Agenda and minutes

There were no apologies and no declarations of interest.

Chris Warner would draft a note of the Management Board discussion for the staff news page.

The minutes of 14 July Management Board meeting were agreed as a correct record.

The Management Board meeting had been dedicated to workforce planning, as part of the annual capacity and resource planning cycle. The purpose was to discuss what each Directorate had identified as being the different or additional resources needed in the short, medium and longer term to deliver the strategic goals of the organisation in light of the significant challenges of the Fifth Assembly.

The aim of the meeting was to identify where it was possible to give a clear indication in principle for funding resources and challenge any areas of doubt.

As background, Nia Morgan provided an overview of the recently laid draft budget for 2017-18, which was based on an increase of inflation plus one percent. The Finance Committee were due to publish their report on the scrutiny of the budget on 21 November. Nia also outlined the financial impact of increasing staff numbers and the amount earmarked to projects already, meaning prioritisation was necessary.

Claire Clancy thanked the Board for their work in preparing and articulating the options and arguments, commenting on the strong sense of challenge that had already taken place prior to presentation at the meeting.

Management Board began the scrutiny of service area plans with the Business Directorate, with Adrian Crompton outlining the key challenges affecting resource needs, being: an increase in the number of committees; an extended business week; and the new Commission and LLywydd’s priorities.

Other factors affecting resources were the increased emphasis on engagement in committees, the MySenedd programme, which would impact working practices and skills across the organisation, and constitutional changes as a result of the Wales Bill and Brexit. Despite restructuring staffing and skills there was still a resource requirement, the immediate priorities being to support digital engagement and the new committee structure.

Dave Tosh followed by outlining the Resources Directorate’s identified requirements, in particular, the challenges for Security around the extended business week and committee schedule and the pressures on Estates to accommodate the number of committees. Other requirements would be driven by structural changes with a plan to reorient services over time.

Craig Stephenson outlined the priorities for Commission Services Directorate, with CAMS’ focus being on preparations for the new Chief Executive and providing resilience and good delivery of the LLywydd’s key messages. A driver for efficiency was the current review of Events, the outcome of which would be considered by the Investment and Resources Board (IRB) in November. TRS were seeing greater activity impacting particularly on interpretation.

Management Board then considered the full list of proposals and where the top priorities lay, agreeing 20 proposals to be taken forward to IRB. Two further posts in ICT were agreed in principle with a request to consider further how to spread the resource across the team. The posts not agreed would be revisited at the next meeting in order to explore further and consider timing and prioritisation. The extent to which proposals had taken adequate account of the Official Languages Scheme would also be considered then.

Management Board would need to be clear about future requirements over the next few months in order to prepare effectively for the following year’s budget.

ACTIONS:

• Nia Morgan to amend proposal spreadsheet to account for those that have received initial agreement;
• Dave Tosh to review the Security proposals and prioritise the requirement;
• Lowri Williams would review HR requirements in light of the proposals and consider what would best alleviate the pressures.

Management Board also agreed to discuss at the next meeting the issues raised by the mental health awareness session given by Time to Change Wales earlier that day (ACTION)

There was no other business. The next meeting would be held on 3 November 2016.