Agenda and draft minutes

Apologies were received from Councillors Rowena Hay, Colin Hay and Jacky Fletcher and Councillor Tim Harman was attending as a substitute for Councillor Fletcher.

None declared.

Minutes of the meeting held on 29 July 2014

Resolved that the minutes of the last meeting held on 29 July 2014 be signed and approved as a correct record.

The Committee is recommended to approve the following resolution:

“That in accordance with Section 100A(4) Local Government Act 1972 the public be excluded from the meeting for the remaining agenda items as it is likely that, in view of the nature of the business to be transacted or the nature of the proceedings, if members of the public are present there will be disclosed to them exempt information as defined in paragraphs ?, Part (1) Schedule (12A) Local Government Act 1972, namely:

Paragraph 1; Information relating to any individual.

Paragraph 2; Information which is likely to reveal the identity of an individual

Paragraph 3; Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular

person (including the authority holding that information)

Resolved that in accordance with Section 100A(4) Local Government Act 1972 the public be excluded from the meeting for the remaining agenda items as it was likely that, in view of the nature of the business to be transacted or the nature of the proceedings, if members of the public are present there will be disclosed to them exempt information as defined in paragraphs ?, Part (1) Schedule (12A) Local Government Act 1972, namely:

Paragraph 1; Information relating to any individual.

Paragraph 2; Information which is likely to reveal the identity of an individual

Paragraph 3; Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information)

Report of the Cabinet Member Corporate Services

The committee considered a report of the Cabinet Member Corporate Services regarding the outcome of a HAY review of senior salaries.The HAY review process was designed to ensure that salary levels remained appropriate and continued to fairly reflect levels of responsibility, and that the senior management grading structure continued to serve the Council effectively. The review encompassed the senior management roles within the Council only (not service managers or below) and the outcomes of the review were set out in the report.

The chair introduced Paul Hancock from HayGroup who had produced the report for the council on Job Evaluation and Pay Benchmarking.  In a short presentation he gave Members an overview of the main elements of the Hay method for job evaluation. He explained that it provided a logical and fair system for determining the relative importance of jobs in an organisation.  He explained that the results set out in the report had been checked with regard to their relative ranking within the council and against Hay points awarded to other similar posts in local government for consistency. The starting point had been the Chief Executive's post to ensure that it was comparable with other similar posts across the industry in terms of job evaluation and pay. He went on to explain in more detail the assessment of Know How, Problem-solving and Accountability which were evaluated separately and then through a series of lookup tables combined to give a total score for that job.

The Head of Human Resources confirmed that each individual post holder in the review had had an interview with the consultant as part of the process. The results would be communicated to each individual in a formal letter and a one-to-one meeting and the individual would have the right of appeal and could request an explanation of how their grading had been arrived at. The consultant advised that individuals would normally need some guidance in interpreting the scores.

A member suggested that the responsibility of a post holder seemed to be the biggest factor in determining the job evaluation with the size of their department and the size of population they were servicing being important factors. The consultant advised that the responsibility for employees would be assessed among other factors. The size of population would not be directly included but this would be reflected in the size of the budget that the individual was responsible for which was assessed, and the impact of the role. The most important factor in the overall assessment was the context in which the job was operating and the level of change and challenge in the role. These were important factors in a commissioning council.

The chair invited members to discuss the report which had been circulated with the agenda. The Head of Human Resources provided some context to Members and emphasised the change in the senior management structure over the last 8 years. The senior management team had reduced from 19 to the current 4 and although the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

There was no urgent business.

8 December 2014

The date of next meeting would be 8 December 2014.