Chief Exec's Blog

An update from the Chief Executive

Good news about Phil and Nick

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I’m delighted to give you some positive news on both Phil Roberts and our Education Director, Nick Williams.

Nick has been on sickness absence for a number of months and he’s now in a position to return to work on a phased basis in early May. I’m grateful to the staff in education who’ve helped cover for Nick during that period, particularly Mark Sheridan who’s been acting Director.

I met Phil earlier this week to check on his progress and recovery. Typically, Phil insisted on getting an update on a range of work issues rather than talk about his own situation. But, again, I’m delighted to say Phil is making good progress and whilst his return is some weeks away, we obviously look forward to him returning as soon as possible.

Our Pupil Referral Unit has had a positive inspection report from Estyn. The report said the PRU is a caring and inclusive community where nearly all young people who attend make good progress and nearly all of them go on to college once they leave. This is an extremely important part of our education provision in an area that requires strong leadership, and this pleasing report is a big step along our improvement journey. Congratulations to headteacher Amanda Taylor and her team for all their efforts.

Pentrehafod Comprehensive, recently refurbished

CMT this week discussed the next phase of school building improvements totalling £150m. There’s a strong link between investment in school buildings and educational outcomes, and some of those schools that have recently benefited from investment have seen better outcomes and behaviours. In the past few years we’ve prioritised investment in additional learning needs (ALN) and education other than at school. The latest Band B proposals include investment in a new special school which continues this commitment. I’ve been impressed by the generally good performance of Swansea schools, but it remains the case that pupils receiving free school meals and those with special education needs and ALN perform less well than others so we need to continue prioritising investment in this way.

CMT also discussed a potential restructure to our ALN service to ensure it’s fit for purpose for the next 3-5 years. The plan is subject to consultation with affected staff but it’s designed to help the service meet the changing needs of young people. I look forward to the consultation having clear outcomes so that we can put the restructure in place.

Current entrance to Home Farm

Given our budget pressures the council has been trying to maximise its return from land it owns or holds. We’ve adopted various approaches and a recent report to Cabinet identified a number of sites where we can go to the market to test whether developers are interested. It has to be a balance between getting the right development and getting the best possible financial deal, and it’ll be interesting to see if our approach can achieve this. Of these sites, Home Farm has attracted greatest attention in the media and on social media. It’s a council depot adjacent to Singleton Park, and although it’s caused a public reaction they’ll have an opportunity to give views if a developer comes forward with a planning application. The proposal does not encroach on the parkland which is a very important point.

Another issue making headlines is High Street which the Daily Mail so generously labelled the worst in the UK! This kind of story affects the community, business and the reputation of our city – so thanks a lot Daily Mail. That isn’t to say the area doesn’t have problems, of course it does. Our Deputy Leader, Clive Lloyd, will be leading work across the council and partners to see how we can work together to improve the street environment and make sure vulnerable people and their needs are taken into account.

Thank you again to all those staff who worked over the untypically glorious bank holiday. Many of our vulnerable citizens would not be able to cope without your support and I really appreciate your hard work.

Finally, continuing the theme of Brexit and parallel universes, I was astounded this week that 21 of the 22 chief executives in Wales spent time discussing whether to fly the EU flag on Europe Day on May 9. The worry is that by flying the flag during the current European election period it could be seen as seeking to influence the outcome of the vote. I expect the regional returning officers will determine it won’t be flown on this occasion. But it’s not something I can get too excited about. I feel I’m in a Monty Python sketch at times!

Brexit’s parallel universe

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Mysteriously, I find myself transferred back into the weird parallel universe known commonly as Brexit.  Despite uncertainty surrounding the European elections, large quantities of public cash (not this council’s!) are being committed to preparing for this potential event, which could technically be cancelled anytime up to midnight on the night before.  Should the election go ahead we will need a variety of staff in place and our electoral services team are currently seeking to fill a number of positions, if interested please apply here.

It is also worth noting that we are now in the pre-election period (from 15th April 2019) for this as of yet unconfirmed election!  We need to be careful, as do all public bodies, not to make announcements etc. that may influence the election outcome.  If in doubt, seek the advice of your manager or the legal services section.

Back in the real world I was pleased to see that sentencing took place this week in relation to the call centre scam known as ‘Wolves of Wind Street’ which I covered here previously, a prosecution brought following an investigation by the Trading Standards team.

Many teams in Swansea operate under severe pressure and that is certainly true in relation to our food hygiene service.  So again, I am pleased to hear of their successful prosecutions recently achieved.  Well done to all those involved in this vital work in an area of public protection that does not always get the recognition it deserves.

School budgets are under pressure along with all other areas of public service.  Since returning to the Council I have been pleased to see that school performance has improved or been maintained across the patch over the last few years.  This week the latest inspection results for Townhill Primary were released and confirmed good performance across all criteria.  Well done to all staff and pupils, it was particularly pleasing to note that children are in an environment where they feel both safe and valued.

When times are tough (when were they not?) it is vital that  there is a clear understanding of what management is doing, whether it be the Corporate Management Team (CMT), the leadership team or individual departmental management teams.  CMT this week agreed a revised template setting out the various responsibilities so that we can be clear who is accountable for what.  Anyone interested can access this ‘corporate grip’ report here.

Whilst I am sure budgets and money are not the most inspiring or uplifting subject for many staff, it is vital that the Council both sets and delivers financial targets.  To this end CMT this week compiled and reviewed early options and proposals leading to the next budget round.  These will be refined and discussed with cabinet over the next few weeks. The financial outlook remains challenging.  Any view that the much-hyped end of austerity could transform the position seems to me to be misplaced. If more money feeds through to local Government it is likely to come with strings attached and will not therefore alter the overall position.

Another week, another threat from Neath Port Talbot to withdraw from a regional arrangement, this time the City Deal.  It is of course for them to manage their own business.  All of us working in regional arrangements will be well aware of the conflicts, the contradictions and the sheer hard work that they entail.  So why don’t we just declare the independent state of Swansea and withdraw from them all? 

There are many reasons, the first is philosophical, a belief that we can achieve more by our collective effort.  The second is practical, Welsh Government policy is to push harder on regional working and there will shortly be legislation in place to push the agenda further and faster.  Our task is to find ways to make regional arrangements work to the benefit of our customers, clients and citizens.  We can influence the policy in positive ways but we cannot be seen to undermine it!

I never thought I would see the day when we built Council homes again.  So the start of work at Parc-y-Helyg is an important step, creating local jobs and supporting some of our apprentices.  Well done to all involved in this initiative.

On a similarly positive note, the sun is due to shine over the Easter break, but I offer no guarantees.  I hope all staff who have the opportunity of a break enjoy their time off.  But we should all thank those many staff who will be working to ensure that services to the community continue over the bank holiday.

Staff engagement is essential

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A key to delivering successful services is undoubtedly staff engagement and involvement.

At CMT this week we had a first look at the summary results from the latest staff survey.  The response rate at about 25% seems low to me, but is typical of this type of survey.  A couple of things struck a chord with me from these summary results.  Firstly, there remains a significant number of people who highlight bullying and harassment, despite our adoption of a zero tolerance approach some years ago.  I’d urge people with concerns to raise them with their line manager. Or failing that you can raise concerns with HR, a trade union or a colleague.  I was also concerned to see that around 30% of people reported not knowing about changes that may affect them.  The survey results will be broken down by area and discussed at Leadership Team.  Each Head of Service will need to show how they’re going to act on the issues arising in their area.  Thanks to all who took the time to respond.

The First Minister, Mark Drakeford, has a particular interest in Looked after Children (LAC).  Consequently, he’s set up a Ministerial Advisory Group (MAG) which is tasked with reviewing services for LAC across Wales with a particular emphasis on driving down numbers and cost, whilst maintaining safeguarding as the primary aim.  The MAG visited Swansea this week, the second of the 22 visits it is undertaking.  The visit was to hear what we are doing locally, challenge us and seek to ensure we’re doing the best we can. Dave Howes (Director) and Julie Thomas (Head of Service) led the discussions from a Swansea perspective and were impressive in terms of their knowledge, professionalism and enthusiasm.  They were both totally focussed on delivering the best outcomes for children and were ably supported by their team.

When I was in the authority previously, change, innovation and improvement in these services was driven, to a significant degree, by the intervention we suffered in 2008.  I was massively impressed to see that the level of innovation and change has continued at pace. It is very much driven by the team and their commitment to the task.  There are of course other high performing teams across the Council and it’s important we learn from them all.

On a lighter note, I’d forgotten the extent to which the Guildhall has become a popular film set until I was reminded by Fran Jenkins this week.  Some of you will know that “Dr Who” and “Keeping Faith” have used the venue recently. And Channel 4 will be here again in June.  These events do of course generate income for the Council, but we also seek to minimise disruption for staff. Similarly, thank you to our Countryside Access Team and in particular Steve Parry for assisting with the filming of the BBC series Weatherman Walking which will showcase our coast when it’s aired a week today.

Whilst I was beavering away in CMT on Wednesday the official opening of Pentrehafod Comprehensive School took place.  There are too many people to mention within the Council, at the school and at our contractor partners to mention individuality.  So thanks to all involved. Major investment has and is being made in our schools and we hope the investment helps to deliver the improvement in outcomes for children and young people that we all desire.

When I left the Council in 2016 I was acutely aware of my passing years, since returning I am reminded of it on an almost daily basis!  I joined the City Council in 1989 and met Huw Morgan around that time, some 11 years after he joined the Council.  Huw leaves us this week as he retires.  Huw will be missed not only as a valued colleague and friend but also due to his vast experience and expertise.  He has many talents including expertise in the areas of water quality, contaminated land and health to mention but a few.  He’s particularly contributed to Swansea’s role in public health research and has represented us on many national groups.  I wish Huw well and I’m sure so will all those who have worked with him.

Hub open for your ideas

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I’ve always believed that no one individual has all the good ideas and given the challenges we face as a council we need all our staff coming up with ideas to help us work better and save money.

I’m really pleased to see we’re today launching our new Ideas Hub to replace the former staff suggestion scheme. The hub gives us a new online platform for staff to put forward their ideas. All ideas will go to the relevant Head of Service who can assess the idea with the aim of responding within 10 working days. Although it’s PC-based, it gives the option for those staff without a PC to get their manager to submit an idea on their behalf. Please use the platform as often as you can because the more ideas we have the better. You can even anonymise ideas if you prefer. You can link to the hub here. Thank you to Rhys Curtis for all his work in developing the hub.

Regional working has been a big focus in the past week. Work is now under way on establishing new governance arrangements for the City Deal to ensure this major programme moves forward to the subsequent phases. Steve Thomas, the former chief executive of the Welsh Local Government Association, is helping the region to put in place these arrangements and recruit a managing director, from existing funds, which should remove any conflicts of interest in the current structure. The region’s joint committee has signed-off the business case for stage one of the city centre project and we expect the UK and Welsh governments to fully sign-up in the next few weeks. Towards the end of June Scrutiny and Cabinet will be reviewing and considering the business case to allow the project to proceed.

ERW, our regional education service, this week agreed its working model for the next 12 months. I’d previously said that Neath Port Talbot were pulling out and refusing to pay their contribution, but they’ve now agreed to pay which avoids another financial issue and more importantly allows us to concentrate on delivering better outcomes for children rather than continue the distraction of internal wrangling.

It was important that Corporate Briefing (a meeting of Cabinet Members and CMT) received a report this week to establish a Swansea youth offending team following a very poor inspection report of the existing regional service. We need to get on with this change at pace and have a clear action plan for delivering this. Whilst this change is on-going we also need to support the staff to continue working with clients. The report will now move onto Cabinet.

Leadership team (CMT and Heads of Service) had their monthly meeting and discussed a range of items including staff travel, mandatory training and a new staff benefits scheme. I was particularly interested in the discussion of flexible working. We’ve been running a number of pilots in areas including Corporate Property and HR/OD and we now need to assess the outcomes. Personally, I’m all for flexibility but as we review the pilots we need to develop hard evidence that this approach is in the interests of the employee and the employer. I also want to ensure all areas of our workforce are equitably allowed and encouraged to participate, not just our office-based staff.

Lots of staff have been asking me about Phil’s progress and without going into personal details I’m pleased to say Phil has had the major part of his treatment and is now at home recovering. I’m in quite regular contact with him and I delighted in taking the mickey when Nottingham Forest recently beat his beloved Swans. Phil is really grateful for all your good wishes and, although there’s still some way to go on the road to full recovery, I’m hoping we can see him in the not too distant future.

Many of us will have visited Plantasia over the years and it’s fair to say the council realised it wasn’t reaching its full potential. Officers in Cultural Services have been working in partnership with specialist operator Parkwood to run the attraction. Officers had a tour this week and they were delighted with the new-look attraction. It has a number of new features including tree-top walks, a waterfall and new café. It opens at Easter and can become a major attraction for the city. Thank you to our officers who’ve spend many months working on this.

This week more than 300 free events have been taking place in venues across Swansea as part of our first ever Learning Festival. It’s taken a huge amount of work by our lifelong learning team to organise and coordinate but hundreds of people of all ages have d taken part. Other services delivered free learning opportunities including libraries, archives, museums, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery and adult services. Thank you to our staff involved.

Finally, I refuse to comment on Brexit any further because with each passing day I become more confused. If local government ran its business like Westminster we’d all be in special measures!

Great work

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It’s always important as Chief Executive to be able to highlight the council’s achievements and praise our staff.

Our trading standards team recently did some great work in helping to prosecute four people over a call centre scam. We’ve seen a number of these scams in Swansea which target the elderly and vulnerable. It’s never easy to bring successful prosecutions and it takes an awful lot of hard work from our staff. Thankfully on this occasion their efforts have been rewarded through the courts. It’s also been highlighted on BBC’s X-Ray programme where team leader Rhys Harries was interviewed. It’s not often that our trading standards team are in the spotlight so credit where credit is due. My thanks to the team involved, led by Nicola Murphy, and colleagues in legal.

Some of our Child and Family staff were recognised at this year’s BASW Cymru Social Work Awards. Helen Philpott was shortlisted in the Spirit of Social Work category, Lisa Collier in the Innovative Social Work category (Michelle Apthorpe collected her certificate for her and is pictured here) and the team at our Ty Nant home was shortlisted in the Social Work Team category. This is a great achievement and congratulations to all the staff involved.

Ania Negele, community coach in Cultural Services, has won a Sporting Excellence Award at the Evening Post Community Awards.  Ania was recognised following a successful year as a performance coach with Weightlifting Wales.  She is the first female Olympic Weightlifting Coach to represent Wales at a Commonwealth Games and is also the newly appointed Great Britain U20 Coach. Well done Ania.

A big thank you to two of our tree services staff who’ve been praised for stepping in after a disabled woman had been robbed in her own home. Matt Palmer and Paul Williams were in their council vehicle when they were approached by carer Jane Morgan seeking help in catching-up with the thief. Rather than allow her to go on alone, they made sure Mrs Morgan and her friend were safe.  The thief was later apprehended by police. Mrs Morgan later contacted the council to say how grateful she was for their help and kindness.

A group of our trainees have become the first to complete our inaugural waste management traineeships. They achieved WAMITAB NVQ level 2 in Sustainable Recycling Activities, run in conjunction with Gower College. Well done to everyone involved.

Last night’s Full Council meeting also recognised the recent achievements of some of our staff. Congratualtions went to Darran Kiley for being shortlisted for a St David’s Award for his bravery after he stepped in to confront a man armed with a knife in the city centre. Also recognised was the Corporate Health, Safety and Emergency Management Service who were shortlisted for a National Innovation Award in Health and Safety. There were congratulations too to the apprentices who picked up prizes at the Gower College Swansea Apprenticeship Awards. The council also collected the Apprenticeship Employer of the Year (250+ Employers). 

These are just some examples of the great work of our staff, if you know of any more please let me know.

On a less positive note you may have seen yesterday’s story about the regional Youth Offending Team being criticised following an inspection. It’s a disappointing report highlighting failings including management, governance, strategy and performance management. It’s important to stress this doesn’t reflect on individual staff who work extremely hard in very difficult circumstances. The regional arrangement covering Bridgend, Neath Port Talbot and Swansea, including ABMU health board, is ending and each authority will in future go back to providing its own service. This will undoubtedly help to focus efforts, but that in itself is not the full solution. When we fully analyse the report we’ll have to put in place arrangements and actions to rectify the findings as quickly as practicable and this will be a major focus in the coming months.

As noted above, last night I attended my first Council meeting since returning. The last time I attended I was kindly presented with a Nottingham Forest shirt as a leaving gift and left with a smile. Last night was slightly different! However, there were lots of familiar faces on the political benches and although the agenda was relatively light compared to recent meetings where issues like the budget have dominated, I was particularly interested in the presentation by Save the Children who we’ll continue to work closely with.

Finally, the mess around Brexit continues and, whatever your personal view, I’m sure you’ll agree we all need clarity as soon as possible. As a council we’re continuing to prepare for the unknown. An example of this is we don’t even know if we’ll be taking part in the European elections on May 23. A huge amount of work has to go into elections, but how far down that road do you go when it may not even happen? This is just one example and the issues facing the public and business sectors are huge, so the sooner they sort it the better for all of us.