| Time: | 3.00 pm | Place: | Committee Room 1, Council Offices, Gernon Road, Letchworth Garden City |
| PRESENT: | Councillor Tricia Cowley(Chairman), Councillor Mrs L.A. Needham, Mr B Leverett(Unison), Mrs D Levett(Unison), C Corr(Staff Consultation Forum), Councillor Bernard Lovewell(Substitute), Councillor Lawrence Oliver(Substitute). |
| IN ATTENDANCE: | Corporate Human Resources Manager Employee Relations Officer Deputy Monitoring Officer Committee and Member Services Officer |
| ALSO PRESENT: | Bob Leverett (UNISON Branch Secretary) Dee Levett (UNISON Chair) |
| Item | Description/Resolution | Status | Action | |
| PART I | ||||
| 1 |
APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Judi Billing, Councillor T.W. Hone, for whom Councillor Bernard Lovewell acted as substitute and Councillor Lee Downie for whom Councillor Lawrence Oliver substituted. |
Noted | ||
| 2 |
MINUTES Minutes It was agreed that the Minutes of the JSCC meeting held on 15 September 2010 be confirmed as a true record of the proceedings and be signed by the Chairman. |
Agreed | ||
| 3 |
NOTIFICATION OF OTHER BUSINESS Two additional reports, on the Confidential Reporting Code (Whistleblowing) Policy Review and on the Conflicts of Interest Policy Review, had not been included on the published Agenda. The Chairman agreed that they could be taken as Items 9 and 10 and presented by the Deputy Monitoring Officer. |
Noted | ||
| 4 |
CHAIRMAN'S ANNOUNCEMENTS The Chairman welcomed both Members and officers to the last meeting of the Joint Staff Consultative Committee for 2010. Members were reminded that declarations of interest in respect of any business set out in the agenda and the nature of the interest, should be declared as either a prejudicial or personal interest at the commencement of the relevant item on the agenda. Members declaring a prejudicial interest should leave the room and not seek to influence the decision during that particular item. Before the business of the Meeting began, the Leader of the Council advised the Chairman and the Committee that she would have to leave early, to travel to another meeting. |
Noted | ||
| 5 |
STAFF CONSULTATION FORUM SCF - 6 October 2010 SCF - 3 November 2010 SCF (draft) - 1 December 2010 The Corporate Human Resources Manager (CHRM) referred the JSCC to the Minutes for the meetings of the Staff Consultation Forum (SCF) held on 6 October, 3 November and the Draft Minutes of 1 December which were tabled at this meeting, for details of the meetings, actions taken and items carried forward. She provided a summary of the main points held at each meeting. For the meeting on 6 October, the CHRM went through the notes on Office Accommodation Update, which was to be a standard agenda item for some time due to staff interest. She also commented on Green Issues, On-Line Recruitment which was now available for internal applicants, Saving Suggestions to help NHDC save financial resources and NHDC Updates regarding the budget briefings for staff, remarking that dates had been given. She informed the Committee that the Shared Managed Services contract had been awarded to SERCO. Under Employee Queries, Staggered Annual Leave had been suggested and considered, with each individual¡¦s leave year beginning on the date he or she had joined the Council. After some investigation this was not deemed to be practical, so would not be put into practice. At the SCF Meeting on 3 November, the Committee were informed that now that the telephony contract had been signed and the new software installed, hot-desking and home-working was possible. A further update was given on the Shared Managed Services and Members and officers were reminded that the budget was key. A further Office Accommodation update revealed that it was estimated that there had been around 70 applications for home-working from staff whose jobs had been assessed as suited to home working. A one-off setup payment was provided for staff to be set up as home-workers. The Leader enquired what the percentage was for partial home-working and was informed that up to 80% was partial home-working. People set up as home-workers were not entitled to have a dedicated desk at the District Council Offices (DCO). It was anticipated that home-working levels would gradually increase. FAQs had been provided for home-workers. Moving on to the Draft Minutes of the SCF Meeting on 1 December, the CHRM went through the Careline Proposed Restructure for which the Head of Community and Cultural Services had attended to give any clarification required. The Monitoring Officer had also attended to advise on the reasons for the proposed restructure (budgetary pressure and retention issues) and the possibility of shared services with another authority. The Waste and Recycling Manager also attended the SCF Meeting on 1 December and commented on Office Recycling and Green Issues. The CHRM took the Committee through Home-working, Office Accommodation, Saving Suggestions and the Strategic Director of Customer Services had advised that UNISON had submitted a pay claim of £250 for all staff which was being considered. He also commented on the budget savings for the next year and the future method of dealing with NHDC post. It was agreed: That the information provided in the three sets of Minutes of the Staff Consultation Forum be noted. The Leader of the Council left the Meeting at 3.30pm. |
Agreed | ||
| 6 |
PEOPLE STRATEGY 2008/2011 - UPDATE Report The Corporate Human Resources Manager (CHRM) updated the Committee on key points of the People Strategy Update report. She ran through the situation with Payroll, Office Accommodation and various projects to improve services, stressing that resources were difficult with two HR staff due to go on maternity leave shortly. The Careers Fair in October had gone well, the Benefits Day in early November was successful, more ILM courses had been provided for staff and three senior managers would be completing the Public Sector Leaders Programme. The course for staff of Working in a Political Environment had been particularly successful (there may be some spin-off activities organised from this course). Several staff were completing the ILM 5 in Mentoring and Coaching in Management and a workshop on the Hay Job Evaluation methodology had been arranged, with participants coming from across the service areas and it was a shared training event with other Councils. The Committee were informed that it had been an exceptional year for absence. November had been another good month, with an average of 3.55 days per person by the end of November. The figures for the 3 months from December to March 2010 could be used to forecast the year end position that was expected to be around 6 days per person. The Chairman commented that this was good news. It was agreed: That the Committee note the progress made against the implementation of the updated People Strategy actions 2008-2011. |
Agreed | ||
| 7 |
EQUALITIES AND RETENTION UPDATE Report The Employee Relations Officer introduced this update and advised that the current rate of retention was 7.9%, which was slightly up on last year. Half of the staff leaving had gone voluntarily and through retirement. The percentage of workers with disabilities was just above the target figure. Additional equalities data had been requested during the summer and just under 50% supplied the information requested. It is still problematic to collect data on all the equality strands such as religion and sexual orientation. The framework for the Equalities Act 2010 was in place. New Equalities Duties will be issued on 1 April 2011 and may require more action ¡V guidance for this will be given shortly, once the requirements have been clarified. The Committee discussed the Update and the information given at Appendix 1. It was agreed: That the Joint Staff Consultative Committee note the update on retention and the progress with equalities. |
Agreed | ||
| 8 |
UPDATE ON LOCAL GOVERNMENT ANNUAL PAY NEGOTIATIONS Report |
Noted | ||
| 9 |
DISCUSSION - WHAT WILL BE THE IMPACT OF THE REMOVAL OF THE CURRENT DEFAULT RETIREMENT AGE (DRA) OF 65? Discussion paper The Corporate Human Resources Manager (CHRM) introduced the paper on What will be the impact of the removal of the current default retirement age (DRA) of 65? and stated that employers were looking at ways to continue to use the DRA and there should be a reasonable alternative to imposing a default retirement age. A policy has to be put together to suit the majority of people¡¦s retirement aspirations, including those who want to retire early and enjoy themselves. This makes manpower planning difficult for Human Resources. Exceptions could be: applying DRAs to certain roles to allow flow of work; failing health could lead to dismissal procedures. Succession planning was more difficult and more people could die in service, having a traumatic effect on colleagues. The CHRM expressed a desire for NHDC to benchmark other local organisations¡¦ method of coping ¡V perhaps to ease into retirement by a reduction in hours, moving to a less major role, etc. The Chairman opened the subject to discussion and comments were made and questions asked such as: could employers impose DRAs for some roles and not others? (yes, but this must be justified and must not be discriminatory); it was a very difficult subject, especially for younger staff¡¦s career progression and disincentives; there was also uncertainty in the current economic climate as some older people could not afford to retire (the State Pensionable age was to be raised to 67 years in the next few years); it would be a good idea to reduce older people¡¦s workload in order to hand over to younger people; if a person continues to work after the age of 65, do they still contribute to their pension? (yes); the knowledge acquired by older people is often invaluable and they need to continue working to build up a healthy pension but younger people sometimes feel picked on; some people could consider changing their career direction leading to new specialisms, so NHDC are training job evaluators; this has been on the agenda for years in the private sector; skills developed must be optimized, as this will become a bigger issue; more flexible pension arrangements and hours were needed. The Committee agreed that: „X Local authorities should offer their workers alternative employment as they get older; „X Knowledge should be retained in the organisation; „X Physical requirements must be kept in mind; „X A pre-retirement workshop is now in the Learning Management Scheme. It was agreed: That the discussion paper on What will be the Impact of the Removal of the Current Default Retirement Age (DRA) of 65? be noted. |
Noted | ||
| 10 |
SUGGESTED DISCUSSION TOPICS List of discussion topics The Committee discussed the list of Suggested Discussion Topics and another subject was proposed ¡V the Effect on Members of Homeworking. More debate followed, and the subject of discussion for the next meeting of the Joint Staff Consultative Committee on 16 March 2011 was chosen as Homeworking ¡V the Effects for Staff and Members. |
Agreed | ||
| 11 |
CONFIDENTIAL REPORTING CODE (WHISTLEBLOWING) POLICY REVIEW Report Appendix A The Deputy Monitoring Officer (DMO) introduced and went through his report and its appendix, which had been produced in order to consider further amendments to the Confidential Reporting Code. He stated that this was important from both the Council¡¦s and employees¡¦ points of view, as employees needed to be properly protected. The current Policy was the 2007 version, as the proposed 2008 amendments were not implemented due to staffing issues. JSCC had previously requested a flowchart for the amended Policy, but due to the number of strands within the Policy it was not possible to produce a flowchart small enough to be usable with the Policy. A Member agreed that it was difficult to produce a flowchart and questioned whether procedures were too dense. The DMO commented that the procedures were designed to give flexibility to the employee wishing to raise a concern. RESOLVED: 1) That the Joint Staff Consultative Committee agree with the proposed Council internal employment policy for Confidential Reporting; 2) That the Joint Staff Consultative Committee endorse the recommendation that the Monitoring Officer prepare an advice note to provide guidance for line managers in dealing with whistleblowing matters. REASONS FOR DECISIONS: To ensure that the Council has effective means of handling whistleblowing complaints. |
Agreed | ||
| 12 |
CONFLICTS OF INTEREST POLICY REVIEW Report Appendix A The Deputy Monitoring Officer (DMO) introduced and took the Committee through the report and the amended Conflicts of Interest Policy. He gave the background to the Policy which currently only dealt with conflicts between work for the Council and an employee¡¦s private life. He advised that there were also instances where potential conflicts of interest had arisen between officers exercising different functions of North Herts District Council, for example the Council and the Trust for Hitchin Town Hall, or the Council and the Planning Authority on the Churchgate project. It was stressed that no issues had been identified to date, but the Policy was proposed in order to ensure good governance. He explained that it was proposed to add a brand new section to the Conflicts of Interest Policy to deal with these potential internal conflicts of interest. If systems were not put in place to ensure robustness of decision-making, a decision could be potentially overturned on judicial review for grounds of procedural impropriety. The Policy proposes that each project is assessed on a case by case basis and appropriate steps taken to safeguard against potential conflict, for example, by keeping separate files, both hard and electronic. The DMO pointed out that Part A of Appendix A was the current policy, renamed as External Conflicts of Interest. Part B was the new Policy and would be referred to as Internal Conflicts of Interest. The Committee raised points and made comments, such as: the meaning of ¡§project¡¨ within the internal conflicts section of the policy; the practical issues which will need to be taken into account such as IT systems, hot-desking etc; the potential long term nature of some of these projects and that systems may need to be in place over a period of years. The Chairman thanked the Deputy Monitoring Officer for his presentation and concurred that it was vital that conflicts of interest were dealt with properly. RESOLVED: 1) That the JSCC endorse the proposed policy and that its comments are noted; 2) That the JSCC endorse the recommendation that the Monitoring Officer and Audit Manager review the use of different external conflicts of interest forms with the Council, with a view to standardising the approach; 3) That the JSCC endorse the recommendations of the development of an Information Barrier Protocol and that there be an early review of the effectiveness of the Policy. REASON FOR DECISIONS: To ensure that the Council has effective means of managing potential conflicts of interest. |
Agreed | ||