To consider a report by the Programme Director.
Minutes:
The Committee
received a detailed overview of the Local Government Reorganisation Programme
by the Interim Head of Paid Service which included:
·
Phase 1
of the programme to deliver the Shadow Dorset Council was largely complete except
for final consequential orders, disaggregation delivery phase to undertake, and
to appoint the Chief Executive.
·
Phase 2 workstream activity continued with Legal and Democratic on
track; Finance progressing well with the draft budget and work on convergence;
Human Resources moving forward on payroll and on a pan–Dorset basis towards
TUPE with good engagement with Trade Unions; Customer services had started with
a workshop on 13 July 2018; ICT strategy and technical elements progressing
well with domain agreed as dorsetcouncil.gov.uk and a single directory being
compiled; Information Governance working on data compliance and systems access;
Communications and branding resources increased, the SharePoint site and other
communications channels were up and running, and a workshop on visual identity
would be held soon.
·
Phase 3
transformation preparations were underway with a session for members on design
principles held to help draft an operating model for the Council.
The Committee
discussed the highlight report and asked questions about capacity of officers
to meet the challenges of the programme.
It was clarified that efforts were in place to gain additional officer
time from each of the Dorset councils, together with efforts to continue
filling appointments within the programme team.
The Risk Register of
the programme was debated in detail, and requests were made for the content to
be updated including corporate risk register information from sovereign
councils, and that key risks needed to take account of major issues such as
TUPE, judicial reviews and budget. A request was made for regular workshops to
review the risks facing the programme.
It was confirmed that an informal session was planned soon and that the
main areas of concern were captured in the workstreams,
such as Judicial Reviews within the Legal and Democratic Workstream,
or the risk register in a different form of words. A further suggestion was made that asked for
risks to be identified as either ‘legal for day one’ or for ‘programme delivery’. In relation to Information Governance, it was
reported that approx. 20 risks and the associated work to mitigate them had
been identified at a meeting on 16 July 2018 to be added to the risk register.
A further risk
identified was that meetings were being cancelled. It was generally accepted that it was
imperative that meetings continued in order to continue the pace of the
programme.
The introduction of
lead members was raised as an important factor in managing risks and being able
to provide assurance to other members about workstream
activity. Some lead members had already
assumed roles, but it was clarified that the composite list and roles for lead
members were being developed and would be confirmed shortly, with some workstreams having up to three lead members.
A further suggestion
was made to refine the highlight report by introducing a performance direction
of travel indicator to show how performance was changing over time, and for
timescales which would add context the risks and mitigations associated with
actions. It was explained that the
highlight report and risk register would be available in real-time through the
new SharePoint site, and other suggestions would be incorporated.
Decision
1. That the
highlight report be noted.
2. That the highlight report and risk register be developed, as outline in the minute above.
Supporting documents: