Cabinet - Wednesday, 24th April, 2024 5.30 p.m.
April 24, 2024 View on council website Watch video of meetingTranscript
Let's go through the formal parts of the agenda. Any apologies for absence in one? I think Anne is there. We are off for Simon. Thank you Anne. Welcome. Richard is here on screen for Linda. Ah, colleagues, John, nice to see you, Richard. Nice to see you. Richard, you're here for Linda, yeah? Thank you. Thanks very much. You're somehow, we can't hear you. Make sure the mic's--
- Thomas Mayor, I am here for Linda, thank you.
- Great, thank you. Always nice to see you, Richard, thank you.
- Thank you.
- Okay, any declarations of interest in one? None, okay, great. The minutes of the 27th of March, any comments, any questions? If not, we're okay with those. Yeah, great. There are one or two announcements, then we'll start, Steve, over to you, sir.
- Just one announcement from me this evening. I know that you're going to reflect on the Brick Lane bombing in a moment, and obviously endorse your thoughts in that respect. The only other piece of information to give cabinet, 'cause I did undertake to keep you up to speed as readily as I possibly could, that we had interviews for the position of Corporate Director of Children's Services, which is one of three that we're currently progressing, with interviews for the Director of Adult Services, Health and Services next week, which is the DAS role, but we interviewed for the DCS yesterday, and members have recommended the appointment of Steve Reddy, who is here, obviously, with us this evening. Subject to due diligence, I thank all cabinet members that you have now all responded in response to an email that you received from Matthew Mannion about any objections you might have to the appointment. That process has now been concluded, and in the next few days, I expect to be able to formally confirm the appointment, but I was keen to let cabinet know an update this evening, man.
- Steve, congratulations. Steve, you've got a huge responsibility on your hands, and attainment has to increase rapidly in time, let's see, yeah, education arrangements at all stages. Thank you, thank you. Best wishes, thanks Steve, anything else?
- Okay, I have an announcement to make. Today, obviously, you know, some of you know, we've been around in time, those marks the 25th anniversary of the brick lane bombings. I remember that day very well. Sad, a devastating racist attack, intended to strike the heart of the British Bengali British Asian communities here in the East End. The bombings marked the second or third such attacks, the others occurring in Brixton and Soho, aimed at other minority communities. In total, 140 people were injured and free-work killed. I remember going down to Soho, some of my friends with the vicinity of the attack in that pub, going outside, going for a walk, it was sad to see how that community there was devastated by this terrible tragedy and attack. As we remember and commemorate those affected, we take heart in the knowledge that attempts to divide our communities, and so hatred have failed. And today, as every day, we affirm as a community, our commitment to bring a council and borough where hatred has no place. Thank you. Councillor, there is a vigil by brick lane today between six and seven, as always every year. If I could ask Councillor Suruk to represent us as the cabinet and the executive, please, if you could kindly leave at the appropriate time to go and join that vigil. Is that okay? Thank you, I did remember if we called it to send the warm Councillor. Our last council got me to just stay behind with us. So, okay, one of you could go, is that okay? Thank you, I'm grateful to you. Can we please, as a community, do a minute silence? I'm not done with this in cabinet before, but it's so important given what happened those 25 years ago in Arbara. Is that okay? Okay, thank you, we've got the time, please, yeah. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
- That's fine, yeah, and also, thank you. Also, yesterday was St. George's Day, and the flag was still this, been flown at the town law. Thank you. Happy St. George's Day. Thank you very much, Chair. Okay, over on the screen, neither chair is here. Thank you, Chair. I understand there's no over on the screen questions. Once again, welcome you, and thank you. I think you wanna make a contribution over to you, sir.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
- Good evening, and thank you for providing me with the opportunity to feedback on the views of the Melbourne Scrutating Committee. I would like to thank Councilor Kabir Ahmed and Councilor Abdulwahid for joining our meeting this week and answering the committee's questions. The committee discussed the progress of the LGA Corporate Peer Review Action Plan. We are pleased to hear that 39% of the actions are already completed, and that 65% of the actions are expected to be completed by May and 85% by August. We are particularly pleased to hear about the commitments made to improving outcomes for women, which includes launching a women's commission, developing a new violence against women and girls strategy and running a campaign to encourage women to become counselors. However, the committee also questioned the development of the action plan and how inclusive the process was in capturing a wide range of views across the Council, including scrutiny and opposition members. We'd like to see more efforts to ensure this is a holistic plan with input from all areas of the Council. We also discussed actions to streamline decision-making the Council's workforce strategy, workforce strategy and efforts to address recruitment and retention to ensure greater diversity in senior leadership. The committee requested further information in writing to understand specific work streams to deliver a workforce that reflects the community. This is a significant plan for the Council and the committee will continue to review its delivery as part of its work program next year to ensure the recommendations set up by the LGA are achieved. Our next item focused on the Council's readiness to ensure larger services from next month. The committee agrees that this service has experienced many performance issues and members shared several concerns they experienced. This includes female residents unable to enjoy female-only provision as male, lifeguards who are still present and residents unable to book facilities due to corporate bookings. The committee stressed that improved resident access must be at the forefront of all plans for the service. We were pleased to hear that there are significant opportunities arising from in-house provision that are already being explored. These include employment for residents, better integration with partners to address health inequalities and potential income generation. We are also pleased to note that some of the recommendations made as part of the Children and Education Subcommittee review of the support provision for women and girls have been realized with specific provisions for women and girls provided. The committee understands that there will be a need for significant investment and questions how the Council will meet financial objectives while ensuring improved customer experience and resident satisfaction. The committee also questioned the plans to communicate the changes to residents and stressed that there is a critical step to ensure everyone is aware of the new provision in place. It is encouraging to hear about the plans for the service. However, we must now ensure that they lead to a better service for residents. The committee will ensure that this remains on our work program next year so we can understand the impact this has on performance. The committee has requested details of KPIs to support this. Our final spotlight focused on parking, which we understand is a priority for everybody who lives, works and travels in the borough. The committee reviewed plans for a new parking enforcement strategy and questioned the Council's plans to reduce parking stress and promote effective parking mobility and enforcement activities in the borough. The committee noted that plans to simplify the customer journey have not been fully realized as there are still many issues when using the online system to purchase permits. Therefore, the committee requested that the service reviews, the service reviews this process, process. Additionally, the committee also discussed plans to better enforce match day and events at London Stadium, plans for electrical charging points and questions performance data on cancellations and number of tickets overturned and what learning has been taken from this data. Finally, Mr. Mayor, the committee agreed on the findings and recommendations from our scrutiny challenge session on markets. Members undertook several site visits and engaged with many traders to hear their lived experiences. We also looked into the best practices adopted nationally and in neighboring boroughs. The report makes several recommendations to enhance our markets and provide better support for traders. It addresses key issues such as traders spaces and storage facilities, toilets, waste management, crime in markets and educating young people about market trading to promote it as a future carrier. The service will now be drafting an action plan response for Cabinet's consideration. I hope that the plan will be carefully reviewed to ensure much needed action is taken to support markets and traders. Unless there is anything I could assist Mr. Mayor and your Cabinet, this is my submission for this evening. Thank you.
- Sure, thank you Chair. Thank you for your submission today. Each and every word is very much noted and we will reflect on it. You can also once again thank you, your cosmetic colleagues for the invaluable work that you do with us, not only in holding us to account, I think we enjoy going before you and being asked questions and to clarify and make presentations and the constructive contributions that you make but also we value your contribution trying to help in us to serve our communities, every single member of them better. Thank you very much. Can I also take this opportunity also, I apologise for not being able to attend me and Steve in my spotlight session last Monday. As you know, I had a brief agreement in a very close member of my family and to make arrangements for the funeral prayers and the burial afterward. Unfortunately, the burial happened yesterday rather than a Monday but it wasn't known at the time. So, but I'll be before you. Both of us will be there. I think it's been arranged also already early next month. I look forward to talking to your colleagues. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Prime Minister. That's fine. Great, thank you. Thank you, I just have one comment, Chair, if that's okay. You're fine. Good afternoon, please. My comment was just in relation to the Corporate Peer Action Plan. So, I just think for the cabinets information, I think it's important to note that I've now met with all of the political groups, including those that are on a group, the Conservative Men Councilor and the Green Councilor and I've attended a meeting with the Labour Executive Group as well. And there has been follow-up correspondence asking for any input. All the groups, including the Aspire Group, might have to the Corporate Action Plan and so far there has been limited response. So, it would be helpful, I think, I will correspond with the groups again to confirm that they have ample opportunity to input into the Action Plan. It is a mechanistic Action Plan. It picks up the 17, 18 recommendations and in total 70 odd recommendations, which we're working on, but I wouldn't want there to be a perception that it's not an inclusive and iterative process. Thank you. Thank you, Chief Executive for the feedback. It's been noted, thank you. Thank you, thank you very much. Can we now move on to the agenda's please, yeah? So, the first paper, extremely important paper is about the community engagement strategy 24, 28. I'll say a few words and I'll bring Steve and the officers. Please come join us. Please, Robin and our colleagues, Craig, we are over to you. Engaging with our communities are extremely important. Council does a lot of work, but people need to be consulting before we, you know, either deliver some of the work or in any event we need to hear from the people. And one of my commitment was in the manifesto before we came in on the 5th of May 2022 that we'll be listening council. Unfortunately, there was a dip in that, the seven HDS we weren't here, especially without being political, having a referendum on the mail system, doing the pandemic wasn't a good idea, having consultation, again, doing the pandemic on whether the roads should be closed a lot with real limited feedback or hardly in feedback, wasn't a good idea, but since I've been here, there was one or two, Steve, you know, one or two consultations I felt was quite embarrassing. You know, a one-ice site, the Roman Road referendum on the neighbourhood plan, what only eight people responded. There's a similar one, you know, six, seven people responded. That's not what we ask the council. We have a very active community. We have leaders in our communities, you know, a strong voluntary sector, and historically the voluntary sector and the communities in time that have always played every significant role in shaping the future of our bar and our policies. So we want to get and commit engagement back to where it was, even better than last time. This paper goes a long way. I'm grateful, thank you for the paper. You know, it goes a long way. Some last things say if it was an opportunity, a gentleman that I'd been a member of.
- Thank you.
- Thank you, Chair. So very briefly, really, we had a conversation some time ago about making sure not only that our community engagement was joined up, that we had a strong sense of corporateness about the way in which we did that, but also that we had the right skills and expertise in place to ensure that we could do the rest rest of you that met your aspirations. And that is something I think that this does, but I'm more than happy to hand over to Robin to say more words.
- Thank you, Mayor. I'd just say a few words and then hand over to my colleague, Craig Morby, to take you through the report. So the strategy that we're presenting here is an overarching framework, which is there to better integrate community engagement into the broader work of the Council. So the strategy provides high-level guidance and the structure needed for services to plan properly their engagement programs. And it represents the culmination of extensive community engagement across Council working, and it fills what was identified, I think quite accurately, as a gap in the strategic landscape of the Council. And the Cabinet is being asked to approve the strategy, noting the consultation work and the equality's implications in the report. I would also like to briefly add to the best value comments in the report by saying that to be a learning organisation capable of continuous improvement, we have to be a listening organisation, and I echo the sentiments that the Mayor expressed at the introduction of this particular item, and engage and consult with the people that we serve. So by bringing forward this strategy and changing our target operating model to one of the places greater emphasis on community engagement, it demonstrates that we are continuing to make arrangements to secure continuous improvement in the way in which the Council functions are exercised, and I think that's an important point to make. So now if I hand over to Craig, to take you through the report.
- Evening, everyone. Sam Craig, more of the strategy and policy lead in the corporate strategy and community service, and I've been leading on the development of the new community engagement strategy. So the Council has a priority to be a Council that listens and works for everyone in its strategic plan, and as Robin said, our new target operating model has recently been developed, and it was more outwardly focused to work in partnership with communities. So to achieve these objectives, it's vital that the Council engages effectively with the community on the issues that matter to them, and to support this, the Council's worked in partnership with stakeholders to develop a new community engagement strategy. So the new strategy is a vision to listen to communities to build a borough that works for everyone, and it has six objectives. Number one, a joined-up approach to coordinating and planning community engagement in the Council and with partners, which leads to better outcomes. Number two, the Council and communities work together to make decisions that improve the borough free. The Council knows how to reach the community, and our South and her groups are enabled to participate. Four, staff have the knowledge, skills, and resources to engage with the community effectively. Five, the community understands how their involvement has influenced decisions made by the Council, and finally, residents get more involved in their community and become the next generation of community leaders. So each of the objectives has a set of actions to achieve them, which are included in the delivery plan of the strategy. And so some of the exciting ideas include service planning, so making sure in service planning each service identifies the opportunities for communities to be involved in decision-making, which will become part of their service plans and will lead us to be able to develop a community engagement calendar. Long-term strategic planning, so ensuring that the refresh of our strategic plan is informed by community engagement and reflects the priorities of the community. Databases of contacts, so we're gonna create a directory of local services and groups and a database with key contacts, key stakeholders, networks, and forums that the Council can reach out to to involve. Engaging our faith groups and local media, making better use of the local media engagement with communities through the voluntary and community sector, and our faith networks. Establishing a corporate engagement and consultation service that leads to strategic community engagement projects, engages our seldom heard groups effectively and helps coordinate community engagement across the Council. We're going to refresh the Council's community engagement plan, but to provide guidance for staff on how to plan, deliver, and evaluate community engagement effectively and provide a range of training opportunities so staff have the necessary knowledge skills and capabilities. And a final exciting action will be about the work that we do to empower our young people through electing a young mayor every two years, a youth council where young people can get involved in shaping Council services and deliver projects to improve their community. So there's a much wider range of actions included within the strategy, but those are some of the exciting things which we're going to do. To develop the strategy, we brought together a project team of Council officers from across Council divisions to guide the development to make sure that this is a Council-wide strategy which had buy-in for more divisions. We conducted an evaluation of the Council's current community engagement practice against recognised standards of good practice to identify our strengths and areas for improvement. And we worked with the project team and mayor's office to agree some draft objectives for the strategy. And after that, we did extensive research into good practice from elsewhere, including speaking to four other local authorities to learn from what they do to ensure best value. We, in total, we consulted with 328 stakeholders. So we actively took steps to engage with a diverse range of community members who were a representative of the Tower Hamlet's diverse community. And that included an online survey, four pop-ups in different localities in the borough, two workshops with members, two workshops with partners, including voluntary community sector, business and other public sector partners, two workshops, specific group of residents who have protected characteristics through our equality's hubs and networks, two workshops with staff, targeted sessions with young people, the Somali community and Bangladeshi community, and meetings with internal teams. So respondents were overall very positive about the vision of objectives, but one of them written in plain English and an objective added around empowering communities which we've actioned within the strategy. And they also said that the new strategy should include principles of good practice based on the feedback from stakeholders around what good community engagement looks like. And we've developed principles of good practice which will guide the council's community engagement in the future. So we use the information from the consultation research and evaluation to write the draft strategy. And to get feedback internally, we deliver presentations to the mayor's office, to divisional leadership teams and met with senior managers with a responsibility for proposed actions. And to make sure that it met the community's needs, we organized two further workshops and a survey to get footage back from residents and partners who took part in the consultation. And we use that information to refine the final strategy which is in front of you. So as we move into the delivery stage, we're gonna set up a strategy delivery group of officers from relevant departments and key partners to monitor review, and revise the community and engagement strategy as we deliver it. We're gonna measure sentiment of residents in areas such as feelings of trust, involvement, listening and feeling informed on an annual basis through our annual resident survey. And to measure the impact the strategies have in each year will conduct a survey of 100 residents to understand their experience of the council's community engagement. And in year one, we'll collect baseline data for that and be able to measure our progress as we move forward. So that's the end of the presentation. Thanks and happy to take any questions.
- Thank you, Greg, our last members to come in. Please, Deputy Mayor.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I hope you can hear me, Greg and Robin. So an excellent--
- You asked me then after that.
- It's an excellent strategy. I think I'm extremely pleased and grateful to you for your hard work. And I'm also grateful that you've added the faith communities as well. But I think one other thing I want to add is yes, you've added local, media, local press, but we know how important the main media is, especially in the whole UK, but especially with our handlers. So I think we should not be shy in a way mentioning the main media when it comes to strategy, when it comes to communicating towards our resident. And this is a big chunk of percentage of our residents. So that's one of the things I would request that we need to celebrate that, not only to celebrate, but we want to mention the main media. So that would be my comment, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. I hope you've heard me.
- Thank you. I'll come onto that. Thank you, thank you very much. Anyone else? Tala.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And thank you, team, for presenting the paper. It's very good paper. It's something that I was cited on quite early because I was one of the seven that attended your workshop. So I'm really pleased to see some of the sort of actions coming out from it. Noting the two community safety items that we have on the objective too. And it's something that myself and colleagues will be quite keen on delivering against. Just on the second item when we talk about strengthening community safety meetings, I think a good example of case in point would be the recent meeting that we had in Weavers following the crossbow attack. Within a short space of time, we managed to get close to 100 people there that have been and will attend it. So it's something that we're quite keen in doing and I think it's also important to mention. As we transition from being a traditional counter to a more community-powered council, we can take lessons from the previous term where we had a community champions program or we had participatory budgets, where local people were empowered to make choices on their local area. And I think when we look at some of those initiatives that have been successfully delivered previously, I think it's something that maybe we can consider moving forward. And also like the idea about not expecting residents to come to us, whether that's to the surgeries or whether that's to the council, I think the fact that we need to be more accessible and be out in the community I think is an important point. Whether that's through the assemblies or other measures. So that's my comment for now.
- Grateful to, Craig, I'll bring you in. No comments, aren't they? No questions as such.
- Thank you. (speaks in foreign language)
- Thank you, Mayor. Mayor, I just want you to highlight that ideologically for us, committee engagement is not just a tick-bock exercise, offering limited access through online surveys and desktop exercises. The council has a golden thread that joins up the strategic plan to the delivery of frontline services. And likewise, that community engagement pays a pivotal and key role in the services we deliver. So it's of the utmost importance that we have a robust community engagement strategy. The council, elected members, and anyone who works as agents or contractors for the council have a responsibility to deliver a service that the residents of this borough need and want. And without that engagement, we really can't test what we're delivering and what we're spending our money on. So we can have a number of ideas on what might benefit those residents. However, if the residents don't take that up, then we will be wasting our money and not getting the buy-in. And this community engagement strategy is pivotal in getting that engagement and buy-in from residents for the services that we provide as a council, for the way officers behave in relationship to residents, the way elected members respond to residents. So it's of the utmost importance, and I welcome this report, because it's not a one-glove-fital approach. There are those who have limited access to the internet. There are those who have limited literacy abilities. So you may have technocratic surveys, which they find very hard and difficult to navigate around, and therefore don't bother participating. So this widened approach to it, I think it's very important, and I welcome this report, Mayor.
- Thanks, Coby. I mean, a good example is the residents ups, the formal one-slop shops, which were reduced to one, I mean, previously we had five, the number of complaints and the anger and the frustration that there were out there in those seven years is phenomenal, because there are those who don't have, you know, laptops, don't have computers at home, those who don't have, they can't speak the language, they can't speak on the phone, et cetera. They didn't have children to look after them, some don't have children. So the one-stop shops helped them with a lot of the service provisions, and when we came back and made a commitment that will reintroduce the one-stop shops now and the resident hubs, that's gone down very well. This is also about engaging and having been a council, people's centred council, let's listen to council, enabling council, that's very important. So hopefully going forward, or always, yes, there are room for improvements, certainly, but I think when the right track, the right track, creating the coming mix and comments then any response to those comments and I'll bring one to other people then.
- Yeah, just to say thanks for the feedback and then thanks for members and also directors for being involved in the process, I think. The nice thing to hear is that some of the comments are important to you are things which we've really tried to reflect in the strategy. I think we're lucky in town, and let's develop a thriving voluntary and community sector and faith network, so we've put actions specifically around how we can work with our interfaith forums on the other organisations that we've got who can bring faith organisations together to do good in the community and reach people to stay involved. And I think talked about the importance of building relationships with Bay media as well as other media as well, and so we've got specific actions around working with our community service to do that and also exploring more like new innovative ways of reaching people such as using local influencers and community champions of Bay use of what's up in the future. And I think, Councillor Childry, you were talking about being more proactive and coming towards communities and using some of the more innovative methods to do that. So hopefully the framework that we've put in the strategy will be a catalyst to do that, and I know there will be a conversation about participatory budgeting coming up soon. And absolutely right, Councillor Ahmed, I think we don't want it to be a tick-box exercise, do we? We truly believe in the impact that good community engagement can have in producing better services as well. And so through this, we've tried to put the conditions in place so that we can really improve community engagement across the Council, making sure staff have got the right knowledge skills and capabilities through, you know, refresh guidance, training, programmes, securing some external support from experts as well, and hopefully that would have a good impact.
- Thank you. Anyone else? I'll call away very quickly, yeah. Please.
- Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mayor, if I'd like to see this, it will come to support this wide imbalance, and particularly I like the idea that they see run six workshops, because in our community, there are a big section of the community members are not computer literate, so the CanEx is when you do online survey, so that's a good idea engaging, but I would also say, emphasise that these workshops are a balance and diverse, engage the diverse community, and that's all I want to say. Thank you. I think it's a good report. Thanks.
- Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This community engagement is an engagement with our resident, and we will listen to them. We will consult with them in various issues, and we will take tangible solution to make our benefit to our resident. And mainly this, we need to ensure that every voice is met and every perspective is valued. And together, we'll build a borough where every voice is met and our diversity is also met. And we will come this report, and we thank our officer to present this valuable study.
- Thank you.
- Thank you. Shall we move on? Grateful to you. Can I just say thank you, Craig, Robbing, Joberbele and Kiran for the work that you all put in. And thank you for taking my views, accommodating my views when developing the report. I think it's a very good report. And you touched on a lot of stuff, it's very important. We have an active, very large voluntary sector in the borough. Historically, they played a very important role in shaping support in developing this borough. So it's important that we nurture and develop that relationship, make it as strong as possible. The faith communities are extremely important. We're blessed. You know, we have a strong faith communities in the borough, which will utilise their connectivity, their experiences, their strengths to our advantage. Historically, we have over the last 25, 30 years and moments of difficulties, the ideal marches, you know, the faith communities and non-faith. They played a very important role in protecting and safeguarding in the borough. When there were London riots, you know, we were good. The communities came together and they pretended us, supported us, supported our youngsters. So we must take advantage of that. You know, today I was at an event where there was some six years voluntary sector organisations. I was talking to them about the recycling, the cleanliness in the borough, attendance in our schools, you know, some of our schools, that's an issue. Like before, they want to work with us. They want to help us. The Council of Mosques in particular, wants to help us work with us. Let's take advantage of that. I know some of those comments are reflected and grateful. We're also very fortunate that this borough is the home to the strong Bangladeshi media. The very strong bean hair, some hundred years, more so over the last four to five 50 years, you know, the digital media, the print media, the TV media. You know, we have 120,000 people from Bangladeshi heritage. Over the last 10, 50 years alone from Europe, there are some 25 to 30,000 people who have come made timeless their home. You know, they don't speak much English or good English. They have languages, Bengali, mother tongue, but there's fluent in Spanish, Portuguese, French. You name it, Italian, double languages. We must, let's utilise, you know, the Bangladeshi media, you know, to our advantage. They don't want, they don't want much in return. They want a genuine partnership respect with us. So, Jubyar has a good connectivity with them. We have good connectivity. Please, I know, let's utilise them, yeah, and then the thought and develop that partnership we have. Historically, they've always been supportive of this council under all leadership. All leadership, and we must nurture. That's very important. So, we shouldn't shy away from naming them, rather than directly. The one media that we have openly in this council, local media, is that foundation media. It's very important. So, I'm going to say that, and can we, some of the stuff that Thala has mentioned about participatory budgeting, about the other stuff, let's reflect on that. It's worked for us in the past. Let's look at what we're delivering in the past. Let's look at and learn from other boroughs across the country, other countries across the country. The end of it, they're doing in order to connect with the people of their respective areas. Let's learn from them too, okay? On that note, I'm really grateful for the paper. Can we agree the paper, approve it, and dole sit, yeah? And we note the recommendations. Thank you very much. Great. Okay, item 6.2, some call is going to join us. Minara, are you here to join us at the front? Yeah, please do. Hello, thank you. Thank you for coming. It's the Women's Safety Over in Scrutiny Community Recommendations and Action Plan. Thala, do you want to start off with the answer? I'd be brief and then I'll pass it over to him and the officers are here to present the report. So, there were seven recommendations made by Ogleville and Scrutiny in February. All actions are in train. A lot of the stuff, to be fair, was existing to my knowledge. So, there's a lot of work that's gone under way in terms of completing those actions. But it's important to note that this is part of a wider sort of array of activities that we're doing in terms of addressing violence against women and girls. You will be aware that we have an upcoming strategy being launched in a few months. There's a number of different sort of consultations. So, we had one in parks. So, looking at inclusive design within parks to make sure that parks are safe for women and girls. And Minara, Simon and Anne will have further details around some of the work. So, this is part of a wider array of activities, also, that we're looking at in terms of addressing violence against women and girls. Anne? Anne, please. Thank you, Councillor. I'll just add colleagues, Mr. Mayor, that preventing violence against women and girls and improving women's safety requires a holistic all system response. And, you know, this is, we see gender-based violence as a pattern of behaviour perpetrated by men against women. And one of the core aims of all of this work is to prevent, walk, to reduce gender inequality and discrimination and improve women's safety. And, as Councillor Chardry's already said, it's part of a much wider piece of work that we're doing, which includes the Women's Commission, the Women's Resource Centre, the new strategy. But I'll ask Simon Smith, who's acting head of community safety, and Minara, who's our vulgar expert to speak to the detail of the report. Free. Mr. Mayor, Councillors, thank you. Thank you very much, Councillor Chardry, and for the introduction. As Councillor Chardry's pointed out, Mr. Mayor, the report found at ages 73 to 85, if your document bundle relates to the action plan developed and implemented following recommendations by overview and scrutiny in February 2023. Those recommendations, the resultant action plan and the progress to date against that plan is submitted for your comment and decision today. A further report will be provided in due course to overview and scrutiny, provided a progress update on those recommendations. I don't intend to repeat the detail of each recommendation, but wish to highlight the following areas of activity. The action plan has been very much focused on a multi-agency approach to ensure that we have women's safety in the public space. We have seen the launch of the borough's first anti-misogyny campaign focused on the nighttime economy, and that has been targeting the role of men as perpetrators. And this has been very much delivered in collaboration with Hackney, the City of London, and obviously ourselves. We have mainstreamed a zero tolerance approach for licensed holders together with colleagues from licensing via a new licensing policy which has signed off by full Council last year. The forthcoming new Women's Resource Centre in Development will offer a safe space and foundation for wider gender-based violence work as well. The Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance accreditation process is near completion and which will improve housing sector response to women's safety. In line with the Strategic Needs Assessment conducted as part of the forthcoming Bull Strategy which Council's Church has mentioned, there is a Council of Mosques program of work currently underway to support faith leaders in delivering that wider piece of work. And we are also working closely with the Merriam Centre and the Interfaith Forum as part of that agenda. We have a provision of 18 months self-defense classes for women in development. And just to highlight some of our school's activity, 19 schools have signed the school's vault pledge and around 89 have signed up to Operation Encompass which is a police-led project to ensure information of domestic violence incidents where children are involved. That information is passed to schools by 9am the following morning. And this allows for an early intervention approach and package to be put in place promptly by those schools. There's been an extensive program of work developed with businesses and awareness conferences with larger and smaller businesses by the Safe Health Campaign in collaboration with the City of London. This includes book lists, awareness material, business advice with wayfinding open days including large corporations. Just to mention budgets, the cost of developing the plan is within the existing budget of 0.49 million. However, further development of the plan making her wider development costs. As Anne and Councillor Charger have mentioned, the new vault strategy is also currently in the final stages of the development and our extensive stakeholder consultation will be published later this time. Thank you Mr Mayor. I open up the discussion of thank you.
- Thank you. Thank you Simon. Anything else you want to add to what's been said? Feel free. You okay? Okay, great. Thank you. Keep to come in. Have you come in this stage today?
- I'll just turn it down.
- Okay, we'll come at the end. I'll make some comments to colleagues.
- Thank you Mayor. I think the recommendations we have here is actually very, very important. The Women's Safety Action Plan. It goes a long way. Because the stuff that we've implemented in the recent budget as well, on top of just the safety concerns for women, we have introduced many things to support each and every family households directed towards women and children, like the free swimming for all women over the age of 16. And the extension of EMA, the introduction of free school meals, the extension of university nursery, all of that helps the family financially. And I think that also helps the women at home. Because financially when there's concerns at any households, the women full foot will feel more of the pressure at home. And I think that covers a big portion of the safety concerns as well. So I welcome this report Mayor. Thank you. Why please, Chef? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you to the officers. I think it's a really important report. And I think it's a paramount that basically we do our best to safeguard our females. On the point of the night time economy, a safe night time economy is essential to the continuous success of our bar art. And I think going forward, I think it's really important that we look at how we support our female business owners, entrepreneurs, going forward, so that they can feel safe running their business as well as those who are as a customer. They feel that they can go out and be safe in our bar art. I think that's really important going forward. Thank you. Thank you very much. Good work, please. Thank you, Mayor. Once again, I mean, this is a subject that I've spoken about long and wide. And I welcome this report, so I'll be a little brief. There's just one typo I wanted to pick out. It's recommendation five. It's tower hamlets housing forum to hoof, not housing management forum. So that's just one type work if that can be erected. But in essence, I endorse this whole report wholeheartedly. I think if there are opportunities to go even further, I think it's worthwhile discussing as well. I know these are initial scrutiny review around that, but I think as an administration, we have a very proactive approach to facing modern day challenges, particularly online grooming and other areas like that. And that plays a role. But one of the things that I was made aware of is not only just social media, but even gaming, how that portrays certain perceptions from a young age. So you can use certain platforms. You start playing games and suddenly you're indoctrinated and these are perceptions and you grow up doing that. So sort of looking at add-ons around those areas as well. So we can sort of cut across generational ages in relation to that. And it's not just about adults, but it's how we grow up.
- All right, Coby, Coby, we're saying.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. We all know women are very important and they're playing very good role in the family for upbringing us, children. I've seen my mother how she sacrifices her life. And also we want to make sure, Mr. Mayor, they are well respected in the community society.
- Yes, one of the example you're doing, our previous admission, they cut a jagonary center. We need extracurricular activity for them to bringing harmony in the society. So we gave them respect and what they deserve in the community, or fully support this report, Mr. Mayor. I think we need to do more for the women.
- Grateful.
- Say, my own, then I'll bring you all by in, and I'll remove one, yeah? Say, okay, thank you.
- Thank you, thank you, Mr. Mayor. I mean, thank you to the coordinates as well for the recommendations. But I mean, that shows how serious we are in terms of, as a council, in terms of your investment, especially to our woman, the female community. As you can see on the action plan, most of it is kind of either completed, and there are a few ongoing. So I mean, that shows the amount of investment we're putting in. So I just wanted to ask just two free clarification. One regarding the third sector and community charity corporate events, it says completed in March 2024, and also the Commission on Domestic Abuse Case Work Service, March 2024 completed with the funding of 475. And the final one, sports team to create calendars of sporting activities for women and girls, which was also April 2024. It's just, I haven't seen anything. That's why I just want to, I'm sure it's completed, it's there. I just want some clarification, that's all. Thank you.
- Okay, thank you.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
- Thank you.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Sports and other very powerful tools to empower people, particularly the women's, the football tournament, headcramp football tournament, and the free swimming for the girls of six and plus will bring immense benefit to our community in their family, beyond family level, it's in public health, and it will empower them in terms of building selfish team and confidence. And it brings a community, healthy community, a community that feels safe. Thank you.
- Thank you. Do you want to come in?
- Yeah.
- Yeah, so apologies if you haven't seen, I mean, it's all very recent, so we awarded a contract to the commissioning. I mentioned that the various other boards, this is the first time to our hand that says committed so much into violence against women and girls. There was a 1.4 to 5 million pound contract, which we just awarded a few weeks ago to Solis Women's Aid for domestic abuse case workers, Somali speaking, Bangladeshi speaking, co-located at six different locations. So that has just happened a few weeks ago, and obviously it's taken eight, nine months to go through the procurement process in terms of the sporting activities, as mentioned in the plan, it was to secure funding to increase participation of women within leisure and sporting services, and that has been secured. It will be an 18 month program by the sports development team for 18 months, twice a week, self-defense classes for women, including as Councillor Hussein mentioned, football activities, we had international women's day activities, free swimming classes, and there's an exploration around bringing in house and leisure services with increased participation. So that's all being done via other departments. In terms of the third sector, we put complete in relation to this, but the work is always ongoing. I think every year, there's thousands that we reach out to directly, and hundreds in terms of outreach activities with the third sector. I'm hoping that answers the question. Thank you, Councillor. Okay, yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Gia. I just wanted to reflect for a moment on two things, really. The nature of the work of the over and scrutiny committee, you and I spend a lot of time thinking about how we engage with scrutiny, about how the Council generally conducts scrutiny, and this is a really good example of what can come out of some really important work, but it actually also builds upon priorities and aspirations that you set. And I just was really taken by the comments that Anne made around having an all-system, holistic approach to this. It has to be an inherent part of what we do, and I know that you and I have been discussing in recent months how housing and how you live your life, your actual, the conditions in which you live, and the impact that homelessness can have, the impact that the housing option service can have, and I just sort of was really helpful to reflect here on conversations that the Mayor and I have been having recently about enhancing that particular service, which I think will also have an impact. And the Mayor's very keen to not just deliver the status quo, but to look at new ways of delivering that service, increased opening hours, weekend opening, 24/7 access. So I just think it'll be a really helpful addition to the recommendations that are being made here that I know you're very keen, and the Cabinet's very keen on supporting Anne's comment that this has to be an allistic approach. It has to be an inherent part of what we do, and these recommendations from over in scrutiny fit very well with that aspiration.
- Thanks, Steve. Work around, I'm glad you touched on homelessness. I will also mention overcrowding, you know. Prevention is so important, so important. Overcrowding, you know. I see families, women in particular, come to my surgery so we meet on the streets at events, et cetera. The one element that contributes to tensions within the family is a lack of space for the parents, for kids, contributing hugely into family tension between husband and wife, between intergenerational conflicts between parents, children and grandparents is because of the overcrowding. So, Paul, reducing the overcrowding in the borough, building more homes, family substance, it's gotta be a, I know you take it very seriously, so does Steve, it could be a priority. You know, we cannot eliminate overcrowding overnight, but we must do it utmost to reduce the overcrowding in the borough, okay? I believe a lot of tensions in the family will go away if we were to provide at least in space over those kids' heads and the family's head, so important. The help in the qualities in the borough, because of overcrowding, because of poverty, the way in clue, the contributes to tensions within the family, it's immense. We see it, we experience it, we have family members who are experiencing problems. You know, the leisure insourcing, I am confident over the years has come a hugely contribute to reducing the health in the qualities, you know, diabetes, coronary heart disease, blood pressure, you know, free swimming, when we did it last time, it helped to reduce, you know, hypertension within some individuals, many of our individuals, especially women folks, you know, and contributed to a much more healthier lifestyle, so bringing the health, the leisure in-house will give us much more flexibility. And starting off with free swimming for girls and women from 16 is going to hopefully contribute towards that. The youth services, the investment, I think we need to now design out the human service, get it up and running, work in partnership with our schools, with our leisure facilities, and with community safety, certain, but more importantly, it's those youngsters getting them active, getting them moving, and valuing education is so important, is so important. Education is extremely important to all of us. It's got to start young, it's got to start early, you know, giving those kids a life chance, you know, having financial security, having a roof over the head, having a healthy lifestyle is important. Attainment, you know, always going about attainment, you know, when only 31% of our kids went to Russell Group of Universities this year, you know, it was worries me, you know, it's what's happened to the other percentages. What are they doing in terms of enhancing the life chances? We've got to get a life chances going. They're so important to us. The investment that we put into community safety, you know, this year, last year, we have spent, invested so much money before we, in frontline services, frontline workforce, that was our commitment to get the public sector going again, and I wish the government was doing that too, then we'll see a much more healthier, much more conscious, a much more educated population, it's important to us, you know, so investing in the community safety, absolutely, absolutely but prevention is so important for us. Working with the other communities, thank you, the Council of mosques, the faith community, other faith community as a synagogues, the churches, it's so important. And people are also the voluntary sector. We have a very active voluntary sector unions in the borough. Working with them is equally important. So I'm grateful to our colleagues in ONS for this, it's very important. We support it very much. I'm going to make some additions to the recommendations as we go along. Is that okay yet? Okay, and other than that, we support it full-heartedly and commend you and the team for the work that you do across the Council. Thank you. Recommendation one, this will make an addition, please. Yep, it's okay. So after the sentence ending with streets, can you put in a sentence, please? Including, just comma, including the Metro Bulletin, please. I know it's the elementary we do work with the police, but I want to say, yeah, explicitly, the Metro Edmonton police, the faith communities in particular, the Council of Mosques and the voluntary sector. Is that okay? That's important. That's recommendation one. Recommendation two, I just want to add police, yeah. After the last sentence, after the word community, fourth stop then, this is to tie into, we'll give it this in right, we'll fold it onto you, this is to tie into a service-wide review of what is an offer to women of all communities. Okay, recommendation three is fine. Recommendation four, I just want to say this after the word available, the last word, can you make explicit reference to young tower humlets given the investment in youth service that we've made? And the design of the service to incorporate the need for education. So the partnership between education, youth services, vital to us, attainment is vital to us. Okay, recommendation five, can we just after the sentence, where it says ends with on RSL states, can you please, I just want to add this, reiterate the need for the ongoing RSL work, began with the ask, the ombudsman event that we could put on here. And recommendation six, can you just include add, this is to be done in cooperation with the faith communities, in particular the council of mosques, the CVS, and the council. Okay, Sam, if you can email that, please, yeah? Is that okay, yep? With those additions, where are we okay to agree with recommendations yet? Is that okay? Thank you, grateful to you. Thank you. Okay, the next paper. Yeah, it's quite straightforward. The nominees for adopting new social housing regulatory functions, which we take really seriously. If you're gonna come in a COVID, then I'll ask Paul to say two words. Thank you very much.
- Go on.
- Thank you, Mayor. So this report sets out the requirement to nominate individuals to two new functions. Responsible person and health and, sorry, responsible person for health and safety lead. The social housing regulation at 2023 introduced social housing landlords should designate an employee as a health and safety lead, who is responsible for monitoring and assessing the risk of failure to comply with health and safety requirements in social housing. This includes informing cabinet of non-compliance with health and safety requirements and providing advice to cabinet on how risks and failures should be addressed. The health and safety lead can be a member of the executive other than the elected mayor or an employee of the local authority. They have recent experience of working in technical environment where health and safety requirements are delivered and have technical knowledge and competency. For this reason, it's recommended that the director of housing asset management is appointed as the health and safety lead, Michael Keelin. The second requirement as set out by the Charter for Social Housing Residence is a requirement to have a responsible person overseeing compliance with a new consumer standards which was fully implemented in April 2024. The nominated individual must be a senior officer and an employee to the landlord, which is namely us, Tower Hamlet's Council. Appointing an individual to this role will provide the mayor and cabinet with a clear line of accountability regarding compliance with the new consumer standards. The name of the responsible person must be published to tenants who is responsible for council housing standards. It is recommended that the corporate director for housing and regeneration is appointed to this role as they have the responsibility for all housing functions, ensuring that statutory requirements are met and provided strategic direction in relation to managing and delivering housing services. Namely, Mr. Paul Paterson, who's right next to me.
- Thanks, Coby.
- Paul Pleaser. Mr. Mayor, I think it's just to reinforce this paper reinforces our commitment to the new consumer standards. It reinforces and plays into the session that we had last week of MAB talking about the insourcing of THH and the work that we're now starting to integrate Tower Hamlet's homes into the council, into one single housing management function. And it also forms into our commitment and the work that we're doing around fire safety and the work that we're doing. This will create responsible persons and a clear straight line to cabinet and to the Mer in terms of our commitment against those consumer standards and our responsibilities under, including our commitment to health and safety and ensuring our properties are safe.
- Thank you. This is quite straightforward. We need to nominate two individuals. Thank you for giving us a narrative in the background and two people have been identified. Can we agree with that, please?
- Okay.
- Okay.
- Thank you both.
- Agreed. Great. I'm going to put the mic up, please, yeah. Great. Thank you. Thank you very much. The contract extension for young people supported live in part way, my human and Steve. Yep, please.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yes, there's a contract report for some provision for some of our very vulnerable young people, those at risk of homelessness and those on the edge of care. We did run a procurement process towards the end of last year, but unfortunately that did not deliver a position where we were able to allocate the contracts. We are engaging with the market and trying to communicate wider beyond the current providers to see who else we could bring forward to bid for this work. And we didn't feel from the procurement process at the end of last year that we had sufficient quality and obviously these are really important services. So we wanted to make sure we had a good provision. So we've brought forward this report to request that we extend the contracts for the current providers while we run that re-tendering process. We are already engaging with the market to discuss the reasons why we couldn't award the contracts and understand what's changing in the market. The initial request was that we do some more work with providers and therefore initially requested a longer extension in consultation with yourself and the lead member. We have reduced the extension just to the six months conscious of the best value implications of long extensions. Thank you.
- Thanks. Can I just thank you for that. I know it's no fault of the service. You went out there can attract the providers. Can I just ask is this, was this an open contract or tender, was it from the framework?
- It was an open contract that went out on the procurement portal. But I think we'll be speaking to our procurement team around how we can make sure we communicate wider and encourage local provision as well.
- Okay, you've touched on it. I mean, it's got to be accessible, approachable and it incorporates local needs. There are small to medium sized organizations out there very much want to work with us. You know, we always get to doing some of the fairs, some of the opportunities that we put on here. People have approached the council to do work with us. So can you please look at the actual tender stratification and can I also have a copy of C. Are there any impediments?
- To attracting the interest that we need to attract. It's very important, yeah. That's one and two. You know, I'm quite reluctant to extend contracts, contracts for obvious reasons because it costs us more money in the long term. It's also about value for money. It's also about service delivery and service performance. But here, it's an exception. We went out, but we can attract the parties that we want to attract. And you're saying, you know, six months is the most utmost that you need in order to get this delivered yet? Okay, okay.
- Can I start by congratulating the corporate director on his permanent appointment? But I think as this is your first cabinet meeting as a permanent corporate director, can I get assurances that going forward, you're gonna have a forward plan in place? And I know the mishap with this particular contract, but we get all our ducks in order and we know which contracts are gonna be coming to an end with foresight and we have preparation in chain in order to look at tendering processes and so on and so forth. So we don't repeat extensions of contracts and we phase in difficulties that may happen. So forward planning, you know, because at the end of the day, if we're talking best value, we're talking about markets, actually. We refer to them. This is one. Yeah, yeah. They went out in time, it was delivered in time. It was a good procurement process. Unfortunately, we didn't attract the interest that we had hoped to. And it's not a big contract. It's quite reasonably small contract. But let's see how we perform better and we are very keen to make sure we do entertain new bids, good bid this time. So thank you. Anyone else? If not, I wanna move on. Go on, keep it away very quickly.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Have any changes been made for a second goal?
- One of the changes that we feel has impacted is that these types of provision now need to be offstead registered. So one of the things we're engaging with providers to make sure that they're well on with getting that registration completed so then they can tender for this work. So that is a change that's happened within the last year. Previously they didn't, they didn't have to be offstead registered.
- Please, Said and Julie, please, you come in.
- Sorry, Mayor, just wanted to make a slight correction to the paper. So the Chief Financial Officers comments related to the original request for the long and nine month period. And obviously that's our six month period. I just wanted to make sure that was corrected.
- That was one Mayor, Julie, sort of what you're talking about. And just wanted to thank Steve and the team for, when we initially flagged up the nine months, we reduced it to six, which was really good. I was going to squeeze a little bit more, but I guess it's just not going to be really fair. So I think we'll leave it there.
- I'll squeeze.
- Yeah, you've done that, yeah.
- The team will work.
- Are they? Okay, you've done enough, yeah? Okay, okay. You know, it's our job to say if you have a single penny and ask that, but we've got to make sure that we deliver on time, Steve. So it's a, it's a, it's a tomorrow process to start, but please can you look at the specs to see, you know, are there in your room to encourage people to apply, encourage people to bid for this good, obviously good, good organizations. It's important to you, but especially local supply chain, local organization, important to us. So, okay, if that's the case, can we, Steve, if you want to come in, then we'll--
- Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to make the point in relation to council. We've had discussions and for a long time now, we are really, really good at forward planning now for contracts. We've moved on from what was inherited. I think it's fair to put it in those terms. And given the mayor's aspiration around contract, like duration, packaging and what have you, an awful lot of work has gone on. And congratulations to those officers that have done that, particularly in the resources department.
- Can we agree the recommendations? Is that okay? Thank you very much, agreed. Can we now move on to the last paper, please? Again, another extension paper. Thank you, officer. Thanks very much. Can you hear a break? Do you want to say a few words? And I've been to a woman and I put it in.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The children and young people's health and well-being services, the new service model, which brings together the statutory service, number one, school health and well-being service, and number two, integrated young people's health and well-being service. The robust and rigorous evolution of the children and young people's health and well-being service procurement concluded the bid did not deliver best value for the requirements as set out in the service specification. True contract extension are required to support the continued delivery of the two statutory service, whilst re-tendering is completed. This report proposes that we extend the current two contracts by eight months in order to start the tendering process again. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
- Thank you. Send me what you want to add, Katie, to what's been said.
- No, that's fine for the reason why.
- Thank you. The reason it's eight months is that this is aligning with the school terms. So the service is delivering programs like hearing and vision screening, and it would be very difficult and risky to change a provider in the middle of a program like that.
- Yes, I'd requested six months and I was told and explained, clarified why it can't be six months, and I think eight months was put forward to accommodate that. Thank you, that helps. Again, this is an exception to the Roman rule because it went out, couldn't find someone for value for money, so we had no choice to go out to the market again. Again, Shuman, can you have a look at the specs? Is there anything there? If you'd like to see, there's an inflexibility there to attract people of interest, of ability, capacity, to be successful, a bit for this kind of contracts. Please, give me a note, both artists, children's services and adult services, please, yeah. There's any changes to that. So, okay, okay, thank you, anyone else? Could we?
- So, sorry, it's gonna come across, again, a repetition, but we've had an understanding of mitigating circumstances around this, but we've had a number of contract extensions from HAC over the last two years or so. And again, can I ask corporate directors, Chief Executive, for us to have robust processes in place so that we can foresee and have also, and I know the Chief Executive just reassured us, but just to put that in line again, 'cause we want that competitive approach, we wanna test the market, we wanna see what's available, and we wanna get best value out of all of our contracts. Thank you.
- Thank you.
- Thank you. Please, Julie, then I'll come in, okay?
- Yeah, I just wanted to go a little bit further, the Chief Executive, 'cause I've an update to the position. I did meet with Shuman yesterday, actually, about procurement, and one of the things we agreed is that at the next month, so we'll bring forward the detailed proposals for particularly resource and procurement in adult social care to meet what has been an accumulated backlog of adult social care contracts, and the current resource and plans and future structural plans for procurement across the council. You should see that next week.
- Thank you, and I mean, I understand the point that could be us making. I made similar points in this kind of forum previously, but we have put in money in the budget, through the budget process, into procurement, into legal, and into other services, and hopefully, I'm very confident going forward, Julie and Steve and the team's corporate directors, going forward, will be in much better position with procurement than we were previously. So thank you for those points, comments. I think, again, straight forward, I want you to go out to the market immediately, please. Don't wait, and we will agree. Is it okay for us to agree the recommendation?
- Yes. - Okay?
- Yes. - Yeah, fine.
- Thank you. - Any other business?
- Before we... - Yeah, please.
- I believe you wanted to acknowledge the public question that we received. - Oh, yeah, yeah.
- Yeah, yeah, we've, so on the previous paper, it could be, we received a public question, and that's fine, I've new touched on it, you answered it.
- Sorry, it was from the opposition group, Leader.
- So... - You can turn up.
- Yes, so as there are no members, if it's appropriate, I'll provide a written response to the question, as there's no one asking the questions. You know, when I get talking, I need to be stopped, thank you.
- Thank you, now, grateful to you. Do a written response, it's appropriate. It's okay, on that basis, can we conclude the meeting and thank you to each and every one of you, until next time, grateful to you. You
Transcript
Let's go through the formal parts of the agenda. Any apologies for absence in one? I think Anne is there. We are off for Simon. Thank you Anne. Welcome. Richard is here on screen for Linda. Ah, colleagues, John, nice to see you, Richard. Nice to see you. Richard, you're here for Linda, yeah? Thank you. Thanks very much. You're somehow, we can't hear you. Make sure the mic's--
- Thomas Mayor, I am here for Linda, thank you.
- Great, thank you. Always nice to see you, Richard, thank you.
- Thank you.
- Okay, any declarations of interest in one? None, okay, great. The minutes of the 27th of March, any comments, any questions? If not, we're okay with those. Yeah, great. There are one or two announcements, then we'll start, Steve, over to you, sir.
- Just one announcement from me this evening. I know that you're going to reflect on the Bricklane bombing in a moment, and obviously endorse your thoughts in that respect. The only other piece of information to give cabinet, 'cause I did undertake to keep you up to speed as readily as I possibly could, that we had interviews for the position of Corporate Director of Children's Services, which is one of three that we're currently progressing, with interviews for the Director of Adult Services, Health and Services next week, which is the DAS role, but we interviewed for the DCS yesterday, and members have recommended the appointment of Steve Reddy, who is here, obviously, with us this evening. Subject to due diligence, I thank all cabinet members that you have now all responded in response to an email that you received from Matthew Mannion about any objections you might have to the appointment. That process has now been concluded, and in the next few days, I expect to be able to formally confirm the appointment, but I was keen to let cabinet know an update this evening, man.
- Steve, congratulations. Steve, you've got a huge responsibility on your hands, and attainment has to increase rapidly in time, let's see, yeah, education arrangements at all stages. Thank you, thank you. Best wishes, thanks Steve, anything else?
- Okay, I have an announcement to make. Today, obviously, you know, some of you know, we've been around in time, those marks the 25th anniversary of the brick lane bombings. I remember that day very well. Sad, a devastating racist attack, intended to strike the heart of the British Bengali British Asian communities here in the East End. The bombings marked the second or third such attacks, the others occurring in Brixton and Soho, aimed at other minority communities. In total, 140 people were injured and free-work killed. I remember going down to Soho, some of my friends with the vicinity of the attack in that pub, going outside, going for a walk, it was sad to see how that community there was devastated by this terrible tragedy and attack. As we remember and commemorate those affected, we take heart in the knowledge that attempts to divide our communities, and so hatred have failed. And today, as every day, we affirm as a community, our commitment to bring a council and borough where hatred has no place. Thank you. Councillor, there is a vigil by brick lane today between six and seven, as always every year. If I could ask Councillor Suruk to represent us as the cabinet and the executive, please, if you could kindly leave at the appropriate time to go and join that vigil. Is that okay? Thank you, I did remember if we called it to send the warm Councillor. Our last council got me to just stay behind with us. So, okay, one of you could go, is that okay? Thank you, I'm grateful to you. Can we please, as a community, do a minute silence? I'm not done with this in cabinet before, but it's so important given what happened those 25 years ago in Arbara. Is that okay? Okay, thank you, we've got the time, please, yeah. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
- That's fine, yeah, and also, thank you. Also, yesterday was St. George's Day, and the flag was still this, been flown at the town law. Thank you. Happy St. George's Day. Thank you very much, Chair. Okay, over on the screen, neither chair is here. Thank you, Chair. I understand there's no over on the screen questions. Once again, welcome you, and thank you. I think you wanna make a contribution over to you, sir.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
- Good evening, and thank you for providing me with the opportunity to feedback on the views of the Melbourne Scrutating Committee. I would like to thank Councilor Kabir Ahmed and Councilor Abdulwahid for joining our meeting this week and answering the committee's questions. The committee discussed the progress of the LGA Corporate Peer Review Action Plan. We are pleased to hear that 39% of the actions are already completed, and that 65% of the actions are expected to be completed by May and 85% by August. We are particularly pleased to hear about the commitments made to improving outcomes for women, which includes launching a women's commission, developing a new violence against women and girls strategy and running a campaign to encourage women to become counselors. However, the committee also questioned the development of the action plan and how inclusive the process was in capturing a wide range of views across the Council, including scrutiny and opposition members. We'd like to see more efforts to ensure this is a holistic plan with input from all areas of the Council. We also discussed actions to streamline decision-making the Council's workforce strategy, workforce strategy and efforts to address recruitment and retention to ensure greater diversity in senior leadership. The committee requested further information in writing to understand specific work streams to deliver a workforce that reflects the community. This is a significant plan for the Council and the committee will continue to review its delivery as part of its work program next year to ensure the recommendations set up by the LGA are achieved. Our next item focused on the Council's readiness to ensure larger services from next month. The committee agrees that this service has experienced many performance issues and members shared several concerns they experienced. This includes female residents unable to enjoy female-only provision as male, lifeguards who are still present and residents unable to book facilities due to corporate bookings. The committee stressed that improved resident access must be at the forefront of all plans for the service. We were pleased to hear that there are significant opportunities arising from in-house provision that are already being explored. These include employment for residents, better integration with partners to address health inequalities and potential income generation. We are also pleased to note that some of the recommendations made as part of the Children and Education Subcommittee review of the support provision for women and girls have been realized with specific provisions for women and girls provided. The committee understands that there will be a need for significant investment and questions how the Council will meet financial objectives while ensuring improved customer experience and resident satisfaction. The committee also questioned the plans to communicate the changes to residents and stressed that there is a critical step to ensure everyone is aware of the new provision in place. It is encouraging to hear about the plans for the service. However, we must now ensure that they lead to a better service for residents. The committee will ensure that this remains on our work program next year so we can understand the impact this has on performance. The committee has requested details of KPIs to support this. Our final spotlight focused on parking, which we understand is a priority for everybody who lives, works and travels in the borough. The committee reviewed plans for a new parking enforcement strategy and questioned the Council's plans to reduce parking stress and promote effective parking mobility and enforcement activities in the borough. The committee noted that plans to simplify the customer journey have not been fully realized as there are still many issues when using the online system to purchase permits. Therefore, the committee requested that the service reviews, the service reviews this process, process. Additionally, the committee also discussed plans to better enforce match day and events at London Stadium, plans for electrical charging points and questions performance data on cancellations and number of tickets overturned and what learning has been taken from this data. Finally, Mr. Mayor, the committee agreed on the findings and recommendations from our scrutiny challenge session on markets. Members undertook several site visits and engaged with many traders to hear their lived experiences. We also looked into the best practices adopted nationally and in neighboring boroughs. The report makes several recommendations to enhance our markets and provide better support for traders. It addresses key issues such as traders spaces and storage facilities, toilets, waste management, crime in markets and educating young people about market trading to promote it as a future carrier. The service will now be drafting an action plan response for Cabinet's consideration. I hope that the plan will be carefully reviewed to ensure much needed action is taken to support markets and traders. Unless there is anything I could assist Mr. Mayor and your Cabinet, this is my submission for this evening. Thank you.
- Sure, thank you Chair. Thank you for your submission today. Each and every word is very much noted and we will reflect on it. You can also once again thank you, your cosmetic colleagues for the invaluable work that you do with us, not only in holding us to account, I think we enjoy going before you and being asked questions and to clarify and make presentations and the constructive contributions that you make but also we value your contribution trying to help in us to serve our communities, every single member of them better. Thank you very much. Can I also take this opportunity also, I apologise for not being able to attend me and Steve in my spotlight session last Monday. As you know, I had a brief agreement in a very close member of my family and to make arrangements for the funeral prayers and the burial afterward. Unfortunately, the burial happened yesterday rather than a Monday but it wasn't known at the time. So, but I'll be before you. Both of us will be there. I think it's been arranged also already early next month. I look forward to talking to your colleagues. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Prime Minister. That's fine. Great, thank you. Thank you, I just have one comment, Chair, if that's okay. You're fine. Good afternoon, please. My comment was just in relation to the Corporate Peer Action Plan. So, I just think for the cabinets information, I think it's important to note that I've now met with all of the political groups, including those that are on a group, the Conservative Men Councilor and the Green Councilor and I've attended a meeting with the Labour Executive Group as well. And there has been follow-up correspondence asking for any input. All the groups, including the Aspire Group, might have to the Corporate Action Plan and so far there has been limited response. So, it would be helpful, I think, I will correspond with the groups again to confirm that they have ample opportunity to input into the Action Plan. It is a mechanistic Action Plan. It picks up the 17, 18 recommendations and in total 70 odd recommendations, which we're working on, but I wouldn't want there to be a perception that it's not an inclusive and iterative process. Thank you. Thank you, Chief Executive for the feedback. It's been noted, thank you. Thank you, thank you very much. Can we now move on to the agenda's please, yeah? So, the first paper, extremely important paper is about the community engagement strategy 24, 28. I'll say a few words and I'll bring Steve and the officers. Please come join us. Please, Robin and our colleagues, Craig, we are over to you. Engaging with our communities are extremely important. Council does a lot of work, but people need to be consulting before we, you know, either deliver some of the work or in any event we need to hear from the people. And one of my commitment was in the manifesto before we came in on the 5th of May 2022 that we'll be listening council. Unfortunately, there was a dip in that, the seven HDS we weren't here, especially without being political, having a referendum on the mail system, doing the pandemic wasn't a good idea, having consultation, again, doing the pandemic on whether the roads should be closed a lot with real limited feedback or hardly in feedback, wasn't a good idea, but since I've been here, there was one or two, Steve, you know, one or two consultations I felt was quite embarrassing. You know, a one-ice site, the Roman Road referendum on the neighbourhood plan, what only eight people responded. There's a similar one, you know, six, seven people responded. That's not what we ask the council. We have a very active community. We have leaders in our communities, you know, a strong voluntary sector, and historically the voluntary sector and the communities in time that have always played every significant role in shaping the future of our bar and our policies. So we want to get and commit engagement back to where it was, even better than last time. This paper goes a long way. I'm grateful, thank you for the paper. You know, it goes a long way. Some last things say if it was an opportunity, a gentleman that I'd been a member of.
- Thank you.
- Thank you, Chair. So very briefly, really, we had a conversation some time ago about making sure not only that our community engagement was joined up, that we had a strong sense of corporateness about the way in which we did that, but also that we had the right skills and expertise in place to ensure that we could do the rest rest of you that met your aspirations. And that is something I think that this does, but I'm more than happy to hand over to Robin to say more words.
- Thank you, Mayor. I'd just say a few words and then hand over to my colleague, Craig Morby, to take you through the report. So the strategy that we're presenting here is an overarching framework, which is there to better integrate community engagement into the broader work of the Council. So the strategy provides high-level guidance and the structure needed for services to plan properly their engagement programs. And it represents the culmination of extensive community engagement across Council working, and it fills what was identified, I think quite accurately, as a gap in the strategic landscape of the Council. And the Cabinet is being asked to approve the strategy, noting the consultation work and the equality's implications in the report. I would also like to briefly add to the best value comments in the report by saying that to be a learning organisation capable of continuous improvement, we have to be a listening organisation, and I echo the sentiments that the Mayor expressed at the introduction of this particular item, and engage and consult with the people that we serve. So by bringing forward this strategy and changing our target operating model to one of the places greater emphasis on community engagement, it demonstrates that we are continuing to make arrangements to secure continuous improvement in the way in which the Council functions are exercised, and I think that's an important point to make. So now if I hand over to Craig, to take you through the report.
- Evening, everyone. Sam Craig, more of the strategy and policy lead in the corporate strategy and community service, and I've been leading on the development of the new community engagement strategy. So the Council has a priority to be a Council that listens and works for everyone in its strategic plan, and as Robin said, our new target operating model has recently been developed, and it was more outwardly focused to work in partnership with communities. So to achieve these objectives, it's vital that the Council engages effectively with the community on the issues that matter to them, and to support this, the Council's worked in partnership with stakeholders to develop a new community engagement strategy. So the new strategy is a vision to listen to communities to build a borough that works for everyone, and it has six objectives. Number one, a joined-up approach to coordinating and planning community engagement in the Council and with partners, which leads to better outcomes. Number two, the Council and communities work together to make decisions that improve the borough free. The Council knows how to reach the community, and our South and her groups are enabled to participate. Four, staff have the knowledge, skills, and resources to engage with the community effectively. Five, the community understands how their involvement has influenced decisions made by the Council, and finally, residents get more involved in their community and become the next generation of community leaders. So each of the objectives has a set of actions to achieve them, which are included in the delivery plan of the strategy. And so some of the exciting ideas include service planning, so making sure in service planning each service identifies the opportunities for communities to be involved in decision-making, which will become part of their service plans and will lead us to be able to develop a community engagement calendar. Long-term strategic planning, so ensuring that the refresh of our strategic plan is informed by community engagement and reflects the priorities of the community. Databases of contacts, so we're gonna create a directory of local services and groups and a database with key contacts, key stakeholders, networks, and forums that the Council can reach out to to involve. Engaging our faith groups and local media, making better use of the local media engagement with communities through the voluntary and community sector, and our faith networks. Establishing a corporate engagement and consultation service that leads to strategic community engagement projects, engages our seldom heard groups effectively and helps coordinate community engagement across the Council. We're going to refresh the Council's community engagement plan, but to provide guidance for staff on how to plan, deliver, and evaluate community engagement effectively and provide a range of training opportunities so staff have the necessary knowledge skills and capabilities. And a final exciting action will be about the work that we do to empower our young people through electing a young mayor every two years, a youth council where young people can get involved in shaping Council services and deliver projects to improve their community. So there's a much wider range of actions included within the strategy, but those are some of the exciting things which we're going to do. To develop the strategy, we brought together a project team of Council officers from across Council divisions to guide the development to make sure that this is a Council-wide strategy which had buy-in for more divisions. We conducted an evaluation of the Council's current community engagement practice against recognised standards of good practice to identify our strengths and areas for improvement. And we worked with the project team and mayor's office to agree some draft objectives for the strategy. And after that, we did extensive research into good practice from elsewhere, including speaking to four other local authorities to learn from what they do to ensure best value. We, in total, we consulted with 328 stakeholders. So we actively took steps to engage with a diverse range of community members who were a representative of the Tower Hamlet's diverse community. And that included an online survey, four pop-ups in different localities in the borough, two workshops with members, two workshops with partners, including voluntary community sector, business and other public sector partners, two workshops, specific group of residents who have protected characteristics through our equality's hubs and networks, two workshops with staff, targeted sessions with young people, the Somali community and Bangladeshi community, and meetings with internal teams. So respondents were overall very positive about the vision of objectives, but one of them written in plain English and an objective added around empowering communities which we've actioned within the strategy. And they also said that the new strategy should include principles of good practice based on the feedback from stakeholders around what good community engagement looks like. And we've developed principles of good practice which will guide the council's community engagement in the future. So we use the information from the consultation research and evaluation to write the draft strategy. And to get feedback internally, we deliver presentations to the mayor's office, to divisional leadership teams and met with senior managers with a responsibility for proposed actions. And to make sure that it met the community's needs, we organized two further workshops and a survey to get footage back from residents and partners who took part in the consultation. And we use that information to refine the final strategy which is in front of you. So as we move into the delivery stage, we're gonna set up a strategy delivery group of officers from relevant departments and key partners to monitor review, and revise the community and engagement strategy as we deliver it. We're gonna measure sentiment of residents in areas such as feelings of trust, involvement, listening and feeling informed on an annual basis through our annual resident survey. And to measure the impact the strategies have in each year will conduct a survey of 100 residents to understand their experience of the council's community engagement. And in year one, we'll collect baseline data for that and be able to measure our progress as we move forward. So that's the end of the presentation. Thanks and happy to take any questions.
- Thank you, Greg, our last members to come in. Please, Deputy Mayor.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I hope you can hear me, Greg and Robin. So an excellent--
- You asked me then after that.
- It's an excellent strategy. I think I'm extremely pleased and grateful to you for your hard work. And I'm also grateful that you've added the faith communities as well. But I think one other thing I want to add is yes, you've added local, media, local press, but we know how important the main media is, especially in the whole UK, but especially with our handlers. So I think we should not be shy in a way mentioning the main media when it comes to strategy, when it comes to communicating towards our resident. And this is a big chunk of percentage of our residents. So that's one of the things I would request that we need to celebrate that, not only to celebrate, but we want to mention the main media. So that would be my comment, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. I hope you've heard me.
- Thank you. I'll come onto that. Thank you, thank you very much. Anyone else? Tala.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And thank you, team, for presenting the paper. It's very good paper. It's something that I was cited on quite early because I was one of the seven that attended your workshop. So I'm really pleased to see some of the sort of actions coming out from it. Noting the two community safety items that we have on the objective too. And it's something that myself and colleagues will be quite keen on delivering against. Just on the second item when we talk about strengthening community safety meetings, I think a good example of case in point would be the recent meeting that we had in Weavers following the crossbow attack. Within a short space of time, we managed to get close to 100 people there that have been and will attend it. So it's something that we're quite keen in doing and I think it's also important to mention. As we transition from being a traditional counter to a more community-powered council, we can take lessons from the previous term where we had a community champions program or we had participatory budgets, where local people were empowered to make choices on their local area. And I think when we look at some of those initiatives that have been successfully delivered previously, I think it's something that maybe we can consider moving forward. And also like the idea about not expecting residents to come to us, whether that's to the surgeries or whether that's to the council, I think the fact that we need to be more accessible and be out in the community I think is an important point. Whether that's through the assemblies or other measures. So that's my comment for now.
- Grateful to, Craig, I'll bring you in. No comments, aren't they? No questions as such.
- Thank you. (speaks in foreign language)
- Thank you, Mayor. Mayor, I just want you to highlight that ideologically for us, committee engagement is not just a tick-bock exercise, offering limited access through online surveys and desktop exercises. The council has a golden thread that joins up the strategic plan to the delivery of frontline services. And likewise, that community engagement pays a pivotal and key role in the services we deliver. So it's of the utmost importance that we have a robust community engagement strategy. The council, elected members, and anyone who works as agents or contractors for the council have a responsibility to deliver a service that the residents of this borough need and want. And without that engagement, we really can't test what we're delivering and what we're spending our money on. So we can have a number of ideas on what might benefit those residents. However, if the residents don't take that up, then we will be wasting our money and not getting the buy-in. And this community engagement strategy is pivotal in getting that engagement and buy-in from residents for the services that we provide as a council, for the way officers behave in relationship to residents, the way elected members respond to residents. So it's of the utmost importance, and I welcome this report, because it's not a one-glove-fital approach. There are those who have limited access to the internet. There are those who have limited literacy abilities. So you may have technocratic surveys, which they find very hard and difficult to navigate around, and therefore don't bother participating. So this widened approach to it, I think it's very important, and I welcome this report, Mayor.
- Thanks, Coby. I mean, a good example is the residents ups, the formal one-slop shops, which were reduced to one, I mean, previously we had five, the number of complaints and the anger and the frustration that there were out there in those seven years is phenomenal, because there are those who don't have, you know, laptops, don't have computers at home, those who don't have, they can't speak the language, they can't speak on the phone, et cetera. They didn't have children to look after them, some don't have children. So the one-stop shops helped them with a lot of the service provisions, and when we came back and made a commitment that will reintroduce the one-stop shops now and the resident hubs, that's gone down very well. This is also about engaging and having been a council, people's centred council, let's listen to council, enabling council, that's very important. So hopefully going forward, or always, yes, there are room for improvements, certainly, but I think when the right track, the right track, creating the coming mix and comments then any response to those comments and I'll bring one to other people then.
- Yeah, just to say thanks for the feedback and then thanks for members and also directors for being involved in the process, I think. The nice thing to hear is that some of the comments are important to you are things which we've really tried to reflect in the strategy. I think we're lucky in town, and let's develop a thriving voluntary and community sector and faith network, so we've put actions specifically around how we can work with our interfaith forums on the other organisations that we've got who can bring faith organisations together to do good in the community and reach people to stay involved. And I think talked about the importance of building relationships with Bay media as well as other media as well, and so we've got specific actions around working with our community service to do that and also exploring more like new innovative ways of reaching people such as using local influencers and community champions of Bay use of what's up in the future. And I think, Councillor Childry, you were talking about being more proactive and coming towards communities and using some of the more innovative methods to do that. So hopefully the framework that we've put in the strategy will be a catalyst to do that, and I know there will be a conversation about participatory budgeting coming up soon. And absolutely right, Councillor Ahmed, I think we don't want it to be a tick-box exercise, do we? We truly believe in the impact that good community engagement can have in producing better services as well. And so through this, we've tried to put the conditions in place so that we can really improve community engagement across the Council, making sure staff have got the right knowledge skills and capabilities through, you know, refresh guidance, training, programmes, securing some external support from experts as well, and hopefully that would have a good impact.
- Thank you. Anyone else? I'll call away very quickly, yeah. Please.
- Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mayor, if I'd like to see this, it will come to support this wide imbalance, and particularly I like the idea that they see run six workshops, because in our community, there are a big section of the community members are not computer literate, so the CanEx is when you do online survey, so that's a good idea engaging, but I would also say, emphasise that these workshops are a balance and diverse, engage the diverse community, and that's all I want to say. Thank you. I think it's a good report. Thanks.
- Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This community engagement is an engagement with our resident, and we will listen to them. We will consult with them in various issues, and we will take tangible solution to make our benefit to our resident. And mainly this, we need to ensure that every voice is met and every perspective is valued. And together, we'll build a borough where every voice is met and our diversity is also met. And we will come this report, and we thank our officer to present this valuable study.
- Thank you.
- Thank you. Shall we move on? Grateful to you. Can I just say thank you, Craig, Robbing, Joberbele and Kiran for the work that you all put in. And thank you for taking my views, accommodating my views when developing the report. I think it's a very good report. And you touched on a lot of stuff, it's very important. We have an active, very large voluntary sector in the borough. Historically, they played a very important role in shaping support in developing this borough. So it's important that we nurture and develop that relationship, make it as strong as possible. The faith communities are extremely important. We're blessed. You know, we have a strong faith communities in the borough, which will utilise their connectivity, their experiences, their strengths to our advantage. Historically, we have over the last 25, 30 years and moments of difficulties, the ideal marches, you know, the faith communities and non-faith. They played a very important role in protecting and safeguarding in the borough. When there were London riots, you know, we were good. The communities came together and they pretended us, supported us, supported our youngsters. So we must take advantage of that. You know, today I was at an event where there was some six years voluntary sector organisations. I was talking to them about the recycling, the cleanliness in the borough, attendance in our schools, you know, some of our schools, that's an issue. Like before, they want to work with us. They want to help us. The Council of Mosques in particular, wants to help us work with us. Let's take advantage of that. I know some of those comments are reflected and grateful. We're also very fortunate that this borough is the home to the strong Bangladeshi media. The very strong bean hair, some hundred years, more so over the last four to five 50 years, you know, the digital media, the print media, the TV media. You know, we have 120,000 people from Bangladeshi heritage. Over the last 10, 50 years alone from Europe, there are some 25 to 30,000 people who have come made timeless their home. You know, they don't speak much English or good English. They have languages, Bengali, mother tongue, but there's fluent in Spanish, Portuguese, French. You name it, Italian, double languages. We must, let's utilise, you know, the Bangladeshi media, you know, to our advantage. They don't want, they don't want much in return. They want a genuine partnership respect with us. So, Jubyar has a good connectivity with them. We have good connectivity. Please, I know, let's utilise them, yeah, and then the thought and develop that partnership we have. Historically, they've always been supportive of this council under all leadership. All leadership, and we must nurture. That's very important. So, we shouldn't shy away from naming them, rather than directly the one media that we have openly in this council, local media, is that foundation media. It's very important. So, I'm going to say that, and can we, some of the stuff that Thala has mentioned about participatory budgeting about the other stuff, let's reflect on that. It's worked for us in the past. Let's look at what we're delivering in the past. Let's look at and learn from other boroughs across the country, other countries across the country. Is there anything they're doing in order to connect with the people of their respective areas? Let's learn from them, too. OK, on that note, I'm really grateful for the paper. Can we agree the paper, approve it, endorse it, yeah? And we note the recommendations. Thank you very much. Great. OK, item 6.2, so I'm calling it's going to join us. Minara, are you here to join us at the front? Yeah, please do. Hello, thank you. Thank you for coming. It's the Women's Safety Over & Scrutiny Commuter Recommendations and Action Plan. Thala, do you want to start off with God? Thank you. I'll be brief and then I'll pass you up to him and the officers are here to present the report. So there were seven recommendations made by Ogleville and Scrutiny in February. All actions are in train. A lot of the stuff, to be fair, was existing to my knowledge. So there's a lot of work that's gone underway in terms of completing those actions. But it's important to note that this is part of a wider array of activities that we're doing in terms of addressing violence against women and girls. You will be aware that we have an upcoming strategy being launched in a few months. There's a number of different sort of consultations. So we had one in parks. So looking at inclusive design within parks to make sure that parks are safe for women and girls. And Minara, Simon, and Anne will have further details around some of the work. So this is part of a wider array of activities also that we're looking at in terms of addressing violence against women and girls. Anne? Anne, please. Thank you, Councillor. I'll just add colleagues, Mr. Mayor, that preventing violence against women and girls and improving women's safety requires a holistic all system response. And we see gender-based violence as a pattern of behavior perpetrated by men against women. And one of the core aims of all of this work is to prevent fog, to reduce gender inequality and discrimination and improve women's safety. And as Councillor Chardry has already said, it's part of a much wider piece of work that we're doing, which includes the Women's Commission, the Women's Resource Centre, the new strategy. But I'll ask Simon Smith, who's acting head of community safety, and Minara, who's our Vogue expert, to speak to the detail of the report. Please be free. Mr. Mayor, Councillors, thank you. Thank you very much, Councillor Chardry, and for the introduction. As Councillor Chardry has pointed out, Mr. Mayor, the report found at ages 73 to 85, if your document bundle relates to the action plan developed and implemented following recommendations by overview and scrutiny in February 2023. Those recommendations, the resultant action plan and the progress to date against that plan is submitted for your comment and decision today. A further report will be provided in due course to overview and scrutiny, provided a progress update on those recommendations. I don't intend to repeat the detail of each recommendation, but wish to highlight the following areas of activity. The action plan has been very much focused on a multi-agency approach to ensure that we have women's safety in the public space. We have seen the launch of the Bowers' first anti-misogyny campaign focused on the nighttime economy, and that has been targeting the role of men as perpetrators. And this has been very much delivered in collaboration with Hackney, the City of London, and obviously ourselves. We have mainstreamed a zero tolerance approach for licensed holders together with colleagues from licensing, via our new licensing policy, which has signed off by full council last year. The forthcoming new Women's Resource Centre in Development will offer a safe space and foundation for wider gender-based violence work as well. The Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance accreditation process is near completion, and which will improve housing sector response to women's safety. In line with the Strategic Needs Assessment conducted as part of the development of the forthcoming Bull Strategy, which Council's Judge has mentioned, there is a Council of Mosques program of work currently underway to support faith leaders in delivering that wider piece of work. And we are also working closely with the Merriam Centre and the Interfaith Forum as part of that agenda. We have a provision of 18 months self-defense classes for women in development. And just to highlight some of our school's activity, 19 schools have signed the school's vault pledge, and around 89 have signed up to Operation Encompass, which is a police-led project to ensure information of domestic violence incidents where children are involved, that information is passed to schools by 9 a.m. the following morning. And this allows for an early intervention approach and package to be put in place promptly by those schools. There's been an extensive program of work developed with businesses and awareness conferences with larger and smaller businesses by the Safe House Campaign in collaboration with the City of London. This includes book lists, awareness material, business advice with wayfinding open days, including large corporations. Just to mention budgets, the cost of developing the plan is within the existing budget of 0.49 million. However, further development of the plan may incur wider development costs. As Anne and Councillor Charger have mentioned, the new vault strategy is also currently in the final stages of the development and after extensive stakeholder consultation will be published later this time. Thank you. I open up the discussion. Thank you. Thank you, Simon. In a minute or so, anything else you want to add to what's been said, feel free. You're OK? OK, great. Thank you. Peeved to come in and come this stage team. OK, we'll comment, Anne. I'll make some comments to colleagues. Thank you, Mayor. I think the recommendations we have here is actually very, very important. The Women's Safety Action Plan. It goes a long way because the stuff that we've implemented in the recent budget as well, on top of just the safety concerns for women, we have introduced many things to support each and every family households directed towards women and children, like the free sumings for all women over the age of 16. And the extension of EMA, the introduction of free school meals, the extension of university bursary, all of that helps the family financially. And I think that also helps the women at home. Because financially, when there's concerns at any households, the women will feel more of the pressure at home. And I think that covers a big portion of the safety concerns as well. So I welcome this report, Mayor. Thank you. Why, please, Chef? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you to the officers. I think it's a really important report. And I think it's paramount that basically we do our best to safeguard our females. On the point of the night-time economy, a safe night-time economy is essential to the continuous success of our bar art. And I think going forward, I think it's really important that we look at how we support our female business owners, entrepreneurs, going forward, so that they can feel safe running their business, as well as those who are as a customer, they feel that they can go out and be safe in our bar art. I think that's really important going forward. Thank you. Thank you very much. Could we ask you this, yes? Thank you, Mayor. Once again, I mean, this is a subject that I've spoken about, long and wide. And I welcome this report, so I'll be a little brief. There's just one typo I wanted to pick out. It's recommendation five. It's tower hamlets housing forum to hoof, not housing management forum. So that's just one type of work, if that can be erected. But in essence, I endorse this whole report a wholeheartedly. I think if there are opportunities to go even further, I think it's worthwhile discussing as well. I know these are initial scrutiny review around that, but I think as an administration, we have a very proactive approach to facing modern day challenges, particularly online grooming and other areas like that. And that plays a role. But one of the things that I was made aware of is not only just social media, but even gaming, how that portrays certain perceptions from a young age. So you can use certain platforms, you start playing games and suddenly you're indoctrinated and these are perceptions, and you grow up doing that. So sort of looking at add-ons around those areas as well. So we can sort of cut across generational ages in relation to that. And it's not just about adult, but it's how we grow up. All right, Coby, Coby, we're saying.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. We all know women are very important and they're playing very good role in the family for upbringing us, children. I've seen my mother, how she sacrifices her life. And also we want to make sure, Mr. Mayor, they are well respected in the community, society.
- Yes, one of the examples you're doing, our previous admission, they cut a jagonary center. We need extra-curricular activity for them through bringing harmony in the society. So we gave them respect and what they deserve in the community, or fully support Mr. Mayor. I think we need to do more for the women.
- Grateful.
- So, my young, then I'll bring you all by in, and I'll remove one, yeah? So, okay, thank you.
- Thank you, thank you, Mr. Mayor. I mean, thank you to the awareness as well for the recommendations. But, I mean, that shows how serious we are in terms of, as a council, in terms of your investment, especially to our woman, the female community. As you can see on the action plan, most of it is kind of either completed, and there are a few ongoing. So, I mean, that shows the amount of investment we're putting in. So, I just wanted to ask just two free clarification. One regarding the third sector and community charity corporate events, this has completed in March 2024, and also the commission in domestic abuse casework service, March 2024 completed with the funding of 475. And the final one, sports team to create calendars of sporting activities for women and girls, which is also April 2024. It's just, I haven't seen anything. That's why I just want to, I'm sure it's completed, it's there. I just want some clarification, that's all. Thank you.
- Okay, well, bye quickly, then.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. (indistinct chatter)
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Sports and other very powerful tools to empower people, particularly the women's, the football tournament, headcramp football tournament, and the free swimming for the girls of 16 plus will bring immense benefit to our community in their family, beyond family level. It's in public health and it will empower them in terms of building selfish team and confidence. And it brings a community, healthy community, a community that feels safe. Thank you.
- Thank you.
- Do you want to come in here, you know?
- Yeah, so apologies if you haven't seen, I mean, it's all very recent, so we awarded a contract to the commissioning. I mentioned that the various other boards, this is the first time to our hamlets has committed so much into violence against women and girls. There was a 1.4 to 5 million pound contract, which we just awarded a few weeks ago to Solis Women's Aid for domestic abuse case workers, Somali speaking, Bangladeshi speaking, co-located at six different locations. So that has just happened a few weeks ago and obviously it's taken eight, nine months to go through the procurement process in terms of the sporting activities, as mentioned in the plan. It was to secure funding to increase participation of women within leisure and sporting services and that has been secured. It will be an 18 month programme by the sports development team for 18 months, twice a week, self-defense classes for women, including as Councillor Hussain mentioned, football activities, we had international women's day activities, free swimming classes and there's an exploration around bringing in house, leisure services, we've increased participation. So that's all being done via other departments. In terms of the third sector, we put complete in relation to this, but the work is always ongoing. I think every year there's thousands that we reach out to directly and hundreds in terms of outreach activities with the third sector. I'm hoping that answers the question. Thank you, Councillors. OK, yeah, thank you. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to reflect for a moment on two things, really. The nature of the work of the over and scrutiny committee, you and I spend a lot of time thinking about how we engage with scrutiny, about how the Council generally conducts scrutiny and this is a really good example of what can come out of some really important work, but it actually also builds upon priorities and aspirations that you set. And I just was really taken by the comments that Anne made around having an all-system, holistic approach to this. It has to be an inherent part of what we do. And I know that you and I have been discussing in recent months how housing and how you live your life, your actual, the conditions in which you live, and the impact that homelessness can have, the impact that the housing option service can have. And I just sort of was really helpful to reflect here on conversations that the Mayor and I have been having recently about enhancing that particular service, which I think will also have an impact. And the Mayor is very keen to not just deliver the status quo, but to look at new ways of delivering that service, increased opening hours, weekend opening, 24/7 access. So I just think it'll be a really helpful addition to the recommendations that are being made here that I know you're very keen and the Cabinet's very keen on supporting Anne's comment that this has to be an holistic approach. It has to be an inherent part of what we do. And these recommendations from over in scrutiny fit very well with that aspiration.
- Thanks, Steve. Work around, I'm glad you touched on homelessness. I will also mention overcrowding. You know, prevention is so important, so important, overcrowding. You know, I see families, women in particular, who come to my surgery, see what we meet on the streets at events, et cetera. The one element that contributes to tensions within the family is the lack of space for the parents, for kids, contributing hugely into family tension between husband and wife, between intergenerational conflict between parents, children and grandparents is because of the overcrowding. So, Paul, reducing the overcrowding in the borough, building more homes, family substance, it's got to be a, I know you take it very seriously, so does Steve, it could be a priority. You know, we cannot eliminate overcrowding overnight, but we must do it utmost to reduce the overcrowding in the borough, okay? I believe a lot of tensions in the family will go away if we were to provide at least in space over those kids' heads and the family's head, so important. The health inequalities in the borough, because of overcrowding, because of poverty, the way it contributes to tensions within the family, it's immense, we see it, we experience it, we have family members who are experiencing problems. You know, the leisure insourcing, I am confident over the years has come a hugely contribute to reducing the health inequalities, you know, diabetes, coronavirus, heart disease, blood pressure, you know, free swimming, when we did it last time, it helped to reduce hypertension within some individuals, many of our individuals, especially women folks, you know, and contributed to a much more healthier lifestyle. So, bringing the health, the leisure in-house will give us much more flexibility and starting off with free swimming for girls and women from 16, it's going to hopefully contribute towards that. The youth services, the investment, I think we need to now design out the human service, get it up and running, work in partnership with our schools, with our leisure facilities and with community safety is certain, but more importantly, it's those youngsters getting them active, getting them moving and valuing education is so important. It's so important. Education is extremely important to all of us. It's got to start young, it's got to start early, you know, giving those kids a life chance, you know, having financial security, having a roof over the head, having a healthy lifestyle is important. Attainment, and I always go on about detainment, you know, when only 31% of our kids went to Russell Group of Universities this year. You know, it always worries me. You know, it's what's happened to the other percentages. What are they doing in terms of enhancing the life chances? We've got to get in a life chances going. They're so important to us. The investment that we put into community safety, you know, this year, last year, we have spent, invested so much money before we, in frontline services, frontline work force, that was our commitment to get the public sector going again. And I wish the government was doing that too. Then we'll see a much more healthier, much more conscious, a much more educated population. It's important to us, you know, so investing in the community safety, absolutely, absolutely, but prevention is so important for us. Working with the other communities, thank you, the Council of Mosques, the faith community, other faith communities, the synagogues, the churches, it's so important. And people are also the voluntary sector. We have a very active voluntary sector, unions in the borough. Working with them is equally important. So I'm grateful to our colleagues in ONS for this, it's very important. We support it very much. I'm going to make some additions to the recommendations as we go along. Is that okay yet? Okay, and other than that, we support it full-heartedly and commend you and the team for the work that you do across the Council. Thank you. Recommendation one, this will make an addition, please. Yep, it's okay. So after the sentence ending with streets, can you put in a sentence, please? Including, just comma, including the Metro Bulletin, please. I know it's the elementary we do work with the police, but I wanna say, yeah, explicitly. The Metro Newton police, the faith communities in particular, the Council of Mosques and the voluntary sector. Is that okay? That's important. That's recommendation one. Recommendation two, I just wanna add to police, yeah. After the last sentence, after the word community falls off, then this is to tie into, we'll give it this in right, we'll fold it onto you, this is to tie into a service-wide review of what is an offer to women of all communities. Okay, recommendation three is fine. Recommendation four, I just wanna say this after the word available, the last word. Can you make explicit reference to young tower humlets given the investment in youth service that we've made? And the design of the service to incorporate the need for education. So the partnership between education, youth services, vital to us. Attainment is vital to us. Okay, recommendation five, can we just after the sentence, where it says ends with on RSL states, can you please, I just wanna add this, reiterate the need for the ongoing RSL work, you can with the ask the ombudsman event that we could put on here. And recommendation six, can you just include add, this is to be done in cooperation with the faith communities, in particular the council of mosques, the CVS and the council. Okay, Sam, if you can email that, please, yeah? Is that okay, yep? With those additions, where are we okay to agree with recommendations yet? Is that okay? Thank you, grateful to you. Thank you. Okay, the next paper. Yeah, it's quite straightforward. The nominees for adopting new social housing regulatory functions, which we take very seriously. Have you been the coming, COVID? And I'll ask Paul to say two words. Thank you very much. Go on. Thank you, Mayor. So this report sets out the requirement to nominate individuals to two new functions, responsible person and health and, sorry, responsible person for health and safety lead. The social housing regulation at 2023 introduced social housing landlords should designate an employee as a health and safety lead, who is responsible for monitoring and assessing the risk of failure to comply with health and safety requirements in social housing. This includes informing cabinet of non-compliance with health and safety requirements and providing advice to cabinet on how risks and failures should be addressed. The health and safety lead can be a member of the executive other than the elected mayor or an employee of the local authority. They have recent experience of working in technical environment where health and safety requirements are delivered and have technical knowledge and competency. For this reason, it's recommended that the director of housing asset management is appointed as the health and safety lead, Michael Keene. The second requirement as set out by the Charter for Social Housing Residence is a requirement to have a responsible person overseeing compliance with a new consumer standards, which was fully implemented in April 2024. The nominated individual must be a senior officer and an employee to the landlord, which is namely us, Tower Hamlet's Council. Appointing an individual to this role will provide the mayor and cabinet with a clear line of accountability regarding compliance with the new consumer standards. The name of the responsible person must be published to tenants who is responsible for council housing standards. It is recommended that the corporate director for housing and regeneration is appointed to this role as they have the responsibility for all housing functions, ensuring that statutory requirements are met and provided strategic direction in relation to managing and delivering housing services. Namely, Mr. Paul Paterson, who's right next to me.
- Thanks, Coby.
- Paul, please, sir.
- Mr. Mayor, I think it's just to reinforce this paper reinforces our commitment to the new consumer standards. It reinforces and plays into the session that we had last week of MAB talking about the insourcing of THH and the work that we're now starting into integrate Tower Hamlet's homes into the council, into one single housing management function. And it also forms into our commitment and the work that we're doing around fire safety and the work that we're doing. This will create responsible persons and a clear straight line to cabinet and to the MIR in terms of our commitment against those consumer standards and our responsibilities on that, including our commitment to health and safety and ensuring our properties are safe.
- Thank you. This is quite straightforward. We need to nominate two individuals. Thank you for giving us a narrative in the background. And two people have been identified. Can we agree with that, please?
- I agree.
- Okay.
- Thanks, Paul.
- Agreed. Great. I'm going to put the mic up, please, yeah. Great. Thank you. Thank you very much. The contract extension for young people supported live in part way. Mayuma and Steve. Yep, please.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yes, there's a contract report for some provision for some of our very vulnerable young people, those at risk of homelessness and those on the edge of care. We did run a procurement process towards the end of last year, but unfortunately that did not deliver a position where we were able to allocate the contracts. We are engaging with the market and trying to communicate wider beyond the current providers to see who else we could bring forward to bid for this work. And we didn't feel from the procurement process at the end of last year that we had sufficient quality. And obviously these are really important services. So we wanted to make sure we had a good provision. So we've brought forward this report to request that we extend the contracts for the current providers while we run that re-tendering process. We are already engaging with the market to discuss the reasons why we couldn't award the contracts and understand what's changing in the market. The initial request was that we do some more work with providers and therefore initially requested a longer extension in consultation with yourself and the lead member. We have reduced the extension just to the six months conscious of the best value implications of long extensions. Thank you.
- Thanks. So can I just thank you for that. I know it's no fault of the service. You went out there can attract the providers. Can I just ask is this, was this an open contract or tender was it from the framework?
- It was an open contract that went out on the procurement portal. But I think we'll be speaking to our procurement team around how we can make sure we communicate, wider and encourage local provision as well.
- Okay.
- You've touched on it. I mean, it's got to be accessible, approachable and it incorporates local needs. There are small to medium sized organizations out there very much want to work with us. You know, we always get to do some of the fairs, some of the opportunities that we put on here. People have approached the council to do work with us. So can you please look at the actual tender specification and can I also have a copy of C. Are there any impediments? To attracting the interest that we need to attract. It's very important, yeah. That's one and two. You know, I'm quite reluctant to extend contract contracts for obvious reasons because it costs us more money in the long term and it's also about value for money and also about service delivery and service performance. But here, it's an exception. We went out, but we can attract the parties that we want to attract. And you're saying, you know, six months is the most utmost that you need in order to get this delivered, yeah? Okay, okay.
- Can I start by congratulating the corporate director on his permanent appointment? But I think as this is your first cabinet meeting as a permanent corporate director, can I get assurances that going forward, you're gonna have a forward plan in place? And I know the mishap with this particular contract, but we get all our ducks in order and we know which contracts are gonna be coming to an end with foresight and we have preparation in chain in order to look at tendering processes and so on and so forth. So we don't repeat extensions of contracts and we phase in difficulties that may happen. So forward planning, you know, because at the end of the day, if we're talking best value, we're talking about markets. We refer to them. This is wrong. Yeah, yeah. They went out in time, it was delivered in time. It was a good procurement process. Unfortunately, we didn't attract the interest that we had hoped to and it's not a big contract. It's quite reasonably small contract. But let's see how we perform better and we are very keen to make sure we do entertain new bids, good bid this time. So thank you. Anyone else? If not, I want to move on. Go on, keep it away very quickly.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Anything that's been made for a second go?
- One of the changes that we feel has impacted is that these types of provision now need to be offstead registered. So one of the things we're engaging with providers to make sure that they're well on with getting that registration completed. So then they can tender for this work. So that is a change that's happened within the last year. Previously they didn't, they didn't have to be offstead registered.
- Please, Said and Julie, please, you come in.
- Sorry, Mayor, just wanted to make a slight correction to the paper. So the Chief Financial Officer's comments related to the original request for the long and nine month period. And obviously that's our six month period. I just wanted to make sure that was corrected.
- That was one we and Julie sort of was talking about and just wanted to thank Steve and the team for when we initially flagged up the nine months, reduced it to six, which was really good. I was gonna squeeze a little bit more, but I guess it's just not gonna be really fair. So I think we'll leave it there.
- I'll squeeze.
- Yeah, you've done that, yeah?
- You've done that, yeah.
- Are they? Okay, you've done enough, yeah? Okay, okay. You know it's our job to save every single penny and ask that. But we're gonna make sure that we deliver on time, Steve. So it's tomorrow process to start. But please can you look at the specs, to see, you know, are there in your room to encourage people to apply, encourage people to bid for this, good, obviously good, good organizations. It's important to you. But especially local supply chain, local organizations are important to us. So okay, if that's the case, can we, Steve, if you want to come with them, will you?
- Thank you, Ma'am. I just wanted to make the point in relation to council. We've had discussions and for a long time now, we are really, really good at forward planning now for contracts. We've moved on from what was inherited. I think it's fair to put it in those terms. And given the men's aspiration around contract length, duration, packaging and what have you, an awful lot of work has gone on. And congratulations to those officers that have done that, particularly in the resources department.
- Can we agree the recommendations? Is that okay? Thank you very much, agreed. Can we now move on to the last paper, please? Again, another extension paper. Thank you, officer. Thanks very much. Can you hear a break? Do you want to say a few words and I'll bring to you a moment and I'll put it in.
- Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The children and young people's health and well-being services, the new service model, which brings together the statutory service, number one, school health and well-being service, and number two, integrated young people, health and well-being service. The robust and rigorous evolution of the children and young people's health and well-being service procurement concluded the bid did not deliver best value for the requirements as set out in the service specification. True contract extension are required to support the continued delivery of the two statutory service whilst re-tendering is completed. This report proposes that we extend the current two contracts by eight months in order to start the tendering process again. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
- Thank you. You want to add, Katie, to what's been said?
- I know that's fine, but the reason why.
- Thank you. The reason it's eight months is that this is aligning with the school terms. So the service is delivering programs like hearing and vision screening, and it would be very difficult and risky to change a provider in the middle of a programme like that.
- Yes, I'd requested six months and I was told and explained, clarified why it can't be six months, then I think eight months was put forward to accommodate that. Thank you, that helps. Again, this is an exception to the Roman rule because it went out, couldn't find someone for value for money, so we had no choice to go out to the market again. Again, Shuman, can you have a look at the specs? Is there anything there?
- I keep it right to see there's a flexibility there to attract people of interest, of ability, capacity, to be successful, to be for this kind of contracts. Please, give me a note, both artists, children's services and adult services, please, yeah. There's any changes to that. So, okay, okay.
- Thank you, anyone else? Could we?
- So, sorry, it's going to come across, again, a repetition, but we've had, I understand the mitigating circumstances around this, but we've had a number of contract extensions from HAC over the last two years or so. And again, can I ask corporate directors, chief executive, for us to have robust processes in place so that we can foresee and have also, and I know the chief executive's just reassured us, but just to put that in line again, 'cause we want that competitive approach, we want to test the market, we want to see what's available, and we want to get best value out of all of our contracts. Thank you.
- Thank you.
- Thank you. Please, Julie, then I'll come in, is that okay?
- Yeah, I just wanted to go a little bit further than chief executive, 'cause I've an update to the position. I did meet with showman yesterday, actually, about procurement and one of the things we agreed is that at the next month, we'll bring forward the detailed proposals for particularly resource and procurement in adult social care to meet what has been a accumulated backlog of adult social care contracts, and the current resource and plans and future structural plans for procurement across the council. You should see that next week.
- Thank you. And I mean, I understand the point that could be us making. I made similar points in this kind of forum previously, but we have put in money in the budget, through the budget process, into procurement, into legal, and into other services. And hopefully, I'm very confident going forward, Julie and Steve and the teams, corporate directors, going forward will be in much better position with procurement than we were previously. So thank you for those points, comments. I think this, again, straightforward. We need to go out to the market immediately, please. Don't wait, and we will agree. Is it okay for us to agree the recommendation? Okay?
- Yes. - Yeah, fine. Thank you.
- Any other business?
- Before we--
- Yeah, please.
- I believe you wanted to acknowledge the public question that we received here. - Oh, yeah.
- Yeah, yeah. We've, so on the previous paper, Kobi and Paul, we've received a public question, and that's fine. I've new touched on that you answered it.
- Sorry, it was from the opposition group, leader. So-- - You didn't turn up.
- Yes, so as there are no members, if it's appropriate, I'll provide a written response to the question, as there's no one asking the questions.
- Yeah.
- Mr. Mayor, you know, when I get talking, I need to be stopped, thank you.
- Thank you, now, grateful to you. Do a written response, it's appropriate. It's okay, on that basis, can we conclude the meeting and thank you to each and every one of you, until next time, grateful to you. You
AI Generated
Summary
The council meeting focused on various community and administrative matters, including formalizing roles for new social housing regulations, extending contracts for youth and health services, and adopting a community engagement strategy. The meeting also addressed women's safety and scrutinized existing service provisions.
Community Engagement Strategy Adoption:
- Decision: The council approved a new community engagement strategy.
- Arguments: The strategy aims to improve how the council listens to and involves the community in decision-making, emphasizing inclusivity and accessibility.
- Implications: This strategy is expected to enhance public participation and ensure that community feedback more directly influences council policies and actions.
Women's Safety Oversight and Scrutiny Committee Recommendations:
- Decision: Recommendations from the committee were adopted to enhance women's safety.
- Arguments: The need for improved safety measures and support systems for women was emphasized, with specific actions to be implemented across various council services.
- Implications: The adoption of these recommendations aims to bolster the council's commitment to preventing violence against women and improving safety in public spaces.
Extension of Contracts for Youth and Health Services:
- Decision: Contracts for youth supported living and children's health services were extended.
- Arguments: The extensions were necessary due to the lack of suitable bids that met the council's value criteria in recent tenders.
- Implications: These extensions are intended as short-term solutions to ensure service continuity while the council re-tenders to find suitable service providers.
Adoption of New Social Housing Regulatory Functions:
- Decision: The council designated specific roles to comply with new social housing regulations.
- Arguments: The designations aim to meet legal requirements and enhance oversight of health and safety in social housing.
- Implications: This decision is expected to improve the management and safety standards of social housing, providing clearer accountability and compliance with national standards.
Interesting Occurrence:
- The meeting noted the importance of engaging with both local and mainstream media to enhance community outreach and participation, highlighting the council's intent to use all available channels to foster a more inclusive dialogue with residents. The Tower Hamlets council meeting covered several important topics, including the appointment of a new Corporate Director of Children's Services, the commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the Brick Lane bombings, and updates on various council initiatives and strategies.
The most significant topic was the appointment of Steve Reddy as the new Corporate Director of Children's Services. The council members discussed the interview process and confirmed that the appointment is subject to due diligence. Steve Reddy was congratulated and reminded of the significant responsibilities ahead, particularly in improving educational attainment.
The council commemorated the 25th anniversary of the Brick Lane bombings, a devastating racist attack targeting the British Bengali and British Asian communities. The council reaffirmed its commitment to creating a borough where hatred has no place. A vigil was held, and a minute of silence was observed to honor the victims.
The Overview and Scrutiny Committee provided feedback on several initiatives, including the progress of the LGA Corporate Peer Review Action Plan. The committee noted that 39% of the actions were completed, with 65% expected by May and 85% by August. They emphasized the importance of inclusivity in developing the action plan and requested more efforts to ensure a holistic approach.
The committee also discussed the council's readiness to insource leisure services, highlighting performance issues and the need for improved resident access. They stressed the importance of communicating changes to residents and requested details of KPIs to monitor the impact on performance.
Parking was another focus, with the committee reviewing plans for a new parking enforcement strategy. They noted issues with the online system for purchasing permits and requested a review of the process. The committee also discussed plans for better enforcement on match days and events at London Stadium, as well as the installation of electrical charging points.
The final spotlight was on market trading, with the committee agreeing on findings and recommendations from a scrutiny challenge session. They emphasized the need for better support for traders, addressing issues such as trader spaces, storage facilities, toilets, waste management, and crime in markets.
The council also discussed the new Community Engagement Strategy for 2024-2028, aiming to improve how the council engages with the community. The strategy includes actions to ensure better coordination, inclusivity, and transparency in community engagement efforts. The importance of working with faith communities, local media, and voluntary organizations was highlighted.
The Women's Safety Action Plan was presented, detailing actions to improve safety for women in the borough. This includes the launch of an anti-misogyny campaign, the development of a new Women's Resource Centre, and the provision of self-defense classes. The council emphasized the need for a holistic approach to preventing violence against women and girls.
Two new roles were nominated to comply with the Social Housing Regulation Act 2023: the Director of Housing Asset Management as the Health and Safety Lead, and the Corporate Director for Housing and Regeneration as the Responsible Person for overseeing compliance with new consumer standards.
Finally, the council approved contract extensions for young people's supported living services and children and young people's health and well-being services. These extensions are necessary to allow time for re-tendering processes to ensure the best value and quality of service delivery.
Attendees
- Abdul Wahid
- Abu Chowdhury
- Gulam Kibria Choudhury
- Iqbal Hossain
- Kabir Ahmed
- Kabir Hussain
- Maium Talukdar
- Mayor Lutfur Rahman
- Musthak Ahmed
- Saied Ahmed
- Suluk Ahmed
- Ann Corbett
- Craig Morbey
- Dr Somen Banerjee
- Joel West
- Julie Lorraine
- Katie Cole
- Layla Richards
- Menara Ahmed
- Nicola Klinger
- Richard Ward
- Robin Beattie
- Simon Smith
- Stephen Halsey
- Steve Reddy
Documents
- Agenda frontsheet 24th-Apr-2024 17.30 Cabinet agenda
- Declarations of Interest Note
- Contract Extension for Young Peoples Supported Living Pathway
- Appendix. 1 for Contract extension for School Health and Wellbeing Service and Integrated Young Peop
- Contract extension for School Health and Wellbeing Service and Integrated Young Peoples Health and
- Community Engagement Strategy 2024-28
- Printed minutes 27032024 1500 Cabinet
- Appendix. 1 for Community Engagement Strategy 2024-28
- Appendix. 2 for Community Engagement Strategy 2024-28
- Appendix 1.Womens Safety Action Plan.MABCPAP
- Womens Safety Action Plan
- New Social Housing Regulatory Functions and Nominees to Adopt Responsibilities
- Printed minutes 24th-Apr-2024 17.30 Cabinet
- Decisions 24th-Apr-2024 17.30 Cabinet
- Public reports pack 24th-Apr-2024 17.30 Cabinet reports pack