Chief Exec's Blog

After months of discussion we’ve now agreed the council’s budget for next year. Thank you to all the staff who’ve been part of those discussions and helped get us through this lengthy and challenging process. We now have a clear budget for the year ahead and we can begin to plan to deliver services based on that funding. Unfortunately, it means some posts are at risk, but we’re doing all we can to support those staff affected by the budget. I know this is an unsettling time, but we’re making every effort to avoid compulsory redundancies wherever possible.

Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown was in Swansea this week to officially open Cwtch Mawr – Wales’ first multi-bank. Based on the concept of foodbanks it provides a range of essentials such as clothing, household items and baby goods to people in need. Since it started in December more than 7,000 people have benefitted and it’s making a real difference to lives. The Multibank initiative was co-founded Mr Brown and Amazon and is being run in Swansea by Faith in Families. The council has secured an asset for the initiative and provided some financial support via ERF monies to get it up and running. It’s also given a significant amount of support so my thanks to all the staff involved with particular thanks to Jane Whitmore for the work on this initiative.

It was great to see the It’s Your Swansea conference yesterday at Swansea Arena. More than 1,000 people attended, along with hundreds of inspiring local businesses helping raise Swansea’s profile as a city of opportunity. The council gave an update on the £1bn regeneration programme that’s transforming our city, and staff were on hand to give information on major projects and business grants. On a similar note I met with officials from the UK business and trade officials at the university to showcase Swansea and the great work being done on life sciences and how our City Region is moving forward.

Congratulations to our land charges team who are the first in Wales to win the Customer Satisfaction Award in the 2024 Land Data Awards for Excellence. Our team manages conveyancing searches which is an essential part of moving home for our residents. It’s voted for by conveyancers and solicitors who are asked to consider quality, efficiency, reliability and value for money. Swansea is the first Welsh Authority to win an award.

Another proud moment this week saw the charity Heartbeat Trust UK visit the Guildhall to present us with an award for our support in helping Swansea become the UK’s first Defib Friendly City. There’s now a network of more than 650 life-saving defibrillators across the city, and the council has helped fund many of those. My thanks to all involved in this life-saving initiative.

Finally my thanks to Steve Bennett, one of our city centre cleansing team, who gave first aid and assistance to an elderly gentleman who had fallen and sustained a significant head injury. Steve started initial first aid, phoned an ambulance and assisted with getting him into an emergency vehicle to hospital. Since that time, the gentleman has recovered and called into the office with a card and box of chocolates for Steve. Well done Steve.

Many of you will know that we had to close Bishopston Comprehensive School just before half-term after ground movement was discovered, forcing us to switch off all the utilities to its buildings. I’m delighted to say that thanks to the incredible efforts of our education and building services teams and, of course, the school plus many others, Bishopston re-opens on March 6 to all pupils. Working every day since the discovery, often in atrocious weather conditions, building services and our contractors have completed the hugely complex job of re-routing water, electricity and gas mains to make this happen. While this has been going on, our education teams and the school staff have pulled out all the stops to maintain learning online for more than 1,000 pupils. Among other things, re-opening means pupils due to sit vitally-important GCSE exams using equipment only available at the school will be able to carry on. I want to pay tribute to Nigel Williams, Louise Herbert-Evans and their teams for their perseverance, professionalism and can-do attitude under pressure. I’d also like to thank Bishopston headteacher Jeff Bird, his staff, governors, pupils and parents for their resilience and patience at a very challenging time. Our response to this incident shows Swansea Council at its very best.

I had a very productive catch-up with the staff engagement group on Wednesday. We discussed a range of topics, focussing particularly on ways we can consult effectively with staff on the issues that matter to them. We all recognised that meaningful consultation must include an effort to ensure everyone has the opportunity to have their voice listened to – and that action on concerns and interests raised are seen to take place. The plan is to carry out some further staff engagement from April to understand how effective these processes are across the Council.

We have also approved our reward and recognition scheme which will now be discussed with our trade unions and councillors before being launched shortly. If you’ve ideas you want to share on this subject, please feedback via your staff representatives or let me know directly.

It’s International Women’s Day next Friday and we’ll be marking the event in a number of ways. It’ll include announcing that the coastal park next to Swansea arena is being named for renowned Swansea businesswoman and writer Amy Dilwyn. Staff events include an online drop-in session on Teams providing advice and support for women. My thanks to Tracey McNulty for pulling together the relevant details and arrangements for the naming event.

Our final budget proposals go to Full Council on March 6 for its decision. It has been a challenging process over a number of months. But if you follow any of the local and national news you will see many other councils facing the same or more difficult choices and challenges. My thanks to all of you who took part in the consultation and to Ben Smith, Sarah Willis and the finance team for their effort in getting us to the finish line. Also on a finance issue, Cabinet and CMT met on Thursday and one of the things discussed was around grant visibility and how announcements from Welsh Government impact on the services we are delivering to our communities. We will be carrying out some further work on the grant process and visibility during this year.

Finally, I can’t let the day pass without wishing you a very happy St David’s Day. If you want to get into the spirit of the occasion there’s three days of our Croeso Festival still to enjoy. Well done to the team in cultural services and their partners for making the festival such a colourful annual event.

CMT met yesterday with the regulatory authorities – Audit Wales, Estyn and Care Inspectorate Wales – who monitor the work of public bodies like us to discuss our plans for the year ahead. We welcome robust oversight of our work because it provides valuable fresh perspectives and helps us improve the services we provide to the public. The catch-up was a very positive and productive engagement meeting which looked at assurance processes and risk assessment work we’re planning for the coming year. Despite the many challenges we face, the regulators were very positive about our political and managerial leadership, our commitment to partnership and collaboration and the effectiveness of our approach to corporate governance. As with other local authorities, they were also interested in how we’re looking to meet the challenges of housing and homelessness, transformation, cybersecurity and budget and risk management.

Corporate discussions with regulators might feel far removed from the work you do every day. But the regulators’ continuing confidence against a challenging backdrop is further reassurance that the way you deliver services that touch people’s lives is being done efficiently and effectively. My thanks to you for your ongoing commitment. The outcomes from our meeting yesterday will inform our corporate and service plans going forward and ensure they are aligned with the corporate risk register and performance management framework.

Managers and staff working in Civic Centre and the Guildhall are being given a reminder that they need to be up to speed on procedures to follow in an emergency evacuation of the buildings. Our health and safety team has published new guidance highlighting what managers need to do to ensure staff with impaired mobility are supported with a Personal Emergency Evacuation Plan (PEEP). You can find the guidance here, so if this may affect you or a colleague, please take a look.

Earlier this week I attended a celebration event organised by the Heartbeat Trust UK where Swansea was named the UK’s first Defib-friendly city. Thanks to a lot of hard work over the last few years from officers and members we now have a network of almost 650 defibrillators which will save lives. The council has played its part in achieving this accolade through direct investment and coordination of assets and the charity was very grateful for our contribution. Find out more about defibs in your community here.

More good news this week is that Swansea Arena has been named among the finalists for a Royal Society of Architects in Wales (RSAW) Welsh Architecture Award. My thanks to all staff involved in the scheme.

It’s time to say farewell to Peter Richards, our Building Control, Bereavement and Registration Services manager, who’s worked for the council since 1988 and retires at the end of the month. Peter’s chaired Local Authority Building Control Cymru for the last 13 years, helping develop policy and regulations in this important area. I have taken plenty if advice from Peter over the years and it’s always been valued so a personal thank you for your service, Peter, and we all hope you enjoy your retirement.

It was a very busy Cabinet meeting yesterday at which members were discussing next year’s final budget plans to go to Council, our capital spending programme, the medium-term financial plan and the third quarter revenue and capital budget monitoring report, among others. Full Council will make the final decision on the budget and capital spending at its meeting on March 6th. But the third quarter revenue and capital report is a reminder that all of us still need to do all we can to live within our agreed budgets in the current financial year. The report says there remains huge pressure on services with rising demand and the cost of inflation causing overspends in a number of areas and it will be a significant challenge to ensure we balance our budget this year. Directors and heads of service are working to mitigate overspends, including freezing vacancies and I’d take this opportunity to remind you of the spending restrictions that are currently in force. You can find them here.

Yesterday I was pleased to see Swansea host a visit from the deputy director from the UK Government’s Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Huw Bryer was catching up on the success stories here of investment through the Shared Prosperity Fund and Levelling Up Fund. When I met him, he was very impressed with the work done and the lead role Swansea is playing in the region on SPF. We’ve been really successful in tapping into these funds, attracting well over £20m to boost major projects like the Lower Swansea Valley regeneration programme as well as key community initiatives that support skills training, volunteering and neighbourhood improvements. My thanks to Paul Relf, Richard Horlock and their teams for facilitating this programme and for all the staff involved in ensuring our communities are seeing the tangible benefits of this funding.

I’ll be catching up with the staff engagement group in the next couple of weeks and one of the key topics we’ll be looking at is the upcoming staff survey. We’re working on finalising questions for the survey now, but one of the most important issues I want to raise in it is gauging views on how communication and engagement with staff have been going over the last year or two. There’s been a lot of change since we emerged from the pandemic and there’s more coming as part of our transformation programme. So it’s important that we understand better how well-informed you feel and how engaged you are – or want to be – with change programmes that affect the way you work.

Ironman 70.3, the recent addition to our summertime events schedule, has been voted one of the top three run courses of its kind in the world. The praise comes from the Global Athletes Choice Awards and it also means athletes think there’s no better run like it in Europe, the Middle East or Africa. It’s estimated that IRONMAN – which also includes swim and cycle elements – attracts around 20,000 spectators to Swansea and, together with the World Triathlon Para Series, it’s worth more than £2m to the local economy. My thanks to the cultural services and special events team for helping achieve this accolade.

This week I was very pleased once again to attend Gower College Swansea’s annual apprenticeship awards. This year two of our employees gained top awards, Isaac Fabb and Sarah Bowkett. Isaac, who works for building services, won Foundation Apprentice of the Year. Sarah, who is on secondment to our education improvement team from Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Y Cwm, won the Welsh Champion Apprentice Award 2024 (Pencampwr Cymraeg Gwobr Prentis 2024). Congratulations to them both and good luck to them continuing their careers with us.

Gower College Swansea is a key partner in helping deliver our training programmes at all levels of the council. You are the council’s most important asset. Council apprenticeships are always in high demand, but it’s not just about apprentices as we are looking at broader opportunities across the council as we try and respond to the recruitment and retention challenges we face. Training our existing staff is also crucial and is a key part of our workforce and organisational strategy that’s designed to assist in attracting and retain staff in a challenging recruitment environment. On Wednesday our heads of service got to hear an update from Rachael Davies, our head of HR and OD on progress on the strategy and its next steps. You can find out more about the strategy here and I’d encourage you to take a look at training opportunities on offer here as well.

Budget papers have now been published for next Thursday’s Cabinet meeting. Members will take into account consultation with staff and the public before submitting final proposals for Council decision on March 7. You can find out more here.

It was great to see  a new report this week highlighting our city as the best place in the UK for first-time buyers to set up home. We all know Swansea is a great place to live, but it’s useful to get independent endorsements that prove our point.

This week Adele Dunstan, our Strategic Equality and Human Rights Co-ordinator, and Elliot King, Cabinet Member for Culture, Human Rights and Equalities, have been showcasing our work as a Human Rights City at an international UNESCO conference. The event was commemorating the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and it was a great honour for Swansea to be invited. Congratulations to them both for the very positive response they received which demonstrates international interest in what we’re doing.

A seal of approval for Swansea of a different kind is news of another major music event coming to Singleton Park this summer called Let’s Rock, featuring major bands like UB40 and ABC. It’s further evidence of Swansea’s growing reputation as a popular destination for major music events and good news for tourism and other businesses. My thanks to the special events and tourism teams for helping make this happen.

And finally, the Welsh Blood Service has just announced lots of places in Swansea where donation sessions are happening over the coming weeks. As you know I’m a big supporter of the service, so if you can give please do.