(time limit 30 minutes)
Motion 1
Councillor Akhtar to MOVE and Councillor Jacques to SECOND:
Council notes that:
- Research conducted in 2015 by New Economy found that labour productivity as in Gross Value Added (GVA) per employment in Greater Manchester was lower than the national average in 14 of our 15 market sectors.
- National productivity has only grown by an average of 0.2% per annum, far below the ONS prediction of 1.6% per annum.
- It is estimated that the downgrading of national forecasts will cost the Treasury around £18 billion by 2021.
- The United Kingdom spends 0.5% of GDP on labour market programmes compared to Denmark and Ireland who spend over 3% and whose productivity levels have risen over the last 5 years.
Council further notes that:
- The Oldham Strategic Investment Framework, Local Economic Assessment and Work and Skills Strategy all demonstrate the need to develop a skilled, educated and dynamic workforce. The Skills deficit for citizens at Level 3 and/or 4 is 10 percentage points between Oldham and England Average
- Consequently, Oldham residents earn £5k a year less than the England average (£23k vs £28k)
- The GM economy will see double digit growth in Professional and Technical occupations with 50% of future jobs growth being office based.
- Re-skilling the workforce is vital if Oldham is to close the productivity gap which currently demonstrates a gap of nearly £10k between Oldham and Greater Manchester and £15k per head between Oldham and the England average.
- According to the Strategic Investment Framework, a 1% reduction in income inequality within Oldham could result in additional GVA growth in Greater Manchester up to £100m by 2035.
- Reskilling the workforce is a vital step to tackling these skills shortages across the city region.
Council is concerned that:
- The latest Government report into the impact of Further Education Reforms shows that there are 6.6% fewer learners entering further education per year since 2010, with nearly 9% reduction in the over 25s
- Since the introduction of Advanced Learning Loans, overall learner volumes in the years that loans were introduced, between 2012/13 and 2013/14, fell by -7.7%. Further, the fall in the number of learners aged 25 or older was steeper at -10.4%
- 58% of Further Education loans funding, amounting to almost £1billion, has not been spent since 2013.
- That the advanced learner loan system, without improved marketing and wraparound support, is not fit for purpose.
- That without changes to the system the UK and Oldham’s productivity levels will suffer.
Council resolves to ask the Chief Executive to write to the Rt. Hon. Anne Milton, Minister of State for Apprenticeships and Skills, outlining the Council’s request to reshape how Advanced Learner Loans operate, informing the Minister of our Careers Advancement Service as an example as to how citizens need support to access skills funding, with a more flexible approach to the loan fund account management. Oldham Council also believes that employers should be able to take the lead in designing new mechanisms for employees to widen the choice to include non-apprenticeship pathways, and flexible part time qualifications to suit employer and sector needs.
Motion 2
Councillor Moores to MOVE and Councillor Hewitt to SECOND:
At present the performance at the Royal Oldham Hospital is deemed to be failing by the Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership on the basis that the local economy is not consistently meeting the four-hour target at the front door of
A& E.
In terms of delayed discharges from Hospital, Oldham is one of the best performing localities in GM and this is largely as consequence of the benefits of an integrated team combined with a robust service offer and significant financial investment. In September 2017, Oldham had the second lowest number of delayed days both in terms of overall numbers and delays attributable to social care and the lowest delayed days attributable to the NHS.
At present the patient flow across the hospital is measured in several ways. All are interconnected and poor performance in one area will impact on another. The Royal Oldham has a comparatively high number of presentations to A & E. Royal Oldham hospital on average exceeds 300 presentations per day and on many days in the last three months has exceeded 350 people per day.
The Royal Oldham hospital currently has 166 beds, plus 27 beds on the discharge lounge which is referred to as G1. This is a total of 193 beds in the medicine division. Whilst the aim across GM is to reduce the number of acute beds in favour of supporting people as close to home as possible, the number of base beds at the Royal Oldham hospital is lower per head of population than other hospitals.
There is a great deal of pressure on the health and social care system, this is a direct result of high demand combined with a lack of adequate resources due to inadequate Central Government funding and the Government’s cap on public sector pay.
In Oldham, the Council, the CCG and its partners are working with the GM Health and Social Care Partnership to address these issues and the recent £21.3 million Transformation Fund investment into Oldham is welcome.
But the transformation funding will not fully address issues such as recruitment and retention, particularly in specialist areas such as Paediatrics and Emergency Care. The Budget also failed to address the underlying problems such as poverty, poor housing and unemployment that impact on the health and wellbeing of our residents. The Chancellor did have an opportunity to address some of these issues in his recent budget, but sadly failed to do so.
This Council notes:
This Council resolves to ask the Chief Executive to write to the Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Health, asking them to ensure that there is an urgent review of pay for NHS staff so that NHS organisations can recruit and retain staff with the right levels of skill to ensure that patients receive a safe, high quality and efficient service.
Motion 3
Councillor Roberts to MOVE and Councillor Chadderton to SECOND:
This Council notes that Oldham, together with thousands more, will celebrate International Women’s day on the 8th March 2018. Oldham Council has already agreed to mark the centenary of the Women’s Suffrage Act by supporting the Suffrage to Citizenship Campaign throughout 2018 and this will include marking the actual anniversary in November. Working with the Youth Council and local organisations, activities will focus on ways of encouraging young women (and men) to be more actively involved in the local community, an aim that fits well with our ethos as a Co-operative Council.
Oldham Council has previously affirmed its commitment to women’s equality; acknowledged the unequal impact of austerity on women and supported the aims of the WASPI campaign for fair access to pensions.
Oldham Council further notes that the Government continues to put forward proposals which threaten vital services for women, this time the funding of refuges for women escaping domestic violence. The Government consultation paper ‘Funding Supported Housing’ includes proposals to remove the payment of Housing Benefit to women living in refuges, which provides over 50% of their funding, and replace this with a ring fenced grant to local authorities which will also have to pay for short-term supported housing for older people, homeless people, people with mental illnesses and drug addicts.
This council is extremely concerned that this threatens the sustainability of refuges, which by their nature often provide a service to women out of the borough, and which are already unable to meet demand.
This council resolves
Minutes:
Motion 1
Councillor Akhtar MOVED and Councillor Jacques SECONDED the following MOTION:
“Council notes that:
- Research conducted in 2015 by New Economy found that labour productivity as in Gross Value Added (GVA) per employment in Greater Manchester was lower than the national average in 14 of our 15 market sectors.
- National productivity has only grown by an average of 0.2% per annum, far below the ONS prediction of 1.6% per annum.
- It is estimated that the downgrading of national forecasts will cost the Treasury around £18 billion by 2021.
- The United Kingdom spends 0.5% of GDP on labour market programmes compared to Denmark and Ireland who spend over 3% and who productivity levels have risen over the last 5 years.
Council further notes that:
- The Oldham Strategic Investment Framework, Local Economic Assessment and Work and Skills Strategy all demonstrate the need to develop a skilled, education and dynamic workforce. The Skills deficit for citizens at Level 3 and/or 4 is 10 percentage points between Oldham and England Average.
- Consequently, Oldham residents earn £5k a year less than the England average (£23K vs £28K)
- The GM Economy will see double digit growth in Professional and Technical occupations with 50% of future jobs growth being office based.
- Re-skilling the workforce is a vital step to tackling these skills shortages across the city region.
Council is concerned that:
- The latest Government report into the impact of Further Education Reforms shows that there are 6.6% fewer learners entering further education per year since 2010, with nearly 9% reduction in the over 25s
- Since the introduction of Advanced Learning Loans, overall learner volumes in the years that loans were introduced, between 2012/13 and 2013/14, fell by -7.7%. Further, the fall in the number of learners aged 25 or older was steep at -10.4%
- 58% of Further Education loans funding, amounting to almost £1billion, has not been spent since 2013.
- That the advanced learner loan system, without improved marketing and wraparound support, is not fit for purpose.
- That without changes to the system, the UK and Oldham’s productivity levels will suffer.”
Councillor Harkness spoke in support of the motion.
Councillor Haque spoke in support of the motion.
Councillor Akhtar exercised his right of reply.
On being put to the VOTE, the MOTION was CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
RESOLVED that the Chief Executive be asked to write to the Rt. Hon. Anne Milton, Minister of State for Apprenticeships and Skills, outlining the Council’s request to reshape how Advanced Learner Loans operated, informing the Minister of our Careers Advancement Service as an example as to how citizens needed support to access skills funding, with a more flexible approach to the loan fund account management. Oldham Council also believed that employers should be able to take the lead in designing new mechanisms for employees to widen the choice to include non-apprenticeship pathways and flexible part-time qualification to suit employer and sector needs.
Motion 2
Councillor Moores MOVED and Councillor Hewitt SECONDED the following MOTION:
“At present the performance of the Royal Oldham Hospital is deemed to be failing by the Greater Manchester Health and Care Social Care Partnership on the basis that the local economy is not consistently meeting the four-hour target at the front door of A&E.
In terms of delayed discharges from Hospital, Oldham is one of the best performing localities in GM and this is largely as consequence of the benefits of an integrated team combined with a robust service offer and significant financial investment. In September 2017, Oldham had the second lowest number of delayed days both in terms of overall numbers and delays attributable to social care and the lowest delayed days attributable to the NHS.
At present the patient flow across the hospital is measured in several ways. All are interconnected and poor performance in one area will impact on another. The Royal Oldham has a comparatively high number of presentations to A & E. Royal Oldham hospital on average exceeds 300 presentations per day and on many days in the last three months has exceeded 350 people per day.
The Royal Oldham hospital currently has 166 beds, plus 27 beds on the discharge lounge which is referred to as G1. This is a total of 193 beds in the medicine division. Whilst the aim across GM is to reduce the number of acute beds in favour of supporting people as close to home as possible, the number of base beds at the Royal Oldham hospital is lower per head of population than other hospitals.
There is a great deal of pressure on the health and social care system, this is a direct result of high demand combined with a lack of adequate resources due to inadequate Central Government funding and the Government’s cap on public sector pay.
In Oldham, the Council, the CCG and its partners are working with the GM Health and Social Care Partnership to address these issues and the recent £21.3 million Transformation Fund investment into Oldham is welcome.
But the transformation funding will not fully address issues such as recruitment and retention, particularly in specialist areas such as Paediatrics and Emergency Care. The Budget also failed to address the underlying problems such as poverty, poor housing and unemployment that impact on the health and wellbeing of our residents. The Chancellor did have an opportunity to address some of these issues in his recent budget, but sadly failed to do so.
This Council notes:
1. The £21.3 million GM Transformation Funding investment in Oldham’s health economy.
2. The fact that Oldham is one of the best performing localities with regards to delayed discharges from hospital.
3. The concern around waiting times at A&E.
4. Its disappointment that in his Budget announcement the Chancellor failed to meaningfully address the issue of public sector pay.
5. That the Budget fails to address issues such as poverty, poor housing and unemployment.
6. This Council thanks all those involved in the health and social care sector for their commitment and hard work.
This Council resolves to ask the Chief Executive to write to the Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Health, asking them to ensure there is an urgent review of pay for NHS staff so that NHS organisations can recruit and retain staff with the right levels of skill to ensure that patients receive a safe, high quality and efficient service.
AMENDMENT
Councillor Harkness MOVED and Councillor Sykes SECONDED the following AMENDMENT:
“In paragraph one, line 2 after Partnership replace the words ‘on the basis that the local economy is not consistently meeting the four-hour target at the front door of A & E’ with ‘because the four-hour A & E target is not being consistently met.’
Amended motion to read as follows:
“At present the performance of the Royal Oldham Hospital is deemed to be failing by the Greater Manchester Health and Care Social Care Partnership because the four-hour A & E target is not being consistently met.
In terms of delayed discharges from Hospital, Oldham is one of the best performing localities in GM and this is largely as consequence of the benefits of an integrated team combined with a robust service offer and significant financial investment. In September 2017, Oldham had the second lowest number of delayed days both in terms of overall numbers and delays attributable to social care and the lowest delayed days attributable to the NHS.
At present the patient flow across the hospital is measured in several ways. All are interconnected and poor performance in one area will impact on another. The Royal Oldham has a comparatively high number of presentations to A & E. Royal Oldham hospital on average exceeds 300 presentations per day and on many days in the last three months has exceeded 350 people per day.
The Royal Oldham hospital currently has 166 beds, plus 27 beds on the discharge lounge which his referred to as G1. This is a total of 193 beds in the medicine division. Whilst the aim across GM is to reduce the number of acute beds in favour of supporting people as close to home as possible, the number of base beds at the Royal Oldham hospital is lower per head of population than other hospitals.
There is a great deal of pressure on the health and social care system, this is a direct result of high demand combined with a lack of adequate resources due to inadequate Central Government funding and the Government’s cap on public sector pay.
In Oldham, the Council, the CCG and its partners are working with the GM Health and Social Care Partnership to address these issues and the recent £21.3 million Transformation Fund investment into Oldham is welcome.
But the transformation funding will not fully address issues such as recruitment and retention, particularly in specialist areas such as Paediatrics and Emergency Care. The Budget also failed to address the underlying problems such as poverty, poor housing and unemployment that impact on the health and wellbeing of our residents. The Chancellor did have an opportunity to address some of these issues in his recent budget, but sadly failed to do so.
This Council notes:
1. The £21.3 million GM Transformation Funding investment in Oldham’s health economy.
2. The fact that Oldham is one of the best performing localities with regards to delayed discharges from hospital.
3. The concern around waiting times at A&E.
4. Its disappointment that in his Budget announcement the Chancellor failed to meaningfully address the issue of public sector pay.
5. That the Budget fails to address issues such as poverty, poor housing and unemployment.
6. This Council thanks all those involved in the health and social care sector for their commitment and hard work.
This Council resolves to ask the Chief Executive to write to the Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Health, asking them to ensure there is an urgent review of pay for NHS staff so that NHS organisations can recruit and retain staff with the right levels of skill to ensure that patients receive a safe, high quality and efficient service.”
Councillor Moores exercised his right of reply. Councillor Moores ACCEPTED the AMENDMENT.
A vote was then taken on the AMENDMENT.
On being put to the vote, the AMENDMENT was CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
Councillor Chauhan spoke in support of the Substantive Motion.
Councillor Ahmad spoke in support of the Substantive Motion.
Councillor Harkness spoke in support of the Substantive Motion.
Councillor Moores exercised his right of reply.
On being put to the vote, the SUBSTANTIVE MOTION was CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
RESOLVED that the Chief Executive be asked to write to the Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Health, asking them to ensure that there is a urgent review of pay for NHS Staff so that NHS organisations can recruit and retain staff with the right levels of skill to ensure that patients receive a safe, high quality and efficient service.
Motion 3
The Mayor informed the meeting that the time limit for this item had expired. Councillor Chadderton as SECONDER of the MOTION requested the Council permit the following motion be rolled over for discussion at the next Council meeting.
“This Council notes that Oldham, together with thousands more, will celebrate International Women’s day on the 8th March 2018. Oldham Council has already agreed to mark the centenary of the Women’s Suffrage Act by supporting the Suffrage to Citizenship Campaign throughout 2018 and this will include marking the actual anniversary in November. Working with the Youth Council and local organisations, activities will focus on ways of encouraging young women (and men) to be more actively involved in the local community, an aim that fits well with our ethos as a Co-operative Council.
Oldham Council has previously affirmed its commitment to women’s equality; acknowledged the unequal impact of austerity on women and supported the aims of the WASPI campaign for fair access to pensions.
Oldham Council further notes that the Government continues to put forward proposals which threaten vital services for women, this time the funding of refuges for women escaping domestic violence. The Government consultation paper ‘Funding Supported Housing’ includes proposals to remove the payment of Housing Benefit to women living in refuges, which provides over 50% of their funding, and replace this with a ring fenced grant to local authorities which will also have to pay the short-term supported housing for older people, homeless people, people with mental illnesses and drug addicts.
This council is extremely concerned that this threatens the sustainability of refuges, which are already unable to meet demand.”
RESOLVED that the Motion be rolled over to the Council meeting to be held on 28th March 2018.
NOTE: Councillors Roberts, Heffernan and Sheldon left the meeting during this item.