Update on our high rise blocks
This week we continued our work on tenant reassurance at our high rise blocks. It’s been a difficult week, starting on Saturday morning when I received notification that four blocks had failed the UK Government tests. By mid-morning on Sunday our magnificent staff had implemented all the required measures and more and the Housing team had delivered reassurance messages to all 672 tenants. This was a massive piece of work and I’m indebted to staff in Housing, Corporate Building and Communications for their brilliant response.
Four of our high-rise buildings – three at Clyne Court and Jeffreys Court – contain Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) and were tested at the request of the Welsh Government. Our other seven sites have not been tested because they do not contain ACM. The tests failed and we’ve been seeking further advice from the Welsh and UK Governments. So far all cladding tested from buildings in England and Wales have failed the tests.
However, we were advised on Tuesday that additional tests on the full system that we’ve been asking for over the last fortnight had been carried out by BRE on panels that are identical to the ones used in Swansea.
These additional tests – known as BR 135 – confirm the panels are fully compliant with building regulations. This provides further reassurance to tenants about the safety of their homes because it confirms the cladding will not contribute to the spread of a fire should there be one.
We’ve communicated this to our tenants and we’ve shared the information with Welsh Government as we hope they’ll confirm our understanding of the situation as soon as possible in order that tenants are fully reassured.
And yesterday there were more developments. Firstly, the Welsh Government requested a review of school buildings before the end of term. And then the UK Government finally announced new testing of the entire cladding system – something we’ve requested for the past two weeks.
Leadership Team
At Leadership Team Directors and Heads of Service considered ways of increasing the number of staff who reply to our annual staff survey. This’ll be the fourth year we’ve done the survey and we want as many staff as possible to complete it. We have to use different methods to reach different staff, especially those who don’t have access to IT in work. If you have any ideas please let me know.
We also had a demo of the new contact portal that we’ll be introducing to our switchboard. Staff can use voice-activation when using the switchboard from September and then we’ll roll it out for the public. Other councils and organisations use it successfully and with more than 20,000 calls into our switchboard every month this should help make us more efficient in dealing with staff and customer calls.
Poverty Forum
Reducing poverty is one of the five corporate objectives and we can use our power as an employer, developer, landlord and investor to achieve this. Opportunities like Welsh Housing Quality Standard, City Deal and tidal lagoon don’t come round every day so we must exploit them to the full.
This week I chaired a meeting of the Poverty Forum Network, an internal officer group, to take stock on where we are, think about how we will monitor progress and agree some key projects to work on.
The recently revised poverty strategy and delivery plan and scrutiny work makes this the right time to reignite the corporate approach through the poverty forum and I’m going to put my personal time and commitment into this and I’d like all staff to do the same.
Congratulations and thanks
The Wales Airshow last weekend was the best yet with 250,000 people enjoying the event. We owe a huge vote of thanks to all those involved in the logistics of this event. Our traffic team managed the required road closures, the special events team were a model of efficiency as were all the staff and volunteers who helped with running the event and clearing up afterwards. The Council even got a round of applause at the end! I’m very proud of all who contributed because it is a massive challenge to deliver this event. Well done all.
I’m delighted the city centre has retained its prestigious Purple Flag status. It was first awarded the status in 2015 in recognition of the excellence of its evening and night-time economy.
Rhys Harries in our Trading Standards Team received the Special Individual Achievement Award at the Anti-Counterfeiting Group (ACG) Awards. Rhys was instrumental in an investigation that resulted in £1 million of counterfeit goods being seized.
Events
Following on from the Airshow, there’s a lot happening in the next few weeks. The Soapbox Science returns to the city centre on Saturday to promote cutting edge research and encourage children to take an interest in science, technology, engineering, maths and medicine (STEMM) subjects.
On Sunday the ‘Eid in the Park’ event is being hosted by Swansea University in Abbey Meadow on the Singleton Campus from 11.30am to 4.30pm. It’s a great family event.
Swansea’s International Dance Festival, Dance Days, also returns this weekend with a mix of free dance performance for everyone.
And the annual Swansea Beach Soccer Festival returns to Swansea Bay on Saturday, July 8 to promote sport and the area as a hub for sport and activity.
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