Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Cllr Hayley Illman, Cllr Ricky Rogers and Mike Osment - Branch Secretary, UNISON.

To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on Wednesday 26 August 2020        

Resolved:

To confirm and sign the minutes of the last meeting held on the 26 August 2020.

To receive any declarations of disclosable interests or dispensations granted by the Standards Committee.

There were no declarations of interest made at the meeting.

There were no Chairman’s Announcements made at the meeting.

The Council welcomes contributions from members of the public.

Statements

If you would like to make a statement at this meeting on any item on this agenda, please register to do so at least 10 minutes prior to the meeting. Up to 3 speakers are permitted to speak for up to 3 minutes each on any agenda item. Please contact the officer named on the front of the agenda for any further clarification.

Questions

To receive any questions from members of the public or members of the Council received in accordance with the constitution.

Those wishing to ask questions are required to give notice of any such questions in writing to the officer named on the front of this agenda no later than 5pm on (4 clear working days, e.g. Wednesday of week before a Wednesday meeting) in order to be guaranteed of a written response. In order to receive a verbal response questions must be submitted no later than 5pm on (2 clear working days, eg Friday of week before a Wednesday meeting). Please contact the officer named on the front of this agenda for further advice. Questions may be asked without notice if the Chairman decides that the matter is urgent.

Details of any questions received will be circulated to Committee members prior to the meeting and made available at the meeting and on the Council’s website.

No statements or questions were received.

The Committee is asked to:

(i)        agree the size, and

(ii)     appoint the members and substitute members (up to four for each Party

Political Group) to each of the following Sub-Committees:

(a) Senior Officers Employment Sub-Committee

Cllr Allison Bucknell, Cllr Richard Clewer & Cllr Hayley Illman.

(Substitute Members: Cllr Jon Hubbard, Cllr Bob Jones

MBE, Cllr Fleur de Rhe-Philipe, Cllr Philip Whitehead, Cllr John Smale, Cllr Ian Thorn, Cllr Tony Trotman, Liberal Democrat vacancy vice former Cllr David Jenkins.)

(b) Appeals Sub-Committee

Cllr Allison Bucknell, Cllr Richard Clewer & Cllr Hayley Illman.

(Substitute Members: Cllr Mike Hewitt, Cllr Jon Hubbard, Cllr Gordon King,

Cllr Fleur de Rhe-Philipe, Cllr Philip Whitehead, Cllr Hayley

Illman, Cllr Ian Thorn, Cllr Tony Trotman, Liberal Democrat vacancy vice Cllr Hayley Illman.)

(c) Grievance Appeals Sub-Committee

Cllr Allison Bucknell, Cllr Tony Jackson & Cllr Hayley Illman.

(Substitute Members: Cllr Peter Evans, Cllr David Halik, Cllr Jon Hubbard,

Cllr Gordon King, Cllr John Smale, Cllr Ian Thorn, Cllr Tony Trotman, Liberal Democrat vacancy vice former Cllr David Jenkins.)

Under Paragraph 2.4.1 of Part 3 of the Council’s Constitution,it is a

requirement that at least one member of the Senior Officers’ Employment

Sub-Committee should be a member of the Cabinet when it discharges its

function to dismiss and take disciplinary action against certain categories of

officer in accordance with the officer employment procedure rules.

Accordingly, it is recommended that a second Cabinet member be

appointed to this Sub-Committee either as a member or as a substitute

member.

The following Sub-Committees were agreed for 2020-2021:

Senior Officers Employment Sub Committee

Cllr Stuart Wheeler, Cllr Philip Whitehead, Cllr Hayley Illman

Substitutes: Tony Jackson, Mike Hewitt, Richard Clewer, John Smale, Carole King, Jo Trigg, Bob Jones, Ian Thorn.

Appeals Sub-Committee

Cllr Stuart Wheeler, Cllr Richard Clewer, Cllr Hayley Illman

Substitutes: Tony Jackson, Mike Hewitt, Philip Whitehead, John Smale, Carole King, Jo Trigg, Bob Jones, Ian Thorn.

Grievance Appeals Sub- Committee

Cllr Stuart Wheeler, Cllr Tony Jackson, Cllr Hayley Illman

Substitutes: Mike Hewitt, Richard Clewer, Philip Whitehead, John Smale, Carole King, Jo Trigg, Bob Jones, Ian Thorn.

Verbal update from Jo Pitt

Jo Pitt - Director – HR & OD, Wiltshire Council gave a brief presentation, points made included:

·         That staff were now being deployed into the wellbeing hub

·         That a Business grants team, T&Cs Enforcement team and a Pandemic Covid team had now been set up

·         That HR teams had been working re-deploying staff to teams more relevant to the second lockdown

·         That HR were looking at all staff who needed to access Wiltshire Council buildings – the importance of trying to keep covid-19 out of the hubs and other buildings. Business cases would be needed to access the hubs etc

The Chairman thanked Jo Pitt for her update.

Verbal update from Jo Pitt and Paula Marsh

Jo Pitt - Director – HR & OD, Wiltshire Council gave a brief presentation, points made included:

·         That there would be a single program lead – Paula Marsh - HR & OD Strategic Delivery Manager

·         That a desk booking pilot was currently being trialled at the Monkton Park hub

·         That a review looking at better utilisation of all Wiltshire Council hubs and buildings was being carried out, this would also look at how to maximise estate commercial opportunities

·         That a second staff survey had just been carried out – an update would be given at next Staffing Policy meeting

·         Work was ongoing looking at the Wiltshire Council workforce and how services work with local colleges

·         Looking at working patterns, and at different operating models

·         Looking at digital services – how Wiltshire Council takes payments from its customers

The Chairman thanked Jo Pitt for her update.

The written report contained in the agenda pack provided an update on new approaches being introduced through the “agile workforce” workstream of the organisational recovery programme to support more flexible deployment of staff within the council.

Points made included:

·         Two outcomes of the council’s Organisational Recovery Programme were that Wiltshire Council could deploy staff and resources to meet business need as well as ensuring that the council was financially sustainable.

·         In July, CLT introduced controls to manage spending, increase savings, reduce costs and improve efficiency.  These controls included a halt on spend on new agency workers or extensions to existing contracts and a freeze on all external recruitment unless approved by CLT.

·         This had meant that wherever possible vacancies were being filled through the identification of resource from within our existing workforce. Since spending controls had been in place external adverts for council roles had reduced from an average of 36 live per week to 6 live per week.  This approach, alongside other spend control measures, had been successful in helping to address the current financial position.

·         Through the response to the pandemic, it had become clear that there was strength in having confident, skilled people who were willing to work in an agile and flexible way. This had enabled Wiltshire Council to deploy staff from across the organisation into critical service areas with a specific business need and support our most vulnerable residents.

Decision

·         That the Staffing Policy Committee noted the approaches that were being developed to support the more agile deployment of staff, in support of the council’s Organisational Recovery Programme outcomes.

·         That the Staffing Policy Committee noted the extension of internal opportunities to Wiltshire Care Leavers to support the fulfilment of the council’s Corporate Parenting responsibility.

·         That the Staffing Policy Committee recognised that there was not another committee meeting until January 2021, Staffing Policy Committee delegate approval of policy changes to the relevant senior officer (the Director of HR&OD) in order to enable approaches outlined in this paper to be implemented as soon as possible, following consultation and agreement with the recognised unions where applicable.

The Chairman thanked Jo Pitt for the report.

The written report contained in the agenda pack report provided the Staffing Policy Committee with information about updates to the council’s recruitment policies.

Points made included:

·         That Wiltshire Council’s recruitment policy was last fully reviewed and updated in 2016.

·         Whilst there had been no changes to the policy since then additional guidance documents, FAQs, templates and forms had been produced as required, either to support managers or where changes to processes had been required in line with either legislation or best practice.

·         Feedback from managers, and the council’s operational HR teams, was that information had become difficult to find and in some cases was duplicated across a number of different guidance documents.

·         A review had therefore been undertaken to streamline and reduce the number of guidance documents, combine all related information together into one place and to ensure the main policy clearly points managers to relevant guidance, depending on the type of recruitment being undertaken.

·         As part of the review, the equalities and inclusion language within the policy and associated guidance documents had been updated to ensure it aligned with current practice, and also with other HR information.

·         The policy and guidance documents had also been updated to ensure that any sections relating to the old behaviours framework had been replaced with new EPIC values and reference to the code of conduct policy, as presented at Staffing Policy Committee in June 2020.

Decision

·         That Staffing Policy Committee noted the report and the planned updates to the council’s recruitment policy and associated guidance documents.

The Chairman thanked Jo Pitt for the report.

Verbal update from Paula Marsh

Jo Pitt - Director – HR & OD, Wiltshire Council gave a brief presentation, points made included:

·         That the cap would be enforced from the 4 November 2020

·         That it was acknowledged that there were issues with the Local gov pension scheme

·         That Wiltshire Council were unable make anyone redundant over the age of 55

The Chairman thanked Jo Pitt for her presentation.