Agenda item

To receive reports from the Chairs of the Council’s Scrutiny Committees in accordance with Standing Order 36.  The reports have been attached as follows:

11.1    Resources & Public Realm Scrutiny Committee

11.2    Community & Wellbeing Scrutiny Committee

Members are asked to note that this session will include an opportunity (within the time available) for Non-Cabinet Members to ask questions of relevant Scrutiny Chair’s in relation to the remit of their Committees.

NOTED the update reports provided by the Chairs of the Community and Wellbeing and Resources & Public Realm and Scrutiny Committees.

No additional questions were raised during the open session of this part of the meeting.

Before being presented with the updates from each Scrutiny Committee, the Mayor reminded members the time set aside for this item was 12 minutes, with each Chair having up to three minutes in which to highlight any significant issues arising from the work of their Committees.  Once these updates had been provided, the remaining time available would then be opened up for any other non-Cabinet members to question (without the need for advance notice) the Scrutiny Committee Chairs on matters relating to the work of their Committee.

Councillor Ketan Sheth was then invited to introduce the update report on the work being undertaken by the Community and Wellbeing Scrutiny Committee, with the following issues highlighted:

·             The ongoing work being undertaken by the Scrutiny Committee focussed around the health and wellbeing of residents across Brent.  As part of a busy work programme the Committee had met in September 2021 to review the support and services being delivered for families in the borough who were homeless or at risk of becoming homeless.  At that same meeting the operational performance of Brent Housing Management had also been subject to detailed review, including the framework for resident engagement.  The final recommendations had also been confirmed from the extraordinary meeting of the Committee held in August in response to the CQC inspection of Maternity Services at Northwick Park Hospital.

·             The Committee had held a further extraordinary meeting in October 2021 in order to undertake pre decision scrutiny and review the implications for Brent Housing Management and the Housing Revenue Account in relation to the proposals for ownership and refurbishment of the Granville New Homes Blocks, prior to their consideration by Cabinet.  A number of recommendations were made by the Committee focussed around ensuring the necessary due diligence had been undertaken in terms of the assessment of options and in procuring and monitoring the design and build quality of any similar types of construction work in the future, which Cabinet had agreed to take forward, as appropriate, with the relevant services across the Council.

·             The Committee had also meet in November 2021 to review the Brent Safeguarding Adults Annual Report 2020-21 and focus on multi-agency partnership arrangements, the interim report from their GP Access Task Group and to agree the scope and terms of reference for an upcoming Transitional Safeguarding Task Group.

·             The ongoing engagement of the scrutiny function in the North West London Joint Health Overview & Scrutiny Committee with the next meeting due to be hosted by Harrow in December 2021 including consideration of the transitional arrangements for introduction of the Integrated Care System.

·             As a final comment Councillor Sheth also welcomed (given the remit of the Community Wellbeing Scrutiny Committee) the commitment highlighted earlier in the meeting by Brent Youth Parliament in seeking to engage with the Council to tackle issues relating to safeguarding and sexual harassment within schools.

The Mayor thanked Councillor Ketan Sheth for his update and advised that as Councillor Mashari had given her apologies the report on the activity of the Resources and Public Realm Scrutiny Committee would be noted as submitted.

As a result it was therefore RESOLVED that the contents of both update reports be noted.

Following the updates provided, the Mayor advised that the remainder of time available would be open for questions from non-cabinet members to the Scrutiny Chair in attendance.  As no questions were raised the Mayor moved on to the next item.