LOCAL STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP - EXECUTIVE BOARD
Minutes
DATE
15 March 2005
VENUE
Committee Room 3, Guildhall
PRESENT
Board Members:
In Attendance:
Secretariat:
David Atkinson, Chief Executive - City of York Council
Jeremy Clough, Chief Executive – S & Y Primary Care Trust
Ian Collins, Yorkshire Forward - Substitute for Geoff Needham
Ken Dixon – Joseph Rowntree Foundation
Mike Galloway, Principal – York College
Cllr. Stephen Galloway – City of York Council (Chair)
Cllr. David Merrett – City of York Council
Liz Page, Managing Director – York & County Press
Simon Stanley, Archbishop's Adviser for City Centre Ministry
Colin Stroud, Chief Executive – York Council for Vol. Service
Jonathan Tyler, Chair – York Environment Forum
Cllr. Andrew Waller – City of York Council
Bob Wood, Chair – Safer York Partnership
Rachel Johns, Director of Public Health, Selby & York PCT
Laura Paterson, Transport Research Officer, CYC
Mark Finer, Principal Transport Planner, CYC
Laura McGillivray, Deputy Chief Executive, CYC
Denise Simms, Senior Partnership Support Officer, CYC
APOLOGIES: Brian Cantor – Vice Chancellor, University of York
Ron Cooke – Co-opted Partner
Len Cruddas, Chief Executive – Chamber of Commerce
Tim Madgwick, Chief Superintendent – North Yorkshire Police
Geoff Needham, Head of North Yorkshire – Yorkshire Forward
1
INTRODUCTIONS AND APOLOGIES
Apologies were received from Brian Cantor, Ron Cooke, Len Cruddas, Tim Madgwick and
Geoff Needham. It was reported that Cindy Benton and Simon Stanley had submitted letters
of resignation to the Chair. Cindy and Simon were thanked for the contribution they had
made to the work of the Partnership and Partners passed on their best wishes to both for the
future. Board Members were asked to consider future faith sector representation on the
Board and suggestions for a replacement were welcomed.
Action – Partners were asked to send suggestions for faith sector representatives to Laura
McGillivray.
2
MINUTES OF MEETING HELD 27 JANUARY 2005
Minutes of the meeting held on 27 January were agreed, subject to the amendment that
Jonathan Tyler had submitted his apologies for that meeting.
MATTERS ARISING
Sub-Regional Investment Plan – Copies of the latest SRIP newsletter were circulated,
containing details of the York and North Yorkshire Development Board, Social Inclusion
Partnership, forthcoming events and an update on current projects. Ian Collins confirmed
that York based SRIP projects were being progressed through the approval process. He also
circulated details of the 2005 review of Regional Economic Strategy (RES) and the issues
that had been identified as key for the RES consultation.
IDeA Peer Review – Laura McGillivray thanked Partners who had given up their time to speak
to members of the IDeA peer review team. She explained that the review team had already
given initial feedback and a full report was expected in April.
Regional Spatial Strategy – Partners were informed that formal consultation on the draft RSS
would now take place from September 2005 for a 12-week period up to Christmas.
3
REDUCING SMOKING IN YORK
Rachel Johns, PCT Director of Public Health, gave a presentation outlining the proposed
approach to reducing smoking in the city (Slides attached). Rachel explained that smoking
was the single greatest cause of preventable death and accounted for approximately 300
deaths in the York / Selby region every year. It was noted that, within the sub-region, only
Scarborough had a higher smoking attributable death rate than York.
It was estimated that 26% of the population within the Selby/York PCT boundary smoked and
that the government had set a national target to reduce adult smoking rates to 21% by 2010.
The strategy to reduce smoking rates would include:
 Smoke-free environments – this was likely to have the biggest impact on rates of
smoking. The NHS wanted to lead by example in ensuring that their premises and
grounds were smoke-free (SYPCT policy would be updated by Oct 2005 and the York
Hospitals NHS Trust policy was under consideration). Liz Page also reported that
staff at York and County Press had been given three months notice regarding closure
of the ‘smoking’ room. Support to carry this through and encourage smokers to
change their behaviour had been available from the PCT.
 Clean air campaign – the PCT and Yorkshire Evening Press had been working
together on a campaign, which would be launched in April, aimed at supporting
workplaces to become smoke-free zones.
 Support / information – support would be available for employers / employees who
wished to get involved in the clean air campaign.
Implementation of the strategy would be monitored by the Healthy City Board, which would in
turn report back to the Executive Board on progress.
Comments following the presentation included:
 Smoke-free areas could displace smoking activity onto the street and increase
littering. It would be important to inform the Street Environment Service of areas likely
to suffer from increased levels of litter throughout the campaign;
 This would be an opportunity to gain commitment from organisations represented on
the Partnership, particularly large employers such as the council;
 Scarborough, Whitby and Ryedale Health Authorities had committed to become
smoke-free environments on No Smoking Day. The next No Smoking Day would be 1
Oct 2005;
 The smoke-free campaign would focus on organisations and their smoking policies.
Action – Partners wishing to commit to the smoke-free environment campaign would contact
Rachel Johns or Liz Page.
4
LOCAL TRANSPORT PLAN 2 AND ACCESSIBILITY STRATEGY
Laura Paterson gave a short introduction to the forthcoming renewal of the city’s Local
Transport Plan (LTP2) and the new requirement to include an Accessibility Strategy as part of
the next LTP. Laura explained that all Local Authorities were required to produce their
Transport Plan by March 2006.
The Accessibility Strategy would form a key component of the Transport Plan and aimed to
improve the quality of life of York residents through increased accessibility to transport
services. The council’s Transport Planning Unit would liase with service providers across all
seven Community Strategy themes to produce a strategy for the city. The five stages of the
accessibility planning process included:
1. Mapping work – identify priority service and geographic areas, stakeholder groups and
existing problems;
2. Local themes – audits of local needs and objectives;
3. Option appraisal – work with partners to identify options;
4. Plan preparation – produce action plans;
5. Monitor and evaluate – Implement and monitor the LTP.
The Transport Planning Team were currently working on a draft Accessibility Strategy and
this would be available for Without Walls Board Members to comment on by May 2005. The
team were using mapping software to assist in identifying areas of poor accessibility and had
held five themed workshops on access to health, education, work, retail and leisure / culture.
Information generated through these processes would be used to develop the Accessibility
Strategy framework.
Comments following the presentation included:
 It would help to identify key services, e.g Youth Clubs, and use the accessibility
software to map whether they were on bus routes;
 Disseminate availability of the software to enable key resources / services to be
mapped;
 The team could consider taking a general approach to accessibility for all and then
overlay issues relevant to socially excluded groups, e.g. high prevalence of student
accommodation or areas of high unemployment;
 Partners would be required to identify issue(s) considered most important e.g. journey
times, cost or distance;
 Gaps in the commercial network could be improved through consultation/partnership
with providers;
 The recent equalities conference highlighted that there were many issues concerning
the accessibility of transport services;
 The Inclusive City Reference Group would be key to involve in accessibility planning
consultations;
 Partners should consider this issue within the context of the theme areas in order to
tackle inequality and achieve Community Strategy aims.
Action – it was agreed that Partners would contact Laura Paterson if they had any further
comments and that the Transport Planning Team would circulate further information on the
process / strategy in early May.
5
CHANGEUP
Colin Stroud gave a presentation on ChangeUp, the Government’s initiative to improve
infrastructure support for the Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS). He explained that
Government had high expectations of the sector with regard to public service delivery. This
followed a review by the Treasury in 2002 on the role of VCS and the subsequent £93 million
fund established by the Home Office to implement recommendations to improve
infrastructure.
Colin explained that the ChangeUp Vision was to regenerate the good citizens agenda and to
ensure that by 2014:
 Efficient and good quality voluntary and community services would be available
nationwide;
 Services would promote diversity and reflect BME / Faith / Rural communities;
 Funding should be sustainable and promote social enterprise
ChangeUp funding had to be spent by 2006, although, as yet, no funds had yet been made
available. The Government Office was responsible for distributing the money, however there
had been delays in the Yorkshire and Humber region. The Regional Forum was in the
process of developing mechanisms to distribute the £1.1 million available to the York and
North Yorkshire area.
The investment plan for York and North Yorkshire included provision for:
 Capital projects
 ICT Support (i.e. support for groups in using and maintaining their own IT equipment)
 HR guidance and advice on employment legislation
 Accountancy advice (Community Accounting Scheme)
 Common database
 Volunteer centres (one per district)
York CVS had made a bid to the ChangeUp fund for £380k to complete development of the
Priory Street site. A total of £1.1 million was being invested in Priory Street, funded mostly by
the sale of Community House. The development would increase office accommodation for
groups and meeting rooms / conference facilities.
Comments from Partners following the presentation included:
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Could the extent of structuring by government make it more difficult to attract
volunteers – i.e. with money came conditions and that could put people off;
JRF had recently completed research into the local BME voluntary sector and could
make their database / address list available to CVS;
Voluntary Groups did not want to work as sub-contractors of the local authority due to
onerous financial monitoring procedures;
The Compact code of practice for funding would ensure that monitoring arrangements
would be proportionate to the amount of funds granted.
Action - It was strongly agreed that the Executive Board would back York CVS’ bid to the
ChangeUp fund.
6
DRAFT CRIME AND DISORDER REDUCTION STRATEGY 2005/8
Partners had received a draft copy of the Community Safety Plan 2005/8, which contained
the six strategic priorities of:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Drugs
Dwelling burglary
Violent Crime
Anti-social behaviour
Vehicle Crime
Road Safety
Laura McGillivray explained that the draft Community Safety Plan had been amended several
times since Partners had received their copy (version 8 was now the most up to date copy).
She explained that we would now need to identify public priority outcomes and agree actions /
performance measures required to deliver improvements.
There had been a heavy bias in the existing draft towards government targets. This was
because York was in the top quartile for crime figures and there had been a requirement to
set targets to improve performance.
Comments from Board Members on the draft Community Safety Plan included:
 It was disappointing that the links to Without Walls theme areas had not been made.
The main focus of the document was on the 6 specific priority areas and no links had
been made back to the different strands of the Community Strategy.
 No high level targets had been included in respect of perception measures for the
Safer City;
 The section on Road Safety had been added late and was still extremely narrow in
that it only looked at major accidents and deaths;
 It had been difficult balancing the views of 20-30 organisations to produce the plan, in
particular because of the heavy hand from Government Office in setting out what the
priorities would be;
 We would need to think across agencies in order to tackle low level offences, as we
could be more creative with the resources available;
 The nature of the targets meant nothing to anyone and could in fact de-motivate
people as they did not understand them;
 Partners should use data and work together more to resolve problems e.g. work with
the health service to get a better picture about violent crime in the city.
Action – it was agreed that Partners would contact Laura McGillivray or Jane Mowat if they
had any further comments on the draft Community Safety Plan.
7
WITHOUT WALLS FORWARD PLAN AND FUTURE WORKING ARRANGEMENTS
Partners had received paperwork that set out:
 The suggested cycle of Partnership Board and Strategic Monitoring Group Meetings
for 2005/6; and
 Issues / challenges facing the city that could require Without Walls support / input;
Board Members were asked to consider whether there were any further issues that would
require Without Walls consideration in the forthcoming year. These could be dealt with as
agenda items for scheduled meetings or could involve arrangement of separate one-off
consultation events.
Board Members comments on the forward plan included:
 There would be an Anti-Poverty Seminar that Board Members were invited to attend
on 25 April, 2-4pm at the Priory Street Centre;
 The Regional Economic Strategy was currently under review and should be included
in the Without Walls work programme;
 Board Members should be given ample notice of seminars / events;
 Consider development of an annual conference that would bring stakeholders
together, test Community Strategy aims and report on progress.
Action – It was agreed that the secretariat would confirm 05/06 meeting dates in an e-mail to
Partners. Partners also agreed to inform the secretariat of any additional issues / challenges
that should be included in the Without Walls forward plan.
8
WITHOUT WALLS PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORK
Partners received an update on preparations to gather Without Walls performance
information for 2004/5. In addition, Board Members were informed of a proposed ‘scorecard’
approach to performance monitoring.
Partners heard that the Council’s Performance Improvement Team were arranging
workshops for the Responsible Officers within each of the themed partnership areas. These
sessions would be aimed at ensuring progress against headline outcomes and success
measures were reported to the first Strategic Monitoring Group meeting in July.
The scorecard proposed would comprise performance data backed up by narrative on
successes and areas for improvement / joint working possibilities.
Action – It was agreed that Board Members would contact the secretariat with suggestions
regarding the scorecard format.
9
ANY OTHER BUSINESS
Ken Dixon referred to the RSS consultation comments that had been submitted to the
Regional Assembly by the Environment Forum and City Council. He was concerned about
acceptance of York as a Sub-area of Leeds and felt that this should be resisted.
Comments from Board Members on this issue included:
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York was included as a sub-area of Leeds, but also as a sub-area with its own sphere
of influence;
The City Development Team could be commissioned to analyse the issues relating to
the Leeds City region and the impact it might have on York;
The consultation period for comments on the pre-draft had closed which would make
it difficult to influence the draft RSS.
The City Development briefing could incorporate an Environmental capacity study;
Significant issues had emerged in terms of the housing figures, as they seemed to
suggest that build rate would be substantially reduced. This would affect ability to
meet demand for housing.
Action – it was agreed that the City Development Team would bring a discussion paper to
the next Board meeting in May on the Leeds key city region and the impact of its acceptance
on York.
There being no other business, the meeting ended at 18.15pm
Date of next meetings (to take place 4-6pm in Committee Room 2 at the Guildhall):
Partnership Board Meetings:
26 May 2005
28 September 2005
23 November 2005
30 March 2005
Strategic Monitoring Group Meetings:
18 July 2005
26 January 2006
Seminars:
25 April 2005 – Anti Poverty Seminar 2-4pm at Priory Street Centre