Chief Exec's Blog

An update from the Chief Executive

Blwyddyn Newydd Dda

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As we come to the end of the year it is a good time to reflect on the events of the last 12 months.

Despite the best attempts of our officers and elected members the future of the Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon remains uncertain.  In January we celebrated the anniversary of the publication of the Hendry report but by June the UK Government confirmed that it would not be supporting the project.  We continue to explore different ways to deliver the scheme and 2019 will see us redouble our efforts to move forward.

In February we held our Smart City event at the Swansea tech hub and this has proved to be an important milestone in moving our digital strategy forward.  Investment by Openreach into the City and the recent submission of our Local Full Fibre Network bid have followed as the City Deal digital projects get underway.  2019 will see more work on the ground as we futureproof Swansea for the impact of fifth generation technology.

March saw the unveiling of the latest local government reform proposals and the suggestion that ten councils were the right footprint for Wales but by July these had been consigned to the dustbin of history.  This was also the month that we completed and opened the first council housing scheme built in the City for a generation which was a real highlight of the year for me.

In April we opened Wales’ first fully integrated family centre and primary care centre at Mountain View in Mayhill and in May we successfully hosted the Radio 1 Biggest Weekend, demonstrating our continuing commitment to culture. More events followed, including the Wales National Airshow along with the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding for the Skyline project at Kilvey Hill.

In July we were visited by the Care Inspectorate Wales as they inspected our approach as a corporate parent, our progress on safeguarding and the performance of our Children’s Services.  In October they issued their report which was highly positive and complimentary about the work our social services teams are doing.

In August our schools celebrated another excellent set of results.  The Senior Management Review was completed with the appointment of my deputy, Adam Hill.

September was a difficult month following the provisional budget announcements from Welsh Government and we completed the penultimate stage in approving our Local Development Plan with the inspectors confirming that there would be no further public hearings.

In October we made significant progress on our Regional Education Consortium, ERW, with an agreement by the Joint Committee to make structural changes and revisit the collaborative approach.  This will be driven forward again in January so that we can ensure that schools get the school improvement support in a more consistent and coherent way. We also celebrated the best High 5 awards to date with inspirational young people from across the City.

My highlights for November were the opening of Lon Las School by TV presenter Huw Edwards and the first signs that the Welsh Government were responding to our concerns about the budget settlement.  I was very grateful to Ben Smith for his support in my submission to the Welsh Assembly Petitions Committee and I hope that it brought home to policy makers the impact of the scale of cuts on the ground.

December was marred by the news that the City Deal Delta Lakes scheme in Carmarthen had some major problems but the Joint Committee, chaired by Councillor Rob Stewart took rapid and decisive action to ensure that the other City Deal schemes could continue to progress smoothly.

So what can we learn from the year’s events?  We are a diverse and complex organisation that provides essential services for our citizens and we do it well.  We deal efficiently and effectively with the challenges thrown at us and this is because we have a talented and committed workforce.  I know morale is not helped by the constant pressure of austerity but we have demonstrated a resilience that other councils would envy.

So thanks to all of you for your hard work this year.  I don’t doubt that next year will be equally challenging for us all but I know you will deal with it as you have consistently done; with innovation, determination and commitment.

Blwyddyn Newydd Dda.  Happy New Year.

Tough times

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Virtually every year of my working life in local government I’ve heard colleagues describe the annual budget settlement as the most difficult on record.  But 20 years ago we couldn’t have foreseen just how challenging things would get.

There’s been coverage of the problems facing Northamptonshire and East Sussex councils and last week the Municipal Journal highlighted the serious financial difficulties facing Birmingham Council.  There are many more on the margins of financial viability and some who now only operate the minimum core statutory services. The situation in Wales has been slightly easier, given the Welsh Government’s relative protection for councils. But all 22 Welsh councils are now facing problems, as shown by the number of councils breaching the notional 5% council tax cap for the first time in their 2018/19 budget.  The situation is compounded by growing demographic pressures, particularly in adult social care, and the agreement of unfunded national pay awards with councils ending up footing the bill.  Public sector pay restraint during austerity has hit staff and their families, there’s a clear trade-off in all councils between the levels of pay and the number of jobs.

There’s no doubt in my mind next year will actually be the toughest on record and we’ll face some difficult choices.  On Wednesday the Corporate Management Team considered our medium term financial planning ahead of the forthcoming budget meetings with Cabinet and Council.  Once again the aim will be to protect services and jobs but this will be really challenging.  We must continue our transformation journey through Sustainable Swansea and CMT are reviewing the programme for discussion with councillors over the coming weeks.  We’ll share this with staff as soon as possible and your views will be important in shaping it.

Despite these difficulties our staff continue to work hard to improve performance. The first quarter performance monitoring report will show 76% of Corporate Plan performance indicators met their targets and 61% improved compared to Quarter 1 last year.  Our staff deserve real credit and thanks for their commitment and efforts in making Swansea a better place.

Recruitment

The Appointments Committee met this week to agree the shortlist for the post of Deputy Chief Executive/Director of Resources.  Council will meet next Tuesday to consider the recommendations of the Appointments Committee and I’ll keep you informed of progress.

Security

There have been a spate of car crimes in Swansea and our staff car parks are not immune to this threat. An employee’s car was stolen from the Civic Centre this week. Please be vigilant and take some practical steps to improve security such as not leaving valuables on display or leaving files, laptops etc in your car. Our security staff will be increasing patrols in car parks and stepping-up CCTV monitoring.

Exam results

Congratulations to all those pupils who sat A-Levels and other exams this summer. Our overall pass rate of 97.6% is the same as 2017 and above the Welsh average. And we have more pupils passing with either A* or A grades – an increase of 1.6% on last year. I’m grateful to everyone for the effort they’ve put in.

Tidal Lagoon

It’s been a couple of weeks since I mentioned the tidal lagoon but a lot has been happening behind the scenes.  We’ve worked with Swansea University on the commissioning of a report by Holistic Capital which outlines the case for taking the lagoon forward.  The Leader has convened a task force to drive forward the project.  The task force met yesterday and agreed how it will consider options for delivering this project. I’ll update you as things progress.

High 5 judging

This week I chaired the annual High 5 awards panel to identify the winners of this year’s competition in preparation for the awards ceremony at the Liberty Stadium in October.  As usual it was a difficult process as all the entries were worthy of recognition.  Thanks to Mark Gosney for supporting the process and to those who submitted the 130 nominations.  The resilience and achievement of our young citizens inspired all the judges.

Nant y Felin

Thank you to all the staff involved in moving our children’s home at Ty Nant Ty Nant to a new base in Pontarddulais. The new home offers better accommodation, while old site in Blaenymaes will be developed into a supervised contact centre, with services for children and families.

Welsh

We have still have some work to do in ensuring the recent Welsh Language Standards are embedded in our everyday work. But as a starter here’s a simple guide every member of staff should follow.

Armed forces

It’s great that our efforts to support the armed forces have been recognised with a gold award from the Defence Employer Recognition Scheme. We’re the only council in Wales to have received this award which is organised by the Ministry of Defence. Well done to everyone involved.

ParkLives

If you’ve not tried it yet you may want to make the most of our ParkLives scheme which is offering 36 hours of activities each week for adults and children in the summer holidays. Thanks to Sarah McCoubrey and the team for their hard work on this programme

Another one bites the dust

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During the past year I’ve mentioned local government reorganisation and last month I speculated the current proposals were going nowhere fast. Well, as predicted, at the recent WLGA Annual Conference in Llandudno it became very clear that the idea of compulsory mergers between councils is well and truly in the bin.  There’ll be no forced amalgamations of councils, but where do we go from here? There’s some logic to the argument there are too many councils in Wales and our council has remained consistently pragmatic on the merger issue.  The way forward now must be through stronger, more accountable and more consistent collaboration between the councils in Wales.  We have a strong record in driving these collaborations but they’re far from perfect.  Many councillors I speak to feel disengaged and distant from the new joint committees that run the City Deal, school improvement and health and social care.  There are no common footprints and our officers spend an increasing amount of time on regional work.  I suspect we’ll be collaborating further on the three footprints identified by the previous Cabinet Secretary, Mark Drakeford.

The current senior management review that was agreed by Council on June 21 will put us in a stronger place to manage the increasing workload resulting from greater collaboration.  My aim is to complete the implementation of the changes by the end of August.

Appraisal review

At CMT we discussed the current arrangements for staff appraisal and performance management.  The existing process and supporting systems are outdated and it’s time for a root and branch review of the whole thing.  I‘ve asked that staff views are fully taken into account in this review so I hope you’ll all contribute to developing a better system.  Annual reviews are helpful but I’m keen to see more regular dialogue between managers and their teams and I know this already happens in some service areas.

We also received a comprehensive report on adult safeguarding from the Head of Adult Services, Alex Williams, before some detailed discussions on the current and future budget challenges.  The need to reduce spend in-year and to manage vacancies is an urgent one and CMT will continue to monitor this over the coming months.  I’d prefer to protect existing jobs from the threat of redundancy rather than employ additional staff who might subsequently find themselves under threat.   Discretionary spend must be contained and I know this will cause difficulties for all of us but there are some major pressures building up in the system which we will have to meet.  This is a situation that all councils in Wales face and it’s likely to get more difficult in the future.

SEQOHS

We’ve just been inspected by the Faculty of Occupational Medicine as part of the re-accreditation process for the Safe Effective Quality Occupational Health Service. Although we’re waiting for the formal outcome, the informal feedback is really pleasing. They recognised many areas of good practice, including our induction arrangements, business continuity plans and the quality of our service. My thanks to everyone involved.

Lagoon – regional talks

Last week I mentioned we’re continuing to look at options for the lagoon and on Monday the City Deal Joint Committee will be considering them.  I’ll keep you updated as these discussions progress.

Lost in Penyrheol

On Wednesday Penyrheol Primary School received a visit from our local songstress Bonnie Tyler.  It came about because the reception class chose to learn about Bonnie for Welsh Week. When she learned what they’d done she offered to visit and even sang Total Eclipse of the Heart, accompanied by the entire school during assembly. She then presented the reception pupils with signed photos and CDs. Well done to everyone involved.

Events

Despite the poor weather on Sunday this year’s Wales Airshow was another great success.  After spending the day on Swansea beach the clouds were a blessed relief.  On Sunday evening I went to the site to see how the clean-up operation was going and was astonished to see that it was almost complete.  Thanks to all involved for delivering this for the city.

This weekend sees the return of Dance Days which is one of my favourite annual events.  The programme, organised by the Taliesin Arts Centre, takes place in and around the National Waterfront Museum and is a must for fans of dance.  Apparently this is my 100th blog so thanks for taking the time to read it.

Dead in the water? No.

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Another week passes and the future of the tidal lagoon looks in severe doubt following the announcements from the UK Government this week.  Following the decision to press ahead with the nuclear power facility at Wylfa, the Secretary of State for Wales has clearly stated his concerns over the forecast cost of energy from the Swansea Bay project.  Personally, I feel this would be a short-sighted decision by the UK Government and based on criteria that do not reflect the long-term nature of large scale energy infrastructure projects.  We’ll continue to work with the Welsh Government and Tidal Lagoon Power to deliver this scheme along with other renewable projects, given our commitment to sustainable development and future generations.

Skyline

This week we welcomed Skyline, our partners from New Zealand who are working on our scheme at Kilvey Hill.  We were able to formally agree the heads of terms and the company spent the week appointing consultants and advisers to manage and deliver the project.  Huw Mowbray and the property team have been working hard to secure this investment for the city and if we can deliver it we’ll have an attraction that is unique to the UK and a potentially massive boost for our tourism sector.  We we’ll continue to work closely with Skyline on pre-application for planning, land assembly and logistical support. We held a dinner at the Mansion House yesterday evening to review progress and agree the actions we’ll each undertake over the coming months.

Local Government Reform

On Monday afternoon the Leader and I travelled to Llandrindod Wells along with our counterparts from the other 21 councils in Wales to meet the Cabinet Secretary for Local Government, Alun Davies.  The meeting was arranged by the Welsh Government to share views on merger and transformation of public services as councils prepare to respond to the recent Green Paper.  This was never going to be an easy discussion and it’s clear there are some very strong and conflicting views on the subject.  My personal prediction, and it’s just that, is that it’s highly unlikely that mergers will take place on a national level, if at all. The debate has been underwhelming and the case for a reduction to 10 councils has not been convincingly made.  I met group leaders this week to get their views on the Green Paper and we’ll be reporting our proposed response to Council in a fortnight.  I’ll add a link to my blog so you can see it for yourself.

University meeting

We recently established a joint Executive Board with Swansea University to help manage the delivery of joint projects including the regeneration of the city centre, the provision of accommodation, digital infrastructure and energy strategy.  The Leader chaired the meeting and it was pleasing to see agreement on these as priorities for collaboration, which will now be developed into specific projects.

Western Bay

On Tuesday I was interviewed by IPC about progress made on the Western Bay Health and Social Care collaboration.  Given the impacts of austerity on public finances, the confusion over regional collaboration footprints and the lack of clarity over funding responsibilities between councils and the NHS it’s a difficult backdrop for partnership working. However, I think some very good progress has been made but we need to focus on better joining up of services.  We await the decision of the Welsh Government on the future geography for ABMU Health Board, with or without Bridgend Council following consultation, but I hope the review by IPC will come up with some positive recommendations that all partners can subscribe and commit to.

Congratulations

Well done to staff at the Glynn Vivian which has been awarded a Trip Advisor Certificate of Excellence. The Gallery has undergone a major refurbishment and is one of Wales’ leading venues. This follows hot on the heels of five other council venues receiving the same accolade.

Thank you to staff in Finance who’ve been working for months on closing our accounts. It’s a painstaking task which has to be done every year. I won’t mention everyone by name, but well done and thank you for all your efforts.

I was delighted to see former Cefn Hengoed Community School headteacher Sue Hollister at Buckingham Palace this week to collect the MBE for services to education. During her 10 years at the helm the school’s fortunes were transformed and rated excellent in all 15 aspects of its last Estyn inspection.

Setting objectives

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I had my annual appraisal this week to review my performance and to set my objectives for the coming year. The appraisal is done by a cross party group of councillors (known as the Chief Executive’s Appraisal and Remuneration Committee) whose job it is to hold me to account for the organisation’s performance and the commitments I gave to them on my appointment.  You may remember that I published my objectives in the blog last year. Thanks mainly to the efforts of our staff I was able to give a good account of myself as we’ve maintained or improved performance in the majority of services, despite facing significant budget reductions. It goes without saying that I’m very grateful to you for this.  The latest telephone survey indicates that two-thirds of our citizens are satisfied with the way we deliver services, although only one-third are likely to speak highly about us.  This still puzzles me but our feedback compares well with most other councils in the UK. The Committee considered my objectives for the coming year and I’ll post them on my blog when they’re confirmed.  In short I’ve committed to making sure the Council takes a strong lead in regional working, to delivering the City Deal, continuing the transformation of the Council, managing the budget and reviewing the senior management structure. This will be a challenging year for all of us with a grim financial outlook, potential local government reform and a huge challenge in re-modelling our city.  I hope with your support I can demonstrate further progress when the committee reviews my performance next year.

Local Government Reform

At Corporate Management Team we discussed the principles behind the Council response to the Welsh Government consultation on Strengthening Local Government: Delivering for People.  You’ll remember the proposal is to reduce the current 22 local councils to 10.  We hope to bring a report shortly to make sure that the views of Council are set out very clearly to the Welsh Government.  I know that the scrutiny panel chaired by Councillor Lyndon Jones looking into this will shortly produce their report and this will also help to inform our response which might include the following points that were raised by CMT:

  • Swansea Council is open to the idea of merger.
  • A voluntary merger approach is unlikely to deliver what the Welsh Government has set out.
  • If there’s a will to do this then it needs to be done rapidly i.e. by 2022.
  • The best model is the one that would deliver sustainable services over parochial interests.
  • We must first have a clear vision for local government in Wales expressed in outcomes for the next 10 to 20 years and structures should follow this.
  • There is no guarantee that biggest is always best.
  • There should be a radical delayering of responsibilities and accountabilities in local government in Wales to reflect Welsh Government as policy maker, local government as deliverer and a single inspectorate.
  • The merger proposals will create confusion in relation to existing collaborations. If authorities were to agree to merge, they may have very different views on arrangements that could freeze decision making on some collaborations until there is clarity.
  • There’ll be a large financial cost associated with local government re-organisation during a time of severe austerity. In 2014, CIPFA estimated that up-front costs of reorganisation across the whole of Wales could range between £160m and £268m.

When the report to Council is published I’ll add the link to my blog.  My best guess is that nothing is likely to happen quickly when the consultation ends as the Welsh Government are focussed on other things.

On a similar note, the Local Democracy and Boundary Commission for Wales has started an Electoral Review of Swansea’s Boundaries.  The consultation runs until July 24 and can be found here.

Virgin Media

I mentioned last week that Virgin Media had announced the start of consultation on the proposal to close its Swansea operation.  On Wednesday the Leader and I met the company to better understand and challenge the rationale for closure.  Whilst it’s clear the nature of the business is changing to reflect the fact that better digital infrastructure has reduced the number of fault calls dealt with at the Swansea contact centre, we told them that we thought it was a short-sighted move in the context of our City Deal digital projects. We’re already working with the company and Welsh Government to soften the blow through redeployment but I hope the company will take our views, and those of the workforce, into account when finalising a decision.

Congratulations

I was delighted to see an email from Nicole Dummett in Corporate Building and Property Services following the two recent awareness campaigns on Domestic Violence.  Staff in the department raised £193.49 and £161.43 towards the campaign for which the staff at the Domestic Violence One Stop Shop were extremely grateful. The first donation was spent on a Christmas party for some of our service users and their children, confidence-building classes and three children’s craft workshops.  This time I understand the donation will be used to support the Shoe Box scheme, particularly for male victims of domestic violence as the numbers are increasing.

Summer ball

Last night’s Lord Mayor’s Summer Ball was a great success. A series of awards were given out in recognition of people’s contribution to Swansea. I’m grateful to Joanne Jones in Corporate Marketing and all the team involved for organising a great event.

Hoping for a miracle

It looks like the Swans’ stay in the Premier League is all but over, barring the ten goal turnaround required for them to stay up. It’ll be a real shame to see the Swans relegated, not just for fans like me, but for the city and the wider region. There’s no doubt that having a Premier League club has been a great selling point for Swansea. So here’s hoping for a minor miracle at the weekend or a better season next year!