Agenda item

Kevin Gordon, Assistant Director, Transformational Change, outlined a report setting out the performance for Quarter 3.  The report drew attention to areas of exception including areas where improvement actions were needed for performance to achieve end of year targets.

The Officer highlighted that the completion of staff appraisals remained a significant improvement challenge.  The Committee noted that there had been some improvement with a completion rate of 34.1% in the year to 9^th February, 2010 compared to 27.2% in the year to 31^st December, 2009.  In relation to MyCouncil issues, the average queuing time at MyCouncil it was noted that performance had improved significantly from 50 minutes average waiting time at the end of the financial year August 2009 to 22 minutes at Quarter 3 for the current financial year.  It was also noted that more queries had been resolved directly by Customer Service Advisors at  first point of contact and the average queuing time for benefits enquiries by phone, had exceeded the target time. 

The Officer discussed a number of other indicators including the slight decrease in the number of adult attendances at all local leisure centres and this was attributed to the downturn in the economy.  The Council’s free swimming initiative launched in April 2009 had seen over 25,500 swims being taken up to December 2009 but uptake in the over 60 age group had been low and further marketing would address this.  In relation to initial assessments for children’s social care carried out within 7 working days of referral, the performance for the third quarter remained lower than the agreed target of 80% but it was thought that this target may have been too ambitious in the context of a nationally raised profile and increased awareness of children’s safeguarding issues.  To address this a restructure of the  front and duty services had been carried out to ensure that duty workers taking new referrals and assessments had the capacity  to manage work coming in through the door.  The Committee noted the national indicator for achievement at key stage 4 in English and Maths, where Slough was ranked in the lower quartile nationally for this indicator and ranked 139^th nationally out of 152 local authorities.  The school improvement service would work closely with national strategies to provide challenge and maximise support to targeted schools. 

In the ensuing discussion Members raised a number of comment/questions as follows:-

• In relation to swimming facilities, a Member pointed out that females in some ethnic groups did not wish to attend swimming in public in mixed groups.  The Officer advised that he would report this back to the relevant Officer so that this could be examined further.
• A Member was concerned regarding the number of initial assessments for children’s social care carried out within 7 working days of referral, and he was asked whether this was due to a shortage of staff.  He was also concerned that 25.9% of cases had not been assessed within 7 days as required.  The Officer advised that this could be due to the collection of information from other agencies and suggested that this subject could be scrutinised further at the Children’s Scrutiny Panel.
• In relation to NI 92, narrowing the gap between the lowest achieving 20% in the early years foundation stage profile and the rest, the member was concerned that Slough was ranked 135th nationally out of 152 local authorities and asked the Officer to comment further on this.  The Member was referred to the detail of the initiatives which had been implemented, including that nine schools were now involved in the communication, language and literacy development programme and there was now a parent engagement partnership.  It was recognised that this was a complex area and action was required on a number of levels. 
• A Member returned to the issue of national indicator 59, Initial assessments for children’s social care carried out within 7 working days of referral, and expressed the concern that the data produced for the third quarter 2009 was now five months out of date.  He argued that because this was a red topic these statistics should be provided on a monthly basis so that the Committee could have knowledge of the latest information.  Clearly the information provided was now historic.  The Officer advised that the information should be reported on a monthly basis but reminded the Committee that the last meeting was dedicated to the budget.  He assured the Committee that performance would be considered on every scrutiny agenda and that information on the indicators would be broken down so that it could be understood.

Resolved - That the report be noted.