ITEM NO. 5
REPORT OF
Economic and Community Safety Scrutiny Committee.
Date 7 July 2003.
TITLE : City Of Salford as an Employer Working Group
RECOMMENDATIONS : First Report to be produced for November 2003 Scrutiny Committee.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY :
Background
The Salford Employment Plan was launched in September 2002. The Employment Plan, provides a clear five year Strategy and Action Plan to give focus as to what needs to happen in
Salford to create and maintain a healthy labour market.
Underpinning the Salford Employment Plan are five strategic actions, of which this working group are exploring & developing ideas around two of the strategic actions:
Strategic Action 1 : To develop an effective and co-ordinated partnership approach to enhancing local employability, and, as a consequence, local competitiveness. Key objective for this working group is to look at co-ordination of work experience opportunities/ Learning
Opportunities.
Strategic Action 3 : To effectively engaging with local employers in order to recruit and train the local workforce. Key objective for this working group is to look at areas, which the City of Salford and Salford NHS can develop in order to become an Exemplar Employer.
The remit of the working group also links directly into the Economically Prosperous City theme within the City of Salford’s Community Plan and its overreaching aim:

To create an economically prosperous city that encourages investment, supports business potential and enables local people to achieve their full potential.
The working group can also make a direct contribution to the following Key Priority:

To reduce barriers to employment and training and assist residents to secure well paid sustainable employment in the City and across region.
The working group can also contribute to Pledge 5:

An Inclusive City with Stronger Communities, which will make Salford a better

place to live.
Actions arrived from First Working Group Meeting Wednesday 3 rd June 2003:

David Horsler (Snr. Principal Personnel Officer Organisational Development and
Equalities Group) to make the first draft of a potential model that can be developed and discussed by the working group for the next meeting. Next meeting to be held on
Wednesday 2 nd July 2003.

Working Group Principal to sign up to.

Working Group to Investigate and explore the various Pathways to employment.

Statistics analysis to be carried out for benchmarking purposes. This is needed in order for a baseline to be established and outputs set.

John Harrison - Head of Life Long Learning, Education and Leisure and Carmen
Martinez - Salford Partnership on secondment from Primary Care Trust are to be invited to all future meetings.

Working Group presentation to LSP on Salford as an Employer on the 9th September
2003
BACKGROUND DOCUMENTS : The Salford Employment Plan. September 2002 (Available for public inspection)
CONTACT OFFICER : Emma Nolan Economic Development Officer - Employability
WARD(S) TO WHICH REPORT RELATE(S). ALL
Working Group - City of Salford as an Employer
Background
This group has been established to look at and adopt best practice to establish The City of
Salford as an exemplar employer.
The working group membership consists of Emily Kynes Team Leader- Economic Development,
Stuart Kitchen Assistant Director-Economic Development, Emma Nolan- Economic Development
Officer – Employability, Karen Lucas Scrutiny Support Officer, David Horsler- Snr. Principal
Personnel Officer Organisational Development and Equalities Group.
The Group will produce a report for consideration by September 2003
Dates for subsequent meetings are as follows:

Wednesday 2 nd July 2003

Wednesday 16 th July 2003

Wednesday 29 th July 2003

Wednesday 13 th August 2003


Wednesday 27 th August 2003
Outline of lines of enquiry identified at the First Meeting
Discussion took place around local skill shortages in sectors where skills and qualifications are preventing local residents from accessing or progressing into employment e.g. Social Work,
Health/Social Care, Childcare, Construction, Retail, IT.
The group will look at the opportunity to link to the LPSA target groups:

Workless families

Older workers, aged 55+

Disabled

Black Minority and Ethnic groups (BME)

People with drug & alcohol problems
Basic Skills and Adult Education
The City of Salford was recommended by the Basic Skills Agency to take a lead and set an example for other employers to address the basic skills needs of their employees (potential and current). Group to look at developing this area at future meetings.
Options Identified
Pre-work Programmes
To introduce a Pre –work programme for people interested in accessing careers within Local
Government . This could be an entry mechanism for a skills register / temp / recruitment pool.
This could cover standard induction to local authority plus placement in any department. This would provide an early access route to job vacancies and train people in the recruitment and selection process to enable them to effectively apply for job vacancies. The programme could include an offer for guaranteed interviews for those individuals who meet a required standard .
Internal ‘Pools’
To establish an internal ‘Employment Agency’ concept providing a pool of employees to meet the Council’s short-term vacancy requirements. This could fill internal vacancies and also provide a service to external partners, which could be chargeable and therefore enable sustainability of a dedicated team to manage and potentially become self-financing. There are existing pools of staff but different Directorates run these on an adhoc basis, and ‘common’ skills needs such as administrative staff are not included .
Work placements / Learning Opportunities
These are currently supply led and arranged in an uncoordinated way across the authority. More and improved opportunities could be achieved by establishing a ‘placement profile’ for the
Council and seeking agreements with various agencies (schools, DWP, BEP, ERP etc.) to fill them on a roll-on, roll-off basis. In order for such opportunities to be offered there needs to be a pledge from all Directorates to this principal. This could be via an annual commitment to X vacancies / placements etc .