Agendas, Meetings and Minutes - Agenda and minutes

Agenda and minutes

Venue: County Hall

Contact: Sheena Jones, Democratic Governance and Scrutiny Manager  01905 846011 Email: DemocraticServices@worcestershire.gov.uk

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Items
No. Item

2094.

Apologies and Declarations of Interest

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Minutes:

None

Chairman's Comment

The Chairman welcomed Richard Morris, Tracey Onslow and Mike Rouse to the Cabinet and stated that he looked forward to working with them. He also recorded his thanks to Alan Amos, Matt Dormer and Tony Miller for their service on Cabinet over an extended period.

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2095.

Public Participation

Members of the public wishing to take part should notify the Assistant Director for Legal and Governance in writing or by e-mail indicating both the nature and content of their proposed participation no later than 9.00am on the working day before the meeting (in this case Wednesday 25 May).  Further details are available on the Council's website.  Enquiries can also be made through the telephone number/e-mail address listed on the website and in the agenda.

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Minutes:

None

2096.

Confirmation of the Minutes of the previous meeting

The Minutes of the meeting of 21 April 2022 have been previously circulated

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Minutes:

The minutes of the previous meeting held on 21 April 2022, were agreed to be an accurate record of the meeting and were signed by the Chairman.

 

2097.

Worcestershire Adult Safeguarding Board Annual Report 2020-2021 pdf icon PDF 148 KB

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Minutes:

Professor Keith Brown, Chairman of the Worcestershire Adult Safeguarding Board introduced the Board’s Annual Report for 2020-21. He was the Chair of the NHS England National Safeguarding Network and was the Lead for national research into financial fraud and scams and advised the Ministry of Justice regarding mental capacity. The Worcestershire Adult Safeguarding Board had a statutory duty to seek and provide assurance that Adults in Worcestershire were safeguarded from abuse and neglect. The duty was shared between the organisations who were members of the Board; the Police, the County Council, Health and the Voluntary and Community Sector.

 

The wicked issues which were currently being considered were rough sleeping, exploitation and self-neglect. In cases of exploitation it was often difficult to fully understand what was going on behind the scenes and with cases of self-neglect it was important to understand the mental capacity of the individual, but it could be complex to understand what people were capable of in different areas of their lives.

 

He believed Worcestershire should be proud of its staff who dealt with safeguarding and he was encouraging some of them to be nominated to the Health Services Journal Patient Safety Award under safeguarding for their work around exploitation.

 

Professor Brown felt that the major risk in the health and care sector was to do with staffing and recruitment but felt that there was an opportunity in the development of the Integrated Care Board, which could help to build bridges with health and social care.

 

The Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care felt that they had been on a considerable journey since the Safeguarding Board had been set up and considerable progress had been made in the area of exploitation, and by working with District Councils, some progress was being made on homelessness. He did however feel that it could be difficult to identify self harm or neglect. The Council was concerned about staffing and it was believed that thousands more care and finance staff would be required in future to cope with Government changes and it was right to boost the pay received by domiciliary care staff.

 

The Cabinet Member for Health and Wellbeing believed the work of the Safeguarding Board was very important in protecting the most vulnerable in the county and enabling them to live more fulfilling lives and she agreed there was capacity issues with carers.

 

In the ensuing discussion the following points were made:

·       In response to a query about what a section 42 criteria was, and why it increased by 27%, it was clarified that it meant whether people met the criteria for significant needs for the Board to investigate. Professor Brown believed that people now understood the criteria better about whether there was a need for a safeguarding review,

·       It was believed that society needed to value carers and recognise that it was a worthwhile and honourable career and which gave people a sense of purpose and a  communication strategy was required to promote caring as a career. It could  ...  view the full minutes text for item 2097.

2098.

Worcestershire Minerals Local Plan pdf icon PDF 224 KB

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Minutes:

Marc Bayliss, Cabinet Member for Economy, Infrastructure and Skills introduced the report on the Minerals Local Plan, explaining that the plan would replace plans which had been in place since 1997 when they covered the County of Hereford and Worcester. The plan was a 15-year vision which covered plans for each type of mineral. The plan had gone through 4 stages of consultation and following an examination in public, the document was found to be sound as long as some modifications from the Inspectors were accepted. The document did not contain detailed site allocations which would be developed as a next stage.

 

Tribute was paid to all the Cabinet Members and Officers who had been involved with the development of the plan and it was explained that following Cabinet consideration the plan would need to be considered by Council for adoption.

 

Members of Cabinet welcomed the plan which meant the County would not be vulnerable to speculative applications and were pleased that the importance of restoration had been recognised and environmental targets were being included. The emphasis was on planning authorities to get restoration right and see restoration done on a phased basis rather than it being done at the end of the project.

 

RESOLVED that Cabinet approved the Worcestershire Minerals Local Plan and Policies Map for recommendation to Council for adoption, with the main modifications recommended by the Inspectors and the additional modifications which are necessary to clarify the plan but which do not materially affect its policies.