Apologies for absence were received from Mr N Hartin.

Members are reminded that they must not participate in the discussion or voting on any matter in which they have a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest and should leave the room prior to the commencement of the debate.

Members were reminded that they must not participate in the discussion or voting on any matter in which they had a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest and should leave the room prior to the commencement of the debate.

To consider the Minutes of the Environment and Services Scrutiny Committee meeting held on 8 September 2014.

The minutes of the meeting held on 8 September 2014 were confirmed as a correct record.

To receive any questions, statements or petitions from the public of which members of the public have given notice.  Deadline for notification for this meeting is Wednesday 15 October 2014.

There were no questions from Members of the Public.

To receive any questions of which members of the Council have given notice.  Deadline for notification for this meeting is Wednesday 15 October 2014.

There were no questions from Members.

The Service Manager for Environmental Maintenance will present a report on the performance of the Highways and Environmental Team Service contract [HETSC]: Ringway.  A representative from Ringway will also be in attendance at the meeting.

Report to follow

The Service Manager for Environmental Maintenance presented the report ‘Highways and Environment Term Maintenance Contract – Ringway update’ (a copy is attached to the signed minutes).  He confirmed that Ringway and the Council had worked together in preparing the report. 

Although there had been issues which had meant the contract was not as mature as it should be, a corner had now been turned and there had been much improvement.  Performance Indicators were set to be achieved by November 2014.  Where there were any outstanding issues, relationships were positive.

The Portfolio Holder for Highways expressed appreciation to Bill Taylor, the UK Managing Director of Ringway and Nick Goddard, the Midlands Director, for attending the meeting and gave her personal thanks to them for their direct involvement in the contract. 

In discussion of the report, Committee Members made comments, raised issues and asked questions covering the following areas:

·       Pothole repair time, reinstatement of the road and permitting;

·       Lessons learnt by Council officers related to scoping and implementing the contract;

·       The degree of importance of achievement of the November 2014 performance indicators in looking to the future and a possible extension of the contract;

·       Why there was a timelag of 2 – 3 months before obtaining performance indicator information

·       How complaints forwarded by Members were recorded;

·       How the new scoping level of £5,000 would assist in expediting works being delivered;

·       The high turnover in contract manager personnel and restructuring of the Ringway operation; 

·       Whether the mechanism of withholding funds from Ringway for not meeting targets might not be useful as they were instead paid into an ‘innovation fund’ which was of benefit to the Council and Ringway;

·       How quickly vacant posts would be filled;

·       Whether it would be possible to recruit good quality sub-contractors at a time of high demand;

·       Whether the re-tender of the engineering contract might impact on Ringway’s performance;

·       How work with the Business Improvement Team could drive improvement;

·       Whether last year’s overspend due to issues in classification of work as capital or revenue was likely to happen again.

Individual examples of where things had gone wrong in Electoral Divisions were also cited, for example, communication issues meaning lines were put down incorrectly, delays in grass cutting, poor quality resurfacing, long waits for jobs to be scheduled, started and completed and response to flooding.

Members of the Committee also gave some plaudits which included work for the Britain In Bloom campaign, some efficient and good quality surface dressing and successful work on the Bridge over River Morda which had been completed quickly and ahead of time.

In summary, the Committee felt that performance had not been impressive during the first third of the contract, and that it had taken a long time address some problems, particularly around IT systems.  The report did provide some reassurance that performance would continue to improve.

In response to the comments made and questions asked, the Council’s Area Commissioner, Service Manager for Environmental Maintenance, Ringway Chief Executive and Ringway Midlands Director stated the following:  ...  view the full minutes text for item 25.

There is a need for an additional meeting of the Committee for consideration of appropriate sections of Q2 Financial Strategy report and the most recent outcome dashboards in order to understand the business plan delivery, the progress and plans for the coming years and to feed back to the Performance Management Scrutiny Committee which will collate an overall view from scrutiny to feed back to Cabinet in December. 

The suggested options for the additional meeting are EITHER Monday 10 November 2014 at 1.00pm OR Monday 17 November 2014 at 2.00pm

The next calendared meeting of the Committee is scheduled to be held at 2.00pm on Monday 8 December 2014. 

Suggested options for an additional meeting of the Committee were either Monday 10 November at 1pm or Monday 17 November at 2.00 pm.  It was agreed to confirm the date and time outside of the meeting.

The next calendared meeting of the Committee was Monday 8 December 2014 at 2.00 pm.