Chief Exec's Blog

An update from the Chief Executive

The show must go on

by 2 Comments

I hope those of you who took time off over the festive period had a great break.  For those of you who worked through it I want to repeat my thanks.  There were a number of incidents to deal with during the holiday period, many caused by the horrible weather we experienced.

I must say a huge thank you to all those involved in responding to the crisis caused by water leaks at the Grand Theatre.  There are too many people to mention but staff at the theatre and colleagues in corporate building and property services and ICT went above and beyond the call of duty to ensure the theatre re-opened within 24 hours of the leak.  It was a tremendous effort and demonstrates their total commitment to the old adage that “the show must go on”.

Hats off also to all the front line officers who helped clear up after this week’s storms and floods.  Keeping the city moving and safe in the face of violent storms is no mean feat but they achieved it once again and we should all be grateful for that.

Corporate Management Team

On Wednesday CMT met to discuss a number of issues including an update on this year’s budget monitoring. Whilst we’ve made significant progress we’re still heading for an overall overspend this year and so a reminder that the current spending restrictions remain in force is timely.  We also considered a report on corporate risks, including financial ones, and we’ll be working with Cabinet Members to agree these next week.  We also discussed the current challenges of regional collaboration and the potential for a change of direction by Welsh Government that will need some detailed discussion with councillors over the coming weeks and months. The Leader and I are meeting the new minister next week so I’ll update you on any developments.

On Thursday the Leadership Team worked on a range of topics including our Organisational Development and Commercial strategies.  I’ve mentioned previously that the best way to protect jobs and sustain frontline services is to become a more commercial organisation and to look for new ways to generate income.

New Year’s Honours

I was delighted to hear Sue Hollister, former Head Teacher at Cefn Hengoed School, was awarded the MBE.  It’s a well-deserved recognition of her outstanding achievements in education and her contribution to improving outcomes for thousands of our children and young people. I was also delighted that Professor Hilary Lappin-Scott, Senior Pro-Vice Chancellor and Professor of Microbiology at Swansea University, was awarded the OBE for services to microbiology and the advancement of women in science and engineering. I’ve worked with Hilary on a number of projects including the Swansea Science Festival and the Soapbox Science events I’ve mentioned in previous blogs.

Congratulations

You may have read on StaffNet that Laura Collins and the Foster Swansea team held a collection for food banks at the Child and Family staff development day in December.  They collected enough food to feed 375 people this Christmas which is a fantastic achievement.  Thanks to all who took part.

Blwyddyn Newydd Dda

by Leave a Comment

My last blog of the 2017 is a chance to reflect on some of the major issues of the past year and to look ahead to our challenges in 2018.

We started the year in fine style by being awarded the Platinum Corporate Health Standard after excelling in corporate social responsibility and innovation. January also saw the Hendry Review say the Tidal Lagoon was a “no regrets” policy. Almost a year on we’re still waiting for a government decision!

The Welsh Government unveiled its ‘White Paper: Reforming Local Government: Resilient and Renewed’ including regionalised services and electoral reform.

Spring brought the City Deal signing which promises a £1.3bn transformation of our economy and we built on our track record of investing in young people by launching our Apprentice Strategy – more than 170 apprentices have come through since 2003.

April showed there were no fools in our waste team when they cleaned up at the IESE (Improvement and Efficiency South East) Awards.

In May we stood united with Manchester following the horrific terror attack which served as another reminder that we all have to be vigilant, particularly at our major events. And our elections team and volunteers pulled out all the stops to deliver yet another election with huge effort but minimum fuss.

The tragic events of Grenfell Tower threw the spotlight on high-rise flats across the UK and our Housing and Corporate Buildings teams led the way in Wales, acting quickly and professionally to reassure our residents. Another election, this time the General, once again saw our staff pull-out all the stops.

The summer brought a mixed bag of news – I was delighted to be permanently appointed Chief Executive and for us to be shortlisted for City of Culture. But this delight was dampened with the shelving of the rail electrification to Swansea and the worrying budget indications from the Government.

The annual local government “league tables” in September showed that despite budget cuts and service pressures:

  • 29% of all our performance indicators were in the top quartile, up from 17% in 2014/15
  • A reduction in lower quartile PIs from 22% to 14%.
  • We’re ranked 9th among all 22 councils, up from 15th last year. Considering we are an urban authority this is a major achievement.

We launched our Love the Lagoon campaign to unite the community in telling the Government we want and need the project.

October is always a highlight for me because of the High 5 Awards and this year a record number of young people were recognised. Autumn also sees the real work on our budget get under way and Corporate Management Team and Cabinet were locked in meetings to plug the budget gap due to government cuts. Each year is getting more difficult.

 

November was a month for lobbying in London when we took both our City of Culture and Love the Lagoon campaigns to Westminster. Closer to home our Christmas Parade was met with great feedback from the public.

Peter Blake

Despite a fantastic effort, our City of Culture bid fell at the final hurdle in December. Since then we’ve had encouraging talks with the Welsh Government on how we can take culture forward. Our annual staff survey showed the vast majority of areas improving. However, there’s more work to do, particularly on appraisals. And just before the Christmas break I was delighted to hear primary school attendance was 95% for the 2017-2018 academic year, compared to 94.9% for each of the two previous years.  The five-year trend since 2011-2012 has an improvement of 2% which is the highest rate of improvement in Wales. Congratulations to all our school and education staff for this impressive result.

So what does 2018 have in store for us? Hopefully a positive decision on the Tidal Lagoon with the clock running at 350 days since the Hendry Review recommended the government gets on with it.  We’ll  see some significant developments taking place around the Arena and Kingsway sites as the city centre regeneration gathers pace.  This will involve major changes to the city centre road network and the development of the infrastructure for a Smart City.

I suspect we‘ll see a restatement of the Welsh Government approach on local government reform, possibly with greater emphasis on mandation unless the pace of collaboration between councils increases.

We’ll set a budget following the consultation process and hopefully continue to deliver excellent services in increasingly difficult circumstances. Our work on modernising and transforming the Council will continue, increasing our agile, digital and commercialism programmes to help us to combat future cuts in the revenue budget.

Above all I hope 2018 will be a healthy and happy year for you and for your families and I want  to thank you once again for the fantastic work during 2017.

Blwyddyn Newydd Dda.

Merry Christmas

by Leave a Comment

As we head into the Christmas break I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all staff and councillors for their work in the busiest year I can remember for Swansea as a city and as a Council.  In my next blog I hope to recap on some of the events of the year but for those of you who’ll be on leave over Christmas I hope you enjoy your well-earned break.  I’m sending my blog out early this week as I’m conscious our offices close at noon on Friday and some people will be taking leave to finish their preparations for the festivities.

However, a number of our staff won’t be relaxing over the coming week because they’ll be working to maintain vital services during the holiday period and I’m immensely grateful to them for this.

City of Culture

On Tuesday I met Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas AM, Minister for Culture, Tourism and Sport at the Welsh Government, following the disappointment of missing out on the UK City of Culture 2021 title. Tracey McNulty and I shared with him the feedback I mentioned in last week’s blog. There were a lot of positive messages from the panel on the Swansea bid and a plea from the UK Minister for Culture to continue with elements of our proposed programme, irrespective of the decision. We outlined the huge amount of support for our bid, as demonstrated by the excellent social media campaign.  We also explained that our strategy for culture remains in place and we’re keen to work with Welsh Government to develop an approach for Wales that would see Swansea at the forefront of its cultural agenda.

Lord Elis-Thomas expressed his support for this and has invited us to develop our proposals further over the next few weeks, so we’ll be working in earnest with councillors on this. It’s clear the Welsh Government is willing to help us to resource this which is great news for us all.  Watch this space!

City Deal

The City Deal discussions are moving very quickly now and the Joint Working Agreement between us will be signed early in the New Year.  Our teams in Place, Finance and Legal have worked hard on this for many months so thanks to them for their efforts. The Shadow Joint Committee received an update on Monday re progress with the 11 projects and details on how the digital strategy for the region will be delivered.  The aim is to put Swansea and the region in pole position for the roll-out of 5G technology after 2020 and to become one of the UK’s leading Smart Cities and a test-bed for the Internet of Things.  It all sounds a bit weird and far-fetched but just over a decade ago no-one could predict the impact, for good or ill, that smartphones would make to our working and our personal lives. The next generation of digital technology will be at least as disruptive as the last so we’d best prepare to make the best use of it for the benefit of the city and our citizens.

Early intervention

Our Early Intervention staff at Swansea Children’s Centre in Penlan and our Jig-so midwives saved a four-week-old baby’s life last week.  The baby stopped breathing during a group session at the centre and our staff performed CPR and then the air ambulance landed within 10 minutes of the call.  Their intervention helped to make sure that the baby, who is now able to breathe unaided and is improving, got to hospital safely. Fantastic work! Further congratulations to our Early Intervention team who led the Mr X Scheme again this year.  They have put in a huge effort along with community volunteers to ensure that over 4,500 children and young people received gifts this Christmas.

And some lucky children had an early visit from Santa, in the form of our refuse collectors, who kindly took it upon themselves to give out selection boxes to the children who get excited to see them on their route each week. Well done to everyone involved.

Farewell

Thanks to Chris Tonkin, head teacher at Townhill Community Primary School, who’s retiring.  I wish Chris all the best for the future and we’re grateful for all your work in improving the school and the lives of the children in Townhill.

Budget top of the agenda

by Leave a Comment

Our budget proposals were approved by Cabinet yesterday and they’ll soon go out for consultation with the public.

The feedback from the public will be important in helping Cabinet make final decisions around February. It’s also important that staff get involved in these discussions. The recent staff roadshows have been well attended and have given Heads of Service and Directors the opportunity set out our priorities and budget situation. Hopefully managers will be discussing how these proposals affect their teams and services in team meetings in the coming weeks.

I know these proposals mean changes and reductions in services and this will inevitably cause concerns among staff. We’re committed to doing everything we can to minimise the impact on staff, although every year is becoming more difficult to avoid compulsory job losses. If you have any concerns please speak to your manager.

Culture feedback

We’ve had some initial feedback on our City of Culture bid. The judging panel said the quality of the bids was so high that all the cities could have delivered a fantastic year – but fine judgements had to be made in choosing a winning city. On the positives they highlighted our youth leadership as a real bonus and opportunity; Swansea is a great place – and city of culture is clearly the right vehicle for the city – our commitment to youth is good, and they praised the drive and energy of the bid team. They recognised that ‘cultural leadership’ in the council was strong but felt we needed to do more work to build the capacity both within and outside the council which to help deliver something on this scale and create a broader impact.

Appointment

Last week I was appointed to take on the role of lead Chief Executive for ERW, our regional school improvement consortium.  The consortium covers Swansea, NPT, Carmarthen, Pembrokeshire, Powys and Ceredigion. The aim is to work together to improve teaching and learning to secure the best outcomes for all learners. I know this won’t be an easy task and from my discussions with teachers and colleagues in our education service I’m conscious that there’s much to be done over the coming months.

Homeless event

Congratulations to all the councillors, officers and volunteers who helped make Tuesday’s event at the Brangwyn Hall such a success. More than 200 homeless and vulnerable people attended and ate a hearty dinner served up by the Leader and his colleagues. Tenancy and health advice were also on hand along with free haircuts. I was particularly pleased to see that counterfeit jumpers confiscated by our Trading Standards team were handed out on the day. Congratulations to Rhys Harries and the Trading Standards team for that. It was also lovely to see an anonymous donation of sleeping bags – thank you, whoever you are! I spoke to a number of people who attended the event and they were universally grateful for the team effort. A number had quite harrowing stories of loneliness, isolation and extreme poverty that reinforced the message that homelessness is not just a problem in winter and at Christmas but an issue for us all year round.

Long service

A number of staff have recently reached 40 years’ service, which is an amazing achievement: Ieuan Pelzer, Gary Cornell, Paul Conipane (all Corporate Building Maintenance), Charles Davies (Glynn Vivian), Julia Incebel (Grand Theatre), Paul Parcell (Construction), Paul Griffiths (Drainage and Coastal Management), Patricia Joslyn (Road Safety), Gethyn Havard (Area 1 Team), Jeanette Lewis (Business Support), Sheila Watts (Cleaning) and Sheila Lewis (Penyrheol Comprehensive). Thank you for all your hard work and support during the past four decades.

Christmas jumpers

Thanks to everyone who took part in the HR annual Christmas quiz. There were some pretty spectacular Christmas jumpers on show and even a visit from Santa!  Teams taking part raised almost £300 for Save the Children which is great.  The quiz was part of Save the Children’s Christmas Jumper Day and I’m sure staff across the council will be wearing some outrageous jumpers today.

 

A Curate’s Egg

by 2 Comments

The latest staff survey results are now published and as usual they throw up a largely pleasing, but mixed picture of views.

Pleasingly, staff perception of the council as a whole has improved compared to previous years and the vast majority of areas have improved and a few have stayed the same. Here’s a selection of results, but full details are via this link:

  • 80% of staff would recommend the council as a place to work, up 5%.
  • 83% say the council is committed to improving service delivery, up 5%.
  • 72% say the council has a clear vision about where it is going and what it wants to achieve, up 8%.

On the issue of bullying the number of incidents have decreased, although there’s a 1% increase in incidents experienced by staff from services users. However, 61% who experienced harassment, bullying or abuse did not report it which is 2% less than last year.

A big concern for me is a third of staff have not had an appraisal in the last 12 months. In the coming weeks Corporate Management Team will be considering how we deal with this, including a review of our on-line appraisal system, and Leadership Team will be developing plans to respond to the survey results.

Thanks to the 2,182 people who completed the survey providing a 26% response rate – 2% more than last year.

To further promote ‘staff wellbeing’ we’re holding a Big Wellbeing Event on January 31 at the Brangwyn Hall.  The event will include wellbeing-themed stalls along with council services stalls and charity stalls.  There’ll be talks throughout the day from renowned speakers and taster workshops you can get involved in.  Details will be advertised shortly.

Staff Roadshows

We’re holding a series of roadshows starting next week to talk with you about the council’s priorities for the coming year and the forthcoming budget.
The roadshow will take the form of a presentation delivered by senior members of staff and will also provide an opportunity to ask questions.
Please make every effort to attend one of these sessions to be able to have your say on our budget proposals, and get a clearer understanding of our approach to meeting the challenges facing the council in the future.

Awards

The awards keep on coming in and it’s a brilliant reflection of our staff and the work they do. In the last few days alone, we’ve had these:

Swansea Museum has been granted full accredited status by the Accreditation Panel appointed by Arts Council England.  Congratulations and thanks go to Barry Hughes and the team.

There was great news from one of the public sector’s most prominent awards events on Tuesday night – our Team Around the Family in Schools (TIS) programme won the Learning and Development category of the prestigious Guardian Public Service Awards 2017. Congratulations to all involved! This prize is tremendous recognition for a genuinely innovative, practical and effective service. You can read the Guardian story on TIS.

The Morfa Distributor Road won the Environmental Sustainability Award at the CIHT (Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation) Wales awards.  Congratulations to the Highways and Transportation team for their hard work and determination on this project.

And we won the ACES 2017 Award for Excellence for the Accommodation Strategy/Agile programme. ACES is the Association of Chief Estates and Property Managers in the public sector with 300 member organisations.   The new agile space in the Civic Centre has more than 200 plus staff working in 141 work spaces. This has freed-up more than 2,000 square metres of space. Significantly, sickness rates for staff working in the agile area hasvereduced from an average of 5 days per person to 0.2 days for the same period last year. Congratulations to Becky Jones and the team. For a second I thought it was Alan Carr presenting the award!

School visits

On a visit to Casllwchwr Primary School I met head teacher, Peter Owen, and Councillor Christine Richards.  It’s a great school in a fabulous setting and is one of the happiest schools I’ve been to.  I met the children who had lots of questions about what’s happening in the city and the work we do.

The school’s road safety committee raised concerns over the loss of their school crossing patrol.  Fortunately, Councillor Richards has a plan to lower the speed limit and introduce a “puffin” crossing from her budget and I promised the children we’d do the work as quickly as we could. Thanks to all at the school for the warm welcome.

I also visited Blaenymaes Primary School to meet with pupils Ethan, Mia and Isaac and hear about the rights respecting work they’ve done.  They also told me about their recent meeting with Hillary Clinton that I wrote about earlier this month. Thanks to head teacher Mark Dennis and Helen Spencer who explained the important work she’s doing with families in the area.

Gower power

It’s not just Dylan Thomas who says Swansea is the best place – celebrities, journalists and visitors from all over the UK are heaping praise on glorious Gower.

TV presenter Sean Fletcher has fallen for Britain’s first Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty big-time and his story featured in the latest edition of the best-selling Countryfile magazine. The eight-page feature is just one of the ways our Tourism team pulls out all the stops to encourage people to visit.

And it’s all part of the countdown to next year’s ‘Year of the Sea’ theme, part of a Wales-wide initiative to celebrate our coastal culture, in which the team will be highlighting Swansea’s beautiful, award-winning coastline.