Transcript

Transcript

I am sharing tonight's meeting. Please note that we are not expecting a fire alarm this evening. So if the alarm sounds, please evacuate the building. I strongly suggest following Jonathan. This meeting has been broadcast live on the council's website. So please turn on your microphones when you are speaking and remember to turn them off when you're finished. Please remember to speak clearly and directly into your microphones. I will now ask my fellow members and the officers to introduce themselves. It's just starting, I'm going to start my ride. And obviously, first job, I'm going to go this way. Jonathan, we're going to go to the services. Councillor Trisha Clarke, till from part ward. Councillor Jacey Jackson, part of the ward. Councillor Shinny Chapman, junction ward. Councillor Sykopanda, St Mary's, St James's ward. Councillor John Wolfe, can I re-ward? Councillor Nick Wain, can I re-ward, sopping for Councillor Wiex? Councillor Dye, hand dash, happy ward. Councillor Heather Star, Flaycock Ward. Councillor Bishay, Brame, Austin Ward. Councillor Convey, Councillor Dunnan. Thanks very much. And we've got two apologies for absence tonight from Councillor Wiex and Councillor Choudhry. We've got a substitute member, so Councillor Wayne. Are there any declarations of interest for the substitute member and any other members of no declarations of interest? Minutes of the previous meeting, I am aware that Councillor Convey has something to say about them. Oh, yes, matters arising. Oh, I'm prepared, have I? Yeah, item page two, last but one bullet point. Officers advised that they could circulate a paper to member summarizing the latest position on the parking account and trends over time. I think actually what Officer said was they would, but either way, they haven't. So, I do hope that that does come to us. In due course, please. I'm actually sure we can make a moment to trace up and trace up on that. And I think I just want an issue, so I'll pick up in the corporate performance section. Oh, it's my chair's report. So, this is the last meeting of the municipal year. I would just like to thank the committee for all your work this year, particularly on the ASB scrutiny review. I felt like it was a good collaborative effort with the strength of the committee and everyone's involvement. So, I would like to thank everyone here for your time and effort, along with all the officers who we met who were, I thought, broadly, really open and honest with us and trying to work hard for the good of residents in the borough. I'd just like to put that on record. This is actually my last meeting in the chair. And depending on how Thursday and accounts go, then Councillor Wayne will be taking out the position in the new corporate resources and economy scrutiny committee. So I will be, Councillor Wayne and I will try and do a bit of a hand over. So, there's a bit of a smooth transition of power. Power?

• Really?
• That's not really what I mean, is it? You know what I mean? The only other thing is just that I'm gonna do a change of order of the business and the agenda tonight. I'm gonna bring up the corporate performance. So item C3 so that it comes after Councillor Wolff's annual scrutiny review. And then we'll do item C2, the transformation projects after that. Public questions. I don't believe we have any members of public. But if any arise, they are allowed to ask any questions. We have no items for calling. So now we're gonna move on to the annual presentation of the Executive Member for Community Safety. Evening, Councillor Wolff. So we're gonna allow, try and allow for about 45 minutes for this agenda item of which I'm gonna ask Councillor Wolff if you can speak for up to five minutes. If you don't feel the need to, don't have to. And then there'll be about 40 minutes of questioning from the members. So over to you, Councillor Wolff.
• Great, thank you. I will time myself and believe it or not, the report that you received this year was shorter than the report last year. But as you can tell, I get very excited by the plethora of activities that we do within my portfolio. And there's a lot that isn't included, including the broader kind of strategic framework in which we operate, which includes our five-year violence reduction strategy, our violence against women and girls strategy, and our youth safety strategy as well. But there is that broader strategic framework that drives so much of this work. The Chair asked me to kind of highlight three things that have happened since the last time I gave my annual presentation and three things for the next 12 months. The first thing I'll say, in the last 12 months, as you can probably deduce, so much of this role is about partnership working. It's an essential part of what I do. And of course, one of our key agents in that is work with the police. As you'll know, I hope, 'cause I talk about it a lot. We were the only London bar to ask and the only BCU to deliver a 10-point action plan of practical, tangible actions on the back of the Baroness Casey report, which is now being scrutinized quarterly by members of the public and monthly by the senior leadership team of the police. I'm very proud of that important piece of work. We also have trained over 600 frontline police officers in our BCU, made up of 1,500 officers, so that's over a third in cultural competency training and ensuring that's frontline officers as well. We've conducted walk and talks in 16 wards, including during the night time, we've got one more to go in arsenal. We signed a memorandum of understanding, so we're really clear on processes and means of communication. We've started to undertake a governance review so that policing structures, neighborhood policing structures, mirror our own in terms of the localities model, which enhances partnership work and there's more to do with that. So on the back of so much of that work, I'm really pleased that we are the only London bar to have received the largest reductions in public order crime types across 32 boroughs, which means that motor vehicle crime is down, robbery is down, vogue is down, knife crime is down, firearms discharges are down. Now, we're never ever complacent, there's always more we can do, but I think that's testament to the hardship work that we have with the police. And I've always been clear that we will adopt a critical friend approach to our business, calling out the bad and championing the good. So that's been a key part of my work the last 12 months. The other area is around what I'd broadly call a protein culture care within his LinkedIn. So whether that's the safe havens and we increased our numbers, I then also wanted us to do an audit of some of those businesses. It's high turnover, some have been signed up five years ago. And that brought our numbers down slightly, but it enabled us to see how those safe havens are operating. And it's kind of made it clearer how we're gonna chart a path forward. And I'll come onto that for the next 12 months. We've also installed bleed control kits for catastrophic bleeding. And the first London bar to have developed a strategy around managing the kit controls. We've also done stuff around civic pride and two new knife bins collecting over 4,000 knives. So all of that work, I kind of seen this spin of promoting a culture of care within his LinkedIn. Finally, over the last 12 months, the ASB Transformation Program has been a key strand of work. As you'll know, we've had an independent ASB report that generated 36 recommendations, which then led to further work and 70. Eight recommendations for the back of that. And I wanna thank the committee for their work, which really nicely feeds in the ASB work we've been doing. I've been very, very clear that it was a mess when I came into it, there's still a lot more to do. And frankly, we've just got to get the basics right. I can't go on enough about just getting the basics right. Case management, reporting, managing expectations. So that's been a key part of the work over the last 12 months. Looking forward, we will continue the work and end social behavior. Oh, I've got 10 seconds. There's civil protection transformations. At the last 12 months, we have seen restructure with the whole new department of community safety, security and resilience, which broadly corresponds with my political portfolio. There are some further changes we want to make to the realm of civil protection, including the creation of a neighbourhood team, which is going to enable 24/7 response service. So we will have officers 24/7 on the streets, not only responding, but also proactively dealing with issues. I can't divulge too much because there's still consultations that have to go ahead. So it's not all set in stone yet, but that work will continue. And then I will of course continue the partnership work with the police, particularly around Clearhold Bill, which will be part of being one of the highest generator of crimes in Islington. There's good work we're doing there, there's more we can do. So lots and lots of work to do, never ever complacent. We are responsive, but we're also getting into a place where we're being proactive as well. If we get on top of data and a data lead, so much of the issues that come across my desk in this portfolio can be proactively managed and dealt with as well, notwithstanding tragedies we've seen in the last 12 months. So with that, I'll leave it there.
• Thank you. I know Council staff had a question, and I see in Council and then Council Clerk.
• Yeah, thanks for that. John, that's really detailed, which is always good to see. The main question I had was just around some of the hate crime and the key themes that you've detailed really well actually on page 22. It's good to see that some of these have gone down in terms of numbering, but where it says, isn't in ranks first out of 32 boroughs for disability hate crime, even though the number of fences is low, then you have isn't in ranks third out of 32 boroughs for homophobic hate crime, and it says the ward with the highest number of fences is junction. Can we just, would you mind just exploring us a little bit? Is that because reporting has got better? So therefore, it's coming up more in the stats of talking happens in crime figures. Is that related to other things that are happening in the borough?
• And obviously, what we see within that as well is quite a lot of intersectionality. So around the homophobic hate crimes, if you look at who's been targeted, whether that's people from an ethnic minority, and the same as disability also comes up highly, people from an ethnic minority. So would you mind just giving us a bit more data around that, thank you.
• Yeah, sure, they're really good questions. You know, we do also know that hate crime is perennially underreported, massive, massive issue. And so when the hate crime forum was established, one of the main aims, independent forum, chaired by Colin Adams, one of the main aims was to increase reporting. And so that actually leads you with a slightly difficult scenario on how do you read these statistics? 'Cause on the one hand, you know, we don't want to see any reports of hate crime. I don't see any instances of hate crime, but we do want people to report. So an increase in reporting can also be attributed to an increase in confidence in the system. I would also say based on the plethora of hate crime awareness events that we hold, I think there is a correlation between increased awareness around hate crime and importance of reporting hate crime, including actually TFL, do a quite a good job on that, and this increase in reports. Also, over the last 12 months, we've initiated a hate crime prevention champion scheme. We've now got 50 champions who've gone through training. I'm supported by the hate crime forum book funded by Islington, which is a positive, and we're working to engage with faith organizations. So each faith organization has a primary point of contact. So the question of, you know, how do you measure success in this realm? It's a very, very complicated one. It is ultimately a policing issue, hate crime. I think there are a number of things we can look at, I think it frankly builds into the broader trust and confidence. Lots of victims of hate crime, particularly in the LGBTQ community, and actually this was discussed at the hate crime forum a couple of months ago for very reticent about reporting. So there's a bigger piece around trust and confidence. I think it's part of that. It also will link into our actions as a council. You know, what are we doing around raising awareness? It will also link to victim satisfaction rates as well. I think with regard to junction in particular, you've got a combination of things. You've got outside archway station, it has become a hotspot location, and I think transport hubs can generate crime. So I wouldn't be surprised if that's driving some of it, also the Whittington Hospital. I don't know that for certain, but I'd wager that that might be having an impact on some of the statistics. But also I hope that there's increased confidence there. Your third question around...
• So it's just around the intersectionality.
• Yeah, so I mean, interestingly, if a hate crime is reported to the police, it will often go into two different categories based on the protected characteristics. So very aware of the issue of intersectionality. For us, within the hate crime forum, so much of it is about ensuring a community response. So we have Telmama around anti-Islamophobia. We've got forum plus engaged. We have been doing dip sampling of hate crime in our borough to make sure that we're understanding the full process. But yeah, it's one we're ever alive to, and I think a big part of it is holding the police to account. And we saw a big increase in hate crime, particularly anti-Semitic and Islamophobia in regard to at least in conflict. And there was a specific hate crime unit that the police set up with one sergeant and three officers to tackle that. We did reassurance patrols as well, but it's an area we'll continue to work on.
• Thank you, I actually had a question about hate crime. So by my knowledge, I think Junction is the only ward in Islington with an LGBT venue, so you've got Siori there. So I just wanted to check whether or not the venue was also part of the puzzle, and whether or not we can link it to people going and leaving to that venue, and whether or not we proactively are supporting either the venue or a cogent police to look at that, or maybe it isn't late, I don't know if you know at all, so that's that you could fall upon.
• Yeah, absolutely. I mean, they don't attend our hate crime forum, forum plus do, and the police. If anyone reports a hate crime, the police should be in contact within 24 hours. But certainly we've been expanding the membership of the hate crime forum, so I will make that suggestion that's very helpful.
• Great, I've got a couple of other unrelated questions, so I do notice on the slides we've got a bit about the park garden, the nice sweeps that they've done, which is great, but I'm very conscious, there's a big image of lots of scary knives that are on that presentation. A, I just want to use a bit of reassurance that the council aren't using that and that would face social media, and at good. But also linked to that, I wondered whether there's another bit of re-engagement needed with the police, 'cause this triggered a bit of research for me. I know Caroline did a lot of work about the fact that the police were putting big scary photos of knives on social media, which meant that young people felt like data on themselves because it meant that the threat of knife crime felt more vigilant, and there's some good research about this. Three of our safe teams have posted big scary knives on Twitter in the last six months, from Tofner Park to Bunhill in front of your park. I want to check to see whether you agreed, whether A, this is counterproductive, and B, whether this is something that we can raise with police teams is something they perhaps shouldn't be doing.
• I mean, in sure, yes, yes, and I will re-raise it. I think, you know, like I said, we've got eight knife bins across the borough. 4,000 knives have been collected thus far. For me, you know, the best way of promoting that is not with big scary images, but that's 4,000 positive choices that have been made. So I think that messaging is absolutely key. I wasn't aware of the particular tweets, but very happy to follow that up.
• I've got the dates to the safe and able of teams I can share with you after.
• I'm slightly surprised as well, 'cause on a walk and talk, I had a safe and able team officer show me pictures on this phone that said, you know, we wouldn't put this out, so I will follow that up.
• Right, I have one more, very quick question. So on the slides around HMO and selective property licensing, we've got a statistic here that 2015 homes have had their licenses granted. The row below shows that 824 licensing inspections have been completed. And so this is on, I don't know, a slight waterfall. Does that, by my reading, does that mean that 60% of HMO properties that are licensed haven't been inspected at all? And is that enough?
• I don't think so. I never like to say this. It's not actually my portfolio. But I will follow that up. I don't know the answer.
• Thank you. Just a quick one on hate crime. So my experience in my ward is that some of the important hate crime hits a bit of a barrier that hasn't got evidence. That's, I just wanted to ask you about that. Can you take something forward when there's no evidence? And then the other thing was about before the transformation, I think that the people on the phone lines were in need of a bit of training because what I was noticing is that people would be repeatedly phoning the ASB lines out of ours or whatever. And they'd be hitting like sort of quite a negative response from the, sometimes from the workers on there because maybe they'd like felt aggregated or, you know, I just wanted about how the training's going for those people working on those lines.
• Yeah, two really good questions. So, I mean, in terms of the hate crime, it's notoriously difficult to get a charge and it's something that we're pushing the police on. They do need evidence. It is worth noting that, you know, the definition of hate crime is only criminal offense that's perceived to be motivated by prejudice based on characteristics. So there's a kind of perception element to it as well which can be very difficult to find the evidence base but the police do need the evidence in order to secure a charge. So I think that is one piece of the puzzle that is leading to kind of a lower sanction and detection rate than I would like to see. So I think that's a fair point and that's something for the police and CPS. On the ASB telephone lines, so, you know, on average, we receive 1,400 reports a month to the ASB phones and online. We've done a lot of work to channel shift onto online reporting, frankly because it's easier and we can capture more data and it's quicker. And this month we'll be launching a new Granicus form which is like, I mean, it's taken a long time to get off the ground because ASB is so complex and the amount of teams are involved, it beggars belief sometimes, but hoping that that's going to further encourage online reporting to be shifted away from phone calls but we will continue to have that phone line option and training is given. I think certainly, we could bear in mind some of those calls go to housing colleagues. Certainly within CSSR, a big thing that we've been doing and this is embedded in our service delivery plan, is to make sure that we are resident focused and that we embed resident care, customer care, however, whatever terminology or wants to use but that we're really listening to our residents and responsive to their needs and that's going to filter down into training and it already has in workshops and various things that we've been doing. So yeah, very cognizant of that and we will continue that work.
• Thanks, I've got Councillor Wayne, Councillor Abraham and then Councillor Pandor go. So Councillor Wayne, do you want to go next?
• Yeah, moving to a different topic. Two long questions. Firstly, successive ward sergeants that I've had deans with have all complained about the level of abstractions from their safer neighbourhood teams and the impact that that has on both the visibility of their teams and the capability of their teams to make a meaningful contribution in their wards. What leverage, if any, can we apply to ensure that the neighbourhood teams can perform as clearly they intend to perform? And secondly, the progress that you've outlined, we are making in our partnership work with the Met in making the borough safer is not always reflected in residence observations and perceptions about the level of crime. Does the visibility of the safer neighbourhood teams and at times lack of visibility may be play into that perception that the borough isn't as safe as residents would like it to be? And what can we do to change the perception of residents as to the safety of the borough?
• Yeah, thanks. They're really good questions. I think in terms of leverage, so abstraction rates or aids are slightly down. They did peak during the Middle Eastern conflict. One thing we did secure was an end to the carousel system. So now officers have a two year tenure, which is good 'cause that creates some stability and enables officers to build some trust and confidence with the community before they go. So that's a positive. I think the second thing is back in the day, the safer neighbourhood teams were beefed out. They were secure, they were present, and they've been hollowed out through years of austerity. And the Baroness Casey report was very, very clear on that. What we have secured in Islington is a notable uplift in police officers. So we're going from in the first year, one to four sergeants, sorry, one to four inspectors, six to 16 sergeants, and 17 to 41 PCSOs. It's a significant uplift. And I should say that they are all bar nine PCSOs recruited. So I'm hoping that that uplift in police numbers will contribute to greater visibility. I also think there's a role that we can play, and this kind of comes onto the civil protection restructure and looking at creating a neighbourhood engagement team. We have lots of officers at Islington Council. We have lots of eyes and ears on our estates. We have compliance teams, we have trading standards, we have concierge, we have caretakers. To what extent are we utilising those as eyes and ears on our estates and providing some visible presence? Now, not to do the police's job, obviously, but I think they're going onto your second question. There is constantly a disjuncture between the realities of recorded crime and perceptions of crime, and I think one way in which you can enable people to feel safer is greater visibility, both of police officers, in certain communities, is not a universal truth, but also greater visibility of council staff as well. I think perceptions of crime also feed into broader trust and confidence issues, so you want visibility, but it's also about, it's why I think civic pride is so important. I quite like the term, grime and disorder. You know, if areas feel dirty, graffiti, littering, dumping, that all contributes to a sense of feeling unsafe, and we talk about the broken window effect as I'm sure you know, I think, adds to crime in an area. So I think there are things we can do in terms of ensuring cleanest streets. There's also things we can do in terms of physical improvements, so we have environmental visual orders, which are the ways of designing our crime, I think with better lighting, cutting back certain hedges, making sure there's better sight lines, that too can increase perceptions of safety. It's also worth bearing in mind, we have extensive CCTV network, both on-street cameras, and a plethora of redeployable cameras as well, and I know that sometimes that can create a sense of greater security for some of our residents, too. So there are a number of things that we can do, and as you recall, we were, at the time, the only London, we had the largest community safety, public consultation, I'm the Safer Spaces Campaign, where we ask people where they felt safe, where they didn't feel safe. We have that data, and we use that data, so we're constantly marrying qualitative data, with quantitative data, to look at increased reassurance, increased patrols, designing our crime issues, to hopefully ensure that people feel safer in our community as well as being safer.
• Thank you for that. So on your page around Police Overview 2324, one of the lines is Ward-Hannell Review, and has that already taken place?
• So, I'm not sure if you, I don't know if you recall, a community safety policy group. We brought a paper which had been worked up in partnership with the police, looking at what was working, what wasn't working with the Ward panels. That has gone toward panel chairs. It's also gone to the Safer Islington Neighbourhood Board, and it includes some commitments from bearing in mind with the Ward panels who frankly have been a bane of my life. We are not responsible for them, they are police-led, they're police-led and they're very much related to the Safer Neighbourhood team. So, I've always felt like I need to make that point, but what we do do as a council is we supply them, we help them as much as we can, we supply the intelligence product, we have a community safety officers present, we do a lot of the administration around Ward panels too. What part of the Ward panel review was looking at what wasn't working, how we could enable, empower the police, but also the Ward panel chairs who are ultimately responsible for the Ward panels and setting the strategic direction and should be members of the community, how they can increase representation of those panels. Because, you know, and I said this last year, it kind of pains me to have to say it again, but usually it's the same types of people that go to these Ward panels, so we need to increase diversity. I think where we're at now, funnily enough, I got an email only two days ago with this Ward panel review. There are some further promises from the police, FAQ for councilors, residents about what the Ward panel actually is, what one can expect, and a partnership promise, so the police are committing to the Ward panels to make them as effective as possible, including sending inspectors. I have to say every quarter I hear from councilors who say the Ward panels aren't working, and that's difficult, and I always relay that to the police. They have now set up quarterly catch-ups with councilors just after the Ward panels, so those issues can be brought directly to the police. So sorry, that was a very long way of saying it's been working progress and it's going to be coming launch soon. Thank you, no no you. That answer was very telling, and because I remember when you took over this role in 2022, one of the things that I was most excited about was your desire in having attended one of my Ward panels, and how symbolic it was. You said you wanted to review Ward panels, so we're two years in, and we're still not there yet. We're two years out of potentially, you know, the next round of elections. So I'm wondering when do you feel like you will have confidence as the executive member for community safety, and could you keep talking about this partnership working? And I would hope part of that partnership working is applying that pressure onto the police. And so when I go to my Ward panels, and I see, you know, community safety officers from LBI, Councillors will go, you know, I wouldn't want to embarrass anyone here by asking Councillors to raise their hands if they have full confidence in their Ward panels, because you know the situation. So I'm just wondering when can we expect to see some really tangible deliverables, because I think we're having the conversation, and I know it's not your full Councillor, Wolf entirely, but we seem to be having the same conversation in 2024 that we were having in 2022, and I just would feel really disappointed if we're having the same conversation in 2026. And so is there anything that you can, what sort of reassurance can we get in terms of, are we asking the police to, you know, are we giving them timelines to start delivering some of this to make sure that people are feeling a tangible difference? I've been to a Ward panel where the Councillors outnumber the residents, and when I challenge the officers around how they're promoting this, that I don't have confidence in the way they're promoting it. They're going on very old lists. We've got a very challenging community, especially in my ward, we've got a large student of population. And so what can you say to reassure me, Councillor Wolf? Well, I mean, broader context, I appreciate being held to account, but you're holding me to account for something I have no responsibility over. So I think that's important to be really clear. So what I can do is apply the pressure, set the timelines, as much as possible, and work collectively and closely with the police, bearing in mind that the police are under a lot of pressures because of abstraction, because of 10 years of austerity. So I'm not going to be here. I'm not here as a mouthpiece for the police to defend ward panels or to tell you, like, oh, yeah, in 10 months, the police are going to do X, Y, and Z. I can't actually give you that. I can give you a very detailed 10-point action plan. I gave Councillors a detailed overview of the board panel promises that we were seeking from the police and the changes that the police were going to implement. I will continue to hold them to account to that. Will I be here in another year time, in another year's time, complaining about ward panels? Very possibly. I'm afraid it's just not in my gift to transform ward panels. I wish it was, but it isn't. But I will apply the pressure, continue to apply the pressure, and I hope that we'll see some tangible improvements. I'm going to put you into jokes on that, just to say that I believe the police are coming to Council of Jackson's committee fairly soon as part of the New Homes and Communities Committee. So that might be a good place to raise a question directly with those who are responsible. Right, I've got Councillor. Do you, I assume you have a name? Yes. Councillor Pandel. Thank you, John, for your presentation. And I've obviously read your report, and I was quite involved when we had the discussion with Muslim women because it came out that Muslim women are not feeling safe. So we did that back in September 2023, and obviously a lot's happened since then, and the rise of hate crime has risen. What I want to know is that I don't feel that we should just have one conversation with this particular round of women. I think that's something that should be ongoing. I often deal with women from different backgrounds, but particularly my own background. And they are saying, oh, well, you know, you've had this one conversation with us. That was nearly a year ago. Are we going to be doing anything different? So I feel that we can't just have one-off discussions. I feel that we have a strategic plan to have it every couple of months, every six months, every quarterly, so we can keep a conversation going so that we can build that trust with women from this particular community to think that, okay, that we're not just abandoned because that's how they're feeling right now. And I can't be a mouthpiece for everybody, but I'm trying to reassure them, but I think that we do need to tackle this more strategically than just have a one-off discussion and think, okay, well, we've done our bit. Yeah, thank you. I mean, I had numerous discussions. There was a welfare house at Finn to be parked. Here in the town hall during his life over awareness month. So every year we have that as a centerpiece. We have our hate crime awareness week that happens every year. And I couldn't agree with you more. Like, this is a continual conversations need to be had. I haven't had just one. I have had numerous. And on the back of those helpful conversations, actions have emerged around hate crime champions, around having a point of contact within mosques, around, you know, again, hate crime is a policing issue ultimately, but making sure that the police are actually responsive to victims of hate crime, linking in with with Telmama as well. And, you know, it's like having allies like you have really championed this has been an essential part of that process. It's not over. Your 100% right is emphatically not over and will continue. Because my only concern is obviously it's still not reported enough. And that's because we're in our for whatever reason. There's not trust in the police. And obviously it's just if we keep the conversations going, keep reminding people that, you know, this is something that needs to be done, then hopefully we'll get the message across. No, I think that's, yeah, I couldn't agree more. And we will continue those conversations. I mean, the other thing I'd say, and you know, we've counseled Abraham support and work, you know, we're working around our work with the Somali community. I think conversations are great, and I'm all for conversations, but there comes a point with residents where, well, what are you going to do? Like, enough chat. And so I'm also keen that we keep up that focus on action. We keep a feedback and we keep accountability in place. And exactly as you said, help try and improve trust and confidence so more people feel empowered to report. Because, you know, the tragedy is, and this came out of my conversations with a number of different Muslim women. It's not being reported, and it becomes normalised. It should, I'm sure, be a normalised issue in our borough. So, yeah, I'm with you on that. I'm sure we all are. And I've seen Councillor Jackson's indicating them, Councillor Chapman, and then I suggest that someone's got burning questions that we wrap up. Right, thank you, John. Good presentation. Quick question around the patrol team that sort of goes around to give fixed penalties for ASB. I didn't really pick up anything on that. I just wanted to know, I think that was an opilot. We wrote a few numbers out. Has it been more recruitment on that team? Does that sit on your side of...? Yeah, do you mean park guard? Not really park guard. There's a group of teams that goes around to deal with... To combine this team? Yes, to deal with. So, if you can just give us a little bit, is that going to be rolled out? Is it going to have more people on that team? Or what's the current issues with that current pilot? Because I'm pretty sure it was a pilot. Oh, Kingdom. Yes. Kingdom. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, Kingdom are an external contractor. Yeah, so it's reviewed quarterly. The penalty notice is given for littering. Looks like it's been successful to the extent that we're in discussions with Councillor Champion. Champion, yeah, I'll get you two mixed up. Around extending Kingdom's contract, so they continue that enforcement work around littering but also dumping, and then it frees up the compliance team to focus on more complex, persistent dumping in hotspot locations. So, I have to be honest, you know, I wanted close scrutiny on how that Kingdom contract went, but I've been reassured that it's been successful and we're in discussions to expand it. And with the Civil Protection Transformation Project, subject to consultation and the like, we'll be looking at strengthening that compliance work. The other thing I'd say around compliance is we've started to, it was always an on-street work, where it's now doing a state-based work as well, and that's generated more fines as well, and it's increased the amount of work that we've done. So, yeah. This is more to do with the knife collection point. I mean, you've quoted a number, I think it's 4,000 plus, and that would have taken us to 2023 or 2022, but that's the last collecting point. 2023, I'm pretty sure it stays on here. Yeah, yeah. Now, I think my question is, I know you're not inside that bin for you to know. Should we be seeing a decrease in number of knives in there on increase? Oh, God, I mean, you know, the number of knife crimes are on the rise in London, although they're decreasing in Islington. I'm very proud of that fact. I've no idea. Ideally, I don't want to see any knives in those bins, but I'd rather see them in the bins and on the streets. I think there is a broader piece of work. You know, we've got high-aged knife bins, and that's great. And if people do have knives, we want to encourage them to make the right decision and dispose of them. There are other things we do around raising awareness of knife crime. We've got knife crime awareness week. We've been concealer trust. Our test purchasing as well. Recently, trading standards actually, over the last 12 months, have generated £138,000 in fines. One of those was against a shop that sold a knife to an underage person. So there's a whole kind of plethora of different work we do around tackling knife crime in our borough. I think as well, you know, going back to the point about the messaging we put out, we know as we get to the summer that crime and social behaviour increases. And what I don't want to do is just for us to always be focused on enforcement. There's a lot of preventative work that needs to be done. And the messaging we put out. So internally, we have very specific strategies, seasonal violence strategies. But, you know, public facing, this is about promoting diversionary offers, some adversity and empowering our young people to make the right choices. So, you know, I don't know whether we'll see an increase or a decrease in the number of knives in those bins. My guess is we will be collecting more and that 4,000 number will go up. I'd much rather them in the bins and on the street. But that doesn't stop us from, you know, the important, more holistic pieces of work that need to be done as well. It's just fine with that. The last question was just capture much bigger messaging around work around the back. I don't want to see any on the street and I'm sure we both share that. And with that, you've already sort of preemed, I don't know how you knew that, about summer, summer is here. And there's always a tendency in terms of rise of, you know, anti-social behavior, stuff or school, I mean, young people are out of school sort of. Last year or the year before that we were sort of quite reactive. Is there sort of a plan on how we're sort of, you know, ahead of what could happen? And that would be really their conversation, the pleas and everyone. So if you could just highlight a little bit around it, I would be grateful. Thank you. Absolutely. I mean, every summer we have a season, we have a summer violence reduction strategy that we work up with the police and council officers. And what that involves is intensification of the work that we do. So that might be around increasing the number of test purchasing within our shops, increasing patrols, use of CCTV. But it's additional outreach work. But it also includes additional things such as some of our city increased opportunities for young people. And what we do is within community safety, security and resilience, within our VOG services, within our youth safety services and within our police partners, we devise a very clear summer violence plan, which kind of has four central pillars to prevent, minimize if there is a critical incident and also to empower the community in that period. So every summer, and I mean, I should say during autumn nights and winter nights, we also have very specific seasonal violence reduction plans as well. We have those developed with our police partners and across the council. So we're very, very hard on it and we're working on those plans as I speak. It carries on on the same topic, but specifically relating to moped enabled and electric bike enabled and street theft. So what's happening in Archway, and I'm sure it's happening elsewhere, is that the preventative work around this. I'm talking actually about the crime that is targeting children, older children, secondary school children as they leave school. So what we're seeing in Archway is young people coming from other boroughs, specifically to target kids as they leave school. All of that work that you talked about around prevention and diversionary stuff is being rolled out really well. But in terms of empowering the community, I don't know what we can do. So I see people, young men who have come to steal things are on their scooters, and I get ready to call the junction police and I do, but it's never quick enough. I can see it happening. The schools are telling people now, even at 3.30, they're telling secondary school children don't walk home alone at 3.30. And it is quite organised, and I think what happens is they choose places that are near tubes. So you can pop up at Toughman Park, you can steal the phones of everyone who comes out of school, and you can get back on at Archway and it's done. So there's lots of talk telling young people what to do, there's huge awareness of it. People are not walking around with their phones. What can be done more to empower the community and how can the police, and we are a borough that's got a lot more police officers, although I don't yet see them more. But it's happening daily in a very sort of, in very obvious hotspots. And the problem is that people are not reporting anymore. These kids are used to losing two or three phones. Some of them now carry brick phones that they can just hand over. It's very, what's happening now is that they're being stopped by slightly older kids who look at the phone and make a decision on whether they want it. Sometimes they ask their victim to open up social media so that they can go through their social media and find out who those kids know and make sure that they're not going to suffer reprisals if it's OK to steal from that. So it's all happening in broad daylight every day, and it's really traumatic. So, community is not empowered on that, and I wonder what more can be done. Yeah, no, I hear and have heard those observations. And I think it's a prime example of where a community response is required because the council allows not going to solve that issue or a crucial partner, but we have to be working with the police and with the community on that. I mean, particularly around the summer violence work, but I think more generally, it's around raising awareness safety training, whether it's wave training, we have in license venues or work we do in schools. I think a big part of empowerment is raising awareness and giving young people the tools to how do they stay safe on the streets. I think that's a part of it, but it's not the only one. I think as well within the sort of empowerment sphere, it is about diversionary activities. We are also aware in Archway, we've just put in a bid to the Violence Reduction Unit for, I think it's £100,000 per annum for two years to tackle specifically that problem you've alluded to. And it is because people have been reporting that it's generated as a hotspot. We get six schools within a two-week period, low threshold. We recognise a hotspot and we activate interventions, and one of those is looking at funding and having police officers in the area between three and six p.m. Anyway, we don't know whether that's going to be successful yet. But I also think, and this is for my other counterparts as well, it's about listening to young people and asking them where they feel safe, where don't they feel safe, what more would they like. And we've had some very helpful discussions with young people in community centres. The former youth mayor has given some really helpful insights into certain things that they would like to see. So I don't want to sit here and say the answer is X, Y or Z, I just think we need to be listening to young people about what they feel they need to equip them. And fundamentally we need to make sure that it doesn't happen because it's not acceptable. Push back a little bit, it's not about equipping young people as victims, there is nothing they can do when someone says I've got a knife, give me your phone. Then there needs to be joined up working with other boroughs, I know it's the police, so I suppose my request is can you find out if there are plans afoot to do that because they're targeting parts of our borough, there is nothing more our young people can do that sometimes they are mugged en masse because two kids with a knife who are a few years older take the phones off everyone. There's nothing more they can do other than I don't know parents go and get them, but they're 14, 15. So I think there is a lot of talking to young people and listening to them and they've said I don't feel safe. We've all been mugged, we carry dummy phones. What else is there other than catching the perpetrators and the people who are recruiting the children who are committing the crimes? Fair enough, I always think listening to young people, empowering young people, we've done some good awareness training, but like you say, that only goes so far and that's why I said it needs a community response with the police stepping up. This is ultimately a policing matter. We did a lot of work with school safety protocols and making sure our school officers were all in place. They are now all in place, which is really positive. So I hope that's a step in the right direction. As a council, we're also looking at exclusions. I think that feeds into a broader issue around some of the young people might be engaging in some of this activity. So as ever in this sphere, there is never a simple answer and it requires pulling numerous levers and working with numerous agencies to do what we can. Yes, you have my reassurance that we will continue to work with school's young people across borrowers to tackle these issues. And thanks very much. I'm going to suggest we wrap it up in this room. I've got an absolutely burning final question that I was indicating, which is, thank you very much, councilor for your time. Next up, we're going to move on to the corporate performance report. So I don't know if you want to come down or if you want to shout from afar. Thank you very much. Hello, welcome. I'm going to do quick instructions. Do you want those corporate performance manager? I can't start doing them with words. Sorry, I'm not one of those instructions. And Dave Fudgekin's in corporate resources. Thank you for folks who might be watching at home. So I dearly will allow up to 20 minutes for this agenda. I've said you can do five-minute instructions as always. I don't feel the need to use it all if you don't. And then we'll do about 15 minutes of discussions before we move on. Thank you. Okay. Good evening, everyone. Welcome to report three corporate performance update, which covers the period of October to December. I'll take the report as read and I'll just highlight some key organizational health messages for the quarter. You'll already have had the Q3 budget update. So you'll be aware of the general fund rate variance reduced in quarter to three to 400,000. And we're on track with a collection of business rates. Counter-types collection felt slightly so unlikely to hit the end of your target. But we will hit the level for which we're budgeted. Workforce sickness absence continued to reduce for the third consecutive quarter this year and is on track to be on the lowest annual rates that we've seen in recent years. However, the use of agency staff did increase over the year. And so this is an area of focus going forward. Digital services as digital improvements continue to be put in place across services. There were more downtime incidents, but they were dealt with quickly. So actually impact on residents and staff was relatively low. Performance in relation to information requests, FOIs and SARs was the best that we've actually had to date. They continue to improve throughout the year and actually both hit their target for completion within deadline for the first time since reporting. So this is suggesting that all those changes that have been put in place over the year really having an impact. Resident experience, Resident satisfaction with access is LinkedIn. Service continue to be high in quarter three. Complaints really continue to be the main challenge in quarter three as numbers. Every stage continue to increase. But having said that there's been big improvements in terms of actually responding to complaints and completing those within deadline through the year. We're up to good rates now. There's more details than the appendix one. For your background and appendix three that describes performance across the services, which will be discussed at the respective scrutiny committees. And it also includes some of the shared themes that tend to kind of underpin some of the challenges that the council is experiencing. I'll leave it there. Hand over to questions. Thank you. I'm conscious we're here talking about agency stuff again and the associated cost. Now, I know I think we have worked to visit matrix SCM limited and the contract there that we signed in 2021 was up to a value of 120 million. And so I'm conscious that a lot of other councils have started to look at the use of external contractors to make. Aidancy staff happen and start to reevaluate different ways of delivering the need for agency staff. So I know Luton Council and Kent Council have both created their own internal organizations and internal banks of agency staff. Luton have reported that last in 2022, 2023 that we brought in half a million pounds worth of savings. And I guess as well, we're a council that very much believes in in-house, attach having our own agency staff also is a great way to bring up working standards. I wondered whether this was something that we've done any scoping on because having seen how often agency staff spend is a topic of big concern. Ways to bring down and the costs seem really important to me. Yeah, so we've been through a process of looking at agency staff with the corporate management team and I wouldn't quite describe it as what Luton have got. But one of the things that is being looked at is where we have, you know, particularly in some areas we've got obviously very large, in sourced front line sort of workforce and in areas where we have to be up to a particular quota of staff or, you know, there's going to be certain stuff on duty or whatever it might be. Rather than what happens quite a lot at the moment, which we have sickness or we have an absence of one form or another and we go to agency staff, whether we can have more of a bank of staff who we call upon to fill in in a more flexible way, who are on the payroll, who are not agency staff. So that is one of the themes that we're definitely looking at. But because we do have, you know, a lot of the pressure in terms and numbers of agency staff is in some of those front line services, particularly in social care, in adults and childrens, but also in this like education and things like that, where there is what could be described as a workforce crisis in some areas where, you know, there are increasing vacancies. Sorry, yeah, vacancies across London, across the country, where it's quite difficult to get to recruit the staff in some of those roles in sufficient numbers of sufficient, you know, the right skills and all rest and all that sort of thing. So we do need to be more innovative about how we go about it and that sort of thing that we are looking at. Just linked to that is one of the options of also looking at cooperating with other councils, because I guess there are examples of other councils out there looking at creating shared banks of agency staff. I think it's happened with supply teachers. So it's cooperation with councils and something else has been looked at in terms of this. It's not something I'm aware of as particularly looking at at the moment in the sense that I think as an organization, we are quite a big employer. So I think we've probably got enough economies of scale to do anything like that ourselves in the way that maybe smaller councils haven't. But certainly, you know, it's certainly something we could we could look at, but the reality of the employment markets, we're kind of in competition with our other bits of all these sets of for staff. Thanks, it's on the same point. So this committee is often told that it's the, you know, it's the children's centers and it's the adult social care where you, you have to have a certain number, you have to have certain ratios or you have to have someone to get someone else out of bed. And that's why we have to, you know, nearly one in five of our staff are not employees of LBI. But this report makes it clear that the increase is driven by admin and clerical staff. So that's very worrying because what is the story there? Are we failing to recruit admin and clerical staff? How can there be shortages in that? And when you, what we see is now that we've got 16.46% agency staff and the impact that's having on costs is really phenomenal because it says that it's 25% higher in Q3 than Q1. Yeah, I think, I mean, the, you know, certainly the, the figure of, of, we've got in terms of, you know, compared to averages across all the councils in London and so on. You're rewriting 16.46 is a bigger figure than we would feel particularly comfortable with in Q3 and it's certainly up from where it was. I mean, I think it's probably not quite the case that admin and clerical staff would have to refer to the exact bits, the report says that I know it is mentioned for sure. And I think in truth, I think admin and clerical staff are in the area where we do sure to recruit it is pretty difficult to do so. But there's a range of pressures, not just the ones you mentioned in terms of, oh, I mentioned, which is social care. But, you know, we do the HRA is a big driver of this as well. So, you know, there is in housing of, well, you know, things like damper mold in, in the housing stock where there are challenges which are well documented nationally, but also here through various conversations, including as we've had at this committee, you know, we have got, sorry to interrupt, but it does. I'll just read you a bit. 165 new agency workers were employed in Q3 than Q2. This was driven mainly by an increase in social and health care qualified and admin and clerical staff. Yeah, yeah, I understand that. Yeah. What I was trying to get across was it is certainly admin and clerical staff. Yes, that is a problem. It is most certainly the social care side of things as well. Health care qualified staff, but I'm saying there's also some other areas to which the report could elaborate on a little bit more such as where there are, sorry, where there are, you know, we are employing, I believe, upwards of 30 staff to look at damper mold issues alone, which we may need to read baseline and think about what's the permanent workforce would need for some of these things, but, you know, there are pressures with, there's pressures with finance, obviously, in terms of how we do that, but in the period at the moment, there are, you know, there are pressures which have led us to go to the agency market to fulfill those. So I just want to understand what the pressure is. Is it that people are sick at this time? Is it that we have not filled positions as they become vacant or people have retired because of financial pressures and now we're struggling to get our admin done. And it's recruitment, certainly. As I say, there are, there are pressures around. If you're asking it. Sorry, I mean, sickness is obviously low in terms of the, you know, we are sickness is obviously a relatively positive feature. Yes, I guess that's the red flags. The sickness is a relatively positive story and yet we're spending more on agency. So do we just not have enough people really day to day to manage. As I say, I think there are a range of pressures, including some cases we're taking on people for particular bits of work, but I think, yes, there is a recruit, a significant recruitment problem as I said before. Yeah. Okay, I'll just leave it with the observation that we've got nearly one in five. So it's, it's not that we've, you can't just be the people are a bit sick over winter or we need some specialist help on a particular day. It's, it's really hard. I think I'll agree with that assessment. I've seen a council o'clock has indicated, is there anyone else? Yeah, um, previous committees, we've talked about the recruitment of IT, because IT is a very expensive agency. The staff aren't there. And we've talked about training people so that we can use our own IT people. I mean, today, I was at my community stage in my ward and there's some young people there actually coming to actually assist the people using the community center with IT problems. And I believe they're working for the council. I think they're trainees in the council. And I just wondered if you can update us on how that's going. And IT is doing a bit better, actually, than it was. It was particularly in COVID, a really, really difficult area where we just couldn't recruit at all really for a whole range of roles. And it was, it was really, really challenging that we have done rather better in that space, actually. So the numbers of IT consultants are down. I can't hear an exact number, but they are definitely down. And we have managed to recruit successfully full time to a number of roles, which were previously we couldn't recruit to. And we hope to be down to single digits of IT consultants by next couple of months or so, which is positive. I mean, it is an area where we might have to take on some more. We have a new financial ledger going on. We will undoubtedly need some specialist expertise for that so that it could vary. But we have, in terms of the slanting more generalist, not generalist, but the roles that we were unable to fill properly, the permanent roles were able to fill, that is a better picture than it was certainly. It's just carry on. That's really good news. But also, just about, we talked about training, you know, employing local people into those jobs, you know, because they're very well paid jobs and just wondered how have you got any update on that? Yeah, well, certainly, apprentices and that sort of thing is something we've pushed quite hard. And we've had, again, I'm struggling with exact figures off the top of my head, but certainly we encourage apprenticeships for all of certainly the area I run. But she's resources, you know, we have that in all the different areas we try and have apprentices, including, you know, some, we've had taken on some sort of work experience. People care leave as that sort of thing in finance. It's been something that we're really, really keen on. And the director of finance is a apprentice as well, through, I'm saying that, you know, formally. So, he's, you know, he's very keen on bringing apprentices through the system. So, it is something we're keen on. And of course, corporately as well, part of the community, we're building strategies apprenticeships. So, the more that we can do, the better, with that, no question, but we need to do more, absolutely more, definitely. Thank you. I just want to come back to the agency staff, just for clarity, or maybe you might be able to give me some answers in this. Have you picked up that there could be deleted roles that are now agency staff? The short and status, no, they're absolutely should not be an obvious end is absolutely not, but that should not be deleted roles that shouldn't exist. So, it is not causing there are no strengths in any part of the council that you think, all right, I know we have to make tough financial decisions, but we've turned around, realized we actually need people to do certain things. Have those role come back as agency roles at all. Oh, it's only hope not. Can, is that something chair that we might want to get some a little bit more work done because I would like to know, unless you've got. I mean, that shouldn't be happening at all. There shouldn't be any deleted post where there is an agency staff member staff covering a deleted post. So, let's come back to you on that, but that should not be happening at all at the council. Dave's also mentioned there's certain things that we're taking on agency staff to get a specific work completed. And like that, like that, that month staff, there's significant numbers there. And as Dave says, we do need to look as part of the year going forward. Well, do we need that set of staff permanently? Do we need to read baseline some of these things? So, I think there are some unanswered questions there, but certainly that I think the point you've raised constantly is that there's a bit of red line and we do need to look into that and come back to you. Can I just follow up? I think you've just actually just touched. Example is the mode that we know there are several pieces of work that has been carried out that needs to address issues now. But we know over the years that we've had to readjust, you know, how cuts down across the council and that really for financial strains. But now those things do become a reality over a period of time with the services that people are receiving. And now we're probably thinking, right, we've got to get that going again. And are they not resourcing as agency staff? And that was the point it was trying to make. And if that's the case, can we actually look at that again, because it would be interesting for us to know it's a good learning going forward. I mean, the example I've given the downtown mode work, that's not because there was cuts made. And because, but it's because there was specific issue which had to be addressed very, very quickly. But I take your point. Councillor PANDALL. Just reading on page 99 the take-off of three places by low income families, children with special education, cases of needs or disabilities and children who are looked after is lower than the rate taken up during the same period last year. I know it says there's a plan in place and we expect to be back on track by the target by summer. But I'd like to know what that plan is and why is it that these families, if it's free for them, what is it that we're not doing? I know there's signs all over this and to come and get your free place. But what is it that is stopping these families to accessing this free place? What can we do more and why is this happening? Can I jump in because it is something that's come up in children scrutiny. And it is, I think part of the plan is engaging with specific communities who, for cultural reasons, don't always feel comfortable handing over their kids ages, you know, two, three. So that's going out into those communities. I think it's part of its COVID recovery as well. People have been at home and they've kind of lost those connections. So it is a KPI and I can pick it up with the next chair of children services scrutiny to make sure it is continually looked up. I've just got two questions and I suggest we quickly wrap this and then we'll quickly move on. So just the first one is the complaints and how much A it seems to be on the increase and it seems to be being driven by housing. And I just want to, I guess, flag it as a concern and see what your comments are around what actions have been taken. And then the other was actually around the challenge that was identified on page 107, just around data quality. And that seems to be causing issues across several teams around actually producing KPI's. I know none of those KPI's actually seem to be ones that come to this committee, but I think it's just joining the dots that there appears to be a data quality issue across the borough across the council. And so again, I'd just like to understand a bit what is that and is, are we able to resourcing some really basic tech that's needed to capture the data. Yeah, I can mention something about the data quality challenges. I think it's actually more of an evolving environment. So it's more that new methodologies or new kind of with being asked for new data. And there's new methodologies need to be put in place. It's kind of it's just getting it's getting everything in place to then be able to report that new sets of those new sets of data. But then there are challenges in getting good data, because, you know, they're complex areas, particularly around kind of safeguarding or tenancy satisfaction and these kind of areas. So it's all the staff are there. The capacity is there. It's just a matter of time to get in place meaningful and quality solutions that we can get that kind of state to provide it all. And if we talk about time, is it a time scale, because I can sort of accept you need to get things to embed and it takes a bit of time. But I guess my concern is if there's drift and then suddenly certain capabilities were just completely blind on for like over a year, two years, that sort of thing. And that's when you can't see what's happening. No, I wouldn't say that's that's the cases is on new stuff that's coming into place. Yeah, I can get more details to you on that kind of thing, but I would say it kind of has overseen the performance that that's not concerned that there's that drift. Yeah, it's just not matter just kind of getting in place. And then my first question I think is to Council Ward is just about the rising complaints, particularly in housing. So there's what action has been taken to try and resolve those complaints before they become complaints. Yeah, absolutely. And no, I don't often says an excuse then it vanishes the imagination, but one of the big factors in the rising complaints, particularly in housing, is bringing in the albums from the previous PFI contract. We saw immediately that there was a spike in inquiries, a spike in repairs inquiries. And when you have more and more and more inquiries and repairs to do that will lead to also a spike in complaints, that still shouldn't be happening. But I think the transition from the PFI has been difficult. And despite our best efforts, we all know there were huge problems in that particular contract and huge problems with the stock that we received back. And that said, that's all in the past night, those ones are in house and you're absolutely right. I mean, 81% of these ones complaints, it's, it's a huge number for housing. I think it goes back to what I've said before. This is about doing the simple things very, very well, and particularly these, the straightforward repairs and straightforward inquiries being answered quickly and satisfactorily. It goes back to making sure that the resident experience is, needs to be absolutely the top priority for the next year. And if, I mean, we've all had experiences as members, where a really, really simple transactional thing, whether it can be housing, but all the directors have this as well. A very, very simple transactional thing just hasn't been done. The resident eventually just gives up and writes to their local counselor, and the local counselor gets very, very mad and writes to the corporate director. And it goes through all that just to get a simple transactional thing done. We have to stamp that out. And that's what the rest experience program is all about. And I'd be, I would be keen to come back to the committee on another date about how the rest experience programs go. I'm sure the next general invite. Brilliant, unless there's any burning questions, I stress to move on so that we finish our sense of time this evening. So thanks very much. So next, we are moving on to the update on the council transformation projects, and we've got our offices online. I'll just ask you both don't mind doing some introductions. Thank you. Good evening, everyone. Thank you, Chair for allowing us to join virtually appreciate that. I'm Raj Chand and the corporate director of community engagement and wellbeing and transformation services in my directorate. And then I'll just do a very quick intro and then we'll go straight into the presentation chair if that's okay. I was just going to say, so this item, I think we've allowed up to 30 minutes. I'm not actually sure we might need that long, but up to five minutes for you presenting. You don't, as you might have heard, don't feel the need to use all the time if you don't need to. I think the slides and the presentation actually incredibly detailed. And then we'll have some questions just about the, I guess, projects today and what's happened up until now with them. Sure. Sure. Sure. Introduce yourself, please. Yeah, I'll introduce. Good evening, everyone. My name is Cherise Monero. I'm the assistant director for transformation based in the community engagement and wellbeing directorates. Sure. So the projects that we're just going to run through what I just wanted to sort of mention, obviously the transformation services, a organization corporate service that sits in community engagement and wellbeing and supports and enables specialist projects within with service specialist as well. So Cherise will run through a number of those, and we have to take any questions for any specific projects and also just a very quick sort of run through in terms of each project, what the next steps are, what the actions are and where things are out. We don't like to say we don't need to go into a lot of detail, there's a lot of detail on the slides, but happy to take any questions on any particular projects. So I will hand over to Cherise to take us through the presentation. Great. Thank you, Raj. I hope that everyone can hear me clearly and can see the slides on screen. But as I said, I'll try and be as succinct as possible, because as you said, Cher, there's quite a lot of comprehensive detail in each of the slides. So, as alluded, we are a transformation resource that cuts across the council. A lot of the work that we do is around delivery of the corporate 2030 plan. So those key strategic missions, delivery that are up to our 2030 strategic framework. Currently, the transformation team are supporting around 13 transformation projects and programs that are council-wide. And a lot of those are very much worldwide and very much pivoted towards fundamentally improving outcomes for our residents across islington. So in this deck, as you would have seen, I've really concentrated on a high-level overview, which I will take you through in a second, and then I've deep-dived into a range of thematic programs that I think will be of interest and are diverse. This just gives you an indication at a very high level as to the functionality of the resource. And one of the key things for us is about driving transformation programs forwards and really taking them right through from very early conceptual stage and right through to co-design, delivery and implementation. So we do that transformative cycle all the way through, which I think is great. So we really get the opportunity to really cross fertilize ideas, but also embed them into practice. One of the key things I want to say about the team is that we're not just doing transformation or innovation for innovation sake, a lot of the programs that we're developing and leading on are almost legacy projects and programs where we want to create blueprints that deliver system change for residents, but also ideas and ways of working that we can embed across practice across the Council. So in many ways, we're looking at how we can kind of future proof and sustain the organization going forward. So it's not just, you know, a means to an end or we're just doing this project. It really is about really looking either entrepreneurially or inevitably at, you know, different ways of working and blueprints that we can hopefully embed across other metrics in the organization and that we can learn practice from. I'm not going to go into major detail on this slide because, as I said, you've had the slide deck and you've been able to appraise yourself. The information, but what I've done here is really try to summarize what the initial originating issue was that we were essentially trying to solve, and what are the key transformative aims and objectives that we're trying to utilize to address that problem. And very often with a lot of the programs that we are leading on is it's in in regards to increased trajectory in demand that we've seen rise significantly if I look at the first transformation program there around what we know that there are multi factorial reasons why demand has increased nationally over the last 10 years, particularly in relation to autism and ADHD, but certainly we are strengthening and building and reengineering our system so that they're resilient and able to respond to that demand. The access is linked and hubs is something that is a more of a deep dive analysis but again that's about delivering early intervention and prevention at the front door of communities so that we are able to offer them a much more holistic person centred service. So really listening to residents around access is linked and hubs which is about not having them repeat their story not having to travel across the borough to get support and really reducing those multiple touch points that we know often are very infuriating when they just need rudimentary forms of support. And then as I said, you know, the latter two programs around young black men again is responding to endemic issues and needs disproportionately within the borough but we also know that there is a disproportionate multiple deprivation and multiple risk affecting that particular demographic and equally with a Somali work so there is some real, I think really brilliant pieces of work within here where we're really trying to tackle wider societal issues. And I hope that's certainly come through in in the slide deck to date. In terms of the next steps of delivery, again, if we go through some of the achievements that we've done within the last 12 months. Again, I'm just picking out some standout pieces here because I know that we are restricted in terms of time. But just in terms of, you know, our access is linked and hubs we launched that. We're at the launch on the 13th of September, you know, it was a kind of experimental endeavor in some ways but we really did scrutinize our testing period. And we've been open for the last seven months now and the demand speaks for itself. And we are starting to really galvanize intelligence about what residents are coming to us with which is no surprise around housing, mental distress, and well being debt and money and it's no surprise in terms of the exasperation around the cost of living. And then just some other ones that I just want to bring your attention to, obviously young black men and mental health is an external funded program, far more entrepreneurial approaches utilize there to deliver a program of multifaceted benefit, but certainly in the context of that program that's about tackling long term inequalities, but delivering it with external funding opportunities there. And I guess the final one that I just wanted to highlight is we are doing such a significant amount of work around our send transitions for colleagues who know we did incredibly well. In our last send inspection in November 21, but one of the areas for us that we did need to accelerate and really drive forward was really reengineering our response to children, making that transition from adolescence to adulthood to make sure that they have that gap around person centered care so that they're able to thrive and the services are integrated to ensure that delivery. And there's just a few examples here that exemplify where savings have been achieved, particularly around where we've had to redesign services or carry out restructures. There's been lean development models that we've had to work with teams around and we've been able to achieve and quite significant savings in relation to that. I'm going to go into any detail on the overviews, because I think that if you've been had the opportunity to appraise yourself of the deck how I've set them out is really succinct about the problem we're trying to solve what's the vision for the transformation program. And what are the key aims and objectives that we need to address this. What is our progress status to date. And what I've given you is a really kind of comprehensive plan of action. You know, earlier in the conversation I heard Council of Bashir talk about tangible outcomes and delivery milestones. So what I've tried to exemplify here is give you a real snapshot of the work and what we're doing, but also a forward lens into what we're actually delivering and buy when, and some of the the overviews where the programs are far more mature in delivery. I've also set out what the impact and outcomes that we want to achieve, and subsequently how we will measure that impact and when they will be realized and why is that fundamental important it gives you that narrative in terms of that impact and outcomes because essentially there's a so what question, you know, why are you delivering these projects and programs. What's the significant difference, what's the added cost benefit analysis, what's the value for money, but equally what's the impact and the outcomes of the residents so what I've articulated here is a real snapshot of what we're doing, but also a roadmap in terms of milestones and delivery and also picking up some of those points around savings and efficiencies. And what I will finalize on is saying, particularly in the work that we're doing around send, you know, it's it's states that we've had a 250% increase. Since 2015 we've got around 56 schools in islington 24,000 pupils. We know that in the next seven years that demand is going to increase. And we just need to make sure that we are being agile and acutely strategic in using our intelligence and evidence base to really develop more demand strategies for the, for the sort of future. So I think a lot of the programs that we're delivering on the next phase is really scrutinizing that level of what's the value for money, what's our demand, how are we using predictive analytics to sense check what our demand is going to be in the future and then how are we then building those very intuitive and resilient systems because we know that, you know, as many councils have expressed that, you know, funding grants are reducing we're living in an economically reductionless environment. So therefore we need to be able to modernize and our delivery needs to be compatible with that changing economic context. I'm going to finalize there, because as I said, for me to go into each individual program, it will take quite a lot of time. But I'm hoping that the questions from the committee will allow me to reflect and deep dive into those areas anyway so I will pause their chair. Any questions from the committee at council o'clock? Yeah, thanks very much for that. And I was at the launch of the first access isn't in help and it's good to hear that it's in progress and be good to have some sort of success, you know, what sort of success rate you're getting regarding people, you know, not having to repeat their story all the time. That is a really good goal from that. And the other thing that came out of one of the things that you mentioned in your presentation about the transition from young people, young people's social care into adult social care. And that in the health and social care scrutiny committee that came up actually as a problem that people were not getting, it was a difficulty they were hitting that they weren't getting responses to the needs and they were having trouble transitioning. So it's really good that you've picked that up and be good to have some sort of update on that as well. Should I come back to that question? Yeah. Yeah, do you want to come in there Raj first. Yeah, thank you. So just on the access is getting to help, um, Councilor, certainly the feedback that we're getting and there's something listed in the performance indicators as well around the satisfaction rate being, I think it was at 93%. Which is really good considering the length of time that that hub, the hubs have been open. So I think the key thing really is how we are putting our resources into that front line to be able to deal with resident queries as they come in in. And I guess what I just wanted to sort of outline also was that we don't always get residents presenting themselves with just one issue. And we're finding more and more now that residents coming through those draws face to face tend to have multiple issues that they need some support and assistance on. So the key thing is how we work in collaboratively with service areas in order to make sure that we can get that resident, the right support at the right time. Yeah, thank you, Raj. I guess just following on from that, just to pick up the points. Just around the, the same transition work, if I may. So, in relation to that area. Yes, I think that we've done some really excellent work there. I think one of the key issues for us was making sure that young people were able to transition effectively. And certainly one of the key areas is around the earlier identification of transition. So in this reengineered system what we're looking at is identifying children around age 14. And we've got a pre assessment tool now so that enables us to really be able to scrutinize what their needs are at 14 and then do some predictive analytics about what the types of needs that they will require going forward. And then ensuring that we have that real close alignment with adults and children working together effectively. I think what we essentially want to see is that when children do make that transition. You know, after their 17th birthday that we have integrated care packages of support that are around housing, but equally around you mentioned health mental health, so that we're really education and employment. What we're looking at within the progression to adulthood is that what does it look like for a child transition into adulthood to thrive. That's our starting point. What are the significant outcomes that we want to see. We want to ensure that children have that right health and well being. We want to ensure that if appropriate that they have the right housing and shelter that they have access to the right education and employment opportunities. And in order to do that you need to have a well developed and mature transition system and the way that we've done it. Within Islington is that children's and adult services are working very closely together but we're also working with our broader partnership. And one of the other significant step change for us is we've redesigned the send local offer, so that parents and carers have a really important role to play in their children's transition. That's another area for us that we've completely co designed that local send offer at transition so that parents and carers have access to not only the support that's available for them, but how they can access it as well. So, that's been a really important step change. And as I said, you know, for us our guiding light is about what would we want to see for all of our children. If we were imagining that 24,000 of our pupils, not all of them will have the complexity of need that will require transition but certainly, you know, 10 to 20% of them may do. What does a good transition look like and subsequently post that transition. What does thriving young adults look like in Islington and subsequently go on to age well. So that's our guiding light. Thank you very much for a very comprehensive answer. Thank you for your presentation. And I just want to say, section three, where I've read about the Somali community plan. I'm really, really happy to hear that you're working with a god bless and foundation. I know of this charity. I work with a sister. She's an amazing person and she is key in trying to get this across. With the Somali community that I work quite closely with, what I'd like to address here is there is lots of issues around housing for many of our residents in Islington. They're specifically for the Somali community because this community isn't neglected. They feel abandoned. Their voice is not her. My sisters walk around Islington and they're experiencing slumber phobia, which they do not report. Purely because they don't have confidence in the council in our workers and they are often ignored. So I'm glad that this is going through, but I would like to see some tangible because we keep talking about housing and I understand we don't have enough homes for a lot of our residents, but how are you going to concentrate to try and uplift this community that they do not feel that they are neglected. I'm just pretty. I'm just really conscious of time so can I ask you to be a succinct and direct possible because there's more members who want to ask questions and we're just going to run out of time. Thank you. Yeah, should I take that one. I'll take that one very quickly. I guess what's of the essence and counselor is about tangible acceleration and delivery of outcomes. And I think one of the things that we're really conscious of is making sure that this is very much a meaningfully community led response and that we're developing solutions that are community led. And what I want to say I guess in reassurance is that we do recognize that there is, you know, lots of frustration. There's lots of discontent, discontentment amongst the community, and it's a legacy issue that has been going on for some time. So what we're really working towards with this particular plan is really pivoting towards understanding what the community needs, and then subsequently designing what those solutions will be in terms of key deliverables. One of the things is about, you know, having sustainable youth provision that's Somali centric for our young people, Galbi is a fantastic organization, but we commissioned them for a very short period of time. We need to have something that's long term and sustaining for them, and that's recognized not just in youth centers but also outreach, we need to be proactive with the community in that respect as well. One of the key things that I just wanted to mention was two things really one was around housing because we do have a housing event that's coming up this Saturday so if colleagues have an opportunity to attend. We do have a housing event on the 18th of May, and that is really designed to start that conversation about what needs to be different what type of support is required we're not going to magic. We have a housing stop, but I know that there is lots of issues around just basic fundamental housing inquiries that are not always met, and how we can kind of improve living conditions, significant numbers of Somali community and living in overcrowded conditions. The final point for me is that this is this contentment what we are working to do is restore and rebuild that trust by really being clear about what we're intending to deliver, not over promising and being proportionate about our response. But also ensuring that we are delivering some quick wins within the community and I think that the youth offer and some of the other areas that I've identified around the North hub, particularly if we are able to execute the North hub. We will be a site where you will be able to report some of those low level and complaints about feeling unsafe because there is a domain within the Northern hub offer around community safety, and that will be a central place in the North part of the borough where we know there's a high concentration of Somali community. So, I think in answer to your question, yes, yes, yes, and we are working at pace to be able to deliver something tangible. Thank you so much for your work, Shari. It's really impressive. And I really like the way you've done the deck, particularly how you've made it clear how impact will be measured. So thank you and well done. Just a couple of quick questions on the access islington hubs. There's so far been 41,000 resident visits. That's sort of mind blowing. It'd be really nice to imagine that we no need for Councillor surgeries. Actually, people can so maybe that will be terrific. But I wonder you also mentioned in your deck that there's a case management system. So I just wonder if that case management system can kind of produce like a lovely pie chart showing of the, you know, what percentage were housing, what were mental health, what were to do with ASP. You know, that would be so interesting. The other thing I wanted to ask was the purpose of the access islington hubs are to resolve people's problems, but also to tackle social isolation. So I was just wondering, as well as going there and getting direct help. Is there stuff people can do that? Can they do stuff with their kids? Can they hang out? Can you go on the internet? Can you have a cup of tea? That's it. Raj might want to come in there first. I'll come in about the tea. I have mixed views on that, but anyway, go for it Raj. And yeah, Councillor, I think in terms of the breakdown of the types of support that people are coming in for all. Yes, we absolutely do collect that. So we've got the figures and we've got the data and we continue to collect that because I think what's really important is how that data will then further sort of support the model as we roll this out. What we've got to remember is we need to make sure that we are providing a fit for purpose service and residents needs are changing constantly as we know we've just come. You know, still in cost of living crisis, but also mental health has been on the increase as well. I think the model really what we are building in the resident hub in the in the actual access to LinkedIn hubs are around working with our partners and these partners in terms of the support and the services that they provide, so that what it's not just about the Council doing their bit but also understanding where there is the additional need and actually making sure that we can either refer in or make contact on behalf of the residents into some of those VCS organizations that can help with things like isolation and mental health and low level sort of issues there as well so it's a it's the plan is as we build the hubs as we as we understand the demand as we kind of focusing on what the needs are. So we build those models moving forward and Cherie's mentioned the Northern hub and certainly, you know, Council will be aware that that is with our VCS partners, man of garden, and there will be a kind of a diverse model there as well, based around the demographic. So I think we just need to make sure that whatever we're offering from a resident experience perspective and got Council Award there who who who is heavily involved in this, as well, around, we are building the service around what residents needs. So it's not about, I think it's not what customer services residents service accounts is used to be is you have a certain offer, and that was it, that that's not how it is we really have to be quite agile with the offer that we are able to provide to our residents. I think that covers off everything. I just wanted to just finalize and say that we do have a pie chart slide that I'm more than happy to send on that does give a breakdown of the number of visits and what they are apportioned to the top is around housing mental distress and well being debt, which is not surprising and also work. So those are the kind of key top ones that we're looking at. The final points was just around the connector sessions. We've implemented a connector session model which enables us to spend more time with the residents. So that we're able to sign post them into the right support. Sometimes it takes a couple of visits from residents to be able to make. And we've had 926 connector sessions since the hubs have been open since September. So that demonstrates and exemplifies that we're reaching residents with the most complex needs and trying to do that wraparound support around the hot drinks. I must say that there's been ambivalent feelings about that if it was down to me and I was in charge of these hubs. Absolutely. But from a health safety regulation point of view, we can offer water, which is not the same as hot drinks. But certainly what we've tried to create and certainly my vision was for the access is lint and hubs was that they would almost resemble a community living room, and so that you were able to come there and have that social connection and build those relationships with other residents so that it becomes more of a kind of place based network. So that it helps to reduce that isolation that we know that often many of our residents do experience. And another part of the service that we are developing which then helps to reduce some of that isolation is we will have an outreach by a lingual service that will be delivered from the northern hub. So that is aimed at reaching some of those communities that perhaps wouldn't always cross the threshold into coming into face to face services. So again, it's really thinking very creatively and very thoughtfully about what the resident journey is and how they access support when they access support and sometimes residents need that little bit of hand holding, but I think overall, and the articulation around the hubs is that so far so good. I think the next phase is about really analyzing how we are delivering early help and support and how that is helping to reduce need and risk escalation into statutory services that we know are far more costly intervention so that's the next piece of the work that the team are undertaking. Thank you very much for that. The time is ticking on so I suggest we move on so thank you very much for your input. Right, we're now moving on to item C4 which is a complex ASB screen review and it's our final report. So quickly, well, I was not saying to introduce it, you should all hopefully know quite well. So this is what we've been working on over the last year if you've, if you have forgotten. And again, I want to put on records to thank you very much to all the members who've been very actively involved, including attend a workshop where we together worked up the 10 recommendations. We've actually got a very good robust piece of work and I'd like to also put on my code, thank you very much for all of the organizing of external evidence gathering. I think you're the only one who went to everything out of all of us and for actually writing the report and I think it's a really great piece of work. And I think it actually shows council offices and council's working together really well to hopefully have something that we can give a bit of time to the executive with the scrutiny changes that are coming next year. This will actually, the 12 month, the various report backs will go to councilor Jackson's new homes and communities committee so I hope you take this report as a labour of love and cherish it. Are there any comments or anything else, any questions or anything want to change in the report, I hope not. Excellent work. Thank you. Yeah. Great. Which case do I need to do? Is that formally agreed? Oh, you're formally agreed. Are we great? Are we happy with it? Yeah, great fabulous Berlin. Right, moving on to the item C5, which is the annual report of the council's scrutiny committees. This was in the papers and which is short summary of what all the other scrutiny committees have done. I'm a list conscious of time, but I will offer up to the chairs. If there's anything you want to say about your screening this year, you can have a maximum minute. Do you want to say anything? Only that the reviews are very good covers it. Thank you for the environment committee back. I'll review on housing new build was kind of quite intense and interesting, but I think at the end, I think we've got a recommendation that could really make a bit of a change around that area. So, yeah, it was an interesting, quite intense one, but we got there at the end. Now I feel obliged to say something, but so I will say something because it pertains to discussion we had about agency stuff. We had a really good evidence gathering session with children, social workers, and they all spoke very well of liking the culture of Islington. But one of them spoke up to say she was an agency worker. She's worked here for years. She trained here. She simply earns a lot more money for doing the same job. And that is the reality of it. And that is something that will have to be grasped. Thanks very much. And that's any of the other members I don't need to say, then let's just move on. Right, item C6, the monitoring items. So we have the council forward plan. Any questions? The scrutiny review. Okay, that's done. That doesn't need to be, I don't need to address that verbal updates from committee chairs assume you don't have anything further to add there. And then the work program, which is effectively complete other than an initial sketching out of what will be at the first meeting of the next committee when this all starts again. Any questions, final comments? Councilor Pandor, I would just like to say a big thank you to the chair of children's. I've obviously sit on that committee and you've been amazing and I've learned so much over the two years that you have been chairing and you've always given me space to talk and raise my concerns. Thank you for chairing that so well and also to Flora for chairing this so marvellously well and giving me the chance and space to talk and I know that I've grown as a person. So thank you, you're so much appreciated. Thank you. I was just going to say that I'd like to echo Councillor Pandor's comments. Really thanks very much for all your work on this committee and, you know, to have that minute. Thank you very much and it's all made very easy, thanks to very diligent members, so thank you. I'm Jason. No, I'm not too sure, are we, are you guys leaving the country or what is going on? Jason, I don't sit on your committee so I can't really comment on that. If there's nothing more, then we can finish the meeting and thank you very much for attending. Yeah, finish at 9.25 which is fine necessarily than I said we would. Thank you.