Notes of the Be Birmingham Executive Board Meeting

NOTES OF THE BE BIRMINGHAM EXECUTIVE BOARD MEETING

10 July 2008, 0900 – 1100 hours

Committee Room 6, Council House, Victoria Square, Birmingham

PRESENT

Jerry Blackett Birmingham Chamber of Commerce

Brian Carr BVSC

Elaine Elkington BCC – Housing

Chrissie Garrett BCC (Representing Tony Howell)

Philippa Holland GOWM (Left meeting early)

Steve Hollingsworth BCC – Culture (Representing Sharon Lea)

Michael Kilduff LSC (Representing Peter Brammall)

Jackie Mould Be Birmingham

ACC Anil Patani West Midlands Police

Cllr Paul Tilsley BCC

Ashley Wain West Midlands Fire Service

Margaret Way GOWM (Representing Philippa Holland)

Steve Whitehorn Jobcentre Plus

Karen Yeomans Advantage West Midlands

IN ATTENDANCE

Alan Clamp OFSTED

Amerdip Dhesy BCC

Kevin Hubery BCC

Richard Kenny Be Birmingham (Note taker)

Waheed Nazir BCC

Dianne Thomas Birmingham Audit

Denise Thompson Be Birmingham (Note taker)

0108 APOLOGIES

Cllr Sir Albert Bore

Peter Brammall LSC

Sophia Christie BEN PCT

Paul Dransfield BCC

Peter Hay BCC

Tony Howell BCC

Stephen Hughes BCC

Sharon Lea BCC – Culture

Steve Morley BEP

Vijith Randeniya West Midlands Fire Service

Joy Warmington BRAP

John Wright Jobcentre Plus

0208 ELECTION OF CHAIR AND VICE CHAIR

Jackie Mould welcomed members to their first meeting of the new Be Birmingham Executive Board. Jackie said it was with great pleasure that she could start the first meeting with the good news that Ministers had now formally agreed the LAA for Birmingham.

Cllr Paul Tilsley appointed as Chair of the BB Executive Board. This had the full consensus and endorsement of the meeting. Cllr Tilsley said that the last couple of years had seen real progress and wanted to see “more of the same” over the coming months.

Jerry Blackett was proposed and seconded as Vice Chair of the BB Executive Board. This had the full consensus and endorsement of the meeting. Jerry emphasised the delivery of the LAA, extending the private sector contribution, and the importance of Board Members actively engaging in the periods between meetings as key priorities. He said he would be pleased to make a greater contribution as Vice Chair.

Decision – Cllr Tilsley and Jerry Blackett appointed as Chair and Vice Chair respectively.

0208 TERMS OF REFERENCE

Jackie Mould took the Board through its proposed terms of reference referring in particular to the recent additions of CAA and Diversity as key work areas. Elaine Elkington referred to the desire for a “dynamic” relationship between the City Housing Partnership and the Board. Elaine also referred to the benefit of comprehensive feedback and dialogue from the Board. Anil Patani reflected the same sentiments for the Neighbourhoods Board but emphasised the need for feedback and dialogue with those working “on the ground” and said communicating the meeting was critically important.

Decision – The Board’s Terms of Reference were agreed.

Action – Jackie Mould was asked to decide how best to communicate Board meeting outcomes to maximise the impact of Board decisions.

0408 MEMBERSHIP

Jackie Mould introduced the membership of the new Board and outlined how it was more inclusive and representative of the key stakeholders across the city.

Questions were asked about the community sector. The position of recruiting community champions was explained. Six people were to be recruited to the Summit next week. Brian Carr said this had synergies with the Third Sector Assembly networks. The process was designed to bring stronger accountability and greater clarity about the constituency represented by community representatives. Anil Patani welcomed and stressed the importance of this and also welcomed the inclusion of BRAP.

Decision – the membership of the new Board was agreed

Action – Jackie Mould to report back on progress on

representation of the community.

0508 GOVERNANCE ARRANGEMENTS

Jackie Mould introduced a paper on the governance arrangements. Cllr Tilsley pointed out that (voting) was a power of last resort and was to be avoided at all costs. His view was that Be Birmingham would move forward on the basis of reaching consensus.

Jackie Mould explained that the Board should adopt a clear position on “deputies”. Jackie said that in her view the Board should take a strong line so that members of the Board know that each other will be in regular attendance and can plan on that basis. This would also help form a strong “team” based approach. This could nevertheless be supplemented, should the Board so to choose, with “named substitutes”. Anil Patani said this was all about striking a balance between ensuring consistency and making sure that all sectors and agencies are present for Board meetings. Jerry Blackett said that given dates are known well in advance there should be an expectation placed on Board members that they would attend the meetings apart from on very exceptional circumstances. It was also agreed that those attending the meeting must be empowered to take decisions on behalf of their partnership, organisation and sector.

Action – JM to write a policy on substitutes for inclusion in the governance arrangements. Partners to provide JM with named substitutes.

0608 SCHEDULE OF MEETING DATES

The schedule was duly noted.

Action – Future Summit meeting dates for the coming year to be determined and distributed.

0708 DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

The protocol set out reflected the one adopted by the Programme Board and was agreed as appropriate for the new Executive Board.

Decision - The Declarations of Interest protocol was agreed.

Action – Governance Packs to be provided for all Board Members.

0808 DIRECTOR’S REPORT

JM outlined the main business facing the Board over the next 12 months. JM emphasised that delivery of the LAA was the main focus. There was also a lot to do to strengthen the family of partnerships, develop the Neighbourhoods Board, strengthen constituency strategic partnership working and complete the stock take and re-structure of Be Birmingham.

Jerry Blackett referred to new work commissioned to develop a common set of competencies/behaviours for partnership working. Jerry said that good strategies and plans were not enough in their own right but needed to be accompanied by the right conditions and values to enable partnership working to flourish. A PhD student was now seconded for the next few months and working from Be Birmingham offices to develop a core set of behaviours for consideration and adoption by the Board. Karen Yeomans said AWM was doing similar work with its Board. Cllr Tilsley said it was important that Be Birmingham created an environment for “constructive” challenge and support without destroying the partnership. This required mutual accountability and support and the respect at all times for the views of others.

Jackie Mould completed coverage of the key business referring to the need for stronger communications and long and medium-term strategy and to complete the restructuring of the Be Birmingham team. The work programme was a “living” document and flexible to adapt to changing and emerging circumstances. Michael Kilduff stressed the importance of performance management and striking the right balance between making sure delivery strategies are in place and not becoming overly complex or bureaucratic. In response Jackie Mould referred to the importance of exception reporting. Jerry Blackett also added reference to new work emerging on risk management following the CAA discussion at the last meeting of the Programme Board. It was important that the partnership worked on the basis of keeping its response to issues proportionate to risk and this demanded that the Board had visibility and responsibility for all its key risks. Reference was made to the potential for the “away days” to help build the Board team. There was a real appetite amongst partners for a ruthless pursuit of delivery against the key issues, a passion to make Birmingham the best, and a desire to secure more dynamic relationships between and within the partnerships and key agencies.

0908 WORKLESSNESS

The Delivery Plan Lead for Worklessness, Waheed Nazir gave a comprehensive and informative presentation on the latest position on worklessness. It was important to note that the position of Birmingham relative to other core cities was getting worse. Waheed also referred to the mainstream budgets and remits of all the key partners that gave a very full and comprehensive picture of the scale of the response to the problem. This gave confidence that there was clarity emerging between the re-design of mainstream services and the added value focus that would flow from the WNF. It was also clarified that the Worklessness Delivery Plan was being considered by the Economic Prospectus Partnership on 24 July. Particular attention was drawn to the economic downturn and its implications. Also great interest was emerging as a result of the Aston Pride work with Tesco and its success. A key issue was the transition from NRF to WNF and getting the balance right so that the fund was able to “bend” the mainstream and bring together a strategic centrally driven approach that carried enough weight to lift the barriers but drew on local influence and intelligence sufficiently enough to differentiate the needs and future needs of specific local communities.

Brian Carr referred to the Third Sector Assembly Pathfinder Network that welcomed the targeted approach on worklessness and an Assembly working group had been formed to channel feed in to the process. Jerry Blackett explored the importance of a city-region approach, referred to international examples of innovative practice where people were paid as an incentive to stay off benefits and tested whether there was now more confidence that the approach would be enough to deliver against the target. Waheed said that a more robust strategy was coming together and his intention was to create space for an innovation fund to support new ideas. Mention was made of the number of jobs created through the RES and the number supported via JCP. Michael Kilduff referred to the significance of the client tracking system as the key tool to providing continuous support services to people as they moved through the employment and skills systems. Anil Patani clarified the scale of the challenge – 5000+ net jobs over the LAA period staying off the benefit system. He asked about the different communities of interest and the extent to which this was well understood and factored in to the tailoring of the strategy, referred to the close links with housing and neighbourhoods, and the extent to which tracking systems worked together such as the criminal justice tracking systems for offenders. Karen Yeomans welcomed the presentation and referred to the benefits of close alignment with the work and resources of AWM, including regeneration zones, to maximise impact.

Action – JM was asked to circulate the Worklessness presentation slides.

1008 SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY STRATEGY

Jackie Mould introduced the item on the new Sustainable Community Strategy – Birmingham 2026. The Board welcomed the strategy although a number of Board Members had some specific comments to feed in to the process. A number of Board Members emphasised how important this strategy was for Be Birmingham as the long term vision and direction for the city and how this really was key for how the partnership worked together into the future.

Decision – The Board gave “broad” agreement to the strategy subject to specific revisions to be coordinated and fed back to Cllr Tilsley.

Action – The strategy to be re-circulated to Board Members following the revisions

1108 COMPREHENSIVE AREA ASSESSMENT

Dianne Thomas, the recently appointed CAA Lead for Birmingham was invited to open up the first dialogue with the Executive Board about CAA. Dianne and Alan Clamp, Ofsted were in attendance. Dianne said that Birmingham was one of ten CAA pilots. Dianne explained that this new performance management framework was now focussing on “area”. This had significant implications for LSPs that were now expected to lead their “areas” into this new framework. CAA was now dependent on joint working across seven key inspectorates, was outcome focussed and was a risk-based system where action or intervention was proportionate to risk. Dianne explained that there were three parts to CAA, an area risk assessment, direction of travel for Councils and Fire and Rescue Services, and Use of Resources (business, money people and other assets) of key agencies including police, PCTs as well. Joint judgements would be reached across the inspectorates at outcome, service and organisational level. This pilot was only concerned with testing the Area Assessment.

Clarification was sought about the process and Dianne explained that the Audit Commission, using its own intelligence and information would reach a view about Birmingham and would then engage in a dialogue with partners. The trialling was an opportunity to shape the methodology. A key focus for the pilot was on Equalities and Diversity – both for Birmingham and Kirklees. This focus was broadly welcomed.

Decision – The Executive Board agreed that at its next meeting on 20 August there would be a dedicated session with the Audit Commission as a roundtable discussion on the CAA Pilot.

Action – JM to agree a process with the Audit Commission to pilot CAA.

1208 DELIVERY PLANNING

Richard Kenny introduced progress made on the LAA Delivery Framework designed to deliver against the Outcomes Framework now submitted and agreed with Ministers. Richard explained that Delivery Planning Guidance, a Template and a Map of plans against the outcomes had been shared with a new network of LAA Delivery Plan Leads to take forward delivery of the new LAA. A workshop had taken place in June and the role of the Delivery Plan Lead had been fully debated and discussed, resulting in eight key expectations placed upon them that reflected the real scope and opportunity for Plan Leads to champion key issues across the city.

A paper was tabled highlighting progress against the delivery planning process. Thirteen Delivery Plans had been received against the first deadline opportunity of 30 June. Many of these plans had been submitted as draft plans as work in progress but nevertheless submitted for consideration by the Board. All the plans had been independently assessed with support provided by Shared Intelligence. As a result the Board was recommended to support four plans in full, two in principle, and to seek further work on the other six.

Some concern was expressed about the extent to which some of the plans had been “signed off” by the relevant thematic partnership executive board. This matter was covered in the report and the advice to the Board was to make all these recommendations conditional on the view of the relevant thematic partnership.