Agenda and minutes

To receive any apologies for absence

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors M Jones, D Newton and A Stott.

To provide an opportunity for Members and Officers to declare any disclosable pecuniary and non-pecuniary interests in any item on the agenda.

Councillor J Jackson declared that she was a member of GMB.

In accordance with Procedure Rules Nos.11 and 35 a total period of 10 minutes is allocated for members of the public to address the Committee on any matter relevant to the work of the body in question.  

Individual members of the public may speak for up to 5 minutes but the Chairman will decide how the period of time allocated for public speaking will be apportioned where there are a number of speakers.

Members of the public wishing to ask a question at the meeting should provide at least three clear working days’ notice in writing and should include the question with that notice. This will enable an informed answer to be given.  It is not required to give notice of the intention to make use of public speaking provision, however, as a matter of courtesy, a period of 24 hours notice is encouraged.

No members of the public were present.

To approve the minutes of the meetings held on 28 April 2015 and 11 June 2015

RESOLVED:

That the minutes of the meetings held on 28 April 2015 and 11 June 2015 be approved as a correct record.

To note the attached Terms of Reference for the Staffing Committee and the Staffing Appeals Sub Committee.

To note the membership of Staffing Committee, as agreed by Annual Council on 27 May 2015 as set out below:

Councillor Barry Moran – Chairman

Councillor Gary Barton – Vice Chairman

Councillor David Brown

Councillor Janet Jackson

Councillor Michael Jones

Councillor David Marren

Councillor David Newton

Councillor Amanda Stott

RESOLVED:

That the membership and terms of reference for the Staffing Committee and the Staffing Appeals Sub Committee be noted.

To consider a report on the progress with Human Resource and Organisational Development items, including Health and Safety

The Committee received a report which gave a year-end review of the Human Resource and Organisational Development Service for 2014/15 and a summary of the workforce priorities for 2015-16, along with the Quarter 1 Health and Safety data and key workforce data.

During 2014/15, a total of 547 corporate and school employees had been trained on 56 health and safety training courses and 34 workplace inspections and visits to premises had been undertaken.  Annual Health and Safety Reviews in schools who purchased Health, Safety and Risk Management Services had taken place at 17 secondary schools, 4 special schools and 139 primary schools.  4969 accidents and incidents had been recorded on PRIME, of which 93 were RIDDOR reportable.  No Health and Safety Executive investigations had been carried out.    The Corporate Health and Safety Policy had been reviewed, along with the Fire Policy. The Corporate Health and Safety Service had won its third ROSPA Gold Award for Health and Safety.

The Workforce Development team had introduced a new evaluation and feedback process so that each training course could be assessed and the return on investment highlighted.  The corporate learning programme, Towards Excellence, offered employees statutory courses on fire, health and safety, data protection and equality.  Training on adult and child safeguarding had been delivered to employees, students, volunteers and elected members.  A range of monthly management development sessions entitled ‘Business Breakfasts’ had been introduced to improve business acumen, with sessions from a range of externally commissioned providers, such as North West Employers Organisation and Manchester Metropolitan University.  A number of effective communications theories, such as Insights Discovery, the science of Laughology and Neuro Linguistic Programming, had been introduced into management team development sessions.  It was confirmed that it was Council policy to require employees, who left within 12 months of undertaking any extensive training paid for by Cheshire East Council, to pay back the cost of the training; this would apply to the more expensive training, such as post-graduate training, but not for short internal courses.

It was confirmed that no employees had set themselves up as contractors/companies and that all employees were subject to a universal PAYE system.

The apprentice scheme had been refreshed and renamed the A Star Apprentice Programme and the age appropriate wage had been implemented to attract high calibre candidates.  Twelve apprentices had gained employment with the Council in the last year.

The HR Strategy and Organisational Development team had been working on the commitment to adopt the Living Wage for directly employed staff. 

The Local Government Transparency Code 2014 placed a requirement on all councils to prepare and publish a range of factual data on which policy decisions were based.  The workforce elements of the Code had been published on the Council’s website to meet four sections of the code – organisation chart, senior salaries, pay multiples and trade union facility time. 

The staff survey had provided a valuable snapshot of how colleagues felt about working for the Council.   A number of actions had been progressed  ...  view the full minutes text for item 12.

To consider a report on attendance management within Cheshire East Council during 2014/2015

The Committee received a report which provided an overview of the sickness absence rates within Cheshire East Council during 2014-15 and an analysis of the main reasons for these rates.  The report summarised the actions taken so far to address absence and promote good attendance.

The sickness absence rate in 2014/15 was 12 days per full time employee, which was a rise on the previous year which was 11.3.  Working time lost to sickness absence as a proportion of all working time available in 2014/15 was 4.6% compared with 4.3% in 2013/14.  The most common reason given for absence was stress.  Details of the main reasons for absence were shown in Appendix 1 to the Report.  It was agreed that the sickness absence statistics could be made more meaningful by introducing different measures such as cost of absence; proportion of employees with no recorded absence; frequency of absence rate, and individual frequency of absence rate.

The latest North West Employers’ Organisation report showed that the increase in absence seen by the Council was similar to the increase seen across the region for 2014/15.  Benchmarking against other public sector employers in the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accounting benchmarking club showed that the Council was slightly above average in its sickness rates in 2013/14.  The data for 2014/15 was not yet available for comparison.  The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development produced an annual attendance report covering the private and public sector.  Their key findings for the public sector in 2014 showed that stress-related absence had increase in three fifths of public sector organisations and stress was the most common cause of long term sickness.  Common causes of stress in the public sector were reported as workload, management style and relationships at work.  

A Task Group, now called the Wellbeing and Resilience Group had been formed, chaired by Brenda Smith, Director of Adults Social Care and Independent Living. The Group included staff from a wide range of services including Public Health, as the work fitted with the wider agenda to promote health in the work-place as well as for residents, HR Delivery, Health and Safety, Workforce Development, Occupational Health, Operational Services Managers and the Trade Unions. 

The Task Group was taking the approach that developing resilience was a critical business issue which needed to be addressed from the three angles of the organisation, mangers and individual staff.  Pressures would always exist at work and in personal lives, and employers could help to create a work environment where pressure was managed appropriately and there was less likelihood of staff going off sick. 

A programme of wellbeing activities would be promoted throughout 2015/16  and would form the basis of an early intervention approach to attendance – details of the programme were detailed in Appendix 3 to the Report.

The Employee Assistance Scheme, which offered counselling, would continue to be promoted and it was hoped that this approach, along with the Council’s emphasis on wellbeing and promoting a climate of resilience, would lead  ...  view the full minutes text for item 13.