Agenda and minutes

www.swansea.gov.uk/disclosuresofinterests

In accordance with the Code of Conduct adopted by the City & County of Swansea, no interests were declared.

To approve & sign the Minutes of the previous meeting(s) as a correct record.

Resolved that the Minutes of the Corporate Services & Financial Resilience Service Transformation Committee held on 25 July, 2023, be approved and signed as a correct record.

The Head of Communications and Marketing stated that the Council had been working on engagement with Co-production Lab Wales for almost a year and introduced Mr Mike Corcoran (Co-production Lab Wales) to the meeting.

Mr Corcoran detailed the work undertaken in building and embedding coproduction within the Council.  He referred to the Council’s co-production champions network, training (including facilitation skills, a toolkit to support live projects) and detailed how the Policy was being developed.

He provided a detailed summary of the Co-production Policy which included the background, a definition of co-production, co-production and other engagement approaches, levels of co-production, applying co-production, when not to co-produce, high level guiding principles for implementation, roles in the process and additional information.

In response to Member questions, Mr Corcoran stated that working with the Council had proved a rewarding process and offered the opportunity to examine co-production in real life circumstances which had provided many ‘light bulb’ moments.

He reiterated the importance of all parties being equal and adhering to universal principles whilst adopting a diverse range of approaches.

The Head of Communications and Marketing thanked the Committee for their views which had helped shape the draft policy. 

He also expressed his thanks to Co-production Lab Wales involvement and continued assistance with early projects.

He urged the Committee to provide any further comments directly to Officers or via the Council’s consultation page and to promote the Policy to any hard to reach groups with their communities.

The Chair thanked Mr Corcoran and the Head of Communications and Marketing for their informative report.        

The Director of Finance/Section 151 Officer presented a report which detailed the information on the Medium Term Financial Plan in preparation for contributing to future savings proposals.

He detailed the context and outlined the challenges in relation to the manner in which Councils are allocated funding from the Welsh Government and the assumptions/forecasts on future expenditure levels and income streams.  These income streams were subject not only to the general economic climate, but also to the political environment.

Furthermore, it was noted that the current economic climate presented a number of difficulties in terms of forecasting levels of inflation, pay awards and future funding.  This was further complicated by the requirement to meet policy commitments as well as balancing legal requirements, generally with insufficient core funding.

The Chair expressed her thanks to the Director of Finance/Section 151 Officer for operating in a challenging environment and suggested that the report be deferred until late January/February 2024 when funding/income streams would have been confirmed.

The Chair presented the Committee Work Plan 2023-2024.

Resolved that:--

1)    The Medium Term Financial Plan be deferred to the meeting on 27 February, 2027.

2)    The results from the Co-production Consultation Exercise be presented to the Committee on 31 October, 2023.