(i)

the business case for the Accommodation Strategy set out the next proposed phase of implementation recommending that the Council vacate six of its current office bases; investment in ICT and infrastructure was required to adapt the existing retained accommodation;

(ii)

the Council may work with the University of Plymouth in the near future to enable better business continuity;

(iii)

it was proposed that the first floor of the Civic Centre would accommodate the Chief Executive, Assistant Chief Executive and Directors as well as other sectors of the Council;

(iv)

as part of the strategy, it was important to consider where council officers were working, the amount of time they spent working at their desks and their ICT requirements;

(v)

several printers would be removed from offices as part of this strategy however a programme would be installed on all computers to direct officers to print remotely to the closest printer;

(vi)

the Council had already achieved £27,000 worth of savings through this strategy;

(vii)

currently the data centre and the hard wire data connection between the Civic Centre and Windsor House had not progressed as expected;

(viii)

an electronic questionnaire had been submitted to officers in different departments that had undergone a move from one building to another in order to understand what went well and what could be improved upon for future moves;

(ix)

it was expected that the ‘pilot office’, situated on floor 11 in the north end of the Civic Centre would be completed by December 2010;

(x)

flexible working spaces were already in place in floor 5 of the Civic Centre;

(xi)

training programmes were being initiated to ensure that council workers were confident to use the new ICT equipment.

(xii)

staff had not yet been informed of where they would be moved as this was not yet finalised; staff would be informed once contract issues had been finalised;

(xiii)

there would be a penalty for the premature surrender of the Ballard House lease however this was built into the Accommodation Strategy business case;

(xiv)

officers would feed back to the Corporate Management Team (CMT) the Panel’s disappointment regarding plans for the ‘Directors area’ on the first floor of the Civic Centre and would highlight the Panel’s reasoning that Directors should not be removed from the operational aspect of their role;

(xv)

it was planned that the ground floor of the Civic Centre would be opened up considerably with enhancements to fittings and additional lighting;

(xvi)

ICT training packages were being initiated to aid officers in their understanding and adaptation of the development of ICT technology;

(xvii)

a significant part of the investment for the accommodation strategy was specified for remote ICT working as the strategy would not be successful without it;

(xviii)

the council had underinvested in its IT services for several years and it was not expected that the 3.2 million investment would solve all information technology problems.