Agenda item

The Head of Communications, Strategy and Policy and the Projects and New Business Manager submitted a report that provided an update on progress towards meeting the actions and targets set out in the Council’s Corporate Plan entitled “East Herts: A Place to Grow”.

Members were advised that following the scrutiny review, these reports would be submitted to Overview and Scrutiny instead of Audit and Governance Committee (formerly known as Performance, Audit and Governance Oversight Committee).

The Head of Communications, Strategy and Policy said that was update in terms of progress against the Corporate Plan and some of the actions had changed since January and a refreshed Corporate Plan would be issued towards the end of the financial year.

The Projects and New Business Manager reminded Members of the four key themes of the Corporate Plan and set the context in terms of the quarter two data that had informed the report, from 1 April to 30 September 2020.

Members were provided with an overview of the progress against the actions detailed in section three of the report and referred to a graph that set out the expected outcomes at the end of quarter two. The Projects and New Business Manager referred in particular to the good work that been undertaken in respect of growing the East Herts lottery.

Members were advised that the carbon assessment tool had been finalised to enable the assessment of the carbon footprint of key projects. In respect of the digital by design thread, the East Herts customer charter had been completed and had been published.

The Projects and New Business Manager said, as a direct impact of Covid-19, two climate change film festivals and two electric vehicle road shows in Hertford and Bishop’s Stortford had been cancelled due to Covid-19 restrictions. These events had been rescheduled to take place in Spring 2021.

Members were advised that, in respect of digital by design, work that had been commissioned to reassess customer requirements at Wallfields and improve the customer journey and self-service in the reception had been put on hold as the reception was currently closed and Officers were reassessing future front of house requirements for the new normal.

Members were given a brief overview of the performance health indicators listed under section 4 of the report and Members were given a detailed update in respect of performance indicators which were performing well. 

The Projects and New Business Manager covered a number of performance health indicators that were not performing to target such as the time taken to process housing benefit new claims and change events, (perhaps due to Covid-19). Members were advised that the percentage of good satisfaction ratings from the website had dropped and Officers had sought to make the Gov.metric system widget more visible to encourage more customer feedback and the ratings were now starting to improve.

Councillor Goldspink asked about work to assess the carbon footprint of proposals relating to Hertford Theatre in terms of whether this would be done before or after the works were completed. She also asked about the work to make the register of the Council’s assets more visible and on the excellent campaign to discourage motorists from leaving vehicle engines idling.

The Projects and New Business Manager said that he would talk to the relevant project leads to get answers to some of the questions raised by Councillor Goldspink. Councillor Buckmaster said that one of the appendices incorrectly stated that strategic site BISH6 had been granted planning permission but that a decision has not yet been made as this was for consideration by Members of Development Management Committee on 4 November 2020. The Head of Communications, Strategy and Policy apologised for that oversight and said that he would clarify that point with the report author. Members received the report and noted the progress made to date against the corporate plan.

RESOLVED – that the progress against the corporate plan to date, be noted.