minutes of the Joint Councils' Meeting

Joint Councils' meeting

7^th April (09)

Held at Hillingdon Civic Centre

Present

David Simmonds ( Chair)

Chris Spencer

Graeme Trott

Anne Plummer

Carey Baff

Natalie Yost

Mary Blanche

Paul Carter

Peter Gilroy

Gavin Jenkins

David Holdstock

Nicola Rea

Karen Goodman

Susan Ellery

Andy Couldrick

Fran Fonseca

Gail Martin

Debbie Shannon

Apologies

Anthony Lillis

Ken Meeson

Les Lawrence

Geoff Alltimes

Draft Minutes from Joint Council Meeting - Held at Kent County Council

14^th October 2008

In Attendance:

Cllr Paul Carter - Kent County Council (Chair)

Andy Ferguson - Hammersmith and Fulham

Alen Renshall - Liverpool County Council

Susan Ellery - West Sussex

Carey Baff - Birmingham County Council

Simon Bentley- Solihull

Amanda Honey-Kent County Council

Chris Spencer - Hillingdon

Cllr David Simmonds - Hillingdon

Julian Windsor - Hillingdon

Cllr Paul Lynch - Hounslow

Cllr Louise Chapman - Oxfordshire County Council

Fran Fonseca - Oxfordshire County Council

Keith Abbott - Kent County Council

Wayne Gough - Kent County Council

Minutes:

Item 1 - Introductions

Item 2 - Minutes

The Chair commented on the good level of support received following the House of Lords briefing, in particular from the 3^rd sector.

Hillingdon updated the meeting on counsel opinion. They had found that the legal advice was that all legal options had been exhausted.

The Chair outlined the developments since the last meeting, and the agreement that had been reached with Liam Byrne, before his move from the Home Office

Item 3 - Update on current financial position and offers received

Hillingdon: Under 18s - had received what they claimed for 06/07. Nothing yet for 07/08. In total they had only received about 25% of historic claim. Over 18s was an issue, especially around the effects of naturalisation

Liverpool: Have been told they can claim for previous 2 years, but no resolution as yet. Have received around £1.4 million against under 18s from previous years.

Hammersmith & Fulham: Full settlement for Under 18s for 06/07

W.Sussex: no figures, but making small surplus from grant for team at Gatwick.

Oxfordshire - Asked for criteria used to judge claims, and their offer was doubled. Like most areas still awaiting settlement for 02-07

Solihull - 06/07 Full settlement. No figure for 07/08

Birmingham - Only £30k difference between claim and settlement. Getting about 5 new UASC per month, 140 in total at present.

Kent - U18 06/07 settled in full. 07/08 nothing so far. Approx £10million claimed, so far offer is at about 25% of this. At the moment Kent is accruing £4-5million in current year in addition to money owing.

In terms of trend Kent were receiving 50% more referrals than this time last year (mainly from Afghanistan and Iraq). Hillingdon, Fulham and Liverpool all reported a reduced number (Liverpool by 40%).

It was noted that the approximately 30% of new claims were knocked back, and that councils are now expected to claim individual by individual.

A further issue was raised concerning naturalisation. Once a UASC becomes a naturalised citizen then they are no longer seen as an UASC and therefore the grant is no longer available, however the care need still remains, e.g Leaving Care responsibility still falls on the council. Hillingdon has done some work on assessing this impact, and predict it could run to millions.

The group also discussed continuing issues accompanied asylum seekers, and other categories e.g Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR). There was general agreement that what is really needed is a simple funding formula that funds full service provision for children not from the UK.

Item 4 - Discussion on Participation in UASC Reform

There was agreement that until the issues of funding is finalised that none of the councils would engage with the UASC Reform, nor apply for specialist status.

Item 5 - Next Steps

Kent (Keith Abbott) will lead, in conjunction with Hillingdon & Birmingham.

The letter should:

The letter should be copied to 3^rd sector, LGA, Association of London Councils, MPs

Draft

Action notes from Joint Council's meeting held in Oxford

20^th February 2008:

Notes of meeting

It was decided by those present at the meeting that the formal agenda would be dispensed with as the major topic of interest to the group was the recent offer of partial settlement by the Home Office. Paul Carter and Peter Gilroy outlined the offered settlement which had been suggested to them in the previous week. The offer from the Home Office was to pay 70% of the deficit money owed to all the members of the joint council but there was no corresponding offer in relation to the deficit in the DCSF grant. If all the authorities had been happy with this suggestion, the Home Office would have written to all authorities outlining a formal offer.

Action: It was agreed not to take this informal offer further. Kent to lead on drafting letter refusing the informal offer. This will be circulated.

Several courses of action were debated. These included looking again at the possibility of judicial remedy, looking at involving MPs in a Ministerial meeting, all authorities to take the opportunity to publicise their position with Members and others who may be able to influence the situation. It was noted that this is an issue which has implications for social cohesion.

Action:

It was noted that the Home Office were keen to engage many authorities around the table as specialist authorities as part of the UASC reform programme. There was some debate about the fact that, whilst this could be useful to us, the Home Office may also look at penalties if local authorities did not agree to participate.

It was suggested that a House of Lord's briefing involving Ministers (if possible) MPs and others such as voluntary agencies and the Children's Commissioner would be a good idea. The briefing would include-

It would be good if this could be held before the 31^st March but this may not be possible.

Action:

Draft action notes from the Joint Councils' meeting held at the LGA

13^th November 2007

Present

Cllr Paul Carter (chair)

Colin Elliot

Cllr Basil Curley

Cllr Mark Dunn

Marcus Chrystomou

Tanya Oliver

Peter Gilroy

Yvette Waide

Carey Baff

Anne Plummer

Cllr Ken Meeson

Cllr Les Lawrence

Fran Fronseca

Andy Couldrick

Cllr Louise Chapman

Cllr David Simmonds

David Holdstock

Cllr Anthony Way

1 Welcome and introductions

Cllr Carter welcomed everyone and introductions were made

2 Minutes and matters arising

The minutes of the last meeting were accepted as a true record

3 Update on response to the letter to the Prime Minister

Cllr Lawrence confirmed that the only response received so far had been a letter of acknowledgement from the PM's office, which arrived on the 9^th November.

5 Next Steps

Cllr Carter decided to take item five next as it was felt that it was important to have a strategy for after the Westminster Briefing.

Peter Gilroy raised a number of options which included going to JR, asking the Audit Office to investigate, raising a special precept or asking the Chairman of the LGA to assist in seeking a response. The route of seeking a judicial review did not seem a very productive one since it had been unsuccessful for Hillingdon.

Cllr Lawrence said he was seeing the Chairman of the LGA later this week and would raise the issue. He also told the group that he had written to the Chairman seeking support.

Cllr Meeson suggested raising the issues with sympathetic voluntary organisations such as NCBas they may lobby on our behalf.

Cllr Curley offered to raise the issues with Richard Kemp who was meeting with Hazel Blears this week on behalf of the LGA. This was accepted.

There was discussion of a Special Precept but this was clearly a matter of last resort.

It was also suggested that the Home Office could be invoiced separately for specialist services in order to highlight the issue.

Cllr Dunn suggested that the government may have made a decision not to assist authorities. Cllr Simmonds pointed out that Hazel Blears response to the LGA's last report on migration was to say that the Government would talk to individual authorities but that, despite writing to Ministers on ten occasions, no Minister had agreed to see Hillingdon.

It was agreed that an independent audit could be a good way forward. This would need to look at a basket of cases from a range of authorities. Once the report was prepared, we could ask for another collective meeting with Ministers.

4 Westminster Briefing and Media Strategy

It was agreed that speakers would be mindful of the possibility of raising community tensions with this issue and all were reminded that it Children In Need week and that these children are certainly children in need. It was agreed that elected members would be at the press briefing.

6 AOB

No AOB raised

7 Next Meeting

[Author ID2: at Thu Feb 21 14:47:00 2008 ]