Agenda and minutes

Cllr Ken Pollock was no longer Chairman of the Panel as he had been appointed to the Cabinet; the Vice-Chairman would chair the meeting.

The Panel had a new member, Cllr Tony Muir.

The Vice-Chairman welcomed everyone to the meeting, including Jodie Townsend as new Democratic Governance and Scrutiny Manager.

None.

Members of the public wishing to take part should notify the Head of Legal and Democratic Services in writing or by email indicating the nature and content of their proposed participation no later than 9.00am on the working day before the meeting (in this case 21 January 2016).  Enquiries can be made through the telephone number/email address below.

None.

Previously circulated.

The Minutes of the meeting held on 25 November 2015 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman

In attendance for this item were the Cabinet Member with responsibility for Highways, the Cabinet Member with responsibility for Environment, the Director of Economy and Infrastructure and the Strategic Commissioner for Major Projects.

The Ketch roundabout (the Ketch) impacted on four local divisions, and county councillors for Powick (Tom Wells) and Croome (Roger Sutton) were invited to join the discussion.

The Director had been invited to update the Scrutiny Panel on the Ketch), since the 24 June discussion, in particular to cover lessons learned.  The Ketch formed part of a stretch of the A440 road from Whittington to Powick roundabout in Worcester, which is subject to improvements due to capacity constraints.

The Director focused on the two main issues involved; how long traffic was allowed to operate once it became clear that the roundabout was apparently unsafe, and also whether the design was flawed?

The Directorate had taken immediate action to close the lane within hours, and subsequently had brought forward a stage three safety audit, and commissioned an investigation by a law firm.

The investigation found three areas of concern:

·         Crucially, information included in the stage two safety audit referring to a risk of collision was not passed to the designers for response. The information included in an addendum to the audit referred to the problem of traffic travelling east from Malvern, which had a short length of carriageway in which to merge. For west bound traffic there was therefore a risk of side swipe or even head on collision.

·         The island had been signed off as complete despite a number of incomplete jobs such as road markings.

·         The island was opened a week ahead of schedule, without initial controlled conditions, which resulted in staff disciplinary action.

Turning to lessons learned, the Director pointed out that the island remained borderline compliant, within existing restrictions. In hindsight, the designs would have benefitted from some kind of three dimensional testing. Once the issues were known, the Council took immediate corrective action to bring the design to safety – work fulfilled by the contractor at no extra cost to the Council.

Major projects such as the Ketch were assigned a project manager, since it would be immense pressure for the Director to have responsibility for all projects. However everyone involved in the project was of managerial level. The process had been reconfigured, including introduction of a new role of 'clerk of works' to support the project team and a team approach. Driveability tests now took place for all major projects, including motorcyclists and larger vehicles, to capture the public driver's view.

The Directorate had never had such a safety glitch before and the experience had sharpened the Directorate's workforce and brought considerable improvement, to the benefit of subsequent projects, such as the Worcester Cathedral project and W6 roundabout. Road safety remained the prime concern of Worcestershire's highways operations and there had been no injuries recorded at the Ketch scene.

The Chairman invited discussion from the panel, with a focus on lessons learned.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 235.

As part of the Council's consultation process for the 2016/17 budget proposals, the Director and Cabinet Members with responsibility for Economy, Environment, Highways and Infrastructure had been invited to discuss:

·         Draft 2016/17 budget

·         Latest performance information for 2015/16

Draft 2016/17 Budget

The Chief Financial Officer talked through a presentation on the 2016/17 Budget and Medium Term Financial Plan, which had been prepared for the Budget member Challenge Group – and which covered:

·         Key Headlines

·         Driving Home Highways Infrastructure Improvement Programme

·         The County Council’s starting point for financial planning

·         How the MTFP had been updated since February 2015

·         How expenditure and income projections were developed

·         The indicative funding gap

·         Plans to address the indicative funding gap

·         The proposed draft MTFP

·         Summary capital expenditure plans

·         Local Government Finance Settlement update and next steps.

In summary, the position in Worcestershire was that:

·         economic growth was continuing to show signs of improvement

·         there was continued revenue investment in the key Corporate Plan priorities

·         demand pressures on services was the biggest issue and was growing significantly

·         the Council's Budget was £327.8m (approximately £1m per day) with £25m savings requirement.

·         It would be proposed that Council Tax would increase by 3.94% of which 1.94% would be ring fenced for the pressures in the Looked After Children and 2% ring-fenced for Adult Social Care to contribute to cost pressures which had been funded by a one-off grant in 2015/16 but unavailable in 2016/17.

Prior to the Local Government Settlement (announced late December 2015), the County Council had a healthy Balance Sheet and were looking at a £2m savings gap.  The Settlement however, was very disappointing for Worcestershire. Shire and District councils had been hit hard as Government had shown intent to accelerate reductions and redistribute grant funding away from Shire County's to Metropolitan and London boroughs.  Key grants such as the Care Act had been rolled-in effectively at zero to the main Revenue Support Grant. 

Looking at the budget's alignment to corporate priorities, the key relevant headlines for this Panel were:

·         Continuing allocations to match the Local Growth Plan, including Phase 5 Malvern Hills Science Park, Worcester Six off site and on site works, further phases of the southern link road around Worcester and three railway stations

·         Strengthening the road maintenance budget by £0.5million and the waste disposal budget by £0.5 million

·         £12 million would be invested over the next two years to the Driving Home highways infrastructure improvement programme – rural and urban road structural surface dressing to improve and expand lifespan of the network

Should the Council choose not to increase Council Tax, the funds would need to be found elsewhere. The proposals to draw more from residents by increasing Council Tax were a risk but also an opportunity, since it would also enable more discussion with residents about value.

The latest estimate was an £11.5million funding gap, to add to the £2million gap already in existence.  Allowing for plans already identified, it was thought there would still be a £2million funding gap.  The Business,  ...  view the full minutes text for item 236.

In attendance for this item were the Cabinet Member with responsibility for Highways, the Head of Strategy and Infrastructure and the Research Business Partner.

In view of the Chairman's other scrutiny meeting commitments that day, the Research and Business Partner was asked to provide a brief summary of the Council's work on the local economic multiplier and how council spending might benefit the local economy.

The Council spent significant sums on services and the local multiplier (LM) was a simple and understandable way of measuring the local economic impact of that spending. Starting with income available, the approach then analysed how much was spent locally/non-locally, and how much suppliers and staff spent locally and non-locally.

This indicated that from the Council's £644.5 million expenditure, 43.7 % was spent on employees who live in Worcestershire and 66% on staff or businesses within Worcestershire. Staff living in Worcestershire indicated they spent 53% of their income in the county, compared to 26% for non-Worcestershire staff.

The analysis indicated that every £1 spent by Worcestershire County Council contributed £2.12 to the economy's economy – it was important to note that this did not capture other outcomes, such as new business and jobs.

The indicator could potentially inform the Council's procurement processes and there was work to be done to see if and how this could be possible.

Main discussion points

Cllr Jenkins was interested in the LM, from an environmental and business perspective. Local companies were more likely to spend locally than multinationals. He was keen to see how this work could be factored into contract processes.

The Research Business Partner was looking at examples of other councils, which tended to be community based. There was also potential to measure the social impact of local expenditure.

The Panel welcomed the LM work and the current contribution to Worcestershire's economy.

Other business

In closing the meeting, the Chairman referred to the Footways Scrutiny Task Group and it was agreed that a meeting would be arranged as soon as possible to nominate a new lead member to take the exercise through to completion.