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Minutes of a meeting of the Scrutiny Committee |
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held on Thursday, 23 September 2021at 6.00 pm
at the 135 Eastern Avenue, Milton Park, OX14 4SB
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Open to the public, including the press |
The meeting was broadcasted live, and can be watched here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPEkL27HQTU
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Present:
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Members: Councillors Nathan Boyd (Chair), Jerry Avery, Ron Batstone, Hayleigh Gascoigne, David Grant, Max Thompson, Eric de la Harpe, Ben Mabbett and Patrick O'Leary |
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Officers: Harry Barrington-Mountford, Pat Connell, Simon Hewings, Candida Mckelvey, Adrianna Partridge.
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Also present: Cabinet members Councillors Andrew Crawford, Debby Hallett and Emily Smith.
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Sc.127 Apologies for absence
None.
Sc.128 Declarations of interest
None.
Sc.129 Urgent business and chair's announcements
There was no urgent business. Chair ran through housekeeping for the meeting.
Sc.130 Minutes
The Scrutiny Committee minutes of the meeting held on 26 July 2021 were agreed as a correct record, and the chair will sign them as such.
Sc.131 Public participation
None.
Sc.132 Work schedule and dates for all Vale scrutiny meetings
The A34 item has been moved to the meeting on 25 November, to ensure that relevant officers from Oxfordshire County Council and Highways England can be present for the discussion.
Chair explained that the Q1 performance report related to the period ending 30 June, but this was the first opportunity after the summer democratic holiday to be able to consider this report.
Sc.133 2021/22 Q1 performance management report
Chair explained that the Q1 performance report related to the period ending 30 June, but this was the first Scrutiny meeting in the cycle to be able to consider this report.
Cabinet member, Councillor Debby Hallett introduced the item. The strategic performance report measured the council’s performance and progress against the corporate plan aims. This will be considered for approval at Cabinet on 1 October 2021.
The 60-page report covered the period of quarter 1 (1 April – 30 June 2021) and showed the hard work officers had put in. Meetings of Scrutiny and Cabinet in May requested that the report would be an accurate reflection of progress made, so ‘no progress’ was stated where applicable.
Councillor Hallett did explain that as this was the first report, any changes would be considered and implemented to improve it for the next quarter, starting 1 July 2021.
Comments were welcomed, and Harry Barrington-Mountford, Head of Policy and Programmes, was present to answer any technical questions.
In response to a query raised, Councillor Hallett confirmed that the timing of reports would be raised with the senior management team to ensure scrutiny had enough time to review them. She asked the committee to focus on the progress for this quarter, not just report presentation improvements.
Comments and questions were raised and were noted by the Head of Policy and Programmes.
Resolved:
For committee to email Chair and Councillor Hallett regarding how scrutiny wish to review these reports in future, as per the discussion had today, and to identify what scrutiny committee want to add to the process.
Sc.134 Exclusion of the public
Committee voted in favour of excluding the public, in order to review a confidential item on Inter Authority Agreement.
Sc.135 Inter authority agreement
The committee considered a report of the Deputy Chief Executive – Transformation and Operations on inter authority agreement. The committee provided their comments.