Chairmen's Committee - Approved Committee Minutes - 30 June 2006

Present

Deputy R C Duhamel, President

Deputy R.G. Le Hérissier, Vice-President Deputy F J Hill

Deputy G.P. Southern

Deputy P J D Ryan

Deputy S C Ferguson

Deputy J. G. Reed

Apologies

Absent

In attendance

Mrs A. Harris , Deputy Greffier of the States Mr. Fox, Scrutiny Officer

Ref Back

Agenda matter

Action

1.

Minutes of previous meetings

The Minutes of meetings of 19th, 24th, 25th, 26th, 30th and 31st May and 5th June 2006 were approved with no amendments but signing was held over to a subsequent meeting.

2.

19.05.06 Item 21

DGOS

Livelink Preview

The President reported to the Committee the results of his recent preview of the intended Livelink training for members.

The President was of the opinion that while the system could have advantages for administration purposes, it was not of any significant value to Scrutiny. The President requested the Deputy Greffier of the States to write to The Chief Executive of the States and the Information  Services  Director  to  request  a  system  which  would benefit scrutiny in researching or searching for information.

3.

31.05.06 Item 1

The Committee welcomed a delegation of the Communications Sub- Group consisting of Deputies S. Power and J. Gallichan.

The delegation suggested that a sub-group of members of Panels should be formed to raise the profile of Scrutiny, using the office of the  Scrutiny  Manager. They  recommended  that  there  should  be weekly meetings between members, the media and the Scrutiny Officers, preferably to be held on Monday mornings.

The Committee decided that a media consultant should be engaged using  financial  contributions  from  each  Panel  budget,  initially indicated as approximately £5,000 per Panel, to assist in the profile- raising. The sub-group was directed to list possible candidates and

make  the  necessary  arrangements  for  them  to  present  to  the Committee as soon as possible. Expressions of interest were to be collected by the sub-group.

The Sub-group noted that a leaflet detailing the nature of Scrutiny had been produced some time ago by officers. It was recommended that this should be updated by the sub-group and distributed. A brief history of the Scrutiny function was to be made available to the media by the sub-group.

The sub-group stated that it was vital to interest young people in Scrutiny, especially schoolchildren. It was minded that a member or members might go into schools to talk to children at some point in the future, although it was recognised that with some schools having up to eight classes per year this would be a significant commitment.

The sub-group was directed to develop the engagement strategy in more detail.

The Citizens Panel was discussed, and it was decided to request the Deputy Greffier of the States to write to the Council of Ministers to  enquire  about  the  progress  of  the  Citizens  Panel  and  public engagement in general.

DGoS

4.

Financial Analysis of Scrutiny reviews

The Committee noted details of the cost of reviews undertaken as follows-

1. a  review  into  the  incorporation  of  Jersey  Post  by  the Economic Affairs Scrutiny Panel; and

2. a review undertaken into the financial framework contained within the draft strategic Plan.

Deputy Reed reported that he had spoken to the Assistant Greffier of the States about recording officer hours spent on reviews in order to monitor manpower costs and total budget.

5.

05.06.06 Item 1

The  Committee  noted  the  minutes  of  meetings  held  by  the Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel, detailing the process by which that Panel developed its amendments to the Strategic Plan for the debate held on 27 June 2006. This had been provided in response to suggestions that the Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel had not been fully supportive of a number of those amendments, and that the Panel was being used to further an individual agenda.

Having  studied  the  evidence, the  Committee concluded  that  the Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel was not being used to forward an individual agenda during the Strategic Plan debate.

It  was  however  generally  re-affirmed  that  it  would  be  seriously disadvantageous for the Scrutiny function as a whole if Panels were to be used to further personal political ends.

The  Committee  agreed  that  information  should  be  shared  more freely between Panels in order to improve debates in the assembly.

Amendment No 18 (b) to the Strategic Plan was discussed, which had been intended to require the Council of Ministers to bring to the assembly  the  financial  and  manpower  consequences  of  the Strategic Plan initiatives over the five-year lifetime of the plan. As this  amendment  had  not  been  successful,  it  was  decided  to recommend a change to the relevant Standing Orders to require the Council of Ministers to include three-year financial planning in the States Business Plan.

This item was to be included on the agenda for the next meeting, and  the   Deputy  Greffier  of  the  States  was  asked  to  brief  the Privileges  and  Procedures  Committee  about  the  Committee's concerns.

DGOS

6.

DGoS

The Committee noted that once the Business Plan was lodged, the Panels would have only six weeks to amend it, four weeks of which was to consist of the States summer recess, during which a number of members were expected to be absent.

The Committee recalled that it had previously been agreed that Scrutiny would be invited to attend key meetings in respect of the strategic and business plans. The Deputy Greffier of the States was directed to write to the Council of Ministers, and the letter to be copied to all members, to inform it that scrutiny was disappointed to note that the Chairmen's Committee had not been included in the Business Plan planning to date as it had previously been assured. A list of all relevant meetings was to be requested.

7.

19.05.06 Item 13

The Committee noted a report prepared by the Scrutiny Office in respect of discussions within the Scrutiny Website Action Group in respect of modifications to update the website.

It then discussed the current design and operation of the website, and noted that access to the site through the main governmental portal was convoluted and that finding details of Scrutiny's activities was difficult. The access could not be altered, however as Scrutiny was a Non-Executive Department.

The  website  design  was  also  considered  to  be  dated.  The Committee indicated that it would prefer a more engaging' site. It was suggested that video clips of sound bites' by Scrutiny Chairmen should be downloadable from the site. The President suggested that this could be accomplished at less expense if the Scrutiny function was to purchase a dedicated camera.

Officers were strongly encouraged by the Deputy Greffier of the States to spend up to 15 minutes at the start of the day ensuring that the site was up to date, as this represented the shop window' of the

Scrutiny function.

The Committee directed that the aforementioned report should be returned to the Committee at its next meeting with more detailed costings included.

8.

25.05.06 Item 2

Proposed Split of the Social Affairs Scrutiny Panel

The  Chairmen's  Committee  recalled  that  all  Panels  had  been requested to provide the President with a list of topics that had been considered  for  review  but  not  undertaken  due  to  resource constraints. It was noted that the Corporate Services Scrutiny and Social Affairs Scrutiny Panels had provided this information. The Economic  Affairs  Scrutiny  Panel  and  Environment  Panel  were recommended to do so as soon as possible. The approach to the debate was also discussed.

9.

19.05.06 Item 5

The  Committee  recalled  that  it  had  previously  considered  the preparation of a register of local persons who would be interested and suitably qualified to assist Scrutiny Panels with reviews.

The Committee confirmed that it supported the idea of a register of local advisers. These advisers would be expected to offer services free  of  charge,  and  this  register  would  be  devised  through  a combination  of  approaches  to  individuals,  approaches  to organisations, and by advertising.

The Committee noted that any information retained on file, be it in the form of written or electronic data would be held in accordance with the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2005.

10.

The  President  informed  the  Committee  that  it  had  come  to  his attention that a number of telephone meetings had recently taken place.

He was of the opinion that it would be more appropriate to collect items  together  and  to  hold  additional  meetings  in  most  cases, although urgent items could still be dealt with by telephone meeting. Telephone meetings were to be instigated by the Chairman or by a majority of members.

11.

Guidelines for dealing with scrutiny requests

The Committee considered internal guidelines for staff of the Chief Minister's  Department  which  had  been  circulated  regarding  the manner in which requests from Scrutiny were to be dealt with. It noted that this was not the agreement that had been expected, and that  the  process  seemed  overly  bureaucratic.  It  was  considered unreasonable  that  Scrutiny  was  not  to  be  allowed  access  to information on a particular subject unless a review into that subject was being considered.

It  was  also  considered  unreasonable  to  have  an  administrative system  in  place  that  hampered  the  access  of  members  to information.

The   Deputy  Greffier  of  the  States  was  directed  to  write  to  the Council of Ministers expressing the opinion of the Committee that the system was overly bureaucratic that should be simplified as working practices had been established.

Deputy Southern noted that the Economic Affairs Scrutiny Panel had been required to agree to a particularly restrictive agreement in order to gain access to files held by the Regulation of Undertakings office. This was in the form of a letter, which was to be passed to the Committee.

DGOS

NJF

12.

Proposed archive of national press articles

The President noted that the national newspapers often contained articles that were of relevance to reviews. The Committee therefore considered  the  possibility  of  either  purchasing  these  papers  or collecting them second-hand, in order that the relevant articles could be held in the Scrutiny Office.

The efficiency of this system was discussed, and it was concluded that with the availability of internet search engines, it would be more appropriate to pay for access to the electronic archives of national newspapers than to manually store and record articles. As soon as the Jersey Evening Post completed its online archive the Greffe should gain access, understood to be at a cost of £10 per month, whereupon the manual recording of articles from this journal would cease.

13.

NJF

The  Committee  received  a  report  from  the  Scrutiny  Office,  in connection  with  the  current  lodging  times  for  propositions  from Scrutiny, intended to address the disparity between the six-week lodging period for a stand-alone proposition, and the eight week period of consideration after calling-in' a proposition.

The report outlined minor changes to Standing Orders that would extend the period of consideration to 12 weeks, and reduce the lodging time for a stand-alone proposition specifically relating to items called-in' to two weeks.

The Committee noted that another report had been produced for the Privileges and Procedures Committee (PPC), which recommended a move to a consensual system under which the Minister and the Scrutiny Panel could agree together to reduce the lodging period.

After considering the options, the Chairmen's Committee approved its report produced by the Scrutiny Office in principle and directed that it be passed to the Privileges and Procedures Committee for its consideration.

KTF

The Committee noted a minute of the Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel that recorded the formation of a sub-Panel.

The Committee noted that it was impossible to form a sub-Panel consisting of a Panel in its entirely, which by extension meant that it was impossible to have a whole Panel operate as a sub-Panel with secondees without discarding at least one member.

The  Committee  agreed  in  principle  that  this  was  limiting  the operation of certain reviews. It agreed that a paper on this matter should be prepared for the consideration of the Committee at its next meeting.

14.

NJF

The Committee was informed that feedback from the recent review into the incorporation of Jersey Post had indicated that a lack of access to financial expertise had hampered the operation of the Panel.

The Chairman of the Economic Affairs Scrutiny Panel contended that it was necessary to have a qualified accounting advisor in order to properly interpret accounts. The Committee agreed.

The  Committee  directed  officers  to  approach several  local  audit companies, in order to gather expressions of interest.

15.

Provision of Information in members' rooms

The President noted that it was difficult and time-consuming to study ministerial decisions in  the form in which they appeared on the website. It was therefore suggested that the website list of recent decisions should be printed once a week by officers and affixed to a bulletin board to be placed in the members' computer room. This was  to  be  updated  weekly  by  the  Scrutiny  Office  on  Monday mornings.

The   Deputy  Greffier  of  the  States  was  directed  to  acquire  the appropriate equipment.

16.

Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel Report

The Committee was informed that the Panel was to meet with the Treasury Minister in connection with the 20 means 20' proposals, as this was considered to be a valuable topic, although a review into it had not originally been considered.

17.

Economic Affairs Scrutiny Panel Report

The Committee was informed that Deputy Breckon was to chair a sub-Panel to review the current status of the dairy industry. This was to draw on other Panels for its membership, which was yet to be decided.

18.

Social Affairs Scrutiny Panel Report

The Committee was informed that comments on the revised projet in respect of the new Sexual Offences legislation had been completed. Reviews into the GP Out-of-Hours service, the powers of Centeniers and the income support system were ongoing.

19.

Environment Scrutiny Panel Report

The Committee was informed that Deputy G.C.L. Baudains was not expected to be in attendance at  the Panel until the end of the summer, and although the planning process review could therefore be delayed, it was anticipated that it could be completed by the end of July, or August at the latest.

20.

Public Accounts Committee Report

The Committee was informed that the Public Accounts Committee was to complete a report into the relocation of the dairy prior to the formation of the Economic Affairs sub-Panel to consider the dairy industry, as above.