Issue - meetings

Report of the Executive Director of Corporate Resources and Customer Services

The Committee will also receive a presentation by the Assistant Director of Place (Highways and Public Protection) on the corporate risk: “Failure to adequately invest in the Highway network and associated assets”.

The Committee considered the report of the Executive Director of Corporate Resources and Customer Services which provided an update on the Corporate Risk Register.

The Chief Internal Auditor (CIA) presented the report indicating that the ownership of the content of the Corporate Risk Register lay with the Strategic Leadership Board.

The CIA indicated that since the last meeting the following changes had been made to the Corporate Risk Register, namely:

The addition of one new risk, namely, ‘Demand and cost of home to school transport’.

The de-escalation of one risk from the Corporate Risk Register to the relevant Service Risk Register. This risk was: ‘Failure to manage and support response to pandemic’.

Significant revision to the Children’s Services Risk Register with four current risks included in the Corporate Risk Register due to their score, namely:

·       The provision of Children’s Social Care is not financially sustainable.

·       Market failure of Social Care provision across Adult and Children’s Services.

·       Failure to manage increasing demand for services.

·       Impact of regulatory framework outcomes.

These risks had replaced the existing risks shown in the Corporate Risk Register which were:

·       Failure to deliver the agreed Children’s Services Improvement Plan.

·       Demand and cost of placements ad packages within Children’s Social Care leads to impact on financial sustainability of the Council.

·       Children’s Services workforce failure to be able to recruit and retain a suitably qualified workforce leading to a large turnover of staff, unstable workforce and outcomes for children.

·       The Council cannot demonstrate it has the capacity or capability to meet the requirements of its Children’s Services Improvement Plan and move from inadequate to good resulting in the recommendation that it becomes a Children’s Trust.

The report indicated that although there had been substantial work undertaken over the past six years to embed risk management across the Council there continued to be work required to ensure that it was consistently and effectively embedded.

Meetings had been held with Officers and Members to develop the Council’s Risk Appetite and it was expected that the formal draft definition of the Council risk appetite would be drafted and refined before providing it to the Committee in due course.

The CIA responded to a range of questions on issues relating to Children’s Social Care, Sandway Homes and Adult Social Care.

Following consideration of the report, the Committee received a briefing by the Service Manager – Transport and Highway Infrastructure and the Highways Asset Manager on the risk: ‘Failure to adequately invest in the highway network and associated assets’.

RESOLVED: That