Agenda item

Report of the Assistant Director, Transformation and Resources, to provide the Committee with data relating to the workforce including non-employed workers, equalities and sickness absence data for the period April to June 2016.

The Committee considered the People Management Report for the period April to June 2016, as presented by Carole Engwell, HR Quality Assurance Manager. The Committee noted that the figure for spend on consultants in March 2016 as set out in appendix 1 should read £1,173,585 and not as set out in the report.

The Committee looked at the data for sickness absence, and asked whether work was undertaken to identify areas of the Council affected by disproportionately high rates of absence. The HR Quality Assurance Manager advised that Management Grip indicators gave a greater breakdown of sickness absence by service areas and were monitored by managers and HR Business Partners in order to identify areas which may benefit from specific pieces of work to address high levels of sickness absence.

The Committee asked whether there was a Council-wide policy in place on the use of consultants, and felt that there was a need to address the perception that consultants were engaged for unnecessarily long periods of time. The Head of People and Change advised that as part of the work to reduce the number of consultants engaged by the Council, a business case was required for the proposed engagement of any consultant and that each consultant contract was reviewed every three months to ensure that the post was still required. The Committee asked about the process for these business cases being approved, and it was reported that these were first signed off by the relevant Assistant Director, and then went to the Priority Finance Sub Group, which gave careful consideration to the business necessity of the request. Finally, all approvals were signed off by a group chaired by a Chief Officer.

The Committee noted the reduction in the number of contracts and the level of spending for consultants, and requested that for future reports the Committee be provided with further details of any consultant contract where the estimated total value of the contract would exceed £100k. It was agreed that additional information would be provided to the Committee for such contracts. The Committee also asked for the All Consultant Posts table to show the estimated cost for the duration of the contract rather than full year costs, as this was potentially unhelpful for contracts of less than a year’s duration.

The Committee noted the workforce equality profile, and asked how this compared with the profile of the borough, it was agreed that this information could be provided. The Committee also asked about the process for dealing with a series of short sickness absences which individually did not trigger the six day target; the Head of People and Change advised that a return to work interview would be held after each absence, and once the total amount absence exceeded six days within a rolling 12-month period, the formal sickness procedures would be instigated. It was confirmed that the focus was on cases where the six-day threshold was exceeded, however cases which did not necessarily trigger formal proceedings but where an unusual pattern of absence was identified would be looked at on a case by case basis. The Committee agreed that long-term sickness absence was the key area to address. For future reports, the Committee asked for comparative information on levels of sickness absence in previous years, and also the overall headcount for previous years.

RESOLVED

That the Committee note the content of the report.