Agenda item

The Committee considered a report of the Corporate Director, Resources which highlighted the strategic risks facing the Council and that gave an insight into the work carried out by the Corporate Risk Management Group during January to March 2016 (for copy see file of Minutes).

The Strategic Insurance & Risk Officer informed the Committee that there were 23 strategic risks with the removal of one since the last report.   The increased and emerging risks were highlighted.

The Chairman welcomed to the meeting the Strategic Manager for Policy, Planning and Partnerships, the Strategic Manager for Safeguarding and Access and the Local Safeguarding Children Board Business Manager, who would be available to answer any queries in relation to the increased risks within Children and Adult Services.

Mr C Robinson asked what the rationale was behind the decision to decrease the risk of ‘failure to protect a child from death or serious harm’ to major.  The Strategic Manager for Policy, Planning and Partnerships advised that assessments are carried out using the criteria and this moved some of the risk from critical to major.  The risk to the stakeholder would remain critical.  The Strategic Insurance & Risk Officer added that there are number of things to take into account such as the financial, service delivery and stakeholder impact.  He advised that the financial and stakeholder delivery risks were less than critical using the criteria.

The Local Safeguarding Children Board Business Manager informed the Committee that there was a requirement to carry out serious case reviews.  The ‘Working Together’ document provided information as to whether a serious case review must be held.  Members were informed that there has been a national increase to the number of serious case reviews held and that any decisions are taken to a panel for approval.

The Strategic Manager for Safeguarding and Access referred to the risk of ‘A service failure of Adult Safeguarding leads to death or serious harm to a service user’ increasing from unlikely to possible.  Members were advised that the profile had changed and that the risk of serious harm had not increased.  There were NHS changes to learning disabilities and a national drive to look at mortality reviews.  Processes were being reviewed and looked at in more detail taking on board consequences of lessons learnt.

Mr Robinson expressed concern of the significance of the changes and the Chairman suggested that it was important for the Committee to understand the differences in the criteria used.  He said that the Committee needed assurances that everything was being done to mitigate risks and to have some understanding of any subtle changes being made.

The Strategic Manager for Safeguarding and Access assured the Committee that the risk in terms of the individual concerned would remain as critical however when looking at service delivery this would not be critical.

Referring to the emerging risk of ‘potential industrial action in response to proposed changes to teaching assistants terms and conditions’, Councillor Temple said that it had been a difficult day at the full Council meeting the previous day.  He expressed concern that this risk had only appeared on this Committees’ papers today.  He had concerns that this had not been flagged up previously and questioned if the mechanisms of delivering the risk to this Committee were not as good as they should be.  He went on to refer to the disposal of the Single Status Pay in 2013 and in particular the four groups of employees that were set aside – such as the Salisbury grade, Youth Workers and Craft Workers and those above spinal column 39.  He asked that the Committee seek analysis of where we stand with those groups.

Councillor M Davinson said that the Public Health workers should also be added to that list.

The Chairman agreed that risks surrounding this may be substantial in future.

Councillor Temple added that the risk to the Council would be overwhelming and he re-iterated his point that the risk had not been delivered to this Committee and questioned if there was a failure in the system.

The Corporate Director of Resources said that these points would be taken on board and discussed further in terms of the dormant risks in relation to the other five groups of employees mentioned.  He added there would be an emerging risk of equal pay claims.  In terms of the full Council meeting on 16 May 2016 he advised that an agreement had been reached to move to a formal stage of consultation whereby existing contracts would be terminated and new contracts offered, effective from 2017.  The potential risk of industrial action had increased and discussions were taking place with head teachers to mitigate to the risk of education available to children.

The Chairman asked that these concerns were addressed and reported back to the Committee.

Resolved:

That the report provides assurance that strategic risks are being effectively managed within the risk management framework across the Council.