Issue - meetings

(1)       Ms Edwards presented a report which summarised the 2007/8 budget outturn, together with additional business plan outturn information, for each of the Service Units within the Communities Directorate. This was the first time that this report had been submitted to the POC.  Ms Edwards invited comments on the evolving process of the reporting of delivery against unit plans.

(2)       Ms Edwards agreed to send Mr Birkett the Directorate’s Full Time Equivalent staffing figures for this year and the likely figures for next year.

(3)       Mrs Hohler referred to the new National Indicator no 11 and stated that Kent was one of only four local authorities in the south east who had signed up to this which indicated how seriously this authority took the Arts.

(4)       In response to a question on the Good Trader scheme, Mr Bainbridge explained that there had been a lot of interest in the scheme from traders.  However, there had been delays in traders joining caused by the time taken for CRB checks and to agree with traders the standard terms and conditions in their contracts.  He admitted that officers had underestimated the amount of time necessary to audit these companies before they were accepted to the scheme.

(5)       RESOLVED that the financial outturn for 2007/08 and the performance outturn for 2007/08 be noted.