REPORT FROM THE CABINET MEMBER FOR RESOURCES AND TOWN & PARISH COUNCIL EMPOWERMENT
21st JUNE 2006
On
Tuesday 1st June the first Induction day was held for all Town and
Parish Councils to introduce the enhanced service this authority is providing,
the day began with a welcome to the first
of many Induction days from Andy Sutton, and
myself
We
wanted to give a better insight into what goes on behind the doors of County
Hall, visit departments and talk to the staffs that are involved with them on a
day-to-day basis.
We
will spend time with them in the parishes to gain a better understanding of
their role in the community.
This
Authority is keen to develop a much closer working relationship with T & PC
that will see the devolvement of services, at a level where they will be
delivered in a truly local way
We
also have a quarterly parish newsletter and provided a parish portal, which is
free, or for £500 they can have support to develop their own.
My
aim is to see all T & PC’s empowered by 2008 and to increase in the number
of Quality Parishes, we currently we have 5. Our Parish and Community
Development Team are working hard and are already able to provide advice,
guidance and support to those councils wishing to reach Quality Status
Training
for clerks is available and we will pay election expenses for those who are
undertaking these this year.
Cllr
Brian Mosdell talked about our Civic Pride Programme.
After
coffee, coaches were available to transport them to Highways and Planning
departments with 2 groups alternating, lunch back at CH and presentations
before finishing at 4pm
On
8th June I paid a visit to ECC, an Excellent Authority, the
objective was to look for ways in which we might improve services and to share
knowledge.
Richard
Jurchim from Risk Management was in the process of restructuring, the objective
is to embed risk into all departments, and this is an issue for us as
maintaining a full risk register is crucial to the success or otherwise on any
project. They, as we are finding, large projects are usually fully risk
assessed and full attention paid to associated risk however, other areas are
sometimes a matter of just ‘ticking the box’
The
HR are in the process of reviewing all of their policies and are looking to
change to an E-HR software package, it’s early stages however I will be talking
to them again.
David
Hall - Director Property services shared with me their strategy for assett
management and as we are in the process of implementing one for the Island,
this was of particular interest and I have shared the process with the our SAM
group to see if we can improve on our draft or vice versa. This Authorities
asset base is in the region of £300 million, compared with Essex CC that is
quite small although the outcomes would be the same, excellent management of an
asset base is crucial to our capital programme.
Cabinet Member for Resources
Town & Parish Council
Empowerment