Social Services & Wellbeing

Invitees:

Councillor Huw David, Leader

Councillor Hywel Williams, Deputy Leader

Councillor Nicole Burnett, Cabinet Member for Social Services & Early Help

Councillor Dhanisha Patel, Cabinet Member for Future Generations and Wellbeing

Gill Lewis, Interim Chief Officer Finance, Performance and Change

Claire Marchant, Corporate Director, Social Services and Wellbeing

Mark Shephard, Chief Executive

Kelly Watson, Chief Officer Legal, HR and Regulatory Services

Jackie Davies, Head of Adult Social Care

Deborah Exton, Interim Deputy Head of Finance

Laura Kinsey, Head of Children's Social Care

Christopher Morris - Finance Manager – Social Services & Wellbeing / Chief Executive’s Directorate

Chief Executives Directorate

Invitees:

Councillor Huw David, Leader

Councillor Hywel Williams, Deputy Leader

Councillor Dhanisha Patel, Cabinet Member for Future Generations and Wellbeing

Gill Lewis, Interim Chief Officer Finance, Performance and Change

Mark Shephard, Chief Executive

Kelly Watson, Chief Officer Legal, HR and Regulatory Services

Deborah Exton, Interim Deputy Head of Finance

Martin Morgans, Head of Partnership Services

Christopher Morris, Finance Manager – Social Services & Wellbeing / Chief Executive’s Directorate

The Interim Chief Officer – Finance, Performance and Change presented an overview of the report, the purpose of which was to present the Committee with the draft Medium Term Financial Strategy 2021-22 to 2024-25, which set out the spending priorities of the Council, key investment objectives and budget areas targeted for necessary savings. The strategy included a financial forecast for 2021-2025 and a detailed draft revenue budget for 2021-22.

The Chair thanked the Interim Chief Officer Finance, Performance and Change for her concise overview of the report. Members asked the following questions:

Social Services and Wellbeing Directorate

A Member noted that the report had two Appendices, one containing Budget Pressures and one with Budget Reduction Proposals.  For Social Services and Wellbeing (SSWB) there were pressures proposed of £5m, yet on the budget savings, the total was about a tenth. It was well known that Social Services and Wellbeing was a reactive department and could see overspends by some £2m. He asked Officers to comment on the disparity between the two figures.

The Interim Chief Officer Finance, Performance and Change acknowledged that SS&W was a demand lead service and there was constant pressure on the budget. There were lots of pieces of work in progress to control that demand, but this was one of the services severely affected by Covid-19. There were opportunities that should enable more efficiencies to be delivered, but that would take time. The savings and the pressures were not necessarily linked, they were for different reasons, so there would continue to be pressures, but that didn’t stop opportunities to deliver savings.

The Corporate Director - Social Services and Wellbeing advised that this had been a year like no other.  Social Services and Wellbeing was a demand lead service and was statutorily responsive to the needs of individuals and the communities served.  Practice had been transformed over a number of years, working in a strength-based way, focussing on what people could do. People with very high level of needs of care and support were connected into communities and had their outcomes met in ways which didn’t mean they were as reliant on traditional care and support services. There were reductions in the number of people who had come into care homes, because of investment in reablement services and this was one of the areas of savings.  Opportunities to provide daytime occupation and opportunities for people, were seen very differently. It didn’t mean that the pressures went away but they related both to quantum of service provided, which linked to the demographics. There was an ageing population which brought with it an increased requirement for some, for care and support and that was reflected in the budget pressures. In addition, this related to the cost of service provision. The social care workforce had been at the fore of the response and the value of the workforce, had been recognised in the budget pressures in terms of the uplift.  There had been increasing creativity during the pandemic. Direct payments  ...  view the full minutes text for item 205

A.        Education and Family Support

Invitees:

Councillor Huw David, Leader

Councillor Hywel Williams, Deputy Leader

Councillor Dhanisha Patel, Cabinet Member for Future Generations and Wellbeing

Councillor Charles Smith, Cabinet Member Education and Regeneration

Lindsay Harvey, Corporate Director - Education and Family Support

Gill Lewis, Interim Chief Officer Finance, Performance and Change

Mark Shephard, Chief Executive

Kelly Watson, Chief Officer Legal, HR and Regulatory Services

Nicola Echanis, Head of Education and Family Support

Deborah Exton, Interim Deputy Head of Finance

Victoria Adams, Interim Finance Manager – Budget Management: Communities, Education and Family Support

Hannah Castle, Headteacher, Cynffig Comprehensive School - Chair of Schools Budget Forum

Neil Clode, Headteacher, Llangewydd Junior School - Vice-Chair of Schools Budget Forum

Registered Representatives

Tim Cahalane - Roman Catholic Church

Ciaron Jackson - Primary School Sector

Rev. Canon Edward Evans - Church in Wales

Lynsey Morris – Secondary School Sector

B.        Communities Directorate

Invitees:

Councillor Huw David, Leader

Councillor Hywel Williams, Deputy Leader

Councillor Dhanisha Patel, Cabinet Member for Future Generations and Wellbeing

Councillor Richard Young, Cabinet Member Communities

Gill Lewis, Interim Head of Finance, Performance and Change

Janine Nightingale, Corporate Director - Communities

Mark Shephard, Chief Executive

Kelly Watson, Chief Officer Legal, HR and Regulatory Services

Deborah Exton, Interim Deputy Head of Finance

Zak Shell, Head of Operations – Community Services

Victoria Adams, Interim Finance Manager – Budget Management: Communities, Education and Family Support

Education and Family Support

The Interim Chief Officer – Finance, Performance and Change presented a report, the purpose of which was to present the Committee with the draft Medium Term Financial Strategy 2021-22 to 2024-25, which set out the spending priorities of the Council, key investment objectives and budget areas targeted for necessary savings. The strategy included a financial forecast for 2021-2025 and a detailed draft revenue budget for 2021-22.

The Chair thanked the Interim Chief Officer Finance, Performance and Change and explained that this was the session on the Education and Family Support Directorate, with the Communities one to follow.

A Member stated that she had heard the Interim Chief Officer Finance, Performance and Change speak many times and challenged the use of the word ‘savings’, stating that the Local Authority was not saving anything, but trying to make cuts to services because it didn’t have the budget consequentially.

A Member referred to page 39, ESF5 and a reference to autistic spectrum disorder children and asked whether the pandemic had any detrimental effect on autistic children. What had been the experience and how badly, or not, had these children been affected.

The Corporate Director – Education and Family Support explained that he was proud that Bridgend had established a number of settings to support the needs of learners with ASD, both in English and Welsh Medium settings. It was fair to say that the last 10 months had been deeply challenging for all sorts of learners. He praised schools for the phenomenal efforts put in place to make sure children were not affected and highlighted his personal experience of visiting schools and observing learners happy and settled within those settings.

In terms of additional support from the local authority, this took different avenues including additional support within classroom settings, within schools with learning resource centres, additional support from learning support staff and also staff within the school and in bespoke settings within the specialist school environment, providing support for families as well when learners were not on site. From the feedback received, this had been successful. It had inevitably affected learners, but from the efforts of school staff and inclusion staff in particular, the local authority aimed to mitigate any risk to learners’ wellbeing.

The Cabinet Member Education and Regeneration began by thanking relevant staff, noting that every autistic person was different. What was shared by many autistic people was that change was not welcome and timetabling changes could be upsetting. He noted the dedication of expert staff in special schools and settings in mainstream schools which had been recognised by Estyn, who were very supportive of the Team Bridgend approach.

A Member referred to page 39, ESF6. He noted the figure of £903k for 2021-22 and recurring amount of £1.1million in future years and asked how the figure had been calculated and whether it was a percentage of the budget, how was it split across Education, where did it go altogether and was it just for schools. In  ...  view the full minutes text for item 200