Policy & Performance Review Committee - Thursday 15 January 2026, 10:00am

Policy & Performance Review Committee
Thursday, 15th January 2026 at 10:00am

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Linda Gillie - Clerk
Lyn Jardine - Councillor

1. Minutes for Approval: PPRC, 18 September 2025

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Lyn Jardine - Councillor

3. Work Programme: Session 2025/26

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2. Action Log: Session 2025/26

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Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Yorkston, Colin
Michelle Cockburn
Lyn Jardine - Councillor

4. Policy and Performance Review Committee (PPRC) Development Plan 2025-2027 – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Resources and Economy

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Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Menzies, Lee-Anne
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office
Linda Gillie - Clerk
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Linda Gillie - Clerk

5. Q2 2025/26 Performance Reports: Heads of Communities & Partnerships, Children’s Services, and Housing – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Resources and Economy

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Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Michelle Cockburn
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Eamon John - Communities
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Menzies, Lee-Anne
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
McMillan, John
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
McIntosh, Shona
Eamon John - Communities
McIntosh, Shona
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Eamon John - Communities
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Eamon John - Communities
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
McIntosh, Shona
Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Menzies, Lee-Anne
Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
McMillan, John
Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Menzies, Lee-Anne
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Menzies, Lee-Anne
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Linda Gillie - Clerk

6. Additional Support Needs (ASN) – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Children and Communities

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Presenting Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Findlay, Jeremy
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Yorkston, Colin
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
McIntosh, Shona
Presenting Officer
McIntosh, Shona
Presenting Officer
McIntosh, Shona
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Presenting Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor

7. Housing Performance Benchmarking Report – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Children and Communities

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Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Officer
Officer
Officer
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Andy Forrest - Councillor
Andy Forrest - Councillor
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Menzies, Lee-Anne
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
Gilbert, Neil
Lyn Jardine - Councillor
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Disclaimer: This transcript was automatically generated, so it may contain errors. Please view the webcast to confirm whether the content is accurate.

Good morning everyone and welcome to this meeting of the Policy and Performance Review Committee on the 15th of January 2026.

Can I first of all ask for apologies?

There are none. Can we ask now for any declarations of interest?

There are none.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:00:37

Linda Gillie - Clerk - 0:00:37

and we need to go through a statement. This meeting has been held remotely and

has been recorded and will be available as a webcast by the council's website.

This is to allow the public access to the democratic process in East Lothian.

East Lothian Council is the data controller under the Data Protection Act

2018. Data collected as part of the recording will be retained in accordance

with the council's policy on record retention and the webcast of this

meeting will be publicly available for up to five years. I'll now take a roll

call of attendance. Councillor Bennett. Present. Councillor Collins. Present.

present

Councillor Gilbert

present

Councillor Jardine

present

Councillor Menzies

present

Councillor McIntosh

present

and Councillor Yorkston

present

Thank you, the meeting is corette

OK, if we can move to item 1 please

1. Minutes for Approval: PPRC, 18 September 2025

Item 1 on the agenda are the minutes of the meeting of the PPRC that was held on 18 September 2025.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:01:54

Can I ask members for agreement that this is an accurate record and seek your approval please?

Yes, happy to.

Great.

Thank you very much.

And if we can move to the next item.

3. Work Programme: Session 2025/26

The second item on the agenda is the action note session 2025 to 2026.

2. Action Log: Session 2025/26

Thanks.

Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office - 0:02:18

I will come in here.

As Linda mentioned, this is the action log for PPRC.

You will see commentary under each action on the action log and all actions other than

2513 are recommended to the committee for closure.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:02:41

Okay. Anyone have any questions, comments on that? Nope. So we're, oh, Councillor Minsi's.

I'm having fun with this laptop this morning, so sorry about that chair. It's just a quick

comment on 25 10 they the outcome and the response I'm absolutely fine with

but in future could we either all have it and I'm not saying we didn't I just

can't recall it or can it be put in the action log so that we can all see it to

sign off in future and I'm thinking more about the public scrutiny rather than my

personal need to see that information

I think that is a sensible suggestion.

Are we happy to approve the recommendations for closure of these items?

I will take silence as a yes.

Thank you very much.

If we can move on to item 3.

Thank you, chair.

Yorkston, Colin - 0:03:51

This is the committee's work plan for 2025, 2026 and has been updated following comments

at the previous meetings.

So again, offered to the committee for approval going forward.

However, just before we do that, I would like to bring in Michelle to comment on the impact

of transformation report.

Okay, Michelle.

Thank you.

Michelle Cockburn - 0:04:19

Michelle Coburn, I am the transformation and digital portfolio manager in the Council.

I would suggest that the impact of transformation item is removed as it has been covered by

two reports last year to committees.

The best value thematic report on transformation was put to the audit and governance committee

on 17 June.

The annual report for transformation was at full council on the 26th of August where it

was agreed that future annual reports would be sent to members' library.

This committee could consider bringing in future annual reports if that's what you wish

to do.

Thank you.

Thank you, Michelle.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:05:01

As convener, obviously we had a conversation around this as well and I thought that was

an appropriate way forward.

Can I cheque colleagues views on that as well, please?

Happy with that.

Thank you, Leanne.

Thank you as well.

Shona, thank you.

Yeah, I'm happy with that.

OK.

And just to be clear, would we propose to see some sort of update come to PPRC in future?

I'm looking at a room, most of the officers, to be disconcerting.

Leanne. So I would say that would depend on if it had gone to other committees or

full council. I think when we've been very mindful of best value for within

the council and streamlining the work that officers do as well as what we

consider so if it's already been to another committee or full council and

and there's been an opportunity for us to scrutinise,

then if things are going into members live today,

we have the ability to call that in if we need to,

and it is our responsibility as councillors

to make sure we're scrutinising that.

So I think that's a judgement call perhaps

on if it has been done already or if we feel it's required.

Yeah, I think that's probably appropriate

because I think each of the leaders of groups

also have conversations with chief officers.

so if this can be one that we kind of keep on that radar as well and if

there's a need to to bring it forward we can. Happy with that folks? Agreed. Thank you very much.

Can we move to the next item please? Oh no we need to take a... sorry I'm looking

at too many bits of paper. Do we need a roll call vote on... no that's fine.

Item 4 then please.

4. Policy and Performance Review Committee (PPRC) Development Plan 2025-2027 – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Resources and Economy

Item 4 on the agenda is the PPRC development plan 2025 to 2027.

Over to you, Yulie.

Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office - 0:07:15

Thank you, Chair.

As Linda mentioned, this is the development plan.

This is your plan as a committee that you developed following a number of sessions with

the improvement service in 2025.

The bulk of the contents of the report are set out in the appendix which sets out the actions that were agreed.

Again, in a similar way to the set up of the action log, I put commentary under each of the comments section and recommended those that have been progressed for closure.

Those actions that I have set out for closure are action 1, 3, 4 and 6.

However, I would just like to remind members that this is your development plan, so that

is my officer judgement, but as a collective you may feel you want to take further steps

under these actions or support further development and training.

Okay, thank you for that Hayley.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:08:12

Before I open it up, I just want to highlight that I consider the main purpose of this item

for us to take stock of progress on our own scrutiny development and to test whether the

actions marked for closure have actually changed our behaviours and not just completed tasks.

So in order to do that I think if we can look at this item from that lens and really our

role in this particular paper is to reinforce that scrutiny improvement is member led and

not just something that officers do for us. OK, so I'm going to open it up for questions,

first of all.

Leanne.

Look, just a quick question for Hayley. I know we've all been asked to complete our

skills matrix what percentage have completed that or numbers if it's easier

to do in numbers Haley because again I'm just on the back of what Lynn has said

this is our development for us and I want to make sure that we are being the

responsible ones here and taking part when the offerings are made.

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:09:34

Thanks Councillor Remsied. I've received 4 so 50 % return.

Okay, thank you for that. In that case, I would suggest then, and I don't want to go

against Hayley's recommendation, but I would keep the skill matrix on until we as councillors

have all realised that we need to take that responsibility and have completed it. And

then at that stage, we could maybe fully review it and close off.

I am going to ask if anyone else wants to come in on that particular point before I

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:10:10

weigh in.

Shona?

It seems sensible to not close it off until we have done the review of it as well.

I think that would make sense from a process point of view.

I would probably agree.

I suppose my thinking was somewhat similar.

We needed to be clear on what our completion of that actually looks like rather than it

necessarily just being something that has ticked off that we have all completed the

skills matrix.

How does that actually equate to us being able to evidence that we have moved on in

our conducting of ourselves in meetings and the scrutiny that we carry out so we can maybe

have a further discussion on that.

Any other questions?

No.

I think we have a question from the audience.

Do you have a comment?

I think we have a comment from the audience.

For some reason we didn't see you on the screen here with your hand up, but yeah, we'll keep an eye out for it. Thank you.

Okay, any other questions on the paper?

No, any comments to close off?

No?

I think we had Leanne first and then Shona.

On the screen that we have got here, I wonder, we are in the middle of the meeting, we can't

change it now.

We will go with Shona first.

I think part of the confusion might be Colin, sorry, I think you need to use the hybrid link for teams to request to speak rather than the regular raise hand. I think that's one of the things that's happening. It means that the chair can't see your hand.

And, and yeah, I think maybe Leanne and I just pressed our buttons at the exact same time.

as we often do. My comment was really just to say thank you so much Haley for this document,

I think it's super helpful. I mean it would have been amazing to have it as a new counsellor

because I think it would actually, I think it actually gives really good sort of suggestions

for how, for the questioning techniques that I think we'll use in all our meetings, but it's

particularly interesting to get that, you know, that kind of theory around what the Scrutiny

committee is for that we have gone into with those sessions. So I'm going to save it on

my desktop so that I can keep going back to it and hopefully review my own performance

against some of that. But thank you very much for all the work that's gone into it. I think

it's a really helpful document and I very much appreciate it.

Thank you Shona. Leanne.

So look, Shona's just said practically what I was going to say. I think this has been

a power of the work so thanks to Hayley and everybody else behind it and I think a bit

thanks to the committee, ourselves for pushing it and being uncomfortable in the start. I

know I certainly was uncomfortable in the start for the changes, but it's been transformational

for us and I really do appreciate it and I'll echo what Shona said. As a new Councillor,

I think this would have been invaluable. We came in thinking combative, hard questioning

was the way to go and actually we weren't getting the answers we wanted anyway, you know, we were

that it was just causing real issues with trying to develop any relationship so I'm really

appreciative of this and it's helped us, helped me personally keep an eye on strategy as opposed to

the granular stuff that really it doesn't make it much difference when we're scrutinised anyway.

So huge thanks, Healy. Thank you. Ruri. It's gonna sound like a big cavern with the

amount of echoing going on here, but I echo Leanne and Shona's comments on it, especially the part

about coming in as a new councillor. I think it's extremely helpful and

sometimes I find difficulty kind of formulating questions. I put it on my skills

matrix as well, sometimes getting bogged down into detail instead of the whole overview

strategy kind of thing. I found it very useful. I just wanted to thank you for that.

Thank you all for those really positive comments. I think it is really important for us all to

reflect, as most of you have said, on our own performance. I think this paper has absolutely

helped us to shape how we do that going forward. I think there has certainly

been a significant amount of progress in terms of the foundations that we now

have and that I just want to confirm to everybody that this is a live and

member -led process, not something that the officers are doing for us. So I

think the public can expect from us going forward quality of our questioning

across the work that we do in this committee and others and greater clarity

on the conclusions that we reach in terms of the actions that we take

forward and how we are going to follow those actions up and we'll keep

this in review and the 50 % of us who have not completed yet our skills matrix

I will find out who you are and come and have a chat.

Okay, thank you.

Just as a way of how I have found the process myself and helping you to, because it can

be quite an intimidating thing to do.

I think we just need to report for noting and approval to agree that the actions are

so it would be agree the actions except for the one on the review then so the

skills matrix was under action 10 which I'd not recommended for closure so we

We can keep that one open.

The proposal was action 134.

Is it a roll call vote to approve that?

Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office - 0:17:10

Linda will take us to the roll call vote to approve the recommendation that 134 and six

are removed.

Thank you.

Linda Gillie - Clerk - 0:17:25

Just to repeat that, this is the roll call vote to close items 134 and six on the development

plan.

Councillor Bennett. Approve. Councillor Collins. Approve. Councillor Finlay. Approve.

Councillor Gilbert. Approve. Councillor Jardine. Approve.

Councillor Menzies. Approve. Councillor McIntosh. Approve. And Councillor Yorkston. Approve.

That's unanimous approval.

Thank you very much, colleagues.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:17:56

If we can move now to more substantive items.

Slightly different substantive items.

Item 5, please.

Linda Gillie - Clerk - 0:18:12

Item 5 on the agenda is a quarter to 2025, 2026 performance reports.

5. Q2 2025/26 Performance Reports: Heads of Communities & Partnerships, Children’s Services, and Housing – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Resources and Economy

These are reports from the heads of communities and partnerships, children's services and housing.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:18:25

And just to be clear on how we are going to proceed with this item, Michelle Colburn will introduce the item and then we'll look at each head of service area independently.

So it would be Eamon John first, then Lindsay Byrne and then Wendy Maguire. So Michelle, over to you.

Thank you.

This is the quarter 2 reports and the new format.

Michelle Cockburn - 0:18:48

These three reports will be presented by the heads of service this morning and are contained

in the appendices.

Please note also that quarter 2 reports for the head of infrastructure and the head of

finance have been placed in members library following on from their presentations at the

last meeting.

I would ask members to note that some of the indicators are new, some of the targets are new also, so these will be kept under review and updated as we move through the cycle.

So you are asked today to note the report and otherwise use the information provided in this report to consider whether any aspect of the Council's performance needs further analysis,

to note that as I say further heads of service reports and the strategic report

which is the annual report will come forward and future meetings of this

group and to note that areas of performance that may have been

particular interest to members but are out with the agreed work plan will be

highlighted and covering reports in the future should we need to. Thank you.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:19:55

Thank you very much and I think just before we get into the the detail I just

want to remind members that the purpose of this item really is to test whether

performance is improving outcomes for our residents not just the activities

and to help us identify systemic risks and pressures across communities,

children's services and housing. So we're moving from a what's the number to

what's the change and why and what next. Okay so over to yourself Eamon.

Thank you chair and good morning everybody. Eamon John, Head of Communities

Eamon John - Communities - 0:20:30

and partnerships. So the report in front of us today, my own report is linked to appendix

one from a performance perspective and in the spirit of agenda item four, I'll probably

try to draw specifically on some of the key strategic delivery plan updates in this quarter.

If I can shine a light on three in particular that's in front of us, there's a national

requirement, we've got an LDP2 around the corner and an open space strategy in respect

of that network of green space is fundamentally important.

I'm happy to report to the PPRC this morning that that strategy document will be in front

of Cabinet next week.

I'm led to believe we're probably one of the first early adopters nationally in the 32

local authorities that will be delivering on that government requirement.

So that will be in front of Cabinet and there's been a range of pre -meets in line with that

and some previous briefings.

So I wanted to shine a light on that particular one.

I also wanted to shine a light on page one on appendix one around implementing the council's corporate emergency planning.

Really, really important we're seeing the range of emergency issues nationally, whether it be flooding, whether it be high winds, whether it be snow.

And that is currently under review. However, the emergency planning team colleagues are advising that we'll be able to have that in front of CLT during next month in February.

So I wanted to shine a light on that one as well.

And the final one I wanted to shine a light on from a strategic perspective was to deliver

the Council's Community Learning and Development Plan.

You know, we had a previous inspection, some good progress and solid progress has been

made there, but I'm also pleased to be able to report to committee this morning that we've

had two very, very successful sessions with Education Scotland leading into Christmas,

where the feedback was strong around the partnership, the growth of the partnerships and colleagues

in the room have been present in that and how that partnership is maturing to make a

difference chair in your language at the cold face.

So they were probably the three elements that I wanted to shine a light on strategically

but obviously my colleague here as well Raymond is with me in the room today from a customer

services perspective if we want to drill into any of the detail around KPIs and I'll pause

there, thank you.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:22:46

Thank you very much for that Eamonn. We will look at questions specifically for Eamonn

and Raymond and we will see where we go from there. Open it up to others first of all.

Lianne?

Yeah, just thank you and thanks for the report. Again, I think it is a lot clearer now than

the previous KPI reports we had. So, really grateful for that. It is just a quick question

around the council action plan number four which includes the East Lothian poverty plan.

and we've got some great overall information there.

What differences can we expect to see

in our poorest communities around this, Eamon?

And I'm not looking for everything,

just the high level stuff.

You know, people don't often understand

why it's really important for us

to have these strategic plans

and to make sure that every workstream

sort of falls within that.

And I'm just trying to put some meat on the bones

of that one, if you like.

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:23:59

Thank you, Councillor Menses, for your question and a very important one as well, and I know

that we have had some discussions around some of the data with poverty.

The poverty working group linked to the council's poverty working plan at a strategic level,

the various subgroups underneath that poverty working group are starting to make a difference,

but some of the examples of the how, well, trying to identify people in our communities

that can get some financial support that are currently not getting that financial support.

Those examples are taking place right now.

Some of the work that we're doing within the partnership around eating and food support,

we've got examples through the poverty group in there as well.

And there's a range of other services working collectively together with education and with

us, sporting bit around trying to support families in respect of being able to participate

in activities, Councillor, that might not have in the past because they didn't have

certain equipment or kits or strips and being able to look at that sort of food bank, clothes

bank, kit bank to support and make a difference to those most at risk in our communities.

They're just a sample but I know that we've shared behind the scenes as well and happy

to keep doing that moving forward. Hopefully that's been helpful.

It has and I am always grateful for our chats because I think it's really good to have someone who's perfectly in tune with my own thoughts on how we fight poverty and why we need to.

So I'm just going to ask one more and again this is more for the public than most of us sitting here because I think we should be well aware of it.

How important is preventative spend within our poverty plan and the things we do as a council?

And again, I'll sort of caveat that most of it is not statutory, so when we're coming up to budget

it's an easy target for us for cuts, but in your opinion as the expert leading this,

how important is it that preventative spend carries on?

Thank you for your question, Councillor Menses, and thank you for the opportunity to be able

to answer on that. Over many years, nationally and locally, that bit around what is seen

as being nice to have services, sometimes termed as non -essential services, are absolutely

fundamental to making the difference to people's opportunities in life and their life chances.

So whether that be culture, arts, sports, music, all of those sort of primary universal services are fundamental.

But I am going to say both nationally and locally, they've been really, really challenged probably for the last 15 years.

The importance of having those primary services is fundamental.

We are working, as you know, from a belonging to East Lothian perspective, strategically,

and those sort of three phases that colleagues are working on just now.

And those primary elements to try to get that long -term differential change in people's

lives are fundamental.

But it is challenging.

I'm not going to shy away from that challenge because when you're trying to square that

off against a financial envelope that we're all facing, then there's some really tough

decisions in there.

But it's crucial that we do not lose because our problems will just be absolutely amplified

even further from where they are today.

Thank you.

Thank you and that was exactly the point I wanted to get across to you. Can I finish

just by saying one thing to all the council officers? Could you just call me Leanne? When

we have chats and it came up yesterday with John, we are on first name terms, we have

built that relationship and I get the formalities for it in council chamber but I really think

the public would appreciate if they understood that we have worked hard to build those relationships

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:27:49

and they continue. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, I'm going to offer anyone else to come in with questions.

I have tried to come in through the hybrid link, but as somebody who's not very

familiar with things like Facebook or anything else. I'm

maybe not as competent as I should be. Thank you. And I just

wanted to echo that point about similar thinking and the way

McMillan, John - 0:28:28

people approach things. Yesterday, some of us managed to

join in on the regional climate hub briefing. And Eamon, I just

wanted to ask if you would maybe say something around the approach to ensuring that climate

challenge is taken account of in all that you do around open space, learning strategy,

learning spaces, community development, so on. How are you working across the board on

that issue?

Am I calling you Provost or am I calling you John?

But either or...

I think if Sir weren't you, John would be fine, thank you.

OK John it is, and Leanne of course, I'll call you Leanne.

You raise an important question John in respect of climate.

Strategically from a Council perspective we have a climate emergency, we've got a climate

of nature emergency and to reflect that strategic approach obviously we've got the climate

nature group of officers in there and there's a range of examples that we've

been working on. Open space being one that comes in front of Cabinet and the

importance there for climate. I go to a meeting tomorrow John with North Beddock

West Golf Course around the coastal erosion and to protect what is a top 20

course in the world to have that conversation around how we deal with

that coastal erosion. So there's a range of mitigations and examples and

and obviously we've got the flood risk group as well, all linked to climate adaptation.

So there's a range of work taking place, but to go on to item 4B strategically,

that's the climate and nature emergency group that the Council has in place.

Thank you.

Thank you. And I don't know, I think we may have noted your appointment at Council,

but certainly in this committee, I'd like to congratulate you and thank you for all your leadership and all that you're doing.

Thank you.

If I may, I know that should be a question, Chair.

I was just going to comment on that.

You have managed to somehow...

If I may.

Yes.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:30:32

Certainly the first one was definitely the question.

Thank you very much.

Shona?

McIntosh, Shona - 0:30:39

Well, my question was actually going to be very similar to John's because we were in

the same briefing and I was also listening to Eamonn mention the different priorities.

And I suppose I was coming at it from slightly a different angle.

So rather than saying, is there a group that looks at this, because I know there are several,

there's the officer group and the member group.

I suppose what I got from the briefing yesterday was the importance of building an awareness

of the impacts climate change is going to have into everything we do.

Everything we do that we're talking about, where we're thinking about what the next 10

years are going to look like, should be taking account of the fact that there's going to

be water shortages, heat waves, probably flooding, just much more extreme weather.

So I wonder if in terms of the amendment in particular maybe the priorities that you mentioned

at the start there Eamonn, like around the open space strategy and the emergency planning

in particular, like how has an awareness of those impacts kind of gone through the development

of those strategies?

Eamon John - Communities - 0:31:37

Thank you Shona for your question and I would say it's fair to say evolving.

we only know what we know, that knowledge is there and we're growing in that space.

You know that we've got that officer group, the political group, there's a range of examples in and around climate that we're doing,

but our emergency planning, without a shadow of a doubt, and it's in our risk register, has seen an absolute increase in the effect of climate change.

you know, much higher winds, more storms, all of the science is showing that's where it's going

and we're trying to reflect that in our emergency planning and in our risk registers.

We're doing that assessment around the coast, around coastal erosion, and we're working with the data and the information as it evolves.

Likewise, obviously, the MUGR, Muscle Ruffler Protection, in your own ward.

So there's a range of work, but what I would say is, I don't think we've got, everyone's got all of the answers right now.

I think all of us collectively are learning, growing, adapting and trying to mitigate where best we can.

McIntosh, Shona - 0:32:40

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:32:42

Thank you. Thank you. Thanks, everyone, so much.

And maybe just come back if no one else wants to come in on the sort of the measures around poverty.

I suppose it's very much in the sense that I know that we are still continuing to evolve

some of our thinking about what data we're collecting and what we're using it for.

I just wondered if we are doing anything, how are we measuring whether the poverty interventions

are actually reducing demand, especially on crisis services?

Thank you, Chair, for your question.

We do have some good data in respect of some of the early impacts that we're trying to have.

Eamon John - Communities - 0:33:29

I am going to say to you the scorecard you see in front of us today, I want to change, I want to update and I want to adapt.

There's a new format in front of us today. I think we can get this better and the poverty data I think can help us around what we want to collect and are we correct in the right data.

But yes there is some data chair in respect of what I shone a light on earlier.

Those that weren't receiving certain funds they could and we've got that data, I haven't got that specifically in front of me today but I could get it behind the scenes for you moving forward.

The other stuff in respect of food, eating, heating, all of that support that's going on in poverty.

But I'd like us to take another little closer look moving forward as well and hopefully through the next quarters coming through we can try and make some changes to our scorecards.

because I'd like to get into some of the specifics. If I'm going to be brutally honest I think

we're library heavy here in our scorecard and I want to make some changes.

Okay that's good to know. And in a similar vein I suppose I'm mindful that as we change

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:34:32

how we have our service offer we sometimes have comments from the public and conversations

amongst ourselves as well about reliance on particular ways of people being required to

access services. Are we seeing anything emerging around inequalities of who's actually able

to access services because we're maybe moving more to online or whatever, are there any

of those pressures surfacing anywhere? I don't have the answer to that specifically

Eamon John - Communities - 0:35:06

in front of me. My gut, without the evidence, is suggesting yes, but I would want to test

that question at the poverty working group to see if there's any detail

behind the question you're asking there. Okay okay that's helpful thank you very

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:35:17

much. Anyone got any comments they want to make on communities and partnerships

in particular? No okay and I'll maybe save comments. Oh, Leanne. Sorry I'm having to

at two screens now so that we can catch everyone there's a bit of a delay.

Yeah and it's not helped by my behaviour either because I keep pressing the wrong button so I

think I'm in John's category with technology especially today. So yeah just a quick one and

it was on the back of what Eamon had said because I think we were all, I'm going to take us back to

2022, first meeting they had on PPRC and the KPIs came out and there was a universal agreement

and especially amongst the newer councillors that this wasn't what we wanted to see. And

I think if we take this word now on a journey of what we need to see and what benefits our

communities, because it's not actually what we want to see, it's are we making a difference

where we think we should be making a difference and are we getting an impact for the money

that we're spending. So I think there's a more communication there with senior officers

with them to see what did they think we should be seeing in front of us and for us to drill

down on that as to how it's impacting our communities and Eamon and I have had a couple

of, had quite a few conversations so I get that information but actually just through

this meeting today realising that the public maybe isn't getting that information and I

think it's really useful for them to see what's happening and why we're so concentrated especially

around poverty and inequality on the pre -emptive spending that we are doing.

Thank you, Lianne, for that comment. Anyone else want to come in?

Nope? OK. If we can now move to Lindsay for children's services, please.

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:37:25

Thank you, Chair. Good morning, everybody. I'm Lindsay Byrne, Head of Children's Services

and Chief Social Work Officer for Esolyan. I'm here to give a brief overview of the Quarter

Two performance report for Children's Services. Overall, we're really happy, particularly

with the progress in delivering our multi -agency corporate parenting plan, but there have been

some changes in the delivery of the board, which would be helpful to note today. We're

really pleased that the board is now going to be chaired by Lesley Brown, Deputy Chief

executive and also some news about the East Lothian Champions Board and the

Corporate Paintings Board. There has been a collaborative agreement to change the

name of how we refer to corporate parents in East Lothian. Our champs

board felt that the phrase corporate parents was a bit stuffy and

official and they wanted to refer to us as East Lothian kin. So this to them

feels more homely, relatable and human, their words not mine, and as elected

members, you're all part of East Lothian Kin and we look forward to sharing future

updates with you from the Corporate Parenting Board. With regard to some

of the key performance indicators, I'll highlight some of the key data that's

coming through. We continue to experience a really high number of referrals through

the front door at Children's Services and it continues to be clear that some

families are experiencing significant challenges. We know that referral

figures are also impacted by the growing East Lothian population and links to

children facing poverty. It's really positive to see that more children are

being looked after within their families or within local foster care and we're

definitely reducing the use of external foster placements. This is in line with

our commitment to keep the promise and the belonging to East Lothian agenda and

we continue to seek kinship care opportunities for all children who

cannot remain safely with their parents. We're really mindful of the figures for

care leavers who do education training and employment and

continue to work closely with partners to improve this.

We know that some young people who have experienced care can take longer to settle in a path of

education, training and employment and really need some time to process their experiences.

For us, it's important that our service is able to respond when people are ready and

our through care duty system ensures that people can re -engage with us at a time that

meets their needs.

With regards to the Easelden Children's Strategic Partnership, it's a really exciting time as

new plan is in development. We'll also be embedding the national promise framework into

the reporting structure of the CSP going forward which will really strengthen our ability to

evidence how we're keeping the promise locally which is something as you know I like to talk

about a lot in this chamber. So that's a very brief overview but I'm happy to take any questions.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:40:09

Thank you very much Lindsay. Open it up to colleagues now.

I have two questions.

Just in case one of them preempts Leanne, shall I do one and let others come in?

No, Leanne is saying no.

My first question, thank you for the report.

I was really excited by the renaming of the corporate parenting board and how you worked

together with the champs to come to that.

Just wondering if you could say a wee bit more about that.

Or is there a report going or coming to the members library that we can read on that soon?

And and yeah. Do you have an idea of how members can be more involved in that going forward?

Because I would really like to be. Thanks for your question, Shona.

McIntosh, Shona - 0:40:58

We are really excited with our collaboration with the Champs.

There's not a formal report as yet, but I believe as part of the corporate parenting board,

we'll ask for a formal update, which can absolutely be submitted to members library if you would like it to.

For a long time our champs have told us that they hate the phrase corporate parents.

It sounds just really formal and quite cold and detached from what we actually try and be for our looked after and care experienced young people.

We visited our champs recently, myself, the Chief Executive and one of my service managers in Children's Services

and that's when we really kicked off some discussions about how we could make this better.

that our champs are really keen to engage with anyone across the council

from elected members to officers and we're about to relaunch the ambassador

programme so with that we'll come out with information about how individual

people can be more involved with our champs. They're a wonderful group of

young people really looking to challenge us to be better and do better in which

I'm always keen to engage with and they very much welcomed meeting Lawrence as

his first appearance at the Gatehouse which was challenging in many ways but

also just a real delight to see how well the group are gelling and also the expansion of

Champs. We now have two separate groups because of the diversity in their age group. We now

have many Champs and an older group which goes well into people's 20s and beyond. So

it's been a really encouraging space. So we're looking forward to kind of rebranding East

Lothian Kin and also that Ambassador role from the Champs. So I'll come out with more

information in due course.

Thank you, Lindsay. My second question was about the stats. There were two lines on the key performance indicators that I thought were worth pulling out and putting together.

One was on the percentage of care leavers who are in education, employment or training. It was only 38 and seemed to have been quite static all year.

and that seemed a very low number to me.

That doesn't seem to be a target against it at the moment.

But I thought that in our previous reports,

it had been a bit higher than that.

But I just wondered to what extent,

what are we doing to try and up that number?

Because I think we want to be,

as we've heard the Chancellor was telling us,

but we want to be ambitious for our young people

and 30 % in a positive destination is not a great number.

And I just wondered how much you might,

you thought that might be related to the fact

that it was also, I think it said it was only 37 %

were engaged that were eligible for a through care after care service were actually engaged

with it. Are those things connected? And yet what are we going to do to get up the number

of positive destinations?

Yeah, thanks for your question. It is something that we are very keen to keep focusing on.

There are a couple of number of data sets that look at this specific area for young

people and there can be some difference. So part of our job is to make sure this is the

most accurate data that we're presenting.

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:43:49

And I do think some other measurements

have it slightly higher than that.

We work really closely with Skills Development Scotland

and East Lillian Works.

And there is a monthly meeting where we look at all people

who are care leavers and try to support that pathway

into employment training or further education.

And we do see people come in and out of pathways

and that can also affect data at times.

not everyone's ready to start and complete something,

so the data can fluctuate.

But yeah, we will be continuing to strengthen

that partnership with also our work with education

and the care experienced team that work within education

in East Lydian is growing in numbers and strength

and our collaboration with them has really seen improvements

today as well.

So I do see it as a really important thing to target.

We have a very busy through care after care service,

although there's only a percentage of people who engage, that doesn't mean they're the only people

who receive support, that means they're the people with an allocated worker. There's also a lot of

people who engage on a much more ad hoc basis through our GT system, so I wouldn't want people

to think that it's only that number of people who engage and get support, it's actually far greater

than that, but they're the people with an allocated worker. So perhaps we can look to show that data

a bit more clearly going forward. Yeah thanks for that distinction, that's helpful. Yeah I suppose

I was also looking at that and thinking about the reports we've had recently from education about

how they're really tightening up on the monitoring in schools and I suppose what I was wondering is

is there a sense if a young person's care experience they're getting really carefully

monitored while they're at school but if they then leave and go to college is there a bit of

a cliff edge in terms of how much they're being supported like beyond that because they don't have

that school set up anymore or would you say that through those monthly meetings with East Lothian

works that you're taking that up and providing it in a different format instead.

Yeah there's been a massive improvement over the past few years of our monitoring and support

of care experienced young people in education and my understanding is that it's good connectivity

when a young person moves on from school regardless of that destination and we have a number of

colleges who are really engaged with our corporate parenting programme and in our children's

strategic partnership so we continue to strengthen those links as well. Also there's other third

sector organisations that can provide amazing support for this group of young people, like

the Bridges for example, and they all link in with our 3K aftercare team to ensure that

a person's plan, their pathway plan, is as robust as it possibly can be. So I feel quite

confident that the links are there, it's just about making sure that young people are ready

and often that can be the biggest challenge. So for me the most important thing is that

support remains available until the person is ready and we don't just say

they haven't engaged in it, they've left school therefore they're not going to

get support going forward. It has to be something that young people can come

back to and feel safe to come back to at a time that suits them.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:47:00

Yeah thank you, thanks for that. Thank you Shona, I'm conscious that we have Leanne

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:47:09

and then John. Leanne next please. Thank you. I was going to ask one of the questions that

Shona just said and I'm really grateful for the additional information about those that

are engaging with the aftercare service because that was a concern so really grateful for

that Lindsay. You mentioned poverty as being one of the factors that families have referrals.

Can we get more of an understanding of why that impacts so much and what sort of impacts

we will see within our children's services because of poverty?

Yeah thanks for your question Leanne. We know that poverty and disadvantage underpins the

majority of children who are deemed to be at risk of harm in our communities. This is

primarily because of the stress it places on families who are already facing challenges

that a number of people face but have less resources to manage those challenges safely

within their own networks. So for example if someone is experiencing mental health difficulties

or addiction problems and that is fuelled in some way by their stress around money and

providing for their family, that means their capacity to pay them safely is absolutely

impacted and poverty is one of the key driving factors there. That's not to say

that it's the only thing that makes Arferral possible to children's services.

There are a number of factors that affect communities but we know that by

targeting people who are most in need of financial support or practical support

to increase their own finances is a really important factor at the front

door of children's services and we see it time and time again where that is a

real driving factor in either them picking up the phone to seek help or someone identifying

them as needing help. We see that through a range of spaces and children's services,

so not just the front door but also in our children with disability service as well,

where families can face additional hardship because of the complexities they live with

in their own home because of the needs of their child.

Thank you, Lindsay. And if we looked at looked after children, whether that's kinship care

or looked after within the community or, or somewhere else, how prevalent is addiction

within those specific cases? And are we as an authority able to tap into networks that

then prevent that cycle going forward for those children?

I feel that addiction is still incredibly prevalent in children's services. It's one of the main causes of referrals alongside domestic abuse, alongside mental health difficulties.

And we see it more and more, not only within parents in East Lothian, but also in our cohort of young people who are experimenting with substances, some to a really dangerous level.

So addiction is still very prevalent in social work services.

We have a range of services, particularly within our third sector, who are specifically designed to support

children who live in families affected by addiction and that includes Circle, who are a close partner of

Children's Services and also Children First. We have dedicated services

for children to provide that support and also to provide a bit of a peer network and understanding.

I don't know if you've heard of the Roots Project,

but that's specifically designed to support children who have grown up in a family affected

by addiction and we've been particularly impressed with some of the outcomes that they've achieved

in East Lothian and been really keen to support and be an ongoing partner with that organisation.

Happy to send you more information about that. But yes, it is something we continue to see

as being increasingly problematic and I stay very linked in to services that support people

with addiction through my role on the Mid and East Lothian Drug and Alcohol Partnership to ensure

that we are addressing and directing resources to the right places to make the biggest difference

and that includes towards adults but also to children who are affected. It remains part

of our strategic plan overall and one of our key priorities.

Thank you. Thank you, Lynne.

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:51:15

Thanks Lindsay and Leanne. John?

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:51:18

McMillan, John - 0:51:20

Thank you, Lynne.

And Lindsay, thank you for the report.

It made me think about a recent case and I haven't had a chance to come back to you,

but in all of your work, do you find that there are any special needs around children

who are in families that are perhaps serving armed forces members or veterans of the armed

forces?

we are a signatory to the to the armed forces covenant and we have gold status

with that. Is there any special needs or concerns that you have around that

category of family or children? We would be keen to identify if that was a factor

in any child or family who was being referred to Children's Services in

and we have links with the support charity Saffa to who we use

regularly if we have concerns that someone's status as a veteran is

impacting the protection or safety of that family or indeed the child's

outcomes. So I wouldn't say it's something we come across regularly but

we do know who to contact and to be in touch with if that problem does

arise and I'm aware of the case you're referring to and I will take that off

with you John. I think that's quite a unique situation and certainly keen to do everything we can to support.

Thank you and I was very impressed by your response but it was just a generic question

around the whole care thing and Chay again turning it into a question if I may terribly impressed by

all the work that you and Champs and Ambassadors do and it's one of the early things I'll end as

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:53:09

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:53:12

Thank you very much. If no one else wants to come in I've got a couple of

questions Lindsay. The first one I was very keen to hear what you had to say

around CHAMPS, how that's changing and the scope that that has. I just wonder in

terms of how we measure what success looks like for care leavers, are we

clear what that success looks like and are we also clear why that might

not be shifting at the moment? And I suppose the subsequent to that is, is there

a role for young people in CHAMPS to help shape that and understand that, you

give us a bit of a challenge in terms of whether we're measuring the right stuff

or whether the aim that we've got is the right one for them. That's a really good

question and yes champs are always involved in helping us set indicators

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:54:14

and ways to measure success and what you said there reminded me that what I

should have said earlier when I'm talking about successful destinations is

a successful destination can look very different for different people and often

just because someone's not in the tick box education employment training if

they haven't offended for six months that's a great outcome for them if

they've maintained a tenancy for longer than a year that could be a great

outcome for them so we have to remember that measures need to be dependent on

someone's capacity to succeed and often our measurements can sometimes be too

high too soon for some young people that's not to say they won't get there

but their journey will look very different to some of their non care

experienced peers. So we are very clear that it's not linear and it's not

straightforward and we want to be ambitious for individuals and not just

expect everyone to achieve the same thing at the same time. So that's

something that champs are really keen for us to know as well, you know, to not

judge them by standards that society might think are the right ones to judge

them on. Actually people succeed in their own way and sometimes that's really

small and sometimes that's really big and it's making sure we captured all of

that and I'm not sure data sets like this are particularly helpful with that

because it's so much more context and nuanced but thank you for prompting me

to remember to say that. I might come back to you because I'd be quite keen on

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:55:36

engaging as chair of this committee to see what role I might have in engaging with them.

My other question is around you touched in your comments earlier around

I think it was through care and after care and you were saying about how you might

not have an allocated worker but I just wondered if you had any thoughts on any

emerging risks from a sustained workforce pressure because I know that

we've got issues around some of that for a number of services but obviously

this one's one where we'd be particularly concerned about potential

risks escalating. Yes, do you mean particularly in the 3 -Kid After Care

service? Just probably a bit wider maybe. Social work wide yeah. I can't

spin it any other way it's always a challenge to make sure there is a

sufficient social work workforce and part of my job as chief social work

officer is to provide assurance to the chief executive and elected members that

social work services are being delivered safely in East Lothian and when we don't

have sufficient staffing my ability to do that is reduced so I'm always very

clear and open with the chief executive and with yourselves

when that is the case.

But generally, whenever I've had to do that,

I felt incredibly well supported by council officials,

by elected members, by finance.

And there's always been a creative way

to look at how we can improve that situation.

So for example, a number of years

ago when we had the really significant recruitment

crisis after COVID, there was creative ways

put in to look at recruitment and improving that.

And that has been an improving picture since that time.

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:57:15

and then recently with increasing referral demands I've had to approach colleagues to say I am concerned about the level of demand versus the current workforce

and there have been creative solutions suggested and shared with me which we're taking forward this calendar year.

So it's always a challenge, it has to be sufficiently staffed, we have to have staff who are confident, well trained, supported, not feeling overwhelmed with caseloads,

making sure that caseloads are in line with national recommendations.

That's something we monitor every single month to make sure that no one is sitting way above that.

We have to consider the role of team leaders, what they have to hold in their heads on a day -to -day basis,

what they have to understand.

We have to ensure that all our investigations that are done by police, health and education, sorry,

police, health, education and social work are progressing well and that nothing is being dropped there

because that is the highest risk across the whole authority at that time.

So it's a constant juggle, but one that is very well supported in East Lothian

and one that I feel very confident if I were to raise concerns about my levels of assurance

that it would be taken very seriously.

And if that wasn't the case, that would be very problematic.

So I'm very pleased to work in a supportive space where people understand those,

the risks that can appear if we don't have a sufficient workforce.

Thank you, Lindsay.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:58:32

I think it is really important to highlight that, especially similar to what Eamon was saying earlier

around the challenges that we face in our resourcing. So I think it's useful to explore

what some of that looks like for services and the people that need our support. So I will,

just one last call out for anyone if you've got any questions.

Nope, can we move to comments please? Sorry Wendy. Any comments? No. Oh yes, Leanne.

So the system is not allowing me to request to speak now so I will email Emma about that.

It's a very quick comment and I will try and keep it short. I think there is a tie in with

the children services and our community services that may not be apparent to those that are not

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:59:33

either in the council themselves or elected members and see the bigger picture and those

are quite often non -statutory services and again our funding envelope is crucial here but when

Lindsay's talking about that pre -emptive stuff and the support she receives quite often that'll be

them families together and other groups and those are only possible because of the really

difficult decisions that we have to make within the budget to allow them to carry on and the

community development officers, the community learning and development teams, all of these

work together to support families in crisis, in severe financial hardship to try and prevent

social work involvement and I think quite often that's a missing piece of the jigsaw

you're looking at from a public perspective there's not a lot of understanding about the work that's

going on to try and stop that and I just wanted to say a huge thanks to all of the teams for the

work they do. Our stats would not look as they do if we were not properly funding that. I'm saying

properly then I don't actually think that's an appropriate word. If it wasn't being funded and

as important as it is to the councillors that have to make those budget decisions. So yeah,

huge thanks to the teams and just one last point, I think Ken's brilliant, I really do think Ken's

brilliant, I think that just that strikes me and I think seeing the smiles across the chamber,

it clearly struck the other people as well there, so great work Lindsay, thank you.

Thank you very much.

If we can move now to our housing report.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:01:28

Thank you.

Officer - 1:01:29

Good morning members.

I am Wendy McGuire, head of housing.

I am reporting on the quarter 2 performance for housing in line with the new report and

templates and I'm going to set out in Appendix 3. I've actually done this slightly different

today in that I've brought my service managers along with me because I think that's important

as well given the deeper focus on housing at today's committee and felt it was important

for them to be involved in that and help obviously in answering any specific questions around

their service areas. This has been a useful exercise and whilst I welcome the additional

scrutiny and reporting of our strategic plans, I'm not quite sure that we've got the performance

indicators quite right yet and really keen to take away some feedback from committee

today to allow me and the team to develop that a little bit further. I think it would

be good just to take a step back and make sure that it is aligning with our ARC returns

to the housing regulator and with the council plan. However, today I can confirm that as

a service we continue to work in a challenging environment within the context of both the

national housing emergency and local housing emergency, we've had to adapt our strategic

plans. I can confirm that the overarching local housing strategy, 24 to 29, is now nearing

the end of its second year and is on target to deliver the approved action plan that was

approved at the committee, albeit as I said we've changed the prioritisation of those

actions to help us in terms of exiting that housing emergency.

We intend to bring the next review and update to cabinet in June.

But keen to just highlight to members today that we've set up a new housing partners meeting

established really to monitor the progress of that LHS but also really to look at opportunities

for wider collaboration with partners.

and you've heard from Eamonn and Lindsay today as well,

and that partner is really allowing us to try

and start to identify key areas

for that early intervention and prevention,

which has been really good across the services

to help each other.

We're currently challenged as well

with some long -term staff absences within our strategy team,

but still have delivered on a number

of really positive outcomes,

including a new health and housing delivery group,

and that is really to focus on the actions

and the cross -working between housing and health.

We're also very well underway with the work

around our new local housing investment framework,

and that is to really improve intelligence of need

and demand at very local areas to help us going forward

to ensure that we're prioritising investment

in the right areas to meet that need.

In relation to poverty and climate change,

again, I know that that's been an area of interest to members.

I can confirm that we've received, the team did really well in securing over a million

pounds of funding from the Scottish Government to deliver EWI, solar PV and battery solutions

in the private sector and we've managed to secure a further 1 .1 million this year with

a real focus on delivering 50 solar PV installations in the private sector.

And again, in our own council stock, we've taken very much a fabric first approach and

and we are developing an interim energy efficiency policy that we intend to bring to the cross -party

sustainability group.

In the context of the current affordable housing emergency, we have developed a new housing

emergency action plan which pulls all those key actions relating to the housing emergency

from our local housing strategy together with our homeless action plan and we have set up

a new cross -party group to monitor and provide the strategic oversight for that as well.

Again I just want to bring attention to some of the key highlights that that has helped

us to deliver and that is a reduction in the number of temporary accommodation units that

we have, we've increased the number of tenancy conversions and I really need to highlight

the significant reduction that we've made in our breaches to the unsuitable accommodation

order.

Delivery of affordable housing continues to be really challenging and high risk is a set

on our ship and that should now be the Lodger Members Library report but that sets out a

need for 120 million pounds of investment to deliver 1370 homes coming through our LDP.

But based on resource allocations that we've got from Scottish Government, we're estimating

we've got around about three programmes to deliver 350 units.

But again, just to give committee reassurance that the team are working really hard to be

creative and really innovative to explore different ways to ensure that we're maximising

that 1 ,370 units on site wherever possible. I'm not going to go into the KPIs themselves

but I'm happy to stop there and open that up to any questions and as I say I've got

my key service managers available to cover some questions on their specific service areas.

Thank you.

Many thanks Wendy for introducing that report. Can I first of all go to Colin?

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:06:41

Officer - 1:06:41

Thank you very much, Lynn. I have a couple of points. I will stick with the first one,

which is what you talked about in the last part of your presentation. The report on page 56 talks

about the SHIP submitted to the Scottish Government in October. It was £120 million

that you referenced at the end of your report there. Has there been any sort of response or

discussions with Scottish Government since you put the report in in October

and you talked about sort of being innovative with regards to the options

to try and get up to the 1370 figure. Could you perhaps elaborate or

explain what options are being considered moving forward?

I'm happy to start off and if you want to supplement that you can come in.

But in terms of the first part of your question, Colin,

just to confirm that the ship was submitted

the end of October.

We haven't received our feedback yet.

But we are in regular discussions

with the Scottish government around the opportunities

that we have in East Lothian.

And that ship will hopefully make

the case to be awarding a higher allocation in 26, 27.

But we're unlikely to hear what the allocation is going

to be until April time. But the government are very well aware of the growth in East

Lothian and the opportunities that are there, also working very closely with the wider regional

housing partners as well, again just in terms of the wider opportunities across the south

east. So we'll continue to do that. In terms of what we're doing to be a bit more creative

and ensure that we maximise as many units on site as possible.

That includes things like looking at alternative tenures, so looking at low cost to ownership

in areas, looking at how we can maybe deliver mid -market rent but without investment, doing

it differently through different financial models.

Also our affordable housing policy allows us to secure service land.

I've been probably a big champion in the past for ensuring that we take areas of land for

affordable housing that's well integrated within developments and that's now proven

to be a challenge to secure land because it makes it really difficult to construct.

So again the team are now beginning new applications coming in, starting to look at that quite

differently to see how we can secure service land on some plots and land bank that, you

so that we've at least got control over when that comes forward.

So there's lots of things that we're doing in that space.

And the LIF that I mentioned earlier as well, the local investment framework, Bex's team

is leading on that and maybe, I don't know the time scales for that, but in May time.

So that LIF, as I said at the beginning, that will really allow us to focus in on where

we feel you know we need to prioritise investment and and give you as members I

suppose you know better intelligence for making what I see some quite difficult

decisions.

Wendy, could I ask you to explain what LIF is?

Sorry, that's the local investment framework so that is I mentioned that just at the start

or during my presentation so that is looking at housing need and demand at a

very local area and so that we know where the investment needs to be

prioritised to deliver social rent.

Thanks. Sorry, Colin, back to you.

OK, no, just one other question.

Moving on to page fifty nine in the report.

And it's in the figures for the number of days of households

presenting as homeless to the case closure.

It's changed from two hundred eighty eight

and December twenty four to September twenty five

down to one hundred ninety seven, which is pleasing to see quite a reduction.

I was just wondering what work is actually going on in order to reduce this figure and

what's the sort of the world on the street in terms of moving forward because

obviously that was September's figure. Is there the hope that the figure will

continue to decrease?

Thanks for your question. I'll bring in Ms. Sanford to elaborate on that one.

In answer to your question, there are probably three factors to that.

During March 24, we had significant staff changes within the housing options team and

that enabled us to take a different approach to previously in respect to how we deal with

case management with regard to homeless households.

Over roughly about a 12 month period we managed to reduce our live cases quite significantly

from 7 .30 to 4 .30 which has really contributed quite significantly in respect of how we deal

with case closures and we have successfully managed to sustain that level for a further

year.

Many of the cases that we've managed to close have been long standing cases and that's dramatically

I guess contributed to the time scales in terms of how long we keep cases open for.

Secondly, we introduced a new case management system around 18 months ago which has led

generally to a much more efficient process to how we handle homelessness cases.

And I guess the third contributory factor is in respect of the policy changes to the

Council's allocations policy which we implemented from the 1st of October 2024.

That had two components, permission to allocate some single homeless households to two bed

properties who met agreed criteria and also a removal of the six -month policy

which basically meant that we were asking Colmar's households to

select a main town and all house types unless there was a medical condition at

the point of assessment. In terms of your question about will this figure

increase or reduce I don't want to raise expectations I think we've done

tremendously well to get to the position we're currently in. I would like to think

that we can maintain that position. Hopefully we may improve on it a little

bit more going forward but we'll certainly be doing our best to try and

keep that figure as is or potentially improve a bit further. Thank you very

much. That's good finish.

Thank you Nikki and Colin. Can I move to Andy Forrest.

Thanks chair. Wendy can I ask, when looking through it I noticed our SHQS performance

is a lot stronger than other local authorities. I am aware that it's not always been the case

for that. I'm just wondering if you'd like to say a bit more on how we've achieved that?

Thanks for your question Andy and I'm going to let Scott Barclay come in. He's our asset

service manager to answer that one. Yes thank you for the question Andy. So our performance,

you're correct in saying it isn't always as strong as it has. We're ahead of our peers in terms of our local authority.

But I think the direct answer to your question, I don't have the evidence to substantiate this,

and this is purely based on discussions at social housing network forums and the like,

is that we've effectively been a lot stronger in response to what I call element 11 and 12 and 13,

the social and the SHQS which is implementation of the smoke, heat and CO

detection legislation change as well as a five yearly electrical requirement

cheques and our properties. So we have had to put a robust programme in place when

that legislation changed and some of our peers have I suspect not been able to

react as well as we have. Thank you.

Thank you. Wendy, elected members have supported changes to our allocations

policy. Do you think these have made a difference and is there anything else

you think we need to be looking at?

Officer - 1:14:55

Thanks Andy. Just to clarify, first of all I guess you're

talking about the changes to allocations policy for homelessness from the 1st of

October 2024. Okay so there were two changes to the council's allocations

policy, one of which was permission to allocate single person homeless households to two bedroom

properties who met agreed criteria. To date we have allocated just under 40 single homeless

households to two beds. We try to do this only where necessary and use those properties

for true two bed households. I guess the work to date has been really positive for those

households that we've managed to accommodate quickly.

Their length of time in terms of open homelessness cases

and potentially in temporary accommodation for some of them

has reduced from what could have potentially been a way

of four to five years to around just over 12 months.

So that's a really good outcome

for those individuals concerned.

In terms of going forward, I would maybe note that

still at this point, over 90 % of our homeless applicants

who've been homeless for six months or more are single. So while it's been really successful

for those applicants concerned and really good for us as a service to be able to reduce

demand in terms of our singles, we still have quite some way to go. The second change to

the policy was to remove what we refer to as the six month policy. Previously a homeless

applicant could select any areas in any house for the first six months that they were homeless.

that has changed and they're required to select a whole main town and all house

types unless there's a medical condition from the outset. That has worked

extremely well. It's difficult to quantify in number terms but I would

suggest that we are now delivering rapid rehousing and practise for those

households and in many situations it's quite, you know, it's quite normal now

that we will have a homeless household that are looking for a two bedroom

property and we can allocate and get them permanently rehoused within sometimes as little

as the first couple of months of the homelessness which is really good for those households

concerned. It's also had a number of other indirect positives as well. It's assisted

us with case closure and time to case closure which I've mentioned in answer to the previous

question. It's reduced the length of stay for some homeless households in terms of temporary

accommodation. It has allowed us to reduce a number of temporary accommodation units

which we've reduced from what was prior to the change in the policy over 200 units down

to 150 at present. It's contributed to us reducing our number of breaches of the unsuitable

accommodation order and if you take all of that into account it's also really helped

us in respect of reducing spend.

Thank you very much.

Andy, sorry, maybe just to supplement some of that as well when you asked about the death

else that we could be doing. I think Nicky raises an important point there in terms of

our group of homelessness in terms of 90 % are single homeless and our other housing

providers delivering new building and easily don't deliver one bedroom properties. So I

think going forward, not just for that reason, but just going forward just to give you some

assurances that Bex and the team will be looking to start reviewing our allocations policy

just to have a look at that and see if there are any changes, permanent changes that we

could be making to that policy going forward to help.

Thanks very much for that discussion. Can I now move to Leanne please?

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:18:37

Officer - 1:18:38

Thanks Lynne. That was really great to hear from Nicky and for Wendy and Scott about the

changes that have been made and the positive outcomes and I don't think any of us can

help but celebrate those that have been significant and really welcome. Wendy you've just finished

on the point that you know one bedroom places are not being built. Is there anything that

we can do as an authority whether that's through planning control or otherwise where we can

try and encourage that more or shape that more and perhaps using our plan empowers local

plan empowers to make sure that those one bedrooms are delivered and just for the public

developers don't like one bedrooms because they are relatively costly and therefore their profits are lower.

But I think as everybody's aware that I'm not interested in developer profits.

I want people out of the temporary and homeless accommodation into a permanent house.

So have you identified planning that we can do that could control that or help towards that?

Thanks, Leanne. And it's a good question. And it's one that, you know, I've debated often, you know,

myself in terms of future sustainability as well around the need for one bedroom.

I suppose it's a balance of that and affordability at the end of the day.

One thing I would give you assurance on in terms of those other providers that aren't

delivering one bedrooms, we do have agreements in place with them that they are allocating

two bedrooms to single homeless.

So our local providers have contributed massively to some of the improvements that you've seen

Going forward though that local investment framework and the work that Bex's team are leading on this year

that will be really key in identifying that local need and demand and

affordability and what it is that we have to or we should be delivering and we work again very closely with our planners so in

terms of any you know

supposed powers that we have to influence housing mix and types and in certain locations those discussions

will definitely be ongoing. I'm just not sure how much we can do to enforce that.

But I'll certainly take it away.

And you've segued Wendy in my next question and the reason it creeps coming up for me is,

like, within May we've got an election coming up and I'm not going to get political with this

chair so you don't have to worry. There could be a change in government and I think we always

have to be cognising to that when we are doing stuff. Are we ready to look at the risks that

we may have now, I'm really grateful Nicky mentioned there's only 40 people who we have

housed in a two bedroom, but say the bedroom tax mitigation ended at the Scottish Government

level, what risk does that expose us to and also then residents obviously and between

we are partners that are thankfully housing them in two bedroom at the minute, but that

cost may not be mitigated going forward?

Yeah and again really good question and like I said I've been debating around

you know that whole one two bedroom debate for quite some time and

affordability is absolutely key in that and so I can't answer that at the moment

Leanne but I'm more than happy to you know keep exploring that and understand

a bit better about what the risks are. Sorry Miss Sanford's Nicky is happy to

coming on that as well. Hi Leanne, so just to clarify, although our team are often

known as the homelessness team, we're burged up as the housing options team,

and with every homeless applicant we have or anybody who's potentially

threatened with homelessness but isn't actually sitting under the statutory

definition, we would always look at affordability when we're looking at

rehousing. So I guess we always focus on homeless households being

rehousing properties but we would take a holistic approach to everybody that comes through our

service looking at a range of different housing options and we would always factor affordability

into that and make sure that whoever was being allocated a property could potentially sustain

that going forward, looking at DHP etc. So we would always take people on a case by case

basis and ensure that whatever direction of travel we were taking they could afford that

property.

Thank you.

Thanks, Nikki.

Thanks, Wendy.

Thanks, Lynn.

Great.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:23:08

I have just got one probably question that I would want to take forward.

Others have been picked up through the discussion so far.

I think it is fantastic that we are able to point today to the improvements in performance

and the impact that it has probably a bit more internally in terms of our processes

and stuff, I suppose I want to ask you if there's a way of trying to capture in review

of our data, whether it's directly with service users or not, what the lived experience of

families who are in temporary accommodation in particular, particularly thinking about

when you were talking Nikki around some of the changes that you've made to how offers

are managed, how can we capture what difference that's making to individual households?

Officer - 1:24:09

Thanks Condina, Lynn. I think this is probably one of our weaker areas, I've been quite honest.

I think prior to the pandemic we had a very, so we sent out surveys to our homeless households

and we had quite a high rate of return and to be completely honest I think that's fallen

by the wayside unfortunately as we got through the pandemic and dealt with the

Ukraine crisis and beyond. It's something that we understand we need to pick up.

What we have at the moment is very limited data in respect of satisfaction

and we collect data in respect of the complaints and compliments that we get

in respect of the service but you're right we need to pick up something more

formally and I do suspect that the fact that we are rehousing people far quicker

and moving people out of temporary accommodation far quicker and on many

occasions of managing to bypass temporary accommodation altogether I

suspect that satisfaction rates would be much higher and given the service

improvements and it's something that we we are looking to take forward over the

next six months in respect of an action plan for the service.

Okay thanks for that.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:25:12

I suppose one last thing has popped into my head and you both mentioned it around that balance between the homeless presentations and the balance of

single person households or whatever. How are we making sure that we are able to sustain

a balance? Have we got something in place to monitor how we're sustaining that balance

between the homelessness allocations and transfer applications to make best use of all the resources

that we've got?

I'm happy to start off and Nicky can supplement that if she can.

So again as part of the allocations review, Lynn, you know that is an area that we'll

be looking at, have we got that right?

Officer - 1:25:54

And I think the team, BEX's team monitor that regularly and you'll see from the KPIs

there that you know we're not in balance with you know meeting the targets that we

originally set and I think that's difficult because it's about really trying our best

to make best use of our stock. We're improving our intelligence about the stock make -up,

who's in there. We've talked about as well the number of, the change in demographics

in terms of older people as well and the importance of transfers around that and movement in the

system. So just to give you reassurance as a team, that is an area that we're continually

and if we ever feel that we need to bring something back to cabinet in terms of changing

those targets, we can do. I don't know if that answers your question.

Thanks Lynn. In terms of the actual targets, just to clarify, we have a 5 % target for sustainable

communities, 25 % transfer and 70 % for general needs which includes 50 % for homelessness.

What I would say is that we're currently roughly around 4 or 5 % over the target in respect

of transfer and we are roughly 4 or 5 % under the target in respect of general needs with

regard to the housing list.

We are roughly on track in respect of our 50 % for homelessness and in reality it's actually

very difficult to increase the number of allocations over and above where we currently are.

The reason for that is, I kind of alluded to this earlier on, over 90 % of our current

live homeless cases are single person applicants.

I would suggest that around 5 % of our live homeless applicants are either already on

offer or they are perhaps not homeless or intentionally homeless and not entitled to

pernatory housing and that unfortunately only leaves us around about 5 % of our homeless

households to potentially allocate to who don't require who require something

other than a one -bed property so when when you know I think people must wonder

when when when think well why are you not able to allocate to that property

but if we don't have a family on the list for say a three -bed property in

Humbay at that point in time when the property is ready to let it will then go

to transfer for example. It is quite a difficult and complex situation but I would point out

that we are making in my view the most efficient use possible of the stock that we have got

available. We just have a bit of a mismatch in terms of supply and demand.

I would maybe just add to that if that's ok in terms of homelessness and we all understand

the emergency that we are in but like I say we have got our changing demographics as well

them are seeing a lot you know a big growth and an older population too so

those transfers are really important for that client group also so it's it's a

continual balancing act. It's like shifting sand more than anything else

isn't it but that's really helpful way of explaining a very complicated system

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:29:10

so thank you both for that. I'll move now into any final comments that people

might have.

I'm going to say that there's definitely nobody putting that no no my arse has now.

That face is never going to happen when I'm on it you know that. I'm sorry I do apologise.

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 1:29:38

Just given that Eamonn, Lindsay and the whole housing team including Wendy have said that

the KPIs we currently have are not quite fitting, is it worth putting something on the action

plan around trying to work on that collectively because I'm very aware as a

councillor I don't know what KPIs would better reflect or what they look like

the heads of service probably do have far more of an idea their teams will

definitely have more of an idea so is that something that collaboratively we

could we could work on and get these KPIs more fitting to to what's needed

I will bring Leslie in.

Thanks, Leanne.

Leslie Brown, Deputy Chief Exec.

Just to say, Leanne, I think Hayley and I have had a bit of a conversation that we want

to have a bit of a review, so I think that would be a really good suggestion and perhaps

we could schedule a session with this committee in between meetings to just have a bit of

a review of the KPIs because I think there is a common thread, as you have said there,

so I think that is a good suggestion.

Thanks. Excellent, thank you. Thank you. Anyone else want final comments?

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:30:46

No, I mean I was going to make a similar kind of point that there's been a lot of

commonality across the various papers today and I think the other thing that

adds to the need for that review is some of the data quality, it's just an

observation more than anything else, number of multiple indicators that have got missing

or unavailable information to them. So I think that is something about making sure that we

are moving from, as I said earlier, what is that number, to really understanding what

is changing, why and what else we might need to look at next. So with that in mind, I appreciate

that we need to note the report but we do need to do a roll call vote.

It's just for noting.

We are just happy to note the report then.

Everything all together.

Thank you very much.

Move to item 6 now please.

6. Additional Support Needs (ASN) – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Children and Communities

Linda Gillie - Clerk - 1:32:04

Item 6 on the agenda is a report on additional support needs.

Thank you chair and good morning everybody.

Presenting Officer - 1:32:12

My name is Jennifer Boyle, I'm Quality Improvement Manager for Equity and Inclusion within the

Education Service.

The purpose of this report is to provide the committee with an overview of the key risks

and developments in relation to the rising numbers of children and young people with

additional support needs, ASN and East Lothian schools, the nature of those

needs and the current provision in place to meet needs. Under the Education

Additional Support for Learning Scotland Act of 2004, local authorities have a

legal duty to identify, assess and make adequate provision for children and

young people with ASN. I would like to draw members attention to sections 3 .2

and 3 .3 of the report which highlights the proportion of children and young

people with ASN nationally and within our schools. Factors giving rise to

additional support needs are broad and they do not require a formal diagnosis.

They can arise from the learning environment, family circumstances,

disability or health needs and social or emotional factors. Needs can also be

temporary or enduring. In East Lothian the child planning framework is used to

identify and support needs with a focus on early and minimal intervention.

To meet the needs of children and young people with complex and enduring additional support

needs, there are six specialist ASN provisions within East Lothian. Demand for these provisions

is rising sharply. Members are asked to note section 3 .7 of the report detailing this and

in 3 .11 the work that has been undertaken to increase the capacity of the existing estate.

If capacity in a provisioned estate is insufficient to meet demand, the Council faces the risk

of being unable to fulfil its legislative duties to meet needs, the consequential legal

challenge from ASN tribunals and the financial risk of out -of -area placements, which also

conflicts with the principles of belonging to East Lothian.

To meet the increasing demand and mitigate the risks to the Council, several initiatives

to support children and young people with ASN are highlighted in section 4 .1 of the

report. These include refreshed policy and guidance, the establishment and now embedding

of child planning framework locality teams, the creation of the equity and inclusion education

outreach service, a revised funding model to support learners with additional support

needs in our schools, an enhanced deaf and hearing impaired service, specialist contracts

and expansion of the existing specialist estate has been undertaken.

However, further growth is being scoped and a future paper to members will detail proposals.

Chair, I would like to conclude by saying that committee has asked to note the contents of the report

in relation to the significant increase in rise in ASN and although approaches to meet need are evolving

and further expansion of the specialist estate is now required to meet statutory duties and avoid risk.

A subsequent paper is planned to be presented at a future East Lothian Council meeting with

further details.

Chair, I'm happy to take any questions.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:35:25

Thank you Jennifer and I think before I open it up I just want to say that I think it's

very helpful to say that I consider this paper to be that sort of overview, it's a baseline

for us to understand the extent to which there is a role for scrutiny in this area and appreciate

what you are saying about future report to a committee or the Council at some point in

the future.

If I can open it up now to members for questions, please.

I am not even seeing anyone reaching for a button.

Jeremy first please.

And then, yes.

Findlay, Jeremy - 1:36:16

And I think you know, tried to use the hybrid link but it didn't seem to work but yeah.

I sent in a question earlier a few days ago highlighting the point that there were no it. They're saying, so it is within the North Eric coastal ward area and I got an answer back saying that those children were moved out to the area for their support.

I was just wondering if somebody could indicate whether they thought that those children were

being disadvantaged because they were being moved out of their school area and being sent

to another school area or not?

Thank you for your question, Jeremy. I would say first of all that I don't believe that

children are being disadvantaged and I thought they were really taking steps to address that.

I think it's a good point to raise in that specialist provisions don't have catchment areas

and that we have really robust processes through our education resource group to police children

so we're always mindful to police children as close as possible to their home

and to make sure that transport arrangements support that as far as possible

so I don't think that children are at any risk in relation to that

I would say that absolutely in alignment with our belonging to East Lothian strategy, our

absolute desire as part of LDP2 is to have provision within local areas so that children

can go to school, whether they have complex needs or whether they attend a mainstream

setting within their local community.

In summary, I don't think there is any risk or disadvantage just now, but it is absolutely

part of our aspiration.

question. Thank you very much. Thank you and Colin.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:38:04

Yorkston, Colin - 1:38:06

Yeah, thanks Lynn and again someone in general. I've tried

to use the hybrid link, but for some reason it's just no

exception. Thanks very much for your report, Jennifer and you

did sort of talk through some of the aspects of what was going to

be questioning that basically

relates to 3 .12 on page 63, which talks about limited

support local authority growth in general, but growth with

children with the ASN needs specifically. And you did sort

of talk about some of the sort of consequences of that. I was

just wondering maybe put a little bit more meat on the

bone. What would that look like moving forward if that

particular capacity wasn't met? And what would the consequences

be? The wider consequences be for the authority if we weren't

actually have the capacity within East Lothian. Thank you for your question Colin. We have worked really hard over the last couple of years in relation to the real growth in increased demand and we have really tried to be efficient and try to maximise in the capacity of the existing estate. I hope the report says that really clearly in terms of trying to build additional classes, trying to increase staffing, to increase numbers within classes within our existing provision.

but I must be honest with the committee that we've got to a point now where really that is maxed out

and if we start to increase class sizes within provisions, you know, then the provision classes very much look like mainstream classrooms

which is absolutely not appropriate and not an aspiration. If we are unable to place children who have

needs which are deemed to be, you know, severe, complex and enduring, first of all, we're not meeting our statutory obligations

Secondly, we're setting children up to fail to go to a setting which isn't designed to

meet their needs.

And thirdly, I suppose the risks to the local authority are that families can seek recourse

through the Additional Support Needs Tribunal system.

So it's never a no, I suppose, to a place within a specialist provision.

Families will then take local authorities to tribunal to seek placement within a provision.

I've detailed in the report the increasing numbers of ASN tribunals across Scotland and

that's mirrored within East Lothian as well. The work that was done in terms of increasing

the specialist provision of the state was very much in relation to tribunal references

that we received through 23, 24, 24, 25. So we've worked really hard as a team to try

and take that risk away from the authority but that's absolutely where we stand and if

We can't then place a child within a provision because we genuinely don't have any more space

that's safe for those children and for the staff, then the families could be looking

for an outwith placement, you know, elsewhere in Scotland.

The costings of that could at least be double the cost of a placement within our local authority

settings and I think too there's a dis -clear as well that I believe that we have absolutely

all the skills and experience to meet our children's needs within our own schools and

It is always a regret if children are sent out, not just because of the financials but

because I know how hard our staff work and how committed they are to our children.

It is always a real loss to us if a child has to be placed out of our own local authority area.

Thank you. I don't know if it is a comment or whether it is a follow -up question.

Obviously, it is important for the right of the parents of the carers to go to a tribunal

if they are unhappy with what has actually been taking place. Presumably, that in itself will

have an impact on the local authority financially, presumably

having to go to the tribunal, but also in terms of time of officers

to actually spend preparing the resources required to actually go

to the tribunal in the first place.

I'd like to comment on your question, if that's what you think

is a really important point and really important question that

you've raised there. You're absolutely right.

That is a huge financial consequence to local authority.

Our legal team don't have the capacity usually to support us

that so we do have to buy in external legal expertise with that and absolutely I can't

underestimate the time that it takes officers in preparing for tribunals and all that goes

with that. It's also not a place where we want to be, we don't want to be sitting in

a tribunal with our families, you know we want to work in partnership with our families

so again that feels like a loss if we get to that point which is obviously always unavoidable.

Thank you very much.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:42:40

Before we go much further, I am very conscious of the time. It is quarter to 12. Can I ask

us all to keep questions and responses as brief as possible because we have other items

to get through. Next is Shona.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:42:54

Thank you. Now I feel under pressure. What was I going to say? I was going to say that

got some questions about the local development plan and when we get under the current local

development plan when developers are building houses as we've heard in the last paper lots about

they obviously make an educational contribution how do they make a contribution from that

specifically towards ASN and how was that calculated and is there scope to increase

it in the next LDP too given that increase in sort of baseline ASN as a proportion of the school

McIntosh, Shona - 1:43:32

Presenting Officer - 1:43:33

the skill people role? Thank you for your question Shona. To date that hasn't been a factor in terms

of the funding that we get but that's absolutely something that's a key priority for us and together

with the strategy and operations team and our planning colleagues too we're looking at funding

formulas and how we can potentially take that forward to be able to tap into that resource

as well our learners with severe and complex needs should be benefiting from that funding

stream the same as learners who attend mainstream schools so absolutely that's a key piece of work

McIntosh, Shona - 1:44:01

under way just now. Great and I suppose as a follow -up would that then any would that be

part of the picture that would help you to increase those provision those specialist

provisions and the places of those beyond what we've got just now? I think given the capacity

of our current specialist provisions it wouldn't be for there it would be for new locations. New

Yeah and I think that's absolutely appropriate when you look at the map and you can see there's

actually gaps within the local authority and where provisions exist so if it needs to be

existing provisions because of efficiency then we absolutely accept that but I think

there's a real opportunity to look elsewhere and more widely across the local authority

to make that a more equitable distribution of resource.

Yeah that sounds good and sorry, sorry chair just can I have one last follow up which is

just regarding how full the current ones are in terms of their capacity. Is it quite difficult

So for you, projecting school rules, given that not all the pupils might want to come

in at P1, you might get pupils who have started in mainstream and then they're really finding

the families are finding it's not working for them.

And like, how do you manage that with those kind of requests, kind of possibly coming

in across all ages?

The quick answer is, if I'm honest, hugely, hugely challenging.

Presenting Officer - 1:45:14

The Education Resource Group meets every eight weeks and we look at requests and we try to

balance all of that and we've done a lot of work just now around about rejecting where

we think numbers are going to go but you're right sometimes we're talking about children

who are not born yet, we're talking about children in early year settings, we're talking

about children who we have no cognites and so on because they've yet to move into the

local authority so it's hugely challenging and it's just how we respond. Data is there

and data is important to be looking at that but it absolutely is a dynamic picture and

that piece into the risk and the challenge. Thanks for all your questions

McIntosh, Shona - 1:45:49

and just to save the time coming back in comments I really appreciate the report

it was very useful and we'll look forward to further reports coming through

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:45:59

in the future. Thank you. I just want to appreciate what you're saying about

there is future development on this. For this committee though obviously we

will want to ensure that we are able to scrutinise that provision as well as

we possibly can. What do you think that might look like for us in terms of what

information we're looking at and how often we might want to consider it?

Given the risks that I've highlighted already, data is absolutely something that's key

that we're tracking all the time so I think it'd be useful to share with this

Presenting Officer - 1:46:33

committee the work that we've undertaken already to try and project forward to

the next 10 years as to what the growth in demand might look like which looks

So obviously being the second fastest growing local authority but also the increase in numbers

with ASN and I think it would be useful for the committee to also look at current provision

numbers, likely spaces, levers and what potential future provision could look like as well.

So I think it would be useful almost to have a bit of a, for want of a better phrase, an

in -out type exercise to look at those numbers and also the geography of your provision might

be some really quite hard raw data I think would be useful for the committee to see.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:47:10

Thank you for that.

Anyone have any final brief comments?

No?

OK, thank you.

I think the report is just for noting, but I think I would maybe like to ask that we

put something on the action log that means that we loop this back once the next step

has been progressed.

OK, thank you.

We happy to note the report then?

Some nodding heads. Rudy?

Oh just happy to note.

Agreed.

Sorry have I missed hands up?

No I'm just saying I'm sorry.

Okay.

Morning.

It's all getting very confusing now.

Okay thank you very much.

Can we move on to the item 7, which is the final item?

7. Housing Performance Benchmarking Report – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Children and Communities

Item 7 on the agenda is the housing performance benchmarking report.

Thanks.

Officer - 1:48:18

I'm Bex Aston, the service manager for housing performance and policy and performance.

This report provides an update on East lobbying council's housing performance for the 2425

benchmarks against our peer groups at national averages.

So overall performance is positive and tenant satisfaction has improved from sixth place

to fifth place amongst our peers. Repairs have seen a strong progress with non -emergency

repairs reducing from 16 days to 12 days and now better than both our peers and in the

national averages. Additionally, like we heard earlier, compliance with the SHQS and EECE

is above sector averages and we've reported on no gas failures in that year. On homelessness

that are encouraging trends with applications and life cases per 1000 population have fallen

and the assessment times have improved to 24 days with good practise within good practise guidelines.

We're aware that there are a number of areas that require attention such as case closure times,

length of stay and temporary accommodation and avoid re -let times and we're working on them

throughout this year. Adaptation performance is below sector averages and we're seeking further

data to understand and improve this as we move forward. So in summary, the strong

progress in repairs, compliance and positive movement in homelessness, but

continue focus on void turnaround adaptations and temporary accommodations

for this duration. I'd like to note as well that a previous landlord report came to

the previous PPRC but it was a request of the of the committee that we bring

back a paper with benchmarking against our peers and national averages and this

is that. We're keen to get feedback from the committee for future reports to make

sure we are reporting on what you guys want to see and that we are taking necessary action

forward so members are asked to note the report on this occasion.

Thank you very much for that Bex. Can I ask colleagues for any questions please?

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:50:12

Officer - 1:50:15

I have one question and just one question. For me, the report absolutely nailed what

I wanted to see for us compared to other social landlords on the national level. My question

is so many of our housing concerns are caused by private landlords, is it a similar report

for private landlords nationally or locally that we could then benchmark ourselves against?

No private landlords don't have as much scrutiny as the social landlords do so we don't hold

that data unfortunately. Okay thanks that's my question answered, thank you. Nice and

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:51:03

Officer - 1:51:05

short and sweet. Thank you. Colin. Thank you. I just want to focus on the bottom, the bullet point,

the bottom of page 69, which you briefly mentioned in your report and it talks about the length of

stay and temporary accommodation remains quite highly slowed down. Which is what, if you could

discuss this further in terms of what are the plans to try and tackle that and are there any

constraints that the team have to operate under that might find that quite challenging to reduce

it as much as you would like to. Yeah Nikki's gonna come in there but just to

highlight this is a 24 -25 report and I think we've already started to see

reductions in this year for that but Nikki will come in on that.

Hi can I have your hand up first of all?

Yes.

So in terms of temporary accommodation we have one of the longest lengths of stay in

temporary accommodation nationally, just to point that out in terms of context,

although we are seeing a reduction in terms of length of

stay within East Lothian locally. I've probably already alluded to what I would say around

this in the responses to my previous questions. We are doing quite a bit to try and bring

the length of stay down in respect of changes to the allocations policy with regard to singles

moving to two beds and the removal of the six month policy and we are taking a much

more efficient approach to households and temporary accommodation in terms of trying

to move people through the system as quickly as possible.

I mentioned earlier on in some detail about the difficulty

that we have, though, in respect of supply and demand

with regards to rehousing homeless households permanently.

And I mentioned that over 90 % of our live homeless cases

are singles.

Only 5 % of our live homeless households

are there for people that we could potentially

rehoused through the allocations policy in respects of two, three and four bedroom

properties which does give us quite a mismatch in terms of supply and demand

and unfortunately we're quite limited in terms of how we can how we can deal with

that going forward. Wendy has mentioned earlier on that we are looking

to progress the LIF, the local investment framework to guide us in respect of

need and demand going forward but at this point in time we are working with

quite a difficult situation and limited resources in respect of a mismatch in

terms of supply and demand and we're just having to do the best we can with

the resources we have available so it is a difficult one we're very aware of it

and we are open to any creative suggestions as to how we can improve the

service in this respect going forward. Thank you.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:53:47

Thank you both very much. I suppose I'm wanting to take this back to as I said at the beginning

of the meeting, you know, we're not necessarily, it would be very easy to get bogged down in

Officer - 1:53:57

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:54:00

the detail on this report in particular. If the purpose of the Scottish Housing Regulator

really is about looking at the trajectory of what performance is saying to us, a couple

questions for you, which of the indicators would worry you most looking

forward? I appreciate what you were saying Bex about this is 24, 25, 23, 24, 25 and

also if the regulator were sitting in this room at the moment, where would

their attention kind of go first do you think? So in my opinion the biggest one

Officer - 1:54:40

to look at is the void relit days. So when we report to the regulator we report on the

days that have been relit, some major voids such as decants aren't in there, OMAs, the

first day of entry is not in there and if we're looking at supplying Nicky with enough

properties to move people forward we need to be on our void performance as best as we

can and we've seen really positive work this year around reduction of that, we've cleared

a huge backlog but in terms of our efficiencies around that and our performance on that it's

really key that we're delivering those voids and having that stock rotation so that we

can move one bed, two beds, three beds around. In addition, the adaptations is a key indicator

as well. We're limited to how many adaptations we can do both with budget but also with house

types that are available and suitability of houses that are available. As we know, we've

got to grow an ageing population to try and deliver that and the stock that we've got

is becoming increasingly difficult so we need to look at more alternative methods, looking

at open market acquisitions to meet that, to meet our population growth and the change

and demand in the population. Thank you. Just want to come in and supplement that and again

Officer - 1:55:47

just maybe to give members assurances around the regulator. So the regulator, we have an

annual assurance statement that we submit at the end of October that's reviewed by the

regulator as well and we've got an engagement plan from the regulator and the key, the highest

area for them in terms of monitoring us is around homelessness at the moment and obviously

breaches and we have been engaging with the regulator quite regularly. They meet us quarterly

just to monitor our progress there. Again, they've been extremely happy and satisfied

with progress made to date. So again, it's just to give you assurances that the regulator

will engage with us as appropriate. In terms of the new management structure that we've

got in place now as well, BECCS is really sort of driving forward performance as a big

issue for us as a team meeting quarterly to look at the ARC data and to make sure

that you know we're on top of any risks or concerns much much earlier than

waiting to review that data at the end of the year so I think that's been

really positive for the team and again gives you assurances and that's why I

would you know in terms of the review and both for the benchmarking report and

the head of service report I would much prefer to be aligning you know some of

those KPIs with that to give members that assurance as well.

Officer - 1:57:07

That's really helpful, thank you.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:57:11

I have Andy wanting to come in.

Andy Forrest - Councillor - 1:57:12

Thanks, Lynne.

Wendy, I wonder if I could ask, I know we're looking back on this report but VOIDS was

also one of the concerns and I know we have made improvements but I was just wondering

have we made further improvements because obviously this is looking backwards in time.

Paul, come in.

Hi, good morning Paul Grant, Service Manager, Property Maintenance and thanks for your question

Andy.

It has been, and Bex alluded to it, a really positive year in terms of void numbers, you

know we've halved the number of voids from our post Covid peak back in early 2024.

But the figure in the report, Bex alluded to this, it does reflect all the completed

voids that were returned during the reporting period.

So a key factor influence in the average real -life time is the proportion of kind of complex

major work type voids that we've done in the period. So these properties typically require significantly more

extensive refurbishment and compliance work than routine voids and therefore they carry, you know, a longer turnaround time.

And that's what we're seeing in the report.

So paradoxically, our recent efforts that accelerate and clear this backlog have resulted in an increase in the overall average real -life time.

The outcome is strongly positive.

We have completed a higher volume of voids overall.

The total number of properties in the system have reduced substantially.

I think it places in a much more stable and manageable position for the months and quarters

ahead.

Thanks for that, Lynne.

Thank you.

Andy Forrest - Councillor - 1:58:47

We have Leanne followed by Neil.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:58:49

Thanks Lynne, you are very kind for letting me back in.

When we are talking about voids, and it's a very specific question to voids, what impact

does our procurement system have on slowing down voids turnover? And I'm saying that

very aware that again we are making huge progression in that with Jamie and his team on that now

as well. But what impact will that have had or does that have?

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 1:59:18

Leanne, could you maybe explore your question a bit further? Are you referring to, for example,

external contractors or was it a specific kind of procurement?

So if I give you an example, I work closely with a guy who's got a latent agency and his

average turnaround is under seven days, but he can literally pick anybody out his roller

decks, anybody that's qualified to do that job, there's no set procurement, there's no

system that has to go through and commercially obviously that's viable for him and that works

for him. And then I look at our council system and imagine if I gave you a roller decks full

of chippies, another thing you would also be able to do the same. So I'm just exploring

and it'll probably be for taking up with Jamie and the team as to what extent does I ever

procurement slow down that and can you identify, because you've got the goal phase back, can

you identify areas that we would be able to say that well we could get this and I think

to be fair on this I think Jamie's doing a lot of work by trying to get contractors in

place that can offer these ad hoc services going forward to the council.

Yeah so yeah I am envious of those private landlords who can have things turned around

in seven days because they can go to any contractor, of course we can.

I suppose what I'd say is though the vast majority of our void turnaround work, now

bear in mind re -elects are about the work that we do but they're also about the work

that our community housing colleagues do to get the properties offered and turned around.

But in terms of the work we do in the properties, the vast majority is done by our in -house

team.

We do from time to time, particularly for the more complex ones, have to go out to external

contractors but I would say we're probably in quite a good place they are

if I was being really specific I think roofing contractors are like hens

teeth and even the ones that we've got on framework and can take a good bit

longer than we would then we would like but we do you know we are finding it

difficult to attract them and I suppose using you know the kind of rates and

things that we have does that answer your question Leanne? That does yeah and

I think that gives us insight and maybe that's something that we can look at when we're looking

at the KPIs going forward as well as it gives us a broader understanding of not just the KPI but

blocks behind that. Let's bring this back to conversation at another time, Leanne, thank you.

I'm running out of time. Neil, please.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 2:01:52

Gilbert, Neil - 2:01:59

90 % of our people on the list being single. Is the figure in that regard higher or lower

or is it just an average across the country?

Thank you.

Hi, so for clarity, it's not 90 % of our homeless households who are single specifically, it's

90 % or over 90 % of our homeless households who've been homeless for longer than six months,

just to clarify. What I would say, I don't have the figures in front of me of other local

authorities to compare specifically but I would say that the trend in East Lothian

is mirrored and reflected across Scotland. Generally speaking all local

authorities have a very very high percentage of single homeless

households. I suspect off the top of my head that we might be slightly higher in

respect of our proportions. I wouldn't imagine by much. Apologies that's

perhaps not a great response.

No, it's fine.

Thank you.

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 2:03:12

OK, and can I now go to any final comments, please?

Very brief again, as we're four minutes past 12.

No, OK, I'm going to keep going.

With that in mind, I think it's been

a very helpful discussion to have and it's useful that officers are picking up

that there's probably similar to our other discussions this morning and

that there's a range of areas but maybe just need to have another look at it and

I think that reflects some of how we are moving forward as a committee as well in

terms of what we are looking at and what we're asking of officers so I welcome

everything that has been discussed this morning and can I just cheque that we

all happy to note that report. Yes. Thank you very much. Just a closing remark, I think

what members and those who are watching the meeting will see across today's agenda is a very

deliberate shift in how the committee approaches our scrutiny work. We're moving away from that

line -by -line examination of reports into more issue -led and outcome -focused.

I think that involves us all having responsibility for making sure that the information that

comes to this committee is as fulsome as possible and recognise the work that various team members

have put into the production of the reports, especially around the data.

I know I said earlier that some of the data might be a bit patchy, but that's probably

down more to the information that's getting fed into the report than

necessarily how the report has been pulled together so I just wanted to make

that clear and again we are all responsible for making sure that we're

getting the level of scrutiny up to a standard. One last thing to

highlight is many thanks to Michelle in particular for her contribution in this

point that we are at now, but also very sad to say that we have to say farewell to you

that you're moving on to another role, so congratulations but sad to see you move on

and wish you all the best for your future. Thank you very much.

Can we now close the meeting formally please?

Policy & Performance Review Committee - Thursday 15 January 2026, 10:00am - East Lothian Council Webcasting

Policy & Performance Review CommitteeThursday, 15th January 2026 at 10:00am

Agenda

Slides

Transcript

Map

Resources

Twitter

Forums

Speakers

Votes

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:00:37

Linda Gillie - Clerk - 0:00:37

1. Minutes for Approval: PPRC, 18 September 2025

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:01:54

3. Work Programme: Session 2025/26

2. Action Log: Session 2025/26

Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office - 0:02:18

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:02:41

Yorkston, Colin - 0:03:51

Michelle Cockburn - 0:04:19

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:05:01

4. Policy and Performance Review Committee (PPRC) Development Plan 2025-2027 – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Resources and Economy

Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office - 0:07:15

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:08:12

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:09:34

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:10:10

Hayley Barnett-Monitoring Office - 0:17:10

Linda Gillie - Clerk - 0:17:25

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:17:56

Linda Gillie - Clerk - 0:18:12

5. Q2 2025/26 Performance Reports: Heads of Communities & Partnerships, Children’s Services, and Housing – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Resources and Economy

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:18:25

Michelle Cockburn - 0:18:48

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:19:55

Eamon John - Communities - 0:20:30

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:22:46

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:23:59

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:27:49

McMillan, John - 0:28:28

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:30:32

McIntosh, Shona - 0:30:39

Eamon John - Communities - 0:31:37

McIntosh, Shona - 0:32:40

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:32:42

Eamon John - Communities - 0:33:29

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:34:32

Eamon John - Communities - 0:35:06

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:35:17

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:37:25

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:40:09

McIntosh, Shona - 0:40:58

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:43:49

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:47:00

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:47:09

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:51:15

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:51:18

McMillan, John - 0:51:20

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:53:09

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:53:12

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:54:14

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:55:36

Lindsey Byrne - Head Child Svcs - 0:57:15

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 0:58:32

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 0:59:33

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:01:28

Officer - 1:01:29

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:06:41

Officer - 1:06:41

Officer - 1:14:55

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:18:37

Officer - 1:18:38

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:23:08

Officer - 1:24:09

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:25:12

Officer - 1:25:54

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:29:10

Menzies, Lee-Anne - 1:29:38

Lyn Jardine - Councillor - 1:30:46

6. Additional Support Needs (ASN) – Report by the Depute Chief Executive – Children and Communities

Policy & Performance Review Committee
Thursday, 15th January 2026 at 10:00am