Agenda item - Written questions from Councillors.

A list of the written questions submitted by Members has been included in the agenda papers.  This will be repeated along with the written answers received and will be taken as read at the meeting as part of an addendum circulated separately at the meeting.

18.1         The Mayor reminded Council that written questions from Members and the replies from the appropriate Councillor were taken as read by reference to the list included in the addendum which had been circulated as detailed below:

 

(a)             Councillor Cox

 

              “How many prosecutions has the Council undertaken for fly tipping in Brighton and Hove each year from -

 

·           1 April 2011 to 31 March 2012?

·           1 April 2012 to 31 March 2013?

·           1 April 2013 to 31 March 2014?”

 

              Reply from Councillor West, Chair of the Environment, Transport & Sustainability Committee.

 

18.2         “1    April 2011 to 31 March 2012?          One

1       April 2012 to 31 March 2013?          One

1       April 2013 to 31 March 2014?          Nil.”

 

(b)             Councillor Hyde

 

18.3         “Given the significant pressure for development on the city’s urban fringe, how many potential housing units across the city are there that currently have planning permission which have a) yet to start on site, and b) have started on site but have yet to be completed?”

 

              Reply from Councillor Mac Cafferty, Chair of the Planning Committee.

 

18.4         “As at 1.4.14, our residential monitoring data indicates that there were:

 

a)               828 units with planning permission for housing but not yet started; and

b)               1510 units with planning permission for housing which have commenced but not yet completed. 

 

(c)             Councillor Simson

 

18.5            “How much money has the ICT department spent on outside consultants/contractors in the last year and how much is this as a proportion of the whole ICT Budget? Can you list the consultants/contractors that the Council has used?”

 

              Reply from Councillor J. Kitcat, Leader of the Council.

 

18.6         “Outline of approach

 

              The ICT department has made use of consultants and contractors across a number of areas over the past year, this has included:

 

·         Agency staff/Contractors to deal with skill and capacity gaps though increased workloads to support planned ICT Investment Fund projects, additional unplanned demand from Public Service Network Code of Connection (PSN CoCo) security requirements and cover vacancies pending recruitment.

·         Consultants to cover off specialist requirements

·         Third party contracts for maintenance, support, licensing and services

 

              The following is an outline of how these different approaches are used and relevant outline figures for the past year.

 

              Agency Staff / Contractors

 

Contractors are used by the ICT Department under the following conditions:

 

1.  Where there is a vacancy and there is uncertainty pending the restructure how it will be used, this is in order to ensure that ICT does not recruit to a post and then put the new postholder at risk. Also to ensure that existing staff are protected from being out at risk through a restructure.

 

 

2.  Where there is a vacancy and the demand levels exceed what can be managed by remaining staff while recruitment takes place.

 

3.  Where there is a temporary need through;

 

 

Three sourcing approaches are used to acquire appropriate capacity and skills. This approach has been worked through in partnership with the HR Department.

 

1.     Where there is clear 6-12 month minimum need and a reasonable (3-6 month) lead time, staff will be recruited to fixed term council contracts. For example ICT project managers.

2.     Agency staff are recruited through the council’s existing contract with “Carlisle/Guidant Group” for temporary need, particularly when start date is urgent and/or duration is expected to be short term.

3.     On some occasions, a third party contract will be used in place of a vacancy (e.g. Training contract with “OLM” - software supplier of the main system used by children’s and adult’s social care services - for CareFirst core training used in place of staff vacancy)

 

The following shows the ICT Department spend on agency staff for 2013/14 and year to date 2014/15. All agency staff are sourced through the council corporate contract with Carlisle Group/Guidant Group.

 

2013/14

 

Agency Staff Spend

 

Security Spend                              £46k

Core Revenue                               £278k

 

2014/15 year to date

 

Agency Staff Spend

 

Investment                                      £142k

Core Revenue                               £92k

 

Consultants

 

Contracts for consultancy are used only in a very limited number of circumstances where there is a temporary need for a project to bring in specialist knowledge that is not otherwise available either through existing core support contracts or staff’s knowledge. The examples to date in 13/14 and 14/15 are:

 

1.  Specialist advice and consultancy from “PTS Consulting” to assist the procurement of Data Centre services.

·      13/14 spend = £33,250

·      14/15 spend = £30,960

 

2.  Specialist advice from “Spinks Telecoms” for the redesign of the core Local Area Network to support PSN CoCo 2015, Telephony Migration and Data Centre projects

·      13/14 spend = £2,644

 

3.  Specialist advice and support from “Point to Point” consultants in: implementation of compliant remote access/home working technologies (two factor authentication, Citrix Netscalers) and drafting a specification for the replacement of the existing Citrix system, to be used in a procurement of services in its build and implementation.

·      13/14 spend = £30,920

 

4.  Specialist advice to support the awarding of a concession for public Wifi using council street furniture

·      131/14 spend = £11,250

·      14/15 spend  = £19,200

 

Third Party Contracts

 

Existing service contracts are also used to deliver both contracted core service and some planned investment activities.

 

For example the “SCC” Contract has been used in the delivery of both Windows 7 migration and security compliance investment activities and services

 

The following shows the ICT Department spend with Service Suppliers above £50k in 2013/14.

 

13/14	Total	capital	revenue	Notes
Specialist Computer Centres Plc (SCC)	£1,297,770	£377,054	£920,716	Mixed spend including Windows 7 migration and rollout, core maintenance of infrastructure equipment, desktop/laptop purchasing etc.
MDNX Enterprise Services Ltd	£1,005,402	£42,021	£963,381	Migration of Wide Area Network (WAN) lines across to new PSN Link network, high spend year as project in migration phase
Virgin Media Business Ltd	£520,176	£0	£520,176	Existing spend against both old data lines for WAN and significant analogue phone line costs
Altodigital Networks Ltd	£512,153	£0	£512,153	Provision of fully managed print/copy/Multi-Function Device (MFD)  service across the council

 

Vodafone Corporate Ltd	£301,133	£0	£301,133	Provision of mobile telephony and blackberry
Virgin Media Ltd	£194,825	£0	£194,825	Existing spend against both old data lines for WAN and significant analogue phone line costs
OLM Systems Ltd	£164,419	£0	£164,419	Support, maintenance and licensing of care system in use by both Adult Social Care and Children’s Services
IDOX Software Ltd	£130,562	£40,212	£90,350	Support, maintenance and licensing of environment systems and Electronic Document Management System (EDRM).
Business Web Software Ltd (Trading as Firmstep)	£134,875	£63,675	£71,200	Implementation costs and licensing/maintenance of Customer Experience Management (CEM) software.
Capita Business Services Ltd	£124,919	£0	£124,919	Licensing, maintenance and support of SIMS software management information system to all schools buying service from the council.

 

SecureData Europe Ltd	£99,909	£0	£99,909	implementation and maintenance/ support costs for a variety of core security appliances and services including firewalls, web filtering etc.
Northgate Information Solutions UK Ltd	£95,214	£0	£95,214	ICT Department costs for support maintenance and licensing for core housing and planning systems.
PAV I.T. Services Limited	£76,717	£0	£76,717	Licensing, maintenance and support of backup and de-duplication systems for all council data.
CIT Vendor Finance (UK) Limited	£72,559	£0	£72,559	MFD related leasing costs

 

 

Departmental Budget

 

As requested for context the following are the key figures for understanding the above in proportion to the ICT Department Revenue Budget

 

2013/14 Starting Revenue Budget                                             £5.71 Million

2014/15 Starting Revenue Budget                                             £6.36 Million

 

              Within this overall budget profile are the following main areas

 

Staffing budget

 

The core staffing budget for the ICT department is

 

2013/14                                                                               £4.4 Million

2014/15                                                                               £4.5 Million

 

Supply & Services (Contracts) Budgets

 

2013/14                                                                               £2.2 Million

2014/15                                                                               £2.6 Million

 

              Investment Budget

 

2013/14 Capital Budget                                                              £1 Million

2014/15 Capital Budget                                                              £2 Million

2015/16 Capital Budget                                                              £2 Million

 

This three year investment is also supported by a £1 Million revenue reserve.”

 

(d)             Councillor Simson

 

18.7         “What has been done on the Scrutiny Panel’s recommendations regarding monitoring the service at CAMHs and Seaside View, and putting in place a transparent and comprehensive feedback system for children with Autistic Spectrum Condition (ASC) and their parents?”

 

              Reply from Councillor Shanks, Chair of the Children & Young People Committee.

 

18.8         “A detailed report on progress to date in response to the Scrutiny Panel recommendations is going to the Health and Well-Being Board in July.   The recommendations referred to in this question are being considered currently in depth as part of a wider review of disability and SEN services being undertaken by the council, which is going to consider and take forward all the recommendations in the Scrutiny Report as part of its work. The disability and SEN review is set to report by the early New Year 2015.  

 

              The council accepts the need for all services to improve their systems for monitoring and feedback  and will work with the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG),  Sussex Partnership Trust (CAMHS) and the Sussex Community Trust (Seaside View)  to achieve further improvements. These are complex services with a number of agencies and professional teams involved and therefore establishing secure and sustainable improvements will take some detailed planning between all agencies responsible.”

 

(e)             Councillor Wealls

 

18.9         “Has the Autism Awareness Award in schools been implemented? What other efforts is the Council making to extend Autism Awareness and Training in the City’s schools?”

 

              Reply from Councillor Shanks, Chair of the Children & Young People Committee.

 

              “The ‘Autism Awareness Award’ accredited by Sussex University is being piloted at Downsview Special school and by the Autistic Spectrum Support Service. This award is undertaken over 2 terms to demonstrate awareness of autism and how this may impact on the pupils and families in the school. Following evaluation of the pilot this award will be extended to more schools as appropriate. An alternative basic level accreditation from the AET (Autism Education Trust) was gained by Patcham House School around a year ago following 2 days training for all staff.

 

            Considerable progress has been made on providing an extended and comprehensive ‘tiered’ training offer to schools and to parents. This offer is detailed on the council website now, ranging from universal training at tier 1 to very specialist training and support for those working with young people facing the greatest challenges at tier 3.The training will be delivered by Brighton and Hove professionals specialising in autism. Training from the Autism EducationTrust (AET) will also be on offer.  Training and support opportunities are being offered to parents explicitly also in this offer as well as to schools and plans are being discussed for some joint delivery of training between parents and professionals. In addition a major conference on autism is being planned for the Spring 2015.”

 

(f)              Councillor Brown

 

18.10      “The Autistic Spectrum Condition (ASC) Scrutiny recommended an Autism Champion to be appointed for the city to champion the interests of ASC children and their families, monitor implementations of the Scrutiny and ensure the appropriate strategies within and external to the Council are consistent and brought together. Has that someone been identified and will it be a remunerated post?”

 

              Reply from Councillor Shanks, Chair of the Children & Young People Committee.

 

18.11      “There are a number of children and young people across the city who have a variety of additional needs.  The Executive Director of Children’s Services has a statutory role of being the champion for all children and this includes children with autism. This is a remunerated post.”

 

(g)             Councillor G. Theobald

 

18.12      “The Friends of Withdean Park spend an awful lot of their own time on the maintenance and upkeep of this wonderful park which, until recently, was home to the national Lilac collection. Unfortunately, a large group of Travellers broke into the park on Friday 27^th June causing damage and disruption to residents.  Police eventually served notice for them to leave late on Monday 30^th June as a result of a number of reports from upset residents of anti-social behaviour.  When did the Council initially ask the Police to use their powers to evict the travellers as I have been unable to obtain this information from officers?”

 

              Reply from Councillor West, Chair of the Environment, Transport & Sustainability Committee.

 

18.13    “The Traveller Liaison team and the police carried out a joint visit to this encampment at 1pm on Friday 27^th June to assess the community impact and to conduct legally-required welfare checks. Earlier that day they had been dealing with an unauthorised encampment elsewhere in the city.  At the time of the visit there were 11 households trespassing in the park. The Travellers were told that they were trespassing, that they were not authorised to stay there, and that they must leave.

 

              On 27^th June, in line with the council’s agreed policy and obligations, a decision was made that the UAE did not meet the threshold a S61 eviction but that the correct course of action was for the council to apply to court for a possession order.  The trespassers were advised that should there be any antisocial behaviour or damage caused by the encampment this would be likely to give rise to a S61 eviction.

 

              It should be noted that while there is a collection of Lilacs in the park it is not a National Collection, having lost this status some years ago. The Lilacs are fenced off to protect them from rabbits, so the trespassers were not camped amongst them. However they did knock down part of the fence when they were in the park and this is now being reinstated. They did not cause any damage to the lilacs themselves.

 

              The police continued to monitor the encampment over the weekend. They had a number of calls over the weekend about the presence of the encampment. They also had calls about quad bike use in the park. Police attended in plain clothes to assess whether there were any unreported behaviour issues. All caravans were issued with ‘words of advice’ about vehicles and public safety. The decision about whether the encampment warranted a S61 eviction was kept under review by the police all weekend.  If the police consider an emergency eviction under S61 is required outside of normal office hours they are able to contact our security contractor, APS, who are authorised to act as the council’s agent in these circumstances. Both the police and APS know how to contact the Head of Tenancy Services, the Head of Corporate Security and key senior personnel out of hours in an emergency.

 

              On Monday 30^th June the council and the police reviewed the situation together and determined that this now gave rise to the council requesting the police evict the encampment using S61 of the Criminal Justice and Public Disorder Act 1994. This decision was made on the basis that the number of households in the encampment had grown from 11 to 39 Households. In addition there was an event planned for Thursday 3^rd July time was needed to clean up the park. In light of the new circumstances the trespassers were directed to leave the encampment by the police by Tuesday 1^st July.

 

              The group left voluntarily on the evening of Monday 30^th June. Should the trespassers return within 3 months they can be arrested by the police.  Our contractor cleared the park on Wednesday 2^nd July, which was the first day that he was available to do so. The gate was left unlocked to enable access for the contractor and re-secured when he had finished his work.  City Parks are currently repairing some damage to the wooden posts around Withdean Park and obtaining quotes to repair the fencing.”