Apologies were received from Dr Sam Everington, Councillor Candida Ronald, and Amy Gibbs. Apologies for lateness were received from Councillor Danny Hassell.

To confirm as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Tower Hamlets Health and Wellbeing Board held on 13 May 2019. To also consider the Board’s Action Log and matters arising.

It was noted that there was a spelling error on page one of the minutes, Dr Paul Gilluley’s name was misspelled as ‘Guilley’. The minutes were approved subject to the above amendment.

RESOLVED:

1.    To approve the minutes of the meeting held on 13 May 2019.

To note any declarations of interest made by members of the Board. (See attached note of Monitoring Officer).

There were no declarations of pecuniary interests.

To note agenda items for upcoming meetings.

The Forward Plan was noted. There were requests to include additional items to the 17 September 2019 meeting. These included:

·         SEND inspection update.

·         NHS Long Term Plan

·         Better Care Fund

The Chair agreed to the additional items.

RESOLVED:

1.    To note the Forward Plan.

To note the Health and Wellbeing Board Terms of Reference for 2019/20.

REPORT TO FOLLOW – reason for delay: Due to an IT failure affecting parts of the Council’s infrastructure the report was unable to complete an internal clearance process and was therefore omitted from publication.  The report must be noted at the 16 July 2019 meeting because committees are expected to review their terms of reference at the first meeting of a new municipal year.

RESOLVED:

1.    To note the Board’s Terms of Reference.

This will be an Interactive Workshop titled "What Would You Do?" to help inform the Tower Hamlets Health and Wellbeing Strategy. Facilitated by Healthwatch Members – Dianne Barham (Director Healthwatch) and Randal Smith (Chair Healthwatch).

5.20-5.50pm (30 minutes) 

The Board took part in an interactive activity called ‘what would you do’ led by Dianne Barham (Director of Healthwatch Tower Hamlets). This was the same exercise Healthwatch had delivered at locality events where they engaged 346 residents to find out what helped or hindered their health and wellbeing. The activity aimed to find out whether the views of the Board aligned with those of residents. The Board were asked three questions. These were:

• What are the things that help or get in the way of leading a healthy life?
• What do residents want from their local health centres?
• To what extent are the ‘I statements’ true for you?

The Chair said the Healthwatch report provided great insight into what mattered to residents around their health and wellbeing and would be used to inform the new Health and Wellbeing Strategy.

Before the session closed Randal Smith (Chair of Healthwatch Tower Hamlets) updated the Board of upcoming Healthwatch projects. One of these included the Young Influencers Programme which aimed to get the views of five hundred young people on how healthcare should be designed for young people.

Another Healthwatch priority was transport. Research was being conducted to understand how difficult or easy it was to travel to health services. The findings would inform the Transport Strategy.

The Chair thanked Randal Smith and Dianne Barham for their contributions.

ACTION:

1.  For Dianne Barham to share the write up from the exercise with the Board.

RESOLVED:

1. To note the Healthwatch report to help inform the Health and Wellbeing Strategy priorities.

To be presented by Tracy Stanley, Strategy and Policy Officer, Children and Culture.

5.50-6.20pm (30 minutes)

The Chair agreed with the Board to take the items ‘A Physical Activity and Sports Strategy’ and ‘Addressing Childhood Obesity’ together.

Katy Scammell (Associate Director of Public Health) and Lisa Pottinger (Head of Physical Activity and Sports Strategy) introduced the items. The Board then heard comments from a Teacher, Parent and the Deputy Young Mayor for Health and Wellbeing regarding barriers to better health.

Presenters emphasised that physical activity was important in the modern sedentary world, in the context of decreasing levels of physical activity.

Katy Scammell, Associate Director of Public Health, summarised her work on childhood obesity.

She said childhood obesity was a key area in the Health and Wellbeing Strategy and for the first time rates of childhood obesity for reception aged children had decreased to match London wide levels. The Year 6 group, however, was still experiencing high rates of childhood obesity. She said Public Health had commissioned some community insight work to find the local perspective on what was working well and what was working less well. The result was the production of the logic models presented in the report.

The logic models were outcome based. They aimed for every child to be a healthy weight and for children to be engaged in healthy physical activity.

Three actions were identified to support the work:

1.     The first action considered what could be done at the environmental level. There were suggestions to improve the public realm and promote cycling.

2.     The second action considered making settings healthier at children’s centres and schools. This included healthier school meals.

3.     The third action was to find out whether services met people’s needs, whether they were joined up, if they were the right services and whether people knew about them.

The first phase of the Physical Activity Strategy consultation identified four key priorities. These included:

1. Driving health change and engaging with people in sport.
2. Shaping places and communities – making leisure centres more accessible, creating outdoor gyms and other healthy spaces.
3. Physical activity as a community engagement tool in order to improve health and reduce anti-social behaviour.
4. Developing young interest in sport activity to improve rates of childhood obesity.

Barriers to better health

Vivian Akinremi Deputy Young Mayor for Health and Wellbeing identified the following barriers to better health. She said:

• young people did not feel safe when using the parks and public spaces.
• there was a disparity in resources for sports activity between schools, this affected young people because they lacked the opportunity to compete.
• There was a lack of affordable healthy food in Tower Hamlets. Healthier food was expensive in comparison to fried chicken. There was also a link between unhealthy food and mental health such as comfort eating.
• There was a need for a counsellor in every school.

Martin Smith, PE Teacher Stepney Green Secondary School, was of the view that children were leaving secondary school less healthy than at the start. He identified the following as barriers to better health:

• Students were experiencing high academic pressure  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.

Presented by Katy Scammell – Associate Director of Public Health.

6.20-6.50pm (30 mins)

This item was discussed above.

To consider any other business at the Chair’s discretion.

6.50-7.00pm (10 minutes)

There was no other business.

Tuesday 17 September 2019, 5pm.