Issue - meetings

Publica Transition Plan

Purpose

To consider the Local Partnerships report and to approve the recommendations therein.

Recommendations

That Full Council Resolves to:

1. Approve the recommendations set out in the Local Partnerships report

2. Instruct the Interim Programme Director to prepare a detailed transition plan, building on the recommendations set out in the Local Partnerships report, for subsequent agreement by Cabinet and Council.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Chair invited those Publica colleagues who felt that they should leave the room to do so. It was noted that an officer from the ICT team would remain in the room to support the technology, as ICT was not part of the proposed transition.

The Chair invited the Leader of Council to introduce the report.

The Leader of the Council, Councillor Joe Harris, made the following report:

In highlighting the background, an options appraisal was undertaken to examine the future of some Council services remaining within Publica following a Local Government Association Peer Review towards the end of 2022.
Full Council at its meeting on 22 November 2023 considered and approved the Publica Review report recommendations from Human Engine. The options appraisal from Human Engine recommended that the Council return a majority of the services from Publica to the partner councils.
Publica would continue to deliver a number of support and customer service functions for the councils.
The work had begun on the transition through the appointment of Andrew Pollard as the Interim Programme Director and the recruitment of Local Partnerships consultancy through the Local Government’s Associations Transformation Fund to provide a bridging report to the final transition plan later in 2024.
The use of Local Partnerships was to help set out some of the key consideration as part of the transition plan to navigate the complex requirements in transferring employees back to council employment such as governance and service design.
The Local Partnerships team engaged with Council staff and Publica staff and management during this process to understand the current position.
The timescales and services set out were indicative which would feed into the transition plan based on their previous experience.

Councillor Tony Dale as seconder then reserved his right to speak.

Council noted the resource required and the complexities of the work in insourcing services back to the Council.

Council noted the uncertainties regarding the financial costs for insourcing services from Publica and the need for more financial information as part of the transition plan.

Council noted the need for the Overview and Scrutiny Committee to be involved in examining the transition plan.

Council asked about the need for the Council to be more fleet of foot in delivering services and cost savings as this was not mentioned in the report. There were also questions around customer services and procurement not being brought back in-house under the proposals and how these would be managed as key parts of the Council.

Councillor Harris noted that procurement and customer services were heavily integrated within Publica, and that this arrangement was working well. Furthermore, this current process was identifying services in the short to medium term that could be brought back to the Councils. However, the points raised around the key considerations of cost savings and service delivery would be taken onboard.

Councillor Mike Evemy joined the meeting during the debate.

Council noted the work done by customer services staff in difficult circumstances.

Council raised a number of ... view the full minutes text for item 34

Meeting: 07/03/2024 - Cabinet (Item 256)

Webcast for 07/03/2024 - Cabinet

256 Publica Review - Local Partnerships Transition Plan PDF 116 KB

Purpose

To consider the Local Partnerships report and to approve the recommendations therein.

Recommendations

That Cabinet resolves to recommend to Full Council to:

1. Approve the recommendations set out in the Local Partnerships report

Additional documents:

Decision:

The purpose of the report was to consider the Local Partnerships report and to approve the recommendations therein.

Councillor Dale proposed the recommendations and Councillor Evemy seconded.

That Cabinet AGREED to recommend to Full Council to:

1. Approve the recommendations set out in the Local Partnerships report

Voting Record

5 For, 0 Against, 0 Abstention, 3 Absent/Did not vote

Minutes:

The purpose of the report was to consider the Local Partnerships report and to approve the recommendations therein.

The Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance then notified Cabinet that there were officers in the room employed by the Publica Group who were directly affected by the item and would be leaving the room.

Once the officers had left the room, Councillor Dale was then invited to introduce the item on behalf of the Leader of the Council:

Following the report by Human Engine presented to Council on 22 November 2023, the Council secured Local Partnerships consultancy support to provide further clarity on the next steps for the Council.
The report was set out as a bridging document to look at the future possibilities for the Council.
The report at section 2 set design guidelines to ensure that the Council structure was modern and commercially minded where appropriate.
Section 2.2 of the Local Partnership report set out the future delivery models between those services within Publica, ‘sovereign’ within the Councils and opportunities to share services between the Councils outside of Publica.
The Local Partnership phases for change set out a timeline of 6 months from April to October for ‘sovereign’ services to return to Councils which was noted as an ambitious timeline and that there were opportunities for the proposed structure to change.

It was noted that climate change officers were not part of the structure column. The Chief Executive Officer noted within the cover report presented that not all services were included in the Local Partnerships report and the report was focussed on the key areas.

It was noted that some of the services in opportunities to share would still need to be finalised as part of the final transition plan to deliver the best services for residents.

It was noted that the Overview and Scrutiny Committee had also had the opportunity to ask questions of the Interim Programme Director.

Councillor Dale proposed the recommendations and Councillor Evemy seconded.

That Cabinet AGREED to recommend to Full Council to:

Approve the recommendations set out in the Local Partnerships report;
Instruct the Interim Programme Director to prepare a detailed transition plan, building on the recommendations set out in the Local Partnerships report, for subsequent agreement by Cabinet and Council.

Voting Record

5 For, 0 Against, 0 Abstention, 3 Absent/Did not vote*

For	Against	Abstention	Absent/Did not vote
Claire Bloomer			Joe Harris
Juliet Layton			Lisa Spivey
Mike Evemy			Paul Hodgkinson
Mike McKeown
Tony Dale

*As Democratic Services Officers had left the room as required for this item, the vote was taken by a show of hands

Meeting: 27/02/2024 - Overview and Scrutiny Committee (Item 54)

Webcast for 27/02/2024 - Overview and Scrutiny Committee

54 Publica Review - Local Partnerships Transition Plan PDF 135 KB

Purpose

To consider the Local Partnerships report and for Cabinet to approve the recommendations therein.

Recommendation

That the Overview and Scrutiny Committee scrutinises the report and agrees any recommendations it wishes to submit to the Cabinet meeting on 7 March.

Invited

Councillor Joe Harris, Leader of the Council

Robert Weaver, Chief Executive

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Chair stated that the item would be taken as the first substantive item on the agenda.

The purpose of the report was to consider the Local Partnerships report and for Cabinet to approve the recommendations therein.

The Deputy Chief Executive introduced the item and invited the Interim Programme Director for the Publica Transition and the Local Partnerships Project Director to speak to the Committee. The Interim Programme Director introduced their experience, including experience of establishing and disbanding Teckal companies.

The Interim Programme Director explained that they had set up a programme office including officers from human resources and finance. The Director was involved in the build-up phase of the project, utilising the framework that local partnerships had put into place.

The Interim Programme Director stated that an early finding was that there was no overarching Publica structure chart, and one was being set up to ease the transition.

The Director from Local Partnerships also introduced the report, the aim of which was to provide high level recommendations for the Programme Director to utilise in setting up the transition programme.

The Cabinet Member for the Local Economy and Council Transformation referred to the recommendations to Cabinet resulting from the report.

As well as raising broader questions about the programme members discussed the report and its annexes. Members raised the following points which were addressed by Officers and the Cabinet Member;

As in their introduction, the programme director confirmed that there was no overarching Publica structure chart.
Members referred to the accountable officer on the report, which was listed as the Chief Executive. The Chief Executive confirmed that future reports would likely be in the Programme Director’s name instead.
Members referred to the complexity involved with officers working for multiple stakeholder councils. The Programme Director stated that at previous organisation they had set up a time sheet as means of recording who was working at each Council but such a system was not currently in place for Publica employees.
Members discussed the timescales for commencing the transition. The Programme Director emphasised that delivering the transition quickly was important but that they did not yet have specific timescales besides those suggested by Local Partnerships in their report. In regard to which employees would be transferred when, the Programme Director and the Director from Local Partnerships stated that the areas to be transferred first were ‘easier’ areas and that the more complex ones would be left within Publica until a later stage. The phases had come out of the workshops and the officers felt it was important to include these. However, the Director from Local Partnerships emphasised that the Programme Director could be flexible with this if the partner councils wished to be.
Members discussed the design led model of the approach, and asked the officers which approach had been taken. The Programme Director stated that the approach had been designed based on the six principles in the Local Partnerships report but that there was no particular systems model they had chosen. The ... view the full minutes text for item 54

Issue - meetings

Publica Transition Plan

Meeting: 20/03/2024 - Council (Item 34)

Meeting: 07/03/2024 - Cabinet (Item 256)

Meeting: 27/02/2024 - Overview and Scrutiny Committee (Item 54)

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