Agenda and minutes

It was noted that apologies for absence had been received from Councillor Edwards-Daem, Councillor Mrs Grigg and Councillor Mrs Stockell.

There were no Substitute Members.

Councillor Mrs Blackmore, the Leader of the Council, and Councillor McLoughlin, the Cabinet Member for Corporate Services, were in attendance.

There were no disclosures by Members or Officers.

RESOLVED: That the items on the agenda be taken in public as proposed.

The following guest speakers will attend the meeting to present on three topics – governance, communication and the key objectives of the Mid Kent Services Director during 2014-15.

Guest speakers include: Paul Taylor, Mid Kent Services Director; Jane Clarke, MKIP Programme Manager; Alison Broom, Chief Executive of Maidstone Borough Council and William Benson, Chief Executive of Tunbridge Wells Borough Council.

The Chairman welcomed Councillors from Tunbridge Wells Borough Council, Swale Borough Council and Maidstone Borough Council to the meeting to enable joint consideration of the issues around governance, communication and the role of the Mid Kent Services Director within the Mid Kent Improvement Partnership (MKIP).

Alison Broom, Chief Executive of Maidstone Borough Council, explained that the partnership had been formed in 2008 between Ashford, Maidstone, Swale and Tunbridge Wells borough councils. Ashford had subsequently withdrawn from the partnership. The first MKIP partnership was Mid Kent Audit which went live as a four-way shared service in 2009.

MKIP was one of a number of ways that the three authorities entered into partnerships, with each authority being able to opt in or out as opportunities arose. Over the years the number of partnership services had grown and included:

It was explained that the percentage of staff employed and the overall budget of the shared services had subsequently grown but had demonstrated good value on investment. By the end of 2013/14, MKIP would have delivered £5.5m worth of savings for £1.8m worth of investment. On existing business case projections this was predicted to rise to £13.3m (£2.25m annually) for £2.15m of investment after 10 years of MKIP (2017/18). This represented £6 returned for every £1 invested.

William Benson, Chief Executive of Tunbridge Wells Borough Council, stated that the partnership began with a relatively ‘light touch’ approach to governance recognising a desire to get on and deliver shared services and to establish a track record that could subsequently be built upon.

The partnership had began opportunistically but had become more structured in its approach following a recognition that certain support services (such as ICT and HR) were important ‘enablers’ to shared services.

In 2008, each authority had agreed a set of formal governance arrangements that stated that Overview and Scrutiny arrangements would be undertaken individually by each of the Parties when the Parties considered Proposals and Recommendations from MKIP as part of their decision making processes. However, it was envisaged that joint scrutiny meetings would be considered when appropriate. The Lead Director/Project Manager for a particular project would attend meetings as required.

Whilst key decisions remained with the individual cabinets of each of the three authorities, MKIP was overseen by an MKIP Board on a day-to-day basis which was made of up the Leaders and Chief Executives.

MKIP had adopted a ‘Gateway’ model to assess whether a shared service should be implemented. Whilst the initial stage of a project was overseen by the MKIP Board, decisions to proceed to implement a shared service were reserved to the individual Cabinets.

Committee members raised a number of questions regarding governance, namely:  ...  view the full minutes text for item 17.

19:15hrs – 20:35hrs