Agenda and minutes

Venue: Committee Room 3 - Civic Centre, St Peter's Square, Wolverhampton WV1 1SH

Contact: Dereck Francis  Tel: 01902 555835 or Email: dereck.francis@wolverhampton.gov.uk

Items
No. Item

1.

Apologies for absence

Minutes:

Apologies for absence were submitted on behalf of Councillors Roger Lawrence and Hazel Malcolm.

2.

Declarations of interests

Minutes:

No declarations of interests were made.

3.

Minutes of the previous meeting - 17 December 2018 pdf icon PDF 311 KB

[For approval]

Minutes:

Resoled:

That the minutes of the meeting held on 17 December 2018 be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chair.

4.

Matters arising

[To consider any matters arising from the minutes of the previous meeting]

Minutes:

There were no matters arising from the minutes of the previous meeting that were not otherwise covered on the agenda for the meeting.

5.

Information Governance Quarter Three Performance and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Update Report pdf icon PDF 167 KB

[To review and comment on the Information Governance quarter three performance and GDPR update]

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Anna Zollino-Biscotti, Information Governance Manager and Data Protection Officer presented the report on Information Governance performance for quarter three (October to December) of 2018/2919. Good performance continued to be maintained on the Council’s response rates to Freedom of Information and Environmental Information Requests (FOR/EIR) and Data Protection /Subject Access Requests.

 

The Information Governance Manager and Data Protection Officer also update the Panel on arrangements for the preparation of GDPR.  The Council’s GDPR programme of work was now concluding and moving towards business as usual status.  Further compliance checks and audits would be scheduled throughout the year that followed on from the initial GDPR readiness audit.

 

Resolved:

1.    That the quarterly progress update on the General Data Protection Regulation be noted.

 

2.    That the quarter two performance for Information Governance be noted.

6.

Housing Managing Agents Performance Monitoring Report, Quarter Three - October to December 2018 pdf icon PDF 141 KB

[To review and comment on the performance and key areas for improvement]

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Kate Martin, Service Director of City Housing briefly introduced the report which showed positive trends on performance of Wolverhampton Homes and the Tenant Management Organisations (TMOs) in managing and maintaining council owned dwellings during the third quarter of the 2018-2019 financial year.  The Service Director also highlighted that the report included feedback from consultations on improvements to the New Park Village Estate.

 

Anthony Walker, Homeless Strategy and External Relationships Manager spoke in more detail on Wolverhampton Homes and the TMOs performance.   Overall there was good performance across the indicators being measured. Universal Credit continued to have an effect on rent arrears collections.  This was a national problem.  The Housing Strategy team was also seeing an increase in the use of homeless services.  The Service Director of City Housing reported that additional funding had been provided to Wolverhampton Homes to support the role out of Universal Credit and it had been confirmed that the funding would continue during the 2019/2020 financial year, through the Housing Revenue Account.

 

Members of the Panel requested information on how successful the Rent Bond Scheme, figures and trends on the housing waiting list; and data on tenants at risk of eviction by TMOs.  The Service Director of City Housing undertook to report back on these issues in the next quarterly monitoring report.

 

Councillor John Reynolds commented that from his involvement on the Social Inclusion Board, data showed that Wolverhampton Homes was successfully managing rent arrears however, TMO performance on rent management had not been as successful in the same period.  He asked whether there was a support issue for the TMOs on their rent management procedures.  The Service Director of City Housing undertook raise the point with the TMOs and report back to the next meeting on the processes they have in place and if there are any unmet support needs to help them manage rent arrears.

 

Resolved:

That the performance of the housing management agents for quarter three of 2018/2019 be noted.

7.

Quarter Three Corporate Top - 25 Indicators pdf icon PDF 287 KB

[To receive an update on performance against the Council’s top 25 corporate indicators in quarter three (October to December 2018)

Minutes:

Ian Fegan, Head of Communications gave a brief introduction to the report on performance against the Council’s top 25 corporate indicators in quarter three (October to December) of 2018/2019.  Overall there was strong performance. Five indicators were demonstrating improving performance, 16 were stable, there were no areas highlighted for improvement, two were annual indicators and two were under review.

 

Referring to the indicator on calls answered, Councillor John Reynolds reported on his experience of the response time to calls to the Adult Education College.  He asked if the Council find a way to monitor the situation and if possible to forward calls through to the Council’s switchboard. Lisa Taylor, Head of Customer Services informed the Panel that the Council had taken on one of the Adult Education phone lines.  It was working with the Service on a better way of supporting them in getting calls answered and to become more resilient with the management of their phone calls.

 

On the indicator ‘reported fly tipping incidents on public land’, Geoff Simpson, Business Intelligence Manager informed the Panel that the measures reported on at the last meeting to tackle levels of fly tipping had resulted in an improvement during the quarter.  Councillor Steve Evans placed on record his thanks to the Council teams for the excellent collaborative work there were engaged in that was making a difference.  There efforts showed that the Council was serious in its response to fly tipping.

 

Councillor Sandra Samuels OBE supported the comments made by Councillor Steve Evans and welcomed the ‘Day of Action’ clean-up events that were recently arranged in Ettingshall and in All Saints.

 

Resolved:

That the Council’s performance against its top 25 performance indicators in quarter three (October to December) of 2018/2019 be noted.