PAPER E

Committee :    RESOURCES SELECT COMMITTEE

Date :              6 SEPTEMBER 2002

Title :              RELATE SOLENT: VARIATION TO SERVICE LEVEL AGREEMENT 2002/2005

REPORT OF THE HEAD OF PAID SERVICE

1.        SUMMARY

1.1      At an earlier meeting, members asked that the options for the further development of the service provided by Relate Solent be brought back for further discussion. This report presents such options for members’ consideration, and these are summarised below and detailed in the draft Variation to the Service Level Agreement (SLA) attached at Appendix A.

2.        BACKGROUND

2.1      At a meeting of this Committee of the 10^th April last, members debated and recommended approval of the 2002/05 SLA with Relate Solent. This recommendation was based upon the maintenance of Relate’s services on the Island at their current level, was subsequently approved by the Executive and is now in force. During these previous discussions, two options for the enhancement of the service were brought before members and these are returned here at your request.

2.2      Both options are offered for the period 2003/05 as a supplement or Variation to the existing SLA, running for the second and third years of the three year agreement.

           Option 1 - Additional Counsellor

           Recruitment of an additional counsellor. This will allow Relate to provide 100 additional counselling hours in the venues currently used, increasing total hours to 600. It will necessitate an increase of £2,100 in the current grant over two years.

Coupled with this is the opportunity to offer the service at an additional venue on the Island, possibly in the southeast. An additional venue will increase the accessibility of the service and allow the current workforce to increase the number of hours they work, if they so wish.

The cost of this option will include an element for rental of premises for an additional venue which will be ongoing, but may be slightly offset by an anticipated increase in client income.

Option 2 - Appointment of trainer

The second option will secure the provision of an education and training service on the Island, including open access courses such as ‘New Life, New Challenge’ and ‘Taking Charge of Your Life’. Anger Management and Stress Management courses can also be provided for the general public or tailor made to organisations’ requirements. Other bespoke training can be arranged, particularly including courses for schools, colleges and prisons.

The cost of providing this service is an additional sum of £4,000 over two years. Relate hope that this service would only need limited further support thereafter to become self-financing on an ongoing basis.

3.        FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

3.1      There is no budget provision for either option. Appropriate sums would have to be earmarked within the budgets for 2003/4 and 2004/5. These sums would be:

4.        OPTIONS

4.1      To recommend to the Executive that a Variation to the Relate Solent Service Level Agreement be approved, based on Option1.

4.2      To recommend to the Executive that a Variation to the Relate Solent Service Level Agreement be approved, based on Option 2.

4.3      To recommend to the Executive that a Variation to the Relate Solent Service Level Agreement be approved, based on Options 1 and 2.

BACKGROUND PAPERS

Service Level Agreement with Relate Solent 2002/05.

Contact Point : Peter Greenwood, ☎ 3697

ALAN KAYE

Head of Paid Service