Agenda item

To present to the Executive a summary of the operational performance position for quarter three of the financial year 2018/19.

Decision

That the report be noted and that the relevant Portfolio Holders be requested to ensure that management has a focus on those highlighted areas showing deteriorating performance.

None.

Key headlines from performance results in terms of those areas performing well included:

·         the number of users logged into the self-service system MyInfo this quarter had increased from 6,409 last year to 7,651 this year;

·         the in-year collection rate for business rates had surpassed its upper target of 84.22% at a figure of 86.23%;

·         the total number of users of the Council’s health and recreation facilities had increased by 55,176 users since Q3 last year;

·         the satisfaction of Public Protection and Anti-Social Behaviour complainants relating to how the complaint was handled had seen a large increase of 12.4% increasing from 80.3% last quarter to 92.7 % in quarter three;

·         the percentage of premises that were full or broadly compliant with food health and safety inspections had improved on its target of 97% with a figure of 97.6%;

·         the percentage of non-major and major planning applications determined within the government targets were above their targets at 94.51% and 97.96% respectively;

·         the rent collected as a proportion of rent owed had surpassed its target of 96.50% at 99.83%;

·         the current level of tenant arrears was better than the target of 3.50% with a figure of 2.47%, but was still a little higher than at the same time last year at 2.22%;

·         the percentage of reactive repairs completed within target time was above the target of 97.50% with a figure of 98.51%;

·         the number of face to face enquiries at City Hall had decreased again in quarter three to 4,893, compared to 10,388 in quarter three last year.

Areas where performance could be improved included:

·         the average time taken to answer a call in customer services had increased by 73 seconds compared to quarter three last year, at 122 seconds, below the lower target of 50 seconds;

·         the level of outstanding customer changes in the Revenues Team had increased to 401 in quarter three this year, from 80 in quarter three last year;

·         the percentage of waste recycled or composted had decreased from 38.20% in the last year to 34.70% in this year, below its lower target of 35%;

·         the average re-let time calendar days for all dwellings, including major works, was slightly below its lower target of 28 with a figure of 28.35;

·         the percentage of rent lost through dwellings being vacant had deteriorated 0.14% to 0.84% this quarter;

·         the average days taken to process new housing benefit claims had decreased slightly since quarter two but was still below its lower target of 26 at 27 days;

·         the average days taken to process housing benefit claim changes of circumstances was outside its lower target of six with a figure of 8.03;

·         the number of housing benefits and council tax support customers awaiting assessment had increased from last year’s quarter three figure of 556, which was now at 1,339;

·         the number of homelessness applications progressed within the housing team had increased from quarter three last year by 343, now reporting at 526.

It was noted that, following the introduction of Universal Credit in March 2018, there had been a lengthening of time taken in most aspects of housing benefit work. In addition, due to the introduction of the Homelessness Act in April 2018, there was an increased number of applicants relating to homelessness.

In terms of key headlines from corporate measures, the following updates were noted:

·         the overall sickness data for quarter three was 2.45 days per full time equivalent, excluding apprentices. This brought the cumulative total of sick days to 7.28 days which was 2.56 days less than last year and was the lowest quarter three average in the last five years;

·         the cumulative average time across all directorates to respond to formal complaints was 7.9 days, which was an increase of 1.4 days from quarter two in 2017/18;

·         90.2% of all staff appraisals were completed by quarter three in the year 2018/19.

In terms of other achievements this quarter, the Council took part in the national social media publicity event for local government #OurDay, which provided the Council with an opportunity to use Twitter to promote its day to day business. The day was a huge success for local government with 33,000 tweets sent out using the Our Day hashtag from more than 9,000 contributors. The Council’s tweets were liked more than 340 times from Twitter users as far away as Australia and Canada.

It was highlighted that the Transport Hub had won another award, this time for the development project at the Greater Lincolnshire Property Awards 2019 and the Central Car Park had recently won the accolade of best new car park at the Car Park Awards. The Housing and Investment Directorate had also been shortlisted for an award at the UK Housing Awards 2019 for the ‘Homebuilder of the Year – Less Than 1,000 Programme’, with final interviews taking place on 14 March 2019. In addition, the Council had been nominated as a finalist for the Local Government Chronicle Awards 2019 for ‘Council of the Year’, with Matthew Hilman, Maintenance Manager of the Housing Repairs Service, having been nominated for the Rising Star Award.

Councillor Ric Metcalfe was pleased to see the Council, and individuals within the Council, getting the national recognition they deserved for the things they were doing in the city.

Councillor Jackie Kirk praised the work that had taken place in relation to the Social Responsibility Charter and was pleased to see how well it was doing.

Discussion ensued on the success of the Lincoln Lottery and the many good causes for the community it had already provided and influenced. Councillor Metcalfe referred to this as a good example of creative risk taking as a Council.