Sandwell Council approves £1.7 million payment into improvement plan

A report on updates to the council’s improvement plan – part of a package of documents presented to councillors this week – suggests a “one-off” fund of £1.768 million approved by Sandwell Council to help finance the recruitment of key officer positions.

The improvement plan – a document created to help rectify historic governance failures at Sandwell – was first drafted last year to help monitor the performance of the council.

The plan itself – part of measures introduced by commissioners appointed by the government last year – comes after an external review revealed a “deeply troubling picture of mismanagement” and “ineffective scrutiny and accountability arrangements” at the council.

At a full council meeting this week, Kerrie Carmichael, leader of Sandwell Council, said: “We have continued to make significant progress since our last report to the secretary of state. We have welcomed Shokat as our new chief executive and have continued to deal with the long-standing issues including leisure services, the ELP system, and Lion Farm.

“We have made progress on the medium term financial plan and the EDI agenda and have an agreed one team framework which sets out the organisational values and behaviours because we know our people are the greatest asset.

“It is a year since the improvement plan was agreed by council and you will find our overall progress in the annual report. I’d like to thank all those involved as this would not be possible without the huge amount of work by base members and officers.”

The council so far have addressed the issues by refreshing its organisational culture and improving corporate plans for key services.

It includes revising a contract with Sandwell Children’s Trust – outsourced from the local authority – corporate plans to Sandwell Leisure Trust, consultations on the decision to build on the former Brandhall golf course and scrutiny on whether to have ‘all-out’ local elections.

An extract of a draft letter sent to the secretary of state, Michael Gove,  circulated to councillors reads: “A year on from the approval of our improvement plan, we are proud to look back over our achievements. We have successfully embarked upon whole-scale organisational change at the same time as delivering on our corporate plan commitments.

“We recognise that there is more work ahead on our improvement journey. The long-standing service issues raised by external reviews in 2021 have now either been addressed or are well-progressed with robust delivery plans in place. This has enabled the council to shift focus to longer-term planning”.

The council has had six leaders in the last six years and three chief executives in the last three years.