Issue - meetings

Report of the Director of Performance and Partnerships (PP/24/04), presenting a proposed Productivity Plan for submission to Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, attached.

RESOLVED that the Productivity Plan be approved for submission to the former Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, with the addition wording to articulate SEND challenges, as suggested at the meeting, and be published on the Council’s website.

(Councillors Leaver and Whitton attended in accordance with Standing Order 25(2) and spoke to this item).

The Cabinet considered the Report of the Director of Performance and Partnerships (PP/24/04) which presented a proposed Productivity Plan for submission to Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, circulated prior to the meeting in accordance with regulation 7(4) of the Local Authorities (Executive Arrangements) (Meetings and Access to Information) (England) Regulations 2012.

The Cabinet noted that the Minister for Local Government had written to Local Authority Chief Executives on 16 April 2024 requesting the preparation of a “Productivity Plan” and its submission to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) by 19 July 2024. DLUHC officials had confirmed that that deadline remained in place.

The aim of the Productivity Plans was to set out how they would improve service performance and reduce wasteful expenditure to ensure every area was making best use of taxpayers’ money. DLUHC would establish an expert Panel to advise the Government on financial sustainability who would also review productivity plans and advise Government on best practice. Government would monitor the plans and use them to inform funding settlements in future years.

The purpose was to “set out what you have done in recent years, alongside your current plans, to transform your organisation and services”.

There was no template, but the plans were expected to be three to four pages in length and address the following four themes:

1. How you have transformed the way you design and deliver services to make better use of resources.

2. How you plan to take advantage of technology and make better use of data to improve decision making, service design and use of resources.

3. Your plans to reduce wasteful spend within your organisation and systems.

4. The barriers preventing progress that the Government can help to reduce or remove.

Productivity plans must have Member oversight and endorsement before they were submitted to DLUHC and published on the authority’s website.

The Council’s proposed Productivity Plan was appended to the covering Report and outlined activities to transforming the design and delivery of services to make better use of resources, outlined the Council’s operating principles and the role of the Change, Performance and Improvement Boards.

It highlighted capital expenditure during 2023/24, the prioritisation of Children’s services, progress to date and the Safety Valve agreement with Government. Also, the additional allocation of £12 million extra funding (£10 million capital and £2 million revenue) to invest in the highway network.

The centralisation of some functions (workforce development, recruitment, project management and change/transformation) had streamlined the  workforce and enabled the rationalisation of posts and removal of duplication.

The Plan also outlined how the Council took advantage of technology and made better use of data to improve decision making, service design and use of resources. Other work such as the transformation of the Council’s estate and replacement of its legacy general ledger system, FINEST, and a new single system for integrated adult social care case  ...  view the full minutes text for item 571