Agenda item

The Director of Finance and Support Services submitted an exception report on the finance and performance monitoring of East Herts Council for the period to September 2013 (Quarter 2), the detail of which was set out in the report now submitted and supporting Essential Reference Papers.

The Corporate Planning and Performance Manager explained that the Planning Contingency budget still to be used was £487,000 to be applied to unforeseen events.  The Corporate Planning and Performance Manager provided an update in relation to performance indicators generally and those which fell within the remit of Corporate Business Scrutiny Committee. 

Councillor T Page expressed concern regarding the variance on social housing and the lack of affordable housing in the area.  He stressed the need to apply this urgently and that it was unacceptable that it was not being applied.  The Director of Finance and Support Services stated that the matter had been discussed recently at Corporate Management Team in the context of Section 106 agreements.  She added that the Council was in discussion with Registered Social Landlords to move this matter along and referred to the difficulties in trying to put schemes together within a short period of time.

Councillor J Wing referred to the Council being 25% under spent on the Capital budget stating that, the Council should be ready to move forward with other schemes quickly when it became clear that an under spend was going to occur.  Councillor Wing further commented that money should not be accruing in reserves but should be moved along more vigorously.  The Director of Finance and Support Services stated that she was keen to see large capital schemes move forward and that she was also keen to ensure that schemes were profiled correctly from the point at which the funding was agreed and the schemes were given the go ahead. 

In response to a query from Councillor T Page concerning the use of resources and their application towards affordable housing, the Director of Finance and Support Services explained that there were restrictions on what the Council could and could not do in terms of the provision of social housing.

The Corporate Planning and Performance Manager provided an explanation of the proposed new “Dashboard Module” which had also been considered by Community and Environment Scrutiny Committees, the detail of which was set out within Essential Reference Paper “G” of the report now submitted.  Members’ comments were sought on the usefulness of the module.

The Chairman felt that the “Best Performing” and “Worst Performing” indicators confused issues and that “Worst Performing” should be omitted from any future module.  This was supported.  

Councillor J Wing expressed concern at the quality of the print and asked that this be improved.

Clarification was sought and provided in relation to the coloured “bar” at the top of the page and why “unknowns” had been included.

In response to a query from Councillor J Mayes regarding complaints to the Council and the subject matter of the complaints, the Director of Finance and Support Services undertook to write to Members with a summary of the complaint issues.

The Committee received the report and asked that, in relation to the “Dashboard Module”:

·        future development of the module should ensure the removal of the “Worst Performing” analysis, as the same information was provided under ‘Best Performing’;

·        all Performance Indicators, including those which were “unknown” (because targets had not been established) be shown across the top statistics bar;

·        the print quality be enhanced (as this currently resembled a dot matrix printer); and

·        supplementary guidance notes be attached for clarity in respect of minimising/ maximising indicators in the Bullet Graphs.

The Committee was also keen to see the Social Housing Scheme variance be spent promptly for the benefit of residents.

The Committee supported the recommendations now detailed.

RESOLVED – that (A) in relation to the “Dashboard Module”, the recommendations as detailed above, be supported; and

(B)   the Executive be advised that the Social Housing scheme variance as now detailed, be spent promptly for the benefit of residents.