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General financial uncertainty.  Unexpected changes to government funding, failure to achieve income or savings targets, and increases in inflation and contractor costs and deteriorating economic environment places further financial restrictions on the Council resulting in difficulty maintaining standards or meeting aims. 

Mark Green

·         Agreed work programmes in transformation and commissioning

·         Budget monitoring in place

·         MTFS in place and monitored

·         Scenario planning in budget setting

·         Strategies for maintaining income (e.g. pricing policies and proactive management of property portfolio)

·         Holding reserves to mitigate impact of financial restrictions

·         Robust risk assessment of new business opportunities

·         Cost recovery through bidding for additional government support for one-off costs and strategic investments

·         Maximise Council Tax to referendum limit

·         Early start to budgetary process for 24-25 to agree key areas

(3 x 5)
15

·         Lobbying to avoid unfavourable financial changes to government funding

·         Identifying measures to address future budget gaps

(4 x 3)
12

Elections Act 2022 implications in terms of Voter ID, Postal Votes and Overseas Voters could lead to greater challenge or failure for a general election in the next year

Angela Woodhouse

·         All usual election risk mitigations are in place including project planning, contingency planning, and risk assessments. 

·         DES Manager on DLUHC BCN group working on Elections Act 2022 implementation and liaising with AEA.

·         Several actions completed around increasing the number of elections staff (including having staff on standby) and more targeted training.

·         Targeted communication plans and training for staff plus increasing the number of staff with electoral administration knowledge

(5 x 4)

20

Contingency planning for post-election challenge impacts. 

(4 x 4)

16

Changes to national shopping patterns and other economic impacts leading to Diminished local retail and leisure sector, limiting the appeal of Maidstone town centre threatening business rates income.

William Cornall

• Regular network meetings with town centre retailers
• Public realm improvement work
• Supporting One Maidstone Business Improvement District
• Work commissioned to promote Maidstone as business destination
• Planning Guidelines documents have now been approved by SPI for the Five town Centre Opportunity sites.  Planning permissions have now been granted on two of these and pre-application advice given in respect of land parcels on Maidstone Riverside.
• Active management of Lockmeadow to enhance the local economy
• Support delivered to the sector through Business Rates grants and assistance grants

• Town Centre Opportunity guidance published and actively being used

• Successful bid to the safer streets fund which has secured £565k investment for community safety in the town centre.

• Acquisition of key property (Grenada House)

(4 x 5)
20

·         Development of a Town Centre strategy to guide the reallocation of land uses within the Town Centre (including retail).

·         The Council has now received a circa £1.2m Shared Prosperity Fund allocation for the next three years.  Officers are in the process of preparing a draft investment plan for the monies for consideration by Members

·         Town Centre Strategy now underway with "We Made That" appointed and work scheduled to complete by Dec 2024.

·         Commencement of Grenada House refurbishment works in Q4 2023/24

(4 x 4)
16

Inflation continues to rise and a significant economic event (e.g. further pandemic impacts, BREXIT, supply chain issues) causes significant changes in construction costs which may also result in a contractor insolvency, as they are generally locked into delivering schemes at a fixed price, and so need to manage their exposure to rising costs in their supply chain.  For the Council, this leads to a narrowing gap between build price and end of property values, increased costs to the Council and a possible time lag in delivery of 1000 affordable new homes, owing to a lack of capacity in the construction sector.

William Cornall

• Use of "off-site" and other Modern Methods of Construction where possible to ensure schemes are delivered efficiently
• Designing buildable efficient schemes
• Financial stability and overall exposure checks for contractor
• Performance bonds and quality monitoring
• Realistically set financial scheme approval hurdle rates

• Appointment of a single architect, employers’ agent and development management specialist as a consistent professional team to support the Council in it delivery of the 1,000 homes programme

• Internal team has been strengthened by the creation of and recruitment into three new roles

(4 x 5)

20

• Exploration of suitable contractor frameworks to access.
• Managing exposure levels to different contractors as the programme gathers momentum.
• Delaying the letting of key contracts if tendering does not yield VFM proposals that are financially robust.
• Careful scheme design evolution to enhance the “buildabilty” of new projects.

(4 x 4)

16

Increased impacts from climate change (including flooding, severe storms, heatwaves, and drought) causes environmental damage reducing residents' quality of life and increasing adaptation support required from the Council.

Angela Woodhouse

·         Air Quality Action Plan in place

·         Emergency planning arrangements in place

·         Parks and open spaces strategy to reduce risk of damage from trees and nature-based mitigation of climate impacts

·         Budget available to deliver actions and additional funding allocated

·         Communication / engagement activities to increase resilience and awareness of residents and businesses for adverse weather events

·         Use of Severe Weather Impacts Monitoring System (SWIMS) to understand impacts of severe weather in borough

·         Member of the Kent Climate Change Network

·         Permanent Biodiversity and Climate Change Manager in post

·         Permanent Biodiversity and Climate Change engagement officer in post to support public and business adaptation to climate change

·         Part of Medway Flood Partnership and Kent Resilience Forum

·         Strong governance arrangements in place with operational board chaired by Director of Strategy Insight and Governance, Fortnightly oversight meetings with the Leader and quarterly reports to Corporate Leadership Team, Policy Advisory Committee, and the Executive

·         KPIs in place and a dashboard of performance has also been developed

(4 x 4)
16

·         Implementation of the B&CC strategy and action plan to engage with public and businesses to adapt to and mitigate impacts of climate change

·         Review of our own estate in line with ambition to be carbon neutral by 2030, and work with partners to reduce carbon, implement a Nature Recovery Strategy to reduce surface run off and increase natural solutions, enhance, and expand wetland coverage to mitigate impacts of climate change and pollution.

·         Partner with KCC, other Kent districts and private landowners on widescale tree planting and nature recovery to mitigate impacts of climate change

·         Conduct Borough Climate Impact Assessment and work with Medway Flood Partnership to identify and develop actions, including natural flood management (nature-based solutions and sustainable urban drainage), which can help to reduce flooding, drought, and urban hotspot.

·         Ensure Local Plan review considers level of current and future projected flood/drought risk and that new developments are planned accordingly.

·         Work with the Kent Resilience Forum, spatial planners and other partners to enhance adaptation and emergency planning contingencies for severe weather and other climate impacts. ‘Strengthening’ of power and water supply and other critical infrastructure should be a priority alongside ensuring more resilient settlements

(4 x 4)
16

The broader housing and cost-of-living crisis leads to housing pressures increasing on the Council, affecting both costs associated with homelessness and ability to meet wider housing needs in the borough.

William Cornall

• Homelessness prevention team in place with increased resource
• Closer working with private sector & housing
associations
• Key policies are in place: Temporary Accommodation Strategy
• Implementation of Housing Management Team
• We work closely with the voluntary sector and community partners
• New Housing Strategy adopted

• Undertaking roadshows with colleagues from Revs & Bens and other stakeholders to support those in financial/housing difficulty

• Use of government grants specifically to support households in financial difficulty because of cost-of-living crisis

• Maximise use of government grants to assist those in financial difficulty

•Increase the use of OneView to identify households who may become homeless

•Trinity now open offering Mon-Fri services for immediate intervention and support/guidance

•Officers have appointed BEAM to help secure move-on accommodation in the PRS

•The Cabinet has now approved for the council to enter into a grant funding agreement with Homes England and the council has received firm allocations for grant funding on our net 5 schemes.

(4 x 5)
20

·  Leader of Council ambition to build 1000 new Council homes as soon as possible and plans to meet this aspiration have been approved and the programme is underway with the second major new land acquisition.  Around 40% of the required plots are now either acquired or approved by the Executive.

·  Improve access to private rented sector through the MBC incentive scheme

·  The Council continues to work with Homes England to promote the 5,000 home Heathlands Garden community through the Local Plan Review, with a view to the project delivering new homes from the late 2020’s.

·  Review of the Home Finder Scheme offer to landlords to increase the supply of stock at our disposal.

·  Capital programme for 23/24 allows for c30 TA units to be acquired this year.

(4 x 4)

16

Major unforeseen emergency with national / international impact (e.g. new pandemic, environmental disaster)

Alison Broom

·  Strong existing emergency planning framework

·  Active engagement with Local Resilience Forum

·  Flexible and committed workforce appropriately trained in various roles to support the council’s response to incidents.

·  Quarterly oversight & monitoring through the Emergency Planning & Business Continuity Group chaired by the Director for Finance, Resources & Business Improvement.

·  Some financial reserves

·  Good partnership working as demonstrated during Covid-19 pandemic

·  Continued update to Business Continuity Plans and arrangements 

·  Regular reports to CLT on improvements to the business continuity arrangements

·  Embedded arrangements over the quarterly review of emergency threats and risks through the Emergency Planning and BC Group including horizon scanning and early warnings.

·  Plans in place for dealing with different types of major emergencies and their impacts.

·  Business Continuity Management Policy

·  Increased resilience for the Emergency Planning & Resilience team by the recruitment of a permanent Resilience Officer.

·  Annual Business Continuity exercise

·  Annual Winter Preparedness workshop and briefing to key responders (including Corporate Leadership Team)

·  Annual refresher courses for Emergency Planning Responder roles

(5 x 3)
15

·  Continue to collaborate with partners within the Kent Resilience Forum to implement good practice and strengthen mutual aid arrangements.

(3 x 3)
9

Security breach or system weakness leading to IT network failure results in wide-spread system unavailability, increased legal and financial liability and reputational damage.

Georgia Hawkes

• Regular backup programmes
• External testing of IT security by specialists –resulting findings and actions are implemented and tested
• ICT policies & staff training, including disaster recovery plan
• Mandatory cyber security training was rolled out and completed
• CLT monitoring of performance indicators, including ICT incidents
• Nessus scanning software reporting daily on system vulnerabilities
• New firewall tested and installed
• Ongoing programme of awareness raising through Cyber events, training, and tests
• Ongoing programme of IT campaigns including phishing

• IT Business Continuity Plan which prioritises the systems that need to be bought back online.

• Bulk messaging system to ensure adequate communication lines available.  Gov.notify used and an awareness campaign run to encourage staff to sign up.

• Cyber Security Incident BC Exercise undertaken in November 2022 and a power outage/loss of systems exercise in November 2023

• New role of Security manager is now in post to support the implementation of the Zurich Cyber Security report.

• Business Impact Assessments have been reviewed and updated. These have been used to update BC Plans

(4 x 3)
12

• Continue to keep up to date and investigate best practice in the corporate approach for dealing with and responding to cyber incidents when they occur.

(3 x 3)
9

Insufficient awareness / expertise leads to not fulfilling residential property and health and safety responsibilities resulting in possible health & safety breaches.

William Cornall

• New Contractors appointed DMS (repairs and voids) and Clareglow (gas) to deliver a more tailored service for the Council

•  Faithfull Farrell & Timms have been retained as a critical friend to allow the new housing management function to up skill.
• The MBC residential portfolio is now being managed by a single team within Housing & Communities, where previously it was split between Housing & Property.
• H&S KPIs are now recorded and reported through a permanent software solution.
• The H&S KPIs are reported monthly to Corporate Leadership Team.
• Good level of awareness from officers around H&S obligations and compliance
• Excellent levels of compliance being reported to the CLT monthly.

• New Residential Portfolio Manager, and associated team appointed and in place since Sept 22, working exclusively on housing management and compliance.

(4 x 5)
20

·  Eventual goal of real time reporting in terms of gas safety

·  Review of existing resources and skills underway to support the housing portfolio and management of properties.

·  Implementation of new specialist housing management software to support the growing portfolio.

·  The Council has almost completed a significant re-investment package of works of its two publicly owned G&T sites and works nearing completion.

·  Staff being supported to obtain the required HSE accreditation.

(4 x 3)
12

Failure of a major contractors, suppliers or tenants: As a result of market pressures one of the Councils contractors goes into liquidation / administration or seeks to negotiate an increase in the cost of the contract.  Leading to disruption and increased costs.

Mark Green

• Regular contract monitoring and communication with major contractors
• Procurement expertise made available through the Partnership with Tunbridge Wells
• Financial performance and sustainability embedded into the procurement process
• Contractor business continuity plans in place and alternative contractors may be available
• 'Exit plan' included as a requirement in the ITT document for all relevant contracts

  • Ongoing financial performance and resilience checks of our suppliers and contractors

(4 x 3)
12

• Risk register being completed for each of the Council’s strategic contracts

• Increased consideration of in-house provision or alternative commissioning routes

• Explore additional resource dedicated to contract monitoring

(3 x 3)

9

Difficulties in recruiting and retaining the right skills and adapting to hybrid working leads to a loss of workforce cohesion and talent.  This results in a loss of productivity.

Georgia Hawkes

·         Workforce strategy updated

·         Training & development programme

·         Occupational health, employee support and HSE Stress Survey

·         Recruitment process that includes ability to adjust pay and market supplement for hard to recruit jobs

·         Rewards package reviewed regularly

·         Commissioning specialist external support as required

·         Online onboarding of new staff

·         Use of ClearReview to encourage continuous conversations and clear objective setting

·         Hybrid Policy in place

·         Market Supplement Policy reviewed and updated

·         graduate microsite has been created to allow the council to recruit graduates in less skilled roles to provide the training to increase skill levels to progress in the role

·         Obtaining information on best practice on recruitment processes and options for hard to recruit roles

(3 x 2)

6

·         Use results of 2024 staff survey to feed into staff motivation and retention activities and strategies.

(3 x2)

6

Uncertainties relating to the Council’s ability to access new funding and availability of PWLB loans increases difficulty securing and leveraging funding to help stabilise and support the delivery of our capital programme.

Mark Green

·         Access to professional networks to identify opportunities for funding

·         Experienced officer capacity

·         Good relationships with funding partners, e.g. Homes England

·         Obtaining forward borrowing

·         Maintaining good financial standing to ensure the council has good credit rating.

·         Investment of one-off resources for putting together funding bids

(3 x 4)

12

·         Investigate alternative sources of funding.

(3 x 3)

9

As a result of significant changes to the Councils' governance (including moving to executive model and the boundary review) sound governance processes may not be maintained during the change or poor processes may be introduced.  Leading to delays in decision making, reputational damage or legal implications.

Angela Woodhouse

·         Monitoring Officer in place to oversee Council activities and provide advice

·         Code of Conduct

·         Timeline agreed for the Local Government Boundary Commission review and work overseen by the Director of Finance and Business Improvement

·         Software to facilitate consultation on ward boundaries

·         Templates and system for agendas and decision publication updated

·         New constitution agreed and in place

·         Training carried out with Officers and Members on the new governance arrangements

(3 x 3)
9

·         Recruit two additional officers into Democratic Services to support the new model

·         Log of issues kept by Democratic Services – contributed to by the Monitoring Officer, Democratic Services and Director of Strategy, Insight and Governance

(3 x 2)
6

Reduced effectiveness of relationships with strategic partners 
Financial constraints and requirements from Government or regulators change the priorities or commitments of our strategic partners or their capacity to work with us. This causes a dislocation with our work and increases Member pressure to highlight concerns.

Alison Broom

·         Participation in Kent One Public Estate Board

·         Maidstone Inclusion Board

·         Good integration with County-wide networks

·         Regular programme of Anchor Institutions and stakeholder meetings.

·         Collaboration agreement with Homes England for the proposed Heathlands Garden Community

·         Umbrella agreement with Homes England concerning grant support for affordable and social rent housing

·         Strategic engagement with health partners including the West Kent Health and Care Partnership and the ICP primary care and estates teams

·         Participation in the Medway Valley Countryside Partnership to complement our parks and open spaces service

·         Mid Kent Services and associated collaboration agreements

·         Collaboration agreement with Ashford and Swale borough councils concerning waste collection

·         Professional team for regeneration projects in place and contractors in place for delivery of 2024/5 programme

·         Relationships established and working well with the Department for Work and Pensions

·         Implementation of shared arrangement for emergency planning and resilience with Swale BC

(3 x 3)
9

·         Continue to explore ways to develop, grow and strengthen partner relationships

·         Dialogue with West Kent Authorities on scope for future working together options

·         Reduced participation in the Kent Resource Partnership

·         Review of agency agreement for parking enforcement

·         Review of inter authority agreement between MBC as waste collection authority and KCC as waste disposal authority.

·          Implementation of decision to extend the Mid Kent Services’ shared Revenues and Benefits Service

·         Dialogue with licensing partnership authorities to agree common internal audit approach

·         Seeking improvements to working arrangements with the Valuation Office and Hm Courts and Tribunal Service (to strengthen MKS Revenues and Benefits service)

(3 x 2)
6

More residents moving from comfortable and making ends meet into financial crisis.  If the current cost of living crisis continues and potentially intensifies there will be an increase in the need for support and demand for services. Leading to Increased financial pressures for residents of the Borough; Homelessness increased; Resident debt increased; Increased stress and mental health problems; Increased demand for support from us and the voluntary and community sector

Angela Woodhouse

·         Anchor Institutions Partnership established and meeting regularly

·         Working with the VCS on volunteering and fund-raising initiatives

·         Investment has been made in Trinity Foyer and it has opened as a Community Hub

·         Love Where You Live & Get Involved project has been launched and continues to be delivered

·         Financial Inclusion Strategy

·         The Community resilience fund

·         Agreed part funding with the Citizens Advice Bureau for a Debt Management post

·         Community Sector newsletter established

·         VCS repository is live and under review to ensure it is kept up to date

·         An action plan is in place – a welfare post has been appointed to and a hardship fund created

·         LIFT Dashboard in place – using available data to proactively reach out and offer support to resident in financial crisis or at risk

·         Quarterly Inclusion Board

(4 x 4)
16

·         Review of the financial inclusion strategy

·         Initiatives focussed on prevention, sign posting and advice as well as reactive measures using Household Support Fund and our Community Resilience Grant. Plan is to bring this work together under a new strategy and action plan, with identified and coordinated resourcing

·         Pursuing ‘No Wrong Door Campaign

·         Increasing proactive community liaison work to ensure strength of engagement between council and VCS

(4 x 3)
12