Agenda item

Members gave consideration to the second of the newly styled Progress and Delivery reports for 2016/17.

The report dealt with the progress and delivery of projects which were aimed at the delivery of the corporate plan. This report highlighted those projects that had entered the delivery stage and were either off track or at risk of not delivering.  The report also dealt with the progress and delivery of the services the council provided. It was an “exceptions” report and dealt with those services which were either performing above the required level or were below the target set for them. The report further provided Members with a summary of activity across services.

It was noted that the report had previously been considered by both the Prosperous Communities Committee and the Corporate Policy and Resources Committee and Members were provided with the minute arising from each.

The Committee were asked to examine the responses given to the report by the Corporate Policy and Resources Committee and the Prosperous Communities Committee and assure themselves that the appropriate level of challenge was being made by those committees to the information contained in the report.

Discussion ensued and concern was raised regarding the performance within Land Charges. It was questioned why the Authority’s performance was behind that of partners.  Members also enquired as to whether it was still the intention of the Government to transfer some of the service to Land Registry.  

In response Officers advised that performance had been a concern historically, however applications were currently being turned around in 5.7 days, which was a significant improvement.  The service had a good reputation for quality and accuracy and because of this, had maintained a core customer base.  A new automated system for Local Land Charges had been procured and was being implemented, with an anticipated completion date of April 2017. This would significantly improve search processing times.

Until the new system was fully functioning the service would face a challenge to consistently turn around searches within the 10 day target using the current manual system. Additional resources had been allocated to the service in order to keep turnaround times for searches within the 10 day target in the interim.

No target had been set as yet for post implementation of the computerised system, however it was hoped search times could be reduced to 24-48 hours.  It was further confirmed that there were still Government plans to move some of the Local Land Charges Function back to central Land Registry, however no timescales had been assigned to this.

The Committee also raised concerns with regard to the performance in Enforcement, and indicated it would be useful for them to understand how many cases were currently being managed, how many were outstanding and which were being given priority. 

The Committee were reminded of their adopted procedure, whereby it would be for the Policy Committee to first challenge the performance in this area, if the Challenge and Improvement Committee were not satisfied with the action the Policy Committee were taking, after two periods, then it would be for the Challenge and Improvement Committee to then offer further challenge.  It was important that the Policy Committees were first afforded the opportunity to challenge performance.  With this mind it was suggested that the Chairman of the Committee liaise with the Chairman of the Prosperous Communities Committee in the first instance regarding any concerns the Committee may have.

Members recalled how historically they had received information on planning enforcement quarterly and requested such an item be added to their work plan, acknowledging that case specific information could not be included due to Data Protection.  There was general discussion as to why Members felt this would be useful to them, and it was therefore agreed that the matter would be further discussed at the next Chair’s Briefing.

Members also advised that they had been led to understand that a duty planner was available everyday, however this had not been their experience.  Officers undertook to investigate.

RESOLVED that having examined the responses given to the report by the Corporate Policy and Resources Committee and the Prosperous Communities Committee, the Committee have assurance that the appropriate level of challenge is being made by those committees to the information contained within the report.