Meeting of the CCPS Membership

CCPS

Meeting of the CCPS Membership

Thursday 17 March 2011, 10.00am

Norton Park Conference Centre, 57 Albion Road, EdinburghEH7 5QY

Present:

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In attendance:

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MINUTES

1.Apologies received

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2.Minutes of the meeting held on 16 December 2010

There being no comments or amendments, the Convener moved that they be accepted as a true record.

3.Matters arising

There were no matters arising not otherwise catered for in the agenda.

4. Presentation from CCPS Director incorporating:

• CCPS priorities and strategy for the coming year. AGL outlined these and they were duly approved by the members present: the presentation and relevant documentation is on the members section of the website (under Details of CCPS meetings in the members’ area).
• Developments within CCPS. AGL outlined the situation with the Scottish Government funded units. The HSEU funding is 25% less than previously and so members of the HSEU staff have agreed to work reduced hours to allow for this drop in resources. The VSSSWF Unit, having completed its programme of work and with no government funding currently forthcoming, will be wound up in its present form at the end of the financial year. NH thanked the Workforce Unit staff for their patience and understanding during the period of the redundancy consultation. Meanwhile CCPS plans to recruit shortly to the vacant post of Policy and Development manager and also for a dedicated officer to work on personalisation and carry forward some of the work done by the Workforce Unit. This additional post would be dependent on government funding for the coming year, details of which are yet to be confirmed.
• Draft organizational budget for 2011-12. AGL spoke to the draft budget, which was tabled. The draft budget was approved.
• Proposed changes to CCPS membership fees for 2011-12. AGL outlined the reasons for the review of the membership fee bands. The new fee structure goes some way to ensuring that CCPS remains a sustainable organisation and the two new bands at the higher end of the scale reflect the fact that more than half the membership organisations are in the highest fee band. AGL explained that this rationalization of the membership fee bands had been put forward by the Board as a preferable alterative to a wholesale overhaul of the membership rates (based strictly on a proportion of each organisation’s income) as CCPS had no wish to hit members with substantial increases in rates at this difficult financial time. There were a number of generally supportive comments from members, including the suggestion that CCPS might consider asking for additional contributions in certain circumstances, for example to fund ‘war chests’ in relation to pieces of work on specific issues affecting groups of members.

5.CCPS membership update

Since the last membership meeting, Who Cares? Scotland, NSPCC Scotland and Erskine have all joined as CCPS members. This brings the total number of members to 71.

6. CCPS representation on working groups/committees

CCPS has adopted a new policy regarding working groups and will now focus on facilitating representation in relation to groups that are deemed to be ‘strategically relevant’ to the CCPS priorities for the year. AGL and Davina Adamson will shortly be going through the list of remaining groups to assess weather they fit the criteria. Other invitations will be responded to with an offer to facilitate the identification of a ‘provider voice’ for the group, but the person going forward from CCPS would not be representative of the membership. CCPS currently remains involved in 34 working groups.

7.AOCB

Martin Crewe enquired about the Business Optimism Survey. AGL responded that CCPS had not wanted to do this before local authority budgets were finalised but that the intention was to have the findings ready prior to the Scottish Parliamentary elections.

AGL directed the members’ attention to the forthcoming final piece of work carried out by the Workforce Unit, namely a research project conducted in conjunction with StrathclydeUniversity into terms and conditions within the third sector. CCPS will disseminate the results as soon as possible.

8.Date of next meeting

The next meeting will take place on Thursday 16June at the Hilton Hotel, Riverside Drive, Dundee

The following sessions took place after the membership meeting:

Commision on the future delivery of public services in Scotland (the ‘Christie Commission’)

Members of the Commission Ruth Wishart outlined the remit of the commission, and the emerging themes at this stage and indicated that they were currently in the process of producing material for the report, due out in June 2011. AGL then outlined the submission of evidence made by CCPS (available at under the heading ‘public service delivery’ and the members were asked for their views on the key issues raised. Commission member Alison Eliot, and adviser to the Commission Martin Sime, were also in attendance.

Expert Panel on future options for Social Care

Professor Brian Williams, expert panel member,and Jackie Bailie MSP, shadow health secretary,laid out some of the emerging issues raised by the consultation meetings held so far on the Scottish Labour Party proposal for a National Care Service . They then invited the members to share their views and thoughts on these issues.

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