Agenda item

Derbyn diweddariad ar waith y Gr?p Gweithredu Asesu Cymunedol ynghylch yr Asesiad Lles.

The Chair welcomed Dr Brendan D’Cruz to the meeting and thanked him for his attendance.

Dr Brendan D’Cruz began by thaning the the Joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee of Cwm Taf PSB for allowing him the time and opportunity to provide them with an update on the work towards the Community Assessment Action Group.

Dr Brendan D’Cruz continued his update and outlined the key points as follows:

The Approach

As set out in the briefing paper, there is a requirement under the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act to undertake an assessment of Wellbeing and the guidance sets out the specific elements that the assessment must contain.

The approach being taken in is to jointly undertake the work with both Bridgend PSB and the Cwm Taf Morgannwg Regional Board (RPB) so that we collaborate in how we engage with the communities that we all serve. To that end we have established one joint Community Assessment Action Group to oversee the work needed for both the PSB’s Well-being Assessment and the RPB’s Population Needs Assessments. We also have the support of Co-Production Network for Wales supporting our commitment to improving how we engage and involve the people and our communities.

Members were reminded of the update from Dr Tom Powell, Chair of the Community Assessment Action Group, at the last JOSC meeting in September. Work has continued as planned since then, and Councillor Caple was also welcomed to the Group.

·       Engagement Group

The Engagement Group met on a weekly basis and have produced and shared bilingual toolkits to support colleagues and groups with carrying out engagement work. Through RPB and PSB support teams, alongside members of the Engagement group we have spoken with groups ranging from Knit and natter to Brownies, Girl Guides and Rangers. We have used the Community Hubs and Neighbourhood Networks, established under the Thriving Communities objective, to speak with people and have promoted a conversation tool for people to fill in as best suits them (online, bilingual and easy read). We have also joined in with Veterans groups, ASD Rainbows, attended Remembrance Festivals and family fun days as well as bespoke ‘hackathon’ events such as sessions for older people, people with learning disabilities and mental health.

PSB grant money has also been used to support community level engagement activity through the region’s county voluntary councils, namely Interlink RCT, Voluntary Action Merthyr Tydfil (VAMT) and Bridgend Association of Voluntary Organisations (BAVO).

We also carried out three ‘Better Futures’ sessions online with young people (aged 15 – 25) from across the region to think about what they want the future to look like, and what needs to change to achieve or create it.

To try and reach as large and as broad an audience as possible, we decided to extend the period of engagement beyond the 100 days initially discussed through our work with Co-Production Network Wales. December 17^th (today) is the official end of the work, and the online conversation tool will be closed this afternoon. The Co-Production Network have also been asked to provide additional support to analyse all the engagement notes and products. An engagement report will be produced summarising key findings and reflecting the scope of the conversations held, this is expected on 14 January and will be fed into the draft Assessment document.

The Engagement Group needs to consider how it wants to continue now that the initial phase of activity has passed. There is an appetite to keep momentum going, but there needs to be commitment and resourcing to allow this to happen, as well as understanding and appreciation from all levels about the value that comes from working in a more co-productive way.

·       Data Group

The Data Group has met for a total of five times. The first four sessions focused on a different pillar of well-being – cultural, economic, environmental and social – and the most recent one (26 November) considering the draft data report compiled by Practice Solutions Limited (PSL). There’s been a good representation from across the partnership, and broader, bringing together a wide range of information that captures what it means to live, work and be in Cwm Taf Morgannwg.

PSL have produced a Data Report that will form part of the Assessment using information supplied by partners and initial findings have also been discussed as part of the engagement process and ‘sense checking’.

This has been shared with Bridgend PSB members at their 13 December meeting as well as Cwm Taf PSB via email. It is available as a background paper for JOSC (page 22 of the pack). The next stages are for it to be quality assured and go to PSL’s design team.

·       What next?

We are expecting the draft Assessment – bringing together the data and engagement reports by the end of January and have asked for Members to nominate themselves to be part of a small PSB working group to scrutinise and sign off assessment for consultation by 7 February.

This will then be sent for translation, along with all other relevant materials like the fact sheets, to begin our statutory consultation on 14 February. The consultation period will run from 14 February to 28 March and during this time it will be sent to all partners for opportunity to give a formal response, as well as the Office of Future Generations Commissioner and Welsh Government. It will also be shared for comment online and sent to those who have left contact details during the earlier engagement work. We are also intending on returning to those groups who have contributed so that they can see how their information has been used, and they remain part of the process. We would also welcome involvement from the Joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee in this phase.

That then leaves us with April to undertake any final revisions, respond to feedback and produce, design and translate the final Assessment product ahead of publication on 30 April 2022.

Following the update, Members were provided with the opportunity to ask questions.

The Chair began the discussion and noted that he went to the meting of the Action Group and noted that during the meeting there was some frustration by officers that exercise is undertaken every 5 years but that the policies of Government are not being influenced. Dr Brendan D’Cruz agreed and noted that this is something that’s been picked up in his conversations with officers. Members were advised that there is a meeting in January to start to think about how things can be done differently and where change can be influenced going forward. The Chair agreed and noted that Scrutiny can consider what influence this change has had on people’s lives and what can be done going forward. The Senior PSB Support Officer acknowledged this point and noted that the frustration is that it can feel like a lip service exercise and that time is spent gathering what matters to communities but that no real change is then delivered for them. It was noted that a lot of the god work by community groups is through short term funding and not sustainable. The Chair agreed and felt that this is something the Committee could certainly look at going forward.

Discussions ensued and Mr Mel Jehu, Co Opted Member, commented that a community risk assessment wouldn’t be needed if, on a daily basis, the community needs were actually aligned to the strategic vision of what the organisation was doing and where the community members were actually feeding into that vision. Further to this, Mr Jehu also added that the members of the community regard community assessments as just processes and what the community care about is what is actually happening to them on a day to day basis. Mr Jehu referenced a document produced by the Health Board titled ‘Our Community – Your Health’ and urged Dr D’Cruz to link in with Natasha Weeks, the Communications Lead Officer on this project, to enhance the work of the Action Group. Dr D’Cruz acknowledged this point and noted that this will be taken forward. The Chair agreed with the points raised by Mr Jehu and noted that the Scrutiny Committee wants to see what’s changed since last time and not to keep going through this exercise every 5 years.

Following the update, Members RESOLVED to acknowledge the update on the work of the Community Assessment Action Group by Dr D’Cruz.