Agenda item

The Board considered the Worcestershire Regulatory Services (WRS) Service Plan 2022/2023.

The Head of Regulatory Services introduced the report and in doing so drew Members’ attention to the Recommendations, as detailed on page 23 of the main agenda report.

The Board signed off on the service plan for WRS each year. The process helped to make Members aware of what the service was proposing for the relevant financial year and provided a sign off that some central government bodies liked to see in relation to service delivery plans e.g., the Food Standards Agency.

The plan followed very much the pattern of previous years and had an Executive Summary to pick up the main points. Last year’s plan had to accommodate WRS activities in tackling the global pandemic as well as day to day activities.  At the time of writing this report, the country retained limited control measures.  However, the Government announced that Plan B measures would end on 26^th January 2022 and compulsory self-isolation for people with Covid on 24^th March 2022.  We needed to see that living with Covid 19 was a fact of daily. 

Away from the pandemic, the service would continue to shape its work around the long-standing strategic priorities for local authority regulatory services provided by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), as these provided a framework that allowed WRS to have a golden thread back to the priorities of the six partner authorities and also to link to the requirements of the various national bodies that oversaw the work of WRS.

A range of high-level activities had been identified within the plan so that Members would be aware of the general focus of activity.  Below this would sit a number of team plans that would be used to drive the actual business activities.

The plan was devised in the face of on-going financial uncertainty in local government generally. The long-awaited Levelling-up White Paper had yet to appear, and the sector continued to push for fairer funding settlements.

Working with businesses and other partners was a key theme for both generating income to mitigate financial risk but also to ensure that outcomes were delivered that matched the priorities of partners and stakeholders.  Delivery for other local authorities also remained a key income generation strategy, supported by work for the private sector and specific grant monies.  Whilst much of our work for customers had fallen off during the initial period of the pandemic response, most of our long-standing customers had come back to WRS, with some new ones in recent weeks.    

WRS would continue to use intelligence to drive the business forward and the embedding of this approach and its associated processes would continue.

The Risk Register has been updated to reflect the current position in areas like IT provision and development, staffing levels, and our reliance on contractual relationships for income.  The threat from cyber-attack had become more real as the devasting consequences had been felt by colleagues in other local authorities elsewhere in the country.  WRS would work closely with our ICT host, Wyre Forest District Council, to limit the risk.

Our long-standing investment in mobile and flexible working found us well-placed to deal with the need for home working and the majority of our activities were now enabled for this working pattern.  However, our reliance on ICT provision to deliver this did increase our vulnerability to disruption.

As with previous years, Members were asked to pay particular attention to the provisions for food hygiene delivery in the coming year. This was to meet one of the recommendations of the auditors from the Food Standards Agency who visited the service in May 2017. They were keen that Members had a better understanding of the demand in this service area when they authorised the plan for this and future years.

Members were asked to note the proposed numbers of inspections and similar activities proposed for the new financial year that would be undertaken to discharge the statutory duties of the six partner authorities in relation to food control. 

The Head of Regulatory Services responded to questions from Members with regard to including WRS expectations in future Service Plans, and in doing so highlighted that; since 2011 the systems thinking process tended to move against targets, the FSA code did give an indication of the expectations of local authorities. 

RESOLVED that

a)    the Worcestershire Regulatory Services Plan for 2022/2023, as detailed at Appendix 1 to the report, be approved; and

b)    that Members specifically note the level of work to be undertaken by the service this year in relation to the partners’ roles as local food authorities.