Agenda item

The Head of People, Policy and Transformation presented the report. The Local Government and Elections (Wales) Act 2021 required local authorities in Wales

to undertake a Self-Assessment of its governance and performance.

Newport City Council had integrated its Annual Report with its annual Well-being Report to

provide an overview on the effectiveness of the Council’s Governance and Performance

arrangements to deliver its Corporate Plan and services. The Council’s Self-Assessment

requirements had also considered the findings and assessments completed in other

statutory annual reports.

The role of the Council’s Governance and Audit Committee was to ensure that the self-assessment had been completed in accordance with the Act; review the draft report with its

considerations and actions; and proposed recommendations

The Strategic Director for Transformation and Corporate reminded the Committee to put forward their recommendations as these would go to Cabinet in November.

Comments from Committee:

The Chair raised the following questions:

Difficulty working out wellbeing objective 1 to improve skills in education and employment opportunities – strategic recovery steps referred to improving school’s attainment, however there was nothing further in the document which referred to attainment.

Item 7 under this objective to improve school attendance, reduce exclusions and improve safeguarding and wellbeing – attendance in school had fallen.  There was no action in document on how to address this and responsibility for this action. 

Those were the only concerns, there was a lot of narrative but little outcome. If the seven key objectives mattered, they should be addressed. Was the report trying to do too much too quickly and losing focus.

The Head of People, Policy and Transformation advised that the report was trying to do all the things mentioned however the report was being presented to develop this approach.  There were and older objectives that were out of time and it was a complex year to be reporting because of the pandemic. Also having different sets of reports had its own problems therefore a blended report was brought forward to satisfy all requirements.

Councillor Horton echoed the Head of Service’s comments and mentioned that was discussed at  Scrutiny Committee earlier that week, and it was a juggling act to cover all aspects.

The Head of Service suggested looking at the overview of the report, pulling out the salient parts for the Committee.

Dr Barry mentioned that try to marry the Corporate Plan with the wellbeing objectives and self-assessment may not work as there was a lot of narrative but not enough about qualitative outcomes which was what people wanted to see. It also needed to be easy to read as it was a public document. There needed to be a relationship between the corporate objectives and wellbeing objectives and there was not enough data regarding this.

Dr Barry also mentioned that as Newport was a multi-cultural city, report underplayed the equality issue and how Newport City Council employees actually related in this aspect to the community and this should be highlighted in the report. 

The Head of People, Performance and Transformation agreed that the mix of staff was not adequately reflected in the report however it was in the strategic equalities report.  This was part of the challenge as a lot of the issues crossed over in various reports without providing a clearer picture for the committee members as it would have been addressed in more detail at Scrutiny, for example.

D Reed considered there was danger of getting balance right for this style of report as it could read as self-promotion rather than self-assessment, this diluted the report and took the shine off the work carried out by the council.  Not sure if this format worked for the council as there was not enough detail in it. The Head of Service advised that self-reflection was new to the council and it was recognised that there was more work to do in this respect.

Councillor Cocks felt that it was an excellent document to find out what was taking place in the council and projects being undertaken.  Whilst the report promoted economic growth, and transport as an example, it did not say how this was being progressed.

Councillor Cocks also referred to equality, there was some excellent work being done in terms of equality issues and promoting equality but there was no evidence on whether it was working or being monitored. The Head of People, Policy and Transformation appreciated that the councillor was referring to the strategic equalities annual report however there was some discussion on that report about clearer outcomes and there was a member/officer group in place where this would be taken forward. To what extent how do we produce that information in this report. Equalities was one of the core values within the council and it had staff groups working on equalities.  It may have been covered within the covid community impact assessment report. In addition, the participatory budget report was aimed at minority communities and inequalities.  However, if the members of the committee did not pick this up within the report, it would be made clearer.

Councillor Harris referred to page 57 where it mentioned that there were only 15 new start up companies, within Newport and asked was this due to covid.  The Head of Service advised that this was one of the points actually covered in the report and that the pandemic was the reason why there were as many start up companies.

The Strategic Director advised that the information was extracts from the service areas and that a response would be provided by the relevant service areas.

D Reed mentioned that the report was a live document and that deadlines regarding some completion projects dates had already passed, ie August and September, therefore had these deadlines been met and should they be added to the report for information. The report reflected information up until the end of March but this could be looked into.

The Chair would have liked to see a foreward from the Leader and the Chief Executive.  There were a lot of hyper-links which was not helpful for those that did not have a computer.

The Chair felt that members reflected that there was confusion about merging the three plans together.  If it was a self-evaluation and self-assessment on the authority, there was not enough self-evaluation.  There was a lot of verbiage and discussion but not enough quality data or key outcomes.  For example in relation to school outcomes, there was no data in there.  The recommendations and actions were statements of facts, with no outcomes, monitoring or reviewing, such as -  where were you, where are you now and what are you doing going forward.  Self-promotion was not a bad thing but there needed to be a balance going forward.

The Chair understood that this was the first document of its kind and there was work to be done corporately. This was a learning exercise and constructive debate would hopefully improve this going forward.

The Head of People, Policy and Transformation thanked the Chair and mentioned the positive feedback received from trade unions and other interested bodies and that the comments would be captured for Cabinet.

The Strategic Director for Transformation and Corporate reiterated that this was the first year this report was completed with a challenging timescale and thanked the committee for its comments.

Resolved:

The Governance an Audit Committee received an overview the Council’s Corporate

Annual Report 2021/22 and made the following recommendations for improvement to the report.

1.         Committee recommended a review of the format of the report

2.         The report lacked detailed analysis and self-evaluation. Where possible this should be rectified before finalisation. If not, it should be included within the next iteration of this report

3.         Actions should be developed further. Many were statements, not measurable actions

4.         Conclusions needed to be based on an assessment of what had not worked as well as what had worked. There needed to be a balance to the evaluative aspects of the report.

5.         There needed to be a clear link between the Corporate Plan and Well-being Objectives and the outcomes being achieved.