Your responses to the recent staff survey will be published next week and I’m really pleased with the results. Overall, 1,441 staff took part in the individual survey, and 1,011 staff took part in 117 team discussions. It was the first time we used team feedback as well as their usual individual responses, and it’s given us a lot of information which we’re now reflecting on before developing a plan responding to the issues you raised. Some of the headline results show the vast majority of staff have regular team meetings and they feel informed about what’s going on at the council. High levels of staff also say they have opportunities to get involved in discussions and to put forward suggestions. There’s lots more information which we’ll publish shortly so that you can see the results in full and we will also be discussing the results at next week’s senior managers group and then we’ll consider how to act upon your views. I’m really pleased with the number of staff who took part and I think the idea of using team meetings to gather feedback has worked well. As always, the results vary across some areas which we’ll also be exploring how we can further improve engagement for staff and sharing service specific results shortly. Thank you to everyone who took part, and I want to confirm that we will act on the findings so hopefully you’ll see the benefits when we come to address the key issues raised.
One of the other ways we’re supporting staff is through our digital services and development. This week CMT had an update on our digital programme and it’s good to see how we’re using technology to help staff work more efficiently. What came through is the huge demand for digital services in our day-to-day work and in developing new ways of providing services. Although digital development isn’t cheap, it can also help us save money and ensure our services are more efficient at a time of tightening budgets. We will be discussing the work with our cabinet and leadership teams shortly. Thank you to our digital team for the work they’re doing to support us.
I’m really pleased with our performance across our services which is down to the huge efforts of staff. This week we discussed the draft report on our annual review of performance which reflects on how well we’re doing in delivering our six wellbeing objectives. It shows we’re making really good progress and despite some huge challenges, there’s some excellent work going on in our priority areas. The report will go through the usual democratic meetings before being published later this year. Thank you to everyone for all your efforts.
Today I’m at one of our climate change events bringing together a wide variety of organisations, communities, residents and businesses from across Swansea. The aim is to get people’s views on how to tackle climate change in their local area. Resilient Swansea, launched by the Swansea Climate Signatories Group, is being run in collaboration with the Swansea PSB. Climate change is among the council’s six wellbeing priorities so it’ll be good to hear views and ideas.
For staff using public transport you probably have views on the quality of local bus and train services. Yesterday we were at a regional meeting where Transport for Wales updated us on the latest proposals for bus franchising. The current services are commercially-driven which often means some less-used routes often face cuts. Franchising allows us to run a more equal service, plugging gaps whilst also leading to improved control in providing more reliable and cost-effective services. It also helps with our ambitions to make the city centre a more thriving and vibrant place during the day and night-time, and supporting our events and tourism by ensuring buses run later into the night.
I’m delighted to see the Government support for Tata at Port Talbot. It’s one of the region’s landmark employers and affects so many people and businesses here in Swansea. Losing Tata would have been a major blow so hopefully, this investment will help secure its future for the region and continue to boost the local economy.
Congratulations to Isaac Fabb one of our apprentices who picked up the Skills for Work Awards at Gower College.
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