Agenda and minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Bloch and Catherine Harris. In addition, apologies were also received from Councillor Canver, the Cabinet Member for Enforcement and Safer Communities, who had been scheduled to attend the meeting and provide evidence.  Jean Croot, the Head of the Safer Communities Service, would provide answers to the Panel’s previously circulated questions on her behalf.

The Chair will consider the admission of any late items of urgent business. (Late items will be considered under the agenda item where they appear. New items will be dealt with at item 7 below).

None.

A member with a personal interest in a matter who attends a meeting of the authority at which the matter is considered must disclose to that meeting the existence and nature of that interest at the commencement of that consideration, or when the interest becomes apparent.

A member with a personal interest in a matter also has a prejudicial interest in that matter if the interest is one which a member of the public with knowledge of the relevant facts would reasonably regard as so significant that it is likely to prejudice the member's judgment of the public interest and if this interest affects their financial position or the financial position of a person or body as described in paragraph 8 of the Code of Conduct and/or if it relates to the determining of any approval, consent, licence, permission or registration in relation to them or any person or body described in paragraph 8 of the Code of Conduct.

None.

To approve the minutes of the meeting of 25 September 2007.

As the meeting was inquorate, consideration of the minutes of 25 September was deferred.

To receive evidence from the following;

·        Councillor Nilgun Canver, Cabinet Member for Enforcement and Safer Communities

·        Helen Brown,  Acting Deputy Chief Executive, Haringey Teaching Primary Care Trust

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As Councillor Canver, the Cabinet Member for Enforcement and Safer Communities, was unable to attend the meeting, Jean Croot, the Head of Safer Communities, gave evidence to the meeting on her behalf. 

Councillor Canver felt that greater sustainability in the resourcing of actions to achieve Safer and Stronger

Communities targets could be achieved through a package of measures:

·        Improvements could be made in policy coordination so that opportunities for collaborative work were identified at an earlier stage and appropriate resources and commitment agreed.  The LAA grant would come to the Borough in a lump sum from 2008 and it was vital that the Haringey Strategic Partnership ensured that the key priorities in the Community Strategy as well as residents’ top concerns – which also included crime - were fairly and adequately prioritised.

·        Serious consideration needed to be given to core funding for areas of priority which were statutory and ongoing.  Examples of this were youth offending work, dealing with anti-social behaviour, reducing volume crime, reducing the harm caused by drug and alcohol misuse and addressing the fear of crime through consistent and professional communications work.

·        There were already some good examples of aligned funding and joint delivery of priorities.  The Supporting People Programme, for example, helped to deliver outcomes relating to drug and alcohol harm reduction, domestic violence and housing for vulnerable people.  This year, the Summer University was delivered as a joint programme by Neighbourhoods, Safer Communities and the Youth Service. There were also good examples of services and partners working together to deliver key priorities, such as partnership efforts to address worklessness and well being and the co-ordination of structured crime prevention work in schools.  Further opportunities should also be explored for joint delivery on LAA work.  These could include victim programmes, designing out crime and providing more effective services for ex-offenders.

The wording of section 17 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 had been strengthened recently and it was now a ‘duty’ both to prevent and reduce crime, disorder, anti social behaviour and substance misuse across all parts of the partnership.  There were some good examples of how crime prevention programmes and activity were being delivered by partners as additional to their ‘normal work’. Examples of this included the Fire Service led Prison Me No Way programme and the use of forensic nursing assessments in custody

suites.  Other work and programmes had become mainstream crime prevention work, such as Operation

Tailgate – a regular joint Police and Council enforcement operation involving a range of external partners –

and the embedding of programmes to address youth employment opportunities for those at most risk.

However, the mainstreaming of crime and disorder prevention work was not yet happening systematically in Haringey.  This requirement should ideally be part of standard business planning and policy making in a way that equalities considerations were. Some boroughs, such as Lambeth, had undertaken a fuller discussion amongst partners on how to meet their statutory responsibilities.

Councillor Canver felt that partners on the Safer Communities  ...  view the full minutes text for item 12.

None.

27 November 2007.

27 November at 6:30 p.m.