7 May 2020

Those present:           

• Mostaque Ahmed, Finance Director and Managing Director, Finance, Portfolio and Performance 
• Ian Ailles, Director General of the House of Commons (Chair) 
• John Benger, Clerk of the House
• Isabel Coman, Managing Director of In-House Services and Strategic Estates
• Sarah Davies, Clerk Assistant and Managing Director of Chamber & Committees 
• Mandy Eddolls, Managing Director of HR and Diversity 
• Eric Hepburn, Director of Security for Parliament 
• Tracey Jessup, Chief Information Officer and Managing Director of the Parliamentary Digital Service  
• Edge Watchorn, Acting Managing Director of Participation 
• Penny Young, Librarian and Managing Director of Research & Information 

In attendance:  

• Marianne Cwynarski, Head of Governance and Central Services and Secretary to the Commission 
• Rhiannon Hollis, Secretary to the Commons Executive Board 
• Jane Hough, Head of Business Planning and Performance
• Clare Jennings, Director of Communications     
• Alex Mills, Chief Accountant and Head of Financial Capability
• William Newing, Business Change Manager
• John Owen, Parliamentary Portfolio Governance Manager
• Sarah Petit, Cultural Transformation Director
• Jamie Williams, Head of the Enterprise Portfolio Management Office
• Katharine Williams, Governance and Compliance Manager 

Meeting

1. Updates and culture reflection

The Commons Executive Board noted the following updates:

• Actions arising from its previous meetings and the work of its sub-groups. 
• Restoration and Renewal: Eric Hepburn reported that the last R&R Board meeting had been held on 1 May 2020 and all actions had now been allocated to either Sponsor Body or House. There was a need for a unified voice for the House Service, and it was proposed to create a new group for those strategic steers, combining Eric’s role as SRO with the role of the Joint Working Group. The Sponsor Body and Delivery Authority Chief Executives were holding a strategic review to confirm the aims of R&R. Some output was expected in July and would then be taken to Commission in September.
• Third recommendation of the Cox Report: Sarah Davies reported that the Commission had agreed an independent panel of experts should be appointed to decide complaints against MPs. The panel would not include a former MP. It would need to be in place by October 2020. Sarah would be involved in the recruitment of panel members, with others, to be determined. Expertise sought would include strong experience in the administration of justice and applying and interpreting rules and standards. The aim was for people to be confident in the robustness and independence of the panel, so that there would be acceptance of its outcomes.
• Commons Executive Board meeting schedule: Ian Ailles explained he had shifted to two shorter meetings a month after receiving feedback that the longer monthly meetings did not work for the remote format. There was an increased volume of business, due to COVID-19. He was confident everything on the agenda needed Board attention, but he invited Board members to feed back if they saw unnecessary items. He reminded CEB members to contribute to the Board notebook – look forward / look back – which was used to brief the Leader of the House for business questions. It was also useful to gather and share stories for communication to teams.
• Culture reflection: the Board reflected on culture and behaviour. One MP had behaved poorly but leaders had taken the right steps to deal with this. It was noted that Board members had been challenged by catering colleagues for breaching social distancing rules in the canteen and this was seen as a positive example of teams feeling empowered to speak up. The Board registered its thanks for the excellent work of catering and cleaning teams in very trying circumstances.

2. Forward planning

Ian Ailles noted that following the decision of the Board to investigate options for prioritisation and forward planning, he had established a steering group and an operating group. The latter was chaired by Penny Young. The aim of these groups was to look at the here and now, taking the results of the staff survey, increase our understanding of end to end costings, and provide input to a revised corporate plan. Edge Watchorn continued her work on metrics which were concerned with the longer term. Edge thanked colleagues for their input on metrics. It was hoped that proposals on metrics would be ready by the end of May, to bring to the Domestic Committees and the Commission. Clarity on the Corporate Plan would be needed in early June.

Penny Young reported on the first meeting of the Operating Group. The Group had a large task and wanted to make the most of the data already held – “quick and clean” was the aim. She was glad to have different views on the group. It was important to be in step with the Commission. The group would present options to the Steering Group. It was agreed that Steering Group papers would be shared to CEB.

3. Covid-19

Marianne Cwynarski presented an update on Covid-19. She thanked John Owen and Mandy for their continued work. She noted that Health and Safety had always been key and it would remain so. She consulted PHE regularly, their advice was crucial. On a daily basis the planning group reviewed data about footfall and service use so that teams could respond. A challenge coming up was that Members might now start to return in greater numbers. The contact tracing app would be released the next week.       

Lee Bridges had made up a package for MPs surgeries, to be used when MPs felt ready to reopen their surgeries. It included non-surgical face masks, hand sanitiser and social distancing signage. This would be deployed when agreed.

It was agreed that office-based staff should continue to work from home where possible. It was recognised that as numbers of Members returning to the Estate increased, there would be some increased demand on office-based staff for example those supporting Committees, and in Broadcasting. There was a need for a sustainable staffing model to support the new arrangements, as at present some staff were working extremely long hours. There was also a need to determine the maximum volume of people who could safely work on the Estate and to work out which teams those should be. Board members agreed they would be gatekeepers with regard to their own teams, to ensure that team members only returned to work physically on the Estate if it was necessary. This position would be reviewed by the end of May.

The Board agreed that some recruitment would still be necessary. There would be a “targeted slowdown” in recruitment, with Board level approval required for any recruitment, and there should be every effort made to use spare capacity from other teams first. Some teams were facing increased demand and some specialised roles were also needed.

The group agreed to hold the line of no democratic access until the end of May, informed by the work of the Operating Group.

Marianne confirmed she would return to the CEB at its next meeting for any further steers required. Ian thanked Marianne and her team for all of their continued hard work.

4. Service restriction or adaptation: developing a framework

Sarah Davies introduced the paper. The House Service management had the authority to restrict or adapt the services it provided to individual passholders, including Members, where it judged that their behaviour posed a risk to staff. The paper proposed a draft corporate service statement, principles for how restrictions of service should operate and next steps for developing a framework. Sarah Davies noted this meant asserting the professionalism of the House Service, and the right to take appropriate action when expectations were not met.

Sarah Petit noted that the proposal was not new – in some cases the House already restricted or altered services. The intention was to provide a framework for clarity and consistency in how this was done. Action would be welcomed by staff and the Trade Union Side. The focus of the paper had been on Members, but the framework was intended to apply to all groups of passholders except Parliamentary staff, where the line management chain provided a better option for responding to poor behaviour. It would be considered whether this process could also apply to contractors.

Some very useful feedback had been received and Sarah wanted to highlight two points as a result. These were that decisions to alter or restrict services should be taken at CEB level, and that the relationship between the Behaviour Code and the House’s duty of care to its staff should be clarified as part of the framework. The Board was invited to agree the statement in principle and approve further consultation with the colleagues identified in the paper.

The Board discussed the paper. The risks of having multiple processes were highlighted. The paper was aimed at covering people for whom the House provided a service on an ongoing basis. Having a bicameral approach was key to promote consistency especially for teams serving both Houses. A version of the statement had already been agreed to by the Lords Management Board, and continued alignment would be key.

The Board agreed the proposed statement and principles, subject to the amendments noted. John Benger would present the proposals to the Commission for approval. Sarah Davies thanked Sarah Petit for her work.

5. Portfolio performance report

Projects and programmes having been put on hold as a consequence of Covid-19, there was no report for April 2020; instead the Commons Executive Board noted and discussed a paper to the Joint Investment Board (JIB) on planning in response to Covid-19. There was a risk that Covid-19 would cause all projects to exceed their thresholds. The Board noted that JIB had approved the following: a proposal from the Houses’ Finance Teams for the central coordination of COVID-19-related spend; a proposal that the focus of the next MTIP should be 2021/22 only and the review of MTIP would start later in the year from October 2020; and that a portfolio reprioritisation exercise would take place over the summer to cover 18 months from October 2020, more detailed plans for which would be presented to JIB in June for agreement. The reprioritisation exercise would take account of Covid-19, new strategies and strategic measures, digital transformation and other developments and would be an opportunity to review decisions made at pace in the immediate response to Covid-19. The Board was also given assurance that checkpoints were in place to verify that the various boards and workstreams were staying aligned and that the right balance was struck between the prioritisation of business as usual work and transformation, particularly given the dependence on digital.

6. Quarterly performance dashboards

The Commons Executive Board noted and discussed the quarterly report, which highlighted operational KPIs by exception. Specifically the Board noted that the number of incomplete business plan actions was disappointing; the main reasons were digital prioritisation and the actions being too numerous and too ambitious. This highlighted the need to be more realistic in future. The Board agreed that the uncompleted actions from last year’s business plan should be considered as part of the reprioritisation exercise but would not necessarily be taken forward. The Board also agreed that once the strategic metrics had been agreed a decision could be taken on what to share with teams and the approach to doing so. The Board thanked Jane Hough and colleagues for their work.

7. Financial monitoring report

The Commons Executive Board noted and discussed the high-level P12 report, specifically the provisional final outturns for Resource and Capital, the risks that materialised and those that did not and the implications in future years.

8. Safeguarding report

The Commons Executive Board noted the report and commented that it seemed odd that some visitor-facing teams had reported relatively few or no incidents. The Board agreed that the Managing Directors of these teams would discuss with the Chair of the Safeguarding Board whether this indicated a problem (such as inadequate training or obstacles to reporting) and agree next steps.

9. Safety report

The Commons Executive Board noted the quarterly report.

10. UK Parliament Now

The Commons Executive Board noted that the beta version of the virtual annunciator, UK Parliament Now, would be launched shortly and thanked the teams involved.

11. Culture reflection

The Commons Executive Board reflected on its performance as a board over the course of the meeting.