Agenda item

This report presents the proposed new One Medway Council Plan 2024-28 which sets out the vision, ambitions and priorities with the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that will be used to track performance against the Council’s key priorities and sub-priorities.

Discussion:

The Chief Executive introduced the report, outlining that the One Medway Council Plan set out the vision and direction of the Council for the next four years and had been subject to significant consultation internally, with partner agencies and the public. The plan also took account of best practice elsewhere.

The One Medway Council Plan sets out the Council’s five priorities: delivering quality social care and community services, benefitting from good education, quality jobs and a growing economy, enjoying clean, green, safe and connected communities, improving health and wellbeing for all and living in good quality and affordable homes.

The Chief Executive added the One Medway Council Plan was underpinned by the Council’s new values and behaviours: Proud to be Medway, caring, respectful, trusted, ambitious for Medway and collaborative.

The following issues were discussed:

Transition – it was queried how the Council intended to transition from the current Council Plan to the new One Medway Council Plan given the challenges in recruitment and funding. The Chief Executive informed the Committee the plan was a new approach and with different ways of working, teams across the Council had been extensively engaged in the development of the plan and it was vital there was a clear sense of direction to allow the transition to take place.

Partner agencies – a Member requested further information on how the Council could engage with external partners such as grammar schools to improve attainment. The Chief Executive agreed that working in partnership was key to achieving the Council’s goals. The Council had recently signed the One Medway Charter with partner agencies and was committed to working closely with partners.

Performance Data - a Member asked if the Council had baseline data available to measure progress in achieving its objectives. The Chief Executive explained the Council was increasingly data driven. Council teams were working on the data and KPIs within the One Medway Council Plan building on previous work within the Council.

Values – a Member requested further information about the plan to embed the Council’s values with staff, the Chief Executive stated the new council values and behaviours were developed in workshops and would be enshrined in staff Performance Development Reviews.

Priorities – a Member commented that they expected more targets to be included in the plan in relation to priority one. The Chief Executive explained there was an ambition to include both universal and statutory services and include reference to inspection reports.  The Chief Executive noted the recent SEND report which showed good progress but acknowledged there was still more to do.

The Deputy Chief Executive and Director of People informed the Committee there would be a detailed service plan with KPIs and in addition a post inspection action plan.

Adult Social Care – A Member asked whether the Council was ready for an adult social care inspection, the Chief Executive informed the Committee that the Council was awaiting the announcement of an assurance review visit by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) which would take place in the coming months. It was his view that the CQC would find that there had been a great deal of positive work undertaken but more still to do. The Chief Executive praised the leadership of officers and the Deputy Leader, noted the agreement to right size adult social care and many positive proposals for further development such as assistive technology to help people live at home and Care for Medway.

Children Leaving Care – A Member commented that the target for the percentage of young people leaving care who were in higher education was set at 50% (key Performance Indication 1.07) however, this figure was currently at 53%, therefore, was the target stretching enough? The Chief Executive agreed there was a balance required between achievable targets and being ambitious, targets would be refreshed each year so that balance could be maintained.

Housing – A Member commented that there were 112,000 homes in Medway and the Council had limited ability to affect house prices to make them affordable. As Medway became a more attractive place to live, house prices would likely increase as a result. The Chief Executive acknowledged that house prices would rise as a natural consequence of improvements in Medway, however he wanted to bring investment and good jobs into Medway so that residents could afford good quality housing. Good housing and employment had a significant impact on residents’ health so it was a key priority for the Council.

Tourism – A Member expressed disappointment that whilst Medway sought to attract more tourism into the area Rochester Tourist  Information Centre had been closed, the Chief Executive stated it had been a very difficult decision to close the tourist information centre, however the financial situation the Council was in required difficult decisions and research had shown that the pattern of how tourists access information about the area had changed. Medway benefited from £360 million per year from tourism and 7,000 jobs depended on it. The Council remained committed to tourism in Medway.

Celebrate Medway Towns – a Member expressed disappointment that Medway wanted to celebrate its towns, however, the funding for Rainham festival had been ended. The Chief Executive stated that difficult decisions had to be taken but that all Members would champion their local areas and he wanted to celebrate the different Medway towns and villages.

Decision:

1.     The Committee considered the One Medway Council Plan 2024-2028 as set out in Appendix 1, the KPIs detailed in Appendix 3 and submitted comments to Cabinet as detailed above.

2.     The Committee noted that Full Council will be asked to delegate authority to the Chief Executive, in consultation with the Leader, to agree any final details of the One Medway Council Plan, and any final measures/benchmarks in relation to the KPIs.