Agenda and draft minutes

Councillor Matthew Lynch and Mark Perks. 

Members are reminded of their responsibility to declare any pecuniary interest in respect of matters contained in this agenda.

If you have a pecuniary interest you must withdraw from the meeting. Normally you should leave the room before the business starts to be discussed. You do, however, have the same right to speak as a member of the public and may remain in the room to enable you to exercise that right and then leave immediately. In either case you must not seek to improperly influence a decision on the matter.

There were no declarations of interest received.

RESOLVED – that the minutes of the meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Task Group - Rollout of Superfast Broadband by BT held on 22 March 2017 be approved as a correct record.

At the previous meeting Members requested information following the presentation from the Superfast Lancashire team.   

Members noted the information received from the Superfast Lancashire team and British Telecom.  There was a need for BT to ensure their data was up to date when residents contacted them. 

Decision: That the information be noted.   

Rebecca Huddleston, Head of Customer Transformation, will attend the meeting to give members an update on the draft Digital Strategy. 

Rebecca Huddleston, Head of Customer Transformation, presented an update on the draft Digital Strategy.

The refreshed Strategy was due to be considered by Executive Cabinet in June.  The aims of the Strategy were to make digital services so good that people preferred to carry out transactions online, rather than by phone, post or in person and to continue to support those who could not do so.  Online services should be ‘digital by default’ – designed specifically for the web.

There were four strands of the Strategy:

1. Increasing digital take up: it was cheaper for the Council for residents to access services online and there were increasing customer expectations to be able to access services digitally.  Future projects included the integration of My Account and eCitizen. 

2. Increasing Digital inclusion: The Council had a Digital Inclusion Officer with a remit to make to digital services more accessible as not all residents had access or could afford access.  This included the provision of access points across the Borough and the provision of training.  Work was being undertaken with partners to achieve this, both for residents and businesses.  Volunteers were involved in the delivery of training.  Sometimes residents did not know how to get their device working when it went wrong or were put off because it didn’t go very fast.  Future projects included digital skills training, free Town Centre Wi-Fi and a tablet loan scheme.

The advertisement of the training sessions was considered and noted that leaflets were distributed in the locality, but word of mouth was also an effective tool as the sessions were all fully booked.  Members could suggest areas for training if they were aware of a need.  The Council were working with partners to provide and signpost training.         

3. Working smarter: Chorley Council staff needed to have the right tools, training and encouragement to be able to work in a smarter and more efficient way, resulting in improved productivity.  Future projects included the redevelopment of theloop and delivery of voice over IP. 

4. Putting customers first: Customers should be at the heart of everything we do as a Council, and providing excellent customer services was a key element of that. 

The Chair thanked Rebecca for her presentation. 

Paul Heyworth, Business Advisor, will attend the meeting to give members an update on the Economic Development Strategy. 

Paul Heyworth, Business Advisor, attended the meeting to discuss the Economic Development Strategy.

Paul aimed to help businesses grow in his role, and sometimes this meant businesses having an online presence.  Previously some rural areas had struggled with the provision and reliability of broadband, but this issue was decreasing.  Businesses were not always aware of the need to order Superfast Broadband.  If there was free WiFi in the Town Centre there would be massive benefits for the local businesses.  

Sessions were run on a regular basis to give advice to businesses on the use of social media and the web. 

Virgin had been in touch with the Council to discuss new business development areas that were in the planning stages to consider the provision of broadband from the outset.  This would be a massive benefit to businesses and could be used as a selling point for businesses to relocate to Chorley.

The Chair thanked Paul for his update. 

Due to timescales between the meetings this information will follow shortly. 

Members considered the recommendations made at the previous meeting and discussed several additional ones:

1.    To support the future projects within the Digital Strategy 

• integration of My Account and eCitizen
• the continuation of digital skills training,
• free Town Centre Wi-Fi, 
• a tablet loan scheme,

2.    To offer digital skills training to pensioners groups and luncheon clubs,

3.    To ask Town / Parish Councils to advertise digital skills training in their newsletters,

4.    To highlight the availability of good digital access within the Economic Development Strategy as a selling point for businesses to re/locate to Chorley. 

5.    (For BT) To review structures in areas which flood to ensure that they are located in the best place. 

To rewordrecommendation 4 To raise awareness with the public and businesses:

·         That the service would not upgrade automatically – there was a need to order Superfast broadband from their provider.

·         That residents should only be charged for the speed they actually receive.

To reword recommendation 5 To support the Council’s ongoing program of digital skills training within the Borough to give the right training to the right people in a flexible way.