Agenda item

The Interim Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services submits a report that informs members of the progress made in developing children’s centres, the approach that the department have adopted for the management of the centres and the procurement process in place to secure the external management of 9 out of the 23 Centres.  The Management Board is recommended to note the report. 

The Interim Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services submitted a report that informed the Board of the progress made in developing Children’s Centres, of the approach that the department had adopted for the management of the centres and of the procurement process in place to secure the external management of nine out of the twenty-three centres. 

The Service Director, Access, Inclusion and Participation introduced the report.  She explained that the children’s centres programme was well established and the children centres strategy made a key contribution to achieving the vision set out in the Government’s ‘Every Child Matters‘ Change Programme and Leicester’s Children and Young Peoples’ Plan and the Transforming Leicester’s Learning Plan, working with a range of partner organizations and communities. 

The Board heard that services were to be delivered to the most disadvantaged areas of the city.

It was reported that Leicester currently had a mixed arrangement of both local authority and voluntary sector management for its children’s centers, and that these contacts were to cease at the end of September 2008.  In terms of the future, the department had agreed to adopt a mixed model of management between the local authority and external bodies through an open tendering process.  Nine centres would be tendered in three blocks of three, and the remaining 14 centres would be managed by the Local Authority. 

In relation to the revenue strategy, the primary funding for the core centres was to be provided to the authority through the Sure Start grant for the years 2008-2011 which was in line with the contract period.

One Member of the Board asked whether performance expectations would be the same for centres delivered both internally and externally.  The Service Director, Access, Inclusion and Participation confirmed that there was one performance management framework for all centres and it was particularly robust.  She agreed to provide a copy of the framework to members of the Board.

A Member of the Board asked how officers could guarantee that a mixed approach of management would add value by supporting and challenging the local authority provision.  The Service Director, Access, Inclusion and Participation responded by stating that it had been proven at other authorities that a mixed approach allowed the authority to learn how to achieve reaching those groups who were harder to reach. 

In response to a Member of the Board who expressed disappointment that the authority had to initiate a competitive tender for many of the centres, it was explained that the authority could not continue with the current contracts, and that all providers were made aware of the process at the earliest stage.

One Member of the Board expressed concern with regard to the other implications matrix detailed under paragraph 6 of the report and felt that it was incomplete.  The Service Director, Access, Inclusion and Participation agreed to ensure that this was completed for when the report was submitted to Cabinet.   The Corporate Director of Regeneration and Culture agreed to raise this issue on a corporate level.

RESOLVED:

(1)     that the report be noted; and

(2)that the Service Director, Access, Inclusion and Participation, circulates a copy of the performance management framework for the children’s centres to the Members of the Board. 

(3)that the Corporate Director of Regeneration and Culture be asked to raise at a Corporate level the issue of incomplete other implication matrixes.