Agenda item

Report and Presentation of the Acting Director of Public Health

The Scrutiny Board considered a report and received a presentation of the Acting Director of Public Health on the proposal to modernise children’s and lifestyle public health services. There was also a corresponding private report detailing the confidential aspects of the proposal (Minute 58 below refers). Both reports were due to be considered by Cabinet at their meeting on 11^th April, 2017, when approval would be sought to commission the two new services.

The report indicated that the City Council commissioned a range of services that aimed to prevent poor health by improving childhood health and supporting behaviour change among at risk groups. It was proposed that these individual services were integrated to provide:

(1) A Family Health and Lifestyle Service: supporting children, young people and their families. This service would include Health Visiting and School Nursing and would be an integral element of the developing family hub model.  The service aimed to systematically reduce health inequalities including supporting the reduction of childhood obesity, families to be more physically active, improving childhood development and readiness for school and reducing infant mortality.

(2) An Integrated Adult Lifestyles Service:  supporting adults at greatest risk of poor health including those who displayed multiple lifestyle behaviours such as obesity, low levels of physical activity and poor diet and smoking as well as other at risk groups including people with mental health conditions.

The proposal to integrate the services was based on what local Coventry people wanted from these services, following consultation with the general public, service users and wider stakeholders and the latest evidence about what worked to improve quality and outcomes.

In order to properly develop an integrated approach for the Family Health and Lifestyle Service a significant amount of re-design was required. It was therefore recommended that the contract would run for five years with two 24 month extensions available. It was also proposed that the service was procured via a competitive tender with dialogue (an approach where tenderers work in partnership with the contracting authority to develop a suitable solution to the service specification and requirement – at the point where the contracting authority was confident that one or more of the solutions presented were sufficiently developed to meets its needs and requirement, tenderers were then invited to submit competitive bids). This procurement approach was innovative and, while it was planned for the proposed contract to be operational during the summer 2018, permission was being sought to extend existing contracts for up to 6 months until 30 September 2018 to allow for robust process.

The proposed contract for the Integrated Adult Lifestyle Service would be operational by 1 April 2018 and would be procured through a standard competitive tender. The contract would run for five years with two 24 month extensions available.

The presentation set out the vision for both services; detailed the delivery principles; highlighted the outcomes that the services needed to make a positive impact on; and provided examples of what the public and professionals had acknowledged as being important. Further information was provided on the consultation and engagement exercises; the proposed procurement route and the contract management. The presentation concluded with the next steps in the process which concluded with the services going live.

The Board questioned the officers on a number of issues and responses were provided, matters raised included:

·  Clarity about the role of Health Visitors, Family Nurses and the management of caseloads

·  The importance of robust monitoring of contracts, the way interventions were evaluated and what was in place to ensure that these were carried out effectively

·  Whether the expertise from the two local universities was used to help with monitoring

·  The opportunities for schools to support parents in helping to raise educational standards

·  The impact of the proposals on existing staff and organisations

·  How the proposed approach would be different in addressing challenges that have been known and understood for some time

·  How the data would be used to ensure that improvements were being made

RESOLVED that the proposed approach be supported and the recommendations to Cabinet, as set out in the report, be endorsed.