Agenda and minutes
Venue: Council Chamber, Civic Centre, Windmill Street, Gravesend DA12 1AU. View directions
Contact: Committee Section Email: committee.section@gravesham.gov.uk
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Apologies Minutes: An apology for absence was received from Cllr Mulheran. Cllr John Caller substituted.
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To sign the minutes of the previous meeting Minutes: The minutes of the meeting held on Thursday, 23 September 2021 were signed by the Chair.
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To declare any interest Members may have in the items contained on this agenda. When declaring an interest Members should state what their interest is. Minutes: No declarations of interest were made.
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Council Tax Reduction Scheme Additional documents:
Minutes: The Committee was presented with information on the existing Council Tax Reduction Scheme and asked to note the work undertaken on the review of the current Council Tax Reduction (CTR) Scheme.
The Head of Revenue & Benefits guided Members through the report and drew their attention to key points concerning the Scheme, its aims, the additional protections in place, how the Scheme would be easier to understand and what was in place to protect claimants from exceptional hardship. More detailed information was available in the report from pages 11-14.
The Head of Revenues & Benefits assured Members that pension age households would not be affected by the new Council Tax Reduction Scheme.
The Head of Revenues & Benefits further updated Members on the progress made on the review of the existing Council Tax Reduction Scheme.
· The consultation document was finalised on 20 October 2021 and consultation commenced on Friday 22 October 2021 · Any individual claimants that experienced hardship from the changes to the Council Tax Reduction Scheme would be able to apply for support from the Exceptional Hardship Fund · The proposed timetable for the consultation was 9 weeks from Friday 22 October 2021 to Friday 24 December 2021. Once it had been approved by Cabinet and Full Council at the budget setting meeting on Tuesday, 22 February 2022 then calculation and production of 2022-2023 Council Tax bills including the approved CTRS would commence from Wednesday, 23 February 2021 · The consultation had been live for just over four weeks and two hundred responses had been received already; the Head of Revenues & Benefits had spoken with the person hosting the server for the consultation and he had advised that it was a very good response considering how early in the consultation it was · The Head of Revenues & Benefits had received the contact information from the Community Involvement Officer for various third party organisations that may have more information about certain groups of people to consult and the best method to reach them. The Head of Revenues & Benefits had scheduled those meetings in the near future · The team had taken a high number of calls regarding the consultation and had provided assistance to them over the phone · The team were conscious of digital poverty and had sent hard copies of the documents out to certain groups to make it easier for them to respond
The Head of Revenues & Benefits encouraged all Members to contact their residents and ensure that they were aware of the consultation and the need for them to compete it. The Revenues & Benefits Team were there to assist, and the Head of Revenues & Benefits asked that Members refer any resident or groups who were having trouble completing the document to the service.
The Head of Revenues & Benefits fielded questions from Members and explained that:
· The service was not monitoring the types of people that were responding to the consultation as the responses were fed to a hosted server however Members should be assured that invites would be issued to every single existing claimant ... view the full minutes text for item 17. |
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LIFT - Outcomes Update Minutes: The Committee was provided with information on outcomes to date from the Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT).
The Head of Revenues & Benefits undertook a demonstration of the LIFT system at the previous Committee so that Members were aware of how the system worked and the types of information it stored. Since that meeting, further information had been collected and it was the intention of the Head of Revenues & Benefits to bring regular reports on the outcomes of interventions using the LIFT system to the Committee.
The Head of Revenues & Benefits directed Members attention to page 44 of the report and updated Members on the progress of the three objectives of the system:
The Head of Revenues & Benefits fielded questions from Members and explained that:
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Annual review of the Information Governance Shared Service Additional documents: Minutes: The Committee was provided with a copy of the annual review that has been conducted in respect of the Information Governance Shared Service with Medway Council.
The Director (Corporate Services) advised that the Council were supportive of the shared service continuing but it was recognised that there were several actions that needed to be undertaken to improve the service for the coming year:
Cllr Hills praised the Service and also praised the Legal Shared Service as he felt the newly appointed officers had vastly improved the level of service received.
The Chair thanked the Director (Corporate Services) for her report.
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Corporate Performance Report: Q2 2021-22 Additional documents: Minutes:
The Committee was presented with an update against the Performance Management Framework, as introduced within the Council’s Corporate Plan, for Quarter Two 2021-22 (July to September 2021).
The Head of Revenues & Benefits directed Members attention to appendix two, gave a statistical overview of the Councils performance indicators that pertained to his service and advised the Committee on the latest updates:
PI23 - Average processing time taken for Housing Benefit claims (days)
PI 24 - Average processing time for changes of circumstance in Housing Benefit claims (days)
· As at end of October, the average processing time for 5.5 days which showed a downward trend · The national average was 7 days and the average processing time for KCC District Councils was also 7 days · The service was in the top quartile for most accurate claim processing turnaround times; far higher than the national average · As at the end of October, Council Tax collection stood at 65.5% and Business Rates Collection had decreased by 5% from last year’s figures. The decrease in Business Rates Collection was due to the Government changing the Retail Discount Scheme on 01 July 2021 from 100% relief to 66% relief. The Council had to rebill all businesses and charge them for the additional 34% from July 2021 onwards; in order to assist businesses with the additional payments, their bills were spread out to the end of March 2022 · The collection had also been affected by limited court dates being made available as courts were clearing the backlog of court cases deferred due to the pandemic. However, the council has obtained additional court dates recently to enable movement of recovery action to a more formal stage for appropriate cases. PI 26 - Total number of reported corporate complaints
· Of the 79 complaints received in quarter two, only three went to stage three complaints
PI 50 - Total number of people signed up to citizens access
· There were 10681 users of citizens access; a 69% increase from this time last year
PI 49 - % of posts involved in shared service arrangements
· All officers and nearly all Members had been transferred over to Microsoft Office 365 with positive feedback reported · Members were encouraged to report any concerns or requests for additional training to ... view the full minutes text for item 20. |