Agenda item

In accordance with Procedural Rule 10.5, the Presiding Member has granted permission for Full Council to determine whether this Urgent Motion should be:

• Discussed at the meeting; or

• Deferred until the next meeting to consider with the benefit of written Officer advice; or

• Referred for consideration and decision to the Executive or a Committee.

To consider the following Urgent Notice of Motion standing in the names of County Borough Councillors A O Rogers; D Wood, K Morgan, S Evans, D Grehan, H Gronow, P Evans and A Ellis.

Despite the email from the Chief Executive sent to Members at 1326 hrs yesterday, this Council regrets that it had no prior information of plans to discontinue the inhouse provision of the night mobile homecare service.  All Members were made aware of this proposal via an email sent two days ago by staff working in the service who were summoned to attend a meeting with officers and unions last week to be told that it was intended to outsource the service to other providers in the private/independent sector.

This flies in the face of the Council's commitment to retain directly provided services where the staff are paid on National Terms and Conditions.  It is unforgiveable that such a change to a much valued and necessary service, was being considered, until yesterday, by management under an unpublished operational delegated decision.

The Cabinet Work Programme had also been varied, whereby both the Annual Director of Social Services report and the draft Adult Services Strategy which were to be considered in July, are now rescheduled to be considered in October 2023.   Should these reports have been considered in July as planned then members would at least have had some information about the proposal to discontinue the night service.

The Operational Delegated decision now being published goes some way to answer the concerns of Members about due process, however what it doesn't do is authorise the officer decision in March to not take referrals, thus deliberately running down the service creating the statement in the CEO email that " the current arrangements no longer presents the most effective means of providing this care and support. ".  

Under these circumstances it is important to establish how officers can use operational authority to reduce a service, with the ultimate aim of removing it, without the knowledge and consent of Members.

This Council therefore requests that the CEO make a statement today, before recess, as to:

-          Why the service was deliberately run down in March and no delegated decision notice was published announcing that change. 

-          How the removal of a service is allowed to be defined as an operational decision as opposed to a Cabinet/Full Council decision.

Following consideration, it was RESOLVED to adopt the Urgent Notice of Motion and the Chief Executive provided the following statement:

“Members will recall the budget strategy agreed by Council on 8^th March 2023, at which time the Council agreed a budget strategy that closed an unprecedented budget gap of £38 million. The budget strategy was subject to a comprehensive consultation exercise and in advance of the provisional settlement from Welsh Government, the Council had already started consultation on several key service changes that had wide ranging implications across our communities, including those to waste services and community meals.

The review of the support at home night mobile service was considered as part of the service efficiencies and operational service reconfiguration savings agreed as part of the budget strategy. In the context of increasing demand and ongoing budget pressures the Council continuously reviews all its services across the Council, including its social care provision in line with the Council’s medium term financial planning arrangements and performance management framework.

To provide Members with some context, the Council’s wider support at home service provides nearly 17,000 hours of care and support at home each week to 1,431 adult residents across Rhondda Cynon Taff through its commissioned and in house services, in discharge of our statutory duties under the Social Services & Well-being (Wales) Act.

The support at home night mobile service is a small discretionary service that is generally used to reduce the length of time between the last call in the evening and the first call in the morning, with some calls during the night to help with continence care. The service provides up to 145 hours of care per week, supporting 46 people.

There is no statutory requirement to provide a home care service at night and to the best of our knowledge, this service is not provided by any other Council in Wales. As this discretionary service was subject to review as part of the budget strategy and ongoing medium term financial planning arrangements, pending that review, from April the care and support needs of new clients were met through alternative provision and no additional people were added to the night mobile service so as not to raise expectations and to ensure continuity of care provisions for those adults.

The review of the service was commenced due to the relatively high cost of the service, the limitations of the service due to its small size and its discretionary nature. There has not been any intention to run the service down since March; this inefficiency was already identified based on the service at the time the budget strategy was agreed.

The review has determined that the care and support needs of the individuals receiving this service can be reviewed and reassessed to make alternative care and support arrangements to meet their assessed needs and this provision can be made through existing in-house and commissioned services. We will not be outsourcing the night mobile service.

In terms of the decision, this was made as a delegated operational decision to implement the service efficiencies and operational service reconfiguration savings already agreed as part of the budget strategy. The decision does not require any changes to the Council’s policy or strategic direction regarding support at home or social care; it merely responds to the needs of adults receiving care and support in a different way. Therefore, the decision has been properly made by the Interim Director for Social Services in accordance with the Council’s scheme of delegation.

I appreciate that this has caused concern to our staff, the trade unions and members are quite rightly concerned about the impact on our valued workforce and of course those people in receipt of this service. I have already dealt with the arrangements to review and reassess the needs of the adults receiving the service and I can assure members that the Council will work closely with the trade unions to support its staff through this difficult time. No compulsory redundancies will be required, and we will manage this through the Council’s management of change policy. Staff will have the options of voluntary redundancy, voluntary early retirement, or redeployment within the service.

Although I am fully satisfied that this decision has been properly made by the Interim Director of Social Services, and that the changes proposed are necessary, I accept that the manner in which the trade unions were consulted in advance and staff notified was not handled as well as we would expect and for that I apologise to the trade unions and staff involved. I also apologise for the concern this has caused to members of this Council. These are areas I will ensure are improved going forward”.