Decision details

To seek the Lead Member’s s approval to revise the payment arrangements to Borough and District Councils in respect of the activities they are undertaking to support the Homes for Ukraine scheme in East Sussex.

6.1 The Lead Member considered a report by the Director of Adult Social Care to revise the payment arrangements to Borough and District Councils in respect of the activities they are undertaking to support the Homes for Ukraine scheme in East Sussex.

6.2 The Lead Member RESOLVED to:

1)  agree to continuing to pay District and Borough Councils for ‘host’ payments under the ‘Homes for Ukraine’ scheme upon receipt of an invoice;

2)  agree to continuing to pay District and Borough Councils for ‘guest’ payments under the ‘Homes for Ukraine’ scheme upon receipt of an invoice;

3)  approve upfront grant funding being provided to each of the District and Borough Councils, with the amount of each grant calculated in accordance with paragraph 2.7 of this report;

4)  delegate authority to the Director of Adult Social Care to agree the terms of the grant agreements and to take all other steps necessary to implement the recommendations in this report.

Reasons

6.3 District and Borough Councils are incurring cost due to administering payment systems to hosts and guests, managing homelessness cases and supporting rematching.

6.4 Significant delays have been experienced in setting up payments systems due to a lack of capacity and resilience within their staffing model.

6.5 Workload is increasing, and it is anticipated will continue to increase, given the current issues with relationship breakdown, rematching activity and homelessness applications. In order to be able to respond in a timely way moving forward, it is vital that the Borough and District Councils have the necessary capacity required to fulfil their part of the whole system response.