Agenda and minutes

No declarations of interest were received.

No apologies for absence were received.

To move “That under Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972 the public be excluded from the meeting for the following items of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act".

RESOLVED –

That under Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972 the public be excluded from the meeting for the following item of business on the grounds that it involved the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act.

5:05pm to 5:30pm

The Cabinet Member for Customers and Communities and the Careline and Support Services Manager attended to provide a progress report on the implementation of recommendations from the review of Careline and Support Services. A report was approved by the Joint Cabinet and Employment and General Committee on 9 February, 2016 to put in place a new structure for Careline and Support Services in order to mitigate the effects of reductions in Derbyshire County Council (DCC) funding and move towards a financially self-sustaining service.

The Careline and Support Services Manager advised that the funding from DCC for the scheme managers had been lost and these posts had been deleted as part of the review. However, funding for the monitoring of Careline alarms and floating support was still being received. The level of funding was expected to fall in 2016/17, with further reductions every year from 2017/18 if the funding for Careline monitoring was withdrawn.

Following the removal of the scheme managers in April, 2016, the cleaning of the sheltered schemes was now carried out by the council’s building cleaning team which had received good reviews. There was a plan to review other contracted services in 2017/18 including window cleaning, grounds maintenance and laundry equipment. The Careline alarm system and associated services at sheltered schemes, including CCTV, would be updated. Brocklehurst Court would be updated first as the scheme would be undergoing a major refurbishment; Support Officers were assisting with the temporary rehousing of tenants.

The Careline and Response Service had been fully staffed since September 2016. A Social Inclusion Officer had been appointed and was working with residents to co-ordinate, facilitate and expand the level of activities at sheltered schemes. A Team Leader for Support Services had been in post since September 2016. The Team Leader had previous experience of working in Adult Social Care and was hoping to enhance the skills of the current support staff in this area. The Publicity and Marketing Officer had been in post since September 2016 and had reviewed all marketing and publicity activity for the service.

Applications were being prepared for accreditation to the Telecare Services Association Quality Standards Framework and the Derbyshire Dignity Challenge.

The Careline and Support Service took over the management of 6 community rooms provided by Housing Services and had a programme of refurbishments planned. Current users had been consulted in order to understand what improvements were needed. Members asked if friends groups were being involved in the refurbishment and management of the community rooms. The Careline and Support Services Manager responded that all the necessary friends of groups had been involved in consultations.

Since April 2016, there had been an increase in the number of self-funders receiving the Careline response service and signing up to the support service. Chesterfield Borough Council (CBC) took the opportunity of offering a Careline provision and monitoring service to residents living in the Derbyshire Dales (DD) and took over two thirds of DD Careline users.

The overall financial situation for 2016/17 was better than  ...  view the full minutes text for item 49.

RESOLVED –

That the public be readmitted to the meeting.

-      Measuring the impact of housing conditions on health

5:30pm to 5:45pm

-      Green Spaces and Allotments Strategy Progress Reports

5:45pm to 6:10pm

Development of a Health and Wellbeing Strategy

The Health and Wellbeing Manager attended to provide a brief overview of the development of the Health and Wellbeing Strategy; a presentation had been received by the Overview and Performance Scrutiny Forum on 10 January, 2017. Data received from the indices of multiple deprivation indicated that there were large inequalities in life expectancy between the most and least deprived areas and some of the illness averages were significantly worse than authority areas in the rest of England.

Partnership working was crucial to improve health inequalities as borough-wide changes were needed to the way people act in order to improve the health profile. An important factor in improving health was through developing community based actions such as Press Red. This approach was targeted at specific areas and tailored for individual groups that could be varied across the borough. Partnership working was also taking place with the DCC Public Health Team and Sustainability and Transformation Plan Place Group, the redesigned NHS partnership. Falls prevention would be looked at initially as a key part to keeping people safe and out of hospital. Work was being carried out with Sports England to apply for funding for projects.

To address the issues with the alcohol-related harm, work would be undertaken with key groups that have a high demand on services. Also, to improve the feel of the town centre, the possibility of managing alcohol licenses on town centre businesses would be considered.

An internal strategy group including members from all services in the Council would be developed. The work of the group would be overseen by the health and wellbeing partnership.

Members thanked the Health and Wellbeing Manager for attending to provide the update.

Green Spaces and Allotments Strategy

The Principal Green Spaces Officer attended to provide an update on the work that had been carried out by the Greenspaces team and the future plans for the boroughs green spaces.

There had been some funding successes since the committee received the last update in August 2016. Eastwood Park in Hasland had received funding for a wheel/skate park and Stand Road Park had been awarded a small sum of funding for pitch side shelters which was linked to a bigger project. Grants had been received from DCC and Viridor for a new play facility at Langer Lane in Rother Ward.

The Greenspaces team had carried out bulb planting in conjunction with primary and junior schools, friends groups and CBC’s Neighbourhoods team. A project was being undertaken at Loundsley Green to create a wetland area; Holme Hall unite, primary schools, friends groups and external contractors were working together to deliver the project.

The Chesterfield in Bloom ceremony was held at Ringwood Hall and was well attended; Chesterfield went on to achieve the gold standard at East Midlands in Bloom. Work had begun to develop activities for this year’s entry which included a painting competition for children based around the Women’s Tour of Britain which was coming to Chesterfield again in  ...  view the full minutes text for item 51.

-      Play Strategy SPG

-      Leisure, Sport and Cultural Activities SPG

6:10pm to 6:20pm

Councillor Derbyshire, lead member for the Play Strategy Scrutiny Project Group, provided an update. The group members had met with the Principal Green Spaces Officer to discuss the public consultation on the revised Play Strategy; the group would meet again to discuss the results of the public consultation when they were available.

Councillor P Gilby, lead member for the Leisure, Sport and Cultural Activities Scrutiny Project Group, advised that the group members were still waiting for a meeting to be set up with the project board for the new Queen’s Park Sports Centre to discuss lessons learnt.

RESOLVED –

That the updates be noted.

-      Review of Water Rates Payment Policy SPG

6:20pm to 6:25pm

Councillor P Gilby attended to provide an update on the monitoring of the recommendations from the scrutiny review of the water rates payment policy. The scrutiny review was carried out due to concerns that council tenants may have been evicted from CBC properties for just owing water rates. During the course of the scrutiny project group’s work it became clear that this was not the case, however the group also discovered that there was not a formal structure to the contract between Severn Trent Water (STW) and CBC. Conversations would take place between STW and CBC to work towards formulating an agreement. The Director of Finance and Resources would contact STW to set up a meeting to discuss the way forward and steps were being made to continue the agreement with STW.

Members asked what the termination period for the contract would be if STW wanted to cease current arrangements. Councillor P Gilby replied that the first aim was to keep the current contract, but STW had indicated that they wanted to take arrangements for water rates collection back in house for their authority clients in Derbyshire; if this was the case a transitional period of one year would be sought.

Members thanked Councillor P Gilby for attending to provide the progress update on the committee’s recommendations.

RESOLVED –

1.   That the monitoring schedule be approved.

2.   That the Review of Water Rates Payment Policy (EW2) be removed from the monitoring schedule.

3.   That Councillor Perkins reports back developments on the water rates contract through her role as scrutiny representative on the Housing Revenue Account Business Plan Steering Group.

6:25pm to 6:30pm

The Forward Plan was considered.

RESOLVED –

That the Forward Plan be noted.

6:30pm to 6:35pm

The Committee considered its work programme. The Chair noted that there were currently no items scheduled for the next meeting in April so it may be cancelled. In addition, members were informed that the next work programme action planning day would take place on 1 March, further detail and an email invite would be sent to members.

RESOLVED –

That the work programme be noted.

6:35pm to 6:40pm

The Minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 6 December, 2016 were presented.

In respect of Minute No. 39, the Chair advised Members that Councillor Dickinson would be carrying out a special project on the future of the old Queen’s Park Sports Centre. The Chair would arrange to meet with Councillor Dickinson to discuss scrutiny’s involvement in the project.

RESOLVED –

1)   That the Minutes be accepted as a correct record and be signed by the Chair.

2)   That the Chair meets with Councillor Dickinson to discuss scrutiny’s involvement with the project on the future of the old Queen’s Park Sports Centre.