Minutes:
Councillor Graham Arthur, and Mr Marc Hume (Director of Regeneration and Transformation Service) attended the Committee to provide an update on the commissioning process.
The Chairman expressed uneasiness on behalf of the Committee that the process of commissioning was not clear to Members, and that concerns had arisen that the process and resultant developments were not being communicated effectively, and that this was giving the impression of a lack of transparency.
Councillor Arthur clarified that the term “commissioning” should more accurately be defined as “transformation”. Members heard that Cllr Arthur met on a weekly basis with the Director of Regeneration and Transformation Service, together with a commissioning team and Assistant Directors. The aim of these meetings was to achieve a transformation of the way LBB operated. Analysis would be undertaken in a forensic manner, which would result in a baseline review. Consideration had to be given to what was statutory, and what was discretionary in terms of services provided by the Council.
The Committee were informed that a detailed forensic process had to be adhered to, and that this could not be rushed. If the process was hurried, then it was likely to result in inefficiencies. Because of this, other councils had rushed into contracts that had not been worked out properly, and the consequences of this had bounced back on them, and residents had been upset. The Committee heard that every decision taken concerning commissioning was taken after scrutiny by a PDS Committee, the relevant Portfolio Holder, and the Executive.
It was explained to the Committee that soft market testing was undertaken, and then a bundle of services would be put together, and that this bundle would then go to market. Bundles would be tweaked according to feedback, so flexibility was required. Cllr Arthur explained that as the proposed contract included a breadth of services including Facilities Management, Property Services, Planning as well as PPS, it was logical to take the proposed bundle to the E&R PDS Committee.
The Director of Regeneration and Transformation Service reiterated what Councillor Arthur stated, and that there would be ample scrutiny and transparency in the processes, with scrutiny by the relevant PDS Committees as appropriate. Subsequent to contracts being prepared for the market, LBB then had to wait to see what sort of response was received and that after this, a further report would be written to report on market interest.
A Member stated that he was not against the process, but that he felt that there had been a lack of feedback to the PPS PDS Committee. The Member stated that he had expressed concern because he had been previously told that the process was slow, only to become aware of changes that had taken place that the PPS PDS Committee had not been made aware of.
A Member stated that there may be cases when joint meetings would be appropriate when contract bundles were relevant to more than one PDS Committee.
The Chairman commented that although she understood that it was logical to send the current bundle of services to the E&R PDS, the bundle did include the entire PPS Division, and therefore it would also have been appropriate to have sent the part of the E&R Report that was relevant to PPS to the PPS PDS to allow the committee to add their comments..
The Chairman thanked Cllr Arthur and the Director of Regeneration and Transformation Service for attending, and for clarifying the commissioning/transformation process.
RESOLVED that the commissioning update be noted.