Agenda item

Further to the meeting held on 29th June, when Members had already given consideration to the first draft State of the Borough Assessment, a draft copy was presented giving the Committee a final opportunity to contribute to its development, prior to being considered by Full Council on 21^st September, 2017.

Members noted that the document would continue to build on information the Local Authority holds under four themes underpinned by population/demographic information, which were consistent with the Doncaster Growing Together document:

·       Population information;

·       Doncaster Living;

·       Doncaster Working;

·       Doncaster Learning;

·       Doncaster Caring.

The areas addressed included:

Living Theme (housing provision) – the indirect links between housing quality and deprivation, affordability and overcrowding was addressed and highlighted that decent housing was very important and a key factor to a person’s well-being.  It was noted that over many years some of the Borough’s housing provision had not changed and that it was a massive challenge.  The Committee was reminded that the Regeneration and Housing Scrutiny Panel would be giving consideration to the Housing Need Analysis and that challenges and possible changes could be addressed as part of this session.

Working Theme (higher working age) – Members highlighted that material changes were taking place for people between 50 to 65 and the expectation that people work to an older age, when 20 years ago people were looking to retire no later than 60.  Bearing this in mind, Members stressed that it was important to ensure the local authority and partners held the correct population information and discuss provision and support for older working members of the community, for example, Health provision.

Members also acknowledged that following the 2011 Census that Doncaster’s figures had the second highest deviation that was predicted and expressed concern that the population growth in Doncaster needed to be accurate to ensure, for example, the Housing Needs Assessment was accurately addressed.

The Committee highlighted that it was now becoming rare for people to stay in the same job throughout their working life and that more retraining was undertaken to make themselves employable.  The Committee also stressed that Apprenticeships were not exclusively for young people.

Learning Theme (youth aspirations) – Members commended the case studies showing very positive actions however asked partners to be cautious as they felt this may not be consistent across the whole Borough.

Marketing the State of the Borough Assessment – Members stressed that because it was a public document it needed to be relevant, precise and easily accessible and understood.  The Committee’s opinion was that the document should be provided at local authority events and roadshows.

Scrutiny’s contribution to and monitoring the State of the Borough Assessment – it was noted that Overview and Scrutiny would continue to routinely monitor performance information where Members could look at strategic intensions and specific areas in detail.  Members were pleased that they would be able to track specific issues over time.  

Overview and Scrutiny has highlighted in the past that it wished to contribute to the State of the Borough debate and therefore Members stressed that they needed to gather evidence from their communities to assist with informing future documents.  There were 10 key areas that required improvement in Doncaster, for example, obesity, smoking, housing and wages which Scrutiny needed to bear in mind when looking at their future work programmes.

RESOLVED:  that the discussion, be noted.