Decision details

To consider the business case for the sharing of the following support services with Arun District Council and Horsham District Council

ICT

HR

Customer Services

Legal

Audit

Revenues and Benefits

Transactional Finance

(Recommendation from Overview and Scrutiny Committee)

Mrs Dodsworth explained that a final report on Shared Services will go to Cabinet in February. There are six services being considered:

·       Audit

·       Customer Services

·       HR

·       IT

·       Legal

·       Revenues and Benefits

The three authorities involved are Chichester, Arun and Horsham although Horsham already has shared arrangements in some of the service areas.

The key principles of the projects are:

·       One employer.

·       One system.

·       One manager.

·       Innovation in service design.

·       A consistent or improved service for the customer.

·       Learning from best practice.

If Shared Services are progressed high level business cases will be established which will require some initial investment. A Joint Board will also be created as part of the governance arrangements. At this stage it appears that savings can be made. There are already examples of some CDC services working with Arun such as Estates, Procurement and Printing. Shared services would retain an element of control over services being provided for CDC regardless of whether it remained the employing authority.

Mrs Dodsworth explained that all affected staff and Union representatives have been briefed.

Mrs Shepherd explained that she had been attending Steering Boards with relevant Cabinet members from all authorities and the other Chief Executives.

Mr Mildred explained one of the key reasons for undertaking the project is to establish ways to continue to provide good service in difficult economic times.

Members asked the following questions:

·       Would the savings be for Chichester or split with the other authorities? Savings will be split fairly between the three authorities. The detailed business case will finalise the method of recharges to each authority.

·       Are the three local authorities the right local authorities and should more be included to maximise savings? Specialist consultants confirmed that three is the advised maximum. The project started with Arun and Chichester. Horsham later showed interest. Adur and Worthing already have shared working and East Hants is part of bigger partnerships.

·       Has outsourcing (in a similar way to printing) been considered? The printing service agreement with Arun is not a tendered outsourcing contract it is based on a service level agreement and Chichester pays for what it uses. How successful has Census been and has it provided other authorities with savings? Horsham is part of Census and has arrangements with IT and Revenues and Benefits. It is important to have a robust business and good governance in place are two of the key lessons to be taken from the Census partnership.

·       Due diligence is key when will this be apparent to members? Due diligence will be at the next stage of the project.

·       Consideration needs to be given to where a manager and service will be located. If the upfront costs out way a possible return then Shared Services will not go ahead. One employer and one set of accommodation for a service should provide rental potential for spare accommodation.

·       The greatest costs are staff costs, are the figures credible? A model will be built based upon the workloads now and in the future. Time recording takes place across the council for each service to help provide these figures.

A number of members supported the principle of Shared Services.

RECOMMENDED TO CABINET

That detailed business cases and implementation plans be developed for all of the six service proposals.