Awards – Page 4

Electrification Plans Derailed

July 21, 2017 by Martin 6 Comments

Rail electrification – a personal view

The UK Government’s announcement to scrap plans for rail electrification between Swansea and Cardiff has been met with widespread dismay and condemnation.

Having met government ministers and officials to present the original case for electrification some years ago, I was very disappointed by the U-turn. The economic case is no different now than it was then, although clearly the huge overspend on other parts of the UK-wide electrification project has contributed to the rethink.

South West Wales has struggled with its peripheral location and any reduction in travel time is a real benefit. The switch from diesel would have major environmental benefits and be much more energy efficient; the trains would have more modern facilities and greater safety measures. It felt like we were going to be a part of a new UK rail infrastructure, squarely on the map and fit for the future.

In the last few years I’ve travelled by rail in Europe which was all electrified with modern, energy-efficient trains and heavily used by the public. A modern economy requires not just digital connectivity but also the most efficient, clean and accessible rail network. The announcement felt like a real kick in the teeth for our city.

City of Culture – what next?

We’ve been shortlisted for the UK City of Culture 2021 – along with Paisley; Sunderland; Stoke and Coventry.

We’re expecting feedback from the DCMS next week and we’re working with partners and funders to nail down the core structure and details required for the final bid on September 29.

The format has changed since our previous bid, with the emphasis on confirming the partnerships, funding, programme content, venues and social, economic and tourism impacts.

The DCMS team and panel members will visit Swansea and our team will travel to Hull in December to present our final bid – before a recommendation is put to Ministers. The announcement will be made shortly after that.

The city will be dressed with banners, posters, window dressings etc and events will engage the community. Our partners will be working on the programme details and we welcome any support you can offer to raise engagement among groups and communities that you work with and represent. Congratulations to Tracey McNulty and her staff along with all the councillors, officers and partners for getting us onto this shortlist. Please follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter #Swansea2021

Public Service Board

Last Tuesday I joined 40 officers and councillors from across Swansea’s public services to identify where we might work together for a better Swansea. The Swansea Public Services Board event was the last in a series of workshops held with citizens, the community and voluntary sectors and public service leaders. We identified trends that will shape Swansea’s future and areas where we can work together to overcome challenges and make the most of opportunities.

Topics discussed included celebrating pride and belonging, developing social capital and tackling climate change. These will be used alongside evidence from the Local Assessment of Well-being to develop Local Well-being Objectives for Swansea.

There will be opportunities to feed into the development of the Local Well-being Plan in the summer before consultation in the autumn.

Director of Resources

I’m delighted Sarah Caulkin, our Chief Transformation Officer, has been appointed interim Director of Resources following competitive interviews. Sarah’s been instrumental in progressing the transformation programme and helping us to plan our future council. With digital transformation, regional collaboration and financial challenges on the horizon this will be a busy and exciting time for us all.

Eid in the Park

Thanks to Riaz Hassan and all the team for organising this year’s Eid in the Park event, which attracted more than 3,000 people. These events promote community cohesion and cultural awareness and lots of people gave their time to make it a success.

Awards

Congratulations to our Corporate Building and Property Services team for winning the Integration & Collaborative Working Award 2017 at the Constructing Excellence Wales (CEW) awards. We’ll be going forward to the National event in November. Let’s hope we win that one too!

Our parks’ staff work has been recognised by Keep Wales Tidy. Victoria Park, Parc Llewelyn, Cwmdonkin Park, Clyne Gardens, Bynmill Park and Singleton Botanical and Ornamental Gardens were all awarded Green Flags. The organisers tweeted this week: “Amazing work by all the team down at Swansea Council – your parks are a pleasure and a joy to visit”

Last week I mentioned the Swansea Life Awards, including the winning teams from Parks Operations and Development and Outreach for the work at Clyne Gardens – here’s a photo of them with their award. Well done.

Farewell

Dr Julie Sheppard, Head of the Education Strategic Planning & Improvement Group, is retiring at the end of the month after 14 years. Julie came to Swansea following a successful career in the private sector bringing with her years of international experience. I’d like to thank Julie for all her work and wish her well in her retirement.

Fingers-crossed for City of Culture bid

July 14, 2017 by Martin Leave a Comment

City of Culture

We’ll learn at about 10.30 tonight if Swansea has been shortlisted for the UK City of Culture 2021 competition. We’re all keeping our fingers crossed as this would open up some great opportunities for the city and its citizens. My thanks to Tracey McNulty and her team who have put all their effort into getting our bid over the line.

Dragon’s Den

I attended the Grand Final of Moving Towards Successful Futures, which promotes entrepreneurship among children. It’s an important part of the new curriculum and Alison Williams from Craigfelen Primary School invited me to the event after reading my recent blog comments about Be the Spark.

Each school group had to design a product, develop a pitch and sell their goods to the public. They took over the central tables in Swansea Market for a day, selling products ranging from notebooks and soap to pots of slime, mostly from recycled materials. I spoke to all the groups and the enthusiasm of the pupils was impressive.

This was a fun event with a serious purpose and my thanks to all the teachers, pupils and staff who have worked so hard on this and particularly to Alison for inviting me.

The winning schools were:

Craigfelen Best Financial

Pontybrenin Best Idea

Craigcefnparc Best Marketing

Clase Best Customer Service

Terrace Road Best Research and Planning

Ynystawe Best Brand

Llwynderw Best Environmental

Christchurch Best Sales

Pentregraig Best Team Work

Blaenymaes Best Display Stand

Trallwn Best Social Media

Oystermouth Best Pitch

Take Care

We’re one of only two councils selected to work with Save the Children as part of the “Take Care Project” which aims to understand the issues relating to children in emergency or disaster situations. Year Six children from Trallwn Primary gave a presentation and wrote a song giving advice on what to do if you were caught up in a fire. They also made a video, which covered how they’d feel and what they’d want following an evacuation, which certainly provoked thought. The event will help change the way we plan and manage emergencies, such as including children in some exercises which was something they specifically asked for.

High 5s

Don’t miss the deadline of July 21 for nominating for the High 5 awards for inspirational children, young people and young adults. Staff can nominate staff as the age limit is 25 so have a think about the younger members of your teams, volunteers and apprentices you work with and consider if they are worthy of a High 5 Award. Swansea City FC star Leon Britton is our High 5 Ambassador again this year. All details here

Awards

We won three awards at the Swansea Life Awards. The Airshow was named Best Event so thank you to our Special Events team, Tourism Marketing, Highways and Transportation, Street Scene and Cleansing for ensuring a safe and enjoyable event. Clyne Gardens won the Best Tourism and Leisure Attraction thanks to the efforts of our Parks Operations and Development and Outreach teams, Tourism Marketing and the park’s Friends. The LC won Best Health/Gym/Spa. Well done to everyone involved.

We’ve been shortlisted for four national APSE Awards for the following categories; Highways, Waste Management, Building Services and Construction and the Best Workforce Initiative, which includes our apprentice scheme. The awards take place on September 7.

The Constructing Excellence Awards are being held today and we’ve been shortlisted for Health and Safety, Client of the Year and also for Project of the Year. Well done to everyone involved and it’s great to see your work being recognised by others.

Farewells

A number of school staff are moving onto pastures new or retiring – Catrin Pugh-Jones, Trui Williams, Jonathan Mead, Gareth Widlake and Sue Hollister. I’m very grateful for their dedication and commitment to children and young people.

I haven’t met them all but they have all made a real difference to their schools. I’ve met Sue Hollister who’s leadership and community engagement at Cefn Hengoed has had a huger impact on its improvement. The school has been judged twice to be an excellent school by Estyn and attendance rates have risen by 10% to over 94%. For the last four years, every single child has gained at least one qualification before leaving school and a range of other results have risen significantly. I’m grateful for her massive contribution. Diolch Sue.

Sad news

I was sorry to hear that one of our former councillors, Mair Gibbs, passed away this week. Mair was an excellent ward councillor who made a major contribution to the well-being of Bonymaen and Swansea. I worked with her on a number of projects and admired her tenacity in pursuing the interests of her constituents. Mair, a former Lord Mayor, was a great ambassador for our city and she will be sorely missed.

In the election spotlight

June 9, 2017 by Martin 2 Comments

This has been another long 24 hours for me and the team who help me to run the UK Government Parliamentary election. I cast my vote as soon as my polling station opened and was greeted by an amazingly cheery and bright-eyed polling station team of Mal, Geraldine and Rebecca. Like all the other polling station staff they faced a long day and I am hugely indebted to everyone who helped run this election. Thanks for the warm welcome from the staff in the polling stations I was able to visit.

The elections team once again exceeded expectations, despite only just recovering from last month’s council elections. This time we faced heightened security concerns following the dreadful events at Manchester and London Bridge and the support from our security staff and special events team was outstanding. I was also grateful for the work done by our resilience team working with the Police.

Congratulations to Dean Howard, the first presiding officer to deliver his ballot papers to the election count. Dean came second at the local government election count but beat his personal best by arriving at around 10.15. As you can see from the photo Dean was pretty pleased with his performance. Mind you his polling station was only 100 yards from the count.

We had a lot of attention on the Gower constituency given the closeness of the 2015 result; a margin of only 27 votes. This wasn’t just from the local and national media companies. Gower was one of eight constituencies across the UK to be visited by the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association team led by Callum Forster and made up of politicians from the governments of Bangladesh, South Africa, St Lucia and Ghana. Each of the eight constituencies is the subject of an election assessment to consider the conduct of the electoral process, and make recommendations for improvement. On Tuesday Huw Evans and I met with the CPA team and answered a range of questions about the electoral process and how it operates here in Swansea. They also visited the postal vote team and a number of polling stations in the Gower constituency. I look forward to their feedback and any suggestions on how the process could be improved in future. Huw and I made a few suggestions of our own which would require changes to national legislation and hopefully the CPA team will take these on board.

Congratulations to the MPs who have been elected to represent our three constituencies;

Swansea West – Geraint Davies

Swansea East – Carolyn Harris

Gower – Tonia Antoniazzi

Appointments

This week the appointments committee met to shortlist candidates for the post of Director of Resources. Interviews will be held on 26^th June and I am confident that Council will be able make an appointment the following day.

On a different note a number of people have asked me why the post of Chief Executive has been advertised. When I was appointed to the post last year it was on an interim basis for one year. Under local government rules interim appointments of the most senior staff should only be for a year. It was my view, and the Leader’s view, that an interim appointment would be the best way forward because it would allow the newly elected Council to choose their own permanent Chief Executive.

Approval of Swansea Central planning application

On Tuesday Planning Committee considered the planning application for Swansea Central. I have mentioned the project a number of times in previous blogs but the approval by Planning committee was a significant milestone and a green light to proceed with the regeneration plan for our City Centre. Comments at the committee reflected the quality and detail of the application. This has required a mammoth effort from our staff and a lot of people deserve to be thanked for their contributions not least of which are Phil Holmes, Huw Mowbray, Lee Richards, Katy Evans, Ryan Thomas, David Owen, Liam Smith and Stephen Smith.

The next phase is delivery and will be equally challenging but I am delighted that the key milestones have been met and confident that we can progress this apace.

Trading Standards

A Trading Standards case in Crown Court earlier this week has determined that a local shop owner jailed for selling dangerous ‘legal highs’ must now pay back more than £120,000 of the money he gained during the years he traded. This is great news and a further example of the hard work by Trading Standards and our Legal Team who have vigorously pursued the case, ensuring individuals do not profit from harmful trading activities.

City Centre

Demolition of the former Oceana building on Kingsway is now about 50% finished. Experts from Cuddy Group, who are demolishing the building for the council, are continuing to dismantle what remains of the building with a high-reach excavator. Scheduled for completion this summer, the demolition will pave the way on site for a new office development accommodating tech businesses.

High 5 Awards

Nominations are starting to increase for this year’s High 5 awards but we want more. The High 5 awards are open to any child, young person or group in three age ranges – under 13s, aged 14 to 19 or 20-25 year olds. We’ve also added a schools award this year which looks to recognise and reward larger school groups, even whole classes, years or teams.

All nominators need to do is fill in a nomination form here where they get the chance to explain why their choice of nominee should get a High 5, whatever the reason might be.

We’ve made it even more accessible to answer any query you have about High 5 this year with a new phone number we’ve set up. If you have a query or would like to leave a voice nomination call (01792) 635699 and leave a message.

UNESCO

Next week we will welcome visitors from across the UK and Europe who are keen to find out how Swansea is encouraging children and adults alike to learn about enterprise.

We were the first city in the UK to become a member of the UNESCO Global Network of Learning Cities and are hosting a two-day meeting on Wednesday and Thursday.

Visitors will hear how we have worked with schools, colleges and universities to reduce the number of young people not in employment, education or training (NEET), and see at first hand the extensive efforts to inspire young people to think about setting up their own businesses.

More than a dozen delegates are expected from as far afield as Scandinavia. I hope we will all give them a warm welcome.

Agile working

In the Civic Centre it’s great to see our new Agile Working area expanding. It’s encouraging to read the positivity coming from staff already there. I particularly like Marlyn Dickson’s observation in her case study: “Business conversations are so much easier … every working day feels much more human and personable.” Still wondering what it’s all about? Pop in and chat to some of your colleagues there!

Congratulations

It was great to hear that Burlais Primary School will soon be home to a garden from the Royal Horticultural Society Chelsea Flower Show after their success in the Greening Grey Britain project. The new school which was completed in 2015 will soon have a courtyard filled with plant life and colour. There was great coverage on the One Show last Monday as well. Congratulations to Alison Bastion and her team.

Congratulations also to transformation officer Gemma Whyley, who helped lead a Welsh team to glory at a major global cheerleading championships in the USA. Gemma was one of two coaches involved with the Welsh Paracheer Unified Freestyle Pom team that won gold at the ICU International Cheerleading and Dance World Championships held in Orlando, Florida. Twenty-five per cent of the team – the first ever from Wales to win at the championships – is made up of young athletes with physical disabilities.

And finally….

Are you going to the Take That concert at the Liberty Stadium on Wednesday evening (June 14)?

If you are, then all the info you’ll need on car parking, taxi tips, drop-off points, pick-up points and road closures is here. My thanks to staff in special events and transport for all their work in the build-up to the event to ensure it runs as smoothly as possible.

City Deal – what it means

March 24, 2017 by Martin Leave a Comment

City Deal – what does it mean?

So we finally got the City Deal signed. So what? Why is it important? For what it’s worth here are my thoughts.

The City Region of South West Wales has faced a steady decline in its economic performance for more than 30 years. In comparison with the rest of Wales and the UK our productivity has worsened since 1996 in nearly every sector, bar the public sector. The economic conditions for regeneration have not been in our favour and despite our best endeavours and a significant amount of European funding we have not been able to halt that decline.

The City Deal is different. It represents a massive commitment from UK and Welsh Governments to helping local authorities tackle our challenges. It is a long-term plan to invest in our infrastructure, both physical and digital. The plan is evidence-based. The Team Swansea approach is a genuine one and the partners in the city are strongly behind it. It has a total value of £1.3bn, including a UK and Welsh Government contribution of £241m, and £673m of private investment. It will be invested in an area with a population of 680,000 and will create 33,000 jobs.

We have the opportunity to exploit a 15-year funding stream. Add this to the massive investment in housing following the Housing Revenue Account settlement with the Treasury and the strong possibility that the Tidal Lagoon will be approved, then the programme becomes truly ambitious.

The arena, office and health campus proposals will be the essential trigger for a more vibrant City Centre with an improved leisure and retail offer resulting from increased footfall.

There will be many challenges in the delivery of these projects. We must align the work we do in schools to the opportunities presented by the City Deal. In my discussions with primary head teachers at Ysgolion Cynradd Abertawe (YCA) this week there is clearly much enthusiasm for the City Deal, but a concern that without a focus on investing in education our children could miss out on the opportunities ahead. Changes to the curriculum must be given time to bed-in, key skills developed and we must identify clear pathways to employment for all our citizens. We must retain a focus on those who face the most challenges and break down the barriers that prevent them from achieving their potential. We must use our investment profile to secure social benefits for citizens, increase our apprenticeship programme and support local supply chains.

The work done by our staff to date is something that I will always be proud of but the future will require departments and staff to work together in an unprecedented way and with absolute focus. Anyone with an interest in skills and education, health and social care, energy, housing, transport, streetscene, sustainable development, tourism, culture, business support and technology will have an essential role to play in this ambition.

We must ensure that governance arrangements for the joint committee that will drive the City Deal are appropriate and that the resources for delivery are in place. Businesses will need a voice and democratic accountability must be transparent so the City Deal is subject to effective scrutiny.

As regards 5G technology I don’t know exactly what it will look like, nor do I yet fully understand its potential to transform the lives of our citizens or how it can help cities to operate. No-one does, or at least I haven’t met them yet. However I am confident that the City Deal will put us at the forefront of these developments.

The most important point is that the City Deal will open up new opportunities for our citizens and it is our responsibility to do all we can to make sure that they get the full advantage of them.

Penybryn School

Last Friday I visited Pen-y-Bryn Special School to talk to the head teacher, Gethin Sutton and the Chair of Governors, Huw Vaughan. Ysgol Pen-y-Bryn has a unit for autistic pupils and educates pupils, aged 3-19, who have a wide range of additional learning needs.

Gethin had recently helped us in the assessment centre for the recruitment of our Chief Education Officer, Nick Williams, and during the process he kindly invited me to the school. I was pleased to hear how well the school and the pupils were progressing and seriously impressed by the quality of the publications and audio books that the school produces. I visited all the classes to meet the children and had the pleasure of attending the weekly awards ceremony which was highly entertaining and a lot of fun. Thanks to Cerys, one of the school’s star pupils for showing me round.

The awards keep rolling in !!!

Beyond Bricks and Mortar has this week won the UK National GO Awards Excellence in Public Procurement for the Best Employment initiative. This is great recognition for the Council’s innovative approach to embedding community benefits in all we do. Including community benefits has never been more important with the opportunities that can be created through the forthcoming city centre regeneration, the City Deal and hopefully the Tidal Lagoon. My thanks to the Beyond Bricks and Mortar team who have put us on the map with this exemplary initiative.

I hope to bring you news about our entries in the MJ awards in the next couple of weeks.

World Social Work Day

Earlier this week our social workers celebrated World Social Work Day which aims to recognise the contribution they make to supporting some of the most vulnerable adults and children in society. Safeguarding is the council’s top priority and, alongside our partners, the work our social workers do makes a significant contribution to the wellbeing of our communities offering support, guidance and a listening ear. Over the past few years I’ve seen the service go from strength to strength, earning praise from the CSSIW and internationally for their pioneering work in areas like dementia and Signs of Safety. I’d like to thank our social workers for their continuing commitment.

Wales National Air Show

Congratulations to our events team after the RAF Red Arrows were again confirmed to take part in this year’s Wales National Airshow on July 1 and July 2. Swansea University has also now come on board as the main sponsors of this year’s event, with further aircraft taking part to be announced over coming weeks.

City of Culture

Thanks to Amanda Hegarty, our Residential Services Manager at Llanfair House, for sending me the photo of this fantastic art work created by the facility’s occupational therapist and service users from recycled material. The City of Culture is obviously alive and well at Llanfair House.

Farewells

There are a number of people leaving the organisation at the end of March and I will be paying tribute to some of them next week.

Yesterday our Staff Choir put on an excellent performance in the Civic Centre Foyer to raise £170 for Comic Relief. It was a lot of fun but sadly a farewell event for the Choir Director John Mills, a performance specialist in Education Effectiveness who is retiring this week after 33 years of service. John has given his free time to sort out the music and tutor the choir for over a year and he will be greatly missed. Thanks John from us all, but particularly the choir members who will miss your guidance and infinite patience.

Today is the last working day for Steve Phillips, Economic Development Team Leader. Steve and his team worked tirelessly on the delivery of our economic regeneration strategy which has formed the evidence base for, amongst other things, our European Funding programmes and our City Deal bid. I have enjoyed working with Steve and wish him well for the future.

Our global platform

March 17, 2017 by Martin Leave a Comment

Global platform

On Monday I travelled to France with the Leader and Huw Mowbray, our Property Development Manager, to attend the international property conference, MIPIM. This is the biggest conference of its type in the world, attracting 23,000 people from 90 countries and gives local authorities a platform to present their proposals for regeneration and development to funders, developers, agents and retailers. We’re conscious of the spending restrictions so we were delighted to be invited by UK Trade & Industry department in Whitehall to present our City Deal and City Centre proposals in the Downing Street pavilion, along with colleagues from Belfast and Glasgow. It was a whistle-stop 24-hour tour which involved a number of discussions with funders and businesses and a presentation by the Leader on the opportunities on offer in Swansea.

Sharing the platform with two other major UK cities has raised awareness of our ambitions as a council worldwide and I’m confident the contacts we made and discussions we had will bear fruit in our quest to secure the City Deal and all that it brings. An announcement is imminent. Dozens of UK councils attended but very few could compete with the quality of work done by our officers, as reflected in the fly-through we commissioned to illustrate the proposition. I’m grateful for all their efforts which epitomise the Team Swansea approach we have been fostering.

Lindsay’s leaving

Today is the last day at the council for Lindsay Harvey our Chief Education Officer.

Anyone who has met Lindsay will know he’s a larger than life character and brings a tremendous amount of enthusiasm and commitment. He has done a fantastic job and some of the progress we’ve made in our schools has been outstanding. I’ll miss Lindsay but I also wish him well in his new post at Bridgend. Nick Williams will be taking over form him and I wish him well.

Senior management review

A report is going to Council on March 23 setting out proposals for restructuring corporate services. The proposals give us a strong platform to progress our business support plans and improve efficiency across the council. If approved by councillors the proposals will be subject to consultation when staff can give their views. The report is available via this link.

Danygraig school

On a visit to St Thomas and Port Tennant I received a warm welcome at Danygraig Primary School. Headteacher Stuart Davies gave me a tour of the school, along with pupils Danushan, Carlo, Ruby and Poppy.

It’s a very old building and I saw the improvements being made by our team in Corporate Building & Property Service. This included a window replacement programme which is helping to keep the building wind and weather proof. This probably shouldn’t include replacing one of the windows which was knocked skew whiff during the three nights blitz and has sat at an unusual angle ever since; a historical legacy that tells its own story!

The teachers are really committed and this school is a real hub of the community. Of course the history of the area is entwined with Swansea docks and overlooks the SA1 district and the location of the proposed Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon. I’ll speak to the Tidal Lagoon company about cementing strong links with the school, along with St Thomas primary, and to make sure that the children are properly engaged in these proposals. The enthusiasm of Stuart and the staff was impressive, reflecting the level of commitment to empowering the pupils to achieve their potential that I see every week in our schools.

Learning needs

The Corporate Management Team received a presentation on the Commissioning Review of Additional Learning Needs (ALN) in the city. Mark Sheridan gave an informative presentation about the work carried out by his team and the challenges the service faces. This is a really important issue for us all and it was encouraging to hear about the corporate commitment to supporting ALN and the great work being done by teaching staff inside and outside schools. The review will be carried on beyond the second gateway report and whilst much remains to be done the rate of progress and analysis is impressive.

Purdah

A reminder that today marks the start of the Purdah period. The restrictions relate to social media as well as general publicity so please read the guidance and help us to ensure a fair and transparent election. For the electoral anoraks amongst us the word “purdah” is a derivation of the Persian word “pardeh” meaning curtain, or veil.

Inspirational youngster

Alfie Walters was recognised at an awards ceremony this week. The 16-year-old from Dylan Thomas School was on a shortlist of three from across the UK for the Educational Achiever Award at The Prince’s Trust annual celebration at the London Palladium. Alfie’s mum passed away when he was just 11. Less than three years later, he also lost his dad, and along with his sisters, he was taken into care. Despite this and with support from the school, our Looked After Children team and The Prince’s Trust he achieved a Level 2 Award on The Prince’s Trust Achieve programme. His skills have made him an excellent ambassador for the trust and he has been invited back to the school to motivate and encourage younger pupils. Well done Alfie.

Film award

This part of the world is well known for its big screen connections and now we can add our own Child and Family Services to the list. They worked with 15 youngsters between the ages of 11 and 19 to create a short film which was crowned Best Animation: 13 and Over at the Into Film Awards in London this week. Judges at the ceremony at the Odeon Cinema in London’s Leicester Square described it as “wonderful and imaginative” and “technically highly accomplished”. Having watched the film I agree with their sentiments. Congratulations to all involved. You can watch the film here: https://vimeo.com/201657295

Awards

We’ve been shortlisted in two categories of the iESE Awards – Transformation Through Support Services and Transformation in Waste & Environment. Well done to all the staff involved and good luck at the awards ceremony.

Pool rescue

Staff at the Wales National Pool saved a male swimmer suffering heart problems. Mark Jones, the duty manager, and his team responded magnificently. The swimmer was taken to hospital and has since contacted staff to thank them. The nurse who attended the scene paid this tribute: “They clearly saved a gentleman’s life today. Mark and the team should be highly commended for a calm, well-practiced Resuscitation.” Our water safety team train the pool staff so well done and thank you to everyone involved.

Sports Awards

Three employees were honoured at last night’s Swansea Sports Awards. Karen Gibbins (Libraries) won the Volunteer of the Year award and Adam Thomas (Cultural Services volunteer) was named Young Volunteer of the Year. Sam Richards (Cultural Services) was runner-up in the Volunteer of the Year category. Well done to all three who are great ambassadors for us.

Farewell

Aeron Kirczey is retiring from the Highways Service after 40 years’ service. Aeron has been a major contributor in advising on highways issues during the planning process and I’m grateful for his input into many of the major schemes he’s worked on.

Also Graham Williams is retiring from Child and Family Services after 42 years’ service. For the majority of his career Graham worked principally within the Child Protection Conference Unit where the model of practice and policies developed were considered innovative and enabled Swansea conference process to be valued as leading the way in policy development. Graham’s commitment to the service over the last 42 years has been really impressive and he’ll be greatly missed.

I wish them well in their retirement and thank them both for their many years in public service.