 Dawb! Yeah, Loris is our new clerk for the Employment Committee. Okay, morning everyone, members in the room and those joining us online. Welcome to this meeting of South Cambridgeshire District Council's Employment and Staffing Committee. My name is Councillor Henry Batchelor and I'm the chair of this committee. Please, can those present in the council chamber note that everything on your desks, o'r ffordd ychydig i gyd yn ymddiwch, mae'n cychwyn nhw'n gweithio'r dda'r ddechrau i ddweud, mae'r cyfnodau a'r sgwrs iawn yn dda'r ddweud. Rwy'n mynd i'ch gweithio'r dda'r ddweud pan wna'n ddweud y ddweud y cwmru o'i ddweud o'r ddweud. Mae'n ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud, mae'n ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud, Please do not use the chat column for any other purpose other than indicating a wish to speak. Please make sure your device is fully charged and that you switch your microphone off unless invited to do so otherwise. Please ensure you've switched off or silenced any other devices you have so that they do not interrupt proceedings. When you're invited to address the meeting, please make sure your microphone is switched on. When you've finished addressing the meeting, please turn your microphone off. Speak slowly, clearly, and please do not talk over or interrupt anyone. Members in the room, please note if we need to vote on any item we should do so via the microphones. Only those present in the chamber can vote or propose or second recommendations. I can confirm we have a full house, so the meeting's court, so we shall proceed. Also, please feel free to note, as Councillor Howe has already pointed out, that we have a new Democratic Services Officer supporting this committee. Mr Lawrence Damari-Homan. Lawrence, do you want to say a quick hello? Good morning, Chair. Thanks for the welcome. Looking forward to working with you. Thank you very much. Okay, we'll start with the items of business on the agenda members starting with number one, Apologies for Absence. I believe we have none, but Lawrence, if you could confirm. Yeah, I can confirm. No apologies for Absence. Thank you very much. Item two, declarations of interest. Members of any items they wish to declare interests on. I'm not seeing any hands, so if anything becomes apparent to members as we go through the meeting, please do just declare them. Item three, minutes of the previous meeting. Members, we have minutes on pages one, three to three of our agendas. Do any members have any issues of accuracy they wish to raise? No, I see none, so I will sign those as a correct record at the end of the meeting. So we'll now move on to the substantive items on the agenda. Starting with item four, which is an annual item we receive here, which is an update on the pay policy statement. I could ask Mr Jeff Memory, Head of Human Resources, who is joining us online. Jeff, welcome. If you'd like to introduce the report and hold on for any questions, please. Yes, certainly. Thank you, Chair. Good morning, members. As you have said, Chair, this is an annual statutory requirement that we publish our pay policy statement. There have been no significant changes to the statement over the course of the last year, a part of course from the fact that it's been revised to reflect the fact of the pay settlement for this year. Perhaps the biggest thing to note on the statement is that unusually and certainly different to the national situation, the gender pay gap in this authority is actually in favour of females rather than males, which is I think reflective of the fact that we pursue very equal pay arrangements and that we're committed to equality as part of the work that we do in this authority. I'm happy to take any questions that members may have on statement and ask that you recommend it to Council in March. Jeff, thank you very much for that introduction. Members, do we have any questions on the pay policy statement starting at page five on our agendas? Councillor Heather Williams, please. Thank you, Chair, through yourself. It's always been seen as a positive thing that's in favour of females on the pay gap. However, I do wonder whether it would be worth just looking at the numbers underneath that because we have a female chief exec and a female deputy chief exec. It could be that given they are the top jobs at that, she might be obscuring the information slightly so it can overcompensate for other areas. I'm just wondering whether there is potential to just check that and maybe take out senior leadership team having almost to break it down into two areas so that the top jobs, as it were, don't actually blur the picture. Obviously, like you say, I do believe that we're a good on the qualities at the Council as an employer. It's not trying to take away from it, but I do think for clarity we probably should look at the two variations, Chair. Thank you, Jeff. I don't know how easy it is, not maybe immediately or today, but how easy it is to separate the chief exec and the chief operating officer out of the table at point 1.1? Yes, we can certainly look to bring that back to the next meeting of this committee, Chair. Sure, or even email it round off to the meeting once the information has been collated. Certainly. Great. Thank you very much. Councillor Clair Daunton, please. Thank you, Chair. Yes, so my question really is also about this table and it's just to ask, if he has any idea of whether or not we are outliers, whether or not South Wales is outliers, or whether in fact we're part of a trend in equality and female leadership. It certainly seems to be the case that the public sector is more evenly balanced when it comes to female leadership and there are a number of local authorities. I don't remember off the top of my head. I'm afraid, Councillor, exactly how many, but there are a number of authorities where the gender pay gap is in favour of females. I'll have to do a bit more research and gather that information and send it to you outside of the committee if that's okay. Thank you very much, Geoff. Members, any further questions on pay policy? I don't see any. So, we have a recommendation, Members, if there's no more questions, which I can never find in these papers. Someone help me? Page five. Page five, thank you. So, we have a recommendation to consider the updated pay policy, which I believe we've done, and also to recommend the pay policy statement to full council, as Geoff mentioned at the start, which will be the March meeting. Members, I don't think there's any... I haven't heard any dissent to that, but I'll take that decision by affirmation. Agreed. So, that is agreed. Thank you very much. Thank you, Geoff. Okay, we move on to agenda item five, which is an item on the hybrid working policy, which was a supplement to our agenda papers members. Did everyone receive this? Oh, no. Yeah, I have it. It was a supplement to our agendas, which was emailed around by yourself, Lawrence. Yeah, have you not seen it? If you like, we can come back to this item if you need to, because I believe it's on the... Sure. Happy to carry on? Yeah, okay. Okay, members. So, yeah, agenda item five, hybrid working policy. We have... This is a new policy, obviously, to accommodate hybrid working at the council. Geoff, I believe you will be introducing this item as well. Yes, yes indeed. Apologies, members, that the person was due to present isn't able to be here today. And apologies, I'm having some internet issues at home, so I'm sorry if I'm not coming across clearly. No problem. This hybrid working policy is looking to do two things. I think members will be very aware of the fact that because of COVID-19, we've had to already work very differently in the council than we had done previously. And we needed to put something in place that recognised that in a more efficient way, given the fact that it's looking like that's going to be a longer term arrangement than we initially anticipated it to be. But also, we're in a position where adapting to these new working arrangements have proven that actually they can be more efficient and effective for officers when they're working in this more flexible way. Now, what this policy looks to do is to enable us to take the best of the way that we're working at the moment and carry that into the future and combine it with the way that we've worked effectively in the past. So what this isn't doing is looking to continue the current working arrangements where most people are working from home pretty much all of the time. But what it is looking to do is put us in a position where we give teams the flexibility to ensure that we meet the needs of our customers, whether that be members or residents or other members of staff in a way that can maximise the efficiency of the team, use the technology that we've got available to us and also make us an attractive employer so that in those areas where it's sometimes difficult to recruit technical experts such as in, say, planning or environmental health, for example, we can cast our net a little bit wider because people would have to commute less. Enabling people to commute less is also positive in terms of the green agenda. There is no proposal to make any changes that will require changes to people's contracts, but what we are looking to do with this policy is to give teams the flexibility to look at how they can work best. We will continue to provide a full office environment for people who work best by coming into the office, and I know members will be keen to ensure that they've got access to staff on a more regular basis when things settle down, and this policy looks to ensure that that's delivered as well. It's not just about having everybody working from home, it's about making sure that we're able to work from home when needed and that where that can happen, it happens in an efficient and effective way and that people have the equipment that they need to work efficiently. There will always be some roles where working from home or working at a hub or working out on the district just isn't appropriate. There will always be traditional roles where people need to come into the office in the way that they always have been. A particularly good example might be the waste operatives that go around and collect rubbish every day. There's no way that those people can work from home, for example. But what we are trying to do is to allow that flexibility, that means that we can meet our residents, our members and our customers' needs as well as ensuring that we're an attractive employer for staff. I'll be happy to take any questions that members may have. Great. Thank you for that introduction, Geoff. We have a question from Heather Williams for you. Thank you. Through yourself, chair, and maybe more of a comment or food for thought, is that given this is quite a new thing, I would suggest that it's reviewed quickly. Some of our policies don't get reviewed for several years. I'd suggest that, as we're looking at this now, that it should be reviewed in 12 months in our recommendations to Cabinet. That would be my first comment on it and whether that's possible. The other thing that I think we should just be mindful of is that flexibility is great, I think, particularly for what we see. We're breaking about the female positive in local government and a lot of that is to do with childcare arrangements and the flexibility around holidays and things like those. But we do need to be mindful that while we're opening up the office for people to come in, unless they may actually need access to those people that prefer to work at home. I don't know if anybody else has ever looked at Myers Briggs so it's a case of preferencing and how people work best, but I think we ought to be mindful that people that work better at the council would be classed as more extroverted, so like that environment, than somebody that's got introvert preferences, that they have those people available. That's my only concern is it's great to have choice, but are we actually disadvantaging people, and I'm thinking particularly on career progression as well, we know that's an issue that people want to progress their careers and that's one of the reasons why they quite often leave. A lot of that is having that access to people that if they're only coming in one day a week because our policies allow that, then we might actually be, with well meant but triggering ripple consequences, which I think is another reason for reviewing it quickly. Thank you, Chair. Thank you very much. I completely agree on the regular reviewing of the policy and clearly the employment committee can have some input into that as well before Cabinet makes a decision on it, but Jeff, I didn't know if you had any comments on the second part of Councillor Williams' comments there. No, I absolutely agree. One of the ways that we're looking to implement this is through a series of team charters where the teams are looking at how they best deliver for their customers, whether they're internal or external customers and also team members, and I absolutely agree that people will need to be able to have access to other members of the team to support them and help them in decision making. It's an interesting point about extroverts and introverts. I will talk with colleagues in HR as to how we can best ensure that the people are not disadvantaged if they're working either way. One of the things that we're looking at, for example, is to improve the hybrid technology in the meeting rooms here. If you're having a joint meeting where some people are joining remotely, as we're having with this meeting here today, the experience has to be as good for both the person joining remotely as the person in the office, so that neither side is advantaged or disadvantaged. So we're looking at how we do that best. But I certainly agree with the points raised and we'll be having as part of the HR team's implementation of this. We're looking at ways that we can monitor to ensure that actually we give that sort of balance between the different types of people that might be using these arrangements. I think I've covered your question, Councillor Williams, but if there's anything I haven't covered, please don't hesitate to either ask here or contact me outside of the meeting. Thank you, Geoff. Obviously, in what we feed back to Cabinet as well, I'm sure that your comments have been captured there so we can feed that back to Cabinet when they debate this at their next meeting. Who's next? We have Councillor Dawnson, please. Thank you, Chair. It's taking up your last point, Geoff, about technology. So it's really sort of an equality issue, an equality of technology, if you like. So hybrid working really depends a lot on access to technology, access for members of the team, but also access for members and members of the public. So I'd want us to be sure that when we move towards this we are clear that we're doing everything we can to ensure access, equality of access to the technology. So I know, for example, that members of staff communicate a lot through teams, teams' phone calls, as well as teams online in the way that we do. That isn't the case for councillors. We don't have teams calling. And I just also want to be mindful of members of the public that we do need to ensure equality of access in the same way that somebody can walk in here and talk to a person. Geoff, any comments there, or is that? No, I'm happy to make it sort of a linked point. But I am currently in discussions with 3CICT about members' access to teams, because I think that's an excellent point, slightly aside from this discussion. But at the moment, from what I understand, you say members don't have access to teams' calls, members don't have access to shared documents stored on teams, members don't have access to officers' calendars, for example. So we're in discussions at the moment to see how that can be provided. Certainly in terms of members of the public, there's absolutely no intention to take away from members of the public any way of accessing our people. So we'll continue to offer the opportunity for members of the public to come into the office to have face-to-face contact if they want that. We're looking to strengthen their ability to contact us by telephone, as well as allow access through the net and other areas. But there's absolutely no intention to restrict the way that members of the public can contact us as a council. Great. Thank you very much, Jess. We now have a question from the Vice-Chair, Councillor Perthable. Thank you. Apologies for that. Thank you very much for the paper. I'm just skim-reading it now, actually. So many apologies. I've not had the opportunity to read it before now. My question is just around flexible working requests and whether this hybrid working policy would replace the need for flexible working applications. You've mentioned that no terms and conditions are changed as a result of this, but I'd like to just better understand would there still be requirements for people to submit flexible working applications and if so, when might that happen? And my second comment is around whilst we have more and more staff working from home, how we are ensuring as a council that their health and wellbeing is being monitored, I think it's very easy for people's mental health to be affected whilst they're working from home and for potentially that to get missed by line managers. So just wondering again what's happening to support our staff. Yes, certainly. Flexible working is the right to request flexible working to statutory right. Although I suspect that you're correct. The implementation of this policy would significantly limit the number of times when people would have to request that because they've got that almost built into the policy. I've got a couple of HR colleagues with me on the call. I may ask Lindsay Smith to just comment if I've missed anything there, Lindsay. No, just to add to that really, I think in terms of the flexible working requests, that would be whether somebody wants to make a permanent change to their working hours, whether it's the reducing or increasing their hours or their days. That would still be required to apply for that under the flexible working request where the hybrid working policy is more around, as Jeff said, working with the team, doing the team charters to think about how we work as a team and a council to enable us to deliver our services. So there is a bit of a difference still, I would say. If you want me to move on to the other point about the health and wellbeing, I'm happy to answer that one as well. I mean, we're providing training for staff and managers, but I'm happy for you to answer that as well, Lindsay. Yeah, so obviously it's been nearly two years now since we've been working from home throughout the pandemic and the HR team have put on various initiatives to ensure that our staff health and wellbeing is met. As Jess says, we've done training for managers, but we've also done various different sessions for staff, and that is still ongoing as well, and we're not looking to change that in the near future. I don't know if you've got any other questions. No, that's it. Thank you very much, Bauty, for your input there. Councillor Howell, please. Thank you, Chairman. I think this is an excellent start. I think this is really good. This has been forced upon us through obvious reasons, and I think we're going to be playing capture for a little while until we get into it, and that's fine. That's no problems at all. One of the things I saw around here was the security of documentation and how we're looking at that. Again, I think that's very good, but I think this is a golden opportunity not only for us to look at how the officers do security of documentation, but also members as well, because they have also the secure documentation. Admittedly, the officers may have more personal information when they're dealing with housing claim benefits or other things such as that, and the councillors may have more business-related, but they still have security documents that need to be looked at. I'm very pleased with this. I've just looked at it here now, and I think it's very, very good. It's a document we're going to have to keep on expanding and adapting as the situation changes and as we're all learning. Chairman, I think this is excellent, and I think it's the way forward. Thank you very much. I don't know if there's any comments to be made there, unless, Jeffle, Lindsay, you wish to. Not essential. No, okay. Thank you very much. We go to Councillor John Williams, please. Thank you, Chairman. I'm picking up a point that Councillor Dalton made about members' access to IT. Cabinet are aware that members have not kept up with the development of Council Anywhere for Officers, and we intend to put into next year's budget money to fund better support for members with IT developments to enable members to match the level of homeworking by officers. I think hardware is also an issue that this Council needs to look at. The equipment that members have because it's their own personal equipment varies greatly, and to enable members to take part in the Council Anywhere setup, there needs to be a common minimum to the hardware specification, and we are acutely aware that obviously some members may not be able to meet that. I mean, it's interesting that many years ago before people even thought about paperless councils, members were actually given a lot more support than they are now. When I joined this council, I got given a laptop, I got given a printer, and I got given a filing cabinet to ensure that our papers were secure at home. Members don't get any of that now, and Cabinet is acutely aware that we need to start looking at the facilities that we give members to ensure that they have just as much. They have the equipment to do their job, and we intend, as I say, to put some money into next year's budget, and also to appoint a post-eat within Democratic Services to specifically look after members' IT requirements. I think that's erin, isn't it, at the moment? No, just to back that up, when I started in 2014, I was offered an iPad, albeit not particularly compatible with a lot of council work, but we were offered some form of technology, so welcome the improvements, and I hope that's been captured in the comments, Lawrence, that we can then pass back to Cabinet. One more speaker. We have Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you. Joining in 2018, I got offered nothing, but I'm fortunate that through work, obviously we have up-to-date technology and things like that, I'd also say that it's, so I've tried to do the paper free, but one of the biggest problems, although I have the hardware, I take Councillor John Williams' point and I agree with it, particularly if we're talking about equality for members as well, that internet access, the fact that in the Chamber, so I'm very conscious and therefore do have paper copies of confidential information, because when we're in the Council Chamber, because we can't get on to the system and I understand the reasons for that because it's our own equipment, but if we had sort of a councillor network, because otherwise we have to open confidential documents on a public internet, on a public Wi-Fi, and I do have concerns about those security risks, and it's silly sometimes, it's one or two pages, but once it's printed it then has to have a cover note and everything else, and I am very conscious of that, or equally on the, I have an iPad which has roaming on it, not everybody does, and you have to pay for that data, so that's the other thing is I know particularly when we have things like full council, and there's a lot of us in here that demand the public Wi-Fi just doesn't work, and so it can actually be quite costly for the running costs as well and for internet access, so I think that's something, and no other councils, they will have in their council chamber for councillors like a broadband circuit of their own, and I do think that that would be better than us using roaming or public Wi-Fi, particularly on the confidential door documents. Thank you, Chair. No, thank you for that, and I fully support that as someone who's constantly in need of Wi-Fi. I appreciate the need for a good connection and also a secure one to open confidential items, so again, I think that's been captured by Lawrence there, he's going to feed that back to Cabinet. I don't think we have any further speakers or comments on this members, so what we've been asked to do in the recommendations is that we review the proposed new policy, provide feedback which I think we've succinctly done, and then refer to Cabinet for their perusal and then I assume approval. Members, are we all content that we can do that? Agreed, yep. Thank you very much, everybody. So that was item five. We're now moving on to agenda item six, which is the new performance development policy. It starts on page 19 of our agenda's members, and it's the memory, I think back over to you for an introduction, please. Yes indeed, again, apologies. I've had to pick up some of the presentations due to that someone else wasn't able to make it, so I'm sorry you're hearing from me quite so much. This performance development policy is looking to do a number of things. First of all, it's looking to make the policy more accessible because our previous policy didn't meet all of the accessibility guidelines. But probably more importantly, it's looking to make a conversational performance part of the regular day-to-day interaction between managers and their teams. Currently, we have a significant annual meeting with a performance development framework arrangement in place, and we're intending to keep that annual meeting, but to ensure that actually discussions around performance are undertaken in an informal way on a regular basis. So we're looking to ensure we don't get to a situation if at all possible where somebody has suddenly has performance management issues because those potential issues are spotted and headed off at an early stage. I think it's important that our managers work closely with all of their team to get the best out of them. People have already highlighted the fact that we're already operating in a different sort of environment. And if you're not going to be sitting in an office with somebody all day and keeping an eye on them, then making sure you have that relationship where you've got regular conversations going on around what's going on in their work, what's going on in their lives, and what's going on with their performance is important. So this framework looks to put that in place. It continues to allow us to evaluate people's performance and look at how we can meet the needs of those people that are performing well and have got aspiring debt to develop and also ensure that we can recognise those people who may not be looking to progress in the council but continue to provide us with a steady, reliable stream of work that many ways make them effectively the engine room of the council that keep us going forward in a steady and positive way. I'll be happy to try and answer any questions that come up about this policy, but again, I may need the support of Lindsay Smith to deal with some of the more technical questions you might have. Thank you very much, Geoff, and we do have one question straight off the back from Councillor Daunton, please. Sorry, can you hear me? Yes. It's actually a question about the word performance. If somebody is happy in their job and feels comfortable in their job, feels that it's the right job for them, it's not really a matter of performance, is it? It's a matter of enjoying the job and being part of the team. Performance has a sort of... I can't think of the right word, but maybe you know what I'm getting at. It's a sort of scoring. It's got a sort of scoring element to it. So I'm just sort of quite anxious about the whole notion of performance. I wonder if you could comment on that. Yeah, I mean, I understand what you're saying, and it's absolutely funny. If you've got somebody that is happy in their job, committed to doing a good job, and it's actually... That's really positive, but they do need to be... We're paying the money. We're managing the public's money here. We do need to ensure that we're delivering value for money for our residents. So they do need to meet a particular standard. I absolutely agree that it doesn't mean that somebody is necessarily wanting to progress, move on to a different job, or anything like that. And it's very valuable to have those steady, reliable people who come in, who do a good job day in, day out. But we do have to ensure that they continue to do a good job. I mean, there have been examples of people who may have been in a job for some time and be performing well, and then their performance might dip for a reason. And that might be because of changes at work or changes in the home life, for example. And being able to keep track of that and identify that there has been a dip and perhaps have those conversations with those people to see how we can support them through what difficult time they might be going through is quite important. So although I agree, this is not about saying where you did 10 last week, so we expect you to do 12 next week. And if they're doing 10 and they're doing it regularly and they're doing it to a good standard, then that's absolutely fine. But we do need to make sure that things are working well and that they're continuing to be able to deliver for residents. I don't know if Lindsay's got anything to add to that. You're muted, Lindsay. I just realised I should have learned by now. Not really, Jeff, to be honest. I mean, I just think one of the things that we have done is we're talking about development rather than management. So in the policy itself, the intention is that it is a positive. It's not that people feel that their performance is being managed. It's that there are opportunities for people that want to develop. But as Jeff says, even those who don't want the career progression, we want to ensure that they're still doing what we need them to do and doing it well on a day-to-day basis, on an ongoing basis. OK, thank you. We have a question from Councillor Persil. Thank you. It's really great actually to see this policy and procedure and to see it written using such positive language and really positive intent. And I really like the fact that you're encouraging continuous performance assessment rather than, which is often the case just once a year as part of the annual performance review. So I really like that. A couple of things that I wanted to ask you about. The first is that this is largely about giving line managers the scope for providing feedback to employees. I wondered if you'd considered as part of the policy seeking feedback from wider sources, so other colleagues and peers as well. It's not just line managers who are able to make an assessment on performance. And in fact, sometimes line managers aren't close enough to the work in the detail to give that in-depth feedback. The other question was around the behavioural assessment. I wasn't clear. I made reference to the fact that behaviours are also considered as part of the reviews, but it's not clear exactly how. We know that it's not just important that people achieve and they reach outcomes, but it's equally important that it's done with the right attitude and the right behaviours. So I wasn't clear about how the behavioural assessment forms part of that review. And then the final comment was just around, I can see that there's lots of opportunity for managers to give feedback to their employees. Is there also the opportunity for employees to provide feedback to their line managers? But I'm very supportive of the policy. I think it's really positively worded. Didn't see you able to answer those? Yeah, so the behaviour, so the council we've got our behaviour framework and we would be looking when we have the conversations with our employees. How they're performing would be aligned to the council's behaviours really. Sorry, I haven't had time to have sight of this policy before the meeting today. So what I'm not sure is if it includes the behaviours framework that's in there, but there certainly is a behaviours framework that we would be looking to. As part of the conversations, that's what we would be expecting. In terms of the opportunity for the employee to provide feedback, again, I believe there is a performance conversation template that we would be expecting the manager to use when they're having the conversations with their employees. And in that, there would be an opportunity for the employee to provide feedback as well. So we do see it as a two-way conversation, not just the line manager giving feedback to the employee. I think that the point you're making, Councillor, about the potential for 360-degree feedback is an important one. So I'll discuss that with colleagues about how we can look to ensure that that's part of the process, because I absolutely agree that actually colleagues and people working in their departments or customers will have a view on how things are delivered. Also about the behaviours framework. We're working hard to produce effectively behaviours on a page for members of staff, which not only explain behaviours, but give some examples of good behaviours and not only does it cover the behaviours we can expect from all of our colleagues, but part of that includes the way that we use our behaviours and the way that we lead as managers. So it will include that as a manager, that the manager will be supportive. And when it comes to having the discussions with the line managers, obviously people like myself will be talking to them about ensuring that they're supporting their staff in the appropriate way, because that's part of what their job is to deliver. Thank you for taking the time to explain that. I'm still a little unsure about, and it would be really helpful if perhaps for the next meeting we could just have some clarification on how the behavioural framework is used as part of the performance apprais or just performance conversations. It's sort of referenced in here, and it's mentioned, which is wonderful, but it's just not clear about how that's actually applied and assessed. Certainly we'll bring that to the next meeting with the chair's submission. Thank you very much. I have Councillor Heather Williams, please. Thank you, chair. I think it's good to have this document, and I think because it is, as has been said, taxpayer's money, and we have to ensure that there's value for money. But I think it does need to come alongside other things. So the performance is important, but we also want quality as well as quantity. It can't be either or it has to be a balance of both. But also the way that this information is used is very important, not just for the individuals, but if you, for example, have a team, you've got different teams in the council, not I don't mean the software, I mean actual physical people, and how actually performance gets treated, whether it's seen as a stick to, you know, encourage people thoughtfully, you must get your performance up, or this, that and the other, because of X, you know, or actually do we notify or notice as an issue and support them to improve. But equally, that people don't actually feel punished because of their performance, so they've got really good, the team's done really well. So what we're going to do is give you a load more work, and we're going to take a couple of people at your team because you're doing so well. You don't need those people, but we're going to give you this work as well. I've seen, you know, not saying here, but in work-based places, both of those things use the actually, we can have all these documents in the world, but we won't get good performance if people feel they're either going to be punished for it, or they're going to work and do not good quality of work because they're worried about these documents. So very good that it's in place and it's an important document for value for money and supportive of it, but if we can make sure that how it's communicated is really important, so I think, and we can talk about that probably later on about communications. With a document like this, it has to be communicated properly what the intention of it is and that people can work without fear of consequence in either direction. Thank you, chair. Thank you for that, and I can hear Lauren's beavering away writing some notes, but we can pass those comments on when we come to the end of this item. Councillor Hart, please. Thank you, chair. I've just got a couple of questions and I hope they're okay questions to ask. I agree, I think this policy, certainly in light of we're talking about people working perhaps more remotely, encouraging conversations, informal conversations can be a really good way of just acknowledging people exist because they're doing a good job and recognising that, so I value that. Thank you. Is it okay if I just go through a couple of paragraphs where I keep reading lines and I think I don't understand, so is that okay if I recognize them as we go through? Apologies if I'm just reading them a different way to other people. On page 25 of our PAC, which is page two of the 11-page document, under item one, second paragraph down, aim of the procedure. The final sentence says, the procedure is aimed at providing a framework for conversations, however, aims to accommodate flexibility and approach. I keep reading that and I'm not sure I understand. I think I understand what it means is that it's going to be flexible so I'm just wondering if the wording there just needs to be slightly different than however, I'm not sure and I don't know if I'm being pedantic but there'll be a framework but there's going to be flexibility in the way that framework is delivered. Is that what that means? Any clarity from Jeff Orling? Yeah, I mean the intention there is to recognize that different people in different roles probably need to have slightly tailored conversations so that if you're talking to somebody who's in a managerial role, the nature of the conversation you will have with them as their line manager will be slightly different to the conversation you might have with somebody who's doing a job, for example, is a benefit processor who's processing work. Some type of work, for example, you would probably see regular the turnaround times might be days or weeks so you would talk about a change that you want to make and you would expect to see that change delivered sort of a week or a couple of weeks whereas if somebody's working on a project, for example, you might talk with that person about the change that they need to make and you'd expect to see the results of that change in a month or two rather than a week or two. So rather than setting a rigid framework where you have this conversation then and then you go and have a conversation in two weeks time and then you do that, it's to say to them that you've got to recognize that the nature of the work that they're doing might be different and to tailor those conversations around what the work that they're doing and the changes that you need them to make. It's just trying to get away from sort of a tick box situation where people are almost going through I've got to do that and I've got to do that and it doesn't always make full sense so it's to try and give them that flexibility. Thank you, thank you. I imagine there'll be lots more feedback in terms of wording and the paper Councillor Heather Williams said about communication it's key, isn't it? What is written is perceived and the shared meaning in that. Is that okay if I go on to another one? For you. I think it's just a paragraph that needs to be shifted up. It's on page 5 of the document and it's under managers preparing for the annual performance development conversation. The final paragraph there says if you have identified any potential development opportunities you may also want to discuss these with your manager. I think that needs to be in the bit that comes under employees preparing for the annual performance development conversation. Is that fair to say, Geoff? Yes, it certainly looks like that. We'll get that changed, my apologies for that. Thank you, thank you. I think there was just one other one or maybe two more, apologies. Page 8 of 11 the document, the final paragraph there says how we do things now forms part of an employees performance and where they are placed on the nine box performance grid. I didn't understand what that meant. Geoff or Lindsay, I'd imagine it's the referring to point 6 in the report which is the previous pages. Yes, my apologies, Geoff, taking me a little time. Like Lindsay, neither of us are the authors of the report so we're having to we only knew this morning that we were covering so having to go back through. Yes. The wording could certainly be improved. I'll have a word with the report's author and see if we can perhaps clarify that. I'm not a hundred, I think you're probably right, Chair, but I can't be 100% certain without double checking that. Maybe when we come to the recommendation, obviously we've had lots of comments from members today if those can be encapsulated and sent forward to officers before the policy is signed off, I think that would be useful. Of course. Councillor Hart, one more. I'll just do the last one then and I do thank you. I'm mindful to say you are here representing this and may not know the document as well as other people so I apologise but I just thought I would feel more comfortable if I've asked the questions. So it's page 9 of 11 and it's the one to the fourth paragraph now. The informal performance development conversations are equally as important as our new ways of working means we need to be flexible about how we manage performance and again it just didn't I couldn't really make sense of it. Sorry, we'll get that tidied up as well. Thank you. Councillor. Thank you very much. I think that's just a grammatical one. Thank you very much and thank you to Councillor Hart for her diligent proof reading. We have Councillor Dawnton, please. Thank you. It's probably a question for both of you. We've got two really interesting good new policies here. I just wanted to ask a little about the implementation of them, the training for the people who will be implementing them if you could just talk to us about that management training. Yes, certainly. What we're looking to do is have a effectively a year-long modular training course for our members where, sorry, officers my apologies, members where once a month they'll be given half-day sessions on relevant topics and then they'll be given the opportunity to put what they've learnt into practice. We're looking to cooperate with our colleagues in other local authorities nearby to share the costs of this service and we've already had discussions with a local provider. There'll be some compulsory elements to the training but there'll also be some flexible elements where managers can choose between a couple of options so that they can, based upon the conversations that they've had with their line managers about what their needs for development are they can ensure that they're choosing modules that development need. So we're putting quite a lot of time and effort because as you rightly say, there's a number of new policies coming to light and we recognise that all of our line managers are going to need the skills to implement that so what we're looking to do is to give them a set of tools that allow them to implement these things well and properly and as has been mentioned how we communicate this to all of our line managers to enable them to implement it properly is important so by having this modular training course we're looking to ensure that we both communicate it well and give them the tools to deliver the new policies with their teams. Anything you want to add to that, Lindsay? Just to add that we do do annual training for our managers and employees actually on the performance development review and that forms part of the annual training programme and it'll fit with what Jeff just said about the modular training for our managers. Thank you. Thank you very much. I don't think we have any further questions on the policy so the recommendation we actually have in the paper is slightly misworded as it makes it sound like we as the committee are asking to implement this new policy whereas obviously it will be officers that implement the new policy so members I think what the actual recommendation should read is that the committee is invited to recommend that officers implement the new updated policy pending union feedback and also incorporating the comments and suggestions that we've given today. So if everyone's in agreement with that approach can I have some grumble of affirmation? Agreed. Thank you very much everyone thank you Lindsay and Jeff for your input and comments on that. We now move on to our regular items which are quarterly updates on retention and turnover and sickness absence from the last quarter. So I think we have Donia Taylor on the line. Donia good morning. Hi there and I believe you're presenting both of these reports to us. Yes I am I think the turnover one is the first one in your agenda pack is that correct? Yes it is agenda item seven members on page 35 of our agendas so we have the information in front of us Donia so whenever you're ready please. Okay so the turnover for quarter two was very low and on page 36 we've got the graph which shows turnover since the beginning of quarter one, 2020 to 2021. Now for quarter two that we only had 16 levers across the organisation which is very low having already run the data for quarter three so kind of like an advanced warning I guess of what's to come the turnover for quarter three is a lot higher so it appears we can see that we're getting a bit of a zigzag over the past kind of six quarters going up and down. In terms of turnover there's a lot in the press around 2022 about being the year of the great resignation I don't know if any of you have been aware in the press and obviously we want to manage turnover as best we can we obviously turn over as natural and we are going to get some levers but we obviously don't want it to be so high that it then becomes an issue from a retention point of view looking then to just specifically at quarter two I'm not going to kind of read every single line in the report I guess I'm just going to pick out a couple of headline information obviously using the exit information to exit interviews to gain feedback from staff we had last year we had implemented a change taking it from the line manager doing the exit interviews from that being HR that started to increase the amount of exit interviews we were getting although it was still below 50% we have been holding online via teams calls with levers as they happen and over quarter two and then we have had more responses from exit interviews as a result so in point 10 we have a return rate of 83.3% compared to 44% in quarter one so you can see that's had a dramatic effect and then the feedback that we get we can then obviously work with line managers to put any changes into place looking at recruitment stats recruitment has been busy over quarter two in this report we have included more information around we have got more information around the golden hello payments and also around point 16 the number of temporary workers in each department and the wider context so the biggest highlights for me really when completing this report going through to the conclusion then we I guess the question is you know we have tried to include as much information that we can gain off our new i-trend HR system which means that the graphs that we have given look a little bit different to what we were doing previously when it was on our old system and we're trying to make things as automatic as possible because that means there's less room for error so I guess my question to yourselves and the committee is are you kind of happy with the documents that we've provided in relation to the turnover report this quarter and or if there's any particular more details that you want you'll have a couple of figures that Jonathan wanted me to bring forward which were asked at the last quarters report so I'm just going to I've just got that information up on my screen so we have included so Heather Williams had a couple of requests on the quarter one report so we have included the percentage of levers in each of the service areas for the quarter and we have looked at that as a breakdown and that is on the appendices graphs and we have also included the information around agency workers and then there was another request from councillor Jonathan wanted to know about the contact centre record of supported career progression so in relation to that point we in 2020 and 2021 moved from the contact centre and one move into the contact centre to prevent a redundancy so just in relation to those points from quarter one so that's the end of my presentation on this figure great thank you very much we do have a couple of questions but members if we could be thinking if there's anything additional we'd like to see from HR in these reports moving forward I think Don you would appreciate that feedback so we can get full the full picture as we need sorry just a quick one for me actually looking at chart six on page 45 I don't see any numbers associated to that particular pie chart regarding the question about whether you work for SDC again so I see the percent or the slice of the pie that says no it's quite small but I don't know what that means in terms of numbers so having things number would be handy I'll get that changed okay thank you questions councillor Hal first please thank you chairman I'm looking on page 43 chart one and we have there the target PI with regards to actual levers and one thing or another and the rolling average is below the target PI now is that good or is that bad I mean I remember being told once that it's healthy to have a good turn over to staff and one thing or another but I mean you know equally if people are very happy they'd want to stay and they don't want to go so how do we really look at those numbers there if you don't mind please on the top chart I'm really looking at target there and rolling average so the rolling average basically allows allows us to kind of look at the look at the look at the 12 months kind of going on average so what that means is that whereas if you look at chart two we've got the spikes in the graph where things are going up and down for every single quarter the rolling average kind of makes it an average so you can kind of see what the 12 month period is quarter two the turn over was exceptionally low I mean it was really exceptionally low only 16 levers and I did have to when I first got the report I did have to recheck the figures a couple of times to make sure we weren't missing anything and we obviously weren't but you know I think there's got to be that balance between a healthy turnover and you know the other thing to think about is we're looking at voluntary levers so it was 12 voluntary levers and then we had four four levers that were in voluntary again in quarter three we haven't had many or I think any dismissals so looking at thinking about involuntary levers obviously that's something that we don't have control over if someone's dismissed obviously you know we obviously want to ensure people are following processes and if they don't for whatever reason then obviously we have that within our policy so I think quarter two is low you know like I said quarter three it then does spike up again so I think on the face of it it is good that we don't have that many levers but obviously we've got things that we can be working on and obviously in relation to the policies that have already been discussed today that will help in terms of think you know encouraging and empowering employees and managers and therefore encouraging retention in that way yeah no thank you thank you for that now I think it's a bit of a double-edged sword this one is here we want a turnover of staff yet we don't want to have any I also think that the policies that you've just put in are going to hopefully make staff we want to remain more so that target you have might have to be looked at again because I don't think it's something we you know we are very good employers which I think we are then people are not going to want to leave they're going to want to stay here but at the same time you know it's the way things are and I'm going to go if you don't mind chairman just very quickly on to chart five here with regards to the rating of them SCDC and poor again we score exceptionally good there we got one thing there which is regards to opportunities for personal professional growth which two people two people said that we're not very good at out of all the people so you know out of 20% maybe if you want to look at it so I think it's very good and I think them numbers maybe have to be revised chairman if we're going to be especially with where things are in the future thank you thank you councillor councillor Heather Williams please thank you chair just first on I'll stick with chart five and I take the points what you're saying about the poor and we're looking at a very small sample here but I'm just linking it back to what we were discussing earlier just looking at the communications obviously we want more to be good rather than just you know not poor even improving the average scores and given the other documents that are coming round I think we should note that that the communications most people haven't said that that's good and the management working relationships is quite low just with what is coming through and the different policies and everything that so I think that's something that should be noted by those that have the ability to look at that and change that the other thing I was looking at is page 46 charts 8 to 11 just looking at the grid is the fill rate it's 55% for the quarter 2, 21, 22 if there's a reason for that because that seems quite a significant drop to the other figures so that's one question on the acting up as well to make sure at times you've had quite high numbers of people acting up which is great and acting up can normally be your first step to getting promotional that career progression but making sure that people are being supported when acting up and that we are reflecting their extra responsibilities and their pay so we can have some assurances there for those people that are currently acting up and you referred to my request last time which was about having agencies as a percentage of the workforce in each department could you refer to me in the document where about that is because that's something that I've felt that I have looked for and quite possibly have overlooked but if you could refer to that because you mentioned that being looked at because last time we had a grid with the number I'm just wondering if I hadn't included it into the response bear with me that's it thank you chair whilst you're looking for that Donia Willem Barth the next speaker if that's okay I couldn't see that grid in the appendix either so I think maybe it's been omitted or in the while that's been looked for councillor Hart thank you chair and I really value this information and I just really want to acknowledge it must be such a tricky time for employees employers and I think people are really viewing them as it talks about a sort of work life balance and I wonder if 2022 is the year of resignation because people are thinking it's more of a life work balance really so yeah lots of questions I just wanted to go back to the pie chart that chair mentioned on chart 6 on page 45 and again the numbers there would be useful but I wondered there were two dismissals due to due to conduct and so part of me thought are they the people that said they wouldn't work for SCDC again or are they are so I'm interested to how those people are they asked to rate does that fit into that feedback because it's a question really what happens Donia not sure if you can answer so I can answer that one and then I'll go back to Heather's questions unless you've got any more Sally so in terms of someone that is dismissed that is conduct for example that is classed as an involuntary leaver and we would not do an exit interview with them and therefore we would not be capturing that information so you can be assured that the information we've got on the exit interview is not someone that's like I said been dismissed and they're not happy and they're saying everything is poor and that kind of skews our figures so that's the answer to that one Thank you and the question from Councillor Williams regarding the chart for agency I'll have to go back in and check where I've put that I can't see it looking at what I've sent across so I'll note that down to kind of then share that information I really am sorry I thought I had included it in the document so I apologise if I can go back to her comments on acting up and answer those questions is that okay? Yes please So acting up in terms of how we're supporting them obviously Jeff's outlined today in terms of the manager training programme going forward what we have done over the last 12 months is HR run some internal new manager training sessions that both new managers and existing managers can attend and people that have been acting up we have encouraged them to attend those as well in terms of pay if they are acting up and they are recorded in this way so i.e. we are reported on that data that means that we do have the we've received documentation in HR which means they are acting up into the next grade or whichever grade however many grades higher they're going so they are being compensated fairly in relation to that and then in terms of the fill rate so looking at the particular figure let me scroll back up so it was a significant amount of roles advertised in quarter two compared to previous quarters so 56 roles advertised were the highest when looking at over the previous six quarters and obviously quarter four was the nearest one in terms of 54 roles advertised and 40 were filled so that was a 74% rate so it's been 55% for quarter two there has been work done so particularly in relation to vacancies at the depot so refuse loaders and refuse drivers we almost have a continuous vacancy and recruitment drive going on and there was work done in terms of looking at retention to those at the depot so going forward I think that will help encourage lower turnover at the depot and potentially then have a positive impact from a fill rate and from a turnover point of view. Great thank you very much for that we have two more speakers and then councillor Dawson Thank you chair I'd like to take us to the report and the conclusions in the report and in particular paragraph 34 on page 40 where we talk about flexible working policies I'd also like us to make reference to the positive policies that we have to recruit those with disabilities and those from ethnic minorities as well as flexible working because clearly hopefully those policies are also helping our equipment efforts Thanks Thank you I'm sure it's been noted Donya if we can include that information Thank you Finally councillor Dawson Thank you Thank you Donya for taking up my point about the contact centre You mentioned earlier the issue of the great resignation as it's called in press reports I've read two press reports using the same phrase and so the point in paragraph 31 on page 40 I think is really important in that context the number of staff who transferred internally to new roles was the highest in over 12 months because I thought in the context of the great resignation it's really important that we keep hold of the staff that we've got and give them opportunities for internal transfer so I just wondered is there some work going on in that area Donya Sorry I thought I was on mute then There's kind of general work in terms of we communicate the recruitment team sorry the recruitment team they communicate on a weekly basis the vacancies that we have across southcams to all staff and all staff email and obviously the different things that we have in relation to the already existing acting up options they're kind of like pre-existing ongoing I can say you've just put your camera on so I don't know if you want to add anything to that The only other thing I was going to add Donya is where we feel or where a manager feels that there is a sufficient pool to fill the vacancy internally there are some vacancies that are only advertised internally we don't always go external with every vacancy so that can give an opportunity for staff to have an internal transfer Thank you when somebody indicates that they're going to leave when the exit interview is it always asked of them had you thought of moving into a different job within the organisation That specific question isn't in the exit interview so specifically asking that the questions do include would you consider working for SCDC again but we don't ask that particular one Thank you very much everyone I think that's brought us to the end of speakers on that particular report we've just been asked to note and comment which I think we've done so with that we'll move on to the next report on sickness and absence which is agenda item 8 on page 49 and Donia back over to you So again so with this report this is the second quarter where we've been using the itrent data in this way which means in a similar way that I asked for the turnover point of view what we are giving you is the overview package I guess of all the data which is why some of the charts look a little bit different but if there is any more detail that you want we can look at that the sickness so the sickness four quarter two had reduced slightly compared to quarter one so sick days per full time equivalent so our BVPI figure 0.7 on page 50 on the document is 1.82 days which is a decrease from 2.03 days for the previous quarter and is also a decrease compared to quarter two 2020 to 2021 so there has been though a significant increase in MSK infections, COVID-19 and other so for quarter one particularly thinking about COVID-19 and infections that number was particularly low but that has increased slightly in quarter two and then again in quarter three that's just completed now and in terms of the fact that we have had increased infections it's just the fact that people were out and about more than when we were in lockdown the previous year so it's natural that we are going to start to get some absence in relation to that all so looking at working days lost so days lost working cost 0.12 also service areas increased with the exception of shared waste environment which saw a reduction so they had a number of long-term absences in quarter one where the employees returned in quarter two and that's what contributed to that figure in terms of stress, depression and mental health that the absences increased slightly in quarter two now the work that we do in the HR team whenever we get a notification so as soon as someone goes off sick if someone is off sick for stress or depression we automatically allocate a HR advisor to that individual and what that means basically is whereas potentially in the past when we've managed absence cases we we would be managing them historically so when we run absence triggers so that they might be kind of like a month behind when things actually happen with our new reporting tools so with iTrend we receive notifications as soon as the manager includes that absence which means we can respond and react like immediately so if someone does go off with stress or depression what that means is the HR advisor would get in touch with the manager we would try and understand if it was personal of work related and what we can do and try and put support in place kind of from the get go so from the start of that absence so whether that's in relation to we would always offer counselling and the two different counselling services we have if it's in work related stress we would be thinking about stress identification tool we would be checking with the manager from the GP and the local mental health team if appropriate and then we would be looking to facilitate a return to work as appropriate and as needed some stress and depression cases can be quite short term there might be only one week or two weeks or some that might be longer but we think by having the earlier intervention from HR and providing that consistent approach across absences that will have a positive impact on the individuals concerned although I appreciate that there might still be off absent from work it might be a shorter absence than if we had got involved later period so that was my point that I wanted to make in relation to stress and depression we've obviously got on page 18 we've got the graph in relation to MSK back and neck pain absences and then 19 COVID-19 absences so this is the number of days absence so this is still relatively small when you think about it absences for the whole quarter for COVID we're looking at I think I'm trying to do the maths off of my head 15 55 63 I think about 67 days when you think about it it's really a relatively small amount compared to other absence reasons across the quarter so that's just a point to know obviously a lot of us are working from home and so for the people that are working from home that are normally asymptomatic but there could be symptomatic with relatively few symptoms if they're able to continue working then they're not recorded as having a COVID-19 absence because obviously they're not absent from work so this figure doesn't include that information so yeah they were my points to note on COVID we've included a lot of information about the training that we offered and then the final points around so point 25 in terms of thinking about musculoskeletal absences and the DSE assessments so we have had 377 employees of approximately it will be in the 500s of people that will be eligible for that have completed the DSE assessment now I know the corporate health and safety advisor is back and looking at that and looking at how we can increase that figure over the next couple of quarters so we should see an increase in that in quarter quarter three and quarter four and then the information in terms of from VIVA from point 26 these are very specific stats around who's accessed the CBT resources calls made to help line and also calls accessing counselling and video counselling so hopefully by including that information at that level of detail that we might not have included on previous quarters hopefully that gives you a bigger picture about things and a bigger picture and a little bit more detail and hopefully you find that useful so that's me summarising the report there Superb, very detailed introduction I really appreciate the effort that goes into these reports I've got one question so far which is from counsellor Heather Williams Thank you chair, it's page 52 one of the first things I thought was a lot of the COVID-19 absences were in housing whether there's more we can do to help those those officers in housing there's a particular reason for that because it doesn't seem to be the biggest way Robert I was also wondering whether so COVID-19 absences and then when you read on it says about 73 days were lost but it's isolation or asymptomatic in my mind they are still COVID related absences it is the impact of COVID because people are still being paid for that period and everything else so I'm wondering whether it's wrong to actually we don't get the true picture I think if it's COVID related while people are absent for work because they've got it they're isolating or anything else it is a COVID related absence and therefore should fall in that category for me personally I think if you want to separate the infection rates of people that are actually infected then that should be COVID-19 cases that are absent rather than absences in relation to COVID but I would personally be interested in both particularly when we are looking at the cost to the council and if we do end up trying to claim it anyway it would be useful to have that information I also noticed about close contacts of people not being vaccinated obviously vaccines is a personal choice but are we ensuring that we're making sure vaccines are available to people so if there's anybody in that category that wants to be vaccinated but for one reason or another is having difficulty in accessing vaccine what are we doing to make sure it's available to them if that's time of work or whatever it may be so that's it from me thank you chair a few questions there Donya I think the first one was around why so many absences in housing and as a follow up is there anything we can do to help reduce that number and then I think there was a request to include the days lost at the depot due to isolation I think in the future numbers albeit it doesn't count as a sick day and then a question around the vaccines as well please okay so the first one housing so the people that were off sick a couple of them I did look at the detail and a couple of them were frontline workers and so therefore by the very nature of so for example there might have been cleaners or sheltered state officers so they will be going in going to more properties and therefore potentially be more at risk of catching COVID versus someone that is a home worker and therefore the only risk that a home worker may have would be from a personal life point of view as opposed to from a working condition point of view so your question in terms of what we can do to help I can speak to our colleagues in housing speaking to managers and seeing what we can do to address that figure so I'll just write down to do that and then in relation to the isolation and asymptomatic so I completely understand and take your point in terms of knowing the figures and we've obviously included that in the report in terms of the number of days lost at the depot so the 73 days lost in total the graph on chart 19 relates to sickness absences and the 73 days so it's a technicality so the 73 days lost that these people are not recorded as sick absence they're just recorded in their normal later hours and therefore we are losing the productivity but it's not a sickness absence we could we could include so we could have as a first graph total COVID I'm trying to think of the right words total COVID I suppose it would be still days lost it just wouldn't be absences because you would be looking at both absences and like I said productive days so we could include a total figure from that point of view and then separate it into sickness absence and isolation like we've had if that would be useful to the community I think that would be handy just to have two graphs just so we as a committee can get a full picture of the days whether they're official recorded sicknesses or not we are losing to COVID so I think that was one of the reasons we wanted to include the COVID stats separately when when we first hit the pandemic so if that could be included in the next report that would be useful as Donya got off in a half no you're back Donya we got you okay have you got me yeah can you hear me okay I haven't gone off in a half so the only thing that I would say obviously is that we well it's just to note that people that are working yeah obviously ignore my point I was just trying to get my head in a bit of a model that no ignore my point yes I'll do a total graph that's not a problem that's fine thank you that's great thank you very much Donya final point around people not vaccinating how we can support them I will have a chat with Lindsay and because these points relate to people at the depot specifically and see what we can do to take that one forward great thank you very much Donya and councillor Howell please thank you chairman to possibly quick questions or to lengthy questions I'll ask my first question do we keep a record of which staff have not been vaccinated okay so I'll finish writing down that point in terms of specific individuals so in relation to the depot they know the information so that we know when it comes to isolation if if people are able to continue to work if they're tested negative or if they need to fully isolate what we don't do is we don't have a list of every employee across the council on their vaccination status we just have the information and at the depot in relation to their employees we're actually allowed to ask that if people have been vaccinated I don't know it's a GDPR question are we allowed to ask people if they have been or not I think we can in this relation in terms of to assess whether or not they need to isolate or whether or not they are able to return to work the employee can choose to not give us that information that is still a choice we don't it's not like you know definitive but yeah Chairman then my second question is maybe I should be asking councillor John Williams this or forgive me but I'll ask it in general terms are we going to look at any are we having any discussions or are we looking at any plans to with regards to people being paid for going off sick or not chosen for whatever reason not to be vaccinated as to those who have been vaccinated as other companies are now doing I'm going to ask Lindsay if she can come in on that point because I know there was some communication previously I'll change my question slightly then Lindsay can I ask councillor John Williams if any discussions are currently taking place I think I'd be better if you come from John yeah thank you chair as far as cabinet is concerned no thank you Chairman I don't need to know any more to this point thank you okay thank you very much sorry councillor Heather Williams yes you wanted to come in yeah I just wanted to be clear as well when I asked about the vaccination it was about councill workers in general whether they work at the depot I don't want us to get into a situation where we're singling out the depot here it's just about making sure that we are being you know as helpful as it is possible for people to get vaccines because for example some people might need time of work particularly if you're a single parent you're not going to be able to do it outside school hours or things like that so it's more about how we're being as an employer and encouraging and making sure it's accessible or having a you know vaccination day at the council or whatever it might focus things like the flu vaccine we as a council I did get after the I don't know if you got yours Henry but after this meeting I was able to have my flu shower which was very helpful and but yeah so the council as an employer could be a way of making it more accessible to people as well so it's but that I think just want to make it clear that's across the council and not singling depot out bless them sure that's fine I think that's been noted but unless you wanted to comment on that Dunia briefly yeah just to add you know I know that from experience of speaking to other colleagues in different areas you can use your flexi to get time off to have the appointment and certainly that's what the majority of people seem to do so the option is there and from a communication point of view on our staff page where we're talking about Covid guidance we are really clear in terms of the information about the vaccination program and supporting employees in that way and we haven't got any I don't think Heels are looking at doing any specific days in relation to Covid-19 vaccinations because they've obviously been delivered to the NHS I know there's work being done around flu vaccination clinics for later on this year like we've done last year it's just on the way our flexi pay scheme works as well as it's sort of capped you can only roll so much over and I know some people quite reliant on that and just for other reasons so I appreciate that might be something that's used but now we're at the point where people that can use that facility have maybe this might be more of a cabinet thing if we could look at saying that you will still be paid even if you have to take an hour off to have a vaccine rather than having to ask them to forfeit a privilege or forfeit wages for that because not everybody will get flexi pay or be able to build that up or we'll have to use it for other reasons so just a suggestion there or maybe asking people that are happy to say they're unvaccinated whether it is access or personal choice because obviously people have that choice absolutely thank you I think that's been noted in the minutes and obviously Councillor Williams has heard your comments as well so thank you very much Members I don't believe there's any further questions or comments on the figures for the last quarter so we've just been asked to note those which I think we have done so thank you very much Donia for your diligence in answering all the questions we have and look forward to seeing the next quarter's reports so Members we now go to final item which is an update on the disability confident task and finish group and I believe we have Lindsay on the line who's going to present this and take any questions we may have Hello again everyone I was just asked to give an update on the disability confidence scheme I believe that Councillor Tyn Johnson had asked previously if the task and finish group had needed to continue so the disability confidence scheme is a government initiative which obviously aimed to help employers employ and retain people with disabilities there's three different levels to the scheme previously the council had level one and then from April last year we achieved level two accreditation to enable us to do that we had to complete a self assessment and it covered a whole range of activities that we needed to commit to do and in regards to that it's around recruiting the right people for our organisation and also retaining and developing our staff so we have got some of these initiatives we've already put in place and there's others that we are still working on so in terms of raising awareness of us as a disability confident employer we have that logo on our website we use it in all our recruitment materials we've been having conversations with some of the disability charities as to how we can promote our vacancies to a wider pool of talent and we had planned to do a disability assessment of our facilities but that had to be put on hold because of the COVID regulations but that is something that we will do when we are able to any new employees that need support through any new employees that may need support to come and have an interview we would put any adjustments in place to enable that to happen for them again if we are appointing anyone with a disability we would liaise with our occupational health provider to ensure that we are putting any reasonable adjustments in place to enable them to work for us same goes with existing employees who may then develop a disability during their employment with us and other things that we've done we're currently speaking with a provider in regards to delivering disability awareness training and that will be rolled out this year both to staff and members and also just before Christmas our equalities within our policy and performance team who deal with a lot of the equalities work they were promoting disability history month so we've done quite a lot in terms of raising our profile and our reach and how we can support our employees there's still more work that we can do on the level 2 but the next level that we might wish to consider is moving to level 3 so when you become a level 3 disability confident employer you're then called a leader and for that to happen there's a few other criteria that we need to meet so the self assessment that we completed for level 2 would need to be validated by an external organisation to ensure that we're delivering on all the activities that we said we would we also would need to as it says here provide a narrative on the activities we have or are taken in terms of us being a disability confident leader and also we would be reporting on our disability mental health and wellbeing in the workplace so it's again I would say it's consideration I think at some point we should be considering moving to level 3 whether that now is the right time for that to happen obviously we achieved level 2 just under a year ago and there is more work that can be done so I guess it's really to give you the information of where we're at now what we could do in the future and I think it's whether to consider if that task and finish group needs to continue to think about what we want to do moving forward I think the take away from the last meeting that we had after the request from councillor Trun Johnson to wind up the group was exactly what you've just described was to let us know what it will take to get to the next level, i.e. level 3 whether we actually want to start exploring that I mean given the information that Lindsay's given us now members that's a decision or at least a decision around the task and finish group and obviously we need to give officers some direction as well so I mean I'd be interested to hear people's thoughts on this as to whether we want to continue with the task and finish group and try and strengthen our level 2 status and then eventually move to level 3 so if anyone has any thoughts around that or equally any questions for Lindsay around the scheme in general I'll be happy to take those now starting with councillor Hill Thank you Chairman, thank you very much if you're just asking to look at the bottom of page 2 Chairman can you just talk at the bottom of page 2 of the report, the minutes what you will see there is the disability conference task and finish group where I specifically asked for a paper to be written Chairman which the committee agreed and you seconded that for today's meeting so it's disappointing that we haven't had a paper written that we could have done that We have had a supplementary paper following this I appreciate it was circulated quite late yesterday but we were sent a supplementary document That's a disappointing Chairman There we are Chairman if you also recall that I have been quite happy to say that we should stick to level 2 at this particular stage until we get all of level 2 and it's implemented throughout the council before we try to go to anything else with regards to level 3 and therefore I think it's very important that we do that we embed it in the council and then go on to the next one not just trying to get the next level up I'd just like to ask a very quick question so is the council yet a double tick employer The disability confidence scheme replaced what used to be the two tick employer So are we now the equivalent of that To be honest I would need to check what the criteria was for the two ticks and the criteria is being a level 2 disability confident employer because my understanding is that the two tick system doesn't exist anymore what is going on the two tick system doesn't exist anymore what we needed to do to be a two tick employer I would need to check what that criteria was to see if what we're at now matches that Chairman May I ask that in June when this committee makes next we might not be here some might be changing we can look at it then I think that would be the best time to revalidate whether or not we should go ahead or not and not make that decision I apologise Chairman, I haven't seen this supplementary document it's passed me by No appreciate it was circulated yesterday so it didn't give us much time to take it in so I do apologise for the lateness of that report councillor I see Council Williams but we do have a few other speakers beforehand councillor Dawnson next please Lindsay you referred to the word workplace now obviously we've had two papers earlier in the meeting dealing with workplace and work practices so I wonder where we are now in terms of being disability confident and being a good disability employer when we're actually changing the whole nature of workplace I wonder if you could comment on that what that means for being a disability confident employer and how we're tackling that so if as a lot of us have been working from home obviously for almost two years if we have an employee that has needs for special equipment or something to enable them to work from home then we would still consider what we can provide for them so we would refer them to our occupational health provider and any reasonable adjustments that we would put in place to consider how we could do that whilst they are working from home there's also another organisation called Access to Work which is a government organisation and again the employee themselves has to complete the application but through an Access to Work sorry an Access to Work application they would be assessed and then they would advise us what equipment they would need to enable them to role and as their employer we've got a duty to enable them to have that equipment the only thing to say is what is reasonable but yeah we certainly consider any request and we put stuff in place so whether it's software or hardware or equipment we tend to do that Can I just come back on that thank you that's very helpful I was also thinking more broadly some disabilities are not necessarily to do with equipment some disabilities are actually to do with a way of working working alone, working in teams or not so are we fully cognisant of that do we take that on board Yeah so although we've predominantly been working from home the office is still open for people that need to go and work in the office if that's for health reasons or other personal reasons so we would be expecting an employee if they do have a need that they would either be speaking to their line manager or someone in the HR team and we would provide that support to enable them if they needed to work in the office rather than work from home that they could do that or it may be that they're happy to work from home that need more regular check-ins with either the line manager or HR or someone else to ensure they're getting the support that we need they need sorry Thank you, councillor Perseval Thank you, I would just echo the point that was made previously that I think that we may be better to retain our level 2 status and continue to work on more initiatives to help retain that membership I think it might be careless at this time to progress to level 3 I think that people who have disabilities aren't necessarily going to approach an employer and ask what level of disability confidently how I think actually just having the status and the logo in itself makes us a statement a clear statement so I think we should retain level 2 for the interim and continue to progress work and initiatives around that effort Thank you, councillor and councillor Hart, please Thank you, chair Another question really I agree, I think we need to make sure that this isn't a tick box exercise and that we're embedded at level 2 and thank you for flagging up that there's still some things to work on there I just noticed that under the challenge at level 3 the last point that says that we are employing disabled people I mean, I'd like to assume we're already doing that Oh yeah, absolutely So I just really wanted to ask a question and I know where I'm perhaps playing catch-up a bit with this but just what percentage of our workforce currently identify with a disability and how that compares with other councils Do you have that information? I don't have the figure off the top of my head but it is something that we do well when we have a new starter, they fill in a new employee form and we do ask that question on there but just to be mindful that there's always a prefer not to say box so we know the ones that have declared a disability but there could be some people who have a disability but they choose not to declare it therefore we wouldn't know I'm just thinking if I could come back on that and thinking about sometimes people have a disability identified later after they've already started working and how we could perhaps capture that information certainly would value being able to have some information on the level where people do quite rightly if they choose not to that's their right but to do declare it I think it might be good for us to have that information in terms of the percentage of our employers Sorry I don't have that information to hand today but it is something that we do record Thank you Thank you very much and finally Councillor Heather Williams please Thank you chair, I have to say that the note that come round yesterday isn't quite the paper I think that we did visit so I think on the decision to whether we disband or keep the task and finish group going I think we need a bit more than what's here to make an informed decision on that so I would suggest that we defer that decision until we've got more substantial information as to what the benefits to the task and finish group what it could or couldn't do that's something that's not recognised or actually what the task and finish group itself has achieved and what actually as it's been said we were doing anyway so we haven't got any of that information which is what we really wanted to know the benefit of the finish group as to whether it should be disbanded or continued so I'm afraid we can't make an informed decision on the note that's here it's not what was asked however when it comes to the levels and what we should be pursuing I think the most important thing of this is that it is genuine and authentic and not tick box and not just trying to get a badge or a logo or anything like that and with that in mind I think it's important that we do it properly and not just rush through so as others have said I think we're at level level two let's make sure that that is properly implemented and regarded throughout the council before progressing so I'm minded to agree with others on that and actually perhaps when we do get the paper coming forward we can see how see how this has been implemented rather than just the requirements of the scheme because any of us can look that up on the government website what we want to know is how that is personal to the council to that in my comments chair Thank you very much I think those are the last speakers I had so what I've been hearing so far is I think most members that have spoken tend to be in agreement that we should continue striving to strengthen our level two status rather than try and progress to level three as it may be a bit too premature regarding the task and finish group itself I probably agree I don't think we're in a position today to make a decision about whether they should carry on or be disbanded so what my suggestion would be to bring a fuller paper on this site until our next committee meeting but as some feedback to you Lindsay and officers I think continuing down the path of trying to strengthen our level two status seems to be the majority view here so hopefully that's helpful for you on that front and I said if it's possible if we could have a fuller paper on the task and finish group itself as we've done to date the type of work they would probably need to undertake to get to level three and what specifically that means for South Cams District Council I think that would be handy if we could have that for our next committee meeting Members are we agreed with that way forward I haven't had any views any other way so can we take that as by affirmation superb thank you very much thank you very much Lindsay Members it includes all the business we have on the agenda today obviously if the date of the next meeting is some way in the future on the night of June we're currently penciled in for I believe there is a reason for that which I think Lawrence has volunteered to explain for us Chair, so essentially we're having a bit of a circuit breaker so I believe we've made comments in the past about assessing reports that are not from the previous quarter but the quarter prior to that plan moving forward is to have a doubleheader meeting where we can deal with two quarters work for reports and then moving forward from there we'll be assessing the quarter prior to that now I think the chair is happy that if we feel a need to introduce another meeting between now and June we can do that and any information on all the policies and anything we've discussed today I will ensure that you're kept in the loop of any relevant information Sure, absolutely Councillor Williams, come in I think there has been a frustration with the quarters especially when we're looking at the sickness it seems bizarre to be saying we've got such low numbers in the depot when we've had to suspend green bin collections so I agree with the stance I've been taking however any information that has been requested for example at the agency staff I would like within at least within a fortnight chair of this meeting because otherwise sometimes we don't get that information until 24 hours before the next meeting and that's too long so if we could perhaps put a deadline in for responses chair I'm sure the officers who need to source that information are still on the call so if that could be noted please any information that has been requested if we could get that sooner rather than later I think that will be hugely welcomed by committee members I see lots of faces appearing so I'm taking that as a yes Okay, thank you very much Members and we'll see you all in June if not before Take care