Agenda item

To receive the Terms of Reference, as agreed at the 8 May 2015 meeting of the Community & Children’s Services Committee.

Members had provided Officers with several questions prior to the meeting. The summary of these are presented in italics as below.

How can the Corporate Parenting Board exercise its role effectively without other partner agencies being at the table?

Officers suggested that a proactive approach should be adopted and a forward plan created. Yearly updates from partners could then be scheduled. In response to an enquiry by Members the Town Clerk clarified that the Committee did have challenge powers.

Should young people be invited?

Members felt that the engagement of young people should be strengthened, although it was agreed that this did not necessarily require their attendance at the meetings of the Sub-Committee as long as their views were meaningfully considered. There was an option for the Committee to meet with a representative from the Children in Care Council (CiCC) and it was acknowledged that the Grand Committee was addressed by the Youth Mayor on occasion.

Members noted that the terms of reference included a reference to the committee “exercising its functions with regard to the views of relevant service users”. It was felt this allowed the Committee to exercise a wide-ranging scrutiny function in regards to relevant partners.

RESOLVED – That a work programme be developed in consultation with the Chairman and Deputy Chair, that officers undertake to open a communication pathway with the CiCC, and that the terms of reference be noted.