Agenda and minutes

To receive apologies for absence.

Apologies for absence were received from County Councillor G Morgan, G Preston, and C Keyon-Wade (other Council business).

An apology for absence was also received from Cabinet Member S Davies (Cabinet Member for Future Generations) and Dr C Turner (Chief Executive).

To receive declarations of interest from Members.

There were no Declarations of Interest from Members relating to items to be considered on the agenda.

To receive disclosures of prohibited party whips which a Member has been given in relation to the meeting in accordance with Section 78(3) of the Local Government Measure 2011.

(NB:  Members are reminded that, under Section 78, Members having been given a prohibited party whip cannot vote on a matter before the Committee.)

The Committee did not receive any disclosures of prohibited party whips which a Member had been given in relation to the meeting in accordance with Section 78(3) of the Local Government Measure 2011.

To authorise the Chair to sign the following minutes of previous meetings as a correct record.

15-12-2022

The Chair was authorised to sign the minutes of the previous meeting held on 15-12-2022 as a correct record.

To receive and consider the Audit Wales report regarding Corporate Safeguarding together with the Council’s action plan.

Documents Considered:

·       Audit Wales report regarding Corporate Safeguarding

·       Council’s Action Plan

Issues Discussed:

Cabinet Member for a Safer Powys:

·       There was an Audit Wales review of Safeguarding in 2022 which reported to Council in December. The review made a number of recommendations which were included in the report regarding how corporate safeguarding arrangements could be improved.

·       Before the report became public work had commenced on implementing a number of the recommendations including agreeing a Corporate Safeguarding policy which had been approved by the Cabinet following comments from the scrutiny committee.

·       The recommendations regarding training had been noted and a training campaign had been implemented to improve the level of training of both staff and Members. There had been a significant improvement in training, with Member training being at 98%.

·       There was a need to embed corporate safeguarding in everything that the Council did and as a key consideration of everything moving forwards. Corporate safeguarding would be considered as part of the corporate self assessment process for all services.

Director of Social Services and Housing:

·       Audit Wales published the final report on corporate safeguarding on 19 December, 2022. The report and corporate action plan was also discussed at the Governance and Audit Committee on 9 February 2023 and the Corporate Safeguarding Group in March.

·       It was clear that there was much work to do and actions to be completed. An action plan was drafted and work to implement the action plan commenced working corporately across all services. The engagement from across the Council including the Cabinet, and the scrutiny committee had been positive and supported by a cross service working group.

·       The Council welcomed and accepted all the recommendations outlined in the report.

·       Progress had been made against all of the recommendations before the report became public.

·       Many of the actions had been completed or have had significant progress achieved against them.

·       All of the recommendations have been added to the corporate regulatory tracker, so that they would be monitored through the quarterly monitoring governance arrangements as well as through safeguarding channels.

·       The Committee was reminded that the Audit Wales report related to the Council’s overall corporate safeguarding arrangements and did not refer to those arrangements for any individual service.

·       Action Plan highlights:

·       Corporate Safeguarding policy – it was recognised that the Council did not have an overarching corporate safeguarding policy in place. A policy was drafted and was approved by the Cabinet on 13 December 2022. Also created was a one page summary showing the key information on one page. The policy was on the central repository together with a refresh date.

·       The Terms of Reference for the Corporate Safeguarding Board was reviewed, refreshed and improved on 5 December 2022.

·       Communication of safeguarding was an area needing improvement. The landing pages on the intranet and public web pages went live in February and corporate communications had been issued.

·       Following the feedback from scrutiny about a safeguarding theme per month, the Corporate Safeguarding Board had agreed this in principle and would  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

To appoint 2 Members as representatives of the Joint Leisure Working Group which will be led by the Economy, Residents and Communities Scrutiny Committee with representation from the other scrutiny comittees.

RESOLVED that County Councillors G E Jones and L Rijnenberg be appointed as the Committee’s representatives on the Joint Leisure Working Group.

To note the scrutiny forward work programme.

The Committee noted the Work Programme as set out on the agenda.