Agenda item

(A)    Mr Hunt asked the following question of the Leader or his nominee:

 

“1.     A recent highway application [2022/0946/07 (2022/RegMa/0069/LCC)] contains a response to the Climate Change Emergency [Paragraph 100 Climate Change/Sustainability] which states:

 

It is considered that the proposed development is aimed at easing congestion within the wider Coalville Area and providing for non-motorised users to access Coalville Town Centre via proposed walkway/cycleway. Thus, it is considered that the proposal would have broad sustainability benefits and there are no concerns in this [climate change emergency] regard.

 

Now that the authority is planning to meet Net Zero Carbon by 2030 (our own operations) or 2045 (for wider Leicestershire) to what extend do such developments contribute to our new Net Zero Carbon target?

 

2.         Was the report suggesting that road schemes which reduce congestion also reduce the carbon emissions, even if traffic is increased.

 

3.         How can the decarbonising effect of our highway schemes be consistently measured in in future applications?

 

What increase in traffic is projected by the A511 scheme as a whole in the period of our Net Zero Carbon Strategy to 2045?”

 

Mr Pain replied as follows:

 

“1.     The Bardon Link Road application forms part of a wider package of measures set out within the Coalville Transport Strategy (CTS). This Strategy was developed to help alleviate the highway impacts associated with the planned growth across North West Leicestershire, without which congestion would likely increase along with vehicle emissions, thereby having a detrimental impact on the environment.

 

In line with Department for Transport (DfT) Guidance, the Council has prepared a Carbon Management Plan, which utilises the Carbon Reduction Hierarchy – as illustrated in Figure 1 below.

 

Figure 1: Carbon Reduction Hierarchy

 

The Carbon Management Plan (CMP) will quantify the baseline carbon impact of the project, which will be agreed with the DfT, and a suitable reduction target set.

 

Throughout the planning and design stages, the project team has examined ways to reduce the amount of new infrastructure needed and where this is not possible, the team has turned its attention to building less or designing more efficiently. The A511 Project Team has committed to appointing a Carbon Co-Ordinator who will take ownership of coordinating and ensuring the successful delivery of the CMP.

 

As the proposed scheme moves into the pre-construction stages, this work will continue with the selected Contractor to examine ways in which the scheme can be built efficiently using low carbon technologies wherever possible.

 

2.         The proposed scheme is not designed to increase traffic, but simply accommodate for traffic generated by planned housing and employment growth across the Coalville area.

 

Without these improvements, traffic congestion along the A511 would likely increase having a detrimental impact on air quality.  

 

Furthermore, the proposed scheme itself incorporates enhanced facilities for pedestrians and cyclists with a view to increasing modal choice and helping to maximise the use of sustainable modes.

 

3.         The Department for Transport will soon be publishing Quantified Carbon Reduction (QCR) guidance; once it has been published and reviewed by the County Council, the QCR may be of assistance in establishing how the decarbonising effect of the proposed scheme can be measured as the construction stage of the proposed scheme is approached.

 

4.         The proposed scheme does not generate traffic but has been designed more efficiently to facilitate trips associated with planned and committed developments across the Coalville area.

 

Due to a projected increase in population and employment, traffic flow along the A511 at certain points is predicted to increase in the morning peak from 1,788 vehicles (2017) to 3,061 vehicles by 2031, and in the evening peak from 1858 vehicles (2017) to 2,216 vehicles by 2031. This represents an increase of 71% and 21% respectively.

 

Scheme specific traffic flow data is not available for the year 2045.”

 

 

(B)    Mr Parton asked the following question of the Leader or his nominee:

“In regard to the proposed saving PH8 ‘Review approach to homelessness support (- £300k from 2024/25), I am concerned this is being portrayed locally as a reduction by the County Council in the core funding of a charitable organisation, the Falcon Centre, when that is not the case. That has been explained to the Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee but I will be grateful if the Leader can clarify and put the position on the record at this budget meeting of the County Council?”

 

Mrs Richardson replied as follows:

 

“The homelessness support service costs Leicestershire County Council around £300,000 a year, with the work contracted out to Falcon Support Services and the Nottingham Community Housing Association (NCHA). The current contract ends on March 31^st 2024.

 

The service provides a broad range of support to adults who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless.  This may include such things as supporting them to find secure stable housing, running benefits advice surgeries, supporting them to access appropriate health services or helping find training, employment and volunteering opportunities.

 

The funding does not pay for the running of homeless hostel buildings, including the Falcon Centre.

 

The Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 placed a new duty on district councils (as the housing authorities) to prevent and relieve homelessness. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has provided district councils with a homelessness prevention grant to deliver on these duties. In effect, the current service isn’t a statutory duty for the County Council to provide specific services for individuals who are homeless, and the Council has not been a recipient of any grant funding that is focused on preventing or relieving homelessness.”

 

Mr Parton asked the following supplementary question:

 

“The question referred to criticism being wrongly directed to Leicestershire County Council. Would the Lead Member therefore be against providing a clear explanation of the situation within Loughborough to the following three bodies: the Falcon Centre, the Member of Parliament and the Borough Council, and how can we deliver this explanation as soon as possible?”

 

Mrs Richardson replied as follows:

 

“I'm quite happy to do that.  Unfortunately, a letter went out from the Falcon Centre that was a little misleading, in public.  I have brought it to the attention of the District Councils etc., but I wasn't aware of where the letters had gone to.  The Falcon Centre should already be aware, but I will re-emphasise it and I'm quite happy to send a letter out to clarify. There will be other people we won't be able to get hold of but, suffice to say, we don't fund buildings. We don't fund their Hub or their hostels.  If we have been shoring them up then they've been using the money in the incorrect way. We do a lot on the benefit side, tenancy, to try and get all the people who are homeless back into society as much as we can and to give them as much help as we can. It's a very rounded provision.”

 

(C)    Mrs Hack asked the following question of the Leader or his nominee:

 

“With many Leicestershire Communities having lost a physical Sure Start facility due to funding pressures it was good to see an addition £1m had been awarded for ‘Family Hubs’ in Leicestershire.  Please could we receive information on the work that is planned within the funding for Family Hubs:

1.         Where will the Family Hubs be located, will these extend services within existing well established ‘sure starts’ or are we anticipating new facilities?

2.         What is the timeframe of the support?

3.         We note that this money is for transitional services, so what will happen after the funding period?

4.         The case made in this council to close sure starts, was based on need, what need hasn’t been met which has led to the bid for additional money?”

Mrs Taylor replied as follows:

 

“1.     Family Hubs are a blend of physical spaces and on-line/web-based services.

The principal idea behind Family Hubs is that they will support all families with children 0-19 (up to 25 with SEND) to access information, advice and where needed, services.

The project commits to working with families and communities to ensure the Family Hubs provision is planned around local needs.  The County Council is working towards establishing a hub and spoke model with one hub in each locality outlined below.

The hubs (both physical and on-line) will act as a central access point to all services available to families.  The Council’s ambition is that the hubs will be the first point of call for families needing support and information around services such as social care, relationship support, mental health services and health services.  The hubs will support other delivery/information sites in each locality.

The initial plan is to have the hubs in the Children and Family Wellbeing Centres in the following localities:

·        North West Leicestershire

·        Charnwood

·        Melton

·        Harborough

·        Blaby, Oadby, Wigston

·        Hinckley

 

In addition, officers are working with Library Services to explore how best to make use of library facilities in areas which do not have a Children and Family Wellbeing Centre.   For example, they are talking to Midwifery Services about the spaces they need to deliver clinics to pregnant women in some of the more rural areas.  Officers are also looking at how they can provide appropriate training (for example, Mental Health First Aid, Trauma Informed Practice, Making Every Contact Count) to library staff so that they are able to advise and signpost families to relevant services.  

 

These libraries will become Family Hub ‘spokes’.  This will all be supported by the development of a Family Hub website which will become an on-line one-stop-shop of information and resources for both families and professionals.

 

The County Council will not be creating any new facilities, i.e. there is no funding for new buildings; this is about making best use of existing spaces and ensuring all families can access the right information and support needed.

 

2.         The funding is in place until March 2024.

 

3.         All the work being undertaken is building sustainability into the approach. 

For example, a ‘Maternity Champions’ pilot is being launched in Loughborough to reach out to women who are not attending maternity appointments.  It is known that Black and Asian women have an increased risk of dying during pregnancy and childbirth, so it is important that officers work with communities to understand barriers to accessing services.

The pilot will identify, train and support ‘maternity champions’ to help spread knowledge and information around pregnancy, childbirth and the early years within specific communities.  These champions will then be supported by the Children and Family Wellbeing Service Volunteer Scheme.

 

4.         Whilst buildings have a role to play in the delivery of Family Hubs it is not an entirely buildings-based programme. 

There is significant emphasis on use of digital and on-line resources enabling families to access information and advice in ways that suit them and at times that suit them. 

The Council will be developing a website that will serve as a one-stop-shop for information, advice, and resources.  Work is being undertaken with partners to ensure the website contains appropriate links to partner services.  Self-help resources will also be developed for families, as well as resources which professionals from all agencies will be able to use to support their work with families. 

Since Covid, families have been accustomed to accessing services in different ways and this funding is helping us to align more closely with what families need.  It will also enable digital poverty to be tackled by providing more public-access technology in the centres for those who do not have access at home.

 

Additionally, opportunities for integrated service delivery are being explored with partners, again looking at making best use of existing buildings.  An example of this is the work being undertaken with maternity services to support their outreach to women who do not live near health facilities.  Officers are also talking to Adult Social Care about closer working in cases where for example a parent has mental health difficulties and needs specialist support.

 

Family Hubs have a much wider remit than the Sure Start programme which was focused entirely on the 0-5 age group.  Family Hubs certainly build on the foundations of Sure Start but encompass some newer developments such as the Reducing Parental Conflict programme.  Research states that relationships between parents impact whole family relationships, even when parents are no longer together.  The impact of children being exposed to frequent unresolved conflict between their care givers can be significant and long lasting in terms of children achieving good outcomes across health, education, and social care. 

Through the Family Hubs programme, a much wider cohort of public facing staff (i.e. in libraries and other public access buildings) will be trained to be able to recognise issues such as parental conflict and provide information, advice and signposting so that they can access the support they need.

 

Mrs Hack asked the following supplementary question:

 

“The question I asked was we know the money is for traditional services so what will happen after the funding period? So far there's one example of looking to volunteers.  I was wondering if a fuller response could be given please?”

 

Mrs Taylor replied as follows:

 

“Yes, I'm happy to put a full response in email to you but I think the plan is for that money to be used. We've got just under £1 million to get all the hubs up and running and the website etc., then it will become business as usual. We're looking to sustain it going forward out of our own budgets if there's no further funding coming.”

 

[Subsequent to the meeting Mrs Hack was advised as follows:

 

The funding received from the Department for Education is to support Leicestershire County Council to transition to a Family Hubs model of working.   In February 2022 it was agreed by Cabinet that Children and Family Services, and in particular the Children and Family Wellbeing Service, would move towards a model of delivery based on the national Family Hubs framework.  The successful application for grant funding means that the work to transition and to enhance some of the developments, such as the website, can be accelerated.   Until the funding was confirmed progress towards working in this way had been made based on existing budgets and resources.

 

There are 3 main elements to the funding:

 

1. Community engagement.  This involves working alongside families to ensure they are involved in developments and have their say in how services are being delivered.  There are both short term and longer elements to this.  Some families they may not wish to be involved in developments in an ongoing way and they will be supported to participate through events, focus groups, surveys etc.  It is also hoped to recruit other families who want to stay involved with the County Council through locality parent forums.  These parents will be recruited through the community engagement work but will be supported long term through the CFWS Volunteer programme and locality management teams.

As mentioned previously, the more targeted engagement work involves developing ‘maternity champions’ in Loughborough.  These champions will be supported beyond the funded period through business as usual, i.e. the CFWS volunteer programme/NHS parent forums.

 

2. Development of a Family Hubs website.  The grant will fund the development costs of the new website and this will include development of resources such as videos for families and professionals to use.  Beyond the funded period the website will be maintained via business as usual resources i.e. it will be factored into existing roles within CFWS.

 

3. Extending the reach to communities through the use of existing other buildings such as libraries.  The main focus is on providing training to front facing staff in a range of buildings which include libraries.  Wherever possible the training is being delivered through a ‘train the trainer’ model so that staff within the CFWS workforce, or within Learning and Development, are trained to deliver the training themselves.  This brings a measure of sustainability to the approach and can be incorporated in business as usual.   Since covid a lot of training has been delivered in the virtual space which means it is much easier and more cost effective to deliver.  Other elements of the grant funding for buildings are around signage, displays and resources.  These are mostly one-off costs.

 

The Children and Family Wellbeing Service will carefully consider the longer-term implications of any proposed changes to service delivery (for example, public opening hours of CFWS buildings) to ensure that costs can be met within budget.  The project is being monitored by the Departmental Management Team which includes Finance Business Partner.]

 

(D)    Mrs Hack asked the following question of the Leader or his nominee:

 

“How much money has the County Council invested in the Investing in Leicestershire Programme (previously known as the Corporate Asset Investment Fund) on a year-by-year basis since it was created, could this be shown by each asset type?”      

Mr Breckon replied as follows:

 

“The Investing in Leicestershire Fund (ILIP) has been successful in promoting economic growth and providing a steady and increasing investment return to support local services including those to vulnerable people. In the current financial year a net return of £6.5m is expected and total returns since its inception are £28.5m. In addition £8.6m of capital receipts have been generated. These assets will continue to generate income going forwards, including £47m over next four year MTFS period, including £17m of capital receipts. If the fund had not been established this revenue would not have been available.

 

The table below provides the detail by asset type.”

 

 

 

(E)    Mr Galton asked the following question of the Leader or his nominee:

 

“1.     How many children with Special Educational Needs (SEN) are still waiting for a school place for this academic year?

2.         How many SEN cases have gone to Tribunal in each of the last 5 years?

Of these, how many cases were conceded by the LA before the decision was made by the Tribunal? Please could you provide figures for each year. 

Please could you provide a breakdown of the outcome of Tribunal cases i.e., cases found in favour of the Child and against?”   

Mrs Taylor replied as follows:

 

“1.     There are currently 48 children with an Education, Health and Care Plan who are awaiting a specialist SEN placement who do not currently have a school place. This number changes week on week as new children arrive and children are placed in schools. The reasons behind the 48 children awaiting a place include: the child has just moved into Leicestershire and a search for a placement is underway, the child has left their named placement and a search is underway for a new placement, the child is awaiting a start date for their identified placement. There are also a number of children who have been offered a placement but the parent/carers are not happy with the offer of placement made, therefore the Department is working with the family to seek to resolve matters in order to place the child in specialist provision.

Securing a suitable placement to meet the needs of children with special educational needs is a priority for the department and officers are working hard to ensure all children with SEN have a placement that can meet their assessed needs.

2.      The table below sets out the numbers of SEN cases that have gone to Tribunal in each of the last five years.  It includes the number of cases resolved prior to the hearing and the reasons for this, as well as a breakdown of the outcome of Tribunal cases.”

Calendar Year	Resolved prior to a hearing				Resolved by hearing		Ongoing
	Resolved prior (Parent)	Resolved prior (LA )	Transferr-ed	Consent Order	Ordered	Dismissed		Total Tribunals
2022	118	4	0	4	31	3	76	236
2021	73	7	0	17	41	4	1	143
2020	27	3	1	35	32	5	0	103
2019	60	11	1	23	12	5	0	112
2018	25	40	1	2	18	4	0	90