Agenda and minutes

To receive any apologies for absence.

Apologies were received from Councillors Amanda Pinnock, Anthony Smith and Harpreet Uppal, and Kevin McAllister.

To approve the Minutes of the meeting held on 1^st February 2022.

The minutes of the meeting of the Panel held on 1^st February 2022 were agreed as a correct record.

Councillors will be asked to advise if there are any items on the Agenda in which they have a disclosable pecuniary interest, which would prevent them from participating in any discussion or vote on an item, or any other interests.

No interests were declared.

Most debates take place in public. This only changes when there is a need to consider certain issues, for instance, commercially sensitive information or details concerning an individual. You will be told at this point whether there are any items on the Agenda which are to be discussed in private.

All items were considered in public.

The Panel will receive any petitions and hear any deputations from members of the public. A deputation is where up to five people can attend the meeting and make a presentation on a particular issue of concern, relevant to that body’s terms of reference. In accordance with Council Procedure Rule 10 (2) members of the public should provide at least 24 hours’ notice of presenting a deputation. A member of the public can also hand in a petition at the meeting subject to the petition relating to something on which the body has powers and responsibilities.

No deputations or petitions were received.

The Panel will hear any questions from the general public in accordance with Council Procedure Rule 11.

No questions were received.

The Panel will receive a report on the updates made to the Gas Safety Management Policy and the Electrical Safety Management Policy.

Contact: Eric Hughes – Head of Assurance and Transformation

The Panel received a report in respect of the updates made to the Gas Safety Management Policy and the Electrical Safety Management Policy to ensure alignment with Council policy and terminology, and to reflect legal and regulatory requirements.

Naz Parkar - Service Director, Homes and Neighbourhoods, Eric Hughes – Head of Assurance and Transformation and Asad Bhatti – Head of Asset Management attended to present the report and respond to Members’ questions.

It was noted that all policies had been standardised in response to the feedback from the Panel at the previous meeting.

Questions, comments and responses were put forward as follows:

·       In respect of the process for checking the technical content of the policies generally, and, for example, if there was a change to the relevant legislation, it was explained that all policies were checked by the relevant in-house teams as a first line of defence. The second line was through submission to the Building Safety Advisory Board (BSAB) and, currently, the Ad Hoc Scrutiny Panel, and the third line was when they were audited.

·       A decision was to be made about whether the named individual/role, with responsibility for compliance with statutory health and safety responsibilities, as required by the White Paper, would be the Service Director for Homes and Neighbourhoods or the Strategic Director, Growth and Regeneration.

·       In order to assist in achieving 100% compliance, it was anticipated that some predictive analysis would be undertaken to establish if there were any patterns in respect of no-access properties.

·       There was a separate data management policy which was applicable to any of the operational safety management policies. This policy provided guidance in respect of the use of personal data.

·       If any personal data was used to undertake analysis and identify trends, this would be anonymised and not processed in a way that would breach the relevant legislation.

·       Detail in respect of how the compliance data would be recorded, managed and validated would be included in the underlying procedures.

with the following revisions or amendments to the policies being recommended:

·       Corrections to paragraphs 4.1 of both policies, 4.4 in the Gas Safety Policy and 4.7 in the Electrical Safety Policy to refer to ‘gas’ or ‘electrical’ as appropriate and an addition to paragraph 4.7 of both policies:.’…where all other attempts to gain access have failed…’.

·       Add appropriate wording to all policies to confirm that remedial actions will be undertaken within the relevant timescale (and as set out within the detailed underlying procedure), in order to be clear that this is a requirement and as a matter of good practice.

·       Add a statement to all policies to the effect that the Authority will handle the recording, management and validation of compliance data to ensure that it enables accurate and reliable reporting and offers assurance to the appropriate places.

·       Inclusion of a list of the key performance measures that will be used within the policies, with how they will be calculated and any further detail being included within the underlying procedure.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 48.