Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Cllr Kaur, Cllr Leach, Cllr Mattu, Cllr Potter, Cllr Findlay and Cllr Gwinnett.

Cllr Samuels declared a personal interest in that her husband’s niece was a member of Positive Participation.

The Chair requested that Cllr Samuels did not take part in the meeting but agreed that she could remain in the room.

Cllr Samuels objected to not being allowed to take part in the meeting but accepted the ruling of the Chair of the Panel.

Cllr Moran declared that she sat on the Board for the Wolverhampton Voluntary Sector. The Chair confirmed with representatives from Positive Participation that it was not a charity but a limited company which chose not to make a profit. Given this it was considered that Cllr Moran did not have any conflicts of interest in relation to the report under discussion.

The Chair introduced herself and the Panel.

Representatives from Positive Participation were present (Gurbax Kaur and Siobhan Samuels) at the meeting but stated that they had not intended to speak to the report and were attending only as public observers. The representatives did however state that they would try to answer any questions that the Panel had.

Paul Smith - Head of Commissioning introduced the briefing note in relation to the consultation that had been carried out regarding the Remodelling and Tender of Mental Health Preventative Contracts.

Officers highlighted that the remit of the Panel was to consider whether the consultation had been undertaken satisfactorily and whether the recommendations that had been presented to the Cabinet Resources Panel on 4^th October 2016 were realistic and rational and a true reflection of the finding of the consultation.

Officers directed Members to page 6 of the report which showed that 419 people had engaged in the consultation process which represented a total of 55% of all those invited to participate. 104 (25%) were service users, four (1%) were relatives of a service user, five (1%) were carers, 14 (3%) respondents identified themselves as service providers, 10 (2%) were members of staff, seven people (2%) skipped the question, 263 (63%) were self-help group members and 12 (3%) selected ‘someone else’ and of that number three stated they were; a Director of a community interest company (CIC) for mental wellbeing, a concerned citizen of Wolverhampton and a user of services for people with on-going mental health issues.

Officers considered that given the above, 85% of users of the system who could have been affected had been consulted and this was considered to be a very strong response rate and would help to influence the direction taken by the Council. 

Officers also confirmed that the services were not subject to any budget cuts or efficiency savings and that there was a commitment to maintain funding of £107,000.

At the start of the consultation process a fundamental element had been a model proposing a hub in the City Centre. However as the consultation had progressed it had become clear that service users were not in favour of this idea and as such the hub proposal was abandoned in favour of a model more akin to the current city wide model. Officers stated that this was clear evidence of the Council taking on board the feedback from the consultation and being reactive to the recommendations and concerns of service users.

Officers stated that the Council was supportive of culturally specific services but it was thought that the current provision was too narrow and that services had to be more inclusive to meet the needs of newly arrived minorities including young black males and members of the LGBT community. There was also concern that there was currently some duplication of services in the City which the new model needed to address.

Cllr Hardacre questioned whether the Council would have to cover the £60,225 currently  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.