Agenda and minutes

1  To highlight reports or appendices which officers have identified as containing exempt information, and where officers consider that the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information, for the reasons outlined in the report.

2  To consider whether or not to accept the officers recommendation in respect of the above information.

3  If so, to formally pass the following resolution:-

RESOLVED – That the press and public be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the following parts of the agenda designated as containing exempt information on the grounds that it is likely, in view of the nature of the business to be transacted or the nature of the proceedings, that if members of the press and public were present there would be disclosure to them of exempt information, as follows:

   No exempt items have been identified.

No exempt items.

To identify items which have been admitted to the agenda by the Chair for consideration.

(The special circumstances shall be specified in the minutes.)

None.

To receive any apologies for absence.

Michael Healey, Rita Ighade, Roderic Morgan, Jackie Worthington.

To confirm as a correct record, the minutes of the meeting held on 21^st December 2018.

The Chair opened the meeting, welcomed the attendees, and introduced Ian Parr who has taken over from Lee Ward.

SI commented that previous minutes from the various tenant’s groups, such as the Repairs and Investment Group, High Rise Strategy group and VOLT have not all been updated to the Leeds City council website and are seemingly some months behind. The Scrutiny Officer (KM) agreed to take this back and clarify procedures to ensure all obligations were being met. An explanation was offered that minutes of these meetings are not normally uploaded until they are approved at the following meeting, which can lead to a one or two month delay depending on whether meetings are monthly or bi-monthly.

JG reiterated that for the Tenant Scrutiny Board there is a 10 day limit to publish the minutes, and that the agenda should be published at least 10 days prior to the meeting.

RESOLVED – The minutes of the previous meeting held on 21 December 2018 were passed as a true record

The Board discussed and agreed at their October meeting recruitment to the Board and the need to make this a priority piece of work for the Board during this municipal year. This report gives an update on progress in this area of work since the last meeting.

KM updated the board members that the leaflet shown to them in a previous meeting advertising the various ways to become involved with the TSB had been circulated via email to over 1000 tenants who had expressed an interest in being involved during either their annual home visit or in response to the STAR survey. The leaflets circulated on Facebook had been seen by over 5,000 people, with approximately 300 engagements (likes/shares/comments etc.). KM advised he had received four responses from interested individuals, and is in the process of contacting them via phone and email to obtain further details having undertaken the appropriate checks to ensure the individuals are not in rent arrears, and have no antisocial behaviour/neighbour dispute issues. JG mentioned that he has heard from another potentially interested individual and will pass details on to KM.

SI enquired whether KM had spoken to the individuals, expressing that anybody who responded should receive a personal response and not a generic reply via email or telephone. KM confirmed he had spoken with two respondents and had left answerphone messages with the other two.

KM acknowledged that the global email that was sent out may have been deemed impersonal (as it was addressed form Tenant Engagement Team), but assured the members this was to manage responses noting that anyone contacting the office would be passed directly on to KM or contacted directly as soon as possible.

SB enquired about a letter she had received from a Tenant Engagement Officer (TEO) in the post, advertising the HAPs and other ways to be involved with LCC. SB asked whether the details of any respondents to that letter would also be passed on to KM. KM clarified that responses to targeted letters sent out to tenants in specific HAP areas would be passed to the appropriate TEO to follow up.

JG asked if SI wished to lead on issues of recruitment and provide future updates to the board, as he particularly had expressed concern in this area. SI agreed and there were no objections from any of the other board members. SI noted that following last month’s previous suggestion that current members of the HAPs should be able to join the TSB, advice from Legal Services confirmed this would be a conflict of interest and therefore not possible. DL added that this was an issue raised when the three ALMO tenant scrutiny panels became one, and that it was agreed that there would be a conflict of interest.

JG enquired about progress on his request to meet with Housing Leeds and Legal & Democratic Services (governance) to which KM advised he is putting together a briefing note for the head of service and will update the board when further details are confirmed.

JG informed the board that the recruitment flyer posted on Twitter had not displayed correctly and he advised the communications team to remove it. KM said he was unaware of this, and told the board as far as he knew the leaflet was  ...  view the full minutes text for item 55.

The Board is requested to receive the update on Estate Standards at appendix 1 and raise any questions with the manager in attendance for this item.

JG introduced David Longthorpe (Head of Housing Management, Resources & Housing) to discuss the two recommendations given a monitoring brief by the board.

Recommendation 3 – That the Council introduces the best waste collection solution for individual estates, even if that results in variations across the city

DL discussed the first monitoring brief regarding the refuse service, referring to the issue with the bin rooms for the Wortley blocks being closed off and unusable while repairs were taking place. DL confirmed repairs have been concluded and the chutes and bin room are operational.

DL advised the Refuse Service will be conducting a review of waste strategy, concerning the collection routes taken and new housing built since the previous review 10 years ago, which is estimated to take approximately six months to complete. The Refuse Service are aiming to align their strategy with national guidelines released in December, and are working with WRAP to assess how collection and recycling systems can be changed and/or improved. The standardisation of collection around Leeds with the collection service in other authorities would be beneficial to increase the amount of recyclable waste, and ways to achieve this goal are being considered.

JG raised an issue that waste collection is not tailored to the needs of high rise blocks or individual streets where access can be problematic and would require a more bespoke approach.  DL confirmed there are already some bespoke solutions in place, for example having a kerbside bag collection on streets that are too steep for wheelie bins, but the review will help to solve further issues that are not yet satisfactorily dealt with.

PM pointed out that there used to be stickers on wheelie bins that told residents what kinds of waste may be put in bins and asked if they were still in use. DL answered that the stickers and letters are expensive to produce and distribute to every Leeds household, and the same information can be more cheaply and effectively accessed online. Residents’ awareness of recyclable material can also be increased if new collection services for glass and food for example were introduced in line with existing collections in other authorities.

SB asked if there were bespoke strategies for each high rise block, and suggested solutions might be found by discussing issues with the cleaners. DL clarified the strategy is primarily to deal with the external removal of waste from the blocks and not the internal waste, but chutes are provided, and much work is put in to educate residents about the potential fire hazard and risk of leaving rubbish in corridors and other communal spaces. Regarding external solutions, DL gave examples of some blocks having more frequent collections and others having outside bin storage to keep in line with the needs of the block.

JG asked about the issue of overflowing bins, as if bins are too full or there are large items in them they are not taken by the collections. JG asked if fly tipping was still as big  ...  view the full minutes text for item 56.

The Boards inquiry in 2016/17 municipal year focused on East Leeds Responsive Repairs Service. It was agreed regular updates would be provided by Housing Leeds on progress of recommendations made. 

Appendix 1 shows the current outstanding recommendations which will be discussed at this meeting.

JG introduced Simon Jarman and Rob Goor to discuss the new repairs system.

Recommendation 2 – Implement and roll out the Total Works system.

SJ told the board the new repairs system TOTAL has now been rolled out across all of Leeds Building Services.

Recommendation 3 – Implement new working practices through Total Works, in relation to creating additional appointments, by reducing waiting times and increased tenant satisfaction.

The TOTAL platform records all orders, labour, and charges, and will incorporate a feature called Optimise which was due to be in use during 2018 but is now scheduled to be trialled in March 2019. The Optimise system acts as a calendar which shows operatives their appointments for the day, can plan journeys and track the time taken per job, re-arranging jobs where necessary or allocating them to other operatives.

The system can show updates on the progress of jobs, and incorporates mapping, so jobs can be attended faster and resolved faster resulting in higher customer satisfaction. The new scheduling system will replace the current manual timesheet system and will allocate each operative 7.5 hours of jobs per day, tracking productivity by time stamping live jobs to ensure they are not over-running.

RESOLVED - Position Status agreed as (4.) Not fully implemented (Progress made acceptable. Continue monitoring)

Recommendation 6 – Administration on repairs performance is improved – so that orders are closed down in a timely manner on systems, including sub-contractor orders. This will ensure that performance reporting is not adversely affected. 

Van stocks are also being reviewed, aiming to reduce the number of times an operative has to visit the stores. TOTAL will also incorporate an out of hour’s system that can allocate jobs at any time, or schedule a repair for the first thing the next day. Monthly meetings are in place with subcontractors to chase up projects that are nearing deadline and need to be resolved as a priority. LBS is seeking to utilise a subcontractor portal which will reduce the administration of allocating jobs, and allow subcontractors to report on repairs in the same way as other LBS operatives. The TOTAL system will be trialled with a smaller repairs subcontractor of around 35 staff before being rolled out across all responsive repairs in the future. SJ offered to bring to a future meeting a live demonstration of the TOTAL system.

JG noted the TOTAL system had been introduced as a simple way of streamlining the repairs process, however Simon Costigan had revealed to him there have been glitches that have slowed the progress somewhat. JG asked how the vans are currently stocked, and if the current process of stocking vans was still in place. SJ answered they are still stocked with a variety of items for various jobs, and are still partnered with Wolseley for re-stocking. Wolseley had promised 100% delivery to site, however this is not always possible especially in responsive repairs as opposed to voids or pre-planned repairs. RG stated that a target of 100% deliveries  ...  view the full minutes text for item 57.

The Board previously resolved a workplan will be provided in all future agenda packs. It should be noted that the workplan does not have a main inquiry at present as the Board agreed to focus on recruitment.

Members of the Board are requested to :-

•  Note the 2018/19 municipal year’s work programme

•  Consider matters outlined in this report, and raised during the meeting.

•  Agree or amend the overall work schedule as the basis of the Board’s work for the remainder of the 2018/19 municipal year.

JG told the board that he had proposed that Sheltered Housing (Retirement Life) is to be on the agenda for the next meeting, and provided an update that LASBT would now be an agenda item for April, as LASBT are currently undertaking a review of the service and so it would be worthwhile waiting until the review is over before being discussed.

SI asked if guests to future meetings would be able to submit a report to the board members prior to meetings so members had an opportunity to read beforehand and frame any questions they might wish to ask. JG clarified that the reports in this meeting were not new information and so did not require a new report, but that guests generally do offer to send reports prior to attending a meeting. KM offered to enquire with Sheltered Housing about information being shared with board members before the next meeting.

JG informed the board that he will be on holiday from 29 January to 6 February.

Friday 15^th February 2019 at 1:15pm

(Pre meeting for all Board members at 1:00pm)

The next meeting will take place on Friday 15 February at 1:15pm

(Pre-meeting for all board members at 1:00pm)

THE MEETING CLOSED AT 2:55 PM