Agenda item

Medway’s Council Plan 2022/23 sets out the Council’s three priorities. This report and appendices summarise how we performed in Q3 2022/23 on the delivery of the programmes and measures which fall under the remit of this committee which are:

·       Priority: Growth (Appendix 1)

Given the overarching responsibilities of this Committee to provide guidance and leadership on the development and coordination of the scrutiny function for all overview and scrutiny committees, this report also contains: 

·       a performance summary of all services (Appendix 2)

This report also presents the Q3 2022/23 review of strategic risks (Appendix 3). At Appendix 4 is a summary of the discussions at the other Overview and Scrutiny Committees.

Discussion:

The Chief Organisational Culture Officer introduced the report which summarised the performance within Quarter 3 of 20233/23 against the programmes and measures that fell within the remit of this Committee in particular, but also performance across all measures.

The Committee then raised a number of questions and comments, which included:

·      The Strategic Environmental Management (SEMS) – updates were requested in relation to the marsh wardens and how they would be funded, and on the Lodge Hill SEMS work. Officers undertook to report the question back to the relevant service and request an update to be sent to the Committee.

·       Street lighting – concern was raised regarding the faulty central management system nodes which would be replaced when stocks became available and how much of an issue that would be going forward. Officers undertook to report the question back to the relevant service and request an update to be sent to the Committee.

·       Air Quality Grant Programme – in relation to the Four Elms Hill Air Quality Action Plan it was asked why further assessments were needed when many had already been carried out over recent years. Officers undertook to report the question back to the relevant service and request an update to be sent to the Committee.

·      Sustainable Transport Programmes – reference was made to this which the report stated had continued to be rolled out across Medway’s schools. It was suggested that this was not consistent across all of Medway and was absent in some areas.  Officers undertook to report the question back to the relevant service and request that a response be sent to the Committee.

·       Private sector property improvements – in relation to measure HC4 and the number of private sector properties that had improved as a result of Council intervention, officers explained that despite the reduced performance at Quarter 3, this measure was on target for the year and had exceeded the target for the first two quarters of that year.  The discrepancy in the performance related to staff turnover and sickness and was also impacted by the time and resource spent on complex cases which although could provide good results for that property, impacted on the capacity of the team to address other cases.

·      Role of Committee – officers explained that a number of the specific areas being questioned by the Committee were outside its remit and sat under a different Overview and Scrutiny Committee, each of which also had the Council Plan performance reported to them for the areas relevant to their remits.  The Business Support Overview and Scrutiny Committee should focus on the areas within its remit and were provided with the whole range of data as part of its co-ordinating role across all scrutiny committees.  A suggestion was made that the items that fell into the remit of a different committee should be included but greyed out to assist with the distinction. It was added that the Committee’s role in looking at performance across the Council was important in terms of the Committee scrutinising possible resource implications that may sit behind particular issues and to recommend interventions that may address areas that were persistently underperforming.

Decision:

The Committee considered the Q3 2022/23 performance against the measures used to monitor progress against the Council’s priorities and noted the Strategic Risk Summary as set out in Appendix 3