Issue - meetings

TO RECEIVE THE LEADER OF THE COUNCIL’S ANNUAL REPORT AND FORWARD WORK PROGRAMME.

Meeting: 15/05/2019 - County Council (Item 9)

9 TO RECEIVE THE LEADER OF THE COUNCIL’S ANNUAL REPORT 2018-19 pdf icon PDF 3 MB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Leader presented his Annual Report 2018-2019 which looked back upon the achievements of the Council over the past 12 months. 

 

This was the Leader’s fourth Annual Report and he reflected on what he considered had been a very busy time for everyone with lots of events, progress and change particularly with the uncertainty of Brexit which had created political instability at both national and local level. In spite of this he expressed delight that the leadership in Carmarthenshire, between the Plaid Cymru Group and the Independent Group, was firm and determined to do the best for local communities. 

He reminded Council that at the start of the current administration he had announced a 5-year plan with almost 100 key projects and programmes that would contribute towards improving the economic, environmental, social and cultural well-being of the residents and communities of Carmarthenshire. The Annual Report noted the progress made to date by each department of the Council. Members were apprised of some of the developments and projects that had been completed or were in the pipeline which demonstrated that Carmarthenshire was leading the way, full of ambition, to make the most for residents, communities and visitors. These included:

 

Space Maker project at Ammanford libraries;Toy Box at Christmas;             50+ Forum; Culture Awards; Supporting new small businesses; Youth ambassadors; Enterprise Support [Coaltown Coffee, Ammanford]; Buckley Site for Housing; A snapshot program with 6th form pupils; Promoting rural businesses; Letting Housing; Period Poverty; First Step; Sports Awards;

The Leader introduced the new ‘mini’ executive board members made up of 10 local school children who would be shadowing their ‘senior’ counterparts and emphasised the need to ensure that future generations had good work opportunities, supportive communities, and great places to enjoy as they grew up and raised their own families.

 

Reference was made to pupil successes in GCSEs, the National Baccalaureate and performance at key stage 5 for pupils aged 16-18 and the Leader extended his thanks to all the Headteachers and staff within the county’s schools for the care, guidance and education that they delivered to their pupils. He also expressed his pleasure to see progress in the Welsh in Education Strategic Plan and the desire to move all the county's schools along the language continuum. It was hoped that this would enable as many young people as possible in Carmarthenshire to be fully bilingual by the time they left school. He added that as a Council the progress on the education modernisation programme was pleasing with projects totalling £20m having been completed in the last 12 months. This latest investment had seen new facilities and improvements at St. John Lloyd, Ysgol Parc y Tywyn, Ysgol Pontyberem and phase 1 of the work at Ysgol Llangadog. There would be further investment of £ 4.1m over the next year at Five Roads School with other projects due to start at Gorslas School, Pembrey School and Ysgol Rhys Prichard.

 

The Leader referred to a number of high profile events held in Carmarthenshire  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9


Meeting: 16/05/2018 - County Council (Item 9)

9 LEADER OF THE COUNCIL’S ANNUAL REPORT 2017-18 pdf icon PDF 831 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Leader presented his Annual Report 2017-2018, copies of which were made available at the meeting, which looked back upon the achievements of the Council over the past 12 months. 

 

This was the Leader’s third Annual Report but his first since the 2017 elections which had seen a change in the balance of power within the council. He reflected upon the fact that this time last year he had welcomed 29 new faces to the benches of the council chamber which represented over a third of the total number of councillors. Whilst, over the last year there had been many training sessions and induction seminars, it was hoped that the new members had a much better understanding of the ways of local government and were better equipped to take crucial decisions over the remaining four years of this council. He expressed the hope that this council would have a lifespan beyond the four years left of this current term.

 

Referring to the recurring theme of austerity the Leader commented that financial efficiencies had been sought in every aspect of the council’s work and he was full of admiration for the staff of the council for coming up with a whole host of innovative money saving ideas. However, services had been pared to the bone and it was now becoming virtually impossible to continue protecting front line services. It was hoped that the impending retirement of the First Minister would lead to a change in emphasis and that local government would be protected from further cuts. Nevertheless although it had been a difficult time much had happened in Carmarthenshire over the last 12 months that made it possible to feel very positive about the future.

 

The Leader referred to the aims of the TIC Programme to think differently, behave differently and through that also act differently. To date it had helped to identify and achieve some £12m worth of savings in terms of actual money and saving costs. Many improvements were happening across the Authority in parallel with the TIC Programme and last year, with a desire to acknowledge and reward that, the TIC Awards ceremony had been launched July. Five inspired projects had been placed on the shortlist and the overall winner had been the Housing Options Team for the way in which it had improved its systems for giving a wide range of advice to the people who need housing. TIC had also supported a key corporate initiative for digital transformation encompassing the ‘changing channel’ programmes in order to expand the way in which residents could interact with services by creating an account and managing services online. A key initiative with regard to flexible working had also been launched that would make better use of the authority’s offices and technology allowing staff more flexibility in working and providing services. To help schools to make savings in order to safeguard the attainment of pupils and education a specific TIC post for schools had been created and a programme of work  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9


 

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