Agenda item

To provide an update on how the Council is performing for the period 1^st April 2019 to 30 June 2019 (Report of Portfolio Holder – Governance and Customer enclosed)

Consideration was given to the report of the Portfolio Holder for Governance and Customer which provided an update on how the Council was performing for the period.

Appended to the report was a revised Performance Overview report.  The report had been revised to provide better detail and more context on how the Council was performing, and how performance and service delivery linked into the Council’s key corporate priorities.  The re-design of the report was also driven by the Council’s business intelligence agenda, to ensure that the data and information held was used to drive service delivery and key decisions.  To tie in with this strategy, the report also included supporting intelligence and data such as comparisons against other similar councils, where possible, as well as the addition of forecasted performance, which was informed by trend and business intelligence analysis. 

The Panel considered the report, and the following issues were raised:

·         It was good to see an overall improvement, which made up the vast majority of indicators.  However, performance with regard to fly tipping was disappointing, and many members were very unhappy about this.  Where an incident could not be cleared within the required timeframe, what action was being taken, and were the current providers of the service satisfactory? 

o   Officers responded that not all issues were due to staff availability, and that sometimes problems arose due to difficulties in identifying location.  The  current service was being provided at a reduced cost, and consideration was being given to the cost of bringing fly tipping collections in house.  The Street Scene and Pride teams were looking at picking up issues that the current provider could not deal with. 

·         Members responded that the website had improved, and that hopefully this should show improvements, and that the next report would reflect this.                              

·         Members commented that some of the ‘same period last year’ data did not match up to the visual graphs, and it was agreed that officers would correct this information.

·         Section 3.3 of the covering report provided reasons for poor performance, and provided details on seasonal trends around bringing properties back into use.  However, information provided further on was contradictory.

o   Officers agreed that the information provided was contradictory, and that more information on seasonal trends was required.

·         Members also stated that statistics around empty properties also appeared to be contradictory.

o   Officers responded that empty homes was an annual national indicator and needed to be recognised within the data.  The Policy Development Panel was already considering issues around empty homes. 

·         Members raised the issue of complaints, and how this information was used?  If the problem was a service issue, this was a complaint.  It was therefore necessary to differentiate between service issues and formal complaints, and supporting information was therefore required.

o   Officers responded that service issues were raised individually be each area, that he would find out the information required and formulate it as a performance issue. 

·         The report stated that there had been two complaints where a response had not been provided within the required 15 days – had an extension period been agreed?
Officers responded that the complainant had been advised to and extended period in order that a suitable response be received.

o   Members replied that if this was the case, the reporting needed to be dealt with in a different way to reflect the reasons behind the delay, rather than reporting that the deadline had not been met.

·         Members asked whether it was possible to provide data at a ward level?

o   Officers responded that not all data could be provided at ward level, but that work could be undertaken to see what information could be provided in this way.

·         Members were generally very complementary of the revised Performance report, and felt that the layout was clear and easy to understand, although consideration needed to be given to the use of certain colours used and ease of reading.

AGREED:

That the report be noted.