Nominations are invited for the election of the Chair and Vice Chair of the Committee for the 2017/18 municipal year.

Note: As per the oneSource legal agreement, the Chair for the 2017/18 municipal year will be from Havering and the Vice Chair from Newham.

Following receipts of nominations and in accordance with the oneSource legal agreement, Councillor Ron Ower was elected as Chair for the 2017/18 municipal. Councillor Lester Hudson was elected as Vice-Chair.

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Joint Committee held on 21 April 2017, and to authorise the Chairman to sign them.

The minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 21 April 2017 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

It was reported that the overall oneSource shared outturn position showed an underspend of £0.080m, split between £0.195m to Havering, £0.045m  to Newham and £0.070m to Bexley. The Havering underspend had been transferred to its oneSource reserve held on the balance sheet. Newham had met its pressure by transferring in funding from its oneSource reserve (funded by prior years’ underspends). Bexley’s overspend had been offset by underspends elsewhere in the council.

The non-shared areas closed with the following variances:- Havering non-shared (£1.3m), Newham non-shared (£1.4m) and Bexley non-shared (£0.560).

It was also reported that the period 3 (2017/18) forecast outturn position for oneSource shared is £2.3m overspend; this was largely due to growth in demand for ICT services. This pressure is split between Havering, Newham and Bexley as follows; £1.044m to Havering, £1.092m to Newham and £0.190m to Bexley.

The period 3 forecasted outturn position for oneSource non-shared areas were Havering non-shared (£0.038m), Newham (£3.5m) and Bexley nil variance.

It was noted that as of period 3 (2017/18), Newham benefits and council tax services had moved out of Newham oneSource non-shared to Newham’s Communities directorate and would therefore no longer form part of the overall non-shared reporting position. It was not included in the early indications figures contained within the report before Members.

The Joint Committee: -

1.    noted the 2016-17 oneSource outturn position;

2.    noted the early indications derived from the 2017/18 period 3 forecasted position;

3.    noted the transfer out Exchequer Services from Newham non-shared to Newham’s Communities directorate.

In accordance with the oneSource legal agreement, the Committee was provided an annual report on the activities of oneSource over the past financial year, including an account of financial matters and an explanation of the main plans and activities for the coming year.

Members remarked that future drafts should include an executive summary. It was agreed that this be included for future drafts.

The Joint Committee noted the draft annual report.

Following a decision at Newham’s Mayoral Proceedings on 20 July 2017 to change the delegations in respect of the leasing of property to the voluntary and community sector, the Joint Committee was required to amend its scheme of delegation to officers in oneSource.

The Joint Committee agreed the amendments to the Scheme of Delegation at Appendix A of the report (appended to these minutes).

The report before Members provided details of performance with oKPI 1 Customer Satisfaction with oneSource services. The indicator was collected by an electronic survey campaign, which was undertaken biannually.

Members noted that the oneSource Business Services team monitors the relationship between oneSource and its customers and overall performance, ensuring oneSource meets the expectations of the programme and needs of its customers.

A challenging target 80% customer satisfaction target has been set for oneSource to exceed in 2016/17. For March 2017, combined customer satisfaction increased to 75%, rising by 3% since the previous survey conducted in September 2016, and slightly lower than the 80% target.

Individually, customer satisfaction with the service received was 82% from Havering customers, 65% from Newham customers, 89% from Bexley customers and 83% from oneSource customers. The best performing services were Strategic Finance (82%), Health and Safety (98%), Printing Services (95%), and Internal Audit and Counter Fraud (85%), Business Improvement (85%) and Project Management Office (82%).

These figures demonstrated that oneSource had made significant improvements to the delivery of its services but still required further action to combat the disparity in satisfaction for all three customers.

The Joint Committee noted oneSource’s Customer Satisfaction key performance indicator (KPI).

The Joint Committee had been notified at previous meetings that the request by Newham Council to transfer its element of the Council Tax and Benefits service from oneSource back into Newham Council’s responsibility had been agreed by both Havering and Bexley Councils.

Subsequent to the previous meeting, a deed of variation had been drafted to reflect the change and preparations were underway to implement the transfer of service.

The Joint Committee noted the report.

The report from the Managing Director updated Members on the governance services review, Oracle implementation, and commercial developments.

Concerning the governance services review it was reported that a business case and a five year strategy for the future direction of oneSource had been drafted for approval by the three councils in September 2017. It was noted that an update would be provided at the next Joint Committee meeting.

The Joint Committee noted the report.