Name

Minute Number

and Subject

Reason

Interest

Steve Meakin

18 – Emergency

Welfare Scheme

Update

Work with the CAB

who hold some of the

funding

Personal

Councillor Sam

Leaves

15c – Cabinet

Member for Co-

operatives, Housing

and Community

Safety

Private sector housing

Landlord

Personal

Councillor Martin

Leaves

15c – Cabinet

Member for Co-

operatives, Housing

and Community

Safety

Private sector housing

Landlord

Personal

Councillor Riley

15c – Cabinet

Member for Co-

operatives, Housing

and Community

Safety

Private sector housing

Landlord

Personal

(a)

the Council had successfully been awarded over £12m in Heritage Lottery Funding toward the cost of the project, and this money was being released in two phases;

(b)

the History Centre would enable many of the city’s impressive collections to be brought together in one place, including elements of Plymouth’s long and successful maritime history, and the city’s record office;

(c)

an enormous amount of public engagement and consultation had been undertaken, including a double-page feature in the Herald, pop-up museums, meetings with community groups in addition to information being published on the Council’s website.  However, more was still to come and if Members were aware of any interested community groups they should let Councillor Smith or the officers know;

(d)

all of the services offered by the Council’s existing First Stop facility would transfer across to the new First Stop Shop.  This would be further enhanced via the support of the meet and greet service and the availability to customers of self-serve computers.

(a)

lessons had been learned from the last waste reorganisation and existing staffing levels had been retained with an extra focus on training so that staff were fully aware of the new routes and had been fully briefed on collection policies;

(b)

assisted collections would continue with staff being more vigilant in identifying properties where this service was no longer required.  In addition, in terms of promoting the assisted collection service, officers had been in contact with the Plymouth disability network and were using similar networks to advertise is availability to those who need it;

(c)

bins which were lost or damaged would be replaced and delivered at a cost of £15.  However, new bins could be collected from a number of specified collection points by the householder free of charge (low income households would not be charged for replacement bins);

(d)

overloaded bins would continue to be emptied but notices left with householders as part of a sustained approach to education and enforcement in areas of the City where waste habits have had a detrimental effect on the amenity.  This included liaison with the University and landlords regarding student accommodation.

(a)

there wasn’t currently a performance indicator on the time it took for landlord’s getting people into accommodation, however, as it was in everyone’s best interests, the City Council could work in partnership with social landlords to identify actions to address voids and to ensure that properties were available to let at the earliest opportunity;

(b)

the Council maintained a comprehensive approach to dealing with long term empty dwellings utilising a wide range of actions to bring properties back into use.  If Members were aware of any empty properties in their wards they should bring them to the attention of the Housing Options team;

(c)

the Council took a firm stance with landlords whose properties were of a poor standard/quality and, where cases were brought to its attention, steps were taken to work with the tenant to take action but this was a long and resource intense process;

(d)

there had been a 40 per cent increase in demand for Discretionary Housing Payments (DHP) as a result of the introduction of the Bedroom Tax – between April and June 2014 £33,836 and been paid to 157 customers compared to the same period in 2013 of £25,557 to 112 customers;

(e)

the exact number of people claiming DHP who were in work wasn’t known however in Plymouth between February 2012 and February 2014 there had been a 22 per cent increase in claimants.

(a)

the new city centre first stop shop, which was being designed around a retail bank model, would be more customer focussed and friendly with staff trained to assist in a much wider range of customer queries and needs.  Included within the facility would be a number of self-service points where customers could access services directly themselves with assistance being available on-hand if required.  Most significantly of all, the shop would be open late on a Thursday evening and on a Saturday morning and it was currently expected that the shop would open to coincide with the first late night Christmas shopping event;

(b)

following feedback, the ‘Customer Access Strategy’ had been renamed the ‘Customer Service Strategy’;

(c)

one of the biggest challenges faced by the Council, besides meeting the demands of face-to-face customers, was the volume of telephone calls.  An automated messaging service was therefore being developed which would give callers various options to select without the need to immediately speak to a member of staff (this option being the last with the caller being asked to hold to be connected).  With simple and straight forward requests being filtered out, the call centre staff would be freed up to concentrate on front line/high priority issues;

(d)

work continued on reviewing and rationalising the Council’s digital service to ensure that it was easier to use and that old information was not unnecessarily retained.  It was also hoped that more use could be made of the highly successful ‘Plymouth App’;

(e)

the new Customer Service Strategy was part of a package of documents, including the Customer and Service Blueprint, Customer and Service Roadmap and Implementation Plan, which would be presented to Cabinet on 9 November 2014;

(f)

the strategy was required in order to –

·         transform the way the City Council interacts with customers and  ensure uniformity of standards across the authority;

·         outline the standards customers can expect when interacting with the Council;

·         deliver services efficiently and cost effectively to all service consumers;

·         align and co-ordinate the necessary changes across the Council;

·         respond quickly to changing environmental pressure, political pressure and social pressure.

(a)

during April to July 2014 Plymouth had seen an overall decrease in crimes compared to the same period the previous year;

(b)

Safer Plymouth (formerly Plymouth Community Safety Partnership) had been going through a period of review and development, including a refresh of its terms of reference and membership;

(c)

as part of its annual Partnership Strategic Assessment of Crime and Disorder, Safer Plymouth had agreed the following performance measures for 2014/15 –

·         Reducing the gap between the worst neighbourhoods for crime and the city average

·         Reducing violence with injury (excluding domestic abuse)

·         Increasing domestic abuse reporting

·         Increasing first time reporting of domestic abuse

·         Reducing anti-social behaviour

and the following new target –

·         Increasing the number of vulnerable victims of anti-social behaviour supported by the vulnerable victim service

(d)

due to the considerable reduction in serious acquisitive crime over the last couple of years and, in order to maintain a focus on crimes affecting the most vulnerable and causing the most harm, Safer Plymouth had agreed to monitor levels of serious acquisitive crime only;

(e)

hate crime was seriously under-reported and work was under way to get a better understanding of it in order to be able to intervene at the earliest opportunity.

(f)

the Partnership was working closely with the Fire Service to tackle the recent increase in incidents of arson, the total number of incidents to date was not available however a breakdown of the number of incidents by area across the city would be circulated to panel members after the meeting;

(g)

a great deal of work had been done in the City with regards hate crime over the past two years, working with diverse groups and communities on building relations and establishing a number of different reporting mechanism.

(a)

those who could currently benefit from the scheme included –

·         young families who had been through the young families programme;

·         people with no money to buy food;

·         someone who needed help to buy clothes for work or an interview;

·         someone requiring assistance with travel costs to get to a family funeral

The concern was that if this fund was no longer available, or limited further by reduced funding, where would these people go for help;

(b)

a geographical breakdown on a ward by ward basis demonstrating where in the City the applications were coming from could be provided and this would be circulated to panel members after the meeting.

(a)

the Problem Debt co-operative review would commence on 15 October 2014;

(b)

a series of workshops had been arranged in relation to the ‘Framework for Working with Citizens and Communities’,  to take place as follows –

·         6 October and 10 October (Reception Room, Council House)

·         14 October (Charter Room, Guildhall)

(c)

with regard to minute 16 above, an e-mail would be sent to councillors canvassing interest in the Customer Service Strategy co-operative review.