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BLACKPOOL COUNCIL

EXECUTIVE MEMBER REPORT TO THE COUNCIL

Report of the Cabinet Member for: /

Business Services

at the Council meeting held on: / 13th June 2007
This report provides the opportunity to report to the Council the latest developments on various matters relating to the Business Services portfolio.
Streetscene and Property including waste collection and disposal
Grounds maintenance
The provision of grounds maintenance services for Blackpool Coastal Housing is continuing and the winter maintenance programme has been completed. There is an ongoing prioritised programme of felling of trees infected with Dutch elm disease and remediation works have been scheduled for the various football field sites (Common Edge Road, Fishers Field, Moor Park Avenue, Fleetwood Road) for June 2007.
Tramways
The renewal scheme between Manchester Square and South Pier (carried out by Birse) and the track renewal works between Beach Road and Thornton Gate are now complete and fully open. Both these works were completed to programme.
Street Cleansing, Refuse and Waste Services
The Neighbourhood Environment Action Team, (NEAT) operational works (fly tipping, graffiti, gully cleaning) are continuing in the Re-assurance Areas and across the other Council ward areas. Education and enforcement tasks are ongoing in relation to both domestic and commercial waste collection and there is ongoing education and enforcement with respect to schools and littering problems.
Parking
Statistics show there was a 9% increase in users on the car parks during 2006/2007 and Parking Services are every year keeping up with technology available to benefit both customers and the operation.
Last year, we increased payments by Paris and introduced direct debit, which is proving to be very customer friendly. Operationally in 2006/7 we obtained secure status on several of our parks a further two parks will be inspected during 2007/8 for this highly sought after award.
Navajo charter mark was also obtained and the service underwent an equality impact assessment the officer responsible being very impressed with the whole service.
Customer First and IT
Information Communication Technology (ICT) continues to move forward with its modernisation programme to improve both the range of services for staff and members and also the customer experience through the Council's web site. They will be a change in the "look and feel" of the Council's web site in a couple of months. ICT is also working with a number of other Councils to provide services as part ofincreasing and maximising the Councils resources. Currently we provide services to Fylde and Rochdale Council. Corporate Print Services are looking to develop more income over the 12 months and will also look to develop a unified post service and a new scanning and indexing service.
A recent scrutiny report has identified the excellent work undertaken by the Customer First service, however there is scope for improvement and work is underwayto understand the detail behind the demands placed on theCouncil in order that we can address some of the root issues around our service provision from a customers perspective. The service has been extremely busy over the last couple months with the new Council tax bills, orange sacks, benefit issues and waste enquiries.
Legal and Democratic Services
The Democratic Services Unit has been busy since the last Council meeting co-ordinating and working with staff from across the Council in delivering the recent local election. The Unit is now implementing the Induction programme for new members, which was previously agreed by the Member Services Working Group.
I am also pleased to inform members that the Council has been short listed at the forthcoming Municipal Journal awards for the best Elected Member Development Initiative (Licensing Training). This is a great achievement for all the members and officers involved in implementing the training for the Licensing Act 2003 and in the evaluation of the training. The final decision will be taken on 28th June.
The Democratic Services Unit has also been awarded the ISO 9001 accreditation, which indicates that they operate a high standard in relation to their procedures and processes and the quality of work they now produce. In May it also successfully retained its Investors in People status, following an inspection and later this year the Council as a whole will apply for that standard. The Member Services Working group has been instrumental in the last 12 months in helping direct the work of the Unit to reach these standards.
The North West Employers Management Board met on 30th May and has awarded the Council the Level 2 Member Development Charter (higher level 'exemplary' status) in recognition of the high standard of member development undertaken. There is only one other Council in the North West, which has been awarded this level of status from the North West Employers.
Human Resources
The Pay modernisation project is continuing to move forward to ensure that it is paying its staff equal pay for work of equal value. In March in conjunction with ACAS the authority tackled the issue of Equal pay with a number of staff groups where there may have been potential disputes.
The authority has now moved onto the next stage of the project. So far, we have worked on an overall Framework that will be used to describe the skills and behaviours we expect employees to have to do their job within the Council. We have developedJob Groups thatdescribe the different types of roles that exist within the wide range of Council service areas.
The next part of the project will be to look at these roles and develop a new grading structure, this will involve job evaluating the newly created roles within the job families and then allocating individual jobs into these job families and into the levels within the job families.
We are workingwith, and in consultation with our recognised Trade Unions. The trade unions requested that we undertake a pilot within one directorate. It has therefore been agreed that the pilot directorate would be Children's Services Directorate. A timeline has been set up as follows:
Job Evaluation - May 2007
Job Allocation - June 2007
Review of pilot - July 2007
Council Implementation – September – October 2007
Financial implications – December 2007
Performance Review – Value for Money Team
The Performance Review Team has been assembled, drawn up from staff across directorates. An initial three-year programme of service specific reviews and cross cutting Value for Money reviews has now commenced. A review of Highways Inspection and Maintenance has now been circulated and a review of the Council’s Human Resources service is well under way. In addition, savings in Information Communication and Technology and Telecommunication costs have been identified.
The target for the current financial year is to identify revenue savings of at least £500,000 per annum. To date savings in the region of £200,000 have been identified.
Reviews focussing upon Catering Services, Social Care Financial Assessments and Community Development are currently being scoped and will begin shortly.
Revenues and Benefits
Council Tax billing and Benefit notification to residents in respect of 2007/08 was completed in March according to plan. The new Revenues and Benefits IT system (Pericles) was used for this for the first time and is now operational across the Division.
Loss of service during implementation and conversion has led to a backlog of benefits work and a reduction in collection rates. We have set incremental targets to reduce the backlog and resume normal processing by July and we have received financial assistance from the Department for Works and Pensions (DWP) to secure additional offsite processing resource during this time. This year’s recovery schedule has been determined and enhanced in order to regain former recovery levels against an improved target.
Work continues with Fylde Council to provide a shared Revenues and Benefits service for both authorities, which will be based in Blackpool Council offices. This project is being led by a joint Board, which includes Member representation from Blackpool and Fylde.
Thank you Mr Mayor, I will be pleased to invite any questions or comments from Councillors in relation to the Business Services portfolio.