Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from County Councillor Barrie Yates.

Members are asked to consider any pecuniary and non-pecuniary interests they may have to disclose to the meeting in relation to matters under consideration on the agenda.

None.

To be confirmed and signed by the Chair.

Resolved: That the minutes of the meeting held on 28 September 2023 be confirmed as an accurate record and signed by the Chair.

The Chair welcomed County Councillor Peter Buckley, Cabinet Member for Community and Cultural Services, Mike Kirby, Director of Strategy and Performance, Donna Talbot, Head of Service Business Intelligence, and Vishal Mistry, Principal Data Manger, to the meeting.

The report provided the committee with an update on the county council's current position regarding its use of data and analytics, further to a report considered by the committee on the 10 November 2022.

A presentation was provided to the committee, a copy of which is attached to the minutes.

Comments and queries raised from the committee were as follows:

·  The cost-benefit analysis carried out to date was an evolving situation and work was being done to determine which operating model would be best for the council to use. As part of this, a number of principles had been formed through the development of different strategies, including both the corporate and digital strategies. Along with ensuring that there was a clear business case model to follow, work was also being done with other partners and council colleagues to develop a series of stages that the council would go through to fulfil its development aspirations. These stages included determining the cost, risks, benefits, and challenges the council would face in terms of implementation, as well as how it would be monitored, and how performance could be evaluated against a predetermined criterion. It was therefore suggested that a report be brought to a future meeting of the committee to look at this in more detail, as well as if the council had enough staff and resources for this area of work. 

·  Colleagues around the council worked with data on a regularly basis and measures were in place to ensure the accuracy of all the data the council held. This included the use of Subject Matter Experts across the various of systems the council used, and the Business Intelligence team would work on the development and management of data across the council.

·  Ongoing work was being done with a variety of partner organisations, often on a subject-specific basis, to understand how, when and where the county council could share data with a partner organisation, and then sharing that data. It was highlighted that some of the main challenges with sharing data with partner organisations was ensuring the data was being managed properly and was appropriately being used by that partner organisation, without the risk of there being a data breach. To mitigate the risks, the council had developed a very detailed procedure when developing relationships with partners to ensure breaches did not occur. It was also noted that a Partnership Working report was due to be presented to the committee later in the year and it was suggested that the report take into consideration how the council worked with other external organisations on data sharing.

· The council often collaborated with other local authorities to share best practices, and to learn what other authorities were doing, as well as connecting to various networks or forums, such as  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

The Chair welcomed, County Councillor Peter Buckley, Cabinet Member for Community and Cultural Services, John Morrisey, Director of Organisational Development and Change, Ellen Smith, Customer Experience Lead, Andrew Hill, Head of ICT Operate, Terry White, Head of Service Customer Access, Ged Maclennan, Customer Access Manager, Clare Blackburn, Customer Service Manager, and Louise Wood, Strategic Communications and Web Manager, to the meeting.

The report provided the committee with key updates on areas of activity to improve the Customer Experience across a range of services, including digital and non-digital initiatives, within the wider organisational change context. The report also provided updates on the recommendations made by the committee at the meeting held on Thursday 9 March 2023.

A presentation was provided to the committee, a copy of which is attached to the minutes.

Comments and queries raised from the committee were as follows:

· It was noted that profiling tools such as Acorn or Mosaic were not widely used by the council. It was therefore suggested that consideration be given to using these types of tools, to better profile customers and learn more about them and their needs.

·  Customers of the county council fell into three categories: those who were content and able to self-serve themselves digitally, those who want to use digital services but find it difficult to utilise the system, and those who were unable or unwilling to use the systems. Therefore, the committee requested a report be brought to a future meeting of the committee, detailing the strategies being implemented by the county council to address the need for digital inclusion, as well as what was being done to address the needs of users who were digitally excluded due to their incapacity or preference to not use digital options.

· People frequently called the council to request specific, straightforward information, and the customer service centre did their best to avoid making things too complicated by overdelivering or failing to ask the necessary questions at the outset. 

·  Surveys were sent out to those who had given the council permission to contact them and those who have used the customer service centre, to better improve the service.

·  The committee was concerned about the speech to text software and how it would interact to those people who didn't speak English as a first language.  It was noted that how it would interact would be addressed during thorough testing of the system, prior to being rolled out.

·  All staff members received ongoing training to help them better understand how to handle challenging conversations, make sure customer demands were addressed, and to accommodate their cultural needs.

·  The committee considered recommendation (iii) in the report which was if the committee would wish to receive a customer experience dashboard on a scheduled basis, providing a small number of key indicators which illustrated progress against customer experience priorities, and the committee agreed to this proposal.

·  The committee expressed concerns about potential changes to the ICT infrastructure in the future due to the fast-changing pace of technology, the associated  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

The committee considered the work programme for the 2023/24 municipal year.

Resolved: That the Community, Cultural and Corporate Services Scrutiny work programme for 2023/24, be noted.

An item of urgent business may only be considered under this heading where, by reason of special circumstances to be recorded in the minutes, the chair of the meeting is of the opinion that the item should be considered at the meeting as a matter of urgency. Wherever possible, the chief executive should be given advance warning of any member's intention to raise a matter under this heading.

There were no Urgent Business.

The next meeting of the Community, Cultural and Corporate Services Scrutiny Committee will be held on 12 December at 14.00pm in Committee Room B – The Diamond Jubilee Room, County Hall, Preston.

The next meeting of the Community, Cultural, and Corporate Services Scrutiny Committee will be held on Thursday 12 December 2023 at 14.00pm at County Hall, Preston.