which, pursuant to Section 100B(4)(b) of the Local Government Act 1972, the Chairman decides are urgent.

There were no urgent items of business.

The Committee is asked to endorse the Executive’s suggested approach to a “Bracknell Forest Supplement” payment (paragraph 5.1.4).

The Director of Corporate Services reported that the Employment Committee had received a number of reports relating to the work to develop a new pay and grading structure for the Council. The Director of Corporate Services had met with trade union officials alongside the Chief Officer: Human Resources to discuss issues relating to low pay and the concept of the Living Wage and indicated that whilst there was no obligation on employers to pay a ‘Living Wage’, there had been a national campaign to encourage employers to support those on low pay.

Trade union representatives had been keen to support those on low pay and were supportive of the proposal in the report for the implementation of a Bracknell Forest Supplement.

The cost of implementing the Bracknell Forest Supplement would be approximately £38,000 for non schools staff and that this could be met from the Council’s contingency funds. Schools had delegated budgets and had agreed to make their own provision for payment of the Supplement. It was noted that schools staff would be the most affected and that headteachers and the Schools Forum were supportive of this proposal.

The Committee were supportive of the proposal but asked that caution be exercised in terms of any linkages with the ‘Living Wage’. The Bracknell Forest Supplement should be a local initiative that wasn’t linked to the Living Wage in anyway. It was noted that the Employment Committee would review the Bracknell Forest Supplement on an annual basis.  

It was RESOLVED that the Committee endorsed the Executive’s suggested approach to a ‘Bracknell Forest Supplement’ payment as detailed in paragraph 5.1.4 of the agenda papers to be implemented from 1 April 2014.

The purpose of this report is to identify the staffing implications arising from the budget proposals for 2014/15. 

The Chief Officer: Human Resources reported that the Executive had now considered the Revenue Budget 2014/15 and recommended that the Council approve it. The budget proposals had also been considered by the Corporate Management Team and by the Special Local Joint Committee. The Committee was now asked to consider the employment implications of the budget proposals before they were recommended for approval at Council on 28 February 2014.

The Chief Officer: Human Resources reported that the proposals led to economies of £4.5m, the impact on frontline staff had been minimised as far as possible.

The Chief Officer: Older People and Long Term Conditions reported that consultation with the Council’s Dementia team around proposed redundancies had began, following the Executive’s decision to reconfigure the service.

All posts in the Adult Social Care, Health & Housing department had been frozen to encourage and create opportunities to redeploy these staff; there were sufficient redeployment opportunities within Adult Social Care, to accommodate all staff at risk in the Dementia team.

Two Members of the Committee expressed concern that there had not been adequate consultation on the proposal to cease the employment of the civic driver. The Director of Corporate Services stated that there had been extensive consultation and that reports around all proposed redundancies had been to the Portfolio Review Groups, Overview and Scrutiny Panels as well as the O&S Commission. Further, papers had been submitted to the Member Finance Group and the Executive. There had been numerous opportunities for members to raise concerns or make comments on any of the proposals within the budget consultation process.

On the PROPOSITION of Councillor Angell, SECONDED by Councillor Leake, it was proposed that Reference 6 within the agenda papers relating to the Civic Driver be omitted from the recommendations laid out in the report.

Upon being put to the vote the motion was LOST.

It was RESOLVED that the Employment Committee recommended to:

i)                    approve the deletion of the posts identified in Exempt Appendix B with effect from the dates identified in the report.

ii)                   agree that the postholders be declared redundant in accordance with the terms set out in Exempt Appendix B with the costs being met from the Structural Changes Fund (subject to any redeployment opportunities being offered to those affected).

iii)                 delegate to the Director of Adult Social Care, Health & Housing, in consultation with the Chairman, the authority to make decisions on the future of the post holders identified in Exempt Appendix C who will be affected by any decision taken by the Executive on 11 February in respect of the Dementia Team. 

To consider the following motion:

That pursuant to Section 100A of the Local Government Act 1972, as amended, and having regard to the public interest, members of the public and press be excluded from the meeting for the consideration of the following item which involves the likely disclosure of exempt information under the following category of Schedule 12A of that Act:

(1)        Information relating to any individual  (Item 8).

(4)        Information relating to any consultations or negotiations, or contemplated consultations, or negotiations, in connection with any labour relations matter arising between the authority or a Minister of the Crown and employees of, or officer holders under, the authority (Item 9).

RESOLVED that pursuant to Section 100A of the Local Government Act 1972, as amended, and having regard to the public interest, members of the public and press be excluded from the meeting for the consideration of the following item which involves the likely disclosure of exempt information under the following category of Schedule 12A of that Act:

(1)        Information relating to any individual  (Minute 33).

(4)        Information relating to any consultations or negotiations, or contemplated consultations, in connection with any labour relations matter arising between the authority or a Minister of the Crown and employees of, or office holders under, the authority (Minute 34).

Exempt appendices B & C.

The Committee noted exempt appendices B and C.

To receive a verbal update report from the Director of Corporate Services.

The Director of Corporate Services confirmed that consultation on a new pay and grading structure would be deferred until June 2015.

The Committee is asked to note a verbal summary of the Local Joint Committee meeting held on 12 February 2014, from the Chairman Councillor Angell.

The Chairman of the Local Joint Committee (LJC) reported that the LJC had met that afternoon and that trade union representatives had expressed concern over proposed redundancies in the Dementia team. However, trade union representatives had reported that they had been consulted throughout the process and were keen to see these staff redeployed wherever possible.

18 March 2014

18 March 2014