Agenda and minutes

Residents, Education and Environmental Services Policy Overview Committee - Tuesday, 4th September, 2018 7.00 pm

Venue: Committee Room 6 - Civic Centre, High Street, Uxbridge UB8 1UW. View directions

Contact: Neil Fraser  01895 250692

Items
No. Item

19.

Apologies for Absence

Minutes:

None.

20.

Declaration of Interest in matters coming before this meeting

Minutes:

None.

21.

To confirm that all items marked Part 1 will be considered in Public and that any items marked Part 2 will be considered in Private

Minutes:

It was confirmed that all items were marked as Part I, and would therefore be considered in public.

22.

To agree the Minutes of the previous meeting pdf icon PDF 124 KB

Minutes:

It was highlighted that Tony Little’s attendance at the previous meeting had not been recorded.

 

It was requested that Minute 15 be amended to reflect the specific reference to the new swimming pool in West Drayton, within the question regarding the School Capital Programme.

 

RESOLVED:  That the minutes of the meeting held on 19 July 2018 be approved, subject to the amendments as set out above.

23.

Annual Complaints Report 2017-18 pdf icon PDF 131 KB

Minutes:

Ian Anderson, Complaints and Service Improvement team, introduced the annual complaints report for 2017-18. The report predominantly focussed on Education services as other complaint areas were to be covered by reports to other Policy Overview Committees.

 

Key points of the report were highlighted, and included:

 

Education complaints were logged for issues that the Council could address, such as complaints regarding school admissions. Complaints that the Council was unable to deal with included issues with head teachers or pupils, which would be addressed through the school’s complaints procedure. Complaints from parents had increased, as parent complaints to Ofsted were now referred directly to the Council to address.

 

In the last year, education complaints had risen from six complaints to thirty three, of which twenty nine were referrals from Ofsted. It was expected that this would continue to increase. Approximately 95% of Ofsted complaints related to primary schools, and of the thirty three Stage 1 complaints, two were partially upheld, thirty were not upheld, and one was withdrawn. There were no Stage 2 or 3 complaints within the period.

 

Time to respond to formal complaints was now 9.36 working days on average, The response time was affected by school holidays as concerns raised had to wait for investigation until the school re-opened.

 

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman had investigated one complaint, which concerned a child’s Education and Healthcare Plan. This was a complicated complaint as there was an ongoing court case, with an outcome expected following a hearing in November.

 

Two compliments had been recorded for 2017/18, though it was likely that more had been received but not recorded. A new process was to be instigated, wherein staff would notify the manager when a compliment was received.

 

8,502 Member’s Enquiries (ME’s) had been recorded for 2017/18. This was 7% fewer than the preceding year, but this reduction was caused by individual enquiries from the same Councillor, on the same area, being treated as a single enquiry. The number of ME’s relating to education was difficult to confirm due to the way in which they were recorded, but was likely around to be 40-50 across the year.

 

The Committee sought clarity on a number of points, including:

 

Would it be possible to record education ME’s by way of a separate email address/inbox?

 

Yes, this was possible and could be looked into.

 

Could the officer elaborate on the complaint currently underway in the Court?

 

The matter related to the school placement named within the child’s Education and Healthcare Plan. A decision on that placement had been made that the Council was now appealing.

 

Could the complaints reports being presented at other Policy Overview Committees be shared with this Committee?

 

Yes, the reports would be available within the published papers for those Committee meetings.

 

Were complaints regarding Hillingdon Academy Primary Schools under the Council’s responsibility?

 

The referral process had changed, and all Hillingdon schools were now dealt with under a standardised complaints procedure, i.e. to the Head teacher, followed  ...  view the full minutes text for item 23.

24.

Past Review Monitoring - Street Lighting pdf icon PDF 111 KB

Minutes:

Dalton Cenac, Highways Asset Manager, and Roy Thabrew, Street Lighting and Signs Manager, provided the Committee with an update on street lighting following the review conducted in 2009/10.

 

The report was summarised, with key points highlighted:

 

Outsourcing:

Highways Services was restructured in 2016. Street lighting installation and maintenance works previously delivered in-house had been outsourced to a new external service provider to achieve cost efficiencies and service quality improvements. The Street Lighting Works Term Service Contract was awarded to JMcCann Ltd for a period of 5 years commencing November 2016, with  the option of a 2 year extension.

 

The scope of the contract included:

 

  1. Capital investment works;
  2. Term service works including:
    1. Routine maintenance, inspection and testing of street lighting and traffic signs;
    2. Non-routine maintenance of street lighting and traffic signs to include emergency call outs and on-going fault repairs;
    3. Night scouting;

d.    24-hour emergency call out;

e.    Management of fault reports, complaints and Member enquiries.

3.    Task order works as instructed on an ad-hoc basis based on a tendered Schedule of Rates e.g. street lighting design for improvement schemes.

LED Investment Works

Work had now been completed, on schedule in July 2018, to replace the existing 23,700 sodium lights within the Borough with new LED lights. Approximately 0.2% of lights had not been changed, due to inaccessible columns etc. Phase 1 of the process was to change the lights in order to achieve energy savings as soon as possible. Phase 1 also included the replacement of 700 life expired concrete columns.

 

Savings

The outsourcing to JMcCann Ltd of Street Lighting Services was expected to deliver net savings of £380k against the previous in-house delivery model, with the associated programme of upgrading existing lanterns to LEDs delivering a further £590k savings through a 60% reduction in energy consumption. The overall saving of £970k was expected to be delivered in full for the 2019/20 financial year, with the outsourcing saving delivered for 2017/18 and energy savings being delivered incrementally as the investment programme was progressed.

 

Partnering Arrangements

To encourage cross-team working/support with other highways service staff, office space at Harlington Road Depot was made available to the Contractor together with desk space at the Civic Centre. Weekly operational meetings, monthly contract meetings, and six-monthly meetings with senior management were being held.

 

KPIs / Performance Management

Performance was being monitored and assessed monthly, with KPIs across the following areas:

 

  • Operation of the contactor's quality management system;
  • Adherence to programme;
  • Financial completion and agreement of accounts;
  • Attendance at emergency call-outs;
  • Term service works;
  • Customer care and responses to Member Enquiries.

 

Routine fault repairs were resolved in within 5 days, though if there were supply problems, this could be extended to 28 days. Member’s Enquiries (ME’s) aimed to be resolved within 5 days, thought the target was 10 days.


Work was now being undertaken to collect data from councils across London, to enable Hillingdon performance to be assessed against neighbouring authorities from 2019/20 onwards.

 

Future Works and Priorities

After the initial investment works  ...  view the full minutes text for item 24.

25.

Witness Session for: 'Review Into User Payment Experience and Modernisation Across Key Resident Service Areas' pdf icon PDF 56 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The item was deferred to a future meeting of the Committee.

26.

Cabinet Forward Plan pdf icon PDF 51 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Members sought clarity that the item on the School Capital Programme was still to be brought to Cabinet at its meeting on 27 September 2018.

 

The Committee also requested further detail on the item on the Car Parking Season Tickets Policy to be brought to the Cabinet meeting in October 2018.

 

It was agreed that this requested information be communicated to the Committee outside of the meeting.

 

RESOLVED:

 

1.    That the report be noted, and

2.    That the information requested be forwarded to the Committee via the clerk.

27.

Multi-Year Work Programme pdf icon PDF 56 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

It was requested that officers ensure that the forthcoming item on School Planning include information on how the Strategic Infrastructure Plan related to the Council’s school places planning, as referenced within the Local Plan Part 2.

 

RESOLVED: That the report be noted.