To consider the work programming for the board.

The chair of the board introduced the work programme item and stressed that it would be a live and fluid document that could and would be shaped to meet the changing demands and requirements of the board.

The board suggested that resourcing issues may be adversely impacting the ability of officers to communicate with and respond to the public and wards (answering phone calls and such like) and that the board might want to investigate this.

The board discussed the previous committee’s work programme. It was agreed that the board’s remit had not changed and that rather than reinventing the wheel it would be wise to retain certain existing items, especially those of an ongoing nature.

The board discussed best value principles and seven themes of best value: continuous improvement, leadership, governance, culture, use of resources, service delivery of partnerships and community engagement.

The board discussed cross-cutting themes that were felt to run through everything done by the Council:

It was asked to what extent was the board confident that the council was taking into consideration and stewarding the county’s resources to meet the needs of the younger and future generations.

The climate ecology emergency was identified as a cross-cutting theme and it was felt that it would be useful to look at the extent to which the climate and ecology emergency was built into everything the council was doing. Examining how the council’s partners and shareholders were embracing and implementing climate and ecology measures was something the board should potentially be scrutinising.

It was suggested the best value principles and identified cross-cutting themes could be combined and applied to create a framework of enquiry, which could help shape committee work programmes and also be applied to council activities.

The board raised concerns about the Wye Catchment Nutrient Management Board and how effective it had been over the last five years. It was felt that the Scrutiny Management Board should look at the performance of the Nutrient Management Board, Cabinet Phosphate Commission and Marches Forward Partnership. It would be necessary to question and establish where these bodies sat within scrutiny responsibility and whether there would need to be a multi-authority scrutiny dimension when looking at these bodies.

The board noted it would like to take a look at the County Plan as part of its work programme.

The board was keen to take a look at and have input on the approach to the budget consultation. It was also suggest that the board should open a wider scrutiny on general consultation and how the council engages with the public, with a view to ascertaining whether the council was maximising opportunities to include public feedback and input within the decision making process.

It was noted that risk management had historically been an area of overlap between scrutiny and audit and governance. Audit and Governance focused on process, but it was felt it was important that scrutiny was able to look at content and that this should be included on the work programme.  

Information governance and knowledge management was identified as potential topic for inclusion on the work programme. This would involve looking at how this information was gathered, integrated, shared with partners and used to inform the council’s decision making. It was acknowledged that this was a very broad subject with some overlap with Audit and Governance.

The chair requested that the Forward Plan should be published as part of the agenda paperwork in future, so that the board and all other committees could use that information to inform reviews of their work programmes. It would be helpful to have the six months look ahead to assist in creating robust work programmes, which would give officers time to put together reports for items further down the schedule.

The board noted that it would need to examine community responses to unaccompanied asylum seekers in the county and establish whether the council and shareholder services were able to provide the right support.

The board noted that it had put forward a substantial number of potential topics and that a key challenge would be to prioritise these. It was agreed that a workshop would provide a good opportunity to discuss and prioritise items for the year ahead.

A discussion took place in relation to whether or not specific items should be allocated to individual members of the board based on their personal/professional areas of expertise. It was also asked how effective scrutiny committee recommendations were in shaping decisions.

The chair explained that task and finish groups allowed the board to take a deep dive into areas and items that it felt needed to be paid additional focus. It was hoped that the board and other committees would use these where necessary to tackle bigger/complex issues.

It was explained that the scrutiny committees were politically balanced in terms of membership make up to promote broad debate, avoid political bias and allow recommendations to be put forward collectively. In terms of scrutiny recommendation effectiveness, it was noted that the previous administration had accepted a significant number of scrutiny recommendations and it was hoped that this would continue to be the case under the new administration. 

RESOLVED: Following the discussions that had taken place during the meeting, the board felt that it would be useful to hold a workshop to allow it to structure and prioritise its work programme. In addition to the existing schedule the following items were also to be considered for inclusion:

-          Prioritising items for the work programme.

-          Measuring, tracking and reporting scrutiny committee effectiveness.

-          Considering if/how to streamline the board’s current list of 12 objectives.

-          Identifying and addressing potential areas of overlap between committees.

-          Creating a framework of enquiry, based on best value principles and cross-cutting themes.

-          Considering where the Wye Valley Nutrient Management Board and other cross-county bodies sit within the scrutiny framework.

-          Examining the proposed process for Executive responses to scrutiny.

-          The County Plan.

-          The impact of unaccompanied asylum seekers on the county.

-          Scrutiny of Hoople and other shareholders.