Minutes:
County Councillor P. Murphy declared a personal, non-prejudicial as the Monmouthshire County Council representative on the SRS Public Board
We received a presentation from the Director of Shared Resource Service (SRS). Prior to the presentation we were updated on SRS position in relation to the WAO recommendations made in July 2015;
Recommendation 4 – Is the service good value for money?
A benchmarking process had been undertaken against 12 organisations including a shared service, a police authority, a bank and public sector organisations. A report providing the detail could be forwarded to the Committee.
Recommendation 2 – Strategic Review of SRS
25 different areas in the strategic review covered items such as culture, service level agreements, performance measures and cost changes. The document could be circulated to the Committee.
Recommendation 3 – Governance of SRS
Final recommendations would be brought to the next Board meeting, including any recommendations from the WAO review. The public board paper could be circulated to the Committee.
Recommendation 1 – SRS Strategy Document
The final recommendation questioned where and what SRS were doing, moving forward. A strategy day had been held with numerous council members, heads of service, frontline service staff, as a peer check. The strategy was presented to the Committee.
Following the presentation Members were invited to comment, during which time the following points were noted:
A Member questioned if there was mention of 3rd Sector organisations, particularly if there was more talk of services being devolved out of Local Authority into Town Councils and other organisations. These organisations may not have the budgets or capacity to cope. The issue of security was also raised. In response the Director of SRS explained that with regards to the 3rd Sector organisations, the platform would provide access to CAB or EAS, allowing a corporate feel for the system. The Cloud based system would allow everyone to work together, regardless of where they were based. With regards to security we were informed that the platforms were secure and compliant ISO2700 systems, where security layers could be added where needed.
Concerns were raised surrounding the reliability of the service, particularly in the case of accessibility from home. Questions were raised regarding VPN issues and what could be done to aid the processes where VPN dropped out. We were informed that typically where there were issues in the home it was a broadband or wireless router issue. In terms of accessibility, to provide a 24 hour or out-of-hours service costs would in excess of £13,000 to have people on call. Other technologies could be looked into where connection would take place automatically without the need of a VPN password.
A Member requested further detail on how far the service had taken expansion into other organisations. We heard that all 22 authorities across Wales were interested in being involved and SRS were looking to add the Police into the same platform.
The Strategy Day had involved over 70 people where Monmouthshire County Council had had a large voice including Chief Officers, Heads of Service and 2 Council Members.
It was questioned what the impact would be if the 5 Local Authorities merged as a Greater Gwent. It was explained that the aim of SRS was to provide the service to whoever wanted to be on the platform.
A member questioned if the service was in the right place politically. The Director of SRS assured Members that the service wished to grow to be the provider for the Gwent footprint, and its aims were to provide a service and reduce costs across the public sector.
Members suggested a workshop, rather than a seminar, be arranged to discuss the intricacies of the intentions of SRS.
The Chairman thanked Mr. Lewis for the presentation and noted that information would be despatched to Committee Members.