Agenda item

This report presents the findings from the recently completed scrutiny review of Disabled Access to York’s Heritage & Cultural Offer, and asks the Committee to agree the Task Group’s draft recommendations, to enable the final report to be presented to a future meeting of Cabinet.

Members considered a report that presented the findings from the recently completed scrutiny review of Disabled Access to York’s Heritage & Cultural Offer and asked the Committee to agree the Task Group’s draft recommendations, to enable the final report to be presented to a future meeting of Cabinet.

The Chair of the Task Group thanked everyone who had participated in this review, in particular the Scrutiny Officer and Cllr Barnes whose contributions had been instrumental. The Task Group agreed that the review had been extremely interesting and meeting and listening to external partners had been hugely beneficial.  

Members discussed Make It York’s offer and agreed it would be useful for the Committee to receive a report which explained their aspirations. To monitor how this new enterprise had been incorporated, Members also agreed to receive six monthly updates.

The draft recommendations were considered and Members discussed the wording used in the sentence ‘making accessibility a requirement of membership’ found in paragraph 87, point x, bullet point 1 of the report.  It was noted that a clearer explanation was needed and the Task Group agreed to circulate an amended sentence around the Committee for approval.

The Chair stated that the Wayfinding Project had funding available that could be allocated to digital use and that at a recent Cabinet meeting a decision on the allocation had been deferred. It was suggested that funding from this Project could be used to generate the downloadable mobile application, which would contain a comprehensive guide to accessible facilities in York.

The Task Group Chair agreed to contact the relevant Cabinet Member and officer involved to explore the options available. If the funding was obtainable the Task Group would redraft points xii and xiii, in paragraph 87 of the report, to reflect that City of York Council would be providing this provision.  

It was agreed the endorsement of the recommendations would be deferred until the next meeting to allow the Task Group to seek clarification on the proposed amendments.

Resolved:

i)             That the review findings detailed in paragraphs 12-82 of the report be noted.

ii)            That the endorsement of the Task Group draft recommendations be deferred until the next meeting.

iii)          That the sentence ‘Making accessibility a requirement of membership’ be amended and emailed around the full Committee for approval.

iv)          That the Cabinet Member and officer involved with the Wayfinding Project be contacted by the Task Group Chair and any updates to recommendations xii and xiii be prepared.

v)           That a report be received, at a future full Committee, from Make It York with 6 monthly updates.

Reason: To conclude the work on this review in line with scrutiny procedures and protocols thereby enabling this draft final report to be presented at the next meeting of the full Learning & Culture Overview & Scrutiny Committee.