Agenda and draft 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.

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the previous meeting of the Committee

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on the 17 July 2024 be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chairman. 

The chair advised the committee that, since the last meeting, the revised contract standing orders had been adopted into the council’s constitution.

There were no urgent items of business.

To receive the revised corporate complaint policy for approval and to provide an update on complaint handling for information.

Ann Moore, assistant director for democratic and registration services, presented the revised corporate complaints policy for approval and provided an update on complaint handling for information. The Committee was asked to approve the implementation of the corporate complaints policy and to authorise the executive director: communities, to make minor revisions to the corporate complaints policy in consultation with the committee chair if required.

The committee was advised that the revised policy delivered the requirements of the new local government and social care ombudsman (LGSCO) complaint handling code (“the code”) which was launched in February 2024 as advice and guidance and all local councils in England were expected to follow it unless there was good reason not to. The ombudsman expected councils to adopt the code by April 2026. However, adopting it sooner provided a more practical experience and the opportunity to modify and improve the approach if necessary.

The new system would allow for more automation in complaint tracking, managing correspondence and storing complaint history. It would also allow for more performance management through capturing data to support better reporting and insights to allow for tracking learning and actions.

The key benefits of implementing the new system were a shorter process with a focus on early resolution, learning and taking action to support improvement. Furthermore, there would be better tracking to keep within timescales as well as more information to manage expectations of the process.

There would be greater visibility of escalated complaints with assistant and executive directors and there would be more involvement of others in some areas. There would be complaints advice provided and the guidance on the intranet updated. Further information would be provided to councillors about the changes via democracy snapshot and councillors’ corner. And, the system would support better complaints data to be reflected in the corporate plan overview report. 

Arising from questions, the following points were noted:

·       It was noted that the system would support the process. They could still deliver an effective approach without it but the system would improve it. The system was predominantly internal but would continue to have an external interface where complainants could write directly onto the system. This would not, however, change all the other means such as email or other methods to submit a complaint. 

·       There was some concern in relation to implementing a new agile process without thorough testing. It was confirmed that there had been testing throughout the process and they envisaged carrying on testing as new blocks were released. It was thought that the system would be available before January 2025 and that there would be additional training before it went live. They would only go live when they were completely satisfied everything was in place.

·       The driver for the change was the good practice guide released by the LGSCO and although it was not mandatory there was a strong expectation that councils would adhere to it in terms of good practice. Moving to a two-stage process from three would ensure that there was  ...  view the full minutes text for item 18.

To receive an update on activity within the Council’s standards framework from 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024

Sanjay Prashar, Borough Solicitor, presented the annual standards report, which captured the standards activity and any code of conduct complaints during the year 2023/24. Members were asked to note the standards outputs as set out in the appendix to the report.

The report highlighted 17 code of conduct complaints of which 7 required no action, 9 were resolved through informal resolution (apology) and 1 through informal resolution (mediation). It was noted that of the 17 complaints, 11 were in relation to parish councillors. The most common complaint was failing to treat others with respect of which there were 8. 

The borough solicitor advised that when producing the annual reports he focused on three things; he would try to identify if there had been any changes in the standards framework in terms of governance arrangements, whether that was nationally or locally, so that may have been that the government had introduced guidance around. The report had been light on governance as there had been no developments locally within the period of the report.

In relation to the figures which were focused on the code of conduct, the borough solicitor would look for discernible trends. This was difficult where there were a small number of complaints, however, there were a few for comment.  It was noted that there was quite a considerable jump in the figures in 2022/23 and 2023/24. This was largely due to a couple of complaints which had been made against a number of councillors so the actual number would have been in single figures.

It was still quite a significant number, but it should be noted that this was split between borough council complaints and parish and town Council complaints. There had not been any outcomes which resulted in the finding against a councillor. One of the things that officers did explore last year in terms of informal resolution were the methods for this. It was costly in time and resources to go through an investigation process and to also convene a panel. Consequently, in one case which involved a residential complaint and officer, introduced a mediation process. The Council commissioned a mediator and that was successful. This would be explored more for similar cases where it could also be effective.

There were no questions arising from the report, but it was confirmed that the Council intended to fully abide by and implement the Nolan principles of very high standards in public office. 

RESOLVED that the Standards output in 2023/24 as set out in Appendix B to the report be noted.

To receive an update on progress on the Annual Internal Audit Plan.

Sally Hendrick, Head of Audit and Risk Management, presented the annual internal audit Update. The Committee was asked to note the report.

The committee received progress against the 2024/25 internal audit plan attached at Appendix 1 to the report. It was noted that recruiting auditors remained a challenge for the team. Furthermore, capacity issues within the team meant that progress on delivering the audit plan had been delayed. There were currently two vacancies in the team. One was being covered by a principal auditor and the other being vacant. There was also another post where the apprentice was on long term sick. Despite this, they had managed to complete 11 audits which was three more than this point last year so the situation was improving. They had also just certified another grant bringing their audits up to 12 and another three audits were being issued in the following week.

Details on the status and outcome of all audits were attached at appendix 1 to the agenda report.

Members’ attentions were drawn to those audits with significant issues arising. Audits where high priority issues had been identified since the last update were as follows:

·       Braccan Walk Youth Facility in relation to the security of the building and records and absence of documented procedures and processes. Consequently, an advisory report had been requested by service management with critical and major risk observations raised.

·       Drug and Alcohol Team (DAAT) where four major recommendations had been made in relation to the care quality commission (CQC) inspection preparation. There were areas of weakness and/or non- compliance with control which put the system/process objectives at risk and undermined the system’s overall integrity.

·       Debt Management Property there had been three major recommendations regarding debt management policy/officer guidance, management information and number of properties. As above, there were areas of weakness and/or non- compliance with control which put the system/process objectives at risk and undermined the system’s overall integrity.

·       In relation to school audits, there were recommendations for four schools and with any major issues these were being followed up as a matter of priority.

In response to questions, the following points were noted:

·       There was some concern regarding the number of times resources had been raised as an issue within the team. This concern was noted, and Members were assured that they were not in the position where they could not give the annual opinion on audit work. They were progressing with the plan and were going out to recruit now for a principal auditor which would include a market premium so which would hopefully generate more interest and be successful.

·       One of the two apprentices were completing their final exams at the beginning of October with endpoint assessment discussions within a few days after this. On completion this would allow for more capacity as they would no longer need a day a week for study. They were looking for future professional training for them to do and hopefully encourage them to stay within the council.  

·       In  ...  view the full minutes text for item 20.

To receive the latest Strategic Risk Register for information and review.

Sally Hendrick, Head of Audit and Risk Management, presented the strategic risk register.

The risk register had been in place for many years in the same format to capture the risks assessed by members of corporate management team. The risk register captured work in progress, and was an ongoing document. Members were invited to offer their feedback on the risk register to the council’s corporate management team.

The risk register was monitored by the strategic risk management group as chaired by the executive director: resources and would be reviewed by corporate management team periodically.

It was clarified that the ‘Targets’ assigned to each risk showed the council’s risk appetite. A comprehensive review of risks, risk scores and mitigating actions 

It was noted that there were a couple of changes that had been made to the format of the risk register. In particular, there had been additional commentary around what the unmitigated risk score was, which enabled you to be informed by what was happening in the risk environment in which the council was operating. Furthermore, officer had also added something as a guide around what they were looking to achieve in terms of the risk and the direction of travel. Officers wanted to move the risk in to bring it down to the tolerance level by adding this arrow to the charts. Members noted that they were trying to move towards determining a target risk score of what officers would like to have in terms of risk, and needing to be realistic and focusing on what the risk tolerance was.

In response to questions, the following points were noted:

·       There was concern noted in regard to a significant increase on the impact of pressures on the local health system and it was now positioned in the top quartile of the risks. Members were advised that the impact was specifically relating to the contributions that health provided for some of the social care and education services that were commissioned. And, because of the pressures on the health system finances, they were taking a more hardline approach on their contributions. The executive director: people had mentioned that a reduction of more than £1,000,000 for the contributions towards children's social care in this year alone. So, this was the reason why the risk had increased and that risk was becoming more of a reality.

The council was working with other east Berkshire local authorities who were also in the ICB system to together make sure that there was collaborative but robust conversations with local health colleagues around those issues. It was noticed that the table on page 63 should be amended to reflect the commentary on page 65 of the agenda report. 

·       It was asked whether the target was where the council was hoping to get to if it managed to implement mitigations or whether the target was what the council would like to be to be safe. It was noted that the targets were what they should be and what officer were  ...  view the full minutes text for item 21.