Archives for April 2017

Another election!

April 28, 2017 by Martin Leave a Comment

I returned from a week’s annual leave to discover we’ll now be running two elections within five weeks following the announcement of a general election on June 8. I have mentioned previously that unless you are involved in the process you have no idea of the volume of work that’s required to run an election. The prospect of a general election was a bit of a shock for the elections team who are currently up to their necks opening postal votes and making all the necessary arrangements for the council elections on May 4. Despite a few technical hiccoughs they’ve made excellent progress and will be working over the bank holiday. Thanks to all of them who’ll probably be sick of the sight of me before too long!

Another point I have made in previous blogs is to ask that you exercise your democratic right and cast your vote next week.

Digital progress

This week the Corporate Management Team discussed the progress made in our aspirations to become a digital business by 2020. Sarah Caulkin, Chief Transformation Officer, presented the report which covered the four strategic layers that underpin our work People Communities and Businesses, Organisation and delivery, Platforms and interfaces and Infrastructure and technology.
We reviewed the excellent progress made since we brought the ICT service back in-house and agreed the priorities to recommend to Cabinet for the coming year. Thanks to all the staff involved in this.

High 5 launch

On Wednesday we launched the High 5 awards at Dylan Thomas School. The head teacher Rob Phillips agreed to host the event and the school hall was packed with pupils who gave us a fantastic welcome.

The plan had been for Leon Britton from Swansea City FC and me to announce the opening of the nominations process. Five minutes before we were due to start we got the message that Leon was unable to attend so we had to change the arrangements. The Lord Mayor attended and we were nearly decapitated when Cyril the Swan menacingly launched a football with a ferocious volley that flew over our heads. Other than that the event went very smoothly!

Curtis Cana, a former pupil of Dylan Thomas School and previous High 5 winner took to the stage and explained what the award meant to him. Curtis is now a youth worker with our Poverty & Prevention service and he gave a great speech in front of a huge number of people. Good job Curtis!

This year’s awards promise to be the biggest and best yet as the team led by Mark Gosney who do such a great job organising the event have secured more sponsors and developed a number of innovative ideas to improve it. Thanks to everyone involved in the launch. Keep those nominations coming in and give those of us on the judging panel a big job of work to do.

Appointments

This week Nigel Williams and Geoff Bacon have been appointed to the posts of interim Head of Corporate Building Services and interim Head of Property respectively, following interviews. Congratulations to them both.

Regeneration

On Monday evening I spoke at the Built Environment Network, along with representatives from Swansea Bay Tidal lagoon and the University of Wales, Trinity St David. It was to raise the profile of regeneration projects to the architects, planners, engineers and surveyors. The presentations were followed by a Q&A session which focussed on connectivity, the need for more residential development and the challenges of procurement. Those in attendance had travelled from all over the UK to attend the event and it’s clear that the development activity in Swansea is generating a lot of interest across the UK.

Sad news

I was deeply saddened to hear that Terry Whomsley, who many of you will know, passed away this week. Terry and I worked together for many years. He was a highly valued and well respected member of our ICT team. I lost count of the number of times he sorted out complex and difficult technical issues that have faced us, and me in particular. He was a true public servant, dedicated and professional throughout his career. His loss has hit everyone who worked with him very hard and our thoughts go out to his family and friends.

Congratulations and thanks

Well done to staff involved in the organisation of the Clean Air Roadshow in Castle Square last Saturday, showcasing electric and hydrogen vehicle technology to 6,000 visitors. We’ve already got electric vehicles in our fleet and more electric cars will be arriving to cut our costs and our carbon footprint.

Thanks to Tracey McNulty and her team in Cultural Services for all their work on the UK City of Culture 2021 bid, being submitted today. If we win the status, it will celebrate our rich culture through a world class programme of events.

Staff in Events are celebrating after the Admiral Swansea Bay 10k won two awards at the UK Running Awards 2017. The event won silver for best 10k in the UK and gold for the UK’s best child-friendly event of its kind.

Congratulations to David Walker who has clocked up 40 years’ service with us. He spent 10 years with Parks before becoming a HGV driver at the Bailing Plant.

This is a magnificent achievement and I’d like to thank David for his outstanding service.

Innovation – our next steps

April 13, 2017 by Martin Leave a Comment

Where next for Innovation?

Following the departure of Leanne Cutts we’ve been reviewing the innovation programme and I’ve spoken to a large number of people about how we take this forward in the future. I’ve always been of the view that this programme should be undertaken by staff and for staff in a way which makes the Council a better and more effective workplace, as well as a forum for innovative consideration of thorny or wicked issues. It has produced some great ideas and improved the organisation. We’re proceeding with the recruitment of the post of Corporate Innovation Officer and I’ll be meeting with the Innovation Community to let them know my thoughts on the future direction of the work following the feedback session a couple of weeks ago.

Agile Working

Sticking with innovation, we’ve opened our pilot agile office on the second floor of the Civic Centre, with facilities and estates being the first to give it a try. During the next couple of months we‘ll be working through the second floor west wing with phases 2 and 3 of the new office accommodation. During this time more staff will be changing from a traditional office environment to agile working . The information and business change, communities first and financial strategy teams will be the next to move on April 24. Over 80% of the old furniture and almost 50% of the carpet tiles used in the new space were up-cycled, following refurbishment by two local social enterprise companies. There’ll be plenty of information for those staff moving to agile, but in the meantime please speak to your manager if you have any questions.

Appraisal

On Tuesday the Chief Executive’s Appraisal and Remuneration Committee met to consider my appraisal for 2016/17 and to agree my objectives up to October 2017. This is a cross-party committee of members and their task is to determine whether I’ve delivered the commitments I gave to the Appointments Committee and to Council when I took up post last year. These objectives are obviously not the only things I do on a daily basis, but they are the priorities for my personal focus. In reality whether or not they’re achieved is down to you and where we have success it is a reflection of your hard work as much as mine. My objectives between now and September were set by the committee and can be found here.

Elections

On Monday I attended the briefing of candidates and agents for the local government elections on May 4. Huw Evans, our Head of Democratic Services, set out the expectations of candidates and agents during the campaign and also explained the arrangements for the count at the Brangwyn Hall. There’s a huge amount of work taking place so thanks to the elections team as well as the officers in special events and highways who are helping with the logistics for the count. All 72 seats in the City and County are being contested and we have 230 candidates in all. This compares with 232 in the 2012 elections. The list of nominations can be found here.

We also have elections at three Community and Town Councils – Gorseinon, Mumbles and Penrice – with 239 candidates.

City of Culture

On Monday I travelled with the Leader, Tracey McNulty and Councillor Robert Francis-Davies to meet Ken Skates, Deputy Minister for Culture, Sport and Tourism at the Welsh Government. We discussed our forthcoming bid to become UK City of Culture 2021 and it was clear that we will get support from Welsh Government if we are shortlisted. Having been involved in the 2017 bid, I know that there’s a long haul ahead, hopefully culminating in a presentation to the Independent Advisory Panel chaired by Grange Hill, Brookside and Hollyoaks creator, Phil Redmond.

Tracey and the team are working hard to make sure we submit the best case to the DCMS City of Culture Team in London by the end of this month. I sent her this photo from the cellar of the Coach House, Wind Street, in 1979 to prove my life-long commitment to culture and she has promised to use me as a case study. Yes, that’s me on the right!

During staff engagement events I’ve been amazed by the extent of the musical and artistic talent in the organisation which may be a hidden, untapped resource for the City of Culture bid.

Vibrant & Viable Places

On Wednesday I met Owen Evans, Deputy Permanent Secretary for Education and Public Services at the Welsh Government. Owen came to Swansea to see the excellent work we’re doing under the Vibrant and Viable Places (V&VP) scheme.

The V&VP programme in Swansea has seen £11.5 million of investment in the Kingsway, Sandfields Housing Renewal Area, Homes Above Retail Premises, High Street regeneration, the Vetch housing development, and property enhancement grants. Owen had come to see for himself the major impact this funding has had in the city and hopefully there’ll be more to come in future. We set out the case for continued funding and explained how we maximised its benefit through programmes like Beyond Bricks and Mortar. Our regeneration, housing and highways teams have pulled out all the stops to deliver these schemes, soaking up underspends from other less efficient councils to supplement our programme. I’m grateful for their efforts.

Farewell

Next week Khan Prince is leaving us for a post in ABMU. Khan started with us as a Safe Routes to Schools Project Officer in October 2005 and moved to the post of Training Officer within the Corporate Training & Development Team in September 2007. Since July 2011 he’s been our Senior Organisational Development Officer. Maureen Rees, who works with Khan as a training officer, is also retiring after more than 30 years of service. I can remember Maureen starting at the Townhill District Housing Office in 1996 and her appointment as Housing Training Officer in 2004. I wish Khan and Maureen all the best for the future.

And retiring today is Paul Henwood, the Education Department’s Child Protection and Safeguarding Officer. Paul is one of those unique people who has visited every school in Swansea delivering vital safeguarding to staff and governors. He’s gained a much-deserved reputation for professionalism, calmness and being a source of information and wisdom for our department and our schools. We wish him well.

Congratulations

Legal Services have once again had a positive report from Lexcel –the Law Society’s legal practice quality mark for excellence in legal practice management and excellence in client care. There was a huge amount of hard work put into the assessment. Well done to everyone in the service, and particular thanks to Viv Rees and her team who were interviewed by the assessor.

Well done to staff at Swansea Grand Theatre, with the attraction being shortlisted in the Excellence in Arts and Entertainment category of the Action on Hearing Loss Cymru’s Excellence Wales Awards 2017. The winners will be announced at an event in Cardiff on May 5. The Grand Theatre has also been entered into the People’s Choice Award category, which will be voted for by the public. To vote go here: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/excellencewales.

Happy Easter

I hope you all have a great Easter bank holiday weekend and thank you to all those staff who’ll be working. There’ll be no blog next week as I will be on annual leave. My next blog will be on April 28.

Coming up trumps

April 6, 2017 by Martin Leave a Comment

Awards

We came up trumps again this week at another UK awards event which highlights the great work our staff are doing. We won the gold award at the iESE (Improvement and Efficiency South East) awards for our Transformation in Waste & Environment submission. The award was for our Household Waste Recycling Centre initiative which is fantastic recognition for the success of the project. Congratulations to staff in waste management and colleagues in parks and cleansing, communications, highways, housing, and the call centre who all contributed.

We also gained the bronze award for Transformation through Support Services, for implementing the ICT Service Desk and self-service portal which achieved improved efficiency, better demand management and reduced cost. The whole Digital Services team were involved in ensuring it was scoped and delivered on time, and I’d like to thank everyone for their hard work.

There were 157 entries and we were the only Welsh council shortlisted in both categories, which is a fantastic achievement.

Great services, great staff

Here are four examples of how our staff are making such a huge difference. After winning an award for a film they made, our Children’s Rights and Participation Group, which is made up of looked-after children and youngsters who have experienced care, is to receive a Diana Award. The Diana Awards are presented to courageous, caring and compassionate young people for transforming the lives of others in the name of Diana, Princess of Wales. I’m sure colleagues in Child and Family Services and Education are especially proud and they too deserve credit for this fantastic achievement.

Another initiative gaining recognition is the council-led domestic abuse hub. The BBC recently featured the story of a Swansea couple who survived domestic abuse with the help of this pilot project, which follows a Sustainable Swansea commissioning review. It’ll be the first of its kind in Wales. Here’s the BBC story: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-39450276

The refurbishment of the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery has been highlighted by Constructing Excellence in Wales as an example of best practice. It was one of a number of projects to participate in the Enabling Zero Waste initiative, with Construction Excellence in Wales providing technical advice and guidance on waste management. Figures show 82.9% of its waste was recycled, 12.1% was converted into energy and 1.8% was either prevented or re-used.

Our Car Parking Services team and Commercial Services have successfully promoted car parking for local businesses. As a result, our High Street multi-storey car park, which has historically been underutilised, now accommodates over 300 Virgin Atlantic and TUI Group employees. Similarly, our Strand car park now accommodates 283 BT employees.

Our New CRM system

The new Customer Relationship Management System (CRM) for managing customer contact went live on March 30. It’s a massive improvement on the one previously hosted by Cardiff Council which has been in place for 10 years. It’s also enabled £70,000 worth of savings to be made. This cloud-hosted system is faster and more robust, which enables our Contact Centre floorwalkers to access data from tablet PCs and mobile phones so they can triage customers during high demand.

I’m really impressed it’s been built in-house using one of the new digital platforms. Our Communications team are also using the social engagement module to monitor traffic around the UK City of Culture 2017 bid. More developments will grow across the Council now the new platform is live.

I’d like to send special thanks to Rayna Soproniuk from digital services and Delyth Evans and Michelle Regan from the Contact Centre, who all worked incredibly hard to get the system in on time.

Discussions with Cardiff

This week I met Paul Orders, Chief Executive at Cardiff Council, to discuss a range of issues including the respective City Deals and how the two cities in Wales can co-operate in the future. Despite my undying love for Swansea City FC, I enjoy visiting Cardiff and it was interesting to hear the forthcoming proposals for the continued regeneration of our capital city. Paul and I have had a number of meetings along with Will Godfrey, Chief Executive at Newport Council, mainly about how the three cities can help to reinvigorate the Welsh economy. Different councils have different strengths and co-operation between us is an excellent way to improve services and learn from others. The challenges facing Cardiff and Swansea are very similar and I explained our approach to transformation through Sustainable Swansea. We identified a number of areas where we can collaborate and I’ll be discussing these with councillors.

School visits

Last Friday I visited Penyrheol Primary School for a meeting of the school council and pupil representatives. It was interesting to hear the numerous activities taking place in the school, and great to see how the investment in new ICT kit there is paying dividends.

The council voted on which charities the school would support and decided that Water Aid and protecting dolphins were their priorities. They’re also collecting for the local food bank. I had a quick tour of the brightly-coloured classrooms. Penyrheol pupils are among the most welcoming and happy young people I‘ve met in schools, so thanks to head teacher Alison Williams, the staff and all the children for looking after me.

On Tuesday I dropped in to see Jamie Richards, Head Teacher at Cadle Primary School. We had an interesting conversation which reinforced my thinking about the need to undertake a cross-cutting commissioning review of services for children and young people. He explained many of the challenges of joint working and I hope he’ll contribute to our thinking on how we can better co-ordinate a whole council approach in future. The pupils were more interested in hearing about the forthcoming airshow than our plans for the city centre or lagoon. Thanks to Jamie, the staff and pupils for a brief but enjoyable visit.

As usual I took the opportunity to have a brief look round the neighbouring community and was pleased to see progress being made in improving the environment and housing in Fforesthall, Cadle and Portmead.

Spring has arrived

It feels like winter is officially over now that floral displays are emerging across our city thanks to the fantastic work done by our teams in parks. It makes a huge difference and I’m grateful to everyone involved.

Clean-up

Well done to staff in our cleansing team who joined local PCSOs in a joint day of litter-picking and clean-up action in Mount Pleasant. It’s an excellent example of how joint-working with other organisations in the city can benefit local communities.