Agenda item

Report of the Leader

The Leader introduced the report and explained that 2020 Vision had been a challenging and ambitious process and represented an opportunity for the council to make savings without cutting services. He referred to the success the council had experienced with sharing services with GO Shared Services and ICT.

The Leader referred Cabinet to the amended recommendations from the published report as circulated and highlighted the following points :

·         Customer services, revenues and benefits and property services had been identified within the project as the next services to be considered for sharing. The amended recommendation 2 stated that Cabinet would receive and have to approve further business case briefings and proposed Service Level Agreements for these services under consideration. He added that this detailed work would begin shortly with a report being brought to Cabinet at some stage in the New Year. He highlighted that members would be involved in this process.

·         2020 would be governed by a Joint Committee with two members represented from each authority. Cabinet would nominate one member and it was proposed that the current Cabinet Member Corporate Services undertake this role. He was the current council representative on the member governance board and the CBC representative on the Joint Monitoring and Liaison Group for GOSS.

·         The Joint Committee would be responsible for overall financial policies and potential HR policies. The Leader referred members to the amended recommendation 5 which now included the introduction of a protocol which would require the Joint Committee to defer any item relating to changes to employment terms and conditions where it was unlikely to be passed by unanimous decision in order to seek a resolution to the matter.  The Leader added that whilst rationalisation of HR terms and conditions would be useful, to have a mechanism in place to deal with any issues was a sensible approach. He also made reference to the deletion of the last sentence of Section 10.4 in the report.

·         The Leader reported that the post of Managing Director of the Partnership had been ringfenced to the Chief Executives of Cheltenham and Cotswolds/West Oxfordshire councils. He explained that the current Chief Executive of Cheltenham had not expressed an interest in being considered for this position. The position of CEX would be deleted at the council but the post of Head of Paid Service was a legal requirement. The recruitment of this post would be a process for the council’s Appointments Committee.

·         The existing shared service arrangements for GO Shared Services and ICT Shared Services would be undertaken by the Joint Partnership Structure from April 2016.

The Cabinet Member Finance referred to the fact that existing shared services with Ubico and GOSS made the council an annual saving of £2.7 m annually. With Government core funding reduced from £8.8 m to £4.6 m between 2009 and 2015 and likely to be further cut between 25 % and 40 % over the next 4 years, further radical efficiency savings needed to be made without cutting services. With evidence that the four councils concerned were already making shared services work so well2020 Vision represented further new ways of working which had been supported by Government via the £3.8 m Transformation Challenge Fund. He reported that Vision 2020 would generate £581 000 of savings annually increasing to £800 000 per annum if a Teckal company was established and these figures had been endorsed by CIPFA.  The Cabinet Member paid tribute to the hard work invested in the 2020 project by all officers involved but in particular the Deputy Chief Executive, Director Resources and the Head of Finance. The Leader reinforced his thanks to all concerned.

Some Members still had the same concerns they had expressed when discussing 2020 at the December 2014 meeting of Cabinet. They did not share the optimism for 2020 Vision that had been expressed at the meeting thus far although they supported the inevitability of having to further generate efficiency savings. They believed that the ‘devil was in the detail’. They said that whilst it seemed sensible for the existing GOSS and ICT Shared Services to be transferred to the Partnership, the transfer of other ‘back office’ council services should be subject to very detailed scrutiny and that they should not be simply considered as a “fait accompli”; each service must be looked at on a case by case basis They believed that a Plan B for those services was still an option.  What was essential was that residents received the best possible services but they feared that the essence of what was Cheltenham could be lost in a 2020 partnership. In their view it was imperative that REST services remained with the council and Cheltenham focussed as they had little in common with the three rural authorities involved. These members also supported the Chair of Overview and Scrutiny’s request that an opposition member should be nominated as the second Borough Councillor on the Joint Committee whilst recognising that this approach would have to be adopted by the other 3 authorities. It was suggested that the Chair of Overview and Scrutiny discuss this with his counterparts in the three authorities. They firmly believed that this approach would provide valuable added scrutiny protection of that joint committee.

A member also suggested that the appointment of the Head of Paid Service be undertaken quickly as in his view the council could not afford to be left with a power vacuum. This would also enable early resolution of any potential conflict between that role and the role of the current Head of Paid Service. 

The Leader of the Council, in response to a comment regarding the financial figures in the business case (appendix 3), explained that these figures were those which had been presented in the bid to Government for Transformation Challenge Award funding. The absolute 2020 figures were now available in terms of what contribution 2020 would have to the council’s budget going forward as detailed in section 16 of the report.

Members requested that all members receive a rapid turnaround of tonight’s decisions by Cabinet.

RESOLVED THAT

1.    the Authority enter into the shared services partnership structure described in Appendix 2.

2.    the consequential revised senior management structure for this Authority be endorsed as set out in section 7.

3.    the 2020 Vision Business Case at Appendix 3 be approved.

4.    the Commissioning Strategy at Appendix 5 be adopted.

5.    the 2020 Vision Joint Committee be established in accordance with Sections 101 and 102 of the Local Government Act 1972, and the Local Authorities (Arrangement for the Discharge of Functions) (England) Regulations 2012 made under Section 9EA, 9EB and 105 of the Local Government Act 2000, with draft Constitution at Appendix 6 including a protocol which requires the Joint Committee to defer any item relating to changes to employment terms and conditions where it is unlikely to be passed by unanimous decision in order to seek a resolution to the matter.

6.    authority be delegated to the Chief Executive in consultation with the Leader, the Section 151 Officer and the Borough Solicitor to finalise and complete the Inter Authority Agreement (including the Constitution) and other documentation on terms to be approved by the Borough Solicitor and to take all necessary steps to create the 2020 Vision Joint Committee by April 2016.

7.    it be agreed that the existing 2020 Vision Member Governance Board arrangements will continue until the 2020 Vision Joint Committee is created.

8.    Upon establishment of the 2020 Vision Joint Committee

8.1          To authorise the delegation to the 2020 Vision Joint Committee those functions of the Authority as described in the draft Constitution for the 2020 Vision Joint Committee, subject to retained decisions as set out in section 10 of this report

8.2          To agree to appoint Forest of Dean District Council as Administering Authority to provide administration support to the Joint Committee

8.3          To agree to appoint Cotswold District Council as the Accountable Body to provide financial support to the Joint Committee and enter into any contracts required on behalf of the Joint Committee

8.4          To agree to appoint the following councils to provide the following functions of the Joint Committee;

Forest of Dean District Council – Monitoring Officer

Cotswold District Council – S151 Finance Officer

Forest of Dean District Council – Clerk to the Joint Committee

9.    to confirm the appointment of David Neudegg as Partnership Managing Director.

10.  to agree to make available such of this Authority’s staff as are necessary for the 2020 Vision Joint Committee to fulfil the functions which the Authority delegates to it

11.  Council be recommended to appoint Councillor Walklett as the Cabinet Member representative on the 2020 Vision Joint Committee.

12.  further business case briefings and proposed Service Level Agreements be received and approved providing reassurance on the benefits, costs and savings to the Authority of the services outlined in section 14.4 of this report, and demonstrating that other sharing options have been considered, prior to delegation of those services to the 2020 Vision Joint Committee

13.  a report and business case be received during 2016 on the establishment of a local authority company for the delivery of the functions of the 2020 Vision Partnership, or alternatively the continuation of the 2020 Vision Joint Committee, and makes an onwards recommendation to Council as necessary.