Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Councillor J Jackson and Phil Mason.

To provide an opportunity for Members and Officers to declare any personal and/or prejudicial interests in any item on the agenda

Councillor D Flude declared a personal interest as she was a retired member of Unison.

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 Committee.

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.

There were no members of the public present.

To approve the minutes of the meeting held on 20 October 2011

RESOLVED:

That the minutes of the meeting held on 20 October 2011 be confirmed as a correct record, subject to the following amendment:

24 Apologies for Absence

‘Olga Kikkinis’ be amended to read ‘Olga Kokkinis’.

To receive a presentation on the Apprenticeship Scheme

The Committee received a presentation on the Council’s Apprenticeship Scheme - the ‘A’ Team, from Ben Whitter, Senior Organisational Development Officer, and apprentice Amy Rowe.

The Apprenticeship Scheme provided people aged 16+ with work based training and development experiences across a wide range of council services.  Since the scheme had begun in 2010 it had given more than 80 young people the opportunity to work in various council services. There were currently 65 young people in placements across the Council.    The Council was developed partnership working with the Princes Trust, Cheshire Fire & Rescue Service, Wulvern Housing, Total People and YMCA. The Scheme had just launched apprenticeships in the Leisure industry with 21 places being available.

The ‘A’ Team had recently attended an event at Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium to share its success and best practice model with other councils in the north.

Apprentice Amy Rowe explained that she had joined the Council as an apprentice in May 2011. She had completed her A-levels at school but had not wanted to go to university and was looking for an alternative when she found about the Apprenticeship Scheme.  She was currently working in Marketing in the Communications Team and also worked on the A Team marketing.  She was working towards her NVQ Level 3 and attended Macclesfield College one day a week.

The Committee thanked Ben and Amy for their presentation and congratulated them on the work that had been done to establish the scheme and make it successful.  The Trade Union representatives echoed this and asked if there was anything they could do to help and support the scheme.

To consider a report on the progress with Human Resource Issues

The Head of Human Resources and Organisational Development, aided by the HR Strategy & OD Manager and Corporate Health & Safety Manager, presented a report which provided a general update on Human Resource issues, including Health & Safety, Organisational Development, HR Delivery and HR Policy and Reward.

Health and Safety

It was reported that the Corporate Health and Safety Service had delivered 38 training courses during Quarter 2.  The courses provided included First Aid, Manual & Safer Handling and on PRIME. 

A programme of Health & Safety Reviews for Children and Families (non- school) had commenced in September 2011.  An initial Review was completed at a residential centre with very encouraging results on health & safety management.  Inspections had also taken place of services and locations in the Places Directorate, Adult Services and Leisure Services

In Quarter 2, 1365 accidents/incidents were entered into PRIME, of which 87 were RIDDOR reportable to the Health & Safety Executive.  These figures represented a drop of 5% for the total numbers of accidents reported and 9% for RIDDOR reports when compared to Quarter 1 of the current financial year. 

It was not possible to draw meaningful comparisons between last year and this year’s Quarter 2 figures as the electronic accident recording system – PRIME, was still in its test phase and was only properly rolled out across the organisation from December 2010, meaning that may accidents continued to be recorded locally and were not collated into one central database as now.  Quarter 3 would provide a more meaningful comparison.

Organisational Development

To broaden development opportunities for staff and maximise scarce resources, collaborative opportunities with other public sector organisations within the sub-region were being progressed and included a programme to develop leadership skills for managers. 

Work was underway to refresh the aspire values and to develop a framework for mangers and staff to define “how” successful people approach their work and achieve great things.  This behavioural framework would from part of the performance development process from 1 April 2012.

HR Delivery

The HR Delivery team had been heavily involved in providing data and carrying out consultation to support the implementation of harmonisation.  The Team had also worked on a number of potential TUPE situations, both into and out of, Cheshire East Council.  These included the provision of information and consultation with staff, unions, and external councils on the transfer out of services and assets to town and parish councils.

HR Policy and Reward

The revised package of terms and conditions had been implemented with effect from 1 November 2011, with the main changes affecting pay in December 2011.  The reassessment of applications for the Regular Car Users Allowance had been completed and the results would be implemented in January 2012 pay.

The current contract for the supply of agency workers comes to an end on 31 March 2012.   Work had been undertaken to re-let the contract on a joint basis with Cheshire West and Chester Council.  A decision would be taken at the Cabinet meeting on 9 January  ...  view the full minutes text for item 42.

The reports relating to the remaining items on the agenda have been withheld from public circulation and deposit pursuant to Section 100(B)(2) of the Local Government Act 1972 on the grounds that the matters may be determined with the press and public excluded.

The Committee may decide that the press and public be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the following items pursuant to Section 100(A)4 of the Local Government Act 1972 on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 4 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972 and public interest would not be served in publishing the information.

RESOLVED:

That the press and public be excluded from the meeting during the consideration if the following item pursuant to Section 100(A)4 of the Local Government Act 1972 on the grounds that they involved the disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 4 of Part 1 of  Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972 and public interest would not be served in publishing this information.

• Devolution of Services/Asset Transfer
• Trade Union Secondments

The Trade Union representatives raised issues in relation to the following items:

• Devolution of Services/Asset Transfer
• Trade Union Secondment.