Agenda and minutes

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Contact: Gary Halsall  Tel: 01772 536989, Email  gary.halsall@lancashire.gov.uk

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Items
No. Item

County Councillors Lorraine Beavers and Anne Cheetham replaced County Councillors Carl Crompton and David Stansfield respectively.

 

The following speakers were welcomed to the External Services Scrutiny Committee meeting:

 

·  Clare Platt, Head of Service Health, Equity, Welfare and Partnerships;

·  Debbie Thompson, Health, Equity, welfare and Partnerships Manager;

·  Angela Harrison, Director of the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC);

·  Robert Ruston, Victims and Vulnerable People Lead, Office of the PCC; and

·  Mark Aspin, Community Services Safety Officer from Blackburn with Darwen Council representing Pennine Lancashire Community Safety Partnership.

1.

Apologies

Minutes:

None were received.

2.

Constitution: Membership; Chair and Deputy Chair; and Terms of Reference of the External Services Scrutiny Committee pdf icon PDF 86 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Committee was presented with a report setting out the constitution, membership, chair and deputy chair and terms of reference of the External Services Scrutiny Committee for the municipal year 2017/18.

 

Resolved: That:

 

  i.  The appointment of the County Councillors David O'Toole and David Stansfield as Chair and Deputy Chair of the Committee for the remainder of the 2017/18 municipal year be noted;

  ii.  The new Membership of the Committee following the County Council's Annual Meeting on 25 May 2017 be noted; and

  iii.  The Terms of Reference of the Committee be noted.

3.

Disclosure of Pecuniary and Non-Pecuniary Interests

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.

Minutes:

None were disclosed

4.

Community Safety pdf icon PDF 118 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Chair welcomed to the meeting Clare Platt, Head of Service Health, Equity, Welfare and Partnerships; Debbie Thompson, Health, Equity, welfare and Partnerships Manager; Angela Harrison and Robert Ruston from the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC); and Mark Aspin, Community Services Safety Officer from Blackburn with Darwen Council representing Pennine Lancashire Community Safety Partnership.

 

The report presented provided an overview of Community Safety Partnership (CSP) arrangements in Lancashire. It set out the legislative requirements for partnership working in relation to community safety and the governance arrangements in place across Lancashire, together with the current Lancashire Community Safety Agreement.

 

Members of the Committee were invited to comment and raise questions and a summary of the discussion is set out below:

 

·  On the membership of the CSPs it was noted that each partnership could enlist additional members that were not Responsible Authorities.

·  The Committee was informed the Office of the PCC was not a responsible authority but did have a responsible representative on all the CSPs to serve and assist the partnerships appropriately. It was not for the PCC to determine which partnership merged with which. The role of the PCC was to receive and determine applications from CSPs that wanted to merge. In the case of the Pennine Lancashire Partnership, it was confirmed that a steering group had been set up to consider the economies of scale of operating on a bigger footprint prior to the merger. The Partnership now met four times per year and had a number of task groups which sat underneath it delivering on key priorities. It was noted that the task groups met on a more frequent basis.

·  It was acknowledged that Chorley and South Ribble worked jointly and had joint meetings but were not formally classed as a single CSP. It was noted that Chorley and South Ribble's joint working arrangements originated from when they shared a community safety manager's post approximately seven years ago, but made the decision to not go down the formal combination route.

·  Regarding the update of Multi-Agency Data Exchange (MADE) to MADE-interactive, Members were informed that the new interactive version would be launched in autumn 2017. It was noted that the Lancashire Insight's webpage contained information around crime and disorder issues in each of the CSP areas.

·  In terms of the PCC providing a grant to each unitary and district council each year for local community safety projects and interventions, it was pointed out to the Committee that this grant was within the budget for the current financial year and there was no intention to remove this funding stream. It was subject to whatever central government provided in terms of funding.

·  On the vacancy for Chair of the Pan-Lancashire Domestic Abuse Strategic Board, members were informed that Lancashire Constabulary had now appointed to this post.

·  The 'Living in Lancashire' resident's panel had been used to survey local communities about their concerns regarding crime, anti-social behaviour and community safety.  Members enquired about the survey's reach and what the return rate for  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

5.

Work Plan 2017/18 pdf icon PDF 86 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Work Plan for the newly established External Services Scrutiny Committee was presented and included topics identified at the work planning workshop held on 23 June 2017.

 

The Chair asked Members for suggestions of topics for this vacancy. Some suggestions were:

 

·  The cost of policing Fracking;

·  The water outage in Fylde;

·  Rail projects in the north – Transport for the North;

·  Business rates – new funding formula and the County Council;

·  Future of Local Government (Lancashire County Council) by 2020;

·  Community Safety Agreement – priorities and/or emerging initiatives

·  Community policing and front desk counter reviews;

·  United Utilities – investments and delivery; and

·  Co-ordination of work on flooding between the County Council, United Utilities, Environment Agency and the Canal & River Trust.

 

Resolved: That subject to the inclusion of the above topics, the 2017/18 work plan be approved.

 

6.

Urgent Business

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.

Minutes:

There were no items of Urgent Business.

7.

Date of Next Meeting and Future Meetings

The next meeting of the External Services Scrutiny Committee will be held on Tuesday 10 October 2017 at 10.30am at County Hall, Preston.

 

Future meetings of the Committee for 2017/18 municipal year are as follows:

 

·  16 January 2018

·  24 April

 

All meetings will commence at 10:30am.

 

Minutes:

The next meeting of the External Services Scrutiny Committee will take place on Tuesday 10 October at 10.30am in Cabinet Room B (The Diamond Jubilee Room) at the County Hall, Preston. Future meeting dates were noted.