Agenda item

Councillor Andy Hull, Executive Member Finance, Performance and Community Safety was present, together with Alan Grant, Acting Head of Human Resources, and Linda Nicholas for attending

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

·         It was noted that a new Workplace Strategy was being put in place and this would be submitted at a later date to the Committee

·         Following the previous meeting of PPS when they considered this issue, a robust action plan had been put in place, and progress is monitored by CMB and improved management information is being provided to Directors

·         It was noted that improvements had been made and long term sickness had reduced. There is also a focus on wellbeing of staff, and there had been a number of dismissals and others are in the pipeline

·         The annual appraisal has been removed and replaced with more regular appraisals where wellbeing of staff can be addressed at an early stage, and allow better reporting. This will allow continuous appraisal of staff

·         In response to a question it was stated that organisational change can lead to stress amongst staff, however HR did provide support to Directors, and the process needed to be managed sensitively. Trade Unions were engaged and consulted at an early stage on reorganisation proposals

·         Reference was made to the Medigold contract and that improvements needed to be made as this is not working as effectively as envisaged

·         Discussion took place as to more elderly manual staff, who may suffer from more injuries than younger staff, and whether measures were being put in place to assist them to remain in employment, by offering reduced hours or more flexible working. It was stated that this could be looked at and proposals submitted at a later date

·         Reference was made to the need to assist staff, especially longer serving staff, who were finding organisational change difficult, particularly with regard the locations project, and that there should be good timely, communications to all levels of staff regarding the project and other projects. This should be an institutionalised response to everyone involved in organisational change

·         A Member enquired why there was a ‘pie chart’ in the report detailing sickness levels by race, and that this did not appear to present any relevant information and should be removed in all future reports

·         In response to a question as to whether the Council tried to ascertain whether stress/anxiety issues were caused by work or home life, it was stated that this was the case, however more regular appraisals would enable concerns to be raised at an earlier stage by staff/management

·         The view was expressed that there needed to be more information provided in future reports detailing working days lost as a percentage of the Directorate, as well as a percentage of the workforce, as this would reflect a truer picture. In addition, a breakdown of sickness by gender. Reference was made to the fact that a number of these issues were being looked at by CMB, and would be reflected the next time the report was submitted to the Committee

RESOLVED:

That the report be noted and that a further report be submitted to the Committee in January 2020, detailing progress including

·         data by service area of level of sickness, and how this has been impacted by the workplace strategy introduction

·         how is support for older workers, particularly manual workers being addressed e.g. more flexible hours, flexible working etc.

·         analysis of data by race to be looked at to ascertain if there is any relevance to this information being provided in future

·         data to be provided on sickness levels by gender

·         data should include % levels of sickness against % of people employed per service area to make the figures presented more relevant

The Chair thanked Councillor Hull, Alan Grant and Linda Nicholas for attending