Issue - meetings

To consider a joint report of the Chief Operating Officer, Cheshire East Council, and the Director of Resources, Cheshire West and Chester Council on the conclusions of the recent review of the Occupational Health Shared Service

Consideration was given to a report which summarised the conclusions of a review of the Occupational Health Shared Service.

The Occupational Health Unit (OHU) was initially considered as part of the proposed ICT/HR and Finance Single Legal Entity but was removed from the in scope services as it was not felt to be sufficiently commercial in practice.

A review was commissioned to help provide renewed direction for the OHU and to identify how it could improve commercially.  A strategic options appraisal identified six options for future delivery of the service:

• Improved As Is
• Lean Model
• Outsource
• Disaggregate
• Direct Service Organisation
• Separate Legal Entity

It was recommended that the Service be taken forward in two stages, with the option ‘Improved As Is’ being selected first as this would allow the OHU to continue to approve and develop it performance and commercialise its operations in order to ensure that future conversion into a company was feasible.  This option paved the way for the second stage and the establishment of the OHU as a commercial company.  A further report would be brought to the Joint Committee in January 2014 recommending an appropriate commercial vehicle for the services, including the potential of out-sourcing, integration into the proposed Single Legal Entity or the conversion of the service into a Council owned company.

RESOLVED:

That the future delivery of the Occupational Health Unit be taken forward in two stages, firstly to continue to improve the in-house service so that it is in the best possible shape for commercialisation and at that stage to then place it in an appropriate delivery vehicle.