Agenda item

Mr Alex King, Deputy Leader of the Council, Ms Katherine Kerswell, Group Managing Director, Ms Sue Garton, County Performance and Evaluation Manager and Mr Richard Fitzgerald, Performance Monitoring Officer have been invited to attend the meeting between 11.30am and 12.15pm to answer Members’ questions on this item.

Members are asked to bring their hard copy of the Towards 2010 Closedown Report from the County Council  papers to the meeting due to the size of the report.

Mr A King, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Policy Localism and Partnerships, Ms K Kerswell, Group Managing Director, Mrs S Garton, County Performance And Evaluation Manager and Mr R Fitzgerald, Performance Monitoring Officer, were present for this item.

(1) The Chairman explained that the item had been called in because the discussion at County Council regarded the Towards 2010 targets, but she wanted the opportunity to discuss what the next steps would be. Specifically, if the Council was preparing a new set of targets, where would they be reported and would Members have an opportunity for input. She also had concerns with qualitative targets, because she felt that the Council could not be a reasonable judge of its own performance.

(2) Mr King acknowledged that there had been many debates over the years about qualitative and quantitative targets for the medium term, but that it was sometimes necessary to have aspirational targets for Members and officers that were not entirely measurable. This was because the ethos of the organisation included a desire to achieve new things and explore new opportunities.

(3) On the preceding Monday, Bold Steps for Kent was released, and it comprised a different form of targets, setting out the direction that the Council wanted to take. This included three priorities:

• Protecting people who cannot help themselves
• Strengthening the Kent economy
• Encouraging people to take responsibility for their own lives.

Mr King explained that this was in recognition of the move to a different society in which people would need to take responsibility for themselves and those around them.

(4) Bold Steps for Kent was published the preceding Monday to separate it from the end of Towards 2010. Having been released for consultation, Mr King hoped it would be debated properly and as many views as possible would be sought before it was debated at County Council, which would hopefully happen in December.

(5) In response to a question about whether the Core Monitoring Report would be a successor to the Towards 2010 targets, Mr King explained that the context was different because the Core Monitoring process was about ensuring that the organisation continued to perform in its core business. He added that the Council would have to avoid self congratulation and that future years would be difficult and also that the Councils would have to continue to strive to improve.

(6) Ms Kerswell added that as part of the Change to Keep Succeeding proposals, the Business Strategy Division would bring together performance management functions from across the whole authority. She explained that this was a response to the changes happening in Whitehall and a different approach in performance management reporting to Government. Learning from Towards 2010 and the Core Monitoring report, the Council’s commitments for the future and the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) initiative to make data from Councils more comparable would all come together to shape what the Council would report.

(7) Mrs Garton explained that having been through the Towards 2010 and Next Four Years processes, there were things that could be done differently in future reporting. She had picked up two particular issues from the debate at County Council, namely: The need to move to having four different outcome statuses instead of three, as had been used in Towards 2010 and the Next Four Years; and a better focus on outcomes and not outputs in the reports.

(8) Mr Christie explained that he did not share the Deputy Leader’s view of self-sufficiency. In relation to Bold Steps for Kent, he expressed a concern about how practical it would be for the POSCs and Cabinet Scrutiny Committee to call the Executive to account on the three objectives that it set out. He explained that with the previous targets it was possible to monitor progress against them, but it would be much easier for the administration to have three broad principles which are difficult to measure.

(9) Mr King explained that in the consultation period Members would need to be asked what they would like to see in the new set of targets. The three noble goals were an essential part of the thinking of the organisation and during the following three months, thought would need to be given to how they could be taken forward and what mechanisms would support them. Mr King stated that a different approach was now needed and he hoped that the debates at the POSCs, Cabinet Scrutiny Committee and Scrutiny Board would explore how this would be taken forward before the discussion at County Council.

(10) On the subject of Target 24: ‘Find new and innovative ways of communicating with the public, including trialling webcast TV’, a number of questions were raised by the Committee. Regarding Open Kent, the Chairman stated that she was confused as to what it was and whether it was operating, since the report suggested it was being piloted. There was also a question about where the intentions for Digital Kent set out on page 150 would be reported. The Deputy Leader confirmed that, subject to the permission of the Chairman, a full report would be taken to the Corporate POSC on the proposals relating to Open Kent and Digital Kent.

(11) Responding to a query about the Kent and Medway Citizens’ Panel, whether Medway Council had withdrawn funding, and whether the Panel was still in operation, Mrs Garton clarified that it was the Kent Messenger who had withdrawn from the initiative, but that support was still available from MORI as and when it was needed. The Chairman raised a query about community engagement initiatives that had been piloted by KCC, as referred to on page 159 of the report. She stated that the Parish Partnership Panel in Tonbridge and Malling had been in existence for a number of years, but had not changed over the last four years and there was no public engagement. Similarly, the Tonbridge forum followed the same format as it always had done. In both cases, the Chairman did not see what was being claimed as community engagement.

RESOLVED that the Cabinet Scrutiny Committee:

(12) Thank Mr King, Ms Kerswell, Mrs Garton and Mr Fitzgerald for attending the meeting and answering Members’ questions.

(13) Ask that the Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Localism and Partnerships provide a report to the Committee detailing the current status of Open Kent.

(14) Welcome the assurance from the Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Localism and Partnerships that he will ensure a fullreport is made to the Corporate Policy Overview and Scrutiny Committee on the proposals relating to Open Kent and Digital Kent.

(15) Ask that the Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Localism and Partnerships ensures that members are fully involved in the formulation of the targets that will comprise Bold Steps for Kent.