Agenda item

A report was presented by Donna Talbot, Head of Business Intelligence, on the performance update for Quarter 1 2021/22.

 

Appendix 'A' provided the latest performance updates available against the agreed Corporate Strategy indicators. In addition, it provided the latest available Quarter 1 2021/22 performance information and associated commentary on the current position of each indicator, including any related issues and required actions.

 

The Cabinet Committee noted the highlights of good performance and those indicators performing below the desired level and/or those that were due to the impact of the Covid 19 pandemic, as detailed in the report.

 

The following officers attended the meeting and provided details and updates on their respective service areas:

 

·  Mike Kirby – Director of Strategy and Performance

·  Dave Carr – Director of Policy, Commissioning and Children's Health

·  Ian Crabtree – Director of Adults Disability and Care Services

·  Steve Scott – Head of Waste Management

·  Ridwan Musa – Highways Manager – Operations

 

Specific areas were discussed as follows:

 

Lancashire will be the place to live

 

Safety carriageway defects – it was reported that the number of reported defects had continued to rise in Quarter 1, as the winter season extended into April with prolonged cold surface temperatures continuing to increase the formation of potholes. It had been a challenge to repair many of these defects within required timescales despite additional resources through the Dayworks contract and the Jet Patching contract being fully utilised. Emergency, urgent and non-urgent (5 working days) repairs had therefore not met the targets this Quarter although the Team had been working very hard on these repairs, with many staff working extra hours. However, safety carriageway defects repaired within 20 working days was above target and it was noted that there were the highest number of defects in this particular category.

 

Street lighting fault repair – both non-traffic management and traffic management lamp-out faults had met the targets, reporting 97% and 100% respectively.

 

CC Edwards thanked the Highways Team staff for all their hard work.

 

Children and Families Wellbeing Service – performance in Quarter 1 had exceeded the target with a continued reduction in families withdrawing or becoming disengaged from the service and fewer families being referred to children's social care. A remodelled Children and Families Wellbeing Service had been introduced in Quarter 1, demonstrating that the service had implemented the model, without impacting on frontline services and that it had quickly adapted to the new model.

 

Looked after children who are actually living in Lancashire – performance in Quarter 1 had exceeded the target. Lots of commissioning activity was taking place to try to shape the market to encourage providers to work collaboratively with the service. Increased investment was being put into our in-house Residential provision to ensure that wherever possible, young people were placed appropriately in their community. The Cabinet Committee noted however that, for some young people, it was appropriate that they should not live in Lancashire.

 

Educational attainment

 

Key Stage 4 – it was noted that figures for this would be available in November 2021.

 

Early Years Foundation Stage and Key Stage 2 – it was noted that performance updates for these were not available, due to assessments not taking place in 2019/20 and 2020/21.

 

School placements – Lancashire's performance had improved and remained on target in relation to pupils being offered one of their top three preferences at both primary and secondary level, with both indicators maintaining quartile two positioning nationally.

 

CC Williamson wished to pass on a thank you on behalf of Cabinet, recognising all the hard work that was done on school placement offers.

 

Adult safeguarding outcomes – although this figure was still below target, an improved position had been seen in people indicating their safeguarding outcomes had been fully met. It was reported that 97% of people had indicated their desired safeguarding outcomes had been either partially or fully achieved.

However, it was important to note that changes may be seen in these figures in the next Quarter, due to limited access of professionals and families going into care settings during the pandemic.

 

Quality of care homes & Community providers – 12 of the 16 county council run care homes were currently rated good or outstanding. An action plan had been put in place to deal with the 4 care homes currently rated as requiring improvement.

 

Two of the 8 county council run residential short break services were rated as outstanding and 6 as good. The county council ran 9 community care providers, 8 of which were supported living services and all were rated as good. The Shared Lives Service in Lancashire was the largest in the country and was rated as outstanding in all key lines of enquiry.

 

CC Gooch paid tribute to domiciliary workers and all staff working in county council and private care homes for all their efforts and hard work.

 

CC Vincent raised a query about face to face GP appointments. This matter would be dealt with during consideration of the Public Health Outcomes in Lancashire report.

 

 

Lancashire will be the place to work

 

Use of Libraries – although all libraries opened on 12^th April, it was important to note that they had not been fully open on this date. However, there were still over a quarter of a million visitors in Quarter 1. Although PNET sessions had been available during Quarter 1, these were still subject to Covid safety regulations, with fewer terminals available to ensure distancing and shorter sessions to allow for cleaning between each use. It was expected that this figure would increase over time.

 

CC Buckley stated that it would be interesting to see how the number of e-downloads would be affected as more people started visiting libraries.

 

CC Towneley pointed out that figures would need to be looked at again, once smaller satellite libraries were up and running and face to face events were taking place.

 

Employment, Education or Training – the Quarter 1 position showed a notable improvement for all young people in employment, education or training, due to a continued focus on this area of work and the excellent partnerships with secondary schools and post-16 providers. The improvement demonstrated the collective effort to support young people to make positive and sustained transitions to post-16 education, employment or training.

 

CC Williamson recognised the amount of work that had been done to achieve this significant turnaround within a relatively short space of time which was to be commended.

 

CC Towneley, on behalf of CC Rear, thanked all the staff involved in supporting young people into employment, education or training, given the continuing challenging circumstances faced by the education sector and children and young people throughout the pandemic.

 

Proportion of children excluded from school – although this figure had decreased significantly for 2019/20, the effects of the first national lockdown should be taken into account, in addition to schools not being fully open to all children having had an effect on the number of permanent exclusions and suspensions. Lots of work was ongoing in partnership with schools to avoid exclusions as far as possible and addressing exclusions was one of the priority work areas in the Education Strategy being presented to Cabinet in December.

 

 

CC Towneley wished to thank all the staff involved for their hard work in this area.

 

Adults with learning disabilities in employment – this figure continued to be low due to the pandemic reducing employment prospects, impeding those with learning disabilities to be introduced to a working environment. The Employment Team who had been redeployed to lead on other areas during Covid had now been re-established and it was hoped to see an improvement on figures. CC Gooch pointed out that adults with learning disabilities tended to work in the catering/hospitality sector which had been greatly impacted throughout the pandemic.

 

Lancashire will be the place to prosper

 

Rosebud loans – whilst performance for the quarter was encouraging, it was due to deals taking longer to be completed and off the back of 2020/21 Quarter 4 being a zero-investment period when these enquiries had originally been initiated.  Whist there was a pipeline of approximately £900,000, it was noted that trading conditions were anticipated to be tougher this coming year and therefore the forecast was currently being adjusted to reflect this.

 

CC Riggott reported that the team had adapted services as needed throughout the pandemic and that if it was more appropriate for businesses to be supported through the government schemes then business had been directed to that. It was hoped that once the county council was the most appropriate provider for these services then figures would improve.

 

Boost European Regional Development Fund – decrease in outputs was attributed to businesses responding to the pandemic with focus moving from growth to survival. The Committee noted that, for April to June 2021, outputs had started to recover to pre-pandemic levels, with outputs focussing on business growth including jobs and new businesses.

 

Boost Recovery Grants – the Business Growth and Innovation Service had established and implemented a small capital grants programme to support Lancashire small and medium enterprises in their response to the impact of the pandemic. As at the end of June, the service had defrayed £1,108,645.80 to 347 businesses.

 

CC Vincent was pleased to see that the figures showed how the economy was recovering with 40 new businesses established against a target of 10 in Quarter 4 (January to March) and 54 new businesses established against a target of 5 in Quarter 1 (April to June).

 

Lancashire will be the place to visit – it was noted that these targets were being reviewed as part of a new tourism growth strategy for the numbers of visitors to Lancashire, the economic impact of visitors to Lancashire, and full time equivalent jobs supported by the visitor economy.

 

Lancashire will be the place where everyone acts responsibly

 

Percentage of older people who were still at home 91 days after discharge from hospital into reablement/rehabilitation services – although this figure was below the county council's target, it was still performing above regional and national averages. The Committee noted the challenge of keeping people in their own homes although rehabilitation services were performing well. The county council worked with a significant number of hospitals and were working on improvements for information sharing. CC Gooch reported that this figure only needed increasing by 5 people, in order for the target to be met.

 

Proportion of adults with learning disabilities who live in their own home – although this was below target, performance was above the national average. The North West was a Centre for Excellence in this area and the county council had a strong history of supporting people with learning disabilities to live in their own homes wherever possible. Some new schemes were also coming to fruition providing good quality accommodation for these people although building work and planning processes had been slowed down due to the pandemic.

 

Proportion of adults and older people receiving long term services who are supported in the community – the pandemic had affected this target due to people not wanting to call on care services, although improvements were now being seen in requests for home care support.

 

Permanent admissions to residential and nursing care homes per 100,000 population aged 18-64 during the year – although slightly below target, this continued to be monitored to understand the impact of the pandemic on this performance measure. Progress had been made, in particular for people with mental health problems who had traditionally been reliant on residential services, who were being supported more in the community.

 

Permanent admissions to residential and nursing care homes per 100,000 population aged 65+ during the year – this was in line with the national average. People had been very hesitant to go into residential care throughout the pandemic. Numbers were now beginning to rise although the focus remained on supporting people in their communities, wherever possible.

 

Number of working days per full time equivalent lost to sickness absence – a slight increase had been observed in May and June 2021, which had also been seen across the country. Although improvements had been seen during Covid and this had partly been due to new ways of working, people isolating and improved hygiene, it was important to recognise that many staff working in front line services had continued working face to face. A programme of activity was being developed to reduce sickness levels, to make the county council as flexible, efficient and responsive as possible, focussing on customer need, staff and service delivery need. The county council was also working with other councils to share best practice and it was hoped that absence levels would continue on a positive trajectory.

 

Revenue forecast outturn % variance to budget – the Quarter 1 forecast was an underspend of £5.219m, due to a combination of variances including underspends on Treasury Management and Children's Social Care offset by overspends on Adult Services and Highways and Transport. It was noted that, as this was the first forecast of the financial year, assumptions had been made based on expenditure and income to date, and knowledge of future activity from Budget Holders. The impact of the Covid pandemic would be closely monitored as restrictions were lifted, as the impact of pent up demand was still awaited. Volatility in actual demand could lead to a significant variance from the current forecast at a later date.

 

CC Williamson asked that the Corporate Risk Register be brought to the next meeting to enable the Cabinet Committee to look at the risks and issues faced by the county council together with the performance outcomes.

 

Resolved: The Cabinet Committee on Performance Improvement noted the Quarter 1 performance update against the agreed Corporate Strategy indicators.