Issue - meetings

The committee is requested to consider this annual report on the effectiveness of the Council’s strategic partnerships to satisfy themselves that these partnerships have appropriate governance measures and risk monitoring procedures in place.

The committee considered the report circulated with the agenda.

Miss Loaring presented the report. The annual review of strategic partnerships was undertaken in liaison with services to identify all the partnerships they were involved with and removing from the list the smaller partnerships, networks and groups.

The committee made the following comments and received answers to questions as follows:

·             Concern regarding continuing funding for the Manhood Peninsula Partnership – Mr Connor, as portfolio holder and a previous member of that group, was invited to speak on the matter. Following the withdrawal of partners’ funding for this partnership there was a risk of its sustainability. The Partnerships Guidance advised that an independent review of a partnership was needed to ensure that it was delivering against its outcomes and was sustainable. If partners were withdrawing funding then it needed to be reviewed for its sustainability. Miss Loaring and Mrs Belenger undertook to take this matter up with the Head of Service.

·             Statistics on thefts under the Safety Partnership – Miss Loaring undertook to check the context of the figure and respond to the committee.

·             The joint priorities of the Safety Partnership should be to ‘reduce’ Child Sex Exploitation, etc. Street Community referred to rough sleepers.

·             Cold alert – This was reaching 250 people which was an effective figure.

Members commended the depth of the report but were concerned that the report was not being given full consideration on the effectiveness of the partnerships. The committee’s role was to look at the governance and risks of the partnerships, whereas the Overview and Scrutiny Committee’s (OSC) role was to consider their effectiveness. Mrs Jones advised that the OSC annually considers the Chichester in Partnership projects to identify those which should be reviewed. The OSC also had a statutory role to review the Community Safety Partnership annually. Mrs Jones undertook to bring this report to the OSC’s attention when setting its next work programme.

As a result of the above discussion members requested that the format of this report be adjusted to allow the committee to consider the governance arrangements and the exposure of the partnership to risks and the mitigation of those risks e.g. the funding the council is putting in and the risk to partners who are also funding the partnership. Miss Loaring undertook to refocus the information under each partnership in liaison with Mrs Belenger.

RESOLVED

1)          That the annual report on Strategic Partnerships be noted.

2)          The committee was satisfied that the council’s Strategic Partnerships have appropriate governance measures and risk monitoring procedures in place.