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I'm really sorry about this. I'm having some tech issues. My laptop completely froze so I've gone into my iPad and it's now asking me to change my passcode. So, I'll be with you as soon as I can. Tech just now. So, I will read out the formal bit at the beginning. So, welcome everyone. Welcome to our new members, Councillor Cowdy and we've got Councillor Osler subbing in. So, nice to see you. Oh, and Councillor Staniforth also subbing in. So, first of all, welcome. The meeting is being held in the Dean of Guild Courthouse in City Chambers, High Street, and Edinburgh and remotely by Microsoft Teams. It will be filmed for live and subsequent broadcast via Council's website. The Council is data controller under the General Data Protection Regulation and Data Protection Act 2018. We broadcast Council meetings to fulfill our public task obligation to enable members of the public to observe the democratic process. Data collected during this webcast will be retained in accordance with the Council's published policy. Okay, so version three of the meeting papers are published on the 31st of May, 2024. Motions and amendments have been circulated electronically. For members joining online, if you could please use the hands-up function to indicate to the convener that you wish to speak. If members are planning to substitute for particular items or a particular point, please make this clear to the convener by confirming who has left and who has joined the meeting. Please note that under standing order 2215, each item is subject to a 40-minute time limit unless agreed by committee under order of business. The convener has discretion to allow proceedings to continue beyond this time limit. Shall I continue? Come here. Yes. The next item is item 2.1, declarations of interest. The Council's Code of Conduct requires members to publicly declare interests in the items being considered at the meeting. These interests can be financial or non-financial. Councilor Malarke. Yeah, it's a transparency statement, and it's non-financial. And it's in item-- This is really good. I've written a note, but I can't get it up-- 8.7 as a director of the improvement service, which is not a Council appointment, but I think it's because they've done-- they've produced the benchmarking framework. I think it would just be transparent to note that. I'm a very new director. Okay, Councillor Miller. Councillor Meyeru has supported something that I didn't, and I've also joined the board of the improvement service, so I'll make the exact same transparency statement. Thank you so much. Mr. King's now advising that because it's through COSLO, it's covered under our declaration of interest. Okay, well, transparency statement's always welcome. I can't see any others. I think we're good to move on, Andre. Okay, so 3.1 is deputations. There are no deputations submitted to today's meeting, so that takes us to Item 4.1, which is the minutes of the 7th of May, 2024, and these are submitted for approval as a correct record. Can they be agreed?

• Please. - Thank you. So the next item is Item 5.1, which is the outstanding actions. We have, I think it's four actions recommended for closure. Those are Action 4, Action 6, Action 8, and Action 9. Are there any comments? I had a couple, so I wanted to ask about Action 6. So we're closing this because it's been put onto the internal audit plan, but I wondered if we should just keep it open until we get the audit, and that gives us a reminder of what we've asked for. So I personally would rather not close Action 6 at the moment. And then the other one, and we'll get to this next, but I don't know how Councillor Jenkinson feels about Action 9, but personally I don't feel like the business bulletin item actually does meet the times of the motion that we agreed 'cause it's just the motion. It's not the actual briefing note that Councillor Jenkinson had requested be put. So it's not public. So we've had something circulated to us as Councillors, but actually I think there was a request for some public information in the business bulletin item. So I would close that, and then I think we can, I'm sorry, agree not to close that, and then pick that up in the next item on the business bulletin if Councillor Jenkinson's happy with that. Yeah, so we did get a briefing. The business bulletin is just the motion with no detail, but there is detail within the report, which kind of covers the topic, but I'm happy to, I'm maybe happy to leave it open, and then we can kind of debate and agree whether or not it's been, it is properly in the public domain if it can be. Yeah, okay, so if we leave it open, and then we can close it next time if we're happy to do that. Okay. Okay, so the next item is item 6.1, the work programme, and the committee is asked to note the work programme. Can that be noted? Thank you. Item 7.1 is the business bulletin, and this has been submitted for noting. So on this, I think it's quite clear, actually, in the business bulletin that we've asked for a briefing, or information to be put in the business bulletin in the public domain, and actually we've just had the motion that we agreed to put in the business bulletin, so I would like to continue this to have that update put into the business bulletin for the next committee if everyone's happy, just because we've asked for it and it should be public. I'd be happier with that as well, because I do think it should be in the public domain, if it can be, and I think that was the context of the motion, that if there was nothing commercially sensitive, then it should be clear in our response to a motion, which we agreed as a committee. Yeah, I just think in terms of governance, we should do what we've agreed, so okay, that's great, and that's been agreed. Other than that, there's no questions or anything on the business bulletin. Okay, so the next item is Item 8.1, the Internal Audit Update Report, June 2024. Just to remind members that there is a B-Agenda appendix to this item, we have an SMP group addendum and a green group addendum, and we have Laura Calder and Hannah Ross speaking to this report. Okay, is there anything you wanted to add, Laura? Is there anything-- I'll give you a moment, Hannah, but to see if there's anything that you wanted to add at all. No? Just happy to take questions. Okay, are there any questions on this report? Councillor Cowie. Thank you very much. It was really, as a new person here, seeing this for the first time, a sort of overview question of the 42 points on the plan. If you take away the three advisories and GRBV, you're left with 32. About a third are coming out in red, about half are coming out in amber, and 16 coming out in green, and I am wondering what is a reasonable ambition? I was a bit concerned that about a third were coming out in red, so I was wondering if there was a view on what would be a reasonable ambition? What are we hoping? I'm happy to take that first of all, Councillor Cowie, so I'm Laura Calder, the Head of Internal Audit. I think a really important message is not to get too hung up in the colours of audits because actually audit looks at risk, and it's really important that we are looking at the right areas. Quite often, the areas that we are looking at could be emerging pieces of work, they could be something that's new for the council. So you're likely to find more issues as we work through that. Having said that, you do want to get the right balance between red, amber and green, and if we verge towards more red, ultimately what that means is the annual opinion, which we bring to committee in September, could potentially be on the red side. So I think for the last two years, we've had an amber annual opinion. Previously to that, for about three or four years, we had a red annual opinion. So we've kind of been around there. It's not just the colour of the audits that make that annual opinion. There's a number of different other things that we take into consideration as we bring that opinion together. So I want to be really clear. I don't think any members want to see an audit plan full of green because that would mean the audit aren't looking at the right things. It would mean potentially that we're not going deep enough and we're not doing enough work. We're trying to get the balance between the ambers and reds. And if I may, a quick follow-up just on that. What would you think would be a reasonable balance? I accept exactly what you're saying. We don't want all greens. We certainly don't want all reds. That balance, I mean, a 10% red would be a good outcome. But would you think 20% reds would be a good outcome as well or a reasonable outcome? So if we're doing around 30 audits for the council, 10% red would be three audits red. I don't think that's reasonable actually. I think we probably would look towards potentially around 25% red would still be reasonable given the areas of risk that we're looking at and given some of the challenges that the council faces. So I think I would look at it like that. Perfect. Thank you very much. Councillor Osler. I think actually Councillor Kumar was before me. If you want to take her online, I'll go afterwards if she'd like to go first. Okay. Thanks, Councillor Osler. Councillor Kumar. Thank you very much. Thank you. Law review report. I'm focusing on the housing voids. I'm not sure. Could we know if you try to take them in order? I should have said this. Because it's such a huge report with so many different components. What I would normally do, and it's because I'm distracted by various melting bits of tech in front of me. What we'd normally do is do the main report and then go through each of the audits because they're almost like individual reports in themselves rather than jumping around between them. So if it's on the voids, Councillor Kumar, I'll come back to you if that's okay. Perfect. Thank you. Okay. Councillor Osler. Yeah. Thank you very much indeed. I'm obviously not a usual member of GRVB. I'm particularly interested in sort of I think it's 19 housing stock condition, tenant safety, damp and malt. Obviously, that's very, very good news, the fact that that has gone green. Huge amounts of work has been done on this and a lot of attention. How confident are we that it will continue to be green and more work be done going forward on this? So we're still following up some of the actions in that and so they're in progress. I do actually think in terms of confidence, it's a question for Sarah perhaps to answer in the service. When that report came to committee, I believe it was March potentially that it came to committee, we were really clear that we'd done the audit work between August and October last year, so the audit work represented that position at the time. There were a few questions at the time about whether the outcome of the audit reflected the experience of some of the residents in the city, so I think Sarah would be able to give an update on how that's continuing. Thank you, thanks for the question. There's been huge amount of work done in terms of establishing that dampness team. I think the resources that we've pooled now around that dampness team's been significant in terms of the progress that we've made. I think the last action actually, audit action from the dampness audit was closed last week, so I think we're now clear in terms of what's been picked up through the audit, but definitely there is obviously ongoing monitoring and improvement under way. It's not perfect, and there's obviously a lot of work still to be done operationally, but we've just recruited for some further posts into the dampness team, so feeling really positive about that. Are there any other questions on the main report? I think I possibly have one on key themes, if no one else has got any questions. This is probably for Laura, actually. It's around the processes and policies, and we had discussion about this last time, and that processes are kind of separate from policies, and that actually we think that we've probably got quite good controls in terms of managing policies, but we're not really very confident that we're looking at processes underneath that, and I wondered, I feel like as a committee that's something we need to do something about, but I'm not entirely sure what, and I think maybe this is something for the annual audit report to think about, but I just wondered if you had any kind of thoughts on that for just now. So following the feedback from committee, we did update this report, actually, to say that we only found one policy-specific related issue when we did the audits that were carried out between Main June, and the rest of the issues were related to procedures, which are detailed there. From an audit methodology point of view, we've actually split that now in our system, so the team will record separately what the issues are with policies and separately the issues with procedures, so that will help us to keep picking that up. In the annual report, I will pick these things out, and we will pick out the various things that we've pulled out through the audits, and we'll strengthen the recommendations that we've made throughout the year. I do think it's one for the executive directors to take forward in their service areas. I have said that to some of the service directors when we've did audits, that if they don't get a handle on some of these things, then audits will continue to raise the same things again and again. So if you read the key themes that we're bringing up here, things like not having end-to-end processes, not having clear direction, a lack of training, things like that, if we don't get a handle on that, we will continue to bring these things up. And I think I have said this before, but I think it's worthwhile repeating, that people might think that policies and procedures aren't important, but actually they provide direction for officers on how to do the work. What we do find is that officers have done the job for a long time, so they don't think that a documented procedure is required. But roles change, people change, we have new staff coming in, and I think the really important thing for me is, if someone started on the first day of a job and they've not got something to follow, then that is when people start to pick up bad habits, things start to be done in the way they've been done. So I think the strong message from me is that we do need to get a handle on, making sure that procedures are documented, they're followed, they're kept up to date, and that we have quality assurance that makes sure that actually people are doing what the procedures say. That's helpful, thank you. So, Councillor Kumar, I assume this isn't on voids, this is on the… I'll bring you in and then I've got Councillor Jenkins… Thank you, Carina. It was actually supplementary to your question. So, Laura, one of the things that you've reported on key themes is around quality assurance and how that was a key theme for all of the FIFO audits, and I know you've spoken a lot about getting a handle on things. I was just trying to understand what are we going to do going forward in terms of the data validation. It just seems that it is across so many different areas. So what are the things that you are advising other directors as well, or will there be consistency, I suppose, because if we don't understand that just now, I'm afraid that quality assurance will remain a key issue on all audits going forward. So could you expand on that a little bit? Thank you. So, quality assurance, when we raise findings, part of my job is to make sure that we're creating consistency across the findings. So hopefully members do see that when we see findings being raised, they're quite often similar wording to try and create that consistency across the audits. But supplement to that, it's important to remember that each audit is unique in the process they need. So if we just have the same wording, then potentially we might not be addressing the risks in that area. Quality assurance shouldn't be difficult, and I'm not trying to downplay it, but it shouldn't be difficult. Procedures are there, it should be a sample that people are doing to check. We're not saying that every single piece of work that someone does needs to be checked, or every piece, but there needs to be a sample. Ideally, it really needs to be tackled from management. They need to have an approach to it. We will keep raising it in audits. I do think that senior management teams, potentially some of the teams from audits need to be raised. We do go to the risk committees for each directorate, but potentially we need to have a bit more of a focus. I think though that I need to be really clear that I don't think this is something for audit to fix. I think that we are raising the findings, and we are very clear in our recommendations, and that management, you know, they give us their management actions for them. The learning needs to come from within the services. We are here, we're here to support people. If people need that support, we're happy to come in and give extra support. Hi. Sorry. I've just had this report blocked. It just came up as blocked through the – CGI have blocked me from reading the report that I was just reading. So hopefully I'll get that fixed on another device. So I had a number of names. So Councillor Jenkinson. Thanks, Camino. Just kind of picking up on the points that Laura was making in regards to policies and procedures, because we're talking about the main report, and it's a common theme that kind of comes out audit after audit after audit. And I've kind of sat on here now for a couple of years, so you do get a sense of the pinch points. One of the other themes that kind of comes out from time to time, but is actually linked is records management. So it's fine having even good policies and procedures in place, but unless they're regularly tested and signed off and kept up to date, to pick up on your point about new people coming into the organisation being assisted with training, if it isn't up to date, it's not really helpful. So I think the observation I suppose I'm making is that these things are kind of hand in glove between policies, procedures and the management of that as well, and that's a good, robust record management system. And it does come up from audit to audit, and I think that that's a kind of general observation, and I think if we're able to encourage that to be a problem to be solved, then I think it will make the pain of internal audit breathing down the necks of council officers slightly easier. So just to quickly come back on that, when we did the policies in policy management framework audit a number of years ago, we looked at policies and procedures as part of that. Gavin's team did a toolkit which is available on the ORB, that's her internet, that sets out what a policy and a procedure and what a process note will be. So the tools are there I think, and there's some templates. I think the real important thing to talk about in reference to the keeping it up to date, one of the things we were really clear about when we did the audit was we wouldn't put an arbitrary date on updating a policy or a procedure. Now, some policies need to be updated annually because they're linked to regulatory things, but actually what the service needs to do is at the outset say we're going to review this every three years, for example, and they need to commit to doing that because what we don't want to do is it to become a burden updating a policy or a procedure, because as soon as you've finished updating that, you would be back into that cycle and going through it. So I think it's about the services taking ownership of each of their procedures and saying, okay, we've got this procedure, reviewing it, is it up to date, we'll review it again in three years' time. That's a work in progress and making sure that there's revision dates on procedures. If it's okay just to kind of come back on that, I think that's the actual point I was trying to make, that reviewing the policy might just be the case of actually someone reviewing it and saying it hasn't changed in the last few years and signing it off, but what that proves is that that hasn't been ignored for six years. It's on a schedule and it has been approved and signed off every three years, because there will be policies that will change annually, there will be lots and lots of change in a big organisation like this, but there will be certain things that won't change from cycle to cycle, but it doesn't mean to say that an appropriate person should be signing that off to say, yep, I'm happy with this. I think that's the kind of point I'm trying to make. Maybe not particularly well, but that's what I'm trying to do. Okay, I've got Councillor Maliki and then Councillor Finc note. Thank you, Joanna. I suppose taking the focus away from audit as we do have a brace and a half of executive directors today, I'd like to throw it open to them to say that we've got what I would say are key management failures. Actually, we might have two brace, because we've got Pat here as well. We've got roles and responsibilities, policies and procedures and records and data management, which are underpinning of good management, so you know what the organisation is doing and you know what you're doing. How are you, as the executive directors, going to ensure going forward that we're not seeing these as themes coming back into the audit? What do you need from the organisation to deliver that, because we don't really want to see these key themes coming forward and I'm sure you don't want to constantly have your staff because there's other things you could be doing like delivering the services that you will have to deliver. So I suppose rather than audit bringing this up, I'd like the executive directors to tell us how we can improve that sort of loop of good governance that we're trying to deliver. If I start at this end, we can work our way along. Yeah, policies and procedures have been a significant issue in my bit of the world. It's a key part of the improvement plan in children's social care particularly, so it's reported to committee every time we do an update report on that. Originally the work was very much around just getting a spreadsheet of which policies we've got, where, which was live, which wasn't, because that wasn't in place. Then being clear about who owns which policy, who's responsible for reviewing which policy, who's responsible for updating which policy. We've also got a partnership with an organisation who supplies policies and procedures around social care nationally and they're doing a kind of external work with us and external review of the policies in that bit of the world. Records management is a big issue for us as well and there were a couple of key systems that we use across education and across social care, both of which are in the process of either being updated or changed. So the move from SWIFT to the new supplier is really key because one of the challenges we've got with SWIFT is we've got an old version of SWIFT as well and we've had conversations before about the amount of information that's on the G-Drive and how that's held and how it's difficult to search. There's obviously a journey between what we've got now to the new system. So there's been a piece of work around setting up practice standards as well and that includes recording standards. So what should be recorded, where on the system, when it should be recorded, within what time scales it should be recorded. And then there is a data set being developed on the back of the practice standard so that we can look at compliance against them. All of that then helps people be clear about what their roles and responsibilities are when they're doing what it is that they do day to day. So I wouldn't say we've solved it but we've got plans in place that means that we're on that journey. Thank you. Some similarities, to be fair, to Amanda, specifically in relation to the system. And we're looking forward to the revised version that comes forward after SWIFT because that will really take us a considerable step forward. In relation to the health and social care partnership, I suppose the governance structures that are set within the IGB, principally the audit and assurance group. For example, performance and delivery group and the strategic planning group oversee a lot of this, depending on what area it is that we're looking at with regards to policy and procedures itself. Similarly, again, to what Amanda just said there, I think it's fair to say that the health and social care partnership is under a considerable improvement journey at the moment. And we're constantly looking at the policies and procedures. We've just very recently reviewed our internal governance structures that are set across health and social care. And we've revised our multi-agency procedures in relation to where we are with adult protection, for example. In my experience, the challenge of constantly being on top of policies and procedures is making sure that you're aligned and contemporary to changes in policy and legislation. And that's an ongoing challenge, especially when you're under the gosh-worth competing demands, for example. But having a central process to be able to govern it and oversee it and determine what it is that's needing revised is absolutely key to this. So it's a challenge across a fairly larger organization of over 5,000 of our workforce. It's a considerable piece of work, but it is governed and overseen, as I've mentioned there, through the IGB governance arrangements. Just to add and convene, I think if you've heard from Pat and Amanda, there are some of those policies and systems that are quite service and directorate specific. You heard Amanda talk about the system actually in both children's and adult care and replacing that. So some of those are quite specific, and they need to be brought up to date. Some of the issues are the way in which -- and I think this is one of the common themes in audits -- is the way in which services and corporate functions interact. And certainly you will remember, Councilor Mowat, maybe not many others will, but a lot of those functions used to be embedded within directorates, what you might call management support functions. In 2015, 2016, they were brought together corporately to provide both efficiency and effectiveness. There's no doubt at that time that left some gaps in directorates, and we've been trying to backfill those gaps ever since when we got into the period. This is, I suppose, Councilor CowdY, to your question. When we got to a time when we were really struggling with internal audit, no question about that. One of the measures we took was to put additional operations managers, members -- I remember Ross Murray, for example, working with us to try and build capacity back at directorate level. And I think one of the things -- it's certainly something for Debs and I to look at in detail -- is that relationship between how corporate functions and directorate functions really, really work effectively together. Because I think the balance is still not quite right, and redesigning that, I think, is centrally important to that corporate service relationship. I think in corporate services, since I started last year, we've gone through systematic approach to looking at what policies we've got, whether they're up to date or not. We review those regularly at SMT along with risks, project management, and all the other things that are on this list, so we've tried to really sharpen that up together with using the technology that we already have to be able to keep track of those things and trace them through the system. There's no doubt in my mind, and also if Noreen was here, she would be saying the same thing, that we need to really strengthen our approach to managers' understanding of what is their roles and responsibilities. And we're working on producing a document that supports that, because a lot of these things are for managers to be leading and taking forward. Thank you. That was quite reassuring, actually, but still some work to do, I think. Councillor Finchendo. Hello. I wanted to ask a question about the Alios, because in the 0.2017 one of the seven of them has formal auditing and the other ones have different types of internal control. I was just curious how that sits within our commitments as a council to auditing and best value, and is that okay, because they're Alios, that they don't have to have that same type of formal auditing? I'll probably take a bit of guidance from Gavin on this, but they're not within the remit that we currently have any of these seven Alios that are in the governance hub. So you know that we do both the InPension fund, we do Seshtran, and we do both the InValuation Joint Board. These are the ones that are included in the work that we do, but these ones are currently not included, and they haven't been, as far as I am aware, for a long, long time, if ever. But Gavin might be able to confirm that. So in terms of this, I think there isn't a requirement in the sense that we have in terms of the duties that are on us as a local authority are the same as the Alios. I think what this does, though, is ask the question whether we should be speaking to our Alios about what we think is best practice in terms of what we think is the best way to run an organisation, and what are our expectations, and have that conversation with them in terms of what they may need in terms of support to make that happen. Did you want to come back, Councillor Ficendo? Yeah, I didn't word my question really well, and that was really the point that I wanted to make about whether it would be appropriate or best practice for us to actually expect, since they are Alios, they're not independent companies functioning separately, to have that similar level of scrutiny and responsibility to how they're using the money as well. I don't know if anyone – did you want to respond to that, Gavin? I mean, I think that's part of this review that we're doing an Alio framework, and we'll be working with Laura to have a discussion with her on what she thinks is the best way to deal with things, and having that discussion with our Alios. So I think it's definitely a discussion that we need to have, and I think this has raised some interesting elements that are worth considering. I think that's helpful. So I had similar notes actually to Councillor Ficendo in terms of sort of thinking, if these were internal departments in the Council, they would get audited, but they're not internal departments in the Council, so they're not. And I actually had a question which is maybe – probably sits with the directors who have responsibility for the various Alios, but what is the financial and reputational exposure of the Council in relation to the three Alios who have no formal internal control arrangements in place? Have we even kind of quantified what that exposure to risk is? I don't know if that's something that's answerable now, but I think it's something that I would certainly hope will come back as part of the Alio review. We can pick that up. Some members will know that in the case of Transport for Edinburgh, there are changes impending there, so that might not be needed to be looked at in the same way, but certainly, capital theatres and EICC should have formal arrangements for internal controls. And either directly or via our observers to the board, we could be raising those issues, so I think we will follow both those up. I'm surprised to read that. Just to follow up, and it's something that this is why we're looking at Alios and why it's important to have these conversations with the Alios, because for instance, capital theatres, I've mentioned this before, isn't owned by us in the same way that EICC are, so they are a much more separate arms length, they're even further arms length than EICC is, so the conversation that we'd be having with those companies is a different conversation. So as with all of these things, it's never a simple answer, and it's something that we have to discuss and have that conversation about what controls they have in place, what we expect, what we would want to see, what issues that causes for them, and whether that changes anything in terms of what we need. So I think it is very useful, and it is something that we need to follow up in the way that Paul's described. Gavin's right, but that doesn't mean we can't suggest best practice to the convener, and in those two cases, I think we should do so. Can I just add something, because I think it's important? So Appendix 5 sets out this summary, so we asked a number of questions, the same questions to the Alios, to keep it fair. I think the summary is saying that for two, so the EICC and Capital Theatres, they're not doing any internal control work, so the ports are going to committee, but there's no independent validation of what they're saying, whether what they're saying is accurate, and there's no validation there. The other ones are doing work. They're doing work that is relevant to the, you know, so for example Edinburgh Leisure, you know, they do in-house, they go out to venues and they do departments, so we're not saying there's nothing there, but there's not probably a consistent approach, which would agree what needs to be done, and I think that's the important message here, having a bit of consistency. I think we do need to remember they're small organisations, they wouldn't be able to handle the burden of a big audit programme, so we need to be clear that anything that they did was proportionate. That's helpful, thank you, Laura. So I can't see any other questions on, oh sorry, Councillor Caldwell. Sorry, thank you. One theme I've sort of seen running through all this in terms of processes, it's maybe a question for the internal auditors themselves, is in terms of procurement being a challenge where there's only limited assurance, so, you know, we see that in the broad sort of outline and report, we also see it in some of the subsections that we'll come on to, and we've also got a separate report about one specific procurement later. It would just be useful to get a sense from internal audits why procurement and contracts seems to be such a challenge for the council right now. I appreciate there's a difficult financial climate out there, but it would just be useful. Thank you. So Lynette is coming to present another paper, and I don't know if Lynette wants to join just to add. So contract management specifically, so not procurement, contract management was a theme over a number of years where we were raising quite a number of issues in contracts, and actually it has came up a bit through this year. I think it's really important to separate contract management and procurement, so procurement is how we procure the works and the legal position through that. At the moment we did an audit of procurement last year, the details and the outcomes in the report, I can't remember off the top of my head what it was, but that was a relatively positive piece of work. What it did throw up, though, however, is the council's not managing non-contracted spend in waivers is an inappropriate way, which is what Lynette has brought an additional paper to committee today on, and we're also doing an additional piece of work specifically looking at non-contracted spend in waivers, which has started. So I think just to be clear on procurement, that's where some of the areas of focus are. And then it's the other side, once we've procured, are we managing these contracts and making sure that we're getting base value, are we holding our contractors to account, are we checking the quality of the work that's done in the services that are provided, that's the pieces that we've picked up. Okay, so I can't see any more questions on the main report, so if everyone's happy, I think if we go through the audits, just in terms of we've got a B agenda audit, obviously, I think we should do that at the end, so we do all the other audits first, and then go through if everyone's happy to do that. So I have the agenda audit first, I think the next audit is the ERP. So I don't know, do we have an officer here, or any comment you wanted to make? So just maybe a little bit of preamble might be helpful, so this was an Agile audit that we completed from 2018 to this year on the ERP project as it went through. For anyone not familiar, it was a systems development lifecycle audit, so we followed the project through the different lifecycle. And so what you'll see is we raised quite a lot of audit findings at the start of the audit as we worked through the governance, and then as we started to work through the audit, they started to tail off. The reason for that particularly was, we had an auditor who worked, two auditors at the time, that worked on the project all the way through, so they were going to meetings, I attended boards, so we were raising issues as they went, so they were being dealt with in real time. I think it's a really valuable piece of work to do it like that because what it means is we're not exposing ourselves to risks and audit coming back afterwards and seeing that we were exposed to risks, we were raising them at the time. And it's a similar approach that we're taking to the new social care operating system, so we're working alongside the project team for that. Thanks Laura. Councillor Miller. Thank you. For the audit report on this, the thing that I was surprised at was that a large project was able to start without all of the project management office systems and tools in place, and that needed audit to flag that up as an issue. Is that something which we've found before, or is that unique to this particular project, and do we have a standard set of PMO procedures and tools and so on? I can't comment beforehand because actually I only started in the council in 2018 when I saw that it was done, and we raised it at the time. We do have PMO support, but I do think that PMO support essentially has probably dwindled a bit, I don't think there's as much PMO support, but obviously Hannah's role that she's now in with major projects, we'll be looking at capital projects specifically. But for the ERP project, I think part of it was because we had some external people in as well, so sometimes when you've got external people in, it's about making sure that you've got consistency to the approaches. It was a long time ago, and we were talking like six years ago, and that finding would have been raised really, really early on in the project. I don't know if you want to add anything. Thanks Laura. I picked up this program laterally in 2021 just to see it through to conclusion, and I think at the start, as Laura said, I think the project management was quite loose, and I think throughout the lifetime of the project, we've really tightened it up. I think as an organization, we haven't been mature enough a number of years ago to understand just how robustly we need to manage a project, and actually I think that was recognized and valued working together with internal audit to really put in the proper governance that allows you to manage third parties, because we not only were working with CGI on this, we also had an implementation partner, and it does require robust project management to keep things on track. I think it was a little bit loose at the early stages. And just coming on where we are now, Councillor Miller, there is a PMO set up to monitor projects which are largely delivering the savings program and the revenue side funded through Invest2Save, so temporary resources that have set up a PMO, and they do have a set of templates, but again that's temporary. Yeah, I mean, so I have the almost identical questions Councillor Miller, like, it's great that this was all picked up throughout this project, but if internal audit weren't there, it would have been a very different story apparently, and I think that's the question. I'm not totally sure we've had answered so far as like, do we fully, are we confident in any large scale project we would have those resources in place, we'd have the roles and responsibilities, the project management software, would everything be in place to begin with? Could I just come in quite quickly, I think what we've learned across the years is that we've now got a blueprint for major projects, in terms of the governance that you need in place, is the project team, the roles and responsibilities, the terms of reference. I think there's a good blueprint now, and actually internal audit have seen that blueprint and are advising services on what to do to set up a major project like this. I certainly saw ERP through to final conclusion, and I've picked up the social care operating replacement, and we've put the same blueprint in place, so that, I guess, that overview of what a good project should look like has been shared with internal audit and will then go on to get shared with other services, the more major projects we roll out, so I think we do have good information now and a good framework. Okay, are there any other questions on ERP? No, okay, are we good to move on to trams? We've got Hannah, is there anything Laura or Hannah you want to add? Just the same principle, so this was a major project, so that we audited live all the way through the project, right from just before final business case, so quite in-depth involvement throughout, and worked really closely with Hannah and the teams had good involvement with some of the external contractors and providers as well, so that's probably all I want to add, but I'm not sure if Hannah wants to add anything. I suppose, just to the extent this might be helpful, is that, obviously Laura alluded to the previous report being an agile audit, as was this, and I suppose just from my perspective and the perspective of the team, that was incredibly valuable. I appreciate how resource intensive it was for Laura's team, and I know that couldn't possibly do it for everything, but it was really good having, essentially, a series of nudges through the project and kind of constructive challenge throughout the project to keep us on track, keep us thinking about things, and it was a really helpful exercise from a project team perspective, and certainly one that I would welcome being involved with again. Yeah, I thought it sounded as though it was the right approach for a program of this size, so it was really interesting to read the overview of how that had helped. I had two questions. One was about how audit and risk findings and actions were communicated to elected members during the project, because this report talks about how it worked up to the board of the program, but it doesn't talk about how that was then overseen by, I don't know, like the APOG or at Tech or GRBV. So how did that link work? And the other question I had was in the background section under business case and budget, it says as at the first of May 2024, no final settlement has been reached with the contractor and the contractual risk has not been settled. And I just wondered if you could explain what that means. I didn't understand that. So I'll come in firstly on just the link between the project board and how it comes to members. So the project board was the final point for where we brought all the actions, sometimes due to the nature of them and to make sure they were dealt with. But we did report in the annual report about progress with chance and progress with ERP, and they did come through overdue actions. So if there was ever any overdue actions, they would have came through in the overdue. To be fair, there wasn't a lot of overdue actions. They were dealt with really swiftly as we move through. I think there's maybe one occasion that I can remember that there was an overdue action for terms and it was dealt with pretty swiftly after that. And so I think the allusion to the no final settlement. So we have with Satya Fournes Neopolitan Construction Systems contractor, we're still working through a final contractual settlement with them. There's a couple of claims that they have. These are, we're working very constructively with them still. And I'm meeting with them regularly and we'll report back once that's all tied up. Thank you very much. I know a huge amount of work has been done. It's not meant to be a slightly cheeky question. I suppose it's the whole governor's attitude. In the lessons learned, it says at the end of it, throughout the project lessons learned were undertaken throughout the project with outcomes reported the project board and shared with other major project teams were relevant. Who decided where relevant. So I'll come in because that's my word then. An odd that lives away relevant. And so I think. So given the nature of that project so for example it was things like a project bank account was used so that was shared, you know, like the experience of having a project bank account was shared with other projects so that they could use that, but there would be some parts of the project, where the learning potentially wouldn't transfer particularly well. And it was really up to Hannah and the team to decide that and to be fair Hannah there's probably most of the lessons were shared. So for example the approach the comms, and, you know, some of the other approaches that were taken. And so I apologize because we're relevant so that we're not saying they were always shared all the time, and it would be relevant to another project. Just to add briefly councils, it's actually a really interesting question I'm not sure we've yet fully embedded also for example the approach to the quantification of risk in the transfer New Haven project was actually relatively new to the Council and brought an approach to risk quantification which we still don't utilize in our projects in the same way and the rest of project so actually there is still some, some work to be done on that. I don't know if all members aware but but since trying to New Haven Hannah's now in a new role around major, particularly capital programs transport placemaking and so on and that that approach to risk management. And if you like the interaction between risk and finance. It is something we will be important to all those kind of projects. Yeah, that's fine. My follow up would be I mean, that's really good news it's really good news that obviously Hannah's moving with her experience, it's more the fact that this is a sort of process so it's not relevant to one particular officer sharing information it's more that there is a process in place. I have to say I mean I think that when we talk about some of the learning so Paul made a really good point around the risk for example, there are things we did on transition New Haven, which you're not going to do on every single project because it just doesn't be a resource for somebody to undertake, but I think that the trick is going to be communicating what we did on transition New Haven, and then finding a set of strategies and, you know, Nicola Harvey mentioned about having blueprints, you know, having something that they pick up off the shelf is really legible and easy to understand, and that is relevant to their, to their level of risk and their project delivery. Great. And actually, it would be an evolution as as Paul was saying about, you know, we had used a new risk way of analyzing risk for the trans project. That's great. But do we have the capacity, and are you as officers being given the capacity to develop those components, because that will take a bit of time. Now, but in the long run, would hopefully save us significant amounts of time. So it's just to ask, are we creating that space for you to create those bits of work. So I've been speaking with Chris Lawson, and now I know that Chris has been looking at kind of operational risk and initially, but I've been discussing with him with Laura, Rebecca Andrew, and finance team on capital projects and also with Ruth Kidd about creating when Chris has got the space to do that, maybe creating a small group where we can pull that risk element together. And obviously anybody else who fancies joining us, you know, you're very welcome. And just to try to create something, I think that the important thing is counselor, my is that people find it something that's helpful and easy to do. I think sometimes these things can become another bureaucratic exercise. And of course, in that situation, they completely lose their power. Thanks computer. And just to back up what Hannah said their counselor. I think there's work already been done. I've also been speaking to Laura and to Chris Lawson on that I do what I would acknowledge is I think there's more work for a comfortable office officers to do to rule that blueprint out, and to educate more and more colleagues on what good, good governance looks like. I still think there's a gap where there are projects that potentially are under way or about to start with people might not always follow that blueprint. So I definitely think that's an action for us to take away. Thank you. I've got counselor knows. Thanks. Can be my question follows on, but I suppose based on this project rather than exporting the lessons from this project. I'm reading the report and I'm trying to kind of reconcile that with real world events on the ground, and I'm struggling a little bit so I suppose my question is, in terms of managing and executing the management of legal risk through the tram project. Was there work done to report back on going and legal cases, I don't remember for example, ever been reported to elect members that residents of Anchor Field were offered one half thousand pounds per property by the trans New Haven project I don't remember that ever been reported anywhere. And there are other issues in terms of outstanding legal claims that that I don't recall being reported to elected members, even for information. So I suppose there's two issues here for me there was one in terms of lack of reporting, and one I wonder to what extent audit was looking at the original terms of reference of the project to make sure that the ethos of the project and making sure people were supported to an effect. It's not just the business support scheme, which is very successful. But all the kind of residents along the route during construction were supported, what work was there to compare how the tram operated and particularly how the tram insurers and those responsible for that end of the tram project operated against the ethos in the terms of reference of the original project. So I'll answer that first of all, the legal parts that you talk about weren't part of the scope of the audit. So the scope of the audit was agreed in 2018 by the previous head of audit, and then the scope was updated again. And I think it's in there 2021 or something we updated the scope again, a previous internal audit, head of internal audit, it wasn't part of the scope to consider the legal issues in the way that you speak about Councillor. I think it's important to be proportionate and the scope of the audit work that we did was substantial for us to start to get into things like the legal parts of it. One, I don't have team that have the expertise to do with the legal stuff so that potentially need to have someone brought in to look at it. And two, we had a really clear programme of what we were working through. It's a fair point and I think that for future projects we can consider as part of scope anything that may have a legal aspect. The really important part of that and the caveat for me would be currently we don't have someone in our team who would have that sort of legal expertise. So we would probably need to bring someone in to support that. If I could just follow up, Councillor, I think that one of the lessons learned from the previous project was around instituting an owner-controlled insurance policy to cover the whole project. Although in fairness I think that the issues that you're describing would be probably relevant whatever insurance policy we had in place. As I think you know, the insurance claims have been dealt with by colleagues in insurance and the loss adjuster and actually with the exception of providing information and support, the project team itself isn't involved and doesn't have a say essentially in how the insurance claims are discharged. I know that there is some parameters around how insurance information is shared with elected members and I think that that's probably some of your frustration. But I know that that's very much from the perspective of looking to protect the Council and I'm sure that's what Ruth Kidd would say if she was here. Councillor McVay, your hand is still up, are you wanting to come back? If I could come back just very briefly, I think that's all helpful. I think this is an idea committee might want to look at. I'm not talking about committee scrutinising individual legal actions that have been taken by insurers or indeed the project. What I'm talking about is the governance of reporting which was lacking entirely. Although I hear the answer that Hannah just gave in terms of the protocol which exists for that, I would have still expected in the reams of reporting, regular reporting which Tram Projects produced, I would have expected some of that to be picked up, especially some of the headlines in that reporting which did specifically cover legal aspects. So I would have expected that to be picked up and shared with elected members. It's potentially something we can look at going forward in relation to other projects because I think there's a quite serious governance issue in Councillors not being updated to ongoing legal issues and the potential financial impact being basically withheld as information from Council. I don't think that's acceptable. I don't think people of Edinburgh would find that acceptable. So I think it's something we potentially need to look at again if it was not considered as part of this audit. Sorry, I was just going to say, I'm not sure we would, as Laura said, deal with it under this audit. I think the issues you raised, Councillor Knowles-McVay, are important. I would want to get something in writing from the Council's Insurance Manager on the way in which policies are taken and carried out in the way Hannah has described and do that as an advisory note to members. I'm happy to try and do it. I'm not quite sure what the best form of that would be, but I do think it's important for Ruth Kidd, our Insurance Manager, to advise members. I'm happy to take that away as an action, but you might need just leave it with me. How will we best do that, if that's okay? That's okay. So we'll take that, perhaps a briefing note or something like that. Okay, Councillor Mower. I don't actually like doing this committee, but actually I think Councillor Knowles-McVay was extremely unfair to officers in saying that there wasn't significant reporting structures coming back. There was the All-Party Oversight Group for the TRAMS project, which reported back to officers, which I sat on, and Councillor Knowles-McVay on. I have to say that having sat there through it, and having been through two different phases of the TRAMS project, what was noticeable about the most recent iteration was the lack of inquiry from Councillors coming forward. That group, that APOG group, would have been able to press those questions if there had been that. There were some Councillors who did press for more information coming forward, but when it was originally set up, what was deemed acceptable reporting back actually wasn't. But it is sometimes for Councillors to have to push and ask for that information, and I think that's unfair, because I think if that had been pushed forward, you can always throw back what we didn't know to ask for the information, but there's questions you can ask and actually questions on a project of that size that, as Councillors are overall responsible for that, we should be asking. I think that was an unfair comment. Okay, I'm not going to facilitate a back and forth between Councillors, so we'll leave it at that. We will get a briefing note. I can't come back under standing orders. Which standing order, Councillor McInerney? The one about being named. Okay, very briefly and only on the point. It was just to say the point I was making quite, I hope quite explicitly, which I don't know if it was taken the wrong way or misinterpreted by Councillor McInerney, maybe a little bit further if I'm wrong. Okay, so the point is we used to have a case for people and how they affected people. We were not given that information. And the reels of information which was reported. And that was my, and that was my comment and I'm not going to apologize for standing up for people who have been in a difficult situation with this project. There are other places for that, such as for Council, I would suggest. So, okay, we're going to have a briefing note on that. And I can't, oh, I actually had a further question on Tram, which was on the, there was one medium fighting related to community benefits, which was outstanding April 2024. And I just wondered what that was and if it was still outstanding. So, that particular finding was around ensuring that the community benefits, the requirement for the providers to give updates regularly to the Council. So we had a system, I believe, actually we've stopped using the system. So there's, this is what happens with kind of delay in reporting. We had a system where providers were required to automatically upload evidence. And then the project, the contract manager, you know, goes in and validates the evidence of the benefits being provided. That wasn't happening for the Tram's project. It doesn't mean that benefits weren't being delivered, but it wasn't being uploaded through the system. And when we did a bit of deeper work, it was because actually that had never been built into the contract requirements for these contractors. So our recommendation was about making sure that contracts set out the requirements for contractors to give that evidence. And Hannah, there's still a bit of ongoing work, I don't know if you want to give an update on that. Yes, as Laura says, the system was actually new when we let our contracts, and so it wasn't built into the contract requirement. And now, we're at the end, the system's actually being discontinued, so it won't be, there'll be a different mechanism for reporting community benefits going forward. As Laura says, we have a slightly different mechanism on the project in terms of our end of project report from the contractors on community benefits. And of course, one of the benefits of us co-locating with the contractor in the office is that we were often able just to observe the community benefits because there was somebody coming in doing an apprenticeship, or whatever was happening. So there was that kind of immediacy of being able to see the community benefits being delivered, but we'll clear off that outstanding action. Okay, that's helpful, thank you. Councillor Caldwell. Thank you, convener, and thank you for the audit. I just wanted to ask the internal auditors if possible. I appreciate reputational risk isn't part of internal audit's scope in this report, but I'm wondering what weighting is given to reputational risk, particularly for major projects, where there was press reports about things that perhaps weren't going according to plan this particular project, and no doubt that will happen in projects going forward. So how does internal audit quantify that? Thank you. So we absolutely do consider reputational risk. Reputational risk is one of the council's enterprise risks, and it pictures through nearly every single audit which we do. So one of the things that we looked at was the whole stakeholder communications part of it, so that's how people are kept up to date, the different methods of that. So that's one of the ways that we looked at it. The other thing is, for example, the reporting, the public reporting to committees and the things that happen. So that's how we would tackle considering reputational damage. In terms of stories in the press, we have to be really careful. Audit is about facts and evidence and triangulating, so if something was raised then obviously we would look to see what other sources of evidence were there to have a look at it. So we do have to be really careful that we don't take every news story as absolute gospel, but we absolutely do consider reputational risk when we're going through things. And I'll be honest with you, in terms of TRAMs, there was a lot of stories, but there's other projects where there can be things that can be reported in that as well. So it's about being really proportionate with the things that are reported. Okay, so I can't see any more questions on TRAMs. I think we can move on to Thrive Mental Health Services. Are there any questions on this, Councillor Miller? Thank you very much, and thank you for the audit report on mental health services. I had a question, well, a couple of questions I'm afraid, I'm sorry. The first one was about the scope of the audit. Was the audit across all mental health services provided across the whole of Edinburgh, or is this a subset of mental health services? I also wanted to know if there are any published measures of performance or delivery of mental health services. It wasn't quite clear to me from the report whether there's any scorecards or any other reports provided publicly that show performance. I wanted to ask Internal Audit if they felt that the timeframe for the management actions was ambitious enough. Thank you. I'll answer some of the questions, and Linda is here as well to support. This was an audit of the mental health strategy. It was any mental health services that were provided under the Thrive strategy. That's the banner of services that were provided. I think something to add on this audit, and it's sometimes difficult to get across in the report, a huge amount of activity going on in this area. One of the main parts of our report, and it does link into your second question about performance, is that actually there's a huge amount of activity. There is an annual report that Linda prepares, and I'll give a bit more information on that. Sometimes it was a bit disparate and all over the place, and our recommendations were to try and bring it together, to be able to show the story of mental health services and how the strategy has been delivered. In terms of performance, we've raised in the report that it's probably not as ambitious as it could be in terms of monitoring performance. Given the nature of some of the baselines and the measurements that were at the start of the strategy being developed, the officers hadn't taken a second look at that to see actually now can we start to measure it, but you'll see through the report that that discussion's been held. I think the really, really important thing for me with this audit, because we had a number of discussions with Linda on it, there is a huge amount of activity going on, and the strategy is a very ambitious strategy, trying to cover a number of things, and it's in danger of turning into loads and loads of different strategies, so it's really important to bring it back together into one, and help them with some of the performance management. The workforce part is really important. The workforce has to be there to support it and deliver it, so that's really important. I cannot remember what your third question was. I'm so sorry. It was about whether the timescales are ambitious enough, in your opinion. When you say ambitious, do you mean are they doing them quick enough? Sorry. I think one of the things that's really important with the timescales is it's better to do the audit action right and take the time and get it right, and for it to be embedded properly, and someone to give us a really quick date they haven't really thought through, and actually it goes overdue, or they only deliver part of it. We have worked with Linda at the time when we were agreeing to the action, so I don't actually think it matters whether an action is for a year's time or two years' time. It's what's actually been done, so the really important piece is that the work happens and it doesn't all wait to the end, and I absolutely don't get that feeling with this team. As I say, they're really committed to what they're doing, so I think it's to allow the time for it to go, for example, things like the workforce issues, until the organisational restructure, until some of that stuff's done, it's quite difficult to really know how they would be able to deliver them. Did you want to come in as well, Linda? Yeah, thank you. I think just to add that we are taking the recommendations really seriously, because we do think it's important that we can demonstrate impact, and we did have, for example, a stakeholder session two weeks ago, where we spoke to all of our partners that are involved in implementing what is really an ambitious strategy for the city. So I'm really mindful of the fact that we absolutely need to demonstrate impact, and I think what's really important is we've got 35 commitments within the Thrive Adult Health and Social Care Commission Plan, and we do report on every single one of these commitments in our annual report. But even within that, there's independent evaluations, for example, for our Thrive Welcome Teams, so there is a lot of data that we are generating, but to represent it as a single report is sometimes quite difficult, which is where we've struggled a bit with the annual report, but we'll continue to do that. But we did take that to our performance and delivery group as well, and we asked members of that committee to come back if there was a specific commitment within the strategy that they wanted more information or more data on, so I'm very happy to do that, if that's helpful. Okay, thank you. And did you want to come back, Councillor Miller? Yeah, I think the answers have been very helpful. I think the sort of stepping back slightly from the audit, I think the thing which people probably want to understand from a mental health strategy is a bit more about why there's such a gap between the ambition to be able to have a healthy, thriving city and the service gap that exists and the waiting lists that exist and so on. That's why I was asking the question about measures of performance available publicly, because I'm not sure there's terribly much transparency. I understand that performance and delivery committee are looking at these things, but I don't think that the public are aware of the strategy and how it's performing and where it might perform better in the future when things are improved. So I'd quite like to go back to that one question, where is that information published? So if I just comment for a minute, our recommendation at 2.1 is about developing a performance management framework to cover the stuff that you mentioned there, because I think that when we were doing the audit, it was difficult for us to piece that together. That was a key theme coming through. So while there was the annual report and there was a lot of information in the annual report, actually the visibility of it wasn't quite there. So we've got the recommendation there about aligning it to the roadmap and the commissioning plan and making these things come together. To be fair, actually, we have only recommended that it comes to a governance forum, but I think it is really fair that that would then be potentially published publicly. Potentially what should happen is if you're publishing a strategy, every year you should potentially report progress on the strategy with some of the performance associated with that. I think Pat wants to come in as well. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Miller. I appreciate the question, and I can understand why you would ask the question in relation to the timescales, but just for a bit of additional context, and I think this is why the timescales actually do, I think, sit fairly well with us. We are on course for an improvement journey. We're undertaking the organisational restructure just now. We've just about finished phase one of that. We'll shortly begin into phase two. Also, we have a very ambitious savings plan. All of this is a classic case of all hands to the pump just right now in relation to all of this. So I do think that the timescales that are being set out here are more realistic, given consideration to everything else that's ongoing just now. In relation to the matter and in relation to performance, I think one of the ways in which we will reconcile this will be through a review of how we report on our current performance reporting framework. It's not specific to delegated services, for example mental health in this case, but you could equally apply addiction and learning disability, for example. So moving forward, that's what we're reviewing. Our annual publication of our performance reports will come through the IJB and they'll be quite specific to mental health and the measurements around mental health. So I look forward to taking that into the IJB for consideration. Thank you. Just for a point of clarification, one of the team just reminded me, the Thrive annual report is published on the Thrive website, so it is published publicly. But as I say, we felt that it was kind of difficult to follow the strategies through, so the recommendations for it was to try and align it a bit more to the strategy. Councillor Osler. Thank you. Just to follow up that last question, you say that the Thrive report is produced annually, but it states within the report you've given, the governance structure for Thrive Edinburgh was stated in the Thrive progress update February 2024. It's included committees such as clinical and clear governance committee, which last received a report on Thrive in 2020. So an annual report is produced, but it doesn't necessarily go to the committees that make up the IJB. Yeah, I probably can't comment on that, the facts are there, but it has been published on the Thrive website. I don't know if anyone... Oh, Linda. In terms of the regularity of publishing of the annual report. We published the annual report and then we took that to the performance and delivery committee in February. We haven't been back to the clinical care governance committee, as you rightly say, since 2020, and I think this is just a mirror of the breadth and width of the strategy. So there's some aspects that absolutely should go to clinical care governance. There's absolutely aspects that should go to performance and delivery, and I think, as Pat says, part of the work that we're doing at the moment is to realign our performance management structure and reporting. So you're thinking it will go to the clinical... So we've made a recommendation at 2.2 for the governance structure to be clearer about who's getting what and when, and for that to be agreed with in the programme. OK, so for Councillor Osler, we do monitor this because we have our overdue actions, and so if this isn't done, it will come back to committee and we won't be able to see it. Could I just be slightly clearer, I suppose, about my question? I mean, that's just one aspect. We were talking earlier about, obviously, lessons learned and making sure that we've got a blueprint and so on. It just seems to be slightly odd, the fact that if a report is being produced on a yearly basis, it's not actually being disseminated to the committees within the organisation. That just seems to be slightly odd. So it's more to make sure that that was just one aspect, that it's being disseminated to the correct other committees as well that make up the same structure. I'll let Linda come back in here, but my understanding is it does go to the performance and delivery committee. I think what we're talking about here is the clinical care governance committee, so it would have to align there as well. So just to be clear, it will be going to both committees in the future, is that the plan? Yes. Yes. Okay. Right. And that's one of the recommendations from audit, so that will be monitored. If that's not completed, it would sit in our overdue actions, so we could pick that up. Okay. I can't see any other questions on this, so shall we move on to the next audit report, which is voids, I think. Is that right? Okay. Any questions on voids? Councillor Mala. Yeah. At the beginning of the report, it says that we're not on target, but we were trying to get to 3% by 31st of October this year. But they were working on projected 80 new monthly voids, but we're at about 100 monthly voids. Can we explain why there's sort of an increase in the number of voids? Do we understand that? And why is that delaying - I mean, there's new work, obviously, that has to go through the process. But do we understand why what number of voids are increasing? I think... Do you want to say something? Yes. Thanks, Councillor Mala. I think it's maybe not so much an increase in number of voids, but a refinement of our understanding of the data, really. So a lot of the work that we were doing in the early part of last year was to get better understanding of the information we have relating to our voids, and turn over and what we find towards the end of last year is that a more accurate average figure, and it's very variable, is in the region of 100 new voids per month. In fact, in April, we had significantly more than that. We are doing a bit of work to try and capture more information about the reason for our property becoming void. There's a little bit of seasonal trend, but not anything that's sort of immediately obvious. But we are looking to make some changes in our systems when our housing officers are terminating tenancies that they capture a reason that gives us a deeper understanding of the reason for that. Obviously, there's a whole range of reasons that tenancies would be terminated, some of them is the death of the tenant, some of them is just a move on to another property, often it's abandonment of a property. So we do need to do a bit more work on that. But what we're seeing is that the around 100 average is a more accurate basis on which for us to project our turnover. Can I have a follow-up? So if I've understood you correctly, Sarah, this isn't a case of there's been a change, it's if we didn't have the information to understand it beforehand, and we're gathering that information now? Yes, I would say the historical data that we've had is not as good as the information that we're capturing now. A lot of the work that we're doing just now is really focusing on improving the data and their understanding of that and how we can use that to inform our projections, our resource and planning moving forward. I had Councillor Kumar, I think, and then Councillor Osler. Thank you, Kudvina. So I'm looking at finding six, but I'm also interested in Councillor Malbert's question just now, because in the later report or finding six, it says that voids are 25% higher. So is that accurate or is that the data that's improved? But I was quite concerned to note that the average length at present is 555 days. Given that we did declare a housing crisis, and I know this has been marked as medium priority, and I understand the reasons why, I just wondered if there was any further discussion in terms of if we could push this as a higher priority, given that there is a housing crisis. And I suppose the second part of my question is, how confident are the Councillors, or how confident are the Housing, Homelessness and Fair Work Committee, that they are getting all the information they need to monitor the voids and see if it's improving? And I understand the approach to work on voids that can be done quicker, but then the off side of that is that the longer term voids are sitting there for a lot longer time. And does that mean that the repairs are now in a poorer state? And is that going to cost us more money to repair? Because the list of longer term voids will be increased basically. I think Derek's got his hand up. Did you want to come in, Derek? Yeah, thanks, through yourself, Kenzina. Thanks, Councillor Kuma. At the Housing, Homelessness and Fair Work Committee last meeting, there was the first of a new performance reporting, cyclical performance report. That includes a far greater depth of analysis of void performance data. That includes the proportion of properties by length of time they've been empty. So, I think it was 33 months, 36, 60, 12 months, or 12 to 18, rather than over. That data showed that across all of those different bands, the number of void properties in them was reducing. So, we're trying to target the right areas. There didn't seem to be any correlation between one band and the other, i.e. they were all coming down at the same time, so there wasn't one coming down and one increasing. One of the quirks of this, we have had a far higher number of properties over 18 months than we'd want to. One of the quirks of this is when they come back on, they increase the average time because of the length of time they've had, so they don't reduce the increases. It's about 555, I would say it's probably likely to increase as we bring more of those longer term properties under. That's just how it works. So, it's successful in getting the properties back in, but it does inflate the average length of time. I think the committee now have a structure, a performance structure, where they can see far more data on voids, what's happening, and have the opportunity every eight weeks when they meet to scrutinise that in far more detail. I hope that helps. Can I just pick up on one point on that, Derek, that I didn't quite understand? So, if you're doing the void length time based on when they come back in to being used, does that mean we're not actually monitoring how long properties have been empty? Do we have an average, this is how long the number of properties that we haven't dealt with have been empty? No, sorry. We know how long each property's been empty for on the termination date when we get the keys back, so we're able to report on that, yes. But what I'm asking is, do we have an average of the properties that are sitting in the void column, do we have an average length of time for how long each of those has been empty, as opposed to the length of time when they come back on, it then impacts on the average of, this is how long it takes to complete voids, but we know how long the open voids, if you like, have been there. I think Sarah is wanting to come in. Derek, you can't see Sarah. Yes, thanks. Yes, we do. We know exactly how many days every void property has been void, and what significantly skews that average figure in the 18 months, plus is there are a number of properties that have been void for a number of years. Some of those, for example, are properties of demolition. And so as soon as within the average you have even a small number of properties that have been empty for a very long time, it obviously skews the average. But we can break that 18 months plus down further. We've got that data, we've obviously presented it in that way on this occasion. But just to be clear, the data that's in the report there is the number of days the property has been void, which is the question that you were asking. I think Derek was referring to the other stat, which is when properties are leaked, that obviously when you leaked a property that's been void for a long time, which is a positive action, it then obviously impacts on the average time to take into, and until we can clear more of those long-term voids, that will continue to be a high number. I understand that. Thanks Sarah. Sorry, can I just come in in the priority point? So the reason that it's medium priority rather than high is because throughout the work we could see the amount of work that was going on in the service to control voids. So all the reporting, all the data work and all the things that were going on. What our recommendation is, our recommendation is not telling the service what they already know because there's no value in that. What our recommendation is doing is seeing actually during our audit we found a number of things that might help the service become a bit more efficient. So what we've said in our recommendation is to consider the things that we've raised to enable that process to move quicker, and the date is really short in it because it's the 31st of October is the date, and the management have committed to completing that action by the 31st of August this year. So it's not a long-standing action. It should be dealt with, you know, purely soon. Thank you. Laura, did you want to come back in? Councillor Comay, your hand's still up. Thank you, Convena. I suppose I'll just press my point on best value. I would like - I think I'd be interested to see how much we are spending on voids long-term. Like if it has that increase, if it's sitting there long-term versus when it first becomes a void. I suppose my thinking is if it's coming and we're fixing things, say in three to six months' time, but if it's left to go on, then it becomes longer-term void and probably harder to prepare if it's actually left to sit there. So that's my point on best value in terms of making sure that we're not pushing things too, too long-term because then they'll be worse for repair and then the council will be paying more money basically to fix this, or put in for demolition. Thank you. Do you want to come in, Sarah? Thanks, Councillor. This is a bit of us kind of generalisation, but many of the longer-term voids are properties that require greater investment, so it's difficult to say does leaving it longer mean it costs you longer in the long-term? I suppose some of those properties will further deteriorate, so they might be problematic properties in voids to turn around because there's water and grease issues, for example, and obviously, if you leave those unattended, that can escalate. What we're trying to do is balance our resources across short-term voids, so keeping the turnover going and getting some of the new voids turned around so that we're keeping those numbers coming through as new lets, but also making sure that we've got some resources focused on the longer-term voids and a direct reference to the sort of trend of how those are coming down does support that. Actually, the voids that are longer than 18 months are coming down slightly quicker than some of the other categories, so it is really just a balance, but quite a number of the properties that are in that long-term category are properties that are awaiting disposal or awaiting demolition, so they're not actually properties we'll bring back into use. So it's quite a complex category, those 18 months plus, but I take your point as something that we are aware of and trying to manage as best we can. Okay, thank you. Councillor Osler. Yeah, that nicely feeds onto the question I was about to ask you, which is about those 212 properties categorised as not for let. It just seems to me slightly sort of odd that we've got this category that includes earmarked for temporary accommodation, disposal and demolition, to me they seem very distinct differences, because obviously something that's sort of earmarked for a temporary accommodation is completely different than disposal, and if you're saying that these make up part of this long-term void, I just wondered, maybe I've missed it somewhere, but there doesn't seem to be a sort of breakdown of how many are in these categories and why they're so complicated in terms of the disposal and the demolition. To me, they seem to be a totally different category to earmarked for temporary accommodation. Yes, thanks, Councillor. It's, I suppose, an aggregation up of properties that we are not in a position to move forward to let for one of a number of reasons. We do have the breakdown, we can provide the breakdown of how those 212, I think, it was at the point of reporting down. And you're right, there's some that will never be let and others that will go on to, I suppose, positive outcomes in terms of being used for temporary accommodation. Just looking at the numbers from yesterday, we're still in the region of about 50 of those properties typically are being used as decants, so they'll always have a number of properties that we need to use for tenants who need alternative accommodation while the appears going on in their home. The ones that are sitting at demolition are stuck in a state that requires a sort of resolution in terms of a legal resolution. And then the ones that are earmarked for disposal are at different stages in the process of being sold. I think we've got about 76 of those at the moment, so they make up quite a significant number of those 212 and, you know, if it would be more helpful in terms of presentation to provide a greater breakdown of that, then we can do that. So we're just trying to, there are so many different scenarios in the pool of void properties that we're trying to present it in a way that this sort of digestible makes sense to people. Thanks, Sarah. Councillor Jenkins. Thanks, Coombeena. An interesting debate, actually. I mean, I'm pleased to hear the decisions are being kind of led by the data, and it's good to hear that that's kind of been accurately captured now. I'm also just kind of picking up the last points that were made. I'm struggling to understand why a property that's earmarked for demolition is classified as void when it's never going to not be void. It's going to be a hole in the ground. So I suppose it's the question is around classification of the data and are we're obviously accurately capturing the information in but are we articulating the information properly? Because, you know, I have no idea how many properties are earmarked for demolition, but I'm not sure that that tells the story. If you know what I mean, that wasn't actually my question. Actually, I was just kind of interested in how that data has been interpreted and articulated. So it's maybe a point to take away. But my question was around the actual audit and the findings within the audit as well, because that's kind of why we're here. And there's a kind of serious point to this as well, but audits about testing key controls. But in this case, it's quite often about the control of actual keys. And at what point is it cost effective to replace locks indoors rather than hunting around and trying to find sets of keys to... Unvoid properties and what impact does that have on the elapsed time? You know, what proportion of time is spent by officers trying to track down keys when we could, you know, change a lock? And there's a serious aspect to my question if you bear with me. Yeah, thanks. It's a valid point because it can be problematic hunting keys around. And we do typically change the locks to a barrel that can be used by a generic key and the other method that we use is key safes. And we had a workshop with a quite significant number of key officers who were involved at some point in the voice process a couple of weeks ago, which was really helpful. And we talked through the end to end to process and paused each stage of the process and sort of opened up discussion about where are some of the barriers? Where are the blockers? And in terms of officers' day-to-day involvement in that process, you know, what are the things that we need to look at changing? And I suppose that's part in response to the findings of the audit. We just need to tighten up that procedure. It's by no means a linear procedure. There are so many different scenarios and keys go off in lots of different directions, hence the point about, you know, trying to manage that more efficiently. So we will make decisions about how, you know, a single process in terms of how we most effectively manage keys. But there does come a point where you have to change the lock back and you do have a physical set of keys and there may still be some final checks to be done. You've got to manage viewings. So the middle part of the process where the repairs are being done is much more straightforward if we've just got one single key or a key safe. But inevitably, there's always a point at which you're physically handing keys around and it can be quite challenging. Thanks Sarah. I've got Councillor Miller. Thank you very much. I wanted to ask a question about finding four about quality assurance. So we've got that it says actions raised as part of quality assurance processes should be prioritised in terms of risk. So I just wanted to ask what kind of risks we had in mind there to guide prioritisation. And I also wanted to ask about the management information. So it says the systems can't talk to each other, but we've been advised that the new Total Connect model will address some of those issues. Why is it that just some of the issues and what are we doing about the other ones? So I'll pick up the point on, or partially pick up the point on the action tracker. I think the general point where it was there was there was a number of actions and they weren't being reviewed systematically. So. So our recommendation is that consider the risk and it's up to management to consider that risk and to deal with the actions in the same way that we do from an older point of view with a high measurement low. So they weren't being considered in that way. They weren't being prioritised. So our recommendation was to to create some sort of priority to tell them to be dealt with like that so that there's assurance that the higher risk actions are being dealt with. So it's not a particular risk as there would be a number of different risks associated with it. But our recommendation was to take a risk based approach to dealing with actions so that in the same way that we do with audits that the ones with the high risk get dealt with in a shorter timeframe, because that's only what it's about. OK. OK. And I had a question as well. It's kind of sort of two questions and it's really quite data related. So the first one was about finding one where it says that and except this is currently and there's an audit recommendation to change it, but currently there's no documented process to support performance reporting of the empty homes process and no documented process or procedure setting out how the figures reported in the annual SHL, which I assume is the Scottish Housing Regulator, return or obtained, including the roles that are involved in different reports and systems. And then if you go to finding five, there is a bit again about reporting to the Scottish Housing Regulator. Management could not provide those details during field work stage of the audit as the key staff members on leave, but on return, informed that rent loss data was received from the council's finance team. However, no independent oversight by housing operations could be substantiated to ensure completeness and accuracy of the reported rent loss data. Now, obviously we have huge rent loss data due to voice. It's a huge budget pressure. I think it's about three and a half million pounds a year, which is phenomenal. And I suppose it was just my question. So it's really good to hear that there is now sort of read dashboard and my data driven dashboard reporting at housing. But I suppose my question is given these findings, how confident are we that that information is going into the dashboard is the correct information? And is there any work around this to kind of check that data and make sure that we are getting the information the right way when it's reported to committee? In terms of the reporting to the regulator for the annual return that we've done this year, we have done some additional validation of that data just based on previous learning. So we do need to work through the process of fully documenting all of that and documenting the process. I think the internal audit identified there was a key person dependency and here as well, which we need to resolve. Obviously, the quality of data is dependent on the accuracy of the information that is put in. And there is regular monitoring of the void status of properties. And so there's a report produced every week that is circulated to the locality housing teams that flags up where there might be anomalies to bring their attention to just check in to make sure that statuses are as they should be. But obviously that's a manual intervention and there will always be that to some degree. But we're just working on continuing to try and refine that and make that as slick as we can. Sorry, I've forgotten the first part of your question, convener. It was related to finding one, I think. And I think that's fair comment, I suppose to a degree it goes back to the earlier conversation the committee was having regarding generally our documentation of procedures. So it's probably fair to say that our performance reporting I would say is on voids. It's quite extensive now. We're reporting through a variety of different kind of forums to ensure that everybody's up to date with where we are on voids. We do need to formalize that in terms of what are those indicators we're reporting against and where are we reporting it to. I expect it will settle down into position where we're not doing as much reporting as we are currently. But as Derek referenced earlier, we are now reporting through a cyclical performance report to Housing Homelessness and Fair Work Committee to every committee. And there will be reporting in there on voids. So I suppose that is now well established in terms of that reporting to committee and we need to document how we're reporting internally in our management structure. OK, that's helpful. Are there any other questions on voids? I can't see any further questions. Oh, sorry, Derek, you wanted to come in. No thanks. Just following on from Sarah's answer, just a reminder, I think, of Advise Committee before, but we're just now getting to implement a new service structure for a consultation. And that will bring in a new data team within the service that will pay far more attention to both the data that's been recorded and the insights we can get from it to help drive performance improvements. To support that, we've already trained almost 70 colleagues across the service in data fundamentals. So data management, data quality, data cleansing. So in terms of perhaps your general point about how confident are we about the data? I think we're getting far better at it, it's here as everything start there and we'll continue to do that through the learning development and the service redesign in order to support them. OK, thank you Derek, that's helpful. So there's no further questions on voids. I think we've got one more agenda. Do we not have or is that, yes, our skills assessment and skills evaluation. Are there any questions on this? Did you want to say something Laura? It was just potentially for the newer members. This piece of work was done with members between October, December last year. So this report, I'm hoping for people who were at the workshop. It feels like it reflects the workshop they had, so there's no surprises here. So the report, I guess is probably not in the waters for discussion, but if there's any comments that anyone wants to meet because we've been through that process, so it's not here for scrutiny. It's kind of final sign off and now what we will do is work with committee services and work with services to help develop the programme behind that. Thanks Laura, that's probably helpful context. Are there any comments or questions on that or are we just happy to have the extensive training programme designed for us? OK, so we've now got the BE Agenda audit on voids. Given the time, I feel like this might, not on voids, but the BE Agenda audit, I feel like we probably will want to have a bit of discussion and I think we should take a break and come back at five to 12 and then pick that one up if everyone's happy to do that. OK. Back on, so I will move the report with the SNP amendment that I just, obviously covers the BE Agenda item and it's just about making sure that information gets to all executive committees, so happy to move. Councillor Kumer, if you would second. Lovely. I'm going to be there, thank you. And Councillor Miller, if you want to move your amendment. Thanks. Just very quickly, it was great to see that the bit about Allios had been picked up on in the questions by different elected members in the committee. I also had a bit of concern about the information that we've been given back, which was useful and helpful, but I think it was a bit more work that needs to be done, so I just wanted to formalise that request so that it comes back within the Allio review. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Miller. Second. Just formally convene. Councillor Stanniford, is everyone happy with that proposal, Councillor? Now, this is slightly difficult because we've gone back to the agenda and it refers to what we've just been discussing, but I do wonder if you wanted to insert in your final paragraph after cyber-attack or other incident affecting business continuity should take place. And because I think that covers the nature of what was debated and what is in that and I think there is a tendency, as we've discussed, you see the word, we want this about the totality to protect the council's services. Yep, I'm quite happy. Did you get that, Andrew? Yeah, I'm quite happy. So what other incident which affects business continuity? Yeah, I'm happy if everyone else is happy with that. So I can't see any other positions, so we're happy to agree the report as amended. Thank you. Okay, so the next item is item 8.2, update report supplier and contract management, and we have Lynette Robertson speaking to this report. Hi Lynette, I'll let you get a seat. That was just to see, is there anything that you wanted to add to the report? No, just to reiterate again, as Laura picked up earlier, what about to do, I guess, more a deep dive through internal audit into non-contracted spend across the council, and that's due to kick off this Thursday. That's helpful. I had a couple of questions. Oh, Councillor Miller. I'm happy to start. I was interested to see that CPS provides quarterly reports to exec directors, and that highlights non-contracted spend. So I just wondered why are we still seeing that coming up if it's being highlighted on a quarterly basis? Sorry, we're asking why the non-contractor that's coming up on a regular basis rather than... Yeah, I guess the point is that if the report is saying that exec directors are having that highlighted to them, then I'm surprised to see it continuing. So why have they not taken steps to spend through contracts to raise procurement? I can't really answer for the directors. I can, I suppose, offer some mitigation in terms of the high volume obviously related to one particular partnership and the information that's provided in the report as to what led to the event in that instance. We have a number of feeder systems as well in the council and the information is, you know, we find out once the spend has gone through where the spend relates to in terms of the suppliers, but not specifics in terms of what contracts they relate to. So we've been trying to find that out and get into the detail of each of those pieces of expenditure. We do appreciate that there will be a level of non-contracted because there are some one-off low-level spend activities that will happen across the directors, but we need to establish what percentage that accounts for and then see, OK, that as a baseline is acceptable and anything above that is a concern. Did you want to come back? I was just going to say the question is perhaps more for Pat to answer then. Oh, did you want to come in, Amanda? Yeah, just to update from my directorate, one of the areas of non-contract spend is purchase cards that are used in both schools and in residential provision and they're for kind of, you know, like day-to-day stuff so they don't count as contracted. What we do do is when we look at the reports of what we're getting on the purchase cards is look at whether or not we can contract for some of that spend. So things like, you know, where schools are buying food for breakfast clubs, for example, could we do that collectively rather than do it individually? So that makes up most of the non-contracted spending in my bit of the world. We are still doing a bit of catch up, so there have been a couple of reports that have come through to committee where there's been a waiver because we're waiting to go out then for a wider procurement exercise where we're bringing a couple of contracts together. But we're about 96% compliant now and that's moving in the right direction. And so that's what we're doing with that information on a monthly basis is kind of using it to understand more and then thinking about how we could go for a procurement exercise that mitigates some of that. So I wanted to ask actually, 4.5 sort of bugged me because it says at the start of the paragraph, like the fluid nature of this form of commissioning is labor intensive as would require continual update for contracts registered. So I'm not going to go into the details of that. But I think it's important to note that the last slide was a little bit of a bit of a break. So in 4.5, it seems to say, oh, it's impossible to do this because of the type of spend. But then it goes on to say, we did it before and we're going to do it again with 50 million pounds worth of contracts. So I don't really understand that and I'd quite like to know what is the correct position. I think that's probably one for Pat more than unless the net wants to come in. Thank you convener. I also have Jenna Gunter here on the call as well who will give us more detail. But just to start, the health and social care partnership has got a requirement to continually reflect on what good looks like. Clearly this hasn't given the non-compliance. And we completely accept that we're absolutely not compliant in most cases. But for terms of some of the complexity around this, we are engaging with 120 providers who provide 6,000 packages of care per week. So there is a nuanced difference here. It's not to minimize the seriousness and the significance of this at all, but simply just to set out the context in terms of the framework itself. And how that is slightly different given that we are dealing with very fluid packages of care at various costs. I'm subject to reviews sometimes on a daily basis as opposed to a framework which is more about almost a fixed cost of a product, for example. So there's a different way of interpreting it. As I said, this is certainly not to minimize it and we've got a lot of work that we need to do. Councillor Miller's point is absolutely valid, subject to review but nonetheless continuing because it's custom in practice at the moment and almost as though the problem is too complicated. We recognize that and what we've set out in the report is a commitment to making sure that we address this and I have to be realistic that it's not something just given how complicated it is that we're going to be able to resolve certainly overnight or in the short term but a commitment to work in accordance with what has been set out in the action plan. I do have Emma on the call who will be able to give us a bit more precise detail in terms of some of the operational stuff. So I would invite her because she's been involved in this certainly for an awful lot longer than I have. Thank you. Thanks, Pat. Emma, anything you wanted to add? Yes, I think particularly to your own question. So the current position, well maybe I'll give a bit of context. Our older people care at home, we did have a framework arrangement in place and that was probably pre-pandemic. Over time and certainly through the pandemic, the demand to discharge individuals from hospital and therefore the requirement for home-based care exceeded what we were able to purchase on our framework. So we had to purchase what we would call spot contracts, which would be classed as the non-contracted spend under urgency. Now, obviously it was recognised that that's not the best way to procure and purchase care and we have been working towards developing a new framework, which would cover all of our contracted spending care at home just now. That has been delayed longer than we would like to have been, but we are confident that we'll have a framework in place for the beginning of the new financial year, so April 2025. So just to answer your point, at this moment in time we have a lot of spot contracts for care at home, which is a bit of a legacy from the purchasing that we did during the pandemic. The existing framework that was there at the time had lapsed, so there is no framework, that's what we're working towards. So right now we couldn't individually put every person that we've got with each of the individual providers, of which there are many, there's over a hundred, continually on the register. But once we move to the framework agreement, which is what our plan is for 2025, then we can put the framework on the register, which doesn't require us to put all the individual details underneath that. It's the overarching contract that would go on. It's just that we don't have that overarching contract in place yet. So hopefully that helps answer your point. But you can let me know if you need further. Yeah, I think that is helpful in understanding why we are where we are. I've got Councillor Osler, and then Councillor Kumar, and then Councillor Mowat. I think my question follows on from Councillor Campbell's, because my question is about what's stated in 4.6, which says the Council does not currently have a central record of checks, which are due in checks which have been completed in line with contract management requirements of each contract, as no single database for contracts is held. I just wondered from a governance and from a risk factor point of view, is that something we're comfortable with? It's no, it's not something we're particularly comfortable with. It is something that we are looking at. There's various tools that we're trying to investigate just now to see if they would give us that central visibility. The key for us really is having a central file with, I guess, the higher risk, medium to high risk contracts and higher values held all in one place. We have tried using Scottish Government systems to enable us to do that, but they're very restricted and don't have a lot of flexibility around them, and we don't have control of the system, so we can't make changes to it. There is a high level IT digital programme around procurement and contract management in Scottish Government, which is going through various stages of business cases and investment just now. That may be the solution, but we're also looking at how we could find a local solution for the council as well. Just to support Linnette's comments, we're not comfortable with that. Alongside, as I've mentioned in previous committees, the work that we've been doing for the contracts and commissioning review, this is, of course, one of the key issues that have been identified from the initial discovery work and as Linnette has pulled out. What is the right system solution to get a consistent version to address this issue and what would work in the best - bringing in some of the other issues that Linnette has mentioned around feeders, around contract spending identification, and great management information around that, making sure that we can get the right solution to address those issues. Thank you very much. I'm going to briefly come back to say, what are we doing in the meantime? It relates to the fact that the issue has been identified and it's more while we wait, because what you're basically explaining is at the moment there is no suitable system. We know there are flaws there because not everything is being recorded on that system. But we do have assurances within health and social care about the checks that they are undertaking as part of their process. We do have a compliance review check that we undertake centrally within my own team. But in terms of capacity, we probably at most get a dozen compliance reviews per year on top of day-to-day work. We're not ignoring the issue. We know the issue is there and we're trying to target high-risk contracts through those compliance reviews. OK. Councillor Comar. Thank you, food and thank you for this report. My question is very similar to Councillor Osler's. So I had handed the similar bit around the new central record for checks, but then in 4.7 it says that appointments for new providers will have those checks. But can I understand, are we also doing that for existing providers where contracts are renewing? Understand the need for spot checks or spot contracts and how that was pushed through because of the pandemic. But can I get assurances that even if they are a provider on the system and we haven't done our full due diligence, that they will also be subject to the same checks as new providers, please? Did you want to come back, Richard? Thank you, Councillor. I want to pick up on your question and the previous question, specifically in relation to the performance and the performance oversight of this. We, given the bulk of this sitting within the Health and Social Care Partnership, there is a read across here, not just in relation to the spot purchasing type of approach, but also across all of our commissioned services. So within the Health and Social Care Partnership, but it would also extend that to the alcohol drug partnership as well in relation to how we oversee and govern and performance manage. So we are on an improvement journey here and we've got a lot of work to do, but it has been recognised that we do need to stand up a much better, a much more precise performance oversight set of arrangements for our commissioned services across the piece. So as a piece of work that's underway just now, I would accept that at the moment we fall short on that, in terms of reporting on that level of performance that's needed. Sorry, thank you. It was just to come back on Councillor Kumar's point, which I think was some assurance around what checks were in place when a contract was in place, as opposed to just due diligence at the outset. So that checklist that forms part of the appendix to this report is a guidance for us when we go out and contract monitor. So when there's an existing contract in place, we would look at some of the aspects of that checklist as part of our contract management and monitoring. And there'll be specific things that we might have that we would go out and check on. So it's just to give you that assurance that we don't just do it at the outset, it's part of ongoing contract monitoring, that we would look at all of those things. But certainly, you know, hot topics or specific areas. OK, thanks. And Councillor Miller? Thank you. Yeah, at 4.1, it says that we have a 93% target for contracted spend levels. Who sets that 93% target? Is that an operational setting or is that set by committee? I think it's a legacy target that was brought across. It was our data team that advised me about the target because I didn't know that it existed, it sort of predates... I think it perhaps relates back to a previous purchase to pay review, probably over eight years ago. Can I have a follow up? Of course. So are there any proposals to review that and look at that and take that back to, presumably, F&R committee about is that the right level? It's still £70 million worth of spend off contract permitted, roughly, out of our budget. So are there any plans to review that and take that back to committee to look at that? Yeah, absolutely. We'll take a look at that. I think what we need to do is have a bit of a quite nuanced approach to it, because inevitably we'll never get to 100% of on contract spend. It's just not feasible given the small quantum or methods of purchasing and all those things. So we'll take that away and do a bit of analysis of the way that we are purchasing things and think and perhaps suggest they still are challenging, but a realistic target for that particular KPI. And is that going to be... is this... is contract spend reported regularly to the F&R committee or is it just coming here through audit, and is that going to be that assessment and setting of the right target reported... go through a committee? The... what's reported to F&R tends to be the contracted spend. So there's reports every six months on new contracts that have been awarded under delegate authority, and then there is an annual report on procurement activity across the council, which covers the council's spend. It perhaps doesn't dive deeply into what's non-contracted and contracted in terms of those values, but that's something that we could include in future reports. I was going to say that that's definitely true in the current position, however, as part of the medium-term financial plans and the kind of theme around financial sustainability and control, there is a review of procurement and commissioning, which is taking place, that will be more regularly reported through that process to F&R for now at least. So that's a bit of additional comfort while we go through that review. I suppose the point Councillor Maillou is maybe making is should there be regular non-contract in the way that we regularly report contracts, then F&R should actually that non-contract be regularly reported in like an annual or six monthly report. Did you want to comment on that? It's just to... you know, we did an audit, this came out, and it's just to know that going forward that that is going to be tracked, both contracted spend, you know, what's been done under delegated powers, what's off contract, just as fiscal grip is being, to demonstrate fiscal grip is being exercised. I think that's been noted, and hopefully we'll see that reported back. I had one final question if no one else has got any other questions. It says in Next Steps that this report will be referred to relevant executive committees, and it's maybe following on from earlier questioning, what is relevant executive committees? It says responsible for the service area is covered by the original report, but I think given like this report is very clear that the majority of the issues are sitting within health and social care, I feel like this should go to the IJB as well as P&S which has oversight for health and social care. So just to confirm that's the plan for this report. So the report will be reported through the Audit and Assurance Committee for the IJB, and given the conversation we've had today in relation to performance as well, that will be covered through the performance and delivery committee as well. So I don't know in governance terms if we can, but I kind of feel like this needs to go to the IJB, and also my understanding is the audit don't have a chair at the moment, is that right? So I feel like we probably just need to send it straight to the -- I only know this because I'm meant to meet with the chair of the Audit Committee at the IJB, and I can't because they don't exist right now, so I suppose we're not allowed to do that. So I think you can send it to the IJB, but it's up to the IJB how they wish to consider it within their governance arrangements. If that's within their Audit Committee, then that's how they deal with it, that's their prerogative. So when we do the piece of audit work that we're starting that will be being reported to the committee, we automatically refer that to the IJB Audit and Assurance Committee as well, if that's helpful? Okay. I mean, we'll send it as much as we can, and we hope that it is given the attention that obviously we've given it, and that it's obviously quite a few concerns here. But with that, are we happy to agree the report? Thank you. Okay, so the next item is Item 8.3, the draft annual governance statement 2324, and we have Gavin King speaking to this item. Is there anything you want to add, Gavin? I suppose just a slight clarification for anyone, just if this is the first time they've seen this sort of thing. This is an early version of the annual governance statement. So it is a strange element that is not the final draft of the annual governance statement. That goes in with the annual accounts. So the whole idea of this is to bring it early doors to GRBV to see whether you think anything is missing, anything that you wish to give more attention to, and then what will happen is this will be worked on further. There will be sections added in terms of from Richard and from Laura, and it will go to external audit, who I'm sure will have comments as well, before it finally goes in and ends up in the annual accounts. Okay, so I had a question actually picking up on a theme that came up earlier, which was around Allios. At 1.18, which is in officer decision making, there's a bit about Allios reporting through assurance schedules being submitted, and the executive director determines whether they feel it's appropriate for any issues highlighted to be included in their assurance schedules and reported in the annual governance statement. And I just wondered, again, I suppose it's about assurance with Allios and governance. How much are we relying on annual governance statements, and do we feel that appropriate issues are being escalated and highlighted through this process? Is it effective at the moment? So I think relying simply on annual assurance schedules would not be recommended. I think it's a formal process, and I think obviously we can take some assurance from that. But I would hate for us to be thinking that is the only way that we should be doing this. And part of the Allio governance framework is looking about how we can ensure that that relationship between the Council and the Allio throughout the year is improved, and there's more formality to that, that we are looking at how we are reporting that to directors and the chief executive to ensure that any matters or any concerns are escalated and dealt with appropriately, whether that ends up just going to the officers and the chief executive or whether that goes to committee for a decision. So that's one of the things we're looking for in the Allio governance framework is to ensure that we have measures in place throughout the year to ensure that we have confidence that those processes are in place. And I suppose I should just add that doesn't mean that there aren't processes in place for companies in terms of their relationship with the Council. It's just I'm not sure that we have a consistent approach through all our Allios. Okay. Thank you, Gavin. I've got a councillor for agenda and then a lot of other people. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for the report. Okay, I'm going to throw a cat in the pigeons on this, and I'm going to say that a common thing. So this is about governance. Now, a common thing that we hear as councillors is that there's actually quite poor governance within the Council. And that there's a sort of democratic imbalance within the Council, and that quite often it appears like officers are running the Council as well. So how do we reflect that, which sometimes can feel like a reality even for councillors, in this sort of assessment of the difficulties in running a council as well, because that is a very, very vital part of it too. And I mean, there is this part about the five political parties and how that makes things more difficult as well. I mean, my personal opinion would be to amend that and say that because of that political share of power, it means that it's very difficult for there to be the democratic decision-making from the Council to actually work and power becomes concentrated in certain areas and not spread in the same way. And the other thing is that we're looking further on in the report, the stuff about things like CLT, there seems to be a lot of people writing their own report cards as well. And I'm not sure how that balances with proper with that assessment of how the governance within the Council as well. So I don't know if anyone wants to comment on any of that, but I feel like I've got it off my chest. Well, I'm glad that that was therapeutic for you. OK. Thanks, Paul. Appreciate that. So I suppose I don't know if I agree that there is a democratic imbalance. I would say that committees are more powerful and take more decisions than ever before. In terms of when we're looking at the political management arrangements of other councils, this Council stands out. In some cases, to a vast amount in terms of its decision-making going through committees and Council compared to committees. So an example which I may have bored you with before. Leeds City Council, which is a similar sized authority to us. And when we were looking at it, had 15 reports at their cabinet. So that is all of their committees put together into one meeting had 15 reports a month. Now, if we had 15 reports a month, I don't think I would be able to cope. I think I'd be on a couch somewhere lying down. So I think we have a vast amount of reports. And I think it's the difficulty is the way that the local government legislation is it is meant to separate between officers and councillors. So it does not expect councillors to do everything. That is not the way that local government is set up. And what is key is in how we look at this, and I think it is a constant struggle, is what we must ensure is that, A, councillors are making the significant decisions and all policy decisions. So they are making all policy decisions and all significant decisions. Officers are making routine decisions in ensuring that the business of the council can operate, not at the fact that we've got a four week or an eight week cycle that the council runs and the city runs. And we have to ensure that scrutiny is at a right level. That councillors are getting across what they need to get across, and they are focusing on the main issues and the significant issues. I think that's really difficult. And I think it's a constant struggle for us. And I think that's what we continue to need to discuss. I think the five political parties that we have represented now and are independent means that we have more scrutiny than ever. And the fine balance of that means that decision making does go across all groups. As I said, it's only, it's what the majority of people stick their hand up at the same time make decisions rather than anything else. And I think in council you see that can be a range of parties sticking their hand up at the same time rather than the same ones as maybe we had fifteen years ago, for instance, when it was just one block of people would put their hands up and that would be a decision made. So, I can understand how it may feel like there's an imbalance because of the range of decisions and the amount of issues that come up throughout the year in what is such a busy and large city. But I think there is a democratic core here. I think it is we have a good structure in place. I think we need to focus on and think again about what we're doing at committee and whether we're trying to do too much. I think you've heard me before say that I think we are maybe doing too much. But I think generally it's something that we have to keep monitoring and having a discussion about and keep improving. And I think it's really useful to have these conversations and these questions because I think we should be focusing on that. And obviously I think with a new chief executive we'll be looking even more at whether we can improve these matters and how we can work together to make these things better. Hopefully that has given some sort of answer to the question. Thank you Kevin. So I've got four more questions. All of the hands up at the same time. So I'm just going to go from left to right. Mine was a very particular question. Thank you so much for the flow chart because I love a flow chart. That was very, very exciting. The one that I did have a question about was licensing board because I know that you've got the credit initials. I appreciate the fact that obviously a licensing board is separate to the council. The councillors still sit on it. Plus obviously officers are still connected to it. So I wondered why that wasn't part of the flow chart. Do we not have a governance structure for it? So it should be in what we kind of call joint boards but is meant to be boards and other matters. I think that may well just be a case of we ran out of space to fit it in the box rather than anything else. But that's that's where I would have licensing board because she said it's councillors but it is separate. Licensing authority separate to the council. So it's slightly different in terms of governance arrangements like you said. But that's where it should be. It should be in that element which is meant to be council connected but not council. OK. Councillor Caldwell. Thank you. Convener. My question is regarding partnership working at point one point two point one nineteen. So it touches on what Councillor Chen just said earlier because I was tempted to put an amendment in but it was my first committee and I didn't want to sort of blunder in. One concern that sort of I want clarity on from officers is in terms of the end of a partnership and it says that there's four city wide partnerships for locality partnerships and thirty neighbourhood networks. My experience has been that the majority of neighbourhood networks haven't been meeting since the start of the pandemic. And my major concern is that it may be inappropriate for that to be labelled in this sort of governance statement if it's not currently active. So it's just to get sort of officers views on that. And as Gavin indicated earlier you know this is an early draft version so appreciate any consideration could be given to amending that. Thank you. Just just to say Councillor Caldwell that I think officers are aware that that system is working in some places but not all others. And Gavin and Jelly Severn Michelle Mulvaney other colleagues have been looking at that both within the council and with partners and will be coming forward with some ideas for change through the course of this year. And that will need to go to PNS from a council point of view and obviously need to be discussed with partners because it's it you're right. It's working in fits and start should we say. I think there needs to be some reform and focus so point is noted but there's definitely change coming on that. Thank you very much for that. That's your answer. That's appreciate it. I suppose in the context of this governance statement because as it currently stands it is is both isn't isn't working. I wonder if it would be possible for that to be reflected in the governance statement or if that would be appropriate. Thank you. We could we could say there's a review ongoing to try and improve the situation I think that would make sense. Yeah I think it's a really good point. Councillor Caldwell and I also this is a draft governance statement. So actually you know by the time it goes into the accounts and I think OK. Thank you can be. So my question harks back to what counselor gender had said about having a look of people marking their jotters and I may have missed something and like Council called well I don't want to go blundering in but four point three says that the conclusion of the government's statement is that the council government is has got a satisfactory level of assurance. And I'm just wondering who and it did strike my question is who makes that assessment and it did suddenly strike me that this is a statement by the officers and it's up to the counselors to make that assessment or is there an independent assessment made of that assurance statement. So the point of the annual governance statement is that it is the chief executive who is making that statement. So that is the whole point of it as chief executive is making the statement and the satisfactory governance obviously based on what I've written. This goes to an external audit. It will go to the annual accounts. They will have their view on whether they feel that the governance of the council is satisfactory or not and will make comment in terms of that. So this is meant to be for instance the council's view of that. If if the council for instance felt that there was issues with that and didn't agree with that, then there would be the opportunity here or at council to to say that and say that they think changes should be made. And as I said external audit. We'll be looking at that too. Thank you. I want to go back to the partnership working paragraph at one point nineteen and I won't be quite so polite as counselor called well because I'm glad that the the commit that he got their first and that the officers have given a commitment that this will be reviewed because I don't think this paragraph as it currently stands is open. Apparently stands is an accurate reflection of the situation that we find in the council. We had our best the last best value audit report we had said that our community engagement was poor and it wasn't adequate. We have not improved that in many areas of the city. And we've now just lumped under partnership working which to me looks a bit of let's go look over there. We haven't got those networks up and running. Some of them haven't met. And I think that as someone who's been a counselor in this council for a long time. I think it is more difficult now for communities and community councils to feed into the business of the council they get consulted with an awful lot. They're not terribly impressed about that because of the nature of the consultations that they go out. They find very difficult to engage with when they're high level strategies rather than working at the level they want to work with which is about improving things in their community. And I don't think we've got that right. And I think it would be wrong to imply that that was working effectively when I think it's the most ineffective. I've seen it in the last 17 years at the moment. So just something just to comment on the structure of the annual government statement 119 is actually just that the structures in place. So it's not the review of effectiveness which 180 which you may still disagree with. But 180 is does say for instance that the council is aware of the need to constantly improve how it empowers community and is reviewing its locality arrangements to see how it can best support this work. So you may not feel that is strong enough. But it's just I think to note that the 119 is just saying what is in place 180 is the comment on its on its effectiveness. Yeah. This has probably made me think a bit about the kind of structure of the way it's reported and I don't know how much is like has to be done but I suppose there's bits that are very clearly review of effectiveness and then you understand the points underneath it will make perfect sense. And then once you get to 130 and decision making. No, sorry if that's wrong 135 and internal controls. There's no more headlines. And yet, I don't think everything there is an internal control and some of them do feel like the areas where we're saying this is things we need to improve. And some of them are kind of stating the fact of internal controls. And I just wonder if it might be easier to read if there were maybe more headings or maybe there's like a areas for improvement section, which might help us to understand where some of those things fit. I think that's a fair point. Okay, thank you. And I had on that because I think one of the things that I picked up on that I wanted to ask about was the IAA, which is that 175, but it's also, it was one of the previous year's actions that was incomplete, I think, and there was a review of the effectiveness of the IAA and the different arrangements for developing and reporting IAA's and then at 175, it says the need, I think this is coming to the improvement, but I'm guessing the need for the council to improve its reporting and publication. And I just suppose I wondered where we were with that given I think one of the things that councillors have raised concerns about IAA is often that when they're done. So sometimes they're done after, after the fact after we've made a decision, which feels really satisfactory because we're then being told, oh, look, this is the impact of the decision that you've made. And I think that feels from a councillor governance perspective, one of the areas for improvement. So I wonder if you could give us an update on that, Gavin. Yeah, I mean, I agree. I think it is an area of improvement that is needed. There has been some very good training by Julie Severin's team. I've been on it myself and which focused exactly when you should be doing an IAA and how it should be carried out. I thought it was really good in terms of what it addressed and got to the nub of the problem. Now, that training has been carried out with a number of officers. I think I'm pretty sure it probably needs to be carried out for further officers, but it's where I think the issue is, is how we get that implementation. And that's a common issue, I suppose, that we've been talking about earlier in this committee is I think we do have a framework in place for ISAs, which is robust. But whether we have got the assurance right to actually get them to um, in terms of officers writing those in when they should and to the degree that they should is another matter. So I think there's significant improvement needed on the implementation of ISAs and how we get that work. But I suppose what I'm trying to get to, I don't think it's necessarily a framework issue, although that is getting looked at to be improved. I think it's more of an implementation issue, but I think either way there's further work that needs to be done. I know that work is getting prioritized, caught up on it with Julie Severin and that is getting targeted to be finished at the end of the year. I think Laura will just come in on this too. So just to confirm, I would agree with Gavin, we did an audit of a policy management framework which included a consideration of the IIE framework. And the IIE framework came out quite strong. There's a clear framework, a clear toolkit. Members may be aware we're auditing the implementation of IIE. So how does that then happen? There's a decision tree that officers have to follow, so we're going to follow that through for a sample and then that will help us start to work that out and then start to provide that assurance piece. That's helpful. And then I had one other thing that I wanted to raise which is something that is pertinent to this committee which is the assurance statements, the annual assurance statements from the directorates, which obviously is in 1.22 as part of the review of effectiveness and it's part of our system, I suppose, of internal controls. And we've had discussions before about the assurance statements coming here. I think these two will come as one. They are a very lengthy document. They just don't feel like they're working. They feel like they're very long. They're very unreadable. They're not user friendly. I think they're probably a tick box exercise in lots of cases because they're so lengthy and you often see the same response, like copied and pasted in one after another. And it just feels like there's got to be a better way. So I do not disagree again. And it's something that we are working on at this moment in time. So the team are working with the operations managers of each directorate to come up with a system where we can do this year round again. So where we're looking at, I think we're talking about a three-monthly process where we've got a truncated set of questions but questions dealing with the key issues that are in the assurance schedules. That is looked at every three months within the directorates. It means that we're getting everything, I suppose, a little bit quicker. We are looking at it when it's live, when these are issues that are fresh in the mind. And that means that we can integrate it into the rest of our governance and assurance process as well. So if we spot something there, where do we escalate it? Where can we fix it? Rather than waiting to the end of the year. That will also give us an easier, I suppose, mode of looking at those because there will be a truncated set of questions. Each directorate will do that. That will then all be put together at the end of the year and be put into an assurance schedule. I don't know whether we can make the assurance schedule much easier because it is a lot of information and we continue to look at that. It is based on CIPFA and SOLAS guidance so we are following a recommendation from them. We have made some changes to it but it is following a broad template. But I think that those quarterly assurance check-ins will probably give a lot more value and meet the sort of needs that you're talking about there. Okay, so can that be reflected in our governance statement that we are reviewing in the areas for improvement? That would be helpful. Okay, I can't see any further questions on this so are we happy to agree the recommendations? And should we go for lunch and come back at two and then we'll be much more efficient for the rest of the committee? I'm confident. Refreshed. Do you want to take us on to the next item Andrew? Okay, so we are at item 8.4 which is the safety of council heavy operated vehicles and we have Scott Miller speaking to this report. Thanks Scott. Is there anything that you wanted to add to the report? Thanks. I would just like to add that since this report was put together there has been quite a bit of activity with regards to fleet replacement for our trucks fleet. So we have had a number of vehicles that have come into the fleet in recent weeks and continue to do so over the next few weeks in our road services department. So that has seen a bit of a change in terms of the exact figures and percentages that are fitted with the latest safety technology, including advanced electronic braking systems. But I don't have the exact figures to hand on where we are with that at the moment. Okay, thanks Scott. Are there any questions? I had one that I wanted to ask around, it was about schools. It was 416 and 417 and in 417 I think it says colleagues are advised not to operate within the area of schools during peak times of the day. So I'm not on tech, I don't really know how this works. I've never sat on Transport Committee so I'm not totally clear but I have in my head a notion of is it route smart is used to route the bins, lorries and I just wondered if that doesn't include scheduling and if there wasn't a more kind of centralised way that it could be managed? I think yeah, so there is a couple of different systems that can provide data on the movements of vehicles within waste services. So one would be the routing technology that they use for actually planning the routes and in addition to that we have the actual onboard system that monitors information in relation to the vehicle specifically and the onboard information on that. So we can look at the route scheduling side and then we can also reference the tracking information from the vehicle as well. So there's two ways to be able to extract that information. And then I think on top of that, what waste services have said to us is that they try to keep drivers on the same routes where possible so they have route familiarisation and educate the drivers about appropriate times of when they should be servicing waste collection within areas in close proximity to schools and associated times of the day with drop off and collection. No, I appreciate that Scott. I suppose I'm just wondering, is it not possible to plant because it said, it's the bit that says colleagues are advised not to operate within the area of schools and I just wondered, I felt like, is it not in the gift of management, if you'd like to schedule so that it's not an advisory thing. It's just scheduled in that schools are avoided during those peak times. I think Paul, you're wanting to come in, aren't you? Unless you want to answer that. If you can add any more to it. All I was going to say Scott, is that I think, I'm not sure the wording is actually that accurate. So the schedules are built around avoiding those times. That's kind of how the system works. Now whether we could strengthen that further technologically because as probably most members are aware of, occasionally we have issues and the service needs to catch up so we might want to vary from routes. I think the technology, I'd need to double check it with Gareth and Andy which I'm happy to do, that the software does schedule routes in certain locations at certain times, but with the flexibility to be altered if needed. I think that's how it works, is that right Scott? Yes, I would say so yeah. Okay, that's helpful. I've got a couple of questions. I've got Councillor Stanifort, then Osler, then Caldwell. This follows on quite well from your question actually Convenor, that is in 4.19 it does say, officers are reviewing the arrangements for waste collection from schools to consider if alternative collection times could be facilitated. But that isn't mentioned in section five in the next steps. The next steps seem very technology focused, to be honest, but rather than on the practice of when vehicles operate and where. So I was wondering if you could guarantee to me that that 4.19 is a next step that is being taken, even though it's not, for some reason, mentioned directly in section five. I think we can guarantee that that will be reviewed Councillor. I can't say exactly what the result of that review will be, but if it says we're reviewing it to see whether alternative collections could be from within the school state, then that's right. I mean, I suspect they just didn't include it in next steps because it was a duplication. But, you know, we will definitely take that forward. And if we could minute that that would be helpful. Thanks Paul. Okay Councillor Aslan. Thank you very much indeed and thank you very much indeed for this report. I suppose it's a question to see there's an awful lot in this and a lot of things that being worked on, but I know to the next steps there's no follow up on this so I just wondered where a follow up will sit, you know, if we're going to get, you know, things minute, things that we're discussing and areas of concern is, is a report going to come back on this or is something going to happen. So we're undertaking an audit based on the motion and that will come back to committee in October. Also come here, I think 1.1.2 refers the report to P&S for noting. Yeah, I mean we can, but it doesn't mean it goes back to committee and we can add, for example, some of the issues that members have raised today. We can add that into that report if that would be helpful. I suppose my question relates to the fact that as this is the, you know, it went from full council to here to P&S, where's the ownership of this report? I assumed it would be here. No, the ownership is with tech. I think because it's got wider issues. So how the fleet works, all of that stuff, that's, as the convener suggested, that's a transport and environment core responsibility. I think there are kind of wider issues around safety, which is why it's being referred there for noting, but for me in terms of any changes in systems, in practices and so on, that should be a transport and environment committee competency. So maybe we should also refer it onto tech as well as P&S. I think that's probably seems like people would like to do that. Councillor Caldwell. Thank you. And you know that that's useful in terms of the October reference there because there's four bits of information that are new that we weren't on the initial report. At 5.3, I know absolutely nothing about trucks. Why are some of the safety mitigations for 26 and 18 trucks, Ettan trucks only? Because I know obviously the council has a fleet of smaller trucks and vans that may also be expedient to have this technology on it. Is it a resource constraint or are there other factors? I think, specifically when we're talking about heavy trucks, the group of vehicles that you're referencing, there's anything above three and a half tonne. What's of, we obviously don't just operate trucks, we operate a variety of different fleet assets, cars, vans alike. I would say that this technology is being rolled out across various different vehicle groups. So we purchased new vans recently. They do come with technology like emergency braking systems as well. But I think typically when talking about serious incidents, it's often the case that there is a focus more on the truck group or I guess groups of vehicles are more likely to be operating in areas where there is a high-density population of pedestrians and other road users. And typically it is instances that involves vulnerable other road users that we can't have quite serious incidents involving these vehicle types because typically there are blind spots on them. It's more difficult to be able to navigate and make use of the same road space when you've got cyclists and large vehicles trying to operate within that area. And really it's a case of how can we make those vehicle types safer in order to reduce the risk that is associated with any serious kind of incidents happening with vulnerable road users who haven't shared the same space as these vehicles. And I think that's a question for all of our panelists. Thanks, Scott. We're just having a bit of a discussion about where this report is going. I think everyone is kind of nodding because that makes sense because that's where operational decisions about these or strategic decisions about the operational. But we're going to have to check because we had a council motion which said P&S so I think we're just going to have to have a bit of a governance discussion. Do you want to come in, Gavin? I mean, so the council motion says that there should be a report to P&S. But I don't see no reason why P&S could consider it. So there's nothing in P&S that allows it to do anything with it. Which then means we probably should refer it to P&S which would be a colossal waste of time for everyone. So my feeling would be that you should send it to tech which is where it should go to and is within the remit of transport. I was going to say and Paul's saying the same, we should check that Kevin's happy with it because he wants it to go to both. So probably he's fine with it going to tech but should we say it will go to tech provided that the right of the motion is happy for that to happen if not it will go to tech and P&S. Did you want to commend Councillor Jenkinson? I wanted to clarify whether we needed to amend the report, an addendum to send it somewhere else or whether we can just do that verbally. That's basically what we're doing is a verbal amendment. Yeah, that's fine. So, okay, I'll amend to go to tech if I can get a seconder but obviously if Kevin's not happy we'll send it to P&S as well if someone can second me. That's fine. Anybody have any questions? Thank you. Did we still have questions? No, I think we're done on questions so there's no further questions. So with that I'll be happy to read the report. Thank you. Thank you so much. I'll ask for questions from all the members of the finance and resources committee just to remind members that we have a gender appendix for this report and we have Kevin McKee, Keith Irwin and Lynette Robertson speaking to this item. Is there anything you want to add to the report? So I'm going to go back to that. So it's something sent on by the committee and we provided a counselor briefing note yesterday. Normally we would try and keep briefing notes to a page or two so apologies if this one's a bit longer. However, given that the unsuccessful bit has raised a number of quite detailed points we thought that problem familiarity the more comprehensive response. And I think the reason why that's important is because at the moment we don't have a solution. So we've got to push back and forth between the unsuccessful solicitors and ourselves. I think their disappointment and anger at the start was based on misapprehension of various points and they jumped the gun before they actually got their standstill letter setting out the exact reasons why they were not awarded the contract. Are there any questions on this report? I found the legal briefing note really helpful actually and most of the questions I had got noted to ask at committee were answered by it. I also wanted to say that I have a couple of questions about the report itself, which not in relation to the challenge but in relation to the procurement process and the process worked with this multi-stage process. So, one was how much changed between when the initial stage was taking place and when the final bids were submitted I.E. did the process of stepping through a slightly different process than we saw with the previous tenders, did that work basically? I think it was a different process. I think it did provide better outcomes because the bids were assessed on their initial submission at the first stages. And we had dialogue with the bidders, that dialogue resulted in improved offers being made with more detail, giving more assurance to officers that the organisations understood what was expected and what their role and responsibility was in delivering the contract. And also it gave us more opportunity to explore their financial offer as well, which we didn't have the first time on the previous contract. In terms of the contract manager, David Waddell will hand over to David as part of the process. But I understand there's also some recruitment on the go for an additional person to go into the team. Okay. Thank you. We are happy to agree the recommendations. Thank you. We are going to move on to item eight.6 which is the quarterly status update digital services. Good afternoon. Thank you. Since we last met, it was just to draw to attention that the finance section has some additional information in it in terms of the rebate and the savings that have been made since 2018. We will talk about the cap and indexation at 2.5% which has allowed us to significantly avoid 18.6 million of estimated costs going forward to the end of the contract in March 2029. And there is a B agenda item today which provides more additional information on the vulnerabilities. Happy to take any questions. Thanks, Nicola. Councillor Miller. Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. On the previous slide, which can be known, thank you for the report. I had two questions. One was regarding P1 incidents because they appear to be up again. So I wondered if you could tell us what's happening there. What's behind that. If there is something that's a trend. Thank you, Councillor Miller. We did see incidents, P1 incidents increase with some significant work on our firewalls and also we have done telephony upgrades and upgrades on our routers. And when you go to do major works like that, it can then have a knock-on impact which is what we have seen. And we have seen the number reduce again and we have got some stable firewalls and upgrades on our routers and further work to do on our routers as well. So some major upgrades have taken place since the last quarter. And I have to say our major telephony upgrade went in successfully over the weekend as well. In terms of meta-compliance, I think it's a good topic to cover since we have talked about cyber incidents. We have seen we do a report every month to CLT to report on completion on the meta-compliance. And we're not seeing the uptake on that really essential training that we need to see. All the organisation do. So every single directorate is getting updates on that on a monthly basis in terms of the completion rates. Then we have a training plan for this year. We are going to be creating a new training plan for this year. And what we are doing is taking forward, that might be the point you're mentioning, additional technology that we will put in place which will absolutely force the training to each user to make sure that people are completing that essential learning. That change request is working through the change process right now and we expect to have that back mid-June with the look of implementing around about August / September time. So we had a - Nicola and Heather and colleagues organised a briefing from some software which would effectively say you need to do this, you need to do this, you need to do this. You've only got a certain number of more goes at this before you are in effect locked out of your system. But on a kind of managed basis it was impressive to see. And we asked Nicola to take that further to see how that could be implemented because we think that's required now. That's good to know in terms of driving up completion rates and hopefully that would then mean that we are more compliant with the number of people who've completed the training. But my question was less about completion rates and more about, so say we have 100% people completed it, how effective is that at reducing the risk that it's trying to mitigate? I'll take the first part and then I'll hand to Heather. So you're right, 100% completion rate will not stop something from happening. We've got various different layers of security in place which I think Heather referenced earlier on, but to educate people across the organisation and make sure they understand what is out there and what potential hacks can happen, does help the different layers of defence. I'm going to hand it over to Heather who will talk about the other arrangements that we've got in place. It's a bit like the locks on your doors and your windows, you can actually put so many things in place, but if somebody wants to get in then they will do their best to try and get in. What we're trying to do is slow them down, but we do have a multilayer of authentication across the estate which Heather will talk a bit more about. Thanks Nicola. I think going back to your question in relation to the training itself, there's two things. First of all, the way that we're doing the training allows us to target areas that are most at risk, so if we know that there's been, for example, a lot of fishing, your next training will be about fishing. We've brought in information governance as well for some of the training that we've put out over the last couple of years. The method that we're using is one that, I guess I don't know the science behind it, hands up on that, but it's that drip feed of keeping it in your consciousness, so that because it's not one thing you do once a year, the reason, the rationale behind doing it monthly is to keep it in people's consciousness because we do have multiple layers of security, but one of the biggest things that we have is our users and their caution when it comes to things that, for example, come into their mailbox, and making sure that our users are alert to as much as we possibly can, keeping it in their consciousness is the reason that we do that training the way that we do it. Okay, I've got a number of different questions. So, Councillor Mawa and then Councillor O'Brien. Thank you, I wanted to ask about the community benefits, which have been detailed, which is helpful, and just how the projects are chosen and decided on. Is that sort of people who are employees of CGI suggest something, or is there a bid-in process for it, and if there's a bid-in process, how are we advertising that? Because there's some things that have been sort of funded that other groups in the city possibly like that opportunity. Thank you, Councillor Mawa. Yeah, CGI don't decide. The nominations come into the council. We really support One City Trust. We've got good connections. I think we talked about that last time around, good connections with Elaine Cavarte and the One City Trust. They will put forward nominations. They come right into digital services. We review them, and I think as we've said before, we look at the resources that we can provide to local businesses and local charities, and actually how we can help them with their IT. So they come right into digital services, and we review them and pretty much look at trying to accommodate most of those requests that come in. Councillor Osler? Thank you very much indeed. I've got a slightly sticky question that's on appendix four service performance. It's probably my own stupidity here, but I don't really understand where it says, Overall number of calls abandoned. We have a figure. And then below we have, Percentage of overall calls abandoned. The percentage doesn't seem to match the figures. I'm a little confused what that all actually means. I will have to take that way and have a look at it, so if you wouldn't mind, Councillor Osler, I'll take a look at that and come back to you on that. It should be a straightforward percentage of the calls that have been abandoned. It should be. We'll take that away and have a look. Well, it's not very clear whether it's calls offered. I'll give you an example. It says, Overall number of calls abandoned. It says there's 468, say for example, out of 4,422, which is called offers, or 3,954, but it's saying the percentage of it is only 2%, which seems quite small in comparison to either of those two figures. Yeah, it will only be the calls that have abandoned. The total calls offered, how many calls have actually abandoned, that will be your percentage of 2%. I think what's not mentioned in here is how many calls have actually abandoned, to let you get to that 2%. Yes, it says the number of calls abandoned. It should be a straightforward percentage. I think we'll check out the numbers and come back. It's coming up as 2%. It should be around about 10%. We'll get that checked. I can't see any more questions on this report. I was going to ask something, but I'll come to you in a second, Councillor Jenkinson, just because. We've got item 11 on the agenda. I'd asked APM to have an additional B agenda section to this, and it's come up as a different report, but it's very much related to this report. My questions are on that. I'm suspecting that you're probably on the vulnerabilities as well. Are we happy to go to B agenda now and take item 11 as part of this and then come back and do the formal bit at the end? OK, can we go to B agenda? Is that OK? And if anyone who doesn't need to be. Right, OK, so we've agreed the B agenda reports are just going back to 8.6 and I did put in an addendum, but I'm withdrawing it because it was largely met by the B agenda report. I think we've had assurance and that being included in regular updates, so I will just withdraw that amendment. So we're happy to agree the recommendations. Thank you. OK, so the next item is item 8.7, the local government benchmarking framework 2223 Edinburgh overview and we have Catherine Stewart speaking to this report. Hi Catherine, anything you want to add? Yeah, I just want to say, so this is the first time that the overview report has come to GRBV. This is a part of a series of reports so the each theme is going to the relevant executive committee and this is just an overview. It kind of covers the whole data set. Happy to take any questions. Thank you Catherine. Are there any questions? Councillor Sandifor? Yes, thank you, Convenor. Environmental services has seven indicators in the lowest quartile, that's much more than anywhere else has indicators in the lowest quartile, almost half. What is it about environmental services that is producing that result? I'll go first. It will be a mix of factors in there. So this data set is a mix of costs. There's some activity and there's some customer satisfaction. So environmental services, none of, there's no particular area where they're all in the red. So it's kind of peppered throughout. One of the issues we have is, some of the numbers are there's been an increase in cost in the improvement service and the LGBF data set ranks high cost as kind of for performance and low cost as good performance. So actually if you're showing investment in certain environmental services like roads, street cleansing, which is what you have done in the last couple of years for 22, 23, which is what this data set is for. You start seeing higher costs which is going to lower our ranking. I think that's, I've not seen any further questions. I'm just going to follow up on that because I think that's something that's certainly been raised by members of my group before. Like for example in education services, if you increase money you're spending per child on education then your quality goes down. Is that something that is this kind of dialogue that we're having with the improvement service or any other councils? So I think it's, if you think about the data set in the round, it's looking at trying to see if you are effective, so if you've got good quality services, then you want to do it as cheaply as possible. As in, if you can do things well for less money, why would you not, sorry I'm phrasing that badly. So I think that's why they generally rank it and they're not going to swing around. So this data set allows us, they call it kind of a can opener so that you have a look and it makes you ask questions. For the cost ones actually, sometimes the cost will go up and actually it's not by us investing and it's right that this data set would pull that to your attention and we can ask the questions. Sometimes it would be actually, yeah we know we're actually focusing it's a priority for us, we want to see performance improve. That's why it is. So that's why it's that way. Every single year we come back around, some of the cost ones around, sometimes a high cost is good, sometimes it's bad. So it's good that the data set gets us to ask the questions. Just following up on that, Catherine, I wonder if there's a way of, and I don't know because I haven't had time to go back into the data set that this comes from, if there's a way of pulling that out in our report. Because I think what's important for us is, and where this comes into its own, is if we invest money, do we see an improving service? And I don't mind if we fall down the thing because our cost of delivery goes up. So say our cost of waste collection goes up by five pounds above the Scottish average. But if our recycling rate then goes up two or three percentage points and goes up above the Scottish average, we've then proved the investment. So I don't know if either we can link to that or just pull those things out when we're reporting back to us to say, yeah, we've gone down here but that's because we invested, but actually our performance, that's gone green because we've gone up. Because I think that's the really useful thing about this data set is when we're tracking that across a Scottish average. And to be perfectly honest, our bin collection should never be really expensive compared to the Scottish average because we collected the city rather than in rural areas where it's more expensive to collect. So in the themed report, so the one that went to kind of transport and environment around the environment, we've got that kind of detail and we've got service narrative that kind of says where there's poor performance, here's what we've been doing or here's what we're going to do. So because this is an overview report, you're not getting that level of detail. However, this is the first time this report has come to you the committee. So there's no reason why we can't. It's trying to find that balance between giving you great detail about 100 and I'm going to say eight indicators and actually pulling out the ones that actually are the ones that you want to have a look at without you feeling like we're hiding anything. We want to be transparent. So it's that balance for us. I just wonder from a presentation point of view, if we've got that more granular detail going to each of the executive committees, we just link those reports at the bottom. And if people like Councillor Stanislaus had it, you could just go and check that against the particular executive report and do it rather than putting more into this or you doing more work. That's probably quite a helpful way to do it. Happy to do that. Yeah, I would agree because I went to try and look for like a couple of like to go into the data and a couple and I really struggled. Actually, and that's why I was going to ask because I think in previous years, they used to be like a national report and you could go and see the charts of 32 local authorities and they don't do that anymore. And you have to go into the data set and it's Power BI and I know everyone loves Power BI. I hated it. I couldn't find the information I was looking for. It was really like complicated. I was just craving the old reports we used to have where I could like look through them. So I think, I mean, that's obviously not you. That's the decision that's been made by the improvement service. But I think if that is the case, I wonder if we could have those links at least to the reports ourselves so we can find them. That would be helpful. I'm only smiling conveniently because some of my colleagues get very excited about that Power BI, don't they? We do like it. There is a national report still there. It's still published. Could we get a link to that? Because the links were to the Power BI thing and I couldn't make them work. I will make sure to send the other link to the members of the committee this year and then in future years we'll put both links in. That's great. I can't see any other questions on this so we're happy to agree to the report. Thank you. OK, so the next item is item 8.8, the review of structural assurance and we have Gavin King speaking to this item. Is there anything you want to add to the report, Gavin? No, nothing but happy to answer any questions. Are there any questions for Gavin on this report? No? Are we happy to agree the recommendations of the report? Thank you. So the next item is item 8.9, proposals to end library overdue fines and this is a referral from the culture and communities committee. We have an SNP group addendum to this item and we have Gavin King and Evelyn Kilmurray speaking to this report. Anything you want to add to Gavin or Evelyn? I don't think she is here. Anything you want to add Paul? OK, any questions on this report? No questions. So I don't think I have any questions. I'll cancel them out. Sorry. It's a sort of question about the report and a sort of question about the amendment. The report and the amendment, the genesis of it seemed to be that because something was agreed this year which led to a budget pressure that this is now ongoing. Now, my understanding of this and it may be that I'm now about to find an arcane bit of council budgeting that I didn't realize was the case, in which case my bad. But my understanding of this would be that that may have happened this year but although previous budgets had assumed this income from library fines, once the policy has changed you would then need to review your budgeting going forward. So it's not an ongoing pressure, it's the issue it's just this year's, what happened this year, not the future and I'm sorry that I missed that. I think, and my colleague Alison Coburn's online to help out if when I go wrong convene, I think, I agree with the first part of what you said but not the second, Councillor SETI. I think in a way this issue has brought up an issue about when policy changes but to make sure that flows through to the budget process. So if members agree that for example library fines should no longer be applicable, then in effect what happens in council budgets is that what is in effect an income target, it's not an income target as in money we need to earn but it's money that finance colleague assume will be raised, that should be adjusted accordingly as a result of the policy decision and it isn't and that we do need to take that away and look at fixing that. But that decision was made, we were asked as I understand it as a result of the budget motion of council to bring a report to the relevant committee to say how this could be done and that's what we did. And then this has been referred here but the real issue is the relationship between a policy decision and a budget decision and I do think we need to have a bit of a look at that, sorry Gavin are you looking at me? I'm not, I think it's just, so for instance this subject is slightly more complex because some of these decisions go back to COVID and actually decisions that were taken during the pandemic and elements that were put in place then and that's which carried over. So I mean I haven't looked at this yet because I thought I'd wait until committee actually agreed to do it. But I have spoken briefly to finance colleagues and it does feel that this is slightly more complex than, than I would hope. I think it makes sense in terms of where decisions are coming from, but it isn't just about this budget decision, it's actually about decisions that go back over the last few years on this one so it's, I don't disagree with anything Paul says but this particular issue has a little bit more to it. So, do you want to come back? Yeah, sometimes you ask the daft lassie question and actually you do open the can of worms to mix my metaphors, so basically we need to sort of go back and review, a lot of these COVID decisions that we took because we haven't rebased our budget accordingly, or there is some impact. No, I don't think I was saying that I think what I was saying is that decision was taken in COVID and then was continued again by committee. And that was then dealt with in terms of the budget wise, but this year, this year was formalized in terms of a policy, if that makes sense. So what I'm saying is COVID it was a temporary measure was put in place. And as a result, temporary budget process was put in place. Then, that was continued on by committee in a temporary without a policy change. This year was finally the point where committee decided council decided to look at that in terms of a long lasting policy. So, I think if people are wishing to look at it then that's fine and we need to look at it in a bit more detail, but I think there is a bit more to this in terms of where we go to and the process we went to which would be helpful for everyone I think. Did you want to come back to council? Yeah, I just when you gave your first response Gavin which you seem to be sort of shuffling away from, you seem to imply this wasn't the only type of decision where this had happened, the only situation where this had happened. So, I'm just wondering if we're going to, if you've got this addendum saying we want to look at this and it appears that there is something that needs to be looked at. Do we have any sort of idea about other bits, other decisions that may be similar that we may need to look at? I'm not aware of any decisions that we took under COVID which still outstanding in this way. Okay, because I suppose my worry about actually sat slightly behind that because, yes, the decision was made to waive library fines, but actually the report says the service took 50,000 pounds of income but there was a budget target 185. So you're already sitting with 135,000 pound budget pressure, and then there was an unofficial decision that they weren't even, they just weren't going to collect the 50,000. So, then we've had a budget motion which agreed 71,000 towards that, but it didn't cover the whole amount, so we've been left with it so I suppose my question is, how did we have a budget process that went, yeah, that's okay to like completely remove, you know, it's gone from highly unlikely that we would get any more, any funding into it to absolutely 100% of all that and there will be no money coming in because of library fines and I think we all agree with that as a policy, but then allowing this budget pressure that couldn't that wasn't had absolutely zero chance at that point of coming into the council to just sit there, so I suppose there's two bits of my amendment are. One is the first is the second one is are we sitting with other parts of the council where there's like a budget pressure, an expectation that some services going to bring in 100,000 a year but it never well, and it's sitting there in budgets and then we're having our finance reports saying there's a budget pressure, like, well obviously, because we've allowed them from the report doesn't say how many years but it says it's a historical figure, so it's been sitting there with this really high expectation and library fines for years and years and years, we don't really know how long so that's why it was just to have a look at those two areas of one in terms of the budget process how do we make sure there's not unfunded pressures going into the budget and can we just have a look and see. Are there any budget areas across the council that are just unrealistic, that we should just get rid of them the next budget process and start from the right point. He asked me to comment on your amendment. Does that make sense. Thanks. Can we agree the report as amended. Thank you. Okay, so the next item is item 8.10 accessibility of council information and this is a referral from the policy and sustainability committee, and we have Gavin King speaking this report. Anything you want to add, Gavin. Any questions for Gavin. Thank you convener. So, I'm new to GRBV. And we had a little informal chat convener at lunchtime saying that I'm still sort of finding my feet as to how it works and what I'm supposed to be looking for. And this absolutely confounded me. So, as what I can see is this is a referral from p&s asking us to look at audits reference in for 20 3.9, or I go to for 20 3.9, it talks about an order from 21 and there being annual orders. After that, but I can't seem to find the audits that I'm supposed to be looking at. Have I done something wrong and I know. I guess that's the point of, again, without wishing to move my mentor mentoring questions. I think the point of this is when we've been asked, but it's a quite often we get to this committee executive committees are the committee's referring reports to us that needs more scrutiny, which is fine. But sometimes we then need to say, well, if we're going to, you know, the executive committee's looked at this report, us just looking at that report again isn't necessarily going to like do anything else. So I feel like, for me, there was a bit of, let's ask for that information about the orders that digital services have been carried out, not, you know, a huge amount of work I hope that's not what we're asking for but just something to say, Can we have a bit of information about the legislative framework what's been done and what's been planned so that we can then do that scrutiny thing that was asked of us at p&s so actually I think you've understood it. If I had done my job properly, I would have read your amendment, and that would have answered my question. Sorry about that. Councilor. Yeah, just just when this is coming back assuming we're going to agree your amendment, which I'm sure we will, because it seems very sensible given that this refers to information that you know we're responding to something that we haven't actually seen. In terms of this work going forward. Is this the place where we look at how we present information to Councillors as well as that sort of accessibility piece, which is dealing with one thing about how we can present reports better because our reports are a lot of words. I keep saying, done blew in the face, we all work on a screen that way and all our reports that way so we're working and we're still working in a portrait world but we use landscape devices, and I just think is can we can we can we use this bit of work to sort of think about that, and also thinking about you know we've heard today. Some people like a table with numbers, some people like graphs with numbers. If we could get our reports down and we could be used presenting information differently. Both, because, you know, I think this accessibility piece is probably for me where that sort of sits, because you're dealing with counselors who access him, you know, we'll get the most out of information in different ways, but it's how and I appreciate that's really what's being built for officers and we don't want every report to be like 1010 times it's like because you're doing it 10 times but is there. Can we use this to find out what best practices in presenting information that's legible for the vast majority of people. I think that's a question for digital services probably I think it's it's something with digital services we provide the tools and the technology, and it's obviously when it comes to a decision on how things will be presented. I think that's a wider Council decision. Gavin. I think it's two different things. So I think there's, there's the digital element here in terms of the accessibility audits, and if you agree that Heather and Nicola will deal with and report to this committee. If you wish to look at committee reporting, how it's done, how best information can be provided to committee, then I think that would be perfectly competent for this committee to do. I think there's something extra to encourage that to happen to me. But I will. Yes, I mean, yes, I mean, we can do that. I'm just conscious of workloads but yes, of course we can manage that, well maybe there's it maybe if this is about the digital accessibility there's another conversation to have about the most appropriate way for that work to happen which is what I think needs to happen, but it may be somewhere else if there's an issue. I mean, one thing, one thing to know, I suppose, is that we are looking at modern gov, and what we do in the future for that, whether that changes, for instance, and so we're going through a process with, with digital services at the moment takes to explore what we do next, and we will be looking and we are looking at for instance, we are looking at a way to deal with committee and reporting so we will be doing a lot of work over that in the next few months anyway so I don't see it as a, I don't see as an additional work in many ways it dovetails quite nicely like you've explained. So I think that is something that we could bring to committee in the future. I don't know if that's appropriate at this point or if it's something that we would you would bring a standalone report in future, is it kind of. Where does that feel like that would fit best for you, Gavin, in terms of reporting to us. I think I'm happy to report, and in the future, I mean how that report looks and how we interconnect it because we're doing quite a lot of work at the moment on a lot of different streams which all kind of work together. So the barriers to elected office work, accessibility, the changes in terms of our technology that we're using will be distressing obviously with our new chief executive how we deal with with work as well so there's lots of different work streams going on. I need to pull them together and try and make sure that that is put to councillors in a coherent manner. I haven't quite yet worked out all those different work streams how they're going to be put together. So I'm happy though to commit to a report. And later this year, I'd rather not, I suppose, make it so specific that I have to do it in a particular form and it allows me a little bit of flexibility, and I can discuss that with you, but at APM to make sure that you're happy I'm sorry I'm saying should we put something down as an addendum sort of goes into our actions and work program. But we'll be kind. I can't read my own writing standalone. Okay, so I've got something like agrees to receive an additional report which looks at the presentation and accessibility of committee reporting, either a standalone report, or included within other reports. I think, yeah, I think what you just want to, I think we just need to separate it out from this piece, this report that's coming back in September. Yeah, that's just so it's a grease to receive an additional report which looks at the presentation accessibility and accessibility of committee reporting, either standalone or included within other reports. So it's very, we've not even put a timeline on it, it just will go into our actions and we'll get reports and point. I've got another question of completely different strand of 4.21 of the report, it mentions obviously a PDF review coming, or underway rather, but it says that committee paper since 2003 have been on the council's website as PDF. This is incredibly meta, I'm sorry for that but say I recognize some of the frustration that members and residents have had trying to access papers from before that time. And even though that may not seem relevant things like traffic regulation orders that maybe went to committee and all that trying to find stuff from before then can be a challenge. I'm just wondering what the council's sort of official stance is on why it's paper since 2003, and not before, I imagine it was probably a resource thing but for a check. Thank you. So 2003 is when we brought in our online committee system. So it's as simple as that. Before, then there wasn't a committee system when online. There was bits and pieces put forward in using early technology. When we look to see if we could take that over it was, it was only for about three years, it was bitty. It did not include all the information, and it was in a form which actually was very difficult to get anything across in any use to anybody at all. So, there wasn't much before online, it was just bits and pieces and it was only 2003 when we got an actual committee management system in place. And it was patchy to say the best it was not very useful information. The only way we could do that is if we did a complete exercise, going into our archives, getting those papers out and digitalizing and bring it onto the computer. I mean, all that is possible. And, but I think we've got 500 years so it might take us a while. Thank you. And this is where I confess, if it wasn't new to the committee I was actually penning an amendment, requesting that but not because I appreciate your time. On that note then on a sort of separate thing as part of this PDF review that's outlined in 4.23 now. What would happen as part of that review, obviously that this review is for papers going forward, what would happen to those papers between 2003 and 2025 in PDF before would they continue to be hosted in the same way or would they be converted to a more accessible HTML format or is that discussion that's not been had yet? I mean, I can answer that for what we'll look at in terms of the committee papers. I don't know enough about what we'll do for the rest of the documentation. In terms of committee papers, what we'll be doing as part of any contract is we'll be discussing that with anybody who is taking over to see what options they could provide us and how much that would cost. I mentioned this at policy sustainability. The accessibility of our documentation now on any contract we're taking forward on our committee management system is now a very high priority. I would say previously it was a desirable rather than essential element of any contract. So we are now making sure that what we do in terms of accessibility is at the forefront and anybody who is providing a contract that will be asked what they can do to not only provide the service but also improve our accessibility. Okay. That's helpful. Okay. Can I just ask how Council webcasting fits into this? Is this also part of that same review or is that a different exercise? I think things like closed captions on Council webcast is accessibility, for example. We are in a procurement process this week for Council webcasting. And again, accessibility, how that's done, what we're doing in terms of subtitles, et cetera, transcripts, accessibility of the site is a major part of that contract as well. Okay. I don't see any further questions. So, again, I'll just move the report with my addendum with the additional addendum of the extra report at some point in the future on committee reporting. Can I get a seconder? Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Kumar. Okay. We are happy to agree the recommendations. That is us. Thank you very much, everyone. .