Previous Reference: Executive, Minute 31 (2017/18)

Members will recall that, in 2017, Bradford Council invited the Local Government Association to conducted a peer challenge review. Following on from that, a number of recommendations were made.

The Chief Executive will present a report (Document “E”) which provides Members with an update on progress to date on the Improvement Action Plan which was presented to the Executive in 2017.

Recommended –

That progress made to date against the Corporate Peer Challenge Review  recommendations, as captured in the Updated Improvement Action Plan in the table set out in Document “E” be reviewed.

(Philip Witcherley – 01274 431241)  

Previous Reference: Executive, Minute 31 (2017/18)

Members recalled that, in 2017, Bradford Council had invited the Local Government Association (LGA) to conduct a peer challenge review. Following on from that, a number of recommendations had been made.

The Chief Executive presented a report (Document “E”) which provided Members with an update on progress to date on the Improvement Action Plan which had been presented to the Executive in 2017.

The Head of Policy and Performance attended the meeting and gave a detailed presentation in respect of the report, going through each recommendation made by the LGA  and outlining the progress made against each one.

The Chair began questioning by asking for an update on redeployment. He was informed that a significant amount of work was being undertaken with affected staff; that a pragmatic approach was being taken to skills transfer and that vacancies were being referred to the redeployments process at an earlier stage  than had previously been the case.

Members stated that the language of the report was not easy to understand and required that plain English be used in future.

A member also commented that the work of the voluntary sector had not been highlighted in the report and asked that a better reflection of that be included in future updates.

A member asked questions in respect of the reserve funds held by the Council and the meaning of the phrases “aggressive approach to commercialism”  and “demand management” which were both used in the LGA Review.

The Leader of Council attended the meeting and advised that the Council held a general level of reserves as well as a reserve for schools and that the Council’s Section 151 officer had advised that a £10million general reserve was as low as was prudent. She also advised that the phrase “aggressive commercialism” referred to the Council covering its own costs and making arrangements with its partners in respect of covering costs.  The Head of Policy and Performance also advised that the LGA considered that there could be a greater level of policy development review and confirmed that this had increased over the last year.

A member commented on the usefulness of inviting someone from the original peer review to return to the Council to answer questions, particularly as the review contained difficult and unclear language.

Another member then questioned officers about the work the Council was undertaking on apprenticeships, stressing his view that, as well as enabling higher level apprenticeships, efforts should be made in respect of target groups such as people with learning disabilities for whom a level two or three apprenticeship may not be appropriate but who should be encouraged into employment as much as possible.

In response, members were advised that work was being undertaken with the employment and skills team on pre-apprenticeships and training opportunities as well as expanding the work experience offer within the Council.

The member concerned commented that it would be useful to discuss partnership working with third sector organisations which worked on employment such as the Industrial Services Group.

A member then queried how apprenticeship placements were identified and was advised that all posts below band eight were being converted to apprenticeships in consultation with managers. It was stressed that this would be a huge culture change for the organisation but that young people had a great deal to bring to the workplace. Members were also advised that there were departmental champions for the apprenticeship scheme and that it could also be an opportunity to “upskill” current staff. They were informed of current work that was underway to provide apprenticeships such as that in Building and Technical Services and the plans to recruit ten new apprentices to one of the neighbourhood teams. Altogether there were 221 active apprenticeships, of which 110 were existing placements, 55 were new starts and 56 were in schools. Work was underway to promote opportunities to care leavers more actively.

A member queried how the process of increasing the level of apprenticeships was being managed in the context of maintaining levels of department performance and was advised that it was a challenge but that previous experience had shown that it was manageable and that managers had the opportunity to have input on filling their own teams. It was also noted that higher level apprentices usually had some degree of work experience.

Members were also advised that an apprentice was defined by the fact that they were paid the apprenticeship salary and that they spent 20% of their time in “off the job” learning that would lead to an apprenticeship qualification. Where the apprenticeship levy was used to up-skill existing staff, the skills learned on an apprenticeship programme could give staff the confidence to progress which created flow overall and in turn created new opportunities for young people.

It was stressed that there was no conflict between the redeployment process and the apprenticeship scheme as vacancies were considered for redeployment first.   

Resolved –

That a further progress report be presented in six months time, focussing on progress made against the peer review recommendations.

ACTION: Chief Executive