Agenda and minutes

RESOLVED that:

      i.        Councillor Beryl Hunwicks be appointed Chairman of the Joint Waste Collection Services Committee for the 2016/17 municipal year.

     ii.        Councillor Vivienne Chapman be appointed Vice-Chairman of the Joint Waste Collection Services Committee for the 2016/17 municipal year.

Councillor Beryl Hunwicks in the chair.

The Committee received and noted the minutes of the meeting of the Joint Waste Collection Services Committee held on 21 September 2016.

There were no declarations of interest in relation to any items on the agenda.

The Committee received a report setting out the constitution of the Joint Waste Collection Services (JWCS) Committee.

It was queried whether point 3.3.1 should be in the constitution.  It was agreed that clarification would be sought from the Joint Waste Collection Services’ Legal Advisor and the Committee would be updated as necessary.

The Committee noted its Constitution.

The Committee was informed that under the inter authority agreement governing the Joint Waste Collections Service Surrey Heath would be acting as the Administering Authority for the contract.  Consequently, Timothy Pashen, Executive Head: Community at Surrey Heath Borough Council had been appointed as the Service’s Authorising Officer.

The Committee noted the appointment and expressed their thanks to Mr Pashen for taking on the role.  The Committee also expressed their thanks to the officers at Elmbridge Borough Council, in their capacity as Project Lead Authority, for all their work to get the partner authorities through the procurement phase of the contract negotiations.

The Committee received a presentation from Eve Risbridger, JWCS Project Manager.  The presentation included an update on the contractual process, an overview of the decision making structures governing the contract and a summary of the work underway to implement and embed the contract in partners’ work.

The Committee was informed that approval had now been given by all four councils to award the contract to Bidder A (now announced as being Amey).  Ismina Harvey had been appointed to the post of Contract Implementation Manager and officers were now working closely with Amey to clarify any contractual matters, agree a comprehensive approach to partnership working and set up a Strategic Partnership Board with responsibility for translating the Joint Waste Strategy into reality before the contract went live on 3 June 2017.

It was noted that Amey had been shortlisted for, and won, a number of awards by nationally recognised organisations including the Clean Britain Awards and the National Recycling Awards.  Amey was keen for their staff on the ground to be ambassadors for their organisation and their centralised Customer Service Centre, which Woking and Surrey Heath Councils had opted to make use of, was a strength that enabled it to provide a 24/7 service every day of the year.  Amey’s use of in-cab technology to easily and accurately capture real time data on a range of issues including fly tipping, excess waste, missed bin collections and contaminated waste would provide partner authorities with a robust and comprehensive data set that could be used to improve both performance and services.

The Contract partnering Board and the Technical Group were working on the alignment of policies so that the four local authority areas were covered by a single set of coherent policies and that residents were charged, wherever possible, according to a standard set of tariffs regardless of their location.

Arising from the Committee’s questions and comments the following points were noted:

·         Wherever possible, Operatives on the ground would be transferred to Amey under the TUPE regulations.

·         To ensure that the transition to the new contractor was as smooth as possible for operatives and residents Amey would brief staff as soon as the current contractors would allow them to.

·         It was stressed that the use of improved user friendly data capture methods could result in more incidents being reported in the first few months and perceived performance levels could fall initially.

·         All members would need to be briefed on the practical implications that the changes could have on residents before the new contract arrangements came into being.

·         Proposed fees and charges had been reached by adding the contractor’s anticipated unit cost for each aspect of a service, for example bulky waste collection, and then adding any capital and management costs.  These would be recommended for approval by individual councils.

·         Any income generated through the fees and charges would remain with individual councils and would not be included in the contract management budgets.

·         The presentation would be circulated to members.

The Committee expressed their  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

The Committee considered a report setting out the proposed protocol to be followed in the event of another local authority expressing an interest in joining the waste partnership.

In approving a policy it was hoped that any local authority wishing to join the contract would be able to clearly see the expectations that would be placed on them by the Partnership and that the Partnership would be able to recoup any costs incurred as part of feasibility studies and exploratory discussions before a contract was entered into.  Any decisions on whether to go forward with a new partner would be dealt with on a case by case basis with consideration being given to the whole package that the joining partner would bring to the table.

It was acknowledged that whilst it would not be prudent to bring additional partners into the Partnership during the initial phases of the contract implementation process it was important that the Partnership should not to be so inflexible in its approach that it missed out on opportunities of working in partnership with local authorities whose current waste collection contracts ended before the implementation of the project across the current four partner areas had been completed; consequently any approaches should be considered on a case by case basis.

The Partnership would examine any learning in this area from other waste partnerships and advice would be sought from specialist legal and procurement experts before any decisions on whether additional partners were approved were taken.

The Committee agreed in principle to the development of a protocol.  It was agreed that the current proposed protocol needed to be refined by the Contract Partnership Board and that the subject would be revisited at a later meeting.

The Committee considered a report setting out the proposed Contract Management Office (CMO) budget for 2016/17 and 2017/18.

The Committee was informed that although it was anticipated that once the contract had been established the total cost of the CMO would be £326,000 during the implementation phase costs would be higher.  Consequently the figures in the report were indicative at this stage.  It had been assumed that all costs would be shared equally between the four partner authorities and that staffing costs would be recharged to the transferring local authority.  It was also stressed that although initial costs appeared high they should be seen within the context of the savings that were expected to be generated over the lifetime of the contract.

It was acknowledged that it would be essential that robust and transparent arrangements were in place to ensure that CMO costs were kept at an appropriate level and it was agreed that the matter was followed up by the Contract Partnering Board.

RESOLVED that:

       i.        The Contract Management Office budget for 2016/17 and 2017/18 be recommended in principle to partner local authorities.

      ii.        The Contract Management budget for future years be noted.