The Chair, Councillor Derek Levy welcomed all attendees to the meeting, which was being broadcast live online.

Apologies had been received from Cllrs Birsen Demirel, Kate Anolue and Mahtab Uddin, Huseyin Akpinar, and Deborah McBeal and Laura Andrews from North Central London Clinical Commissioning Group (NCLCCG) and Olivia Clymer from Healthwatch Central West London.

Members of the Council are invited to identify any disclosable pecuniary, other pecuniary or non-pecuniary interests relevant to the items on the agenda.

There were no declarations of interest.

The Chair to introduce the purpose of the meeting.

The Chair introduced the purpose of the meeting which was to agree and prioritise items for the Health and Adult Social Care Scrutiny Panel work programme for 2021/22. This is informed by item 5 on the agenda. The Chair advised that pre decision scrutiny was very important and would welcome opportunities for this.

To agree the minutes of the Health & Adult Social Care Scrutiny Panel meeting of the 24 March 2021.

AGReed the minutes of the meeting held on 24 March 2021.

It was noted that the minutes mentioned an additional meeting to be organised to cover 2 items. Unfortunately, this had not been possible, this will be discussed further under agenda item 6.

The Scrutiny Panel will hear from the Cabinet Member, officers and representatives from North Central London Clinical Commissioning Group outlining priorities and areas of challenge:

Cabinet Members and Officers will be asked to leave the meeting at this point

The Chair invited the Cabinet Member for Health & Adult Social Care, Cllr Alev Cazimoglu to outline her priorities for the coming year.

Cllr Cazimoglu highlighted the following:

·         Scrutiny is a very effective way of highlighting issues. The Cabinet Member was very receptive to the idea of pre decision scrutiny.

·         She reflected on the difficult year due to the pandemic and recorded her gratitude to the front line Adult Social Care staff who had carried on delivering services looking after vulnerable, elderly and disabled residents throughout the pandemic.

·         The number one priority is Safeguarding, and this could be considered by scrutiny in a number of ways;

• Safeguarding Adults Annual report,
• There has been a significant increase in safeguarding alerts during 2020/21 the panel may wish to look at the circumstances around this
• The use of DoLS (Deprivation of Liberty Safeguard)- the Council authorises in excess of 1k of these a year, members may wish to assure themselves that these powers are used appropriately or whether they are underused or overused
• Modern Slavery Team- what outcomes are being achieved and what more needs to be done

·         The second priority is the Health & Social Care White Paper, there are two areas within this that it was suggested that scrutiny may wish to focus on; the development of Integrated Care system, which will lead to another reconfiguration of the CCG. It is important that there is a local voice. The other area is the reintroduction of Social Care inspections. This inspection regime will be similar to the way Ofsted work in Children’s services. Members may want to look at the outcome of inspections and the committee may wish to look at what officers are doing to become inspection ready over the next 18 months.

·         Mental Health Service Review, the NCLCCG are leading on this review and this in addition to the national programme. There will be some new investment so it will be important to ensure that Enfield is part of this. It was suggested that members may wish to look at analysis from the wide scale review and ensure that all matters are fully considered, particularly the deficit in mental health services locally. Transformation provides opportunities but cannot solve underfunding. It is important that Enfield’s voice is heard.

·         There is also a review of Community services, there is a significant funding deficit in community services in Enfield. If Enfield received the average amount that other boroughs receive this would mean a substantial increase in funding.  Enfield has the lowest spend on community services within the North Central London boroughs.

The NCLCCG representative had been unable to attend the meeting but had sent through their key 3 focus/ priority areas as follows:

• Delivering the Covid vaccination programme
• Recovering access to services post Covid
• Transition to Integrated Care Systems/ Integrated Care Partnership (ICS/ICP)

Dudu Sher-Ami, Acting Director of Public Health then provided priorities on behalf of the Cabinet Member for Public Health as follows:

• Covid Vaccinations- the process the borough has undertaken, the outcomes achieved,  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

To agree and prioritise items for the new work programme.

The Chair introduced this item, the aim is to plan the work programme and prioritise items for the business meetings for the year. It was highlighted that as stated in the minutes of the 24 March there were two items outstanding from the last year and that the previous panel felt that they should be discussed as soon as possible. These items were:

o   Reconfiguration of the NHS

o   NCLCCG GP contract Changes

Regarding the two outstanding items the concern was on the GP contracts changes and the impact that this was having. It was suggested that the reconfiguration maybe picked up at the JHOSC.

The North Middlesex Hospital Trust follow up report awaited on the Care Quality commission (CQC) inspection at some point in the year was also mentioned as a future item in these minutes

The Chair suggested that there is a need to hold an extra meeting in July, which will need to be confirmed with the Monitoring Officer, to pick up on one- or two-time sensitive issues. Members in attendance supported this suggestion

Most of the attending members supported taking less items but in greater depth on the agenda. The panel members also supported the idea of visiting services and are open to a flexible way of working.

For each item there should be consideration of what can be achieved and what are the outcomes, what could be done better. There needs to be laser focus for each topic.

The Chair was surprised that the issue of mental health was not raised following the pandemic, other than in the context of structural reconfiguration and possible amalgamation.

If there was to be a meeting in July it was suggested in addition to the safeguarding annual report, the GP contract changes, and the ICS may be appropriate not withstanding that the actual content and what the Panel is seeking to achieve will still need to be finalised.

In summary the subjects in addition to those suggested for a possible July meeting agreed for consideration whilst still to be finalised are:

·         Safeguarding including the Annual report, alerts and DoLS

·         The rollout of the vaccination programme

·         The priorities on lifestyle choices within the Joint Health & Wellbeing Strategy. What can be done regarding this to bring focus? The wider issues of public health must not be lost. Has there been suppression of service delivery due to the pandemic, what are the trends?

·         Mental Health

·         Reconfiguration of the NHS and the impact on local services. Public health could have a clear view on this and what changes may be needed. Timings would need to be explored for this issue.

·         Community Services, its very important that the voice of Enfield does not get lost

·         Healthwatch was a suggestion. They were invited to this meeting and will be invited to future meetings.

To note, for information, the attached terms of reference for the Health & Adult Social Care Scrutiny Panel.

The terms of reference were noted.

To note that the next Health & Adult Social Care Scrutiny Panel meeting is scheduled to take place on Thursday 16 September 2021.

The date of the next meeting and that the Chair will be seeking an additional meeting in July was noted.