Agenda item

 The committee will be asked to approve the restructure of the Council’s Human Resources service.

Members were asked to consider proposals for the restructure of the Council’s Human Resources service in order to meet a Council approved level of savings of £884k for the Human Resources and Personnel Services. The Committee were advised that as a result of the Finance and HR Support Functions Reviews and the Children’s business support and development review it had been identified that the best configuration for these  HR related services was to bring them together and enable them report to the Head of Human Resources. It was noted that as a result of this amalgamation the Head of Human Resources would  be responsible for :

·        Schools Personnel

·        Payroll work of officers in Leisure, Catering, Transport and Parking /Enforcement services

·        Schools Health and Safety Work

·        SAP establishment maintenance work from the financial systems team in Corporate Finance.

Members noted the current structure of the service set out in pages 84-86 and proposed structure set out on page 88. The post which had been deleted were further highlighted in Appendix B which were a summary of changed posts including deleted posts.

The Head of Human Resources communicated some minor anomalies in the report which did not impact on the final recommendations of the report.  These included:

• Appendix A - HR Support - there should be an additional scale 4 post included in the new structure.
• Schools Payroll& Employee Admin – Schools Pay and admin team – the single PO1 post should read PO2/3,SO2 post should be removed and there were 5xSc6/SO1 in the new structure.

The Committee noted  that Appendix F of the report contained mainly union comments from Unison with some comments from the GMB union.

Members enquired about potential increased income for the service from sharing recruitment services with Waltham Forest. It was noted that these discussions were at an early stage with £20k of funding secured to take this investigation of shared activity further forward.

 Following the reduction in posts responsible for  health and safety provision, Members further sought assurances that the level of health and safety management provision provided to schools would be maintained.  It was explained to the Committee that, the reduction in these posts was responding to feedback in the consultation where this was highlighted as a savings area. The Committee were informed that the Corporate Health and Safety manager would be covering these duties and  this post holder would ensure that the necessary health and safety regulations were met.

 The Committee were advised the due to pressing timescales to complete the report the equalities impact assessment enclosed was not fully completed. The Committee agreed to consider and agree the recommendations of the report subject to considering the completed equalities impact assessment at their meeting on the 19^th May 2011.

RESOLVED

1. That the revised post changes and deletions detailed in Appendix B be approved, taking into account the outcome of the consultation outlined in Appendix F and paying due regard to the authority’s public sector equalities duties.

2. That  the revised service offer outlined in Appendix A be noted.

3. That it be noted that the revised structure will predominantly be implemented with effect from 1 October 2011 in recognition of the considerable people change work that HR are supporting across the Council.  Where posts can be deleted in advance of 1 October without impacts on service delivery support these will be actioned earlier.

4. That the level of savings levels to be achieved from the review in 2011/12 outlined in paragraph 11 be noted.

5. That the completed equalities impact assessment  be considered at the Committee meeting on the 19^th May 2011.