Agenda item

A report was considered that provided an update on the IT systems issues that had been experienced by Members since May 2019 and presented an outline plan for reducing the impact of future issues.

In introducing the report, both the lead Executive Member and lead officer apologised to Members for the inconvenience that they had experienced with their IT devices.  Whilst it was no excuse, there were a number of challenges and complexities around providing IT support to a diverse range of Council services.

The lead Member also wished to remind her colleagues of the ability for IT officers to remotely access their devices without the need to make a visit to the Council offices and her intention for a quarterly update report to be presented to the Panel to enable for performance to be regularly monitored.  Finally, the Member also highlighted that an ‘IT Resilience’ report was to be presented to the next Panel meeting on 11 July 2019.

During the ensuing discussion, the following points were raised:-

(a)   A number of Members paid tribute to the support that was being provided by the Member IT Officer and the Panel welcomed the news that his contract had recently been extended;

(b)   Whilst the issues had been very frustrating, the Panel felt that the regular communication from officers had in part mitigated the levels of impact and disruption experienced by Members;

(c)    A Member had given advanced notice of the following question:

‘What research, if any, was carried out before the purchase of the new Surface Go tablets into the likelihood of the small size of the type being displayed causing eye strain if the device is used for any length of time? Also what research, if any, was done on the suitability of the smaller keyboard for use for writing longer documents, especially for those with ageing or arthritic fingers?’

In response, the lead Member informed that the Surface Go devices were rigorously tested during the previous Council and this was not identified as being an issue during the trial.  However, the importance of Members having a positive experience with their IT devices was recognised and if any Members were experiencing such issues, then they were encouraged to speak to her and/or the Head of Practice for IT outside of this meeting;

(d)   With regard to communicating with IT officers out of normal office hours, it was confirmed that consideration had been given to this option.  However, it had been concluded that the cost of providing out of hours IT support was very expensive and currently deemed unaffordable;

(e)   The benefits of all Members having the ‘Blackberry Client’ application installed on their mobile phones to enable them to access their Council emails was emphasised by a number of Members.

It was then:

RESOLVED

That the Panel:

1.     request that the IT Head of Practice consider the best methods and frequency for communicating system outages and resolution times to Members;

2.     ask that the IT Head of Practice note the concerns raised by Members and ensure that these are highlighted in the IT Resilience report that is to be presented to the Panel meeting on 11 July 2019; and

3.     encourage all Members to have the ‘Blackberry Client’ application installed on their mobile phones.