Budget setting in progress

The sunset last Friday, on what was a sad week for me, was completely brilliant.

Friday night's sunset

It marked the end of the first week for my father without his wife of many decades and the end of our first week of him living with us. The dog is already enjoying the extra attention he gives her and he is relishing some blue skies. 

Saturday's sky

This working week I have been concentrating on another key part of my role facilitating the democratic process and in particular the setting of a legal budget. In truth, the development of the way forward for our corporate plan and a budget which meets the constrained resources at our disposal has been underway for many months.  

Indeed, in this blog I have made reference and added links to our budget consultation exercise ‘Stop, Start, Change’ and our animation spelling out where the money comes from and what it is spent on. But the process of 54 councillors meeting their obligations to set a legal budget culminates in Budget Council and this took place last night, Thursday 26 February.  

Budget Council at Hove Town Hall

The Council

At Budget Council 

This year we were faced with a very complex set of options for members, namely three alternative budgets to be discussed with 14 amendments tabled in advance. A lengthy and open debate on the amendments and the substantive proposals took place between 4.30pm and 11pm.  

However, despite a number of adjournments and constructive discussions between Group Leaders, there was no basis for a majority agreement by that time of the night and the meeting was adjourned until Tuesday 3 March at 4pm. I very much hope that the constructive discussions that began last night will end up in forming a new alternative budget resolution which can find majority favour and enable us to set a legal budget within the required time scale.  

In practice the decision needs to be taken and the relevant papers prepared for the printers by Thursday 5 March. The law requires the decision to have been made by Tuesday 10 March. The strongly held and differing opinions in the chamber reflect very well the strongly held and differing views of our residents when they are consulted and so coming to agreement is necessarily difficult and will require some compromise. The whole process underlines the demanding responsibilities on our elected members to be both representatives and leaders of their communities and citizens. Our role, as officers, is to support them to fulfil these obligations and it is important that I end by recognising the fantastic hard work of colleagues in the unsung areas of finance, legal services, democratic services and communications, not forgetting my own talented and committed Executive Leadership Team.  

At a recent ELT meeting

Throughout our work we seek to behave in line with our organisational values and to fulfil the obligations of our work objectives enabling the council to play its part in making this city a fantastic place to live, work and visit. 

Best wishes
Penny

Pride in our public service

Hello everyone

As an alternative to today's rainy sky, this was last Friday's walk to work

Care from our public services
I have to start this week with the sad Valentine’s day I spent with my father, dealing with the death of my dear stepmother Helen, from Alzheimer's. The relationship of this event to work is that for the short term at least, I have become the carer of a carer. After two years of devoted caring for my declining stepmother, my father is exhausted and sad. His achievement of care at home and a peaceful death in her own bed for the woman he loved for more than 40 years was enormously aided by a whole range of public servants. And as we left the registrars on Tuesday, he commented that every single public servant from the assistant registrar to the carers who recently started helping him with her personal care, to the GP and myriad of others, have all been quite fantastic. This is an accolade for services in East Sussex but it is also an accolade for public services more generally. It goes to the heart of why I am a dedicated public servant and proud of what we achieve every day. The services that our staff and partners give, are critical to sustaining a civilised society. And let's not forget the volunteers (of whom Helen was one) whose contribution is often unsung yet so key to making the challenges in the cycle of life manageable.

When I went into public service I remember one of my university tutors writing and congratulating me. I hope that university tutors would still do that nowadays, but I rather wonder. As a local authority we ensure and assure a wide range of services and functions. Whether it's seafront services ensuring the safety of those caught unaware by the ferocity of the sea; social care staff enabling a dying citizen to achieve their wish to die at home; or council tax staff who ensure we receive the necessary payments to contribute to supporting the £2.1 million we spend each day on the 800 or so services we provide.

Seafront services on Hove promenade

Our customer service centre at Bartholomew House

A speedy response
Another key area of public service that I want to raise this week is that of refuse and recycling. I am delighted by the speedy clear up following on from last week’s industrial action. It’s not just me that has noticed, so thank you. I have also received a number of supportive messages on twitter following the super quick removal of some graffiti that I had drawn to my attention at the end of last week. Again this public service is noticed and makes a big difference.

The graffiti before it was removed 

A festival to celebrate
Finally I wanted to end on an optimistic and on celebratory note. On Wednesday night the programme for 2015 Brighton Festival was launched. This year the guest director is novelist Ali Smith. As ever, the programme, including the Children’s festival, looks eclectic and exciting. And culture is vital to wellbeing and happiness, so I for one am going to start planning some cultural events for May and I encourage you to do the same.

The 2015 Brighton Festival brochure - get your copy around the city

Keeping our city running, together
So coming back to my theme of public service, I would like to thank everybody who works for and with local authorities, whether in health, the police or the private and community and voluntary sectors. It’s our shared effort that keeps our city running with vital services for citizens and support to the vibrant economy of the city. We must work together, and in tough financial times prioritise, find new ways of doing things, and be prepared to be open and share our resources and responsibilities with citizens and communities.

Best wishes
Penny

Safe and secure

The sun shone this morning reminding me that all week we’ve had a dull, cold February without much sun and so here's a picture of this morning’s brightness.

A glimpse of sunshine

Visiting the Brighton Centre

The last time I recall seeing the sun was at the weekend and particularly on Friday afternoon when I visited the Brighton Centre and met with Ian Hardy and Howard Barden. We reviewed how we are working together on plans for the seafront, including exciting waterfront developments that will eventually see a new conference centre and arena down at Black Rock. It was a delight to meet members of the management team to look around the building and to see a conference gathering momentum while I was there.  Keeping the business flourishing through this time of planning and change is at the forefront of Howard and Ian’s minds and keeping the building safe and secure is one of the constant challenges to the whole team, and they do it very well.  

Howard, Carrie, Colin, me, Rebecca, Michael, Ian

Being vigilant

Keeping our buildings, staff and citizens safe and secure has been a theme of this week and I have reminded everybody to be vigilant, recognising the heightened security threat level announced by the government recently, particularly in respect of police and our Jewish community. But the message of being safe and secure and remaining vigilant is equally one for all of us; so simple things such as always wearing our council ID, not allowing people to tailgate when we come through secure entrances and following our intuition if we have concerns, are all important things to do.

All talk and no vote

Running a fair and open election process is also on my mind and this week I met with my deputy returning officers to particularly focus on the workforce plan for the elections.  We have also started a campaign to raise awareness of the importance of registering to vote 'All talk and no vote'. I am really keen that the hard won vote is something that should be exercised by all eligible citizens and, of course, registration is essential to allow that to happen. So far the campaign does seems to be having an impact and citizens are busy adding their names to the electoral register.

One of our adverts on the side of a bus

Meeting our unions

On Tuesday I met with the branch secretaries for GMB (Mark) and Unison (Alex), at their request, to review the state of our industrial relations. From my perspective it’s important that we keep open channels for communication and maintain a respectful relationship that allows us to discuss and agree over differences. Despite a number of individual issues at the moment, ours was an open and good natured meeting. It’s important to me that we have a well led organisation with good industrial relations characterised by openness and respect and, ultimately, a commitment to working together.

Me with Mark and Alex

Redefining how we work

Over the coming months and years, how the council, communities and citizens work together will need to be redefined.  We will have to learn how to enable volunteers to have more autonomy in supporting their communities. One of many examples of this is happening already is in Hollingdean where some active citizens want to be able to open the Children’s Centre as a community building at weekends. I met with Valerie Foucher and Yvonne Rivers to review how this work is going with Steve Barton, head of service, Sam Warren, city neighbourhood co-ordinator and Richard Tuset, head of policy and communities. The news was encouraging and we had a really stimulating discussion about a collaborative agreement with citizens being at the heart of new ways of working. 

Richard, Sam, Steve, Valerie and Yvonne

Restoring Saltdean Lido

Another example of collaborative working was the meeting with the community interest company for Saltdean Lido fronted by its chair, Rebecca Crook, and Bridget Fishleigh. Local citizens have formed a Community Interest Company (CIC) and successfully bid to restore and run the magnificent Saltdean Lido. It’s clear that the council was not in a position to ensure such an outcome for Saltdean Lido without collaborative working. The CIC has taken on the challenge of securing a safe future for a wonderful building and a fabulous leisure offer for an important part of our city, namely Saltdean. We wish them well. 

Rebecca and Bridget

From the Lido archives

Providing employment

Many of us want to see Able and Willing become a flourishing business for many years to come. It provides employment for learning disabled adults and makes and sells important promotional and embroidered products. It is clear that this will need some continued support from us but it also needs a business plan that can support commercial independence. We held a meeting this week with two members of the business community who want to assist with advice and support. We agreed that they should join our monthly meeting and help it become a Support and Challenge board with the aim of Able and Willing becoming a viable business. I am grateful to them for volunteering to bring their expertise and commitment. We see this business as playing an important part in our strategy for people with a learning disability and achieving their aspirations to be able to live, work and play independently.

Geoff White, Able and Willing business manager

Being safe and secure means adapting to circumstances, taking new opportunities, seeing and mitigating new threats. Look out for yourselves and one another and I hope we see a bit of that sun that peaked out this morning over the weekend.

Best wishes
Penny

Working together

As regular readers will know, every day I am delighted and entranced by the seascapes I see as I walk to work. 

Seafront on Tuesday morning

Walking in on Wednesday morning

City Management Board

Tuesday was no exception, as I walked along our seafront to meet with partners in the City Management Board at Jubilee Library. The main focus of our discussion was the way forward; how we respond to the demography, finance and policy challenges that we all face. There was complete agreement across police, universities, health service and council that our agenda of working together with our common vision is the only approach that is going to get us through tough times. Encouragingly, we are all committed to promoting wellbeing, resilience and aspiration and we share a joined up view of public service. We all see a bigger role for volunteering and would very much like to see public service volunteers working across neighbourhoods and communities supported by all the public service organisations of the city.

First joint meeting

Working together sums up the spirit of the first joint meeting of the Health & Wellbeing Board and the Children & Young people’s committee that took place at Hove Town hall on Tuesday afternoon. Councillors, senior health representatives, parents, carers and young people came together to hear about and approve a strategy for joined up services for children with educational special needs or with disabilities. 

Regan Delf presenting the first strategy

Then we went agreed a strategy for adults with learning disabilities which came out of an independent review of services. Both pieces of work involved those who use services and carers and parents. Both pieces of work had the needs and aspirations of service users at their centre and both pieces of work firmly committed us to joining up services and personalising them. The two reports were approved unanimously and set us on a course of making changes.  These changes will improve the experience of service users and will make better use of our resources. It really was a very encouraging meeting and I was moved by the degree of support and agreement for both plans. 

Mark Hendricks presenting the second strategy

Adult Social Care conference

Working together could also have been the theme of the Adult Social Care provider conference that I opened on Wednesday. This annual meeting of staff from across adult social care who work directly with older people, with those with a disability, including a learning disability, is now a firm fixture in my calendar. The session considered change and uncertainty and it also celebrated achievements. 

At the ASC provider conference

Karen Divall presenting at the conference

A highlight for me was Dr Tom Scanlon’s presentation on happiness and mental wellbeing. He left us with a message that a key to happiness is CLANG. CLANG stands for: Connected; Learning; Active; Noticing; Giving.

Dr Tom Scanlon at the conference

Service redesign

Continuing with the theme of working together, I have been encouraged by the tremendous work taking place to develop proposals for service redesign for Refuse Recycling and Parks Services. I know that many staff, as well as external experts, have been engaged with the work. Colleagues from the Executive Leadership Team gave constructive feedback one evening this week. I hope that the proposals will be seen as providing for a secure and efficient future. So it’s very disappointing that we continue a dispute with a small number of drivers who are going to withdraw their labour for a few hours next week and continue a work to rule. I am disappointed that they have not accepted the independent job evaluation. And I am sorry that this action is continuing to undermine the attempts of managers and the vast majority of the staff to demonstrate the reliable service that we want the city to value and recognise. We remain willing to talk to the trade union and its small number of members affected by this dispute.

Budget proposals for 2015/16

Finally we have worked with the administration and leaders of the opposition parties to develop this year’s budget proposals. The budget has been developed alongside the corporate plan and sets out the future purpose, principles, values and priorities for the council. Whichever council tax increase is chosen (0%, 2% or 5.9%), there will be a significant reduction in our budget and changes in the way we do things. We would want to make some of these changes anyway. The two reviews that I mentioned earlier are examples of that. The budget will be considered by Policy & Resources committee next Thursday but final decisions will not be taken until Budget Council on Thursday 26 February.

Thank you for continuing to work together.

Penny