Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Alderman & Professor Emma Edhem, Alderman Sir Peter Estlin, Judith Pleasance and James Tumbridge.

Alderman Hailes declared two interests as follows:

• As the Chair of the Resources, Risk & Estates (Police) Committee of the Police Authority Board;
• As General Counsel to a FinTech company.

To receive the Order of the Court of Common Council from Thursday, 21st April 2022.

Members received the Order of the Court of Common Council from Thursday 21 April 2022 to appoint the Committee and receive its Terms of Reference.

To elect a Chair for the year ensuing.

The Committee proceeded to elect a Chair in accordance with Standing Order No.29. Dawn Wright, being the only eligible Member who expressed a willingness to serve, was duly elected as Chair of the Committee for the year ensuing.

To elect a Deputy Chair for the year ensuing.

The Committee proceeded to elect a Deputy Chair in accordance with Standing Order No.30. Randall Anderson, being the only eligible member who expressed a willingness to serve, was duly elected as Deputy Chair of the Committee for the year ensuing.

To receive the public minutes and non-public summary of the meeting of the Digital Services Sub-Committee held on 28 January 2022.

Minutes of the previous meeting

The public minutes and non-public summary of the Digital Services Sub-Committee meeting held on 28 January 2022 were presented for information only, in light of the change of governance structure from a Sub-Committee to a Grand Committee.

RESOLVED:

that the public minutes and non-public summary of the Digital Services Sub-Committee meeting held on 28 January 2022 be noted.

There were no matters arising from the minutes.

Joint report of the Town Clerk and Chamberlain.

The Committee received a joint report of the Town Clerk and Chief Operating Officer providing a work programme and forward plan of items for consideration.

There was a request that the FCCRAS programme update for September be presented to the meeting in July or November. An update at the meeting in July would present an opportunity to update members on shortlisting and negotiation with shortlisting suppliers, whilst an update in November would coincide with the awards decision period. 

RESOLVED:

i)           that the work programme be noted;

ii)            that the FCCRAS programme update scheduled for September be either brought forward to the meeting scheduled for July or deferred to the meeting scheduled for December.

A report of the Direction of Innovation and Growth.

Members received a report of the Director of Innovation and Growth, following which the following issue was discussed:

A question was raised as to what stance Innovation and Growth took on government legislation in relation to digital and crypto assets given the ongoing dialogue between the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Government. In response, officers advised that they continued to work very closely with both the FCA – which had also been the case on the Digital Sandbox pilot – as well as with government on innovation, particularly from the position of the new Centre for Finance, Innovation and Technology. In terms of crypto assets, whilst there was no specific liaison with the FCA on that topic, Innovation and Growth were kept informed as to progress, particularly in relation to remaining updated as to what the government was doing through its CBDC task force and its different engagement groups.

RESOLVED, that:

the update be noted.

A report of the Chief Operating Officer.

Members received a report of the Chief Operating Officer, following which several points were made.

Members noted, with some concern, the ‘Lessons learned’ on page 29 specifically in relation to the comments around the capacity of the Corporation itself to affect and manage change effectively, and the highlighting of a cultural resistance at the Corporation to new procedures.A question was raised as to what was in place to drive change and to ensure issues were addressed.

In response, the Chief Operating Officer advised that there would be a review of the Programme Board to ensure an external challenge was involved in programme delivery, and that each of the lead officers would also be involved. Members also heard, however, that behavioural change was a much broader topic than one specific ERP programme. Related issues would be dealt with, necessarily, via HR initially. Officers advised of the importance of adopting the ways of working which were inherent within the programme as opposed to altering the programme to fit current working methods and practices. Another change was the ‘Continuous Improvement’ project, which was a new resource within the Corporation and involved extensive process re-engineering prior to programme implementation.

Members’ attention was also drawn to a particular note of concern, which was the significant vacancies and the inherent risk in not having officers in place in those roles in order to lead on the transformation workstreams and to ensure that budget holders were taking responsibility. The Chamberlain agreed that the lack of resources to deliver change due of the level of vacancies was an area for concern, but emphasised that the senior leadership was committed to addressing this.

A member queried whether the lessons learned were Corporation-specific. In response, the Chamberlain confirmed that they were designed to address what the Corporation as a

A report of the Chief Operating Officer.

The Committee received a report of the Chief Operating Officer, which summarised Priority 1 and Priority 2 incidents in March 2022, and the following points were discussed:

• A glossary of terms would be introduced for future reports.
• P1 and P2 incidents were both serious incidents: in every instance, a major incident process which followed standard good practice in the I.T. industry was followed.
• There was a query as to what resolution mechanisms were in place to deal with external dependencies which resulted in failure of service delivery.  Officers, in response, advised contracts were in place via Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and any breach of delivery was escalated through these contract mechanisms. It was agreed that the areas where action had been taken as a result of this process would be brought to the next meeting for discussion.
• There was ongoing mapping of all call systems, software products and contracts, with this work being undertaken in conjunction with the production of a joint SLA with the Shared Service to ensure that all products were covered by the Shared Service and the Agilisys contract, which was welcomed by members.
• Members heard that many of the P1s and P2s in the police were as a result of external legacy technology within policing as a whole. One key aim was for national policing to keep improving its technology and collaborate more closely with other forces via use of cloud-based technology, which would have the benefit of removing connectivity problems.
• Members asked that these issues be reported to future meetings of Resource, Risk & Estates (Police) Committee (RREC), given that committee’s remit included risk.
• In response to a query regarding when the mapping would be complete, a timeframe of approximately three to four months was given. Members asked officers to provide a progress update to RREC

A report of the Chief Operating Officer.

Officers introduced a report of the Chief Operating Officer and drew members’ attention to the fact that some key risks had been reduced. A review of risks was underway by the leadership team with a view to including new risks on the dashboard and heat map, and this would be presented at the next meeting.

A member queried some budget reductions given the importance of buying the appropriate hardware for the end user. In response, officers advised that there was little in the way of discretionary spend; benchmarking exercises had demonstrated that there was value for money in the procurement of hardware and services. The Chief Operating Officer undertook to provide the committee with a summary of the changes implemented as a result of the TOM (some benchmarking in terms of how much was spent overall) at a future meeting. This was welcomed by members, who agreed that a common understanding of need and service delivery was key, with any decisions to alter budgets due to level of need necessarily being put to members for agreement.

RESOLVED, that:

i)             the report be noted;

ii)              a report of the Chief Operating Officer be presented at the next meeting outlining benchmarking exercises undertaken.

A joint report of the Chief Strategy Officer, the Director of Community and Children’s Services and the Director of Innovation and Growth.

Officers introduced a report of the Chief Operating Officer and drew members’ attention to the fact that some key risks had been reduced. A review of risks was underway by the leadership team with a view to including new risks on the dashboard and heat map, and this would be presented at the next meeting.

A member queried some budget reductions given the importance of buying the appropriate hardware for the end user. In response, officers advised that there was little in the way of discretionary spend; benchmarking exercises had demonstrated that there was value for money in the procurement of hardware and services. The Chief Operating Officer undertook to provide the committee with a summary of the changes implemented as a result of the TOM (some benchmarking in terms of how much was spent overall) at a future meeting. This was welcomed by members, who agreed that a common understanding of need and service delivery was key, with any decisions to alter budgets due to level of need necessarily being put to members for agreement.

RESOLVED, that:

i)             the report be noted;

ii)              a report of the Chief Operating Officer be presented at the next meeting outlining benchmarking exercises undertaken.

There were no questions.

There were no items of urgent business.

MOTION - That under Section 100(A) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the meeting for the following items on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Part I of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act.

RESOLVED, that:

Under Section 100(A) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the meeting for the following items on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Part I of the Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act.

To receive the non-public minutes of the Digital Services Sub-Committee meeting held on 28 January 2022.

The Sub-Committee noted the non-public minutes of the Digital Services Sub-Committee meeting held on 28 January 2022, which were presented for information only, in light of the change of governance structure from a Sub-Committee to a Grand Committee.

None.

A report of the Comptroller & City Solicitor.

The Committee received a report of the Comptroller & City Solicitor.

A report of the Chief Operating Officer.

The Committee received a report of the Chief Operating Officer.

A report of the City of London Police.

The Committee received a report of the Chief Operating Officer.

A Report of the Chamberlain.

a)            Forensics Network – PV12327

A Report of the Chamberlain.

b)            Forensics Storage – PV12326

A Report of the Chamberlain.

c)            National Identity Access Management

There were no non-public questions.

There was no other non-public business.

A report of the Chief Operating Officer.

A report of the Chief Operating Officer (to follow).