Agenda and minutes

Councillor Marshall welcomed everybody to the inaugural meeting of the Bute & Cowal Area Community Planning Group and explained the Community Planning process saying that it will be open and transparent.

Apologies for absence were intimated on behalf of the following:-

Councillor A MacAlister

Councillor J McQueen

Councillor L Scoullar

Councillor I Strong

Councillor J R Walsh

Andrew Law, Link Director

Gordon Watson, Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National

None

Jane Fowler explained that Community Planning is a process which helps public agencies to work together with the community to plan and deliver better services which make a real difference to people’s lives.  The Council have a duty to lead and support the process.  Jane explained that the revised Community Plan is almost compete, there is a Single Outcome Agreement in place and the Council have partnerships who have been involved in preparing these agreements. 

Jane Fowler spoke on the Community Planning Partnership structure and explained the roles of the Thematic Groups.   Jane explained who were the Core Partners and the key tasks for the Community Planning Group, i.e. Community Engagement, Develop the Area Community Plan, and Performance Management for Community Plan Outcomes.

Jane Fowler explained that the stakeholders consist of Community Groups, Service Users, Third Sector Organisations, Advocacy Groups and CPP Partners, and how they all link to the CPP.  Jane spoke on the community engagement ambition to strengthen and extend community planning processes, increase community involvement in CPP, build capacity of organisations and communities and share experiences, knowledge, skills and resources which will be of benefit to us all.

Jane Fowler explained that there is a new Community Plan being developed through dialogue led by the thematic leads:-

Douglas Cowan, HIE

Andrew Campbell, SNH
Douglas Hendry, ABC

The Community Plan has 4 main themes, Economy, Environment, Social Affairs and Community Engagement.

Brian Barker spoke on FAB (Fairer Argyll and Bute) and explained that data has been updated since Needs Analysis was carried out.  Brian explained that data has come from secondary sources and the information will never be able to pinpoint individuals in need.  Brian said that all areas experience need to some degree, e.g the needs for younger adult cohorts are concentrated in towns, and needs for older age cohorts are more geographically dispersed. 

Chief Inspector Mosley explained that a lot of these needs are very difficult to solve.

Jane Fowler spoke on the Area Plans advising that everyone will have to be focused on agreed outcomes, there will have to be a coordination of action to deliver on outcomes with clarity and openness which enables effective scrutiny and performance management.

Jane Fowler asked Partners to think about the challenges and risks they face and the outcomes they want to see, then there is a need to think about how these outcomes are achieved and how you know measure success.

The Local Community Plan is facilitated and coordinated by the Council’s Corporate Services Manager with input from all partners, and will contain promises that Partners are making to the community.

Partners need to manage the performance of the Plan, this is done jointly across services and partners and is based on the jointly agreed priorities from the Plan.  Once the Plan content is agreed Partners have to decide on what information they want to see, to demonstrate success in achieving priorities, this information is from a variety of sources giving a richer overall picture of what’s happening.

Jane Fowler showed the group examples of scorecards on the Council’s Pyramid system.

Partners need to be clear about success measures, making sure they relate to the outcomes and be clear about who is providing the data.  The Council’s Performance Management team will collate the data and produce scorecards.

Members discussed the group membership and Councillor Simon asked for somebody from Transport and the Scottish Ambulance Service to be invited along, he also expressed his concern over the representatives from the 3^rd sector not being properly engaged, Councillor Marshall agreed and asked that the Dunoon & Cowal Business Association be invited along.  Councillor McNaughton said that there are lots of Community Trusts in the area and asked that one of their members are invited along.

Shirley MacLeod advised that once the Community Council’s are all properly constituted then it will be up to them to decide who to send along to meetings and cascade the information.

It was agreed that Janet McKellar would bring a proposal for the appropriate people from the 3^rd sector to attend the LACPG, one from each priority within the Community Plan i.e. Economy, Environment and Social Affairs.

Members agreed the following dates:

12^th January- Rothesay

2^nd March- Queen’s Hall, Dunoon for Community Seminar

4^th May- Queen’s Hall, Dunoon

7^th September- Rothesay Pavilion for Community Seminar

2^nd November- Queen’s Hall, Dunoon

Martin Turnbull spoke on the 100 Community Voices and advised that he did not think a single event would give enough awareness of what Community Planning is trying to do.  Brian Barker advised that there will be two community events over the year.  Martin explained that Community Learning had been able to access Scottish Government funding that might be able to be used for the community events.  Martin also explained that he had purchased electronic voting equipment which could be used, this equipment means that people can give an anonymous answer which means that they tend to give a more honest answer.  Martin suggested setting up a small group to discuss how to take the community event forward.

It was agreed that Shirley MacLeod would bring together the correct people to be on this group and Martin will bring a report to the January meeting.

The Group further agreed that in order to progress in developing a draft Local Community Plan a small subgroup will come together and examine the Community Plan, the Needs Analysis and Partner’s exiting delivery plans, with a view to developing a draft Local Community Plan containing a small number of key outcomes.  This draft Community Plan will be brought to the January meeting of the LACPG for discussion/consideration.