Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Greenslade and Hastrick.

There were no disclosures of interest.

The Task Group is invited to consider the following methods of service delivery – in-house delivery, shared services and outsourcing.

At the meeting, the Task Group should consider each delivery option from a Member perspective and discuss:

·               What are the advantages?

·               What are the disadvantages?

·               What are the risks? And how could they be mitigated?

·               What safeguards would the Task Group like to see in place?

a) In-house

b) Shared services

c) Outsourced

Introduction

The item ‘Experience of other local authorities’ was carried over from the meeting on 7 February 2012.

The Chair introduced the item and suggested that both items be taken together. This was agreed by the Task Group.

The Task Group asked for some background information on the Association for Public Sector Excellence (APSE) who had written some of the documents under discussion.

ACTION- Committee and Scrutiny Support Officer

Councillor McLeod recommended that the Task Group think strategically about the topic. The Committee and Scrutiny Support Officer responded that the scope referred to the advantages and disadvantages of different methods of service delivery and the discussions would be related to that point.

Discussion of individual services

Councillor Jeffree referred to Appendix 1 of the Executive Director- Services’ report from the meeting of 7 February. He noted that this demonstrated that services at the Council were already delivered in a variety of ways. It was not possible to make general statements that services should, or should not, be outsourced. Specific functions had to be considered against performance criteria and the delivery methods for each could be scored. It was clear from that where the Council did not have the specific expertise it made sense to outsource.

The Vice Chair said he was interested to hear Members’ views of the documents. He agreed with Councillor Jeffree that the approach needed to be ‘horses for courses’; one size did not fit all. He noted that planning was a technical service but in general local authorities delivered it well in-house. He referred to the progress of the Council’s own planning department which had improved its performance exponentially over the last ten years.

The Chair highlighted the example of Environmental Services; the documents showed that there was not a lot of competition to deliver this service as it was an expensive market to enter. He noted that in the example there had been a lack of flexibility and commitment to recycling.

Councillor Bell noted that the Portfolio Holder for Finance and Shared Services had been present at the last meeting to discuss the political impact of shared services. Budget Panel had looked at the cost of the planning service compared to other councils in 2010/11.

The Chair added that different service areas had different needs; it was not possible for the Task Group to decide wholly in favour of a particular service delivery method. The Executive Directors had presented the logic behind the decision to outsource and to share services. His view was that it would have to be clear that outsourcing would bring in the required savings and ‘tick all the boxes’.

Concerns about outsourcing

The Vice Chair said that Watford was a small council and services could become expensive without economies of scale that other councils and outside companies could have. If a service was put out to competitive tendering it could be cheaper but the risk was that the service provided would be worse.

The Chair agreed but added that the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 15.

The Task Group was asked in the original scrutiny proposal to review this document and add any questions or issues it wishes to see addressed.  Members are asked to review the document and raise any issues and note any questions they have.

It was agreed that this item would be carried over to the next meeting on 22 February 2012.

Members are asked to review the work programme and add any items they would like the Task Group to consider.

The discussion of the work programme was included in item 14.

Wednesday 22 February 2012 7pm

Monday 27 February 2012 7pm

22 February 20127pm

27 February 20127pm