WHAT I DO ON YOUR BEHALF… how long does it take?

So, how many hours do I work on your behalf?

My electronic diary records the work I do and since June 09 when Conservatives won control of Staffordshire my role and workload has chanaged a lot.

I was appointed to the County Cabinet with responsibility for Adult Social Services and Health in Staffordshire but I’m determined that my local work which is so important to me won’t be affected.

But that did mean I had to step down from my role as Deputy Leader at Lichfield district. 

I’ve separated out my local work for the people I represent from the wider responsibility for Adult Social Services & Health for the whole county.

The County Division of Lichfield Rural East…

I represent about 13500 people living in rural areas around Lichfield and Tamworth and Fazeley with Mile Oak, a more populated town. The area is large and takes 30 minutes to drive between its furthest points:

• I spend on average around 20 hours a week dealing with local issues which are either instigated directly by constituents or just need doing. This can be visiting people and places, opening events, speaking at public meetings and generally dealing with constituents’ issues.
• I try to keep Fridays specifically for local work and also often visit people and events locally at weekends.

Lichfield District Ward of Shenstone…

The ward is made up of 1500 people and consists of the areas around and including Shenstone, Wall, Muckley Corner and Shenstone Woodend:

• Meetings at the Council House in Lichfield account for an average of 6 hours a month 
• Ward work, mainly dealing with residents’ issues, takes on average 10 hours a month
• General administration work accounts for around 5 hours a month

Cabinet responsibility for Social Care and Health

I normally spend four days each week at County Buildings in Stafford or going out to visit healthcare orientated people and places as well as attending meetings across Staffordshire and nationally… more often than not in London.

The Department has a direct budget of around £300million with additional partner funding from Primary Care Trusts in specific policy areas. About 4000 people work for Social Care and Health, based in Stafford and across the whole county. Each district/borough area has County Social Services offices with budgets to spend in that local area.

I work closely with my Departmental Management Team. It is led by the Director for Social Care and Health who is the official I work most closely with. He and the DMT are responsible for ensuring the day to day ‘business’ of the Department runs smoothly and also that policies and approaches I want to pursue are delivered.

Just about everything that happens, good or bad, is my responsibility and even if I’ve had nothing to do with something specifically, if it falls within my area of responsibility, it’s ultimately down to me. You can view more about what the Department does here.

Some of the areas we are focussing on since June:

Internal:

• Investing in the department’s ICT (which is 25 years old!), allowing staff to do what they were trained to do by getting them out from behind computer screens and delivering real front line services. In time that also provides major efficiency improvements.
• Cutting down bureaucracy that weighs real delivery of services down. I only want information and stats collecting which lead to safer, better service delivery. If Government targets and inspection regime happens to need the same as we do for ensuring better and more accountable services then that’s great. But we must stop slavishly chasing targets even if it upsets the Government inspectors.
• Encouraging the people in the Department, at all levels, to improve day to day systems by feeling able to use their expertise to change approaches and come up with new ideas and processes. To do that we’ve set up a grassroots ‘Bureaucracy Busting’ regime to drive out waste and nonsense.
• Openly valuing and trying to understand issues that people in Adult Social Services have to contend with every day. Making sure they feel some ’connection’ to me as their political lead. I’ve met nearly 2000 staff at a series of district meetings and established a regular Cabinet Member Forum where different groups of 40 or so from across the service meet me to give an appreciation of issues and what I need to do to help them improve services at the sharp end.
• Encouraging a much bolder approach to strategy and planning for the future. Being clear what the best approach for focussing on long term plans is. Not just short term fixes to get things out the way but standing back, taking a little extra time and getting the right outcome first time instead of changing things time and time again. 
• And broadly trying to find ways of making each pound available go further and do more. The challenges ahead because of demography (the population age make up). The proportion of older people in Staffordshire and nationally is growing at a tremendous rate. People are living longer but as a consequence have greater needs, carewise, for many more years. The financial impact of that is growing very much faster than the money available so budgets are a massive headache.

Our communities: 

• Rebuilding trust in Staffordshire’s approach to some aspects of social care after the Department was pushed and pulled in different directions by the previous Administration. The inept political approach resulted in the controversy around ‘Changing Lives’. I need to demonstrate a new and more considerate approach to the challenges ahead making sure, wherever it’s possible, to do things ‘with people not to people’.
• I want to see an integration of community Health provider services and Social Care provider services across Staffordshire to create a more equitable approach for everyone wherever they live in the county. The variances in approach and provision of healthcare needs improving and integration should also make things easier for people to understand.
• And all of this is about my new vision for health and care in our county. ‘Staffordshire Cares’ is the brand new overarching approach which means not just provision of services but a lifestyle orientated focus for people in future. It will mean joined up services, easily available information and advice through Staffordshire Cares Direct, a 24/7 phone number across Staffordshire, new interactive website, information points in places people go like supermarkets, shopping centres and health centres which will all provide information, help and advice as people get older or more vulnerable. It will mean a transformation over the next three years.
• Part of that transformation is a step change in investment to provide more independent living developments. Real opportunity for people who have disabilities, or as they get older, to live life instead of just existing in institutionalised care. We are working to increase, four fold over the next five years, the availability of homes to rent, part buy or fully own in Extra Care and Flexi Care housing schemes. Appartments of exceptional quality with excellent social and leisure facilities and activities which encourage an independent and more normal life with 24/7 quality care and support on site. Our plans mean Staffordshire will be a national leader in independent living opportunities.   
• The protection of vulnerable people is also a key responsibility. We are overhauling the structures, effectiveness and accountability to keeping adults safe. Chief officers from across the public sector in Staffordshire will work with a new Independent Chair to ensure all public services are engaging around safeguarding properly and they will in future be directly responsible to me. Clear focus and greater political accountability around safeguarding than ever before.
• The Public Health agenda is about using the numerous different public services we all use to help improve the general wellbeing of all people through education, innovation and joint working. This is a huge challenge as the difference in life expectancy between people in some parts Staffordshire is as much as seven years. It includes efforts to tackle drug use as well as finding ways to reduce the number of people who harm themselves through excessive alcohol consumption.

My responsibilities do not directly include primary care such as hospitals, GPs and dentists etc although we do work closely with Primary Care Trusts around hospital admissions and discharges and particularly reducing the need for acute care. Plans for integration will bring these services much closer together. Work around safeguarding of vulnerable adults does include primary care and is one of my responsibilities.