Apologies were received from the following members of the Committee:  Councillors Chris Naylor and Sam Walmsley.

Others present at the meeting:

Councillor Roger Evans – Portfolio Holder for Finance,

Councillor Ruth Houghton – Portfolio Holder for Social Care

Councillor Julian Dean – Group Leader, Green and Progressive Independent

Claire Braddock, Scrutiny Officer, Tim Collard, Service Director – Legal and Governance, Tom Dodds, Scrutiny Manager, James Walton, Executive Director – Resources, Billy Webster, Service Director - Strategy 

Members are reminded that they must declare their disclosable pecuniary interests and other registrable or non-registrable interests in any matter being considered at the meeting as set out in Appendix B of the Members’ Code of Conduct and consider if they should leave the room prior to the item being considered. Further advice can be sought from the Monitoring Officer in advance of the meeting.

In relation to the public question submitted, Councillor Myles-Hook reported that he had previously worked with Price Water House Cooper as a consultant. 

To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on 11 February 2025 (attached) and 22 May 2025 (to follow).

The minutes of the meeting held on 11 February 2025 and 22 May 2025 were confirmed as a correct record.

To receive any questions from members of the public.  Deadline for notification is 12 noon on Tuesday 3 June 2025.

A public question was received from John Palmer asking whether the Committee would scrutinise the Council’s contract with Price Waterhouse Coopers.  The Chairman explained that it was not possible to answer the question currently, this being the first meeting of the committee.  The committee would be collecting and considering proposed topics for its attention under its work programme agenda item and would assess what to cover going forward based on the potential benefits.

The full text of the question is available from here:  public question

To receive any questions of which members of the Council have given notice.  Deadline for notification is 12 noon on Tuesday 3 June 2025.

There were no questions from members. 

To note progress to date in achieving the outcomes of The Shropshire Plan (TSP) and confirm that the KPIs currently agreed remain the same for Q1 of 2025/2026 and thereafter, be aligned to the refresh of TSP in 2025/26.

REPORT TO FOLLOW

The Assistant Director – Transformation introduced the report explaining the continuing work to refine Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) , set targets, and improve benchmarking, and drawing attention to the interactive dashboard.  He referenced areas of success and challenge and reiterated that the Council’s highest priority remained balancing the budget while protecting vulnerable populations.

Members asked questions regarding Shropshire’s performance in timeliness of Education Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) and expressed concern about the backlog and the radical restructure in the team and the 40% deficit in staff, with those remaining being less experienced. The Executive Director - People explained there had been a variety of reasons for the reduction in staff during quarter 4 but reported that the team was now fully staffed with a recovery plan in place to address the backlog and at least achieve the England average time - of 50% completion in 20 working days by quarter 3.  There had been a national increase in demand for EHCPs which related to a range of complex issues, including the covid pandemic.  EHCPs had been suggested as a work programme topic for the People Overview and Scrutiny Committee and the Executive Director offered to arrange a briefing for all councillors if this would be helpful.    

Members also expressed concern about the drop in performance for household waste sent for re-use, recycling and composting in quarter 4, and asked about impact of the garden waste collection charge and introduction and then cancellation of the need to book a timeslot for household recycling sites.  Questions were also asked about the underlying reasons for an increase in households in B&B accommodation and given this trend, plans for temporary accommodation into the future.  The Service Director said he would arrange responses to these questions from the relevant service manager (please see this briefing information at the end of the minutes)

Members asked where responsibility lay for agreeing updated metrics and queried indicators used in the report as the definition of ‘green’ performance appeared to include those less than 2% below target, and some such as the rural deprivation index were significantly out of date.  Member discussion also covered recycling target challenges, positive progress in community services, and numbers in education employment or training.  The impact of National Insurance increases, and reasons why identified savings had not been achieved was also discussed. 

The Service Director explained that the 2% margin for reporting ‘green’ performance was a national standard.  He acknowledged feedback on metrics and confirmed that KPIs would be agreed by Cabinet going forward with input from scrutiny committees.  He thanked members for the useful discussion and reiterated that suggestions and feedback on the dashboard were welcome at any time.

To scrutinise the Financial Outturn and identify issues that may require further investigation by an overview and scrutiny committee

REPORT TO FOLLOW

The Executive Director of Resources presented the report which provided a review of Shropshire Council's 2024/25 financial performance highlighting an overspend of over £34 million due to pressures in a number of areas including children’s services, school transport and adult social care.  He also set out the impact of the cumulative effect of demand pressures, inflation, funding shortfalls, non-delivery of savings and income generation delays. 

The Executive Director answered questions from members covering a number of areas including: Strategic Management Board costs;’ reasons for overspends and non-achievement and delays in making savings; costs associated with voluntary redundancies; the Dedicated Schools Grant; ringfencing of the Housing Revenue Account and complications around identification of statutory services and discretionary services;

The new Portfolio Holder for Finance said that £47.2m of the £90m of savings identified for 2024 – 25 had been achieved, which meant that £42m had been rolled on to the 2025-26 financial year and a total of £60m of savings would be required.

The Chairman highlighted the need for scrutiny committees to be proactive and look in more depth at areas consistently overspending and at the reasons for non-achievement of savings to ensure scrutiny attention was adding value and best use was made of committee time.   

To scrutinise financial performance at Period 1 and identify issues that may require further investigation by an overview and scrutiny committee

REPORT TO FOLLOW

The Executive Director – Resources summarised the period 1 report which gave a very early view of the Council’s financial position and highlighted savings of £60m, a projected overspend of £13.884m and forecast a small positive general fund balance of £349,000 at year end.  It was noted that an authority of this size should have a have a general fund balance of between £10m to £20m

During discussion of the report, members emphasised the need for continued openness and early access to financial reports to allow scrutiny committees and members to identify issues and contribute to solutions in good time before cabinet decisions were made. The offer to make reports available via the Members Gateway as soon as they were ready was welcomed. 

Challenges around delivery of non-statutory services; contract arrangements, budget constraints and external factors outside of the control of the council were discussed.   It was noted that effective communication strategies would be needed to manage public expectations and explain the rationale behind financial decisions, such as revenue-generating measures that may initially be unpopular but were necessary for financial stability.

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The report was noted and it was agreed that continuous monitoring and early action on emerging issues would be crucial for effective budget management.

This report from the Member Bullying and Harassment Task and Finish Group details the work undertaken, and recommendations made, in response to any incidents of bullying and harassment faced by elected Members (attached).

Councillor Ruth Houghton, Chair of the Task and Finish Group on Member Bullying and Harassment, reported on the work undertaken by the Group .  She expressed gratitude to the members of the council who had shared personal experiences of harassment, some of which had been very disturbing, these had helped understand the nature and extent of the problem. Police colleagues had also been involved in the work which had been very helpful and helped inform its findings and recommendations. 

The Group had developed a new protocol and flowchart for use by members and had made it available on the Member Gateway so that it was accessible in time for the lead up to the election in May.  Continued collaboration with the police was essential to ensure there was awareness of any wider issues.

In discussion, the committee raised the balance of being accessible as a councillor to the public whilst keeping safe and risks predominantly experienced by female councillors.  It was also agreed to adjust the flowchart to clarify the points of contact system for reporting an incident.  

The Chairman and committee members thanked Cllr Houghton, and all who participated in the Task and Finish Group for an excellent piece of work.  The Committee endorsed the report and recommendations within it and agreed to review progress on a regular basis to ensure that any new learning is captured.    

To discuss  and agree items for the work programme for 2025/2026

The Committee considered proposals for the future work programme and agreed it should include follow ups on previous recommendations to monitor implementation. It would be important that all committees cross-referenced activity to avoid duplication. 

Areas suggested for the work programme included:  use of consultants – costs and benefits; planning enforcement; use of artificial intelligence and digital transformation to maximise efficiency; transport; waste management and community infrastructure.  These would be considered outside of the meeting and proposals narrowed down for discussion at the next meeting. 

To note that the next meeting is scheduled to take place on 8 September 2025.

8 September 2025.

Questions raised at the meeting requiring  follow up response:

Link to the dashboard: Microsoft Power BI

Question

HEn6 % of household waste sent for re-use, recycling and composting

Waste missed target by 6% latest quarter and dropped by 12% between Q2 and Q3- very concerning match it with the cost of the garden waste we all knew would cause a problem, then with booking of the recycling centres people have not gone back to putting their waste where it should be. Is there any move to sort this out before it becomes even worse?

Service Response

The reported figure was for Q3 2024/25 at 45.6%. The Q4 24/25 figures were finalised w/c 23 June 2025 and are newly reported below:

Percentage of household waste sent for re-use, recycling, and composting:

 **Q4 24/25: 43.73%

**Q3 24/25: 46.47%

 **Q2 24/25: 58.61%

 **Q1 24/25: 59.76%

Whilst our latest quarterly figures for Q3 and Q4 are below target of 52.6%, our performance year to date is 53.10% (Q1-Q4 2024-25), exceeding the target.

We will continue to monitor our rates through our monthly contract meetings as the full impact of the implementation of the chargeable garden waste service will not be known until September. 

The option to present food waste within the garden waste bins was previously implemented in Shrewsbury, North Shropshire, and South Shropshire and part of the original contract specification however, this was removed with the introduction of the garden waste subscription. Food waste is now collected within the general waste bin for all residents although the amount that had been collected with the garden waste was not recorded and has had very little impact on our recycling levels.

Question

HEc18 Reduction in households in B&B accommodation

B&Bs why is this increasing, what is the underlying reason for this? what type of issues are people facing?

Given the trend do we have any additional plans for temporary accommodation?

Service Response

B&B numbers are not increasing, there has been a reduction from 90 to 69 quarter on quarter. The reason this is an exception is because this is higher than we expected them to be at this point in time.  We have significantly reduced the number of placements in B&B over the past 6 months and have a number of projects in the pipeline to reduce this further.  Listed below.