This is an opportunity for Members of Council to ask the Mayor, Members of the Executive or the Chairman of any Committee or Sub-Committee a question on notice under Procedure Rule 10.2.

The Mayor reported that 5 questions had been received under Procedure Rule 10.2.

(a)        Councillor Wright asked the following question for which he had given notice:

“Please will the Executive Member responsible for Adult Social Care advise on what the average time taken for the provision and set up of care packages in the community for people in Partington (M31 postcode) is from the time any patient from a local hospital is deemed medically fit to be discharged from hospital but requires a care package at home?”

Councillor Stephen Anstee, the Executive Member for Adult Social Care advised that currently the Council does not routinely record waiting times by where people live, therefore, the information requested was not available. However, he explained that all local delays were recorded diligently in accordance with national guidance. The Council monitored daily capacity reports which identified hospital delays by placement and referrer, i.e. which hospital, or part of the health and social care system, i.e. Ascot House. Data from other reports summarised the home care position. The Executive Member stressed that the Council and its teams continued to work extremely hard to eliminate all delays across the Borough and certainly in Partington.

As a supplementary question, Councillor Wright enquired as to the efforts made by the Council to Government to ensure that residents in his ward were not left in hospital waiting for a social care package because of the postcode they lived in.

Councillor Stephen Anstee indicated that he would be happy to follow up on individual cases and was aware of the unique challenges in Partington because of the geographical isolation of the area. The Council was working to remedy this through the creation of a new system for care at home and a new career pathway for Trafford residents wanting to enter the social and health care profession, to be piloted in Partington. The model included salaried staff, providing an opportunity to develop skills in health care as part of a career progression programme. Different methods of recruitment were to be used in an attempt to attract those that may not have considered this type of work before. The design of this scheme would inform the wider Greater Manchester approach to commissioning support at home and was expected to improve the use of staff time by testing a locality based approach together with improving the recruitment and retention of staff and importantly providing a timely service to local residents with improved outcomes. With a go-live date of September 2017, the Executive Member was happy to provide more information to ward Councillors as the scheme progressed.

(b)        Councillor Andrew Western asked the following question for which he had given notice:

“Following a recent letter from Kate Green MP and myself regarding the proposals for Flixton's greenbelt set out in the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework, the Leader of the Council responded stating that "it is not possible to speculate, determine or advise on the status of the original proposed allocations ahead of the publication of the new draft of the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework." Elsewhere in that response, he states that he is "aware of the need to respond to the concerns of the local community". Given that the land in Flixton he has earmarked for the building of 750 homes is owned by the Council does he not agree that it is entirely possible to speculate on the future of this site because the best way to respond to the concerns of the local community would be to rule out selling this land to developers, effectively preventing build on the site now and in the future?”

In response, the Leader of the Council, Councillor Sean Anstee explained that the first round of consultation on the Spatial Framework produced in excess of 24,000 responses across Greater Manchester, including many from Trafford and Flixton in particular, and that it was right and appropriate that they were given the time to be considered, together with the suggestions for alternative sites. The Leader indicated that the reason it was not possible to speculate in advance was that he believed there was unanimous agreement across the Chamber and local authorities across Greater Manchester that production of a spatial framework was the right thing for Greater Manchester and should authorities start to talk about site allocations independently there would be no framework.

Putting a supplementary question, Councillor Andrew Western asked the Leader of the Council to confirm whether the Council owned the land in question and regardless of the outcome of the Spatial Framework, that he could refuse to sell it, if he so wished.

Councillor Sean Anstee thought it was appropriate to read the text of the response he had sent to Kate Green, MP and Councillor Andrew Western, to put into context the differing viewpoints. Expecting that there would be common agreement if Members were asked whether there was a housing crisis and were more homes and affordable housing needed, the Leader also suggested that there would be unanimous agreement if also asked if they wanted accessible green spaces and an environment that was clearly less polluted than it was today. Everyone would agree with those two relative positions but when considered together there would be conflict. Councillor Sean Anstee believed that Councillor Andrew Western was asking him to make a binary choice about in or out, yes or no, when the situation was more complex than that. He also believed there was a political approach to the question and stated that his administration had taken an approach with the spatial framework from day one to work with local communities and local Ward Members to find a solution to the complex issues the Council faced to house its future generations and to suggest otherwise through the question was a position he did not support.

(c)        Councillor Taylor asked the following question for which she had given notice:

“Please can the Executive Member for the Environment inform the Chamber what measures are being taken to hold Amey to account as it is patently obvious from the declining state of the environment in Trafford over the last two years that they are not fulfilling the terms of their contract.”

In the absence of the Executive Member for Highways, Parks and Environmental Services, the Deputy Executive Member Councillor Shaw accepted that there was room for improvement and with that in mind, the Council was working closely with senior management from Amey to improve the whole of the environment across the Borough. In recent months, Amey had brought in additional resources at a managerial level and for front line staff to support the One Trafford Partnership team. Additional resources from the Council were also being deployed to ensure that the Council could monitor and evaluate the impact of improvement actions. Councillor Shaw asked Members to bear in mind that it was a long-term relationship to deliver environment, highway and technical services. Governance arrangements were cross-party and the process for ensuring expected performance was established. Where further improvement work was required efforts were targeted, an example of which was Old Trafford supported by the Council’s Environmental Improvement Team. With all things said, the Deputy Executive Member pointed towards examples of good outcomes, including high recycling rates and 8 green flags across the Boroughs parks and green spaces. However, regards to contractual breaches, these were dealt with according to the mechanisms available within the contract.

Councillor Taylor asked as a supplementary question when residents could expect a reversal in the downward trend and if there was no improvement, when would the contract with Amey be terminated?

The Deputy Executive Member for Highways, Parks and Environmental Services was not in a position to answer the second part of that question but did indicate that there were improvements and with additional resources it could take time to bear fruition, however, the Council were monitoring things very closely.

(d)        Councillor Baugh asked the following question for which she had given notice:

“The, parents, children, past governors and teachers at Bollin Primary School have been subjected to an extremely stressful and disruptive year. Can the Council please explain why it has repeatedly refused to commission an independent investigation into the appointment of the previous Headteacher at the Bollin Primary School and the subsequent events that led from her appointment in September 2016 to the disastrous Ofsted Report in March that placed the school into Special Measures?

This Council has a duty of care under the Council’s governance arrangements to uphold the highest possible standards with particular reference to transparency, reporting and auditing to deliver effective accountability, without an independent investigation, Council is not fulfilling its obligations.”

Councillor Whetton, Executive Member for Children and Families started by saying that no one was happy to see a school in troubled circumstances and that he did commiserate with pupils, parents and teachers on their adverse circumstances. Councillor Whetton was aware that much work had been undertaken to get the school back to where it should be and that an investigation had been undertaken by a distinguished retired police officer. Members were also aware that Ofsted had reported on the school’s performance and the improvements required. In terms of commissioning an independent investigation into the appointment of the previous Headteacher and the subsequent events, he was not convinced of its necessity. Furthermore, he was not content that it was correct to assume that the starting point for any sequence of events was precisely where it was being placed by the question. The Executive Member was unsure why there was a feeling that there had been a lack of investigation given the history and felt certain that an appropriate level of examination had been undertaken and it was time to look to the future and focus all efforts for the benefit of the pupils.

The Executive Member believed that the interim executive body of the school was managing and conducting its business very effectively. There were resources in place to support the Ofsted Improvement Plan in line with the timescales so the work of making progress for the school was well underway and that for him was the priority. As Councillors and school governors, Members were well aware that the lines of responsibility for running schools lay primarily with the governing body. The governing body set the aims and objectives for the school, the policies and targets for achieving these and monitored and evaluated the progress being made towards the aims and objectives. Councillor Whetton considered it vital for schools to review their performance between Ofsted inspections. The Council’s role was not to be running a school but it could and should get involved in helping a school that finds itself in trouble. There were examples of Trafford schools being successfully assisted and he believed that a rapid turn-around was being achieved at Bollin Primary School under the leadership of the team in place, with the assistance of the Council.

Councillor Whetton did not accept that the Council was failing in its duty of care, especially given the rapid and effective way the Council got involved when things started to go wrong, nor did he feel there was an absence of transparency, audit or accountability. He was happy to meet with Councillor Baugh to discuss in more detail but it would not include instigating any further retrospection.

Councillor Baugh asked as a supplementary question why the Council’s own framework for monitoring, challenge, support and intervention in schools, published in September 2016 and presented to governors the last term, was not followed and suggested that if it had been, it would have prevented the events that eventually took place and that the Council should listen to the concerns of parents and the Bollin community as a whole, since only through an independent investigation could lessons be learnt to ensure that a similar situation did not happen again in any other Trafford school.

Councillor Whetton agreed to look into the matter and offered to discuss the issue further with Councillor Baugh. He was unsure as to whether the escalating circumstances that occurred at the school could necessarily have been prevented, however, since everyone involved were receiving mixed messages, the Executive Member was happy for a meeting to include some of the parents and past governors of the school.

(e)        Councillor Mrs. Brophy asked the following question for which she had given notice:

“What is Trafford Council doing to improve grounds maintenance service across the borough, especially for our parks and greens spaces in terms of treatment of weeds, cutting hedges, cutting grassed areas including grass verges.”

Councillor Shaw, Deputy Executive Member for Highways, Parks and Environmental Services, reported that the One Trafford Partnership recognised that it had been a challenging year following a significant number of service changes at the start of the season and that further improvements were required to deliver the quality of service expected of the Council. Work to change the culture throughout the Partnership was well underway with the development and implementation of the supervisor quality site inspection schedule to ensure that supervisors were out on the ground monitoring and assessing the teams. Workshops had been used to examine the current barriers to delivering good service. Work was also ongoing to improve how the Partnership manages the plant and equipment supplier, since it was key to have access to the correct equipment as and when it was needed.

In terms of weed control, Councillor Shaw advised that the Partnership employed two contractors and 14 of the 21 wards had now been completed. Daily updates highlighted any areas that needed mechanical removal which in turn were followed up with inspections. The Partnership acknowledged that grass verges had been a problem and additional resources had been made available to assist in maintaining grass verges across the borough. It was also recognised that further improvements were needed in some parks and the Partnership was working hard to overcome those challenges. However, the Deputy Executive Member indicated that it was worth noting that the Partnership had increased its green flag quota to 8 parks with Lostock Park gaining such status for the first time that year. Additionally, much good work had been done in support of Altrincham, Stretford and Partington in Bloom. Finally, Councillor Shaw reported that following the end of the bird nesting season, hedge cutting had commenced the first week in July.

Asking a supplementary question Councillor Mrs. Brophy, sought more information on work to tackle grass verges and hedges and Councillor Shaw indicated that he was more than happy to meet to through the specifics in detail.