None.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillor Marsie Skeete (substituted by Councillor Sally Kenny)

Resolved: The Panel agreed the minutes as a true record of the meeting.

The Chair clarified that the report on the recruitment and retention of BME teachers will now be circulated at the end of January rather than last November as previously planned.

The Chair asked for confirmation that the monitoring of six weekly visits are being undertaken by the Corporate Parenting Board? Yvette Stanley confirmed that a Corporate Parenting meeting had taken place that day and performance had be reported to be 90% in audited cases. There were still issues regarding extracting data from Carefirst so sample audits were also taking place.

The Director of Corporate Services gave an overview of the current budget position.

Councillor Taylor queried in the increase in cost for taxi’s cars and concessionary fares.

The Director of Corporate Services reported that expenses for these services are increasing and London Councils who administer the scheme are conducting a review.

Councillor Holmes asked what strategies are in place to source different funding streams such as European funding, especially as parts of the borough will meet the eligibility criteria. And should this be a future skill set for council officers?

Paul Ballat reported that this issue is going to be the focus of a meeting taking place later this month between the Cabinet Member, council officers and CVS providers in connection with the proposed commissioning savings where the commissioning team will look at how to provide practical assistance to voluntary sector organisations for grant funding. People do need to think about how to grasp future opportunities and this is something for the council to consider.

Councillor Neep asked what we are doing to support families who will lose services under the Transforming Families Programme and will undergo serious change, and what can we learn from the Transforming Families Programme?

Paul Ballat reported that the families who are receiving support will have an exit strategy and will be re-directed to other services if necessary.

Yvette Stanley reported that there is a department overspend of £3 million partly to ensure we maintain safe caseloads in the children’s social care team. Special Educational Needs Transport is a demand led service although there are stringent criteria. Placements for looked after children is also a high spend area. This provides us with additional challenges in delivering the savings which are having to be made from areas which are not overspending.

This means we cannot take on more families with need at the lower levels of our Wellbeing model. We can signpost to the voluntary sector but their resources are diminishing as well. Some families need six months intensive input, working with a high level of need very intensively, if people trickle up we will not be able to absorb them. We will need to use increasingly focussed interventions in the future, using only tried and tested evidenced based interventions.

The Chair thanked officers for their reports and confirmed with the Panel that there was a reluctant acceptance of the need to make the savings.

Youth Service (CSF2014-06)

Yvette Stanley said we spend a third of our budget on youth commissioning in each of the three localities. In 2015/16 we had reviewed one service which provides housing advice, mainly to the over 19s and 74% of the users are not Merton residents. We are exploring if that service could be funded by others. We are trying to create a youth service that is not dependent on local authority funding. A third of the savings for 2015/16 will be achieved through cutting a development fund. 

Councillor Holmes said the volunteering task group sought to develop a  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

Yvette Stanley said it took time to recruit people with the right skills mix given the flexibility required for the role. We are delivering sustained outcomes and have an opportunity to sustain a version of the programme. We are working in partnership with the Transforming Families and Central Social Work Team and between forty and eighty young people are being supported.

Councillor Kenny said it was amazing work which she wished could be extended. She expressed her thanks to the team for all their hard work.

Councillor Maxi Martin encouraged Panel members to meet the Transforming Families Team as they have some good examples of the impact that they work has had for local families.

Councillor Neep said £800 funding per family is quite low and is quite concerned about the shortfall of funding to sustain future outcomes.

Yvette Stanley said the Transforming Family reserve is able to enhance the funding.

RESOLVED

The Panel agreed to note the report and expressed thanks to officers for their work in this area.

Yvette Stanley gave an overview of the report.

Councillor Holmes asked if maintaining three extra government targets will be a burden for officers.

Yvette Stanley said the way to help young people is through education. The three targets will effect change. Accommodation is a critical issue, inappropriate accommodation leads to crime. It is not an extra burden to monitor and it helps the prevention strategy.

RESOLVED

The Panel agreed to note the report.

The Chair thanked officers for their work on free school meals pupil premium and asked if there is an estimate on what still may be achieved.

Paul Ballat said the original under-registration rate was 27% which equated to some 1200 pupils. As a result of the project some 800 additional eligible pupils have been identified. He estimated that between 400-500 eligible pupils remain unidentified and that the project would continue.

Officers were thanked for their work in achieving additional funding and Paul Ballat expressed his appreciation to the Chair for his input.

RESOLVED

The Panel agreed to note the report and expressed thanks to officers for their work in this area.

The Chair thanked officers for their time in meeting with Councillor Linda Taylor and himself to discuss the potential revisions for the basket of indicators and for providing the proposed new set of indicators intended to start from April 2015. He also referred the Panel to the principle in the Update Report by which officers would inform the Panel of any other indicators where performance is causing a concern, as and when this might occur.

RESOLVED

The Panel agreed to note the report and expressed thanks to officers for their work in this area.

The Panel considered a possible review on emotional well-being. It was agreed not to proceed with this idea and to consider a new task group review in the new municipal year.  The Chair thanked Rebecca Redman for her work.

RESOLVED

The Panel agreed to note the report and expressed thanks to officers for their work in this area.

The Panel noted the work programme.

RESOLVED: The Panel agreed to note the report.