northlincs.gov.uk

168   (33) ANNUAL REPRESENTATIONS AND COMPLAINTS REPORT 2013-2014 – The Director of People submitted a report which sought approval of the annual representations and complaints report 2013 for children and adults social care service in line with the statutory requirements.

There was a statutory requirement to present an annual report covering representations and complaints received about services delivered under the Children Act 1989 and under the NHS Community Care Act 1990.

They required the Local Authority to address these representations, through a three stage procedure for complaints concerning services to children and a two stage procedure for Adults Social Care Services.

The Children Act procedure had timescales attached to each stage and specific guidance as to the handling of complaints at each stage.  The procedure for Adults Social Care aimed to resolve complaints within one stage; timescales were therefore attached to each complaint according to the issues involved.

Details were outlined within the report.

Resolved – That the Annual Representations and Complaints Reports for Children and Adults Social Care Service be received and approved.

169  (34) PEOPLE DIRECTORATE UPDATE OF CAPITAL PROGRAMMES –  The Director of People submitted a report which provided an update on the progress of capital programmes and sought approval for the revised capital programme and approval to proceed with the proposed outline schemes for 2014-15 starts.

The capital programme for 2014-18 was approved by Council on 25^th February 2014, which incorporated funding allocations for the following programmes:

• the School and Children’s Centres Capital Programme (SCCIP)
• Temporary School Buildings
• Kitchen upgrades (universal infant free school meals)
• Additional Capital
• Community Provision
• Sure Start Children’s Centres

The report provided an update on progress of the portfolio of capital programmes and recommended the completion of additional feasibilities studies to consider the benefits of enhanced community provision and the increasing capacity of school places.

Full details were outlined within the appendices to the report.

Resolved– (a) That Option 1 be approved to proceed with works at the wellbeing hubs; (b) that the new starts and variations within the programmes be approved, and (c) that the preferred option for Alkborough Primary School parking be approved.

169   (35) SCHOOLS FUNDING FORMULA 2015-2016 – The Director of People submitted a report which provided an update regarding the feedback from Schools Forum and individual schools in respect of consultation on the proposed funding  formula changes, and sought approval of the factors to be used for calculating the funding formula shares for mainstream schools in North Lincolnshire 2015-16.

The Department for Education (DFE) introduced new arrangements for how schools and academies were funded with effect from 1 April 2013. The Education Funding Agency (EFA) published in August an updated Operational guide ‘Schools revenue funding 2015 to 2016’, outlining the arrangements to help local authorities and their schools forums to plan the local implementation of the reformed funding system for the 2015-16 financial year.

The guidance set out how local authorities calculate individual school and academy budget shares using a range of mandatory and optional formula factors. The data sets for each factor was specified and provided by the EFA.

The Schools Forum had considered the updated guidance from the DFE and the different options for distributing the additional funding in 2015-16.

Details of the funding factors were outlined within the report and appendix.

Resolved – (a) That the proposed formula factors to be used to calculate the individual schools budget shares for mainstream schools within North Lincolnshire 2015-16 be approved, and (b) that the unit values to be applied to each factor would be confirmed in January 2015, once the final allocation of DSG had been made to North Lincolnshire.

Note: Reports are in Portable Document Format (PDF) and therefore require a suitable reader to view them. A reader can be downloaded free from the Adobe website (full instructions for downloading the reader are provided on the site).