Agenda and minutes

Councillors O’Halloran, Court and Klute. Councillor Kay for lateness.

Councillor Wayne stated that he was substituting for Councillor O’Halloran

Declarations of interest

 If you have a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest* in an item of business:

§  if it is not yet on the council’s register, you must declare both the existence and details of it at the start of the meeting or when it becomes apparent;

§  you may choose to declare a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest that is already in the register in the interests of openness and transparency. 

In both the above cases, you must leave the room without participating in discussion of the item.

If you have a personal interest in an item of business and you intend to speak or vote on the item you must declare both the existence and details of it at the start of the meeting or when it becomes apparent but you may participate in the discussion and vote on the item.

*(a) Employment, etc - Any employment, office, trade, profession or vocation carried on for profit or gain.

(b)  Sponsorship - Any payment or other financial benefit in respect of your expenses in carrying out duties as a member, or of your election; including from a trade union.

(c) Contracts - Any current contract for goods, services or works, between you or your partner (or a body in which one of you has a beneficial interest) and the council.

(d) Land - Any beneficial interest in land which is within the council’s area.

(e) Licences- Any licence to occupy land in the council’s area for a month or longer.

(f)   Corporate tenancies - Any tenancy between the council and a body in which you or your partner have a beneficial interest.

 (g) Securities - Any beneficial interest in securities of a body which has a place of business or land in the council’s area, if the total nominal value of the securities exceeds £25,000 or one hundredth of the total issued share capital of that body or of any one class of its issued share capital. 

This applies to all members present at the meeting.

None

RESOLVED:

That, subject to the addition of the word ‘the’ and the deletion of the word ‘he’, the minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 21 January 2016 be confirmed as a correct record of the proceedings and the Chair be authorised to sign them

The Executive Member Finance and Performance stated that the final settlement from the Government had now been received and that this did not differ from the provisional settlement announced. He added however that additional monies had been given to Conservative shire Councils

The Chair outlined the procedures for filming and recording of meetings and also the procedure for Public questions

The Chair informed Members that a meeting had been arranged to visit the Integrated Gangs Team at Tolpuddle Street in relation to Knife Crime scrutiny review on 19 February 2016 at 10.30 a.m. and all Members were welcome to attend

Members welcomed Ross Adams, Chance UK and Shareen Connolly, Safer London Aspire and some young people taking part in the scheme, to the meeting.

During consideration of the evidence the following main points were raised –

·         Safer London Aspire is a mentoring project for 11-18 year old young people at risk of involvement in ASB, offending and gangs

·         Members were informed of the activities that the mentors took part in with the young children and the scheme tried to ensure that mentors chosen to work with children had similar interests

·         Mentors met with children regularly and at present there were 27 active mentors and 52 on the database. In future they were looking to identify more categories of mentors and interviews after application took place and assessments and if these were successful mentors would then attend a 3 day intensive training course and then final suitability is assessed

·         In response to a question it was stated that the scheme did have sufficient applications for mentors and that most of the children referred tended to come through referrals from Families First, youth offending etc.

·         Safer Aspire stated that ideally they would like to extend the service to more young people and to recruit more mentors and train them more intensely

·         The view was expressed that it was felt that there is a need for more early intervention and more input from schools

·         In response to a question it was stated that mentors were allowed £20 per week to spend on activities per child, however it is often difficult to get children into sporting clubs. There is currently MOPAC funding for early intervention for 11-17 year olds

·         The MOPAC funding was initially for a 2 year period and this has been extended for a further 2 years until 2017, however following this funding is uncertain but there is a commitment for it to continue in some form. Councillor Convery stated that in his discussions with MOPAC about youth crime in the borough he felt that funding would continue and the monies would be concentrated on youth crime and Domestic Violence

·         The young children present stated that they felt additional funding would be beneficial given the cost of activities. Members stated that they wished the children success in the scheme and in future

·         Chance UK provides an early intervention programme for 5-11 year olds through intensive mentoring and family support

·         Referrals mostly came from the child’s school and would be in relation to concerns about mental health, hyperactivity, peer pressure etc. and work would be carried out with the child and the family and there were high instances of parents who suffered from depression and anxiety, from Domestic Violence etc.

·         The results of Chance UK were consistently good and 85%-95% of children when graduating from the service had improved behaviour and 75% had improved social care and relationships with their families

·         Chance UK services were able to be externally evaluated

·         Members expressed the view that Chance UK did excellent work and that the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 207.

Councillor Paul Convery, Executive Member Community Safety was present for discussion of this item and outlined the report.

During consideration of the report the following main points were raised –

·         Islington has seen a reduction of 4% in serious youth violence this year and also reductions in first time entrants to the criminal justice system which shows that more young people are being diverted away from crime

·         The introduction of Operation Attrition and Operation Omega had had a marked reduction on phone crime and other linked offences, such as the theft of two wheeled vehicles. However, towards the end of the year, a number of known young offenders were released from custody and despite active offender management, there has been a significant rise again in theft snatch levels, particularly during December 2015. These crimes have been committed by moped riders and by young people on pedal cycles

·         There is also a focus on adults who are recruiting young people into the community although there is a great deal of work still to be done in relation to this

·         Youth violence, robbery and knife crime have all seen continued reductions and in the second half of 2015 the number of knife related critical incidents has almost halved

·         The forming of the Integrated Gangs Team is now almost fully staffed with significant contribution from Children’s Services to support safeguarding and work around child sexual exploitation

·         There is a focus on known individuals and case management of a relatively small number of individuals and cross border work with Camden. It was noted that the gangs in Islington and Camden were of a different nature to those in Haringey and Hackney

·         Reference was made to the recent report of the Youth Offending service and it was stated that it had indicated a problem with the Police involvement but that Councillor Calouri would be attending the next meeting of the Committee to discuss the report, however there were good working relationships with Police in areas such as licensing and the Community Safety Unit. In addition, the Police were addressing the concerns outlined in the Youth Offending service report

·         In response to a question it was stated that there were a number of extremely young offenders and it is important to target these and it may take 3/4 years before the measures being taken are reflected in reductions in criminality and there is a need to stop criminal behaviour before it becomes prolific

·         It was stated that only 5/6 criminal behaviour orders were issued last year and these were linked to gang activity and serious criminality

·         Community engagement is taking place and youth crime and community engagement are the primary themes of the Islington Crime summit on 5 March

·         It was noted that a number of young offenders came from extremely damaged families and it is important to deal with these underlying problems as well as enforcement action being taken

·         A Member expressed the view that the gentrification of the borough and social widening of wealth  ...  view the full minutes text for item 208.

Councillor Andy Hull, Executive Member Finance and Performance was present, together with Steve Key, the Service Director Finance.

During consideration of the report the following main points were made –

·         The Executive Member stated that he encouraged Trade Unions to notify him of instances if they felt contractors or sub-contractors were not paying the LLW

·         It was noted that the threshold in the Procurement rules that triggers the requirement for competitive tenders has been raised. In addition it is being looked at as to whether the threshold could be set higher for certain procurements so that voluntary organisations could benefit from a ‘light touch’ approach where it may be possible to reduce the tender burden on certain services within this categorisation

·         In relation to paragraph 3.4 it was noted that the issue of social value in housing contracts had been raised as an issue and that the issue of sub -contractors needed to be clarified. It was stated that there were social value champions on the Procurement Board and that the issue of payment of LLW to sub-contractors could be clarified in terms of the relevant legislation. It was stated that information could be supplied detailing some of the instances of where challenges had been made by the Procurement Board

·         In relation to local suppliers reference was made to how many of LBI’s suppliers were based in the borough and it was stated that this information would be provided to Members

·         In response to a question it was stated that data on the use of LBI consultants, as opposed to agency staff, in the past few years be provided to Members together with the strategy to reduce this by 2020

·         Reference was made as to whether when commissioners drew up packages of work this is co-ordinated to draw together similar schemes and it was stated that this is being looked at

·         In response to a question it was stated that the Resident Impact Assessment was not relevant on this particular report, however these are included in each individual procurement report and that an example could be provided to Members

·         It was stated that with regard to domiciliary care that all staff now received the LLW and that they were paid for travelling time and the Council were leading the way on social care provision resulting in a more content and stable workforce

·         Reference was made to the tendering for capital works and that the Leaseholders Association often complained that the procurement process was based on a schedule of rates and following the tender award there was often an uplift and the Service Director Finance stated that he would investigate and let Members know details thereon

·         A Member enquired whether services could consider in house provision before procuring services and it was stated that whilst this is not always possible, managers would always review the best way of delivering a service before they considered a procurement process

·         In response to a question as to how many of the contractors were local  ...  view the full minutes text for item 209.

Councillor Andy Hull, Executive Member Finance and Performance was present together with Ian Adams, Director of Financial Operations and Customer Service.

During consideration of the report the following main points were made –

·         Members welcomed the retention of the residents support team

·         Reference was made to paragraph 4.1 of the report and that this outlined the main issues although some changes proposed had been rejected by the House of Lords

·         The benefit cap introduction has now been delayed to October 2016 and until July 2017 in Islington and additional funding had been allocated to London and Islington’s Discretionary Housing payment allocation had risen from £1m to £1.1m

·         In response to a question it was stated that the shared accommodation changes came into force in 2018 and would be applied to the public sector in addition to the private sector. Councillor O’Sullivan requested that he be informed of any possible exemptions to the changes

·         The view was expressed that more elderly people will be subject to the benefit due to the increase in the retirement age and that if people are made redundant it is more difficult for them to get back into work

·         Reference was made to the fact that some of the changes would make it punitive for certain people to return to work

·         Islington was one of the trial DWP areas for the testing of Universal Credit (USDL) and the results of this had been submitted to Government and it had shown that people could be supported back into work and none of the people on the trial had been subject to DWP sanction. It was stated that a briefing on the USDL trial could be sent to Members

·         In response to a question it was stated that the projected date for the transition to Universal Credit was now 2018/19

·         Concern was expressed that with the introduction of personal budgeting and the fact that residents may run up rent arrears particularly if on a low income

RESOLVED:

That the report be noted and that Members be provided with a briefing on the USDL trial

The Chair thanked Councillor Hull and Ian Adams for attending

RESOLVED:

That the report be noted