Agenda and minutes

An apology for absence was submitted by Councillor Nigel Dixon.

There were no substitutes at the meeting.

To receive questions / statements from the public, if any.

There were none received.

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee held on 17 July 2024.

The minutes of the meeting held on held on 17 July 2024 were approved as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

To determine any other items of business which the Chairman decides should be considered as a matter of urgency pursuant to Section 100B(4)(b) of the Local Government Act 1972.

None received.

Members are asked at this stage to declare any interests that they may have in any of the following items on the agenda. The Code of Conduct for Members requires that declarations include the nature of the interest and whether it is a disclosable pecuniary interest.

None received.

To consider any petitions received from members of the public.

None received.

To consider any requests made by non-executive Members of the Council, submitted to the Democratic Services Manager with seven clear working days’ notice, to include an item on the agenda of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

None received.

To consider any responses of the Council or the Cabinet to the Committee’s reports or recommendations:

The Committee noted the current tracker of its recommendations to the Cabinet.

To receive an update from the Director of Resources on the Council’s financial performance and projected outturn for 2024/25 for the revenue account, capital programme and reserves statement as at the end of July 2024.

Suggested time 45 minutes.

Councillor Bailey asked what the £350k underspend in employee costs in the Place and Climate Change Department consisted of. The Chief Executive (CEX) advised that the underspend was in the current financial year and Appendix A was the officer suggestion for savings as the current position in quarter 4.

Councillor Cushing asked if the Council had been able to manage with these vacancies should the posts still need to exist. Councillor Shires advised that there were service reviews being undertaken and that would be one of the questions that would be asked.

Councillor Holliday asked what is the effect of the outcomes being received on the residents of these vacant posts. The CEX stated that was being worked on at the moment by officers and the Cabinet, some of which may not be permanent posts and an appraisal is undertaken on the effect of the removal of a post when it becomes vacant.

Councillor Boyle asked about the ongoing costs of paying agency staff to fill vacant posts. Councillor Shires advised that the agency fees were for the finance department. The CEX stated that the agency arrangements for the deputy Section 151 Officer post would end in October.

Councillor Housden asked if the Council was being compromised by the number of vacant posts. Councillor Penfold added there was a point at which it could tip to affect the delivery of services.

The CEX advised that the recruitment challenges had changed across services over time and some of those were national shortages. Performance in some services were good compared to other authorities but there remained recruitment issues in some services. 

Councillor Penfold asked about the progress on getting donations and advertising income for Pier and Car Parks. Councillor Shires stated that the Estates Team were working on this for a more commercially based approach as referenced by the recent Corporate Peer Review recommendations.

Councillor Bailey asked if was possible to have a snapshot of the Council’s investments and to look at the Council’s best practise. The Democratic Services (Scrutiny) Officer advised that the Treasury Management Strategy ought to go to the Governance, Risk and Audit Committee.

Councillor Hankins commented that the council needed to borrow money to bridge the gap with the Parish and Town Council precept and the income and expenditure were not synchronised and asked what was the prospect of this changing.

Councillor Shires stated that the council paid the precept up front and would ask the Director of Resources to provide a written response on the level of borrowing the Council needs to cover this.

Councillor Cushing asked if the council borrowed £8m internally to pay for the work on the Reef and Refuse Freighters does this mean the council has to find another £8m to put back into the reserves. The Director of Resources was asked to provide a written response on this.

Councillor Holliday asked whether it was possible to spend the £150,000 earmarked in the capital programme for the Public Conveniences Energy Efficiencies for the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 191.

To receive the final report and recommendations from the Homelessness Task and Finish Group.

Suggested time 1 hour

Councillor Holliday, the Chair of the Task and Finish Group, advised the committee that on 31 August 2024 there were 2,369 households on the council waiting list with 488 having the most urgent housing need with only 136 houses let. There were 53 households in temporary accommodation. The Council received a forecasted net subsidy of £6.5million for 2024/5.

Councillor Holliday stated that the Task and Finish Group (TFG) sought to find the widest possible interventions to prevent and reduce homelessness as well as solutions to relieve homelessness.

Councillor Vickers asked why the recommendation of working with the registered providers to reduce tenancy fraud had not been put forward by the TFG. Councillor Holliday stated that there was some data from Victory Homes and there a question on whether that data that it was the highest in North Norfolk correlated to what the council understood.

Councillor Fletcher asked whether the costs of the vetting of the Cornwall scheme that matched younger residents who need accommodation into a home with an older resident(s) that needed assistance would outweigh its benefits.

Councillor Holliday advised that Cornwall Council were a higher tier authority so could do the assessments needed more easily but had achieved 50 or 60 supported people through the scheme.

Councillor Shires added that it might be worth talking to Norfolk County Council on their Housing for Carers scheme.

Councillor Penfold referred to the recommendation on the potential of a pilot scheme that moves out the perpetrator in domestic abuse cases rather than the victim and asked whether it was being trailed elsewhere. Councillor Holliday confirmed that it had been.

Councillor Holliday added that the Domestic Abuse Charities had indicated that they would like to work more closely with the Council to provide greater support to victims at an earlier stage.

Councillor Hankins commented in respect of communication with Parish and Town Councils on Domestic Abuse that he felt the Councils knew of the data in their areas but were unsure what to do with it and a checklist from the council of how they could help would be useful and how to raise it with their communities.

Councillor Housden stated that homelessness and housing supply was a wider problem and there was a recommendation on empty shop buildings being converted to accommodation. Town and Parish Councils could help with long term empty properties, some landowners would be happy to take pods. Giving a portfolio of options to the Councils was needed.

Councillor Housden added that it was a matter of discussing with people and that the pressures on homelessness were going to grow and the Council needed solutions and to engage with communities to build the right message and address preconceptions that were inaccurate.

Councillor Fredericks asked Councillors to go out and talk to their local communities and spread the message on homelessness and what can be done. It is their residents who are homeless.

Councillor Holliday advised that the Campaign for Rural England had suggested Homes for Local People was  ...  view the full minutes text for item 192.

To receive an update from the Chief Executive on the progress being made in implementing the Corporate Plan 2023-27 against the Action Plan 2023-24 and Action Plan 2024-25 – to end of Quarter 1 – 30 June 2024.

Suggested time 15 minutes.

Councillor Adams, Leader of the Council, updated the Committee on changes between the 2023/4 Action Plan and the Quarter 1 2024/25 Action Plan. Councillor Adams was satisfied with the progress on the 2023/24 Plan.

Councillor Cushing commented that it would be useful to have delivery date targets for each action to assess the progress on each item. The report said that 10 actions in the 2023-24 Action Plan had been completed with 18 carried forward but this was difficult to judge without delivery dates.

Councillor Cushing added that he would expect to see more of a mix of Red, Amber and Green actions in the plan and there was lot of green in this plan which might raise questions about how the RAG status is being assessed.

Councillor Adams advised that it was planned to meet and review the assessments, and it was the target to complete actions within the year. He would take away the comments about the delivery dates.

Councillor Penfold asked what methodology was being used to make the assessments and whether it was a common one or was it down to the individual lead officers.

Councillor Adams stated that Cabinet did challenge the RAG assessments. Green was on target or delivered, Amber was not on target but intention to deliver a different way or slightly delayed with Red not on target. White indicated work hasn’t started. The commentary was as important as the RAG status.

Councillor Penfold referred to the action produce and publish a Rural Strategy and Action Plan by June 2024 which had a commentary of Initial scoping discussions held yet was marked as Green and should be an Amber.

Councillor Adams advised that there would be a focussed look at the RAG assessments including that one which would be report back to the committee.           

Councillor Holliday asked about how actions were carried forward on achieving external funding and the take up of benefits and how they were assessed when circumstances changed from one year to the next.

Councillor Adams confirmed that there had been £1.2m received of additional benefit payments for residents which was a huge level of achievement but the changes to Winter Fuel Payment would change that focus but it was right that they remain a priority albeit with a bit more of a focussed approach.

The CEX advised that the Corporate Plan was aspirational and sought to match the manifesto commitments of the administration with the resources that were available to the council and was not a performance report. Officers had advised that an annual action plan would enable accountability about when things might happen. He added that the Council was a very small organisation facing an increased demand for its services.

Councillor Heinrich asked what were the success criteria for the actions and it would be useful to have a couple of bullet points at the end of an action to illustrate how successful it has been.

Councillor Housden queried what the protracted discussions with stakeholders were in relation  ...  view the full minutes text for item 193.

To consider an update from Councillor Boyle on the last meeting of the Norfolk Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee, an update from the Scrutiny Officer on progress made with topics on its agreed work programme, training updates and to receive any further information which Members may have requested at a previous meeting which includes information on the creation of some North Norfolk profile Indicators.

Suggested time 30 minutes.

Councillor Holliday advised that she had done a Freedom of Interest request on the number of people who were seeking Dental treatment and there was provision in Fakenham and the figures were significantly less when compared to Norwich and were unacceptable.

Councillor Boyle agreed and highlighted that the practise in Fakenham wasn’t in the report considered by the Norfolk Health Overview Scrutiny Committee.

Councillor Brown asked if the loss of the devolution deal meant the dental school proposals would not go ahead. Councillor Boyle commented that there were a number of options being considered and there was strong support for a dental school.

Councillor Penfold asked how the proposed North Norfolk Profile Indicators would fit in with the other performance reports that came to the committee. The Director of Communities (DoC) stated that they would sit alongside the existing performance reports and would be indicators that would consider North Norfolk as a whole rather than the council’s performance for example housing data that could indicate the likely future risk of homelessness.

Councillor Housden asked if the indicators would look at influencing factors in Norfolk that would have wider effects. The DoC advised that this was looking at data sets and trends and you could look at wider indicators and picture including comparative information.

Councillor Holliday asked about how the Performance and Productivity Oversight Board intended to work whether that would be with a contextual approach or a traditional performance management approach. The DoC advised that the Board has only just started and there was a lot of work needed to do. There was still an opportunity to further mould the board’s terms of reference. 

The DoC added that the aim was to make the indicators that were used to be beneficial to the Council and could give an indication of a potential direction of travel for the Council to recommend to the Cabinet.

The Democratic Services (Scrutiny) Officer advised that there was a workshop planned to consider the indicators on the afternoon of 9 October and as the outstanding recommendation from the committee’s workshop in May to undertake some questioning training had yet to be done this would be a chance to undertake that training prior to the workshop.

Resolved – that a workshop be held on 9 October PM to consider some North Norfolk Profile Indicators and to undertake some questioning training,

To pass the following resolution, if necessary:

“That under Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act 1972 the press and public be excluded from the meeting for the following items of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in paragraph _ of Part I of Schedule 12A (as amended) to the Act.”