Agenda and minutes

No declarations of interest were received.

To consider and approve the minutes of the previous meeting.

The minutes of the meeting held on 2 June 2014 were agreed and signed by the Chairman as a true record.

To receive a report of the Cabinet Member for Community Services providing a review of the Christmas / New Year 2013-14 storms & flooding (and previous severe weather events) and making recommendations for how the County Council, in collaboration with its partners, can be better prepared to manage such future events and flood risk.

(Report of Cabinet Member for Communities, Mr Mike Hill and Interim Corporate Director of Growth, Environment and Transport, Mike Austerberry)

Cabinet received a report providing a full review of lessons learned from the Christmas / New Year 2013-14 storms & flooding (and previous severe weather events) and making recommendations as to how the County Council, in collaboration with its partners, could be better prepared to manage such future events and flood risk.

Cabinet Member for Communities, Mr Mike Hill introduced the report.  He reminded members of the extreme conditions experienced over the Christmas and New Year of 2013 – 14 and the resulting flooding and loss of power for over 28,000 homes.  He explained that the report was made up of two parts, each of which would be accompanied by a presentation.  The first part of the report would focus on the emergency response by KCC and partner agencies and encapsulated feedback from many parties involved in that response and those affected.  Mr Hill was, overall, proud of the response, which had seen staff working long hours in difficult circumstances and cancelling Christmas leave to return to work.  However, lessons could be learned and to that end the report contained twelve recommendations for improvement.  The second part of the report considered long term flood risk management solutions and also put forward recommendations to improve protection from flooding in the future.

Paul Crick, Director of Environment and Planning spoke to the item.  He made a presentation to Cabinet regarding the emergency response review and subsequent recommendations [attached as appendix 1].  In particular the presentation referred to the following:

         i.        The statistics related to the flooding, namely that:

·         50,000 sandbags had been provided to try to protect affected properties

·         32,000 calls had been received by KCC

·         6km of public rights of way had been left in need of repair, as had many kilometres public highway

·         A total of 929 properties had been flooded in Kent.

       ii.        Identified successes of the emergency response:

·         Staff systems had withstood the pressure of exceptional circumstances

·         No lives had been lost and property had been saved in many instances

·         Staff commitment and resourcefulness

      iii.        Identified areas for improvement:

·         Visibility, of all partners, in affected communities

·         Warning and informing

·         Multi agency co-ordination

·         Internal KCC resilience – not relying on a small number of people to work many hours

·         Provision of sandbags & other practical support

·         Individual and community resilience

·         Role and involvement of central government

      iv.        The report contained 17 recommendations which related to:

·         Review and enhance KCC resilience

·         Multi agency on scene liaison arrangement – ‘Bronze’ on site liaison must occur more quickly.

·         Review and enhance flood warning arrangements

·         Strengthen multi-agency protocols

·         Creation and implementation of a Countywide, partner-wide emergency response policy.

·         Explore opportunities for contributions from KCC and partners toward future flood resilience programmes.

Andrew Pearce, representing the Environment Agency made a further presentation to Cabinet [attached as appendix 2].  In particular he referred to:

·         The fact that 60,000 properties in Kent were considered to be at risk  ...  view the full minutes text for item 69.

To receive a report of the Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Public Health reporting the content and potential implications of The Care Act 2014 which received Royal Assent on 14 May 2014 and will establish a new legal framework for adult care and support services. 

(Report of Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Health, Mr Graham Gibbens and Corporate Director of Families and Social Care, Andrew Ireland)

Cabinet received a report regarding the Care Act 2014 (The Act), which received Royal Assent on 14 May 2014 and which would establish a new legal framework for adult care and support services. The Care Act, the report informed, was widely considered to be the biggest change to care and support law in England since 1948 and would replace over a dozen pieces of legislation with a single consolidated law coming into effect incrementally between April 2015 and April 2016. The report set out for consideration the work already underway to prepare for implementation and an assessment of the main financial and other implications that the Council may face.

The Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Health introduced the report.   In initially referred to an administrative error; the agenda front sheet wrongly referred to The Social Care Act 2014, and should read, as the report, The Care Act 2014.

Having clarified this point Mr Gibbens moved to the substantive issues contained within the report and in particular referred to the following:

       i.        That he welcomed The Act, the changes and clarification it would bring to the arena of Social Care. 

      ii.        That the draft regulations had been issued and Councils were asked to respond by August 2014 part of this consultation would address the financial implications of The Act.  As was customary with consultation responses in the field of social care, he would invite representatives of the opposition groups to join discussions as KCC’s response was finalised.

    iii.        The Transformation Programme in Adult Social Care had pre-empted some of the requirements of The Act such as new rights for carers and as such Kent was well positioned.

    iv.        That the Safeguarding Adults Board would inherit a statutory status and as the Board in Kent had been established for some time this too was a change for which the Council was well prepared.

      v.        One further important consideration that would be assessed in due course would be the capability of the Council’s IT systems to ensure that they were fit for purpose in the future.

The Leader echoed the positive comments of the Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Health, agreeing that The Act was good news for families but reminding members that the positive changes must be financed.  The Council was involved in discussions with Central Government to ensure that ensure that not only was additional funding made available but that that funding was distributed in a way which reflected the demographics of each geographical area.

Michael Thomas-Sam, Strategic Business Advisor, was in attendance to present to Cabinet.  The presentation [attached as appendix 3] particularly drew the attention of members to the following information:

         i.        That The Act would replace over forty pieces of current legislation, and would expand the reach of formal social care arrangements, bringing additional people in to the legal care framework.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 70.

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(Report of the Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance and Procurement, Mr J Simmonds, and Corporate Director of Finance and Procurement, Andy Wood)

Cabinet received a report providing for consideration, the provisional revenue and capital budget outturn position for 2013-14, which included a final update on key activity data.  In addition the report contained a summary of the contribution of each Directorate toward the successful financial outturn reported.

The Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance and Procurement introduced the report for Members.  With regard to the revenue budget he reported the following information:

       i.        That £95million of savings had been achieved despite already having made £105million in the two previous years and that delivery of a 14^th consecutive balanced budget in such circumstances was a significant achievement.

      ii.        That a final underspend of £9.8million excluding schools had been reported after having transferred £4million to reserves with the agreement of Council to support the 2014-15 budget.

    iii.        That after rolling forward monies required as a result of rephasing commitments listed within the report, the remaining £4.7million would also be credited to the Economic Downturn Reserve.

    iv.        That congratulations were owed to all directorates for the achievement reported.

      v.        Individual Directorate performance was as follows::

a.    Education, Learning and Skills despite continuing pressures had reported a saving of £1.8million

b.    Specialist Children’s Services whilst it continued to experience approximately £3million of underlying pressures had shown some signs of stabilisation, although fostering continued to present particular difficulties.

c.    Adult Social Care had reported significant savings of approximately £18million as a result of the Adult Transformation Programme and work undertaken with the NHS support for social care funds.

d.    Enterprise and Environment had reported a £3million overspend but as widely reported had spent £4.9million on ‘Find and Fix’ to repair highway damage caused by the extreme weather conditions experienced in the winter months.

e.    Customer and Communities had reported an excellent saving of £6.3million largely as a result of clever vacancy management and work with the Libraries and Registration service.

f.     That £3.7million of government funding above that which had been predicted had been received in the financial year and had been committed to the Economic Downturn Reserve.

The Cabinet Member continued to the Capital Budget and reported that:

a.     That the working budget for 2013-14 had been £256million and the actual spend reported was £203million.  The individual variances which constituted the overall £53million variance were almost exclusively the result of rephasing and would be rolled over to the 2014-15 budgets.

Corporate Director for Finance and Procurement, Andy Wood spoke to make two points.  Firstly, he reiterated the appreciation expressed by the Cabinet Member for the hard work of officers and Members that had ensured the delivery of a successful budget and secondly to remind members that the £9.8million of savings reported, represented approximately 1% of budget and therefore illustrated the fine lines that existed between delivering targets and overspending and further evidenced the need for the hard work to be  ...  view the full minutes text for item 71.

To receive a report of the Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance and Procurement containing the first budget monitoring information for 2014-15 and reflecting the position for each of the Directorates based on the major issues arising from the 2013-14 outturn.

(Report of the Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance and Procurement, Mr J. Simmonds and the Corporate Director of Finance and Procurement, Andy Wood)

The Deputy Leader & Cabinet Member for Finance introduced the report for Members.  He observed that the first report of the year was slightly disappointing and emphasised the importance of careful budget management particularly in light of the discussion regarding the potential financial implications of The Care Act that had taken place earlier in the meeting. He assured Members that main aim for the administration would be to once again deliver a balanced budget despite this and other challenges.

Mr Simmonds continued; he reported that pressures of £8.39million were reported and although this was a concern it was not unusual for early indications to be somewhat negative.

There were three areas in which significant pressure had arisen.  These were:

·         £2million on Home to School SEN transport

·         £3.3million on Specialist Children’s Services and

·         £2million on Learning Disability Services

Each pressure had arisen between the setting of the budget in February and the end of the financial year in April.  Each Directorate was aware of the issues and had put in place action plans which would seek to stabilise the issues as soon as was possible.

Corporate Director for Finance and Procurement, Andy Wood confirmed at the request of the Leader that the Senior Management Team were committed to managing the reported overspend down in order to deliver a balanced budget.  He made one further comment; the spend reported in June was slightly higher than he would have liked and although this alone would not have a significant adverse effect on the budget, he reminded members and officers of the caution with which spending should be undertaken.

Finally Mr Wood, reiterating the comments of the Cabinet Member, expressed concern at the reported pressures but acknowledged that early negative reports were part of a familiar cycle.

It was RESOLVED that the report be noted.

To receive a report of the Cabinet Member for Education and Health Reform setting out the background and rationale for the revised Elective Home Education (EHE) policy.

(Report of the Cabinet Member for Education and Health Reform, Mr Roger Gough and Corporate Director for Education and Young People’s Services)

Cabinet received a report containing a revised Elective Home Education policy for consideration and approval.

The Cabinet Member for Education and Health Reform introduced the report for Cabinet.  He described the recent development of the area of Elective Home Education and the growth in the number of children now classed as being educated at home.  The draft Elective Home Education Policy therefore dealt with a range of complex and serious issues.

Mr Gough reported that a number of representations had been made in relation to the draft policy, since its publication as part of the Cabinet agenda and as such he proposed a two stage approach to agreement of the document in order that further debate and investigation could take place.  The matter would be considered here for noting and returned for further consideration and agreement in the autumn following discussion at Cabinet Committee and further investigation of points raised by members of the public.

The Corporate Director for Education and Young People’s Services, Patrick Leeson, was asked to comment.  He spoke of the very clear duty on the Local Authorities to ascertain whether children educated at home were receiving a suitable education and described the draft policy as being designed to help and support parents who chose to educate their children at home, to provide that suitable education.

Mr Leeson also commented on the growth in numbers to which Mr Gough had made reference.  This growth, he reported, had seen the numbers of children in Kent being educated at home almost double over the last 4-5years to just under 1400.  Of these children approximately one third were aged 14 and 15 and therefore at a critical stage of both their development and their education.

It was important that the policy allowed the Council to assess the suitability of education being received so that where it was needed support could be offered.

To evidence the difficulties that children educated at home sometimes face and the importance of a policy that allowed the Council to properly fulfil its duty to ascertain that children are suitably educated Mr Leeson reported to members:

·         That a sizeable number of those children who become home educated are already regarded as needing additional support.

·         That 45% of those children home educated had persistent absence in the year before they were removed and overall the average attendance of home schooled children in the year before they became home educated was 59%

·         That 15% of home educated children in the County were already known to Children’s social services and almost 20% of home educated children go on to become NEET.

Finally Mr Leeson reminded Members that many parents who elected to home educate their children, did so for very principled reasons and delivered an excellent education.  The Council’s policy would not seek to interfere or intervene where this was the case. 

The Leader agreed with the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 73.