Minutes:
6.1 The Chair thanked Dan Gilby for drafting the initial Population Churn report. The Chair felt that the bullet points entitled ‘next steps’ would be a good basis on which to form recommendations to the Executive.
6.2 Dan Gilby reported that there has not been a great deal of work on population churn in Southwark and it would be beneficial to revisit this subject once further work has been carried out.
6.3 The issue of population churn links in with lobbying activities and funding allocations however, as yet we, as a Local Authority don’t fully understand the churn within the local population and how we provide services to our diverse communities. Building a better understanding of population churn in the borough would allow use to make better use of existing resources by using this understanding to inform service design and delivery and predict future population churn.
6.4 The potential around the current data sources and how we utilise that data is yet to be fully explored. There are qualities issues around how we use information and data collected to inform our service provision. The quality of the data could be improved with more engagement with local communities.
6.5 The Southwark Alliance has submitted a bid to the Migration Impacts Fund, consisting of nine projects across a range of Council services, which are designed to assist local partners in dealing with the impact of migration on existing services and settled communities. The bid totalled £682,043 and a response from the Department for Communities and Local Government on the outcome of the bid is expected on 15 June.
6.6 It was stressed that Southwark needs clear and accurate information from all the departments operating in Southwark and that wherever possible, the Census work should be promoted at all levels within Council departments.
RESOLVED: Members agreed that the bullet points entitled ‘next steps’ would be developed as recommendations to the Executive.
Questions
6.7 The sub-committee and ONS Officers discussed further questions.
6.7 Question 1: White paper: Forms will primarily be delivered by post (to as many as 95 per cent of households). Forms will also be posted back to a central location. What happens to the remaining 5% of places?
6.8 Answer: The rest will be delivered by hand. This is to address any mismatches in the system and promote more effective engagement. The rehearsal should test the robustness of the systems, in particular the ‘post back’ exercise.
6.9 Question: What is fallback position if something goes wrong with post out / back mechanism?
6.10 Answer: There is currently no ‘post out’ fall back however, the address register will say a lot about the quality of the procedures. It is acknowledged that a significant amount will be missed however. The doorstep operation will help to spot patterns that my assist with the coverage of the survey. The public will be encouraged to make contact with ONS through the ONS and Southwark Council’s contact centers. There will not be extra provision for Southwark to take calls regarding the Census but all queries should be easy to answer for the Southwark contact centre and if they are not, people will be directed to the ONS contact centre.
6.11 Question: A labour force of some 30,000 temporary field staff will be employed to carry out the Census. This is a big reduction to the number of enumerators employed for the 2001 census (75,000). How exactly will the field force be distributed to low response areas?
6.12 Answer: There has been more effort to ensure that there is good training in the skills that are needed to carry out the work effectively. Enumerators in the past were expected to be jack of all trades and as a consequence, their overall abilities were compromised. Now enumerators will have their duties more clearly defined and will receive training in their area of expertise. It was not clear how many enumerators will be employed by Southwark at this stage. It was acknowledged that ONS have Southwark down as one of the top 10 hardest boroughs in which to conduct a successful Census count.
6.13 Question:
· Will there be sufficient training and capacity to deal with the volume of calls you are likely to get from areas such as Southwark?
· Will additional resources be made available for hard to reach areas with specific information and training made available to contact centre employees?
6.14 Answer: ONS have put together simple FAQs for use on Councils websites. These questions usually cover all bases but if there is a more specific query ONS advise local authorities to put them in touch with ONS directly. Members commented that Vangent, the subcontractor for certain work carried out for and on behalf of the Council would have to be informed that they would be expected to undertake this extra responsibility. There will be no extra funding form ONS to Southwark for this.
6.15 Question: Although the council can see the benefits of using new technology in order to manage scarce resources more efficiently during 2011 census we are concerned that too much reliance is being placed on the OI system. What risk analysis and alternative provision has been made around the potential for OI failure?
6.16 Has this new technology been thoroughly tested in census conditions and how?
6.17 Answer: If there are problems with the post back system, the new OI (Questionnaire tracking) system should assist with clarifying what it is ONS are expecting back. ONS officers are confident that this system is very robust with each questionnaire having a bar code with which to identify it. The contract has been awarded to Royal Mail for the post back service.
6.18 Question: Is 25% response online too optimistic? How do you come by these figures and what is the strategy for dealing with areas like Southwark where this response will be much lower?
6.19 Answer: There is now an online facility which should increase the amount of responses. There is now a ‘belt and braces’ approach to ensuring as many returns as possible. It is thought that with publicity numbers will significantly rise.
6.20 Question: Will local authorities receive any extra resource to fund the management of the census process and a local publicity and stakeholder engagement campaign?
6.21 Answer: There will be no extra funding, provided by ONS to resource the management of the process. ONS have not received any extra money from the treasury so this Census is operating on an act of good will, looking to utilise money already received.
6.22 ONS/Southwark need to look at publicity locally. Southwark to look at the promotion of the Census work within community groups, newsletters and the existing communication channels.
6.23 The Chair and sub-committee thanked all involved for the work that had been undertaken this year.
The meeting concluded at 10pm.