Agenda item

Report of the City Surveyor.

The Sub-Committee considered a Report of the City Surveyor concerning the Cyclical Works Programme for 2019/20.

Members asked the City Surveyor whether he had adequate staff in place to tackle the backlog of works. The City Surveyor responded that despite the amount of work in the pipeline, staff, although stretched, were managing. The list of works was a moving feast and a renewed impetus to reduce the operational property footprint would, in turn, ease pressure across the team. Members also queried whether those in the department had sufficient levels of project management skills to meet the challenge, the City Surveyor responded that this was less clear cut.

Members requested that future iterations of this Report should include a greater focus on the macro clarity on where we were on the bow wave and the implications for finances and operational capability.

A Member asked when the bow wave was likely to be eliminated. Officers responded that whilst the overall level of the bow wave was plateauing, it will not come to an end, as officers are adding new items to the list on a regular basis. Unless Members decide to merge the CWP budget with the Maintenance budget, the bow wave would remain.

RESOLVED – that the Sub-Committee approved the following:

·         review the attached appendix schedules and approve the recommended works in the Actual List to the value of £12.6m as essential and should be prioritised as proposed;

·         review the attached appendix schedules and approve the list of projects in the Reserve List to the value of £11.5m as works that need to be completed should savings from the Actual List projects arise;

·         agree the final proposed programme of works be submitted for approval of funding at the meeting of the Resource Allocation Sub-Committee in January 2019;

·         approve that where projects on the Actual List are delivered at a saving or do not proceed for any reason that the funding be reallocated by the CWP Peer Review Group to undertake projects from the approved Reserve list and then report to this committee at the next progress report.