Agenda and minutes

At this point, Members are asked to declare:

·        any personal interests not included on the Register of Interests

·        any prejudicial interests or

·        any disclosable pecuniary interests

which they may have in respect of business on this agenda

Members were asked to declare, at this point in the meeting, any personal interests, not included on the Register of Interests, or any prejudicial or disclosable pecuniary interests they may have in respect of business on the agenda. Councillor Stuart Barnes declared a personal non prejudicial interest as a co-opted member of the Board of Trustees of SNAPPY.

To approve and sign the minutes of the Learning and Culture Policy and Scrutiny Committee held on Wednesday 22 March 2017 and  Wednesday 10 May 2017.

With regard to the minute 49 (Update on Implementation of Local Area Teams) of the minutes of the 22 March meeting, concern was raised that the update scheduled for the November meeting on the Early Help Strategy, Local Area Teams and Sycamore House update was too long to wait.  Officers advised that the Early Help Strategy was currently out for early consultation and that it would be possible to share this with Committee Members which would provide them with detail on its aims and objectives, how success will be measured etc.

Resolved:  That the minutes of the meetings of the Learning and Culture Policy and Scrutiny Committee held on 22 March and 10 May 2017 be approved as correct records and then signed by the chair.

Note: Agreement of the 22 March 2017 minutes had been deferred at the meeting on 10 May 2017 as the former committee Chair had requested that further information be included in relation to the discussion which had taken place with regard to minute 46 (2016-17 Third Quarter Finance and Performance Monitoring Report).

At this point in the meeting members of the public who have registered to speak can do so.  The deadline for registering is 5.00pm on Tuesday 4 July 2017.  Members of the public can speak on agenda items or matters within the remit of the committee.

To register to speak please contact the Democracy Officers for the meeting, on the details at the foot of the agenda.

 Filming, Recording or Webcasting Meetings

Please note this meeting may be filmed and webcast or audio recorded and that includes any registered public speakers, who have given their permission.  The broadcast can be viewed at http://www.york.gov.uk/webcasts  or, if sound recorded, this will be uploaded onto the Council’s website following the meeting.

Residents are welcome to photograph, film or record Councillors and Officers at all meetings open to the press and public. This includes the use of social media reporting, i.e. tweeting.  Anyone wishing to film, record or take photos at any public meeting should contact the Democracy Officers (whose contact details are at the foot of this agenda) in advance of the meeting.

The Council’s protocol on Webcasting, Filming & Recording of Meetings ensures that these practices are carried out in a manner both respectful to the conduct of the meeting and all those present.  It can be viewed at http://www.york.gov.uk/download/downloads/id/11406/protocol_for_webcasting_filming_and_recording_of_council_meetings_20160809.pdf

It was reported that there had been no registrations to speak at the meeting under the Council’s Public Participation Scheme.

This report updates Members on the current activities of the York Museums Trust (YMT) against the agreed core partnership objectives.

Members considered a report which provided an update on the current activities of the York Museums Trust (YMT) against the agreed core partnership objectives between April 2016 and March 2017. Members noted that new objectives for the partnership had been agreed by the Executive in April 2016 and the Executive had agreed that twice-yearly reports be made to scrutiny highlighting developments and challenges against those new objectives and against YMT’s long term financial plan and capital development plan.

YMT’s Chief Operating Officer attended the meeting to present the report. He advised Members that YMT had won various awards and accolades during 2016-17 and provided a detailed update on work undertaken during the past year against the core partnership objectives. He responded to questions relating to the YMT card, visits to museums by school groups, use of the Museum Gardens out of hours for financial benefit, plans for the development of the Castle Museum in conjunction with plans for Castle Gateway as well as plans to obtain an Albert Moore painting for the city.

With regard to the YMT card and membership renewal, he confirmed that members appeared to be waiting until their next visit to renew, creating fluctuations in membership numbers. He advised that around 35,000 people had joined the scheme originally and that membership was now around 24,000 but was likely to stabilise around 28,000.

Resolved:  That the report be noted and Members comments be taken into consideration.

Reason:     To fulfil the Council’s role under the agreed partnership arrangements.

The following Executive Member’s will be in attendance to provide an update on their priorities and challenges for the 2017-18 municipal year.

•              Executive Member for Culture, Leisure & Tourism - Cllr Ayre

•              Executive Member for Education, Children & Young People – Cllr Rawlings

•              Deputy Leader, Economic Development & Community Engagement– Cllr Aspden

Three Executive Members attended the meeting to provide an update on their priorities and challenges for the 2017-18 municipal year.

The Executive Member for Culture, Leisure and Tourism, presented a written update which had been circulated to committee members prior to the meeting. He responded to specific questions raised during discussion and confirmed:

·        There had been a significant change in the way Sport and Active Leisure operated. The team had been reconfigured and now worked more closely with public health with which it had a natural fit. There was still a focus on promoting competitive sport as well as getting people into sport for health reasons and a focus on work with disadvantaged groups and partnership work.

·        Further details on the Community Stadium Project were to be presented to the Executive in late July 2017.

·        The council’s role in volunteering - encouraging large sections of the workforce to partake in volunteering, utilising a large number of volunteers to help deliver services to residents, and promoting the ethos of volunteering and the value it has to the city.

·        In relation to Make It York the main piece of work was around the event strategy.

·        The current service level agreement for Explore York Libraries and Archives Mutual was nearly at its close. Currently undertaking a lot of work with library users to refresh the library vision and to get a clear idea of what is wanted from the library service going forward..

·        In regard to Parks and Open Spaces, a lot of work has taken place to look at how best to use volunteers and volunteering organisations

Members asked for an update on a recent Conservative motion presented to council which called for a World War 1 commemorative cultural event to be organised, and were advised that a member steering group needed to be established to take this forward. The Chair suggested that it may be suitable for members of this committee to participate.

The Executive Member for Education, Children and Young People then provided his update. He drew Members’ attention to the different formats of the Executive Member’s reports and suggested that scrutiny committees would benefit from consistency in the format used by when reporting to scrutiny.

He provided members with information in relation to the following key achievements within his portfolio area within 2016-17, and congratulated officers on the good Ofsted outcome for Children’s Social Care last November:

·        The number of children and young people in care was stable, bucking national trend. Low numbers of children and young people were placed out of area and this number was reducing.

·        Local area teams incorporating the Healthy Child Service had been launched.

·        92% of children and young people in the city were in good or outstanding schools and work was continuing to further improve that number.

·        Continued strong performance at all key stages in schools - best results in North Yorkshire.

·        Regional Adoption Agency/unaccompanied asylum seeking children – doing well.

·        Work was ongoing to continue to make changes to wellbeing stats  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

This report analyses the financial outturn position and performance data for 2016/17 by reference to the service plans and budgets for all of the services falling under the responsibility of the Corporate Director of Children, Education & Communities.

Members considered a report which analysed the financial outturn position and performance data for 2016-2017 by reference to the service plans and budgets for all of the services falling under the responsibility of the Corporate Director of Children, Education and Communities.

The Finance Manager, Adults Children and Education and the Strategy and Policy Group Manager attended the meeting to present the report.

The Finance Manager reported that the overall net variation for the Directorate was a small under spend of £33,000 for the year, which effectively meant a balanced budget for 2016-17, and highlighted a number of variations across the services.

The Strategy and Policy Group Manager drew Members attention to the update on performance contained in the report. He explained that because of the slight changes to the scope of the committee, the set of indicators being presented were different to those previously  seen by the committee. He suggested that, outside the meeting, he could look at aligning the indicators being reported on, to better inform  the committee’s areas of focus over the forthcoming year . He responded to questions asked and provided more information in response to the following issues:

·          Question of local authorities having to pick up deficits when schools are forced to convert to academies.

·          EFL2 Children with Child Protection Plan indicator

·          Indicator 103b (% of final Education, Health and Care Plans issued within statutory time limits, including exceptions)

·          Overspend on high needs place and top up funding.

Resolved:  That the report be noted.

Reason:     To update the committee on the latest financial and performance position for 2016-17.

This draft final report presents the findings of the Scrutiny Review into the planning of major events.

Members considered the draft final report of the Tour de France Scrutiny Review Task Group which presented the findings of the scrutiny review into the planning of major events.

Members acknowledged the review had taken some time to complete and the reasons for that and noted the agreed remit of the review which had focussed on the planning, promotion and delivery of future major events to ensure all associated risks were managed properly.

Members discussed the findings from the review in relation to the provision of camping sites and entertainment/spectator hubs and the Grand Departy Concert. They acknowledged the decision taken by the council to look at ways to offset the costs of the Tour, noted the late organisation of the Grand Departy and the lack of evidence of appropriate risk assessment. Members then considered the review conclusions and the proposed draft recommendations.

Members agreed with the task group’s view that cross party consensus was important in the planning of major events. The Task Group confirmed they had been assured that the current system of project management now in place would address many of the issues identified through their review.

It was agreed that the following minor amendments be made to the report:

·        Para 74 (ii) Opening paragraph should be amended to “ In regard to the involvement of councillors by organising bodies in an future major event or any possibly controversial smaller activity:…….”

·        Para 74 (ii) third bullet point should be amended to include word “seek” so that it reads “All Councillors should be kept updated toseek a cross party consensus.

·        Para 34 needs clarification by adding to last sentence to read “it was seen as a non TdF event which would potentially divert custom and revenue away from the TdF concert arranged by Welcome to Yorkshire for  3 July in Leeds.  There was no record of that risk being assessed.”

·        Paragraph 18 should read “….. with the Millennium Bridge campsite postcode being shown as Millenium Bridge Terrace”

·        Para 63 – change word “main” to “regional” to make clearer so that para reads “……. rather than being part of the regional TdF event marketing,….”

Thanks were expressed to those Members of the Task Group who had participated in the review as well as the scrutiny officer for compiling what they considered to be a very comprehensive draft final report. 

Resolved:  (i)      That the amendments/additions detailed above and agreed by committee members be incorporated into the final report before presentation to Executive.

(ii)      That the draft recommendations detailed at paragraphs 73-75 of the report be endorsed

Reason:     To conclude the work of this scrutiny review in line with scrutiny procedures and protocols, and to enable this final report to be presented to the Executive.

Members are asked to consider the Committee’s work plan and potential scrutiny topics for the 2017-18 municipal year.

Members considered the committee’s work plan and potential scrutiny topics for the 2017-18 municipal year. The Scrutiny Officer explained that this was a basic work plan based on the previous year’s work plan.

The Scrutiny Officer suggested Members may wish to receive an update on the Healthy Child Service which was raised during the Executive Member updates and officers suggested that this be provided as part of the Local Area Teams update to be presented to the committee in November 2017.

Clarification was sought as to whether updates in relation to children’s health and wellbeing should be presented to the Health, Housing and Adult Social Care Policy and Scrutiny Committee or this committee. It was acknowledged that the portfolio area for the Health Housing and Adult Social Care Policy and Scrutiny Committee was very large and in the past the whole of the children and young people’s agenda had come to this committee therefore it would make sense for this update to be presented to this committee. The Scrutiny Officer agreed to liaise with officers and other scrutiny chairs to confirm whether this was the correct way forward.

Members questioned whether there were any topics within the community engagement area of the Executive Member for Economic Development and Community Engagement’s portfolio area which should be reported to the committee. The Scrutiny Officer advised that an implementation update on the previous Ward Funding Scrutiny Review would be presented at the November meeting and Members were welcome to identify any possible areas of interest from those on which the Executive Member had spoken. It was suggested that the effectiveness of arrangements around the reshaping of equalities engagement could be a topic of interest.

Members views were sought as to whether the committee felt a Scrutiny Task Group should be established to look into the organisation of the World War 1 commemoration event which was raised during the Executive Member updates. Members agreed it would be a sensible approach, so the Scrutiny Officer agreed to liaise with the Assistant Director (Communities, Culture and Public Realm) to check if this was an acceptable way forward.

The Scrutiny Officer asked Members to consider any possible scrutiny topics or policy development work they wished to look at during the forthcoming municipal year and advise her of anything.

Resolved:  That the work plan be approved subject to the above amendments/additions.

Reason:     To keep the committee’s work plan updated.