Agenda and minutes

Joint Meeting of the Cabinet / Education Skills and Culture Scrutiny Committees - Wednesday, 27th March, 2019 10.00 am

Venue: Council Chamber - Port Talbot Civic Centre. View directions

Items
No. Item

1.

Appointment of Chairperson and Vice Chairperson

Minutes:

Agreed that Councillor A.L.Thomas be appointed Chairperson and that Councillor L.C.Jones be appointed Vice Chairperson for this joint meeting.

2.

Declarations of Interests

Minutes:

The following Members made declarations of interest at the commencement of the meeting.

 

Councillor D.Jones

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning - Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as she is a Governor at Cilfrew Primary and Llangatwg Community Schools and confirmed he has dispensation to speak and vote.

Councillor E.V.Latham

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a Governor at Tywyn Primary and Ysgol Bae Baglan and confirmed he has dispensation to speak and vote.

Councillor P.A.Rees

Re:  Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a member of the ERW Board.

 

Councillor P.A.Rees

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a Governor of Cefn Season Comprehensive School and Crynallt Primary School and confirmed he has dispensation to speak and vote.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Councillor R.G.Jones

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a member of the ERW Board.

 

Councillor R.G.Jones

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a Governor at Ysgol Cwm Brombil and Coed Hirwaun Primary School and confirmed he has dispensation to speak and vote.

 

Councillor L.C.Jones

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as she is a Governor at Melin Primary and Tonnau Primary School.

 

Councillor S.K.Hunt

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a Governor at Blaendulais and YGG Blaendulais Primary Schools. Also, his daughter works at Ysgol Castell Nedd.

 

 


 

 

Councillor C.M.Crowley

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a Governor at Tywyn Primary School and Awel y Mor Primary School and confirmed he has dispensation to speak and vote.  In addition, he has family members working in Neath Port Talbot Schools.

 

Councillor A.Llewelyn

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW)  he is a School Governor and confirmed he  has dispensation to speak and vote.

 

Councillor N.T.Hunt

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning – Education through Regional Working (ERW) – as he is a Governor at Rhosafan Primary School.

 

Councillor J.D.Morgan

Re: Joint Report of the Chief Executive and the Director of Education, Leisure  ...  view the full minutes text for item 2.

3.

Education Through Regional Working (ERW) Report (enclosed within the Cabinet Papers)

Minutes:

Pre-Scrutiny

 

The Committee scrutinised the following matters.

 

Cabinet Proposal

 

The Joint Committee received information on the Education through Regional Working – Regional School Improvement Consortium and the Council’s future participation in the (South West and Mid Wales) Regional School Improvement Consortium (ERW) as detailed in the circulated report.

 

Discussion took place on the process that had resulted in the proposal to serve notice of the intention to withdraw from ERW with affect from 31 March 2020.  It was explained that officers of Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council (NPTCBC) had raised concerns to the Consortium and the Welsh Government in relation to three areas of concern Governance, Quality and Financial over the last 2 years and the proposal before Members today was the last resort.  Evidence was available for Members to scrutinise if required. 

 

Following on, it was explained that the support currently provided by ERW was in relation to school development, self evaluation and professional coaching.  In addition, one area that ERW was to focus on was the plans to roll out the new curriculum, to date no information had been made available.  Director of Education, Leisure and Lifelong Learning explained that as a result Neath Port Talbot Education Department was taking steps to arrange plans for the new curriculum locally as this would have a significant impact on the life chances of the young people of Neath Port Talbot. 

 

Reassurance was given that links with schools outside of Neath Port Talbot would continue.  Strong links currently exist between NPTCBC and the City and County of Swansea as both councils have similar geographically and demographical makeups.  ERW has a system of partner schools but these were not arranged by the matching of areas, in some instances head teachers travelled from Neath Port Talbot to Cerdigion where the schools did not face similar issues.

 

 

Lliw Afan Nedd Primary Head Teachers (LLAN) views had been sought in addition to a School Survey undertaken where the feedback was that the support received from the Education Department within NPTCBC was excellent but raised issues in connection to the support received from ERW which was in line with the issues that Education Officers had previously raised.

 

The Chair of the ERW Joint Committee identified a new model for working in her letter to the Minister for Education in February 2019.  To date no response had been received from Welsh Government or ERW to the letter or to the requests for meetings to discuss a way forward.  Emphasis was given that work would continue to try to resolve issues and to develop an improved model for regional working and that the decision to withdraw was the last option for the Council to take.

 

Officers confirmed that there was no penalty for withdrawing from the consortium stated in the Contract. Any Authority may withdraw from the Agreement by giving notice in writing to each of the other Authorities to expire 12 months from the end of the date Financial Year in which the notice is  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.