Chief Exec's Blog

An update from the Chief Executive

A promising year ahead

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A happy new year to you all. 2019 promises to be an interesting year.  I suspect Brexit will continue to dominate the news and the political debates but we’ll continue in our mission to improve the city whatever happens.

Following the holiday period the work to regenerate the Kingsway will gather momentum again as this critical part of the city infrastructure gets a long-awaited facelift.  I’m confident the plans Council approved will breathe new life into the city centre and the funding from UK and Welsh governments through the City Deal will supplement our own investment in this transformation.

At the same time we must maintain our focus on the other corporate priorities and we’ll be reinforcing this important message in the forthcoming staff roadshows – more on these below.  As some of you know I’m not a big fan of Christmas but if I’d made a list to Santa it would have included;

  • Greater clarity on Brexit from the UK Government at the earliest opportunity
  • A sense of direction from the Welsh Government on the future shape of local government
  • Some real evidence that austerity is over, including a fair financial settlement for local government

Sadly thus far Santa has been unable to find my house but let’s hope 2019 will bring these to us at some point.

Staff roadshows

As you know, Cabinet agreed to consult on our budget proposals for next year. The public consultation is already under way, which staff can take part in, but on top of this we’re holding a series of staff roadshows at various council venues this month.

I’ll be attending some of the roadshows, and Adam Hill, our Deputy Chief Executive, will be fronting many of them along with directors and heads of service. I hope as many of you as possible can attend these so we can get your views and thoughts on where we are and where we’re heading as an organisation. Here’s a list of the roadshows, please agree with your manager which session to come along to.

We’re also producing a staff survey next week for you to give your views on proposals that affect our workforce.

Care home fire

On December 21 I was alerted at about 6.30pm that there had been a serious fire at a private dementia care home in Gorseinon.  As you might expect the rest of the evening was spent on the phone as our emergency planning and social services colleagues worked tirelessly to relocate the 27 vulnerable people who needed to be rehoused immediately.  This was one of the toughest logistical challenges we have faced for a number of years and the response was simply amazing.

I must thank all our colleagues who responded brilliantly. The residents were all assessed at the scene and two needed hospital treatment. Our emergency duty team had to find temporary accommodation for the remaining residents who moved into the spare beds we have at Parkway. It was a real team effort as our staff worked with colleagues from the fire, police, health services in very difficult circumstances.

From our end it involved colleagues from emergency planning, transport and social services who are too numerous to mention by name. Many, even though they were not on shift, made themselves available at no notice and worked long into the night.  It really was a superb reaction. Thank you all.

Reverse advent calendar

Congratulations and thanks to all involved in the “Reverse Advent Calendar” in the run up to Christmas.  Four charities, the West Wales Poundies, Morriston Hospital Children’s Ward, Zacs Place Homeless Support and the Salvation Army church, were all supported by the efforts and generous donations of our staff.  Hats off to the organisers of this initiative which I hope will go from strength to strength in the future.

 

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.

Budget report published

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A huge effort this week has gone into finalising our budget proposals for next year.

We’ve spent months discussing options with Members and we’ve now published the report for Cabinet on December 14. The budget has been a consistent theme in my blog so you’ll know the issues we face in terms of government funding, new spending pressures and a number of our services are over-spent due to rising demand and pressures.

It hasn’t been easy to reach this point and I want to thank the officers across the council who’ve been involved in preparing proposals and completing EIAs, along with Ben Smith, Sarah Willis and the finance team and staff in Access to Services, Communications and Democratic Services.

Once Cabinet agree proposals we’ll be consulting with the public and staff. We’ve planned a series of staff roadshows in January where you can learn more and have your say.

CMT has agreed further steps to reduce this year’s over-spend. On top of the vacancy freeze and spending restrictions, we’re reducing non-essential spending in the following ways:

  • Review and reduce the number of p-cards.
  • A workshop for staff with “buyer access” to Oracle.
  • All non-essential items removed from the i-procurement catalogue.
  • Non-essential spending approved by:
  • ICT hardware and software – Jo Harley.
  • Furniture – Geoff Bacon.
  • Advertising and bulk printing (non MFD) – Lee Wenham
  • Publicity/promotions – Lee Wenham

It’s more important than ever that we all support these measures to help reduce our in-year spending.

Phones

We’ve all been facing problems with our phone network in the past week. But we’ve been working on a modern, longer-term solution with the roll-out of Unified Communications. The current system is old and will continue to give us problems, so the sooner we can complete this move to the new system the better. My thanks to our networks team who’ve been working so hard to fix these issues and to those staff helping us switch to the new system.

City Deal

On Thursday the Leader and I attended an event for businesses as a means of updating them on the City Deal.  Around 200 businesses attended and the progress made was recognised by all.  There was a welcome sense of real anticipation and positivity among the businesses given some of their concerns over Brexit and the economy.  The leadership demonstrated by the public sector was warmly welcomed.  The Welsh and UK governments will shortly be conducting an independent review of the whole City Deal as the final stage of the project approval process and I hope they use this review to streamline processes and remove bureaucracy from the current approval arrangements.

Openreach

Having had discussions with Openreach for the past few weeks, it’s good to see the roll-out of the fibre network in Swansea.  The initial phase for SA1, SA2 and SA5 will hopefully be quickly followed by a broader roll-out to put Swansea in the leading pack for digital connectivity in the UK.  It’ll be about 24 times faster than the current UK average. Thanks to all who’ve been involved in delivering this latest sign of private sector confidence in the city.

New First Minister

Mark Drakeford has been elected Leader of Welsh Labour which means that he is likely to become First Minister in due course. I hope his appointment will give local government more clarity on reorganisation, regional working and the final budget settlement. The Leader and Cabinet Members have worked closely with him in his previous Welsh Government roles so I hope we can build on this.

Supporting families

We’ve received a toolkit from the Home Office to support EU citizens and their families to apply to the EU Settlement Scheme. Hopefully, it’ll help our staff deal with key issues such as housing, benefits, voting and safeguarding among others. We’ll provide further information to staff shortly.

Congratulations and thanks 

Colleagues in Social Services won a total of 16 awards at Tuesday’s Patient Choice Awards. The awards are a chance for patients, service users, carers, family and friends to say thanks to those who made a real difference by providing outstanding care. It’s great to get this recognition and I know many staff go the extra mile. Well done to all of you.

The team at our baling plant went the extra mile when a family got in touch to say their young daughter’s much-loved toy bunny had been accidentally placed in the waste compactor. She is about to go for her 39th operation and she’d had the toy as a baby. Plant supervisor Martin Rees along with Paul Brown, Andrew Phillips and Lee Howells emptied the skip and searched for the toy, eventually finding it after 45 minutes, much to the relief of the family. Thank you boys, that’s a lovely effort.

Our Property team have been praised in the Allotment and Leisure Gardener magazine. Having helped allotment holders manage their own sites, it said we’d done “everything to help this transition run smoothly”, and added: “Here in Swansea it’s an exciting future for the allotment movement.”

 

 

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.

A bitter blow

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On Monday the UK Government dealt a bitter blow to the tidal lagoon with their decision not to support the scheme by subsidy.  No major energy project has 100% popularity but the support from the community of Swansea and our region was overwhelming.  The war of words that continues is testament to that.

Personally I’m deeply disappointed, it’s a lost opportunity to create a new industry and to translate the Future Generations legislation into real outcomes for citizens.

Many will be confused by the arguments over the level of financial support required and whether the decision was based on the pilot project rather than the pipeline of similar schemes proposed.  The comparison with off-shore wind generation and the reduction in cost following pilot schemes is unavoidable.  Presumably, if the legal requirement in relation to non-disclosure of commercially sensitive information is released we will have a clearer picture of the facts.

But we are where we are, so the question is what do we do now?

The Leader and I are adamant we mustn’t give up on the lagoon project.  The requirement for zero carbon, reliable and sustainable energy will increase in the coming years.  Energy security is a real concern for future generations. The community, business and cross-party political support in South Wales for this is something we must build upon and we’ll continue to look for ways to deliver it. The Leader and I have been overwhelmed by the enthusiasm of the people of Swansea and the region for this project, grateful to the work of all the staff who dealt so effectively and efficiently with the planning application and full of admiration for the communications team who’ve run a first class Love the Lagoon campaign.

City Deal

On Monday the Leader and I met the Secretary of State for Wales, Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Transport to discuss progress on the City Deal projects.  It was pleasing to explain the work that’s been done in Swansea and across the region in the run up to the signing of our Joint Working Agreement next month.  This means we can draw down cash from UK and Welsh Governments to deliver our key projects in the city centre; the Digital Village, Digital Square and Arena and Box Village and Innovation Precinct.  Our team is currently working on the extensive and exhausting five case business model and my thanks go to all involved.

The First 1,000 days

The Core Group of the Public Service Board met again this week.  Along with revisions to governance and action planning we heard a presentation on the First 1,000 days from colleagues at Public Health Wales. 

The first 1,000 days, during pregnancy and up to a child’s second birthday, represent a critical part of childhood when we form attachments to our caregivers, learn how to safely explore and trust the world around us, and start to communicate. It is when we see the most rapid phase of brain growth and development and where the foundations are laid down for our future health and wellbeing. This critical period has a long lasting impact on individuals and families. They shape the destiny for children as they grow up: their educational achievements, their ability to secure an income, their influences on their own children, and their health in older age.

The PSB agreed to sign up to the First 1,000 days partnership agreement and committed to improved joint working in this critical area.

Congratulations

Nicola Fredrickson, Deputy Head at St Helen’s Primary School, has won a silver award in the UK teaching awards.  She’ll now attend the National Awards in October. Jack Branford, a teaching assistant at the school, and one of Nicola’s ex-pupils, was also awarded a certificate of excellence for his role.  The school was also awarded a certificate of excellence in the school of the year. Congratulations to all.

Congratulations to the team at Swansea University for another successful Soapbox Science event last week.  Once again there were some great presentations on work done by female researchers in STEMM subjects ranging from the impacts of video games on the brain to monitoring diseases using printed sensors.

More planes than you can shake a stick at

Well it’s the Wales Airshow for me this weekend as I join the throngs on our annual pilgrimage to Swansea beach for one of the UK’s most-loved events.  Thanks once again for all those providing the logistics that enable this huge and complex event to happen.

Eid

A word of thanks to to everyone who got involved in the Eid in the Park celebrations last Saturday at Singleton Park. It was organised by us in collaboration with the Welsh Islamic Cultural Association Swansea and Swansea University and more than 5,000 people came along.

Farewell and thank you

Last week I mentioned a long list of long-serving staff who are leaving. Unfortunately, I missed out Neil Sewell who works in Audit and has 34 years’ service. My best wishes to Neil and all our other leavers, many of whom are having a farewell drink today.