Agenda item

The Chair introduced the Financial and Performance Review report before inviting members to comment on the Corporate Performance indicators.

ID1.8a -Total number of digital online transactions

The Service Director for Information Technologies advised that the trend was towards a reduction of the number of forms that are to be completed by members of the public with information now available at the start.

Peaks were however observed when launching new services like garden waste or issuing annual bills.

Cllr Stubbs asked what sort of figure should be expected around March.

The Service Director for Information Technologies responded that the current focus was on providing residents with the right experience going through the form. The percentage was to be seen as contextual figure rather than a trend and priority was given to monitoring the feedback received on the form.

The Chair wondered if, in the future, the metric could become a purely contextual figure to be reported and analysed to work out whether it's good or not rather than a performance indicator.

The Chair also invited members to suggest any alternative performance indicators to measure something useful.

Cllr Bryan suggested a kind of metrics based on the emails received, whether or not people knew about the forms, the number of forms that were there and forms that didn’t exist.

The Service Director for Information Technologies said that team was working on analysis the data and amount of emails received as part of the launch of the new contact centre system / refreshed telephony and emails. Accessibility and make things easy for visitors would be the key with large buttons to facilitate navigating through the site.

ID1.4a - Total percentage of materials collected for recycling and composting

The Deputy Leader / Portfolio Holder for Finance, Town Centres and Growth said that he had spoken with the Portfolio Holder for Sustainable Environment who advised that the target was raised from 49% to 51% to make it more challenging and that the dry summer meant less garden waste had been produced which explained the figures.

ID3.13 – Percentage of fly-tipping incidents where sufficient evidence gathered to proceed to formal enforcement

The Deputy Leader / Portfolio Holder for Finance, Town Centres and Growth commented that despite best efforts finding evidence i.e. names and / or addresses on items was not an easy task – fly-tippers being cautious not to leave any information behind.

Cllr Stubbs asked if something could be done to address the pile of fly-tipping that had been building up, some of which could be recycled, being mindful of the investigation work that was being carried out.

The Deputy Leader / Portfolio Holder for Finance, Town Centres and Growth responded that he trusted that officers had this in hands.

The Chair asked if any members wish to bring up any other indicators that wasn’t in the red.

ID1.13 - Average number of days per employee lost to sickness

Cllr Grocott noted that details were not provided for privacy reasons and wished for regards to be passed on to employees that were being affected by sickness and long-term illnesses.

The Service Director for Strategy, People and Performance advised that a balance had to be found to allow scrutiny without sharing sensitive information.

ID2.6a and 6b - Percentage of complainants informed within the required timescales of any action to be taken about alleged breaches of planning control

Cllr Grocott suggested there may not be enough staff to cover the amount of complaints received.

The Deputy Chief Executive responded that while there had been some struggle in the past with capacity the team was now fully staffed and catching up with previous knock-on effect.

Resolved:     That the contents of the report and appendices be noted and that the Council’s service and financial performance Committee continue to be monitored and challenged for this period.

Watch the debate here