SUMMARY / PURPOSE

To inform the Committee of the findings of the Best Value Inspection Service following the re-inspection of the Highways and Transportation Service.

BACKGROUND

Following an inspection of the Highways and Transportation service of the Isle of Wight Council, in September 2001, the Best Value Inspection Service issued a report in December 2001. In this they assessed the Council as providing a ‘poor’, no star service that had poor prospects for improvement. Because of these findings, they informed the Council that they would re-inspect the Highways and Transportation Service in ‘approximately 6 months’ to evaluate progress in developing a long-term improvement plan, implementing service improvements, improving corporate and service performance management systems and implementing their recommendations. They also said they would continue to evaluate progress longer term in collaboration with external auditors.

In answer to the criticisms levelled, a ‘Best Value Improvement Plan’ for the service was produced. Members of the Committee will be in possession of this document and will be aware that it concentrated on 7 areas of improvement: -

Corporate and Departmental Vision, Department’s Working Style, Service Strategies, Staff Development, Performance Management, Procurement and Service Improvements.

The Best Value Inspectors returned to re-inspect the Service in August/September 2002 and spent 8 days with the Engineering Services Department.

FINDINGS

The report issued by the Best Value Inspection Service was published in October 2002. This time they assessed the Council as ‘now providing a fair, one-star service that has promising prospects for improvement’. Members of the Select Committee are in possession of a copy of the report and the main findings and recommendations are re-produced below: -

1) Strengths:

§ The Council has set up a call centre that is providing a better service to the public.

§ Public rights of way and street lighting continue to provide a good service.

§ Systems are now in place to improve safety and manage performance.

2) Issues that still need to be improved:

§ Road conditions are still poor in many places, although significant improvements have been made along some of the main routes to the ferries.

§ Aims and objectives for the Service are not as clear as they could be.

§ Comprehensive strategies for car parking and highway maintenance are still lacking.

§ The Government assesses the Isle of Wight Local Transport Plan (LTP) only as average compared with other councils.

3) The Service now has promising prospects for improvement because:

§ Councillors, managers and staff are all committed to further improvement, and a corporate framework is emerging to promote improvement.

§ Systems are in place to provide better information on which to base decisions.

§ A wide range of projects were completed in the last year.

§ The LTP ‘lays the necessary groundwork for further improvement over the next few years’.

§ The Council has shown it has better capacity to spend available money.

§ A high level of government funding for transport schemes seems assured until 2005/06.

4) Things that still need to be addressed:

§ Many of the internal procedures are new and un-tested by the Council.

§ Service and medium-term business planning needs to improve.

§ There is no unified improvement plan for the next three to five years, with clear priorities on which to base future improvements.

§ The future strategy for procurement in unclear.

§ Other departments are dissatisfied with the support they get.

5) To rise to the challenge of continuous improvement, councils need inspection reports that offer practical pointers for improvement.

6) The Council has already risen to this challenge by its positive response to the recommendations in the previous report. If the Council is to maintain progress, it is essential that it makes continued effort to achieve all of those recommendations. The Council recognises this. However, because of the

re-inspection, they should be reinforced with the following extra recommendations.

It is recommended that the Council should:

§ Develop a service plan, within the corporate business planning framework, which:

Is based on a medium-term (three to five year) programme of activity, subject to annual update, which is used to manage day to day delivery of the highways and transportation service, and to implement a unified improvement plan;

Has clear aims that are compatible with the new community strategy and corporate plan;

Has clear service standards which meet the needs of local people;

Has challenging targets for improving performance in areas of weakness;

§ Develop a unified improvement plan which:

Sets out a co-ordinated set of improvement tasks and priorities, to replace the different current plans;

Is supported by appropriate planned resources;

Ensures that actions are undertaken in a sensible order;

Is based on ‘SMART’ (specific, measurable, achievable, resourced and time-based) principles;

§ Define a comprehensive scope for a car parking strategy, and ensure that it is completed in a reasonable time scale;

§ Draw up an action plan to achieve the aims of the procurement strategy; and

§ Agree the level of support the Service will provide to other service departments, to help them carry out their roles effectively.

ACTIONS REQUIRED

It is pleasing to see that the Best Value Inspection Service recognises the efforts made to improve the Highways and Transportation Service. However, complacency must not be allowed to creep in as our performance management systems are at an early stage in their development and will still require considerable officer time to implement. The most important of these is the introduction of a Quality Management System to ISO 9001 standards, for which a deadline of December 2003 has been set. It is hoped to attain ‘Investors in People’ by June 2003 and this is considered essential since staff are the most important resource.

The report criticises the poor road conditions, which they consider to be within the worst 25 per cent of unitary councils. It is therefore essential that additional revenue funding be made available for highway maintenance.

The Inspectorate are also critical of the lack of business planning and therefore efforts need to be concentrated into the production of a meaningful Service Plan, which covers the forthcoming 5 years.

Finally the Inspectorate are suggesting that a Car Parking Strategy be developed as soon as possible. Work on this is currently being undertaken by a Car Parking task group of the Environment and Select Committee.

PAPER D

SUMMARY / PURPOSE

BACKGROUND

FINDINGS

ACTIONS REQUIRED

FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

RECOMMENDATIONS

BACKGROUND PAPERS