MAIDSTONE BOROUGH COUNCIL
POLICY AND RESOURCES COMMITTEE
Minutes of the meeting held on Monday 4 July 2016
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Present: |
Councillor Mrs Wilson (Chairman), and Councillors Adkinson, Mrs Blackmore, Boughton, Brice, Cox, English, Fermor, Garland, Mrs Gooch, Harvey, Pickett, Mrs Ring and Round |
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28. Apologies for Absence
It was noted that apologies for absence had been received from Councillors Harper, Harwood and McLoughlin.
29. Notification of Substitute Members
It was noted that Councillor Atkinson was substituting for Councillor Harper, Councillor English was substituting for Councillor Harwood and Councillor Mrs Ring was substituting for Councillor McLoughlin.
30. Urgent Items
There were no urgent items.
31. Notification of Visiting Members
There were no Visiting Members.
32. Disclosures by Members and Officers
There were no disclosures by Members and Officers.
33. Disclosures of Lobbying
There were no disclosures of lobbying.
34. Exempt Items
RESOLVED: That all items on the agenda be taken in public as proposed.
35. Presentations of petitions (if any)
There were no petitions.
36. Question and answer session for members of the public (if any)
There were no questions from members of the public.
37. Report of the Head of Legal Partnership - Mid Kent Services Revised Governance Arrangements
Members considered the report of the Head of Legal
Partnership which set out revised Governance arrangements for Mid Kent Services
and the model Shared Service Collaboration Agreement for use with future shared
services.
The Deputy Head of Legal Partnership presented the report and advised that the
two appendices contained revised versions of both the Governance Arrangements
for Mid Kent Services and the model Shared Services Collaboration Agreement
which had been agreed and discussed with the MKS Chief Executives and the MKS
Board, including advice and input from the Director of Shared Services, Section
151 Officers and Monitoring Officers.
Members noted that the Agreement covering the Governance Arrangements of the
Mid Kent Improvement Partnership (MKIP), now called Mid Kent Services (MKS),
was originally prepared in 2008. It had been updated in 2012 and had expired
at the end of April 2016.
The Deputy Head of Legal Partnership drew Members’ attention to the main changes to the Agreement which included the fact that the arrangements would be permanent where previously they had been for a fixed period of four years.
In accordance with the fact that the arrangements were
permanent, it was noted that they were subject to termination provisions which
were linked to the termination provision in the model Shared Service
Collaboration Agreement.
In response to questions from Members, the Deputy Head of Legal Partnership
advised:
·
That the font and numbering issues would be corrected within the
Collaboration Agreement
·
That the Collaboration Agreement was a rolling document
·
Issues such as failure of the service and accountability were
dealt with within the Collaboration Agreement although it was noted that it
would be difficult to specify who would be accountable
·
If a partner voted to exit a shared service, this would not
necessarily mean that the shared service could not continue with the other
authorities
·
The questions as detailed in Appendix D had come out of an audit
undertaken by the Audit Partnership and were not a definitive list, there may
be others added at a later stage
RESOLVED:
1)
That the revised Mid Kent Services (MKS) objectives and strategic
priorities as set out in paragraph 2.5 to the report of the Head of Legal
Partnership be agreed;
Voting: For: 14 Against: 0 Abstentions: 0
2)
That the revised MKS Governance Arrangements be agreed and delegated
authority be given to the Chief Executive to sign the document;
Voting: For: 14 Against: 0 Abstentions: 0
3)
That the model MKS Shared Service Collaboration Agreement template be
agreed subject to minor amendments to the font and numbering; and
Voting: For: 14 Against: 0 Abstentions: 0
4)
That the Head of Legal Partnership, in consultation with the Leader and
Chief Executive, be authorised to make any further minor amendments as
necessary to the documents described in recommendations 2 and 3 above.
Voting: For: 14 Against: 0 Abstentions: 0
38. Duration of Meeting
10.00 a.m. to 10.35 a.m.