Agenda and minutes

To receive any apologies for absence.

None received.

There were no declarations of interest.

Representatives of town or parish councils and members of the public who live, work, or represent an organisation within the Dorset Council area are welcome to submit either 1 question or 1 statement for each meeting.  You are welcome to attend the meeting in person or via MS Teams to read out your question and to receive the response.   If you submit a statement for the committee this will be circulated to all members of the committee in advance of the meeting as a supplement to the agenda and appended to the minutes for the formal record but will not be read out at the meeting.

The first 8 questions and the first 8 statements received from members of the public or organisations for each meeting will be accepted on a first come first served basis in accordance with the deadline set out below.  Further information read Public Participation - Dorset Council

All submissions must be emailed in full to chris.harrod@dorsetcouncil.gov.uk by 8.30am on Wednesday 26 June 2024

When submitting your question or statement please note that: 

• You can submit 1 question or 1 statement.
• a question may include a short pre-amble to set the context.
• It must be a single question and any sub-divided questions will not be permitted.
• Each question will consist of no more than 450 words, and you will be given up to 3 minutes to present your question.
• when submitting a question please indicate who the question is for (e.g., the name of the committee or Portfolio Holder) 
• Include your name, address, and contact details.  Only your name will be published but we may need your other details to contact you about your question or statement in advance of the meeting. 
• questions and statements received in line with the council’s rules for public participation will be published as a supplement to the agenda. 
• all questions, statements and responses will be published in full within the minutes of the meeting.   

No requests for public participation had been received.

To receive questions submitted by councillors.  

Councillors can submit up to two valid questions at each meeting and sub divided questions count towards this total.   Questions and statements received will be published as a supplement to the agenda and all questions, statements and responses will be published in full within the minutes of the meeting. 

The submissions must be emailed in full to chris.harrod@dorsetcouncil.gov.uk  8.30am on Wednesday 26 June 2024.

Dorset Council Constitution – Procedure Rule 13 

No questions had been submitted in advance of the meeting.

To note the Terms of Reference.

The Terms of Reference were noted.

To note the report.

The Interim Corporate Director for Commissioning and Improvement introduced the report which set out the recent commissioning activity.

Officers responded to Members’ comments and requests for clarification, details included:

• The new St Martin’s Extra Care Home in Gillingham was on target to a be opened in September 2024 and would provide 55 units of extra care housing, with Care Dorset as the care provider.
• Referrals into Adult Social Care currently came from all parts of the health and adult social care system and it was essential to have conversations through the Integrated Care Partnership to ensure that the correct professionals were making referrals to re-able somebody before a situation could reach before “crisis point”.
• All referrals went through the access and assessment team where it would be triaged to understand the nature of the request and understand if further intervention was required and it would be this point where the reablement service would be considered as part of the assessment process.
• Officers would welcome feedback on how to improve the referral process to achieve better outcomes.
• The average stay in reablement beds was 6 weeks and settings operated a 1:3 ratio in terms of staffing to support these beds – each support worker supported three people.
• Reablement sought to create a domestic environment to better support the transition back home and in some cases a small domiciliary care package could be offered where appropriate.
• With regard to Sidney Gale House, Care Dorset were working with residents and their families to find suitable alternative accommodation prior to any redevelopment taking place and were having conversations with the Council surrounding this matter, including the proposal for the Council to rebuild it to a modern standard and lease back to Care Dorset, although there were conversations happening to establish alternative methods. An update on this would be provided to a future meeting of the shareholder committee.

NOTED

To note the report.

The Chair of the Independent Board of Directors and Managing Director of Care Dorset introduced the report which gave Members a brief context of the work undertaken since October 2022 and set out the recent activity within the company, including some of the future ambitions.

Officers responded to Members’ comments and requests for clarification, details included:

• There was an ambition to raise rates of pay amongst employees of Care Dorset, but this may come with increased expectations of colleagues, although a balance would be struck. A systems review was taking place at present that would assist Care Dorset in identifying areas for improvement.
• Para 8.6 of the report should have read “5000 care hours”, not “5000 care homes”.
• There was a plan to develop the ‘Care Dorset Academy’, which would allow Care Dorset to grow and develop its own colleagues and provide them with different career progression pathways and make use of the apprenticeship levy to offer a series of qualifications.
• There were improvements still required in some of the day service opportunities, which weren’t regulated, but Care Dorset used the same standard across the board, and this was therefore a desire to make improvements, as opposed to a requirement.
• The process followed in relation to the reablement service involved colleagues working directly with hospitals to identify individuals suitable for the reablement service and were also on the multi-disciplinary team calls that took place to identify individuals ready for discharge. The result of these initiatives had seen improvements in the levels of occupancy.
• The use of agency staff was part of the makeup of social care administration. There was always a desire to keep it as low as possible, due to costs, but sometimes it was unavoidable. There was an agency cap within Care Dorset, which needed to be approved each month by the director of operations or managing director. Usage of agency staff had improved with this model being in place and a tool had been developed for teams to ensure safe staffing levels, similar to that used within the pandemic although it was acknowledged that there was still room for improvement within the service though.
• Care Dorset would work more closely with Dorset Council in the future prior to making what could be perceived as controversial operational decisions.

NOTED

To note the report.

The Chair of the Independent Board of Directors and Managing Director of Care Dorset introduced the report which set out the end of year financial position up to September 2023.

Officers responded to Members’ comments and requests for clarification, details included:

• Within the proposed strategy which would be presented at a future meeting, there would be a series of key performance indicators (KPIs) included as part of this document. In addition to this, the contract with the council would also contain a series of KPIs to measure performance.
• There were two different sources of funding going into the contract for different elements of delivery.

NOTED

To consider the draft Forward Plan.

The forward plan was noted.

To consider any items of business which the Chairman has had prior

notification and considers to be urgent pursuant to section 100B (4) (b)

of the Local Government Act 1972. The reason for the urgency shall be

recorded in the minutes.

There were no urgent items.

To move the exclusion of the press and the public for the following items in view of the likely disclosure of exempt information within meaning of paragraph x of schedule 12 A to the Local Government Act 1972 (as amended)

There was no exempt business.

To confirm the minutes of the previous meeting.

The minutes of the previous meeting were noted.