To consider a report from the Interim Director of Human Resources.

The Resourcing Consultant presented the report to the Committee and informed members that the level of spend was close to that of the same period in the previous year. The Committee were notified of the work that was ongoing across the Council around recruitment, retention, and development within the workforce to ensure that staff stayed and grew with the organisation. Work was also ongoing to develop a northwest pledge to agree a set price for agency workers across the region.

The level of agency spend in Quarter 3 had increased since quarter 2, which was in large part due to funding for an adult social care contract which enabled residents to be discharged from hospital. Member’s attention was drawn to the Legal and Democratic department where a large amount had been spent locums to ensure the Council could meet its statutory duties. The total spend for the quarter was just over a £1M and the Committee were assured that the Council continued to use a robust vacancy management programme. When Trafford’s agency spend was compared to the other GM authorities, they were the 7^th Highest out of 10.

Following the introduction councillor Hornby asked whether there was anything that could be done to offer staff more flexible contracts, as she had only heard about people being allowed to work full or half time contracts. Interim Head of Resourcing and Development responded that the Council offered a whole range of flexible working options for staff and noted that it had been some time since this was communicated across the Council and they would look at re-communicating the options.

Councillor O’Sullivan asked whether people who came from Ukraine would be able to work as social workers in the UK. The Chair answered that it was a statutory position and staff needed to have a degree to be able to do the job, which had led to issues in the available workforce with Council’s having to compete with agencies for the limited number of qualified professionals. 

Councillor O’Sullivan knew of one resident was qualified to teach English in Ukraine. The Director of Human resources responded that it depended on whether qualifications were transferable between the countries and assured Councillor O’Sullivan that she would investigate whether that was the case for people from Ukraine.

Councillor Acton asked about the work of the agency staff focus groups and the make-up of those groups. The Resourcing Consultant responded that any agency staff employed for over 13 weeks could come across to work for the Council without penalty. The groups were made up of agency staff who had worked with the Council for a prolonged period but had not decided to switch to work for the Council. The work of those groups was to identify what the barriers preventing them from becoming Council staff. Councillor Acton asked that the information from those groups on why they did not want to switch to work for the Council be shared with the Committee.

Councillor Ennis asked if there were any timescales for the completion of the GM work. In response the Director of HR informed Members that the work was being driven by the combined authority and that the Committee would receive a detailed update once a timeline was available.

RESOLVED: That the report be noted.