Dear Sir,

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000 - INFORMATION REQUEST

I acknowledge your request for information received on 24th August 2008.

Your request is being considered and you will receive the information requested within the statutory timescale of 20 working days as defined by the Freedom of Information Act 2000, subject to the information not being exempt or containing a reference to a third party.

If appropriate, the information may be provided in paper copy, normal font size. If you require alternative formats, e.g. language, audio, large print, etc. then please let me know. I understand you wish the information to be sent to you by e-mail.

For your information, the Act defines a number of exemptions that may prevent release of the information you have requested. There will be an assessment and if any of the exemption categories apply then the information will not be released. You will be informed if this is the case, including your rights of appeal.

If the information you request contains reference to a third party then they may be consulted prior to a decision being taken on whether or not to release the information to you. You will be informed if this is the case.

There may a fee payable for this information. This will be considered and you will be informed if a fee is payable. In this event the fee must be paid before the information is processed and released. The 20 working day time limit for responses is suspended until receipt of the payment.

If you have any queries or concerns then please contact the Information Officer at London Borough of Redbridge, Town Hall, PO Box 2, High Road, Ilford, Essex, telephone 0208 708 2331, e-mail [Redbridge Borough Council request email]

Further information is also available from the:
Information Commissioner at: Information Commissioner's Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Telephone: 01625 545 700

www.informationcommissioner.gov.uk

Yours faithfully,

Lin Pankhurst
Freedom of Information Coordinator
Strategic Services

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Dear Mr Hardwicke Carruthers,

I refer to your request for information as detailed in your email of 24th August.

I apologise for the delay in responding to your request. This is because the complaints information in Redbridge is not held centrally and has therefore had to be collected and collated across all our departments; this task is taking longer than we anticipated to complete.

I hope to be able to provide the information to you shortly, once again, my apologies for the delay in responding.

Regards,

FOI Coordinator - Strategic Services
Tel: 020 8708 2331

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Dear Mr Hardwicke Carruthers,

I refer to your request for information and I sincerely apologise for the
delay in responding to you.

This is because the information in Redbridge has not been held centrally,
nor in financial years for all complaints data, and has therefore had to
be collected, collated and checked across every department individually;
this task took much longer than we anticipated to achieve.

You asked:

Question: I would like to know the average proportion of time the
elected representatives of your authority spend as part of their duties
for 2005/2006, 2006/2007 and 2007/2008 on their main activities. The
activities that form their duties (employment) as an elected
representative are:

1 directly resolving complaints against the executive (Council
Staff) of the Council by residents;
2 sitting on committee's;
3 acting for the political parties that they represent and/or
ceremonial duties (i.e. all time not spent on sitting on a Committee or
resolving a complaint against the executive);

The total time spent by an elected representative for a Council on these
three activities should be 100 per cent of the time they spend 'working
for a Council' as an elected representative.

Answer:
1. The elected Members of the London Borough of Redbridge do not
resolve complaints relating to officers of the Council made by residents.
These direct complaints by customers are handled via the [1]Councils
Corporate Complaints Procedure. Details of the procedure are available via
the Council website ([2]www.redbridge.gov.uk ). As you will see, the
London Borough of Redbridge complaints scheme does not require Member
participation in the process, with the exception of Adult Social Services,
where they may be required to sit on a panel.

2. The Council keeps records of Members attendance at Committees but
does not hold information on the amount of time spent at each committee or
on duties performed for the Council at other functions, public meetings.
Information about [3]Member's participation in committee meetings (direct
link) is available on our website: [4]www.redbridge.gov.uk

3. The London Borough of Redbridge is not required to know how
Members spend their time acting for political parties and it is not
recorded. We are therefore unable to provide any information with regard
to this question.

Question: I would additionally like to know how much in total was
paid to local councillors to meet all their duties (including expenses)
for 2005/2006, 2006/2007 and 2007/2008 by your authority, and how many
elected representatives are (and were) represented on your authority for
these years.

Answer: Details of Allowances paid to individual Members can be found on
our website: [5]www.redbridge.gov.uk or [6]here(direct link).

There are [7]63 elected representatives on our Authority. This has been
the same for all the years in question.

Question: I would also like to know how many Complaints in total
were submitted to your Council in 2005/2006, 2006/2007 and 2007/2008 for
each year. I would further like to know how many of these complaints were
formally considered by an elected representative for each of these years.
Answer: The number of complaints submitted in total were as follows:

2005/2006 - 1266
2006/2007 - 1492
2007/2008 - 1336

The number of complaints considered by a panel where a Member participated
were:

2005/2006 - 2
2006/2007 - 1
2007/2008 - 1

Question: I would further like to know how many complaints against
the Executive (Council staff) led to the elected representatives formally
identifying that the Executive had acted wrongly for the years 2005/2006,
2006/2007 and 2007/2008, and how many of these formal determinations by
the elected representatives identify that there was no wrong-doing by the
Executive. How many staff employed by your authority in 2005/2006,
2006/2007 and 2007/2008 ceased to be employed by your authority as a
direct result of a complaint against the Executive, and the Councillors
identifying this to be the case.

Answer: There were no complaints against members of staff considered by
elected representatives. Staff dismissals are recorded as ‘misconduct
‘ issues and not classified as complaints brought up for members
consideration.

Question: I would further like to know how much money the Council
has paid to a complainant (i.e. victim of a Council's wrongdoing) through
its own complaints system (i.e. excluding any intervention by the Local
Government Ombudsman, Valuation Tribunal or similar body) in2005/2006,
2006/2007 and 2007/2008.
Answer: The following amounts were paid to complainants through the
Council's complaints system:

2005/2006 - £ 266.00
2006/2007 - £2,339.00
2007/2008 - £2,891.70

Question: I would like to know how much money either in the form of
local settlement or additional formal finding of maladministration causing
injustice the Local Government Ombudsman has recommended that your Council
pay in 2005/2006, 2006/2007 and 2007/2008 (for each year) and if the Local
Government Ombudsman's recommendations have been met in full (including
any non-financial recommendations for each year)).
Answer:

2005/2006 - £7,500
2006/2007 - £3,300
2007/2008 - £5,854

All recommendations were met in full.

Question: Please detail any recommendation that has not been met in
full and provide a copy of the Elected representatives decision. Please
additionally identify if these costs were met directly by Council Tax
Payers or the Council's insurers (excluding self insurance by a Council)
Answer: All recommendations were met in full and any costs came from
within Service area budgets.

Question: Finally, please provide details of the financial cost of
administering all your complaints systems (including FoI and DP) by the
Executive for 2005/2006, 2006/2007 and 2007/2008 and the number of staff
employed in administering complaints and resolving these (Full time
equivalent staffing levels).
Answer: The financial cost of administering our complaints systems
(including FOI and DP) is met from within existing service budgets and is
generally not recorded separately. Equally, we have very few staff
employed specifically to administer and resolve complaints or FOI
requests. In most cases, staff within the individual service areas carry
out these functions as part of their normal duties. It has therefore not
been possible to identify either the cost or the FTE levels for this area
of work for the whole Council. However, where costs have been identified
by individual service areas, I have included them in the figures below.

2005/2006 - £62,795.80
2006/2007 - £74,457.13
2007/2008 - £76,058.70

Question: Please also provide details of your total administrative
costs for 2005/2006, 2006/2007 and 2007/2008 and the total number of staff
employed by your authority, as well as any pay increase (including
increments) made to the Council's Chief Executive (Head of Paid Service)
in pounds sterling for each of these years.
Answer:

1. Our financial statements can be found on our website:
[8]www.redbridge.gov.uk ([9]Direct Link) For your convenience, I have
attached pdf copies of the summary statements for each of the years.

2. The total number of staff employed by the London Borough of
Redbridge is currently : 9101 (7275.14 FTE)

3. The pay increases (including increments) paid to the Chief
Executive were as follows:

2005/2006 - £4072
2006/2007 - £4112
2007/2008 - £3585 (+ £14,366 arrears following review
during 2008.)

Question: Please additionally identify if the Chief Executives wages
included performance related payments.

Answer: The overall reward package has recently been changed to include
the potential to attract performance related payments, although the Chief
Executive has not asked for any so far, and none has been paid to him.

I trust the above information is sufficient for your purposes and
apologise once again for the delay in providing it for you.

Yours sincerely

Freedom of Information Coordinator (Strategic Services)
020 8708 2331

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