Councillor McManners

Board Members are asked to declare any personal or personal prejudicial interests they may have in any of the following agenda items.  Guidance is contained at the end of these agenda pages.

None.

When the chair agrees, questions from the public for up to 15 minutes – these must be about the items for decision at the meeting (excluding the minutes) and must have been given to the Head of Law and Governance by 9.30am two clear working days before the meeting (email executiveboard@oxford.gov.uk or telephone the person named as staff contact).  No supplementary questions or questioning will be permitted.  Questions by the public will be taken as read and, when the Chair agrees, be responded to at the meeting.

Written questions from the public, with answers, were distributed at the start of the meeting. These are attached to the minutes as an appendix     .

This report advises the Board on the outcome of the debate at April Council on petitions received concerning publicly funded leisure in Oxford.  The report recommends the Board to note the contents of the report, the views expressed in the petition by the campaign group, the public consultation and engagement exercises carried out by the Council and the substantial body of evidence established and, in the light of this, to confirm the previous policy to build a new high quality swimming pool facility adjacent to the Blackbird Leys Leisure Centre and, once completed, to close both Temple Cowley Pools and Blackbird Leys Pool.

The Head of Leisure and Parks submitted a report (previously circulated, now appended) providing information on the Council’s response to two petitions received concerning publicly funded leisure facilities in Oxford.

Resolved to note the contents of the report, the views expressed by the campaign group in the petition, the public consultation and engagement exercises carried out by the Council and the substantial body of evidence established and, in the light of this, to confirm the previous policy to build a new high quality swimming pool facility adjacent to Blackbird Leys Leisure Centre and, once completed, to close both Temple Cowley Pools and Blackbird Leys Pool.

This is the Quarter 4, 2010/11 (January – March 2011) report on the management of corporate risk as contained in the Corporate and Service Risk Registers.  The Board is being recommended to note that Risk Registers are being regularly monitored and that actions to reduce risk are taking place.

The Head of Finance submitted a report (previously circulated, now appended) providing a summary of the changes to the Corporate Risk Register and Service Risk Registers submitted as part of the Quarter 4 update.

Resolved to:-

1)     Note the report; and

2)     Note that risk registers were being regularly monitored with actions to reduce risks taking place.

This report provides non-financial performance monitoring information for Quarter 4, 2010/11 (January - March 2011) and final outturn information.  It recommends the Board to note the increase in the number of performance targets that have either met or exceeded the 2010/11 target and the actions that are in place to address the performance measures that did not achieve the year end target.

The Head of Business Improvement submitted a report (previously circulated and now appended) which contained non-financial performance monitoring information for Quarter 4 of the last financial year as well as the full year results.

Councillor Price drew attention particularly to the reduction in carbon emissions, reduction of days lost to staff sickness and the percentage of council spending made locally. He congratulated officers for this performance.

Councillor Brown, on behalf of the Value and Performance Scrutiny Committee commented on the report which had been to the committee the previous evening. He said that on the whole the Committee had been impressed with the full year results. The principal point of scrutiny concern was the high level of abandoned calls to the contact centre.

In response to the concerns of the Scrutiny Committee the Chief Executive said that work was being progressed to improve call response times in call centres. He said that a sustained large increase in call volume had been experienced peaking especially during the adverse weather earlier in the year, and at the time of changes to recycling and garden waste container collection. He said that staff changes and training as well as merging two call centres would improve performance. He added that a large number of callers had disconnected after listening to pre-recorded information, although there was no way to tell if their queries had been resolved.

Resolved to note:-

1)     The increase in the number of performance targets that had either met or exceeded the target set for 2010/11; and

2)     The final outturn performance information and the actions that were in place to address the fourteen measures that had not achieved the year end target.

This report provides details of provisional outturn for 2010/11.  It recommends the Board to:-

• Note the outturn of £28.1m which is £0.2m favourable to the approved Budget for 2010/11
• Agree a transfer of the additional General Fund surplus of £0.2 m to the Severance and HR Reserve
• Agree the transfer £1.256m to the General Fund working balance
• Approve the carry forward requests recommended by the Corporate Management Team as summarised in Table 7 and detailed in Appendix E
• Approve the net transfers (to) / from provisions as follows –

                        * (£0.7m) for the General Fund

                        * (£0.2m) for the Housing Revenue Account

• Approve the net transfers (to) / from earmarked reserves as follows -

* (£0.8m) for the General Fund

* £0.9m for the Housing Revenue Account

The Head of Finance submitted a report (previously circulated, now appended) setting out the forecast outturn position for the Council’s Capital and Revenue budgets for the year ended 31st March 2011 compared to the approved budget. In addition it provided explanations for variances from the outturn reported as at 28 February 2011.

Councillor Brown, on behalf of the Value and Performance Scrutiny Committee commented on the report which had been to the committee the previous evening. He thanked the report author for presenting the report in an accessible, easy to understand form. Areas of concern from the Scrutiny Committee’s perspective were the level of unachieved savings (at £582k) and the very large underspend in Community Housing and Community Development. The committee had also expressed concern at the underspend on the staff training budget. He said that the Committee felt that savings targets should be carefully set so that they were realistic for service areas and capable of being achieved.

In response to the concerns of the scrutiny committee Councillor Turner said that managers were encouraged to be ambitious when proposing efficiency savings; budgets were drawn up with contingencies put in place to mitigate the effects of medium and high risk targets not being met. The Corporate Director for Finance and Efficiency added that the many of the unachieved savings could be attributed to department restructures and lower than expected income levels. The Chief Executive advised that money from the transformation fund was spent on staff training so that overall the required budget was spent in relation to staff training.

Resolved to:-

1)     Note the outturn of £28.1m, which was £0.2m favourable to the approved Budget for 2010-11;

2)     Agree the transfer of the additional General Fund surplus of £0.2m to the Severance and HR Reserve;

3)     Agree to transfer £1.256m to the General Fund working balance;

4)     Approve the carry forward requests recommended by the Corporate Management Team and summarised in Table 8 and detailed in Appendix E of the report;

5)     Approve the net transfers (to) / from provisions 

-          £(0.7)m for the General Fund,

-          £(0.2)m for the Housing Revenue Account

6)     Approve the net transfers (to)/ from earmarked reserves

-          £(0.8)m for the General Fund

-          £0.9m for the Housing Revenue Account                            

7)   Note that movements to and from reserves were set out in Table 3 and detailed in Appendix B of the report.

This item is included on the agenda to give members the opportunity to raise issues on the Forward Plan or update the Board about future agenda items.

Nothing was raised under this item.

Minutes of the meeting held on 25 May 2011

The minutes of the meeting held on 25 May 2011 were approved as a correct record and signed by the Chair.