SIG Summit 2013

IL0 – Not Protectively Marked

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Sandwell’s Policy and Intelligence Summit Friday 21 September 2012

Feedback Report to SIG

Context This feedback report provides details of Sandwell’s Policy and Intelligence Summit held on Friday 21 September 2012. The summit aimed:

• to help identify what Sandwell’s current and future intelligence needs are to help drive policy

• to help create a work programme for Sandwell's Strategic Intelligence Group.

• raise awareness about the key policy issues impacting on Sandwell and what intelligence is already available across partner organisations.

• Provide a networking opportunity. This report includes

i) a summary of the summit content, including details of the views contributed by delegates

ii) potential work areas for SIG to consider, and iii) an evaluation of the summit

The three appendices provide additional detail about the summit content. 1. Summit Content

a. Key Note Presentation The key note presentation was delivered by Laurie Thraves from the LGiU. Some of the key points raised are attached as appendix 1.

b. Workshops Five free-flow workshops were held. They were thematically based and incorporated all policy areas. They were deliberately chosen to sit outside existing policy frameworks (e.g. JSNA, Council’s Scorecard, Health and Wellbeing Strategy) to aid


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creativity and so that they were not aligned to any single planning framework. The workshop themes were:

Social cohesion, role of the citizen and communities Welfare reform and housing Demographic change Economy, growth, skills and the environment Social care and health throughout the life course

Delegates were asked to consider the following questions:

What is the problem How are partners responding? What intelligence do we already have? What are the gaps in our intelligence (what else do we need to know)? What will we do next?

Details of the delegate feedback from the workshops is attached as appendix 2.

c. Delegate Voting Feedback Delegates were asked to vote on 5 questions. 62 delegates participated in the voting exercise. The results are attached as appendix 3. The overriding message was that delegates supported a priority focus on the economic regeneration of Sandwell and gaining a better understanding of poverty. 2. Potential work areas for SIG to consider Subject leads and facilitators have considered all the points raised by delegates during the workshops. They have recommended areas of intelligence work that SIG could take forward as part of their work programme.

Workshop Intelligence activity recommended Social cohesion, role of the citizen, and communities

Making better use of informal information and “street talk” which community organisations have access to including better two-way links


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between public sector/enforcement agencies and community centres etc. Gathering more information and mapping of neighbourhoods and the assets within them Gathering intelligence about people’s access to banking facilities and online resources e.g. in order to manage their finances effectively and their universal credit application Co-ordination of impact analyses in relation to welfare reform e.g. Midland Heart analysis of likely tenant responses Impact assessment of proposed residency test

Welfare reform and housing

Research to understand the overlap between households impacted by different aspects of welfare reform Providing an online tool for demographic work

Demographic Change

More analysis of the impact of population-related change on services e.g. migration, ageing population, increase in children, carers, residential location choices (e.g. schools, local environment, social mobility)

Economic growth, skills and environment

Forecasting numbers and types of jobs that will be required in the future Working with partners to share health information and intelligence more effectively. Aiming at “do it once – share effectively”

Social care and health throughout the life course

Analysis and production of summary document to meet the current needs of commissioners, linking existing data, intelligence, commissioning, contracts and strategy


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3. Evaluation and Lessons Learnt

a. Evaluation Forms Evaluation Forms were distributed to all delegates. 19 were returned, which represents a small sample of the 73 delegates.

Delegates were asked to rate the information sent to them beforehand, the presentations, the opportunity to put forward views in workshops, the delegate voting session and the suitability of venue and room layout.

The views expressed in the evaluation forms were very positive with the majority of questions scoring 4 or 5 out of 5. Some specific comments were: • ‘A marvellous event - much better than the usual for the

informal and open nature of the workshop and for the way everything was taken on board’

• ‘Very good event with excellent opportunity for discussion’ • ‘Look forward to report and more opportunities to attend

these type of events.’ • ‘A second summit is a must’. An area for improvement is the information sent to delegates in advance about the summit as many delegates did not rate this highly.

Some specific comments from delegates also need to be considered for future events:

• ‘Improve microphones - they don’t work, improve layout of room - very formal’

• ‘Felt some of the topics for the workshops could have been better, seemed a little too broad ranging. Learning and Culture seemed to be underrepresented in the topics and attendees.’

b. Other lessons learnt and observations

Attendance

• 73 delegates attended the summit. • Delegates were invited to attend through existing

networks and through SIG members disseminating the invite


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within their organisations. Numbers were capped at 80 delegates to ensure that the workshops were a manageable size.

• Attendance numbers initially seemed low (maybe due to the Summer holidays) and a second wave of invites were issued including the use of the Council’s managers circulation list. The Council’s managers circulation list generated a huge amount of interest. A week prior to the summit, numbers were well in excess of 80. 90 delegates were offered a place and unfortunately many others had to be turned away. This indicates the appetite across partners for events of this nature.

Presentations

• Delegates enjoyed the presentations and found them thought-provoking

• Some notes were taken during the key note speaker’s presentation – but these were not detailed. Since the summit, many delegates have requested a copy of the key-note speech. For future events involving a key-note speaker it would be worth considering making an audio recording so that the speech can be shared after the event, and with people who were unable to attend.

Twitter

• The twitter feed #trendingsandwell was used by delegates attending the summit and the ‘roving reporters’ also tweeted comments.

• The twitter feed helped to capture some of the key points raised during the presentations and the discussions during the workshops. There were also a number of “followers” of this commentary who were not at the summit, and this allowed them to engage with the content.

• The twitter feed has been captured at: http://t.co/iedLqm6G • For future events, it may be worth advertising the #hashtag

in advance, to generate even more interest. This would also help to market the event in advance.

Workshops

• Generally the workshops worked well as the comments captured are detailed and did focus on the questions posed


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by SIG. This should provide SIG with a good basis to decide a work programme.

• Feedback from delegates on the workshop style was mixed. Some delegates really enjoyed the free-flow format, others commented that there was not enough time to contribute to all the workshops.

• Some workshops fell into a more traditional facilitated workshop discussion with delegates sat round a table. Other workshops were more fluid with delegates continually popping in and out and joining the discussion. The use of subject leads and facilitators helped to focus the discussion on the key questions.

• Delegate movement around workshops could have been improved. The “floating facilitators” and frequent microphone announcements encouraged delegates to move on, although the microphone announcements could not clearly be heard in the annexes.

• The planning group had discussed whether to force-people to move round the workshops (e.g. using timed rotation), but felt that a more creative-environment would be created through allowing delegate to choose for themselves.

• It may be beneficial for more feedback to be gained from delegates on this aspect of the summit to help with the design of future events.

• During the workshops the post-its were generally not used. This may be due to the post-its being too small for delegates to note their points on, or that they were located on the workshop tables rather than being handed to delegates at the start. For future events, a range of sizes of post-its could be used and delegates could be handed these on arrival.

• Delegates tended not to write on and use the flipcharts at the start of the workshops, but this improved as comments started to be added to them. Subject leads and facilitators felt that this could be improved by some thoughts being added to the flipcharts before the workshops commenced.


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Cost The brief was to deliver the summit at minimal cost. We were unable to gain business sponsorship to help fund the summit. The summit cost a total of £251.04 which equates to £3.43 per delegate.

Report Author: Rebecca Clarke

on behalf of SIG Planning Group

IL0: Not Protectively Marked Appendix 1

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Appendix 1 Sandwell’s Policy and Intelligence Summit

21 September 2012

Key points raised during Key note speech Laurie Thraves, LGiU

• this is a period time of unprecedented change in the

economy, society and public services. The scale and pace of change is greater than at any time since war-time and the creation of the welfare state.

• Some of the current policies have not been as revolutionary as was initially expected e.g. right to buy and community challenge.

• Communities will become more involved in service delivery • The move of public health to Councils is the right fit. Every

£1.20 councils spend, saves £2 in the health sector • The same levers are being pulled by Central Government to

try and encourage growth– e.g. focus on house building and low interest rates.

• The ageing population will bring significant challenges. There are currently 10,000 100year olds in the UK – there will be 1million by 2070.

• Broader trends need to be thought about, e.g. drought, flooding, huge growth in world population (in the next 50year an extra 150million people in the developing world)

• Predictions o A poorer state – money will not come from the state o fewer hospitals, police and fire stations o fewer local authorities as they merge together particularly

districts o community governance (town and parish councils) will

bloom o all schools will be ‘independent’ of the local authority o community universities o access to new pharmaceuticals and treatments will be

restricted and waiting times will increase o public health interventions will be the only significant way

to achieve big changes in outcomes o more people will buy health and social care insurance

products


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o ‘personalisation’ will be accelerated with more service users being given a funding allocation, across more services, which they may ‘top up’

o Mergers of services o Some services will be centralised, others localised o More localised criminal justice o New or growing areas of service delivery:

services supporting independent living ‘socialisation’ services for older people information management services about

citizens/service users government advisory services such as financial

advice government and insurance: flooding, social care commercial trading by parts of government significant new forms of funding public services

through new financial models


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Appendix 2

Feedback from Workshop Discussions

Please note: the information contained below represents the views expressed by summit delegates

General points relevant to the role of SIG and all policy areas: • Intelligence needs to be more co-ordinated and accessible to

more people • We all need to share information • We need to be aware of other information/ intelligence sources

e.g. information from businesses (e.g.) retail stores, informal information and indicators, and “street talk”

• We all need to embrace evidence-led policy • We all need to work in partnership • We need to understand more about the issues affecting

organisations other than our own but we all need to understand the ‘central’ issues

• A concern was that it could become more difficult to share information with schools

• We all need to work with the voluntary sector • We need to look forward – not back • Economy and Skills should feature as a topic on the SIG

agenda as it was felt by delegates that this is central to solving many of the boroughs problems

• SIG: o needs to concentrate on how it becomes influential in

guiding policy development (it can be seen as separate and even disjointed to the formal decision process)

o needs to develop work with other agencies including businesses, schools, the college and the voluntary sector to achieve further two way information sharing

o needs to consider how it makes intelligence more accessible to a broader audience – interpretation is required as Sandwell Trend is sometimes too detailed

Feedback from individual workshops Delegates made the following comments / expressed the following opinions in relation to the workshop questions.


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Workshop 1 – Social cohesion, role of the citizen, communities

What is the problem? • Workforce and skills • Disengaged communities • Increase in crime and drugs in communities • Racism • Financial literacy and education

How are partners responding?

• Tasking – the view was that this is working and is an opportunity to address other issues and consider anecdotal info

• Credit unions

What intelligence do we already have? • Understanding of language, culture, religion • Advocacy workers have information about families

and communities • Voluntary sectors organisation have different

intelligence needs – need a repository for other types of intelligence

What are the gaps in our intelligence (what else do we need to know)?

• intelligence from schools • “street talk” needs to be heard and acted on • Share informal information e.g. warning signs –

does a child display signs of neglect? • Retail stores sharing information about shoplifting

and other anti-social behaviour • need to address fundamental issue about data

sharing with VCS and others • Understanding how people can/ want to access

intelligence

What will we do next? • New methods of capacity building to compensate for

increased use of VCS services


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• Local authorities need to build trust with communities to make community info easier to share

• Community budgets • More hubs / VCS alliances • More support to secure external funds by VCS orgs • Clearly identifying neighbourhoods • Create neighbourhood infrastructure where none is

apparent • Set achievable goals at neighbourhood level • Transfer/ local management of physical assets that

generate income • Recognise potential of people e.g. mums and

toddlers, Agewell (1200 people) • Recognise huge contribution of VCS and the cost of

cutting it • Use intelligence to align SCVS

Workshop 2 – Welfare Reform and Housing

What is the problem? • Money management • Chasing money • Training to use internet • Lack of wider understanding of the issue • Ensuring people get the help required (e.g many

suffer in silence) • Lack of economic opportunities • Lack of consideration of the “smaller” issues e.g.

carers’ accommodation

How are partners responding? • Making best use of housing stock • Contributing to welfare reform debate

What intelligence do we already have about the issue?

• Data on families affected by potential changes • Number of people receiving benefits • % people receiving housing benefit • The welfare reform act impact toolkit


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What are the gaps in our intelligence? • Response to the welfare reform act • Access to internet • Where are universal credit claimants • Educational attainment of benefit claimants • Access to banking facilities – and financial

awareness • Network support • How will benefits be delivered in future? What role

will the Council have in delivery of universal credit • Skills of local population if investment is planned • Health impact • How many people in receipt of benefit pay for

housing

What will we do next? • Strengthen link between partners so all parties are

involved • Link data and intelligence of all partners • Promote living wage

Workshop 3 - Demographic Change

What is the Problem? • Changing population – population growth, migration

(migration stats are poor), ageing population, increase in children

• 2011 Census figure shows significant underestimation of the population in the mid year estimates

• London Borough’s displacing people as a result of Welfare Reforms

• Cuts – Targeting vulnerable • Increase in children – demand for schools and

childcare provision. • Ageing Population - Longevity increasing but

resulting in more health problems. More people likely to opt for private insurance which creates a 2 tier system.

• Lack of economic opportunities from growth in population


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• Increased population projected in Sandwell due to cheap housing, improvements in the physical environment

• Will new schools e.g. free schools, be located in the areas that need them? The same question also applies to childcare providers.

What intelligence do we already have about this issue?

• Population estimates • Projections • Census

o Census information – questions on: how many hours care someone gives limiting long term illness general health

• Dispersed Asylum seekers – we have figures on these but they are only about 5% of the migrant population.

• Education data e.g. historically some families have moved out of Sandwell for education reasons at KS2. This trend is now changing

• Monthly birth data (held by PCT).


• Migration and migrant population - we need to track new arrivals more effectively.

• We need to disaggregate data by ethnicity and other categories so that we have a more detailed picture of the issues so that resources can be better targeted. We need more accurate data that predicts changes. We are not collecting this data at the moment!

• Ageing population issue demands greater knowledge of ‘carers’ – who – where? There is a question in the Census on carers (How many hours are spent caring for someone?) but need for further info on carers.

• In terms of health - People quite often under play health problems in answering questions on health. Proxy questions may be useful to get a more realistic picture.


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• We are not consistent in the way we collect data/intelligence across partners so that data cannot meaningfully shared or analysed

• Cannot rely on national data for changes locally. • Knowledge on carers i.e. who they are and what

their needs are. The information we have is not detailed or accurate enough. Although there was acknowledgement that we will never be able to identify all carers and that it would be very difficult to get such information.

What will we do next?

• We need to make better use of the intelligence we have to predict what we need to do.

• More evidence based decision-making where the medium and long term impact and outcomes are the goal and the decisions are based on clear evidence of need and impact. Decision makers should champion this approach

• Predictive analysis, social marketing • Try to plug the gaps in intelligence. Supermarkets

like Tesco know so much about their customers from clubcards etc, we need more detailed knowledge of our customers.

• Demographic challenge –Need to find the headroom to make some bold decisions, requires investment upfront – are local authorities prepared to do that?

• Manage expectations. • Use demographic and other data to plan policy and

services. • Maintain good relationships with schools in order to

continue sharing data/information • Share information – this will require culture change • Continue the close working between Public Health

and Sandwell MBC • early data and identification of potentially vulnerable

people to support early interventions before things escalate. (recognition of the challenge that service providers do not necessarily have a culture of intervening early and prioritising resources on prevention).


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Workshop 4 – Economy, Growth Skills and the Environment What is the problem?

• Recession • Different job styles e.g. different types of

payment/reward/ wage, carers • Under utilisation of Broadband infrastructure • Anticipating what jobs will be required in the future -

needs to link to employment site intelligence

How are partners responding? • There is active engagement with business in the

Borough e.g. partners engaged with potential around environmental technologies

What are the gaps in our intelligence?

• Sharing the intelligence • Young people – communities • Careers advisors • Revise channels to share intelligence with other

business • Need to improve joined up working across agencies

make sure that the theory transfers into practice • Use of intelligence need to fully involve schools and

be delivered to teachers and students • Need to further develop volunteering and work

experience “get young people to enter work” – use intelligence to direct people to areas/opportunities

What intelligence do we already have?

• CRM database • Basic intelligence on economy in the local economic

assessment

What will we do next? • Better joined-up working e.g. Black Country working

to join up the economic strategy, and between agencies.

• Need to know our businesses and how we work with them

• Better use of the broadband infrastructure • Current intelligence to be presented in a better

format and Identify ways in which intelligence can


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be shared in a practical way which are realistic and accessible to ‘interested parties’

• Seek buy-in and leadership • Getting more for less • Try to ensure that an economic strategy is

understood and taken forward with all agencies recognising how they contribute in a meaningful way

• Ensure that economy and job creation is prioritised high on the political agenda

• Identify new contributors able to provide economic intelligence – business etc.

• As well as encouraging new business, be mindful of supporting existing medium sized business helping them survive and flourish

• There is a need for an economic strategy that is understood and owned thereby providing leadership for the economic growth of the borough

• Further development of meaningful Black Country working is required – intelligence should be shared so that partnership is encouraged and competition is avoided

• Two-way sharing of information with business needs further work. SIG provides a lot of information/ intelligence – need to encourage business to feed in their intelligence to complete the picture

• The economic problem is often seen as too difficult and separate to other services. There needs further connection between housing and business development

• Business development – further education – schools

Workshop 5 – Social Care and Health throughout the life course

What is the problem? • Greater demand for social care • The whole social care system is not fit for purpose.

Needs re-writing • Demographic changes - ageing, workforce/skills,

looked after children, troubled families • Poor outcomes for some – inequalities, poverty,

poor health


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• Personalisation is not working – concept is sound. Difficult to implement

• Increased numbers of children in care • Personalisation / welfare reform – may lead to

increase in domestic abuse/safeguarding • How to invest in prevention and capacity building

with a reducing (traditional) budget? - adopting new approaches to service delivery that deliver better individual and community outcomes - for less

• JSNA in a ‘separate box’ • Too much reliance on traditional ways of working –

need to explore different means of gaining work experience models such as friends and neighbours

How are partners responding?

• Agewell is making links with statutory and voluntary organisations including CCGs, friends and neighbours, HWB, befriending. Agewell is also holding seminars and forums to raise issues for members, acting as advocates and the voice of older people

• HWB is key but hasn’t yet engaged wider partners – (this is about to change and board is reviewing approach as it approaches statutory status from April 2013)

What intelligence do we already have about the issue?

• Demographics • Finance, costs • Priorities (Simalto) • Activity/ demand • Market • Outcomes • Satisfaction • Geographical neighbours • Who is ‘we’ – public sector? Third sector? Local

people? Private sector? • Evidence on how partners might be involved in

public health • Information from personalisation assessment e.g.

Mencap,


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• We all have intelligence/data . but it is hard to pull together (even across areas of the Council) to help us tackle the issues


• Analysis that links data, intelligence, commissioning, contracts and strategy coherently to inform the system change we are grappling with

• CCGs need to join the debate • Social bonds – accessing funding through private

sector – where are we with it? • Identify which partners we would like to be playing a

role in public health • Central Government data around social fund -

reliance on national rather than local intelligence – Sandwell is different

• Internal gaps between intelligence in council areas • Social return on investment – need more data/

analysis/ information • Systems don’t talk to each other / collect coherently

What will we do next?

• Plan for demographic changes • Lobby/influence national changes: health and social

care system – comment on white paper this month • Take some risks • Outcome based commissioning – move away from

commissioning activity – allow for innovation • Consistency and time to imbed – show a model

works • Bring intelligence together under a jointly agreed

‘priority framework (perhaps via the Health and Wellbeing Board) across key partners and SHARE!

• Develop new relationships with third sector and previously less explored partners e.g. commercial (think Barclays bikes), academies, planning

• Link intelligence work to the Health and Wellbeing Board: JSNA is key and needs a big push/support from partner agencies

• Need more development work around intelligence with CCGs


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• Develop social enterprise as a model for future services

• Engage with members to give an overview of the public health function

• Potential to increase voluntary working e.g. the financially independent and older people with time on their hands

• Need to improve the understanding of the economy in schools so that information /intelligence for both teachers and students

• Look at different ways of rewarding and paying people to work – volunteers/experience


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Appendix 3

Results of the Delegate Voting Session

Delegates were asked to vote on 5 questions. 62 delegates participated in the voting exercise. 1. Which Sector do you work in?

Local Government - 65% Voluntary Sector – 13% Health Service – 11% Private Sector – 5% Other – 5% Police – 2%

2. If organisations in Sandwell could only provide three services which would you pick? (Pick three)

Number of Votes

Service Area

31 Health 31 Social Care 28 Housing 25 Jobs and Skills 14 Learning and Culture 11 Strong Communities

9 Community Safety 5 Environment

3. Which area is most in need of improvement? (Pick one)

Jobs and Skills – 54% Social Care – 23% Strong Communities – 11% Learning and Culture – 4% Housing – 4% Health – 4% Environment – 2% Community Safety – 0%

4. If we could only address 3 issues in Sandwell, which would you pick? (Pick three)

Number of Votes Issue


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39 Worklessness 34 Poverty 23 Unhealthy lifestyles 15 Inequality 14 Access to funding 13 Anti-social behaviour, crime and social

breakdown 11 Suitability of housing

7 Population change 5. Which area is the biggest gap in our understanding? (Pick one)

Poverty – 25% Inequality – 23% Population Change – 17% Worklessness – 13% Unhealthy lifestyles – 11% Access to funding – 8% Suitability of housing – 2% Anti-social behaviour, crime and social breakdown – 2%

Documents

SIG Summit 2013