Notes of the North West Scrutiny Support Officers’ Network Meeting

Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council - 19th July 2007

Present:

• Blackpool Borough Council - Steve Sienkiewicz and Mark Towers
• Burnley Borough Council - Eric Dickinson
• Cumbria County Council - Douglas Scott
• Ellesmere Port & Neston - Shirley Hudspeth and David Tighe
• Knowsley Metropolitan Borough Council - Joanne Griffiths
• Lancashire County Council - Mel Ormshire
• Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council - Robert Haddrell
• Preston City Council - Steven Dugdale
• Rochdale Borough Council - Peter Jones
• St Helens Council - Ian Blythin and Carole Swift
• Salford City Council - Karen Dainty and L. Sharples
• Sefton Borough Council - Debbie Campbell, Ruth Harrison, Patrick Sebastian and Michele Wainwright
• South Ribble Borough Council - Louise Benney and Joanne Heron
• Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council - Katy Spencer
• Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council - Howard Boots and Diana Paver
• Trafford Metropolitan Borough Council - Samuel Martin
• Warrington Borough Council - Julian Joinson, Ivan West and Alison Williams
• West Lancs District Council - Cathryn Jackson
• Wigan Council - Diane Taylor

Apologies for absence:

• Fylde Borough Council - Tracey Scholes and Annie Womack
• Lancaster City Council - Elizabeth Bates
• Liverpool City Council - Joan Leonard
• South Lakeland District Council - Tracey Ingham and Steve Richards

1. Introduction

Ruth Harrison welcomed everyone to Bootle Town Hall, Sefton, it was agreed that Howard Boots Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council chair the meeting.

 2. Notes of the Last Meeting

The notes of the last meeting of the Network held on 11th October 2006 were approved as a correct record.

 3. Regional Health Scrutiny

a) Draft Strategy for the North West

Doug Scott, Cumbria, provided a general introduction to work undertaken in respect of regional networking, and recent developments prior, and subsequent to, the Regional Conference arranged by NW Scrutiny Officers in partnership with the NW Strategic Health Authority (SHA), details of which were circulated with meeting agenda.

Doug explained the history to the establishment of the new regionally based SHA’s and the work undertaken by a number of NW Health Scrutiny Officers to forge links, and build relationships with the new SHA for the NorthWest region. This included a meeting with Mike Farrow, Chief Executive and Jo Watts, Communications Officer at the SHA.

Two key areas of discussion at the early stages were: 

• Principal Working Relationships with Primary Care Trusts.
• Joint Working across Local Authority boundaries at Regional and Sub Regional Level.

Funding for the Conference funded in part from the Centre for Public Scrutiny (CfPS) provision of £10,000 to encourage networking (further report at (d) below). Doug also expressed thanks to Manchester City Council for their financial and administrative support with regards to the Conference.

Key messages arising from the Conference:

• The priority for local authorities in general is to look at issues within their own area, rather than considering regional issues.
• NHS - the ongoing major reconfiguration agenda impacting on services in the region, and forthcoming reconfiguration / assessment of specialist services at a national level, may have a possible impact on regional service provisions

A follow up meeting involving a small number of NW Scrutiny Officers (Doug Scott, Cumbria, Karen Dainty, Salford, Robin Roberts, Cheshire and Dave Fletcher, Greater Manchester) had taken place. The Officers had met to compile an Action Plan for future forward plan issues and partnership working with the SHA.
Further debate arising from the strategy took place when officers considered the Action Plan (see (c) below).

(b) Relationship with SHA (North West)

Karen Dainty, Salford, informed the meeting of discussions with the Sue Henry, SHA Partnerships Officer with regards to the SHA producing a quarterly electronic bulletin on basic issues on their business agenda. The format could be along the lines of an update already distributed to MPs.

Karen advised the meeting that Sue was willing to attend future meetings of the NWSSON, and assist the network in the planning of future events involving the SHA.

It was suggested that an annual event could take place with the SHA on a regional basis.

It was agreed that an updated distribution list of Members of this group be compiled and sent to Sue Henry.

The SHA were also keen to disseminate information throughout the NHS using best practice examples from the NWSSON ‘pool’ of officers. There was particular interest on the part of the SHA in developing sub-regional workshops on best practice and shared learning.

(c) Action Plan

Following on from the above items, Karen and Doug explained that the SHA meetings and regional conference had all been very positive, and there was a desire from NW Scrutiny Officers and the SHA to produce a more definitive action plan over the next 6-9 month period.

A discussion followed with Officers raising a number of specific ‘hot’ topics that could form the basis of the action plan. These included:

• Specialist Commissioning - Local Authorities Engaging with the Specialist Commissioning Team.
• Co-ordination of ‘Lead’ Authorities to head up specialist service reviews.
• LINks - Sharing of information on the commissioning of Local Involvement Networks (LINks).
• The complexities of the commissioning of health services from the private sector.
• Quarterly briefings (electronic and/or paper) from the SHA.
• Raising the profile of Overview and Scrutiny within the NHS at regional level
• CfPS events
• Local Area Agreements / Local Delivery Plans - negotiation and dialogue with PCTs.
• The development of shared distribution lists to include Elected Member, Scrutiny Officer and NHS contacts. 

Further discussion took place regarding the NWSS Officers views on the proposals for a follow-up (possibly) annual event and suggested topics for the agenda - Commissioning and Local Authority input into the planning and provision of Specialist Services.

In respect of the matter of raising the profile of Overview and Scrutiny within the NHS at regional level, it was suggested that benefit could be gained from a presentation to the SHA by an OSC Chair and PCT representative on their experiences of relationship building and partnership working.

Nominations ‘in principle’ for Chairs and PCT representative were received from: 

• Sefton MBC
• Salford City Council
• Tameside MBC 

Officers from the above authorities would communicate with their relevant Chairs, and liaise with each other on how to take this idea forward.

(d) Balance of CfPS funding (£8459)

Karen Dainty advised Officers that as a result of efficient housekeeping and the assistance of Manchester City Council (the host Council for the funding), a balance of £8459 remained from the CfPS provided funds to encourage networking. It was put to the meeting that the balance of funds be utilised to support future events, and that the SHA be approached to regularise joint funding of future workshops and/or network events.

It was agreed that Doug Scott would approach Liz McQue, North West Employers Organisation to suggest their support in helping to administer the Annual Event. Members agreed that early in 2008 would be appropriate for the first Annual Event and it would be useful to have Commissioning as the key topic.

Based upon earlier discussions with the SHA, it is believed that the SHA could be amenable to assist with funding sub-regional events. 

e) Sustaining Regional Initiative in Health Scrutiny

Howard Boots (Tameside) sought the views of the meeting regarding the Conference Summary Paper D (Jessica Crowe statement) in respect of the conference talks and discussions. It was felt that the paper did not fully represent the view of the Conference, and requested that this be addressed with the CfPS, and a correction be published.

Additional Item / Matter Arising - LINks

Rob Haddrell, Oldham requested that the topic of LINks be considered as a possible subject for future training, due to its relevance to NHS and Local Authority Commissioning, and the identified skills gap on both the Elected Members, and Officer side in many authorities.

It was suggested that the CfPS be contacted and note that a deficiency exists in the understanding of the commissioning process; and that along with devolved powers of Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) and ‘basic’ knowledge of the NHS as a whole there is an ongoing requirement for Member development in respect of healthcare provision.

It was agreed that a solution could be found utilising the CfPS healthcare advisor support programme, enabling individual authorities (or groups of authorities) to access assistance and training from the CfPS - free of charge, Members felt that a powerful message should be sent back to the CfPS stating that this group have found the training very useful and feel that further support and training is essential.

4. Quality Benchmarking Framework for Overview and Scrutiny

Rob Hadrell, Oldham, informed the meeting of work undertaken at Oldham in respect of Quality Benchmarking of a number of services at the authority, and its possible uses to assess, with uniformity, the efficiency of Overview and Scrutiny across the region (and even nationally).

Rob explained that Quality Bench Marking (QBM) provided a quick approach (once initial frameworks had been agreed) to measuring the shape of a particular service, and provided a practical method of specifying and assessing levels of service using 4 easily understood rankings. Basic, Good, Better and Best.

QBM is an established method of measurement, with strong credibility across a wide range of services / organisations, arising from a sound basis in shared working and comparison against agreed frameworks.

Rob explained that the QBM had been used effectively for the assessment of Environmental Health Services, Waste management and Health Development in Oldham. Potential existed to extend the process to Overview and Scrutiny.

It was suggested that the CfPS self assessment toolkit could provide the basis for such a QBM, and possible areas (used in the Oldham example) could include:

• Engaging the Community
• Critical Friend
• Bringing Balance to the Debate
• Being the Public’s Voice
• Setting Priorities
• Challenging Performance 

Volunteers were requested to assist in working up a ‘framework’ for the assessment, possibly using the CfPS building blocks form the ‘Good Scrutiny Guide’.

The following Officers agreed to work together on the initial project and present to the next NWSSON meeting.

• Rob Hadrell, Oldham
• Joanne Heron, South Ribble
• Sam Martin, Trafford
• Mel Ormshire, Lancashire

Should any other authorities wish to take part in this project, Rob Hadrell may be contacted on 0161-770-3931

5. Water Fluoridation

Karen Dainty, Salford apprised the meeting of the ‘Salford Model’ approach to consultation on the above topic, providing a full and frank summary of the authority’s experience regarding the process of Scrutiny involvement in the pre-consultation phase on the topic of water fluoridation.

Karen informed the meeting of specific issues that had to be considered when dealing with this (contentious) issue at a local level, namely:

• Legislation - The Water Act
• Nationally organised pressure groups
• Polarised views

Salford had taken care to ensure that Members were given as factually-based, and balanced information as was available, structuring their meeting to include a presentation from a Consultant in Oral Health, a presentation from the Chair of the British Fluoridation Society, followed by counter argument from a Speaker against Fluoridation (National Pure Water Association).

Karen explained that Salford were awaiting further report back regarding feasibility studies and cost benefit analysis following their consideration of the topic.

It was suggested that there could be benefit from a Member training event to inform Councillors on this issue, assisting them in their leadership role when this matter goes to full consultation.

6. Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

There was a brief discussion on the above Bill, noting that there had been a number of (very) recent developments regarding the implementation of the Bill, specifically a delay in respect of the element of Community Calls for Action involving links to the Police and Justice Bill - Crime and Disorder. Specifically “holding partners to account”.

It is understood that there had been a “pause” rather than postponing of the Bill, and the implementation date of April 2008 may still be achieved.

Howard Boots (Tameside) explained that a number of authorities had already made progress in re-organising their scrutiny structures to better fit in with monitoring Local Area Agreements (LAA’s) and targets.

Further discussion provided a number of suggestions for the briefing of Members on:

• LAA and Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) to assist in holding LSPs to account
• Possible trigger mechanisms to automatically flag issues to scrutiny for report - should agreed LAA targets not be attained.

7. Future Networking in the North West

Joanne Heron (South Ribble) introduced the item ‘Future Networking’ informing the meeting that the NWSSON comprised 40 Authorities, with an average of 30 officer attendees at each NWSSON meeting. The network was, on average, meeting 3 times per annum, and the consensus of all present was that the forum provided a benefit to officers both in terms of detailed discussion on specific topics, and information of a more general nature benefiting ‘newer’ member officers to the overview and scrutiny function.

A brief discussion followed concerning the forum remaining and ‘Officers only’ network, and/or the possibility of opening up the forum to elected members.

Howard Boots (Tameside) informed the meeting of ongoing discussions with NW Employers regarding training opportunities and gathering of contact information in respect of Officer and Elected Member data base.

Discussion continued on how the network could be used to share information on other aspects of scrutiny on either:

• generic issues, whereby topics relevant to all authorities could be shared via e-mail (in the form of briefings similar to, and including, those produced by the CfPS); or
• specific specialist topic briefings

It was hoped that upon completion of the contact detail database / e-mail distribution listing, communication between scrutiny officers across the NW region would allow improved sharing of best practice, in addition to the possible development of a discussion forum to enable NWSSON members to share ideas outside of the formal meeting cycle.

It was also hoped that the network would allow improved sharing of communications involving the ‘Chairs’ network.

It was agreed that a number of alternative forums existed whereby Elected Members and Officers could meet at regional level, and the NWSSON should retain its ‘Officer only’ status.

Joanne reported that she and Howard Boots had attended a meeting organised by the Centre for Public Scrutiny in respect of the development and support of regional networks and in particular sought nominations for two people to represent this network at any future meeting relating to regional scrutiny networks.

It was agreed that Joanne Heron and Howard Boots would represent the North West Scrutiny Support Officers network.

8. Additional Item - Post Office Closures

Sam Martin (Trafford) asked the meeting if any authorities present had experience of scrutiny work on the topic of Post Office closures.

Sefton MBC officers provide a short summary of how the first round of the post office urban renewal programme had been handled, and the difficulties experienced in dealing with the post office as an organisation in this particular matter.

A number Scrutiny Reviews into this topic had been undertaken by other local authorities in the past. (electronic copies available from Sefton MBC)

9. Next Meeting

The next meeting will be held at St Helens Council in October 2007 at a date and time to be arranged.