To seek approval to commission, by means of a competitive tender process, a housing-related support service for vulnerable young people, complimented by an offer of targeted and universal prevention services specifically developed for vulnerable young people aged 16 to 25.  New premises have been sourced through a local registered housing provider and a specialist provider is sought to offer varying levels of support to young people with different needs.

This service will not accommodate children in care under the age of 16.

The proposed new model will form part of Herefordshire’s growing offer of accommodation to young people and ensure flexible responses to people accessing services via multiple routes. 

The service will improve outcomes for vulnerable young people in Herefordshire and focus on meeting their individual needs through the provision of good quality accommodation, a clear pathway and flexible support options. The housing itself will be provided in Hereford by a local registered housing provider. The accommodation based, outreach and mediation support will be commissioned from a specialist support provider via a competitive procurement process. The support services will operate from the accommodation in Hereford and outreach and mediation services will support young people throughout the county. 

It is proposed that a procurement will commence in June 2020, and mobilisation will align with the completion of building works and the end of an existing supported accommodation contract for young people on 31 October 2020. That contracted service no longer meets the changing and diverse needs of Herefordshire’s vulnerable young people. The proposed new service would therefore commence on 1 November 2020.

That:

(a)       the commissioning by way of an open procurement process of an accommodation support service, along with floating support and mediation services for vulnerable young people, aged 16 to 25 years, be approved.

(b)       authority be delegated to the director of adults and communities, following consultation with the director for children and families and cabinet members, to award a contract for housing related support services for a period of up to five years and maximum cost of £3.1m.

To agree the approach to allocating additional budget of £275k for 2019/20 towards additional support for local community transport initiatives and local solutions to maintain access in rural communities noting continuing financial pressures on support for the conventional bus network.

The details of the grant programme have been developed in the context of the 2017 passenger transport review which included extensive consultation and following discussion with local community transport providers. Criteria for accessing the grant will ensure that projects which will support older people, people with disabilities and rural residents without access to private car or public transport are prioritised.

The original decision to provide additional funding indicated that this should be to establish a grant for the purchase of new accessible vehicles for community transport providers. The recommendation is to support a broader range of projects and for it to be made available for a wider range of community groups, with community transport providers being given first opportunity to submit bids. This approach was developed following discussion with community transport providers during which they indicated that they could improve their services if the funding could be allocated for a broader range of activities including:

"           New vehicles for community transport use

"           Software to help plan journeys

"           Schemes to support access for young people

"           Initiatives to attract more volunteer drivers

"           Schemes which will feed into and support existing transport services

"           Scheme which use social media and smart technologies to increase access

"           Brokerage - making greater use of vehicles available in the local community

Whilst the proposed approach will give community transport providers the first opportunity to bid for grant funding it also allows for further rounds to be opened up to other community groups. This will be subject to funds being available after the first round. This is proposed as it reflects the findings of the passenger transport review that other community groups including parish councils and other local charities can play an important role in supporting local access and will add to the overall capacity of the grant programme.

That:

(a)  a Rural Access Grant Scheme be approved with:

·           a non-recurring budget of £275k

·           scheme criteria as set out in appendix 1;

·           grant allocations and spend being completed by 31 March 2021; and s

the head of service for transport and access be authorised to determine grant awards to a maximum of £30k in accordance with the approved scheme criteria, and having regard to the recommendation of the appraisal panel.

The council building maintenance and cleansing services were amalgamated under a single contract, which was procured through an open market tender exercise and this contract is due to terminate on the 31 August 2020. This contract now needs to be procured for a period from 1 September 2020 to 30 June 2023.

That:

(a)  a propertymaintenanceandcleaningservice contractbe procuredfortwo years and nine months from1 September2020– 30 June2023 with provision for a one year extension;and

(b)  the director of economy and placebe  authorised, following consultation with the  cabinet member  for assets, contracts and procurement, toawarda contract tothe successfulprovider for each or both services followingtenderevaluation,with acontractvalueof upto £12m per annum.

To make the Lyonshall neighbourhood development plan as part of the statutory development plan for Herefordshire and approve the consequential updates to the countywide policies maps.

To fulfil the legal duty to make /adopt the Lyonshall neighbourhood development plan and update the countywide policies map as part of the statutory development plan for Herefordshire.

Herefordshire has positively supported communities to be involved in producing a neighbourhood development plan and currently has the greatest number being produced in a local authority area within England. 

There are currently 112 plans being produced in Herefordshire (68 of which have now been Made) by parish councils and their local communities. These neighbourhood development plans will provide more locally detailed policies to support the delivery of the Herefordshire Local Plan – Core Strategy and guide development within the local parish until 2031

On 20 May 2016, the Council delegated authority to the cabinet member infrastructure for decisions on all further neighbourhood development plans adoptions, and consequential amendments to the countywide policies map.

That:

(a)       The Lyonshall neighbourhood development plan is made as part of the statutory development plan for Herefordshire; and

(b)       The required consequential changes are made to the countywide policies map.

To advise on the implementation of the Public Service Vehicle Accessibility Regulations 2000 (PSVAR) and its implications for home to school and college transport in the county.

From 1 January 2020 school and college students paying a fare must be transported on vehicles compliant with the PSVAR. Although it is the individual operators’ responsibility to ensure compliance with the PSVAR, as the commissioner, the council has a duty to ensure that the services it commissions are operated legally and in accordance with all applicable regulations.

Work with transport providers to ensure compliance with legislation by 1 January 2020 has progressed well and has included providing students with alternative travel options and where possible arranging for contractors to use PSVAR compliant vehicles. In addition the Department for Transport (DfT) has issued a 2 year exemption which can be applied to some non-complaint services. Despite having undertaken this mitigation work, and implementing the DfT exemption, there remains 252 students who do not require accessible transport and who will be travelling on non-compliant services from 1 January 2020.

To allow time for further work to be carried out with transport providers to secure compliance,  approval is sought to cease charging for the spring academic term for home to school transport and post-16 transport on specific council provided services that are not yet compliant with PSVAR.

The implication of the decision recommended in this report is that free travel will be provided for the Spring academic term 2020 for up to 252 students, traveling on 7 transport routes, to 7 different schools and colleges. The students affected come from a range of transport groups:

1.    Post-16 college transport provided to in and out of County students attending Hereford colleges

2.    School aged students traveling to a range of schools around the County using the Council’s school transport vacant seat payment scheme

3.    Denominational transport provided to school age students attending schools based on their religious beliefs

A report advising on longer-term options will be prepared for consideration in January 2020.

That:

a)    with effect from 1 January 2020 vacant seats, denominational transport and post-16 transport will only be sold to students on services compliant with or exempted from the Public Service Vehicle Accessibility Regulations (PSVAR);

b)    on services that will not be compliant or exempt after 1 January 2020 fare paying passengers are allowed to travel free of charge for the spring term, January to April 2020. 

To approve the use of earmarked reserves to provide the opportunity to recruit to improve the quality of children's social work.

Cabinet has recognised that the council can support children's social care work further by enabling more staff to be recruited within this financial year. This is in conjunction with work that the council has already done to increase the number of social work posts, expand the early help service and family support service to work with families and business support to take some tasks off social workers.

The proposals in this report will enable the service to potentially recruit five social work posts (including a senior practitioner post) and a manager to provide further capacity that would be located in the assessment service and carry out assessment team work. This would enable some cases to be held in the assessment teams rather than in the child protection court teams and therefore lessen the pressure on social workers, particularly in the child protection court teams where we are finding it particularly difficult to recruit agency and permanent staff, despite all the work the council has done to improve the retention and recruitment offer.

That:

the use of earmarked reserves of up to £150k to recruit 6 children’s social work posts before the end of the financial year be approved.

That:

(a) the council object to the removal of 36 public call boxes in the county due to relevant factors e.g. need for emergency calls, poor mobile phone coverage as detailed in appendix 2; and

(b) the council agrees to the removal of 21 public call boxes in the county due to the low usage levels, availability of acceptable/good mobile coverage as well as lack of objections from local communities, as detailed in appendix 2; and

(c) the council supports the adoption of 12 public call boxes in the county by parish councils (or community groups) in order for those kiosks, once decommissioned, to be used for community benefit as detailed in appendix 2.

To approve a procurement exercise to identify an external provider to deliver an independent visitor service for Herefordshire’s Looked After Children.

The existing contract for the Independent Visitor service is due to end on 31st March 2020. Without a decision to re-tender these services, the Council would not be meeting its statutory duties as a corporate parent of looked after children.

To agree the executive response to the recommendations from the review of highways maintenance – pothole repairs.

The review was commissioned by the general scrutiny committee who appointed a task and finish group to consider the highway maintenance plan and seek to address concerns expressed within the community about the potential mismatch between policy and practice on pothole repairs.  The review made a number of recommendations.  It is proposed that all of the recommendations are accepted, with the exception of recommendations 6, 8and 14, which are partially agreed, and recommendations 11 and 13 which are recommendations that executive cannot implement or require agreed in principle. Full responses are set out in appendix 3.

That:

a)    the response to the general scrutiny committee’s recommendations regarding the review of highways maintenance – pothole repairs, as attached at appendix 1 is approved.