Agenda item

Appendix 1 to the report is in the private section of the agenda at Item 18.

The Cabinet Member for Finance, Performance and Core Services presented a report on the outcome of a review into the future provision of a range of core Council services, which had been undertaken in the context of the Elevate East London contract ending in 2020 and changes to the Council’s operating model as a consequence of its ongoing transformation programme.

The Council had entered into a joint venture arrangement with Agilisys in 2010 which led to the formation of Elevate East London.  The initial seven-year service contract had been extended for a further three years, however no further extensions were permissible and the contract would end in December 2020.  The Cabinet Member referred to the significant improvements that Elevate had made to the services that had transferred, the savings that had been achieved under the arrangement and other benefits that had accrued, such as the creation of 400 new jobs, and placed on record the Council’s appreciation to the management and staff at Elevate for all of their hard work. 

The end of the contract in 2020 did, however, present the Council with an opportunity to reassess the delivery of the services that would be returning from Elevate, alongside other core services that had been retained within the Council.  In that respect, the Cabinet Member referred to the detailed business case that was included as an exempt appendix to the report and advised that of the five potential service delivery model options that had been assessed, the preferred solution at the present time was to bring the majority of services back in-house, with only certain specialist services to be outsourced. 

The Cabinet Member advised on the anticipated costs that would be incurred by the Council to transition to the new service delivery arrangements and the savings projections once the new arrangements were fully implemented and operational.

Cabinet Members spoke on the positive contribution that the Elevate arrangements had made to the Borough.  In concurring with those sentiments, the Leader also welcomed the opportunity for the Council to meet its pledge to provide as many services as possible via in-house arrangements and confirm Barking and Dagenham’s status as a leader across London.

The Cabinet resolved to:

(i)  Agree that ICT services be delivered by an in-house provision for strategic ICT, policy and specialist applications support and that other packaged ICT services be delivered via outsourced arrangements;

(ii)  Agree that Customer Services be delivered primarily by an in-house provision with the option that specialist areas, such as the out-of-hours and Careline services, can be delivered via an outsourced arrangement;

(iii)  Agree that all other Elevate services (procurement, accounts payable, revenues and benefits, including financial assessments) be delivered in-house;

(iv)  Delegate authority to the Chief Operating Officer, in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance, Performance and Core Services and the Director of Law and Governance, to agree the terms for an orderly planned exit of the Elevate East London joint venture and the timescales for and potential phasing of services being transitioned to agreed new arrangements;

(v)  Approve a budget of £9.7m for the proposed exit of the Elevate contract and the implementation of the new operating models for all Core Support Services, noting that anticipated savings from implementation of changes were a minimum of £7.8m per annum from 2021/22 and a positive return on investment was forecast; and

(vi)  Delegate authority to the Chief Operating  Officer, in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance, Performance and Core Services and the Director of Law and Governance, to undertake all steps to implement the above recommendations including negotiations and to conduct the procurement and enter into any deeds of variations / contracts / agreements and all other necessary or ancillary agreements with any successful bidder(s) and/or other related parties in accordance with the strategy set out in the report.