NHS GRAMPIAN

Minute of the Grampian Area Partnership Forum (GAPF)

held on Thursday 15 December 2011 at 2.00pm

in the Conference Room, Summerfield House

Present:

Richard Carey, Chief Executive (Chairperson)

Gordon Stephen, Employee Director

Mike Adams, UCATT

Gemma Barclay, SOR

Jim Clark, GMB

Sharon Duncan, Unite

Alistair Grant, RCN

Eileen Grant, GHP

Laura Gray, Director of Corporate Communications

Alison Hardy, Clinical Nurse Manager

Deirdre McIntyre, SOCAP (VC)

Martin McKay, UNISON

Sandra-Dee Masson, BAOT

Gary Mortimer, General Manager Facilities and Estates

Mike Ogg, General Manager, Aberdeenshire (deputy for Sandy Dustan)

Clark Paterson, Group Finance Manager (Deputy for Alan Gray)

Philip Shipman, HR Manager (Deputy for Andrew Fowlie)

Anne Ross, Head of Performance & Quality Improvement

Clare Ruxton, Interim Director of Human Resources

Gail Thomson, Business Manager (Deputy for Frances Dunne)

Joan Anderson, Partnership Support Officer

In Attendance:

Adam Coldwells and Fergus McKiddie, Joint Chairpersons, Acute Sector Partnership Forum

- for Item 2

Item / Subject / Action
1 / Apologies
Apologies were received from Kirsten Sawers, RCM (no deputy),Ian Francis, CSP (no deputy), Shona McDougall, BDA (no deputy available), Jane Starley, BIOS (no deputy), Jenny Greener, non-executive director (no deputy), Mike Scott, Chair of the Staff Governance Committee (David Anderson deputised), Andrew Fowlie, General Manager, Moray Health Services (Philip Shipman deputised), Alan Gray, Director of Finance (Clark Paterson deputised), Vincent Shields, General Manager Acute Services (no deputy), Pauline Strachan, Chief Operating Officer (no deputy), Bill Cowling, Project ManagerMental Health, Duncan Stephen, ACB (no deputy). Frances Dunne, Nurse Manager, Aberdeen City CHP (Gail Thomson deputized), Sandy Dustan, General Manager Aberdeenshire (Mike Ogg deputized)
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* / Acute Sector Partnership Forum Presentation
Adam Coldwells and Fergus McKiddie attended the meeting to give the annual presentation from the Acute Sector Partnership Forum (presentation attached). They reported increased numbers of management on the group but there was a need to increase the number of Staff Side Representatives as there were areas that were under-represented. Everything discussed at the Partnership Forum fell under the 5 agreed themes for Acute Sector. These 5 themes were: Workforce Planning; Quality and Safety; Finance, Risk and Performance Management and Public Health.
An audit was undertaken on breaks during 12 hour shifts as a concern had been raised by Gordon Stephen. A sub-group was set up and an action plan had been developed and work was ongoing with a communication to staff the first action.
Safe Affordable Workforce (SAW) was always reported and this would be moving into workforce planning. The Health and Safety Committee were working on Healthcare Acquired Infection. A lot of work was ongoing with Staff regarding the Emergency Care Centre. The day to day work of the management team was done in partnership. Healthy Working Lives received a Silver Award which was a big achievement for a large acute hospital.
Stress in the workplace was discussed at the Partnership Forum and Healthy Working Lives Group was involved with taking this forward. Issues were raised from the Stress Audit and one of the issues was regarding how managers manage as this has an effect on peoples working environment. There was still lots of work to be done around this.
The General Managers weekly team meeting was attended by a Partnership Representative as was the weekly vacancy control group. All groups were open and transparent.
It was felt that having a full-time Partnership Representative aligned to Acute Sector had made things easier for the Staff Side Chair of the Partnership Forum.
Royal Aberdeen Children’s Hospital (RACH) will move to Acute Sector. It was noted that not all childrens services were based at RACH. The Acute Sector would be video conferencing with Dr Gray’s Partnership Forum for half an hour at each meeting and then discuss local issues for the rest of the meeting. It was planned to meet up in person once each quarter.
There were issues over those who attend GAPF not being part of the Acute Sector Partnership Forum and vice versa, but there were capacity reasons for this.
Communication was key to this years work.
Gordon Stephen thought the five themes were a good idea to give the group focus and suggested that other parts of the organisation might want to do a similar thing, they wouldn’t have to be the same five themes.
The presenters were asked for the one thing that has made Partnership work and the response was making the effort, members turning up, communication, empowering staff.
3 / Minute of Last Meeting held on 24 November 2011
The minute of the last meeting held on 24 November 2011 was approved.
4 / Matters Arising
Partnership Information Network (PIN) Policy and Practice
A new CEL (2011) 28 circular had been received launching new PIN Policy and Practice documents. As they were part of a CEL this meant that the Chief Executive must act upon it.
5 / Dates for Sector Partnership Forum and Sub-Group Presentations 2012
Dates for Sector Partnership Forum and Sub-Group Presentations to GAPF for 2012 were approved.
6 / Industrial Action
a.Day of Action 30 Nov Feedback
Gordon Stephen reported that the Day of Action went well. A full debrief with management would be organised to discuss what worked and what didn’t. The publicity on the day was good.
Richard Carey stated that the management team had done an outstanding job, led by Pauline Strachan, with business continuity plans. Work had begun with pandemic flu planning and was now very well organised for business continuity for whatever reason that is required.
Trade Unions and Staff got their point across in the campaign against pension changes.
b.Day of Action – Future plans
The ballots for action were valid for some considerable time. Negotiations were still going on so no plans for future action were being made meantime.
Management would have to plan for any future action.
7 / Delivering Safe, Effective & Timely Care in the Right Place
a.Health Care Support Workers
Clare Ruxton presented the update paper on Health Care Support Workers (HCSW) coming from the CEL (2010) 23 on how to implement in NHS Grampian. From 1 January 2011 all new starts had to go through the HCSW training. Now staff already in post need to go through a process. Any member of staff who applies for a new role will be treated like a new member of staff. GAPF supported the proposed. A global would be circulated to staff and the training would become part of the eKSF Review.
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* / Developing the Workforce and Empowering Staff
a.Knowledge and Skills Framework Update
Clare Ruxton explained that as well as keeping Personal Development Plans as a priority, there was a need to concentrate on objective setting. Learning and Development Department were running objective setting courses for staff.
Another issue was how we deal with bank staff. A lot of work was ongoing nationally on how to get bank staff onto eKSF. Helen Cheyne and the Learning and Development Department had been involved in these discussions but still no agreement yet.
PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) had been asked to do an audit on eKSF and implementation so information on what has been done would be available. Helen Cheyne hoped to attend the February GAPF to update the group.
A question was raised about how many staff had functioning log in details and Clare Ruxton proposed that she ask Helen Cheyne to undertake an audit on this.
b.Face to Face Sessions Feedback
Laura Gray presented the report on the Face to Face Sessions (presentation attached).
These sessions started as blocks of sessions but were becoming more regular as requests came in to attend departments/teams, etc to have a session.
30 sessions had taken place to date with 300 staff attending and 174 evaluation forms completed. The report was available on the intranet.
As many staff were not able to attend the organised sessions it was important that sessions were requested by wards and departments.
Some issues were raised at the sessions that required work without waiting until the end of the process and these issues were dealt with.
A huge number of topics for future sessions were suggested by staff. All questions asked by staff would be individually answered.
Dates were planned for twice year sessions next year and everyone was to encourage departments/teams, etc to request a session.
It was noted that quite often staff were frustrated with day to day issues and these issues need to be listened to by their operational manager. If they can’t resolve the problem this should be explained to the member of staff and escalated if necessary to ensure that the member of staff felt they were being listened to.
On line dialogue on the intranet with Richard Carey was tried but there were too many technical difficulties so it was put on hold.
c.Safe Affordable Workforce (SAW)/Workforce Planning
Clare Ruxtonupdated the group on SAW. Redesigns were ongoing. The SAW Steering Group was to be held the next week. Gerry Lawrie, Workforce Development and Redesign Manager,had attended the last one and a way forward for the next round of challenge meetings had been agreed which would feed into the Workforce Planning process.
Staff Side explained that the six key questions were to be taken into workforce planning process to ensure early involvement of Staff Side using the aligned representatives.
Richard Carey updated the group on the management vacancies. The Director of Public Health post had been advertised with a closing date in the next week and interviews on 10 January 2012. There had been a good level of interest. Sir Harry Burns, Chief Medical Officer, would be the external person on the interview panel.
The Director of Workforce post was also advertised and interviews in January. Mike Scott, Non-Executive Director, Kathy Cowan from NHS Orkney and John Connaghan from the Scottish Government were all to be part of the interview panel.
A role of Head of Modernisation had been discussed at an Executive Away Day. The job description would be available before Christmas and a ring fence for applicants would be identified. It was hoped to appoint early January. This would be an internal appointment to realign with Health and Care Framework and have a more detailed action plan.
Gordon Stephen reported that John Connaghan had attended the Employee Directors meeting and acknowledged that a 5 year workforce projection was too far ahead and it was now a 3 year projection which would be asked for. Workforce and medical workforce redesign needed to be related and not dealt with separately.
NHS Grampian was redesigning services using SAW which was about Safe Affordable Workforce. Need to keep looking at the 2020 vision and Health and Care Framework.
d.Management of Stress at work/Employee Stress Management Action Group (ESMAG)
This item was postponed until a future meeting.
9 / Improving Efficiency, Productivity and Sustainability
a.NHS Financial Report Update
Clark Paterson reported a slight overspend of £1.3m for NHS Grampian as a whole but was confident this would be turned into a break even by the end of the financial year. There were constant challenges every year and everyone needed to keep up continuous scrutiny.
Mike Adams stated that staff had appreciated the financial challenges but that they were getting more and more difficult to cope with.
At the end of November there was an underspend of £270k approximately. Pay and non-pay broke even which was the best ever pay situation. Nursing costs were the lowest ever. Non pay costs underspent by £19k.
Once again the hard work of all staff was highlighted. The more that could be done this year the better financial position NHS Grampian would be in next year.
b.Financial and General Reports from Sectors
Aberdeenshire
Mike Ogg reported that Aberdeenshire were £400k underspent. This was due to the SAW/Workforce Planning redesigns and the Change Fund. The Change Fund monies of £2.8m were going towards three pieces of work – early intervention, re-enablement and end of life. Work would be taken forward with the Local Authorities. This funding may disappear in three years so the work must be complete in that time.
Facilities
Gary Mortimer reported that Facilities was £111k underspent. This was £1m efficiencies and £800k of a saving. This was a result of huge effort from all staff. There was a catering loss in the dining rooms and Cairngorm Coffee Shop. Winter expenditure was still to come.
The Energy Centre was now generating 90% of energy required for the Foresterhill Site.
32.5 posts had been removed as a result of SAW redesigns. Agency Staff, overtime and procurement had all been looked at. Continually looking at SAW redesigns as changes took place. Still work to be done in Estates, Physical Planning and Soft fm.
The old power station was to be demolished in January and made into a car park for contractors’ staff. It was essential to have all the different aspects of the car parking proposals in place at the same time. It was noted that the car parking problems outside Foresterhill required to be looked at in due course.
Work was ongoing on carbon capture and very good work had been done and Richard Carey stated that he didn’t think it would have happened without the commitment of Gary Mortimer.
Facilities hoped to break even by the end of financial year.
AberdeenCity
Gail Thomson reported that at the end of OctoberAberdeenCity had a surplus of £41k and at the end of September they broke even. £262k was as a result of resource transfer. They expected to have a surplus of £466 at the end of the financial year.
Mental Health
No-one was available from Mental Health Services but it was reported that they had an overspend.
c.Voluntary Severance Scheme Update
Clare Ruxton reported that the closing date for applications had been 31 October. General Managers, HR Managers and Staff Side Representatives were reviewing all supported and non-supported applications. The Executive Panel would meet on 12 January and the Remuneration Committee would meet to finally approve the applications on 17 January 2012. All successful staff would exit the organisation by 17 February 2012.
A decision for those staff who were supported but ultimately unsuccessful would be taken on an individual basis following 17 February.
10 / Improving the Public’s Health and Reducing Inequalities
No Items.
11 / Any Other Competent Business
Richard Carey informed the group that Lynn Marsland, Head of Strategic Change, had been formally seconded to the Scottish Government for two years to work on the Human Resource Shared Services agenda. She will be keeping an office in Grampian as she will work with NHS Grampian as part of the role with NHS Scotland.
Jubilee Anniversary Public Holiday
The date had been set nationally as 5 June but the Scottish Government were still to decide whether it would be an NHS public holiday.
Agenda Item for Next Meeting
Health and Care Framework.
12 / Communication to Organisation from GAPF
Items communicated to the Board in the letter from Gordon Stephen would be the face to face sessions, Acute Presentation and Partnership Working in general, workforce planning with SAW being integrated and the clear message regarding early intervention of partnership.
The Health Care Support Workers agreement would be circulated for staff in global email.
13 / Date and Time of Next Meeting
The next meeting would be held on Thursday 16 February 2012from 2pm to 5pm in the Conference Room, Summerfield House

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