Agenda item

[To update the Committee on the key risks the Council faces and how it can gain assurance that these risks are being mitigated]

Lesley Roberts, Strategic Director for City Housing updated the Committee on risk 27 , Safety Concern around the City’s Tower Blocks, and on issues that had moved on since her report at the previous meeting.

In response to questions, Strategic Director reported that:

·     Decisions on whether to implement any likely changes that might arise from the Grenfell Enquiry in advance of the publication of the Government’s reports and recommendations, would be made collectively. Where the Council’s highrise blocks are scheduled for work it would be sensible to anticipate the contents of the Government’s report.  In terms of the rest of the housing stock, a measured approach would be taken on what work we do.

·     The ‘stay put’ policy, had served the Council well over the last dozen years.  West Midlands Fire Service want to maintain that policy.  We will await to see if there is a concerted approach coming out of the Enquiry on this issue.

David Watts, Director of Adults Services reported on risk -  21, Transforming Adult Social Care (TASC) Programme and on the work being undertaken during 2017/2018 to support the transformation of adult social care and meet savings targets included in the Council’s medium term financial strategy. In response to questions the Director reported that: 

·        Home visits to elderly people had not stopped with the introduction of the Promoting Independence programme. As part of the programme the Service has been working on a robust community offer. The approach was to say to older people, how do we help you overcome the barriers that stop you from being involved in your community or to do the things that you used to do, rather than just providing home visits.

·        The risk had been rated prudently. The financial savings target was challenging and the plans to achieve it relied on factors outside the Council’s control. It was therefore difficult to downgrade the risk at this time. The current position and approach to delivering the savings was regularly reviewed with the Audit team.

·        Capacity existed within the city to respond to referrals from private care providers, although there had been some exiting from the domiciliary care market. The Council had recently increased the hourly rates for domiciliary care services and introduced the Wolverhampton Wage. Monitoring of domiciliary care provision funded by the Council was delivered through the Commissioning Contractor Department within the Quality Commissioning Team (QCT) and by the QCT in the Clinical Commissioning Group. The Service also regularly met with the Care Quality Commission. People in receipt of Council funded domiciliary support also received an annual review. Wolverhampton HealthWatch would also perform health visits to people’s homes. The Service also relied on the eyes and ears of council employees and councillors for intelligence on monitoring of care provision.

Hayley Reid, Senior Auditor, gave a brief outline of the remainder of the report on the key risks the Council faced and how the Committee could gain assurance that the risks are being mitigated.

Councillor Martin Waite commented that the number of looked after children (LAC) was not reducing and remained static.  From his discussions with council employees there was not a lot of scope for the Council’s LAC population to reduce.  He asked whether the rating of the risk should therefore be reduced.   The Senior Auditor suggested that it was worth looking at the wording of the risk.  She undertook to speak to Emma Bennett, Director of Children’s Services. In response to the Chair she added that whilst the target had been achieved, it would remain on the risk register because LAC was a strategic programme.  The risk could be reviewed to determine whether it should remain a strategic risk or a risk for the People directorate.

Mike Ager, Independent Member reported that the practice adopted by the Committee of calling in risk owners for a more detailed discussion on their plans to mitigate the risk and progress being made, was a valuable exercise.  

In response to a further question, the Senior Auditor explained how the risks for each programme were tracked, and that in relation to risk 14 (School Improvement) the percentage of the city’s schools classified as good was at 85%.  The Council was reliant upon when OFSTED could carry out their school inspections.

At the end of the discussion the Committee agreed that risk 9 – City Regeneration be discussed in detail at the next meeting.

Resolved:

1.     That the strategic risk register at Appendix A to the report be noted.

2.     That the increase in the risk score for risk 9 – City Centre Regeneration, due to cost and programme control issues, relating to a small number of significant City Centre regeneration projects be noted.

3.     That the reduction in the risk score for risk 26 – Community Cohesion, due to the reduction in the likelihood of an incident occurring be noted.

4.     That the main sources of assurance available to the Council against its strategic risks at Appendix B to the report be noted.

5.     That risk 9 – City Regeneration be considered at the next meeting and the risk owner be invited to attend.