Agenda

• the ordinary meeting held on 16 October 2018.

To receive and consider the attached report by the Cabinet held on 6 November 2018 (recommendations to follow).

To receive and consider the attached report by the Cabinet held on 6 November 2018 (recommendations to follow).

To receive and consider the attached report and recommendations by the Governance & Audit & Standards Committee held on 2 November 2018.

To consider the Chief Executive's attached report.

Standing Order (32(d)) requires a vote by members before each motion to determine whether or not the motion is to be debated at the meeting or stand referred to the Cabinet or relevant Committee (including Scrutiny) to report back to a future meeting.

Proposed by Councillor Ryan Brent

Seconded by Councillor Scott Payter-Harris

Portsmouth City Council’s Children and Families Directorate was recently inspected by Ofsted under the new ILACS inspection framework, this took place between 3rd - 14th September 2018. It is with great pride after the publication of the report, Portsmouth City Council can say that the service that children and families receive is now overall good.

Over the last four years the previous Conservative Administration worked hard to improve standards in Children's Social Care. This followed an inspection which took place between 25th June - 16th July 2014 ,just 21 days after the new administration had been formed. The rating of the service was ‘Requires Improvement’.

A new strategy and focus was introduced to improve the service which involved a new senior management team being appointed.  The approach adopted by the previous Conservative administration involved targeting specialist help to ‘families in need’, as a way of supporting children remaining with their families and avoiding them being taken into the care of the Local Authority. The strategy over the last four years has led to the first overall ‘Good’ Ofsted rating of the service since the 2010 Children’s Services Annual Assessment.

This council therefore,

1.         Places on record its sincerest congratulations and appreciation to all of the hard-working officers involved within the Children and Families Directorate who achieved an overall good inspection outcome for the city

2.         Recognises that the inherited Conservative strategy facilitated the 2018 inspection outcome under the current Liberal Democrat administration

3.         Encourages all members to continue to embrace their responsibilities as corporate parents

4.         Asks the cabinet and lead member to continue to support and prioritise the work of the Children and Families Directorate

Proposed by Councillor Suzy Horton

Seconded by Councillor Leo Madden

Portsmouth City Council notes that, as a result of ongoing Government Cuts, Portsmouth schools have lost over £3.7m in overall funding between 2015 and 2020, with the schools in the most deprived areas experiencing bigger cuts.

PCC knows that this loss of money can result in increasing classroom sizes, staff losses, reductions in SEN funding and the narrowing of the curriculum.

PCC notes all the work that finance officers and Schools Forum have done to mitigate the worst impact of the transition to the National Funding Formula locally and the efforts schools make on a daily basis to protect children from the cuts.

PCC notes the £400m allocated as ‘in year bonuses’ to all schools in the recent Budget by the Chancellor, and whilst acknowledging that something is better than nothing, asserts that this is a distraction from the serious issue of long term underfunding of schools.

PCC resolves to:

Resist the Government’s on-going cuts to school budgets and call for more funding to be invested in education

Call on the Government to fully fund the pay increase for teachers

Support all schools and organisations campaigning against cuts

Ask the city’s two MPs to seek to ensure that the government provides better funding for schools

Proposed by Councillor Suzy Horton

Seconded by Councillor Ben Dowling

Portsmouth City Council believes that educational outcomes for children are better when they attend school regularly, so that they can benefit from all the opportunities both in terms of gaining qualifications and wider social and emotional development.

The council notes that, whilst attendance has increased in the last few years, Portsmouth absence rates are still below average with 1 in 5 children missing at least a week’s school through unauthorised absence last year.

The newly launched Portsmouth City Council two year attendance campaign, ‘Miss School, Miss Out’ (#missschoolmissout) aims to reduce the number of absences in Portsmouth schools by focusing on aspirational and hard hitting messages of the importance of school attendance.

The aspirational ‘What could you become?, together with the “Your life depends on it’, themes, highlight to children and parents the seriousness of non-attendance on future opportunities.

PCC resolves to ask the Cabinetto support the campaign by:

engaging with schools and local communities in challenging absenteeism to encourage city-wide consistency with the campaign 

Using social media, working alongside Headteachers and other staff in every ward in the city to roll out and enhance the campaign

Promoting Portsmouth as a city where school attendance and quality of education is a top priority and source of pride.

Proposed by Councillor Luke Stubbs

Seconded by Councillor Donna Jones

Council notes the ongoing nationwide shift in spending power away from High Streets and towards online and out-of-town shopping.  It notes that town and city centres across the country have contracted in recent years and that regrettably Portsmouth is no exception.

Council therefore welcomes the Chancellor’s announcement of a reduction by a third in business rates for retail premises, restaurants and pubs with a rateable value below £51,000.  It also welcomes the government’s new Future High Streets Fund, which will make £675m available of investment money to support High Streets across England.

While the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has not yet published details of how the fund will work, Council calls on the Cabinet to draw up a bid or bids once the criteria become clear.

Proposed by Councillor Matthew Winnington

Seconded by Councillor Claire Udy

This council expresses severe concern at the effect on local residents being turned down for Personal Independence Payment and Employment and Support Allowance as a result of decisions made on the back of medical assessments.

This is putting many Portsmouth people in serious financial difficulty and having a really detrimental impact on people's mental and physical health.

Of most concern is that if people do get turned down for Personal Independence Payment or Employment and Support Allowance that should they go through the appeal process then 53% of Employment and Support Allowance claimants are successful with their appeals in Portsmouth and 75% of Personal Independence Payment claimants. This adds up to a staggering cost of between £249,100 and £274,750 in administration monetary cost alone for the Mandatory Reconsideration and Appeal processes on top of the confusion, anxiety and damage to daily life the delay in getting the benefit they are entitled to.

With Universal Credit rolling out these consequences of these dreadful decisions by the Department for Work and Pensions will only get worse with the money available less for the majority of disabled Universal Credit claimants compared to Employment and Support Allowance.

This council therefore asks Cabinet to commit to call on the Department for Works and Pensions to immediately completely review its decision making process so that correct decisions are made straight away for Portsmouth people rather than people only getting paid after a lengthy and costly appeal process. This will be done by a letter and ongoing lobbying from any members of this council who wish to sign it to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.