Madam Mayor
I should like to begin by paying thanks to my cabinet, policy advisors, and back-bench colleagues for the support they have provided me over the past year.
I would also like to pay tribute to our Chief Executive and Senior Management Team who have done all they can to help deliver our agenda. Indeed we should be grateful to officers at all levels who have worked hard to serve our residents during what is a very difficult period for local government. The constructive relationship between the management team, staff and Unison has been an essential part in finding our way ahead. As the numbers of staff employed have reduced many of those who remain have needed to deal with increased workloads whilst having their pay levels frozen. We are most grateful to our officers who have embraced change and done their best to deliver improved customer service with a cheerful smile.
Let us remember at this time of the challenges faced by the UK. The former Labour Government left office having spent the country into massive debt. For every £4 being spent £1 was from borrowing. As a country the debt amounts to over £16000 for every man, woman and child.
As elected representatives of our community we must steer Worthing through these difficult times. Having already announced a 28% cut in local authority spending power the coalition government are now warning of yet deeper cuts to come.
With this backdrop it is perhaps surprising to have read so many positive headlines about our town over the past year. These have come from both national and regional publications.
It is customary at this time for me to say how well we have done whilst the opposition group tell us how dire things have become.
So for a change I thought I would start with a précis of what others are saying about our town:
In April last year the Retail Gazette highlighted Worthing and Stirling as the two top towns bucking the national trend for retail gloom. It reported a 17.6% increase in Worthing’s shopper numbers in the previous month.
In June readers of the Times learnt of Worthing’s charms in a report which said Worthing has escaped the economic woes that have beset a number of South Coast towns.
In July Sussex Society Magazine reporter Katy Rice described Worthing as “the South Coast town on the up”. She said “a revamped Worthing could soon be giving Brighton a run for its money as the hippest destination on the South Coast.” In the same article one local business owner said “Worthing is really buzzing at the moment” and another said “Worthing just wasn’t working a decade ago – It was a ghost town when we first came here. But now there is buoyancy, a feeling that things are happening, that Worthing is on the up”
In August the Brighton Argos featured a report which said “Worthing has it all” it want on to praise our revamped sea front, our vibrant atmosphere, our beautiful parks and gardens and the new café culture in the town centre.
In October the London Evening Standard said “Worthing’s no longer the wallflower, this South Coast commuter town is now fighting its corner with some prize winning architecture”
Then in November Etc Magazine’s Kelly Wickham explained why Worthing is ready to step out of Brighton’s shadow and claim its place as one of the best seaside resorts on the South Coast.
Finally in January the Worthing Herald led with the following headline – Town Looks Forward To An Exciting Year.
So why are these things being said and what part have this council played?
The Council has delivered a sizeable programme of improvements over the past 12 months.
We have adopted new Corporate Priorities which focus on change including more entrepreneurship and external funding bids.
Following last years local election count I announced that officers were off to France to bid for funding. Whilst this was seen by many as a long shot we were delighted to receive around £170k from the European 2 Seas Programme. The majority of this money will be used to support Tourism, businesses, and the visitor economy in Worthing. The remainder will be used to enhance the new play area planned for the active beach zone. The required match funding will be met from our existing budgets.
The regeneration of Splash Point has been completed and I understand the scheme has been shortlisted for an award by the Civic Trust.
The £600k Pier Pavilion Roof renewal project continues. Whilst some delays have been caused by the weather and theatre productions we hope to see the scaffold removed so the building is in its full glory in time for the summer.
At Palatine Park we look forward to seeing the £1.4m investment in eight new football pitches together with a state of the art club house which will be handed over to Worthing Town Youth Football Club. This for me is a classic Big Society project with so many of the club trainers being community volunteers.
Another example of the Big Society has been seen at Brooklands Park where the passion and drive of community volunteers lead by Lyn Aaron-Ferringo has been rewarded. The unique We Cycle Too project costing £200,000 was funded by West Sussex County Council’s Aiming High for Disabled Children programme. Your council provided the land and officer resource to make the dream a reality. The specialist bicycles are for hire to organisations, schools and families with children with disabilities. There are various bicycles, including ones where children can be seated on a bike with their parent or personal assistant. For many of these children it may be their first experience of cycling! There is a purpose built 400m track with a choice of long or short routes. An extra 12 blue badge car parking spaces with full accessibility has also been created. This wonderful facility is a credit to Lyn and her team with visitors travelling long distances to participate.
Last summer saw the opening of the new sand volleyball courts in Beach House Park. An innovative arrangement with a local business owner has seen these facilities operate with no subsidy required from your council. During the year further funding was obtained for improved fencing.
The opening of the Waterwise play area on West Parade since nicknamed by locals as ‘Shark Park’ has encouraged other community groups to campaign for further new and improved play areas. These include the Homefield Park Community Action Group and Selden Kids In Play. The councils external funding manager is working with these groups to identify finance with the parks team helping and encouraging the community volunteers.
The play parks in Queen Street and at Tarring Rec were completed with the aid for external funding bids.
The new Durrington Community Centre has opened its doors and I understand local residents are delighted with the new facilities.
Improvements in our Leisure Centres have continued with the newly refurbished fitness suite and café at Worthing Leisure Centre. The Leisure section has also been busy making bids for external finance and this has resulted in awards totalling £126,000 over the past year. We now have 5140 members of our Fit4 scheme, an increase of 16% over the previous year. This has increased income by £220,000 whilst increasing the fitness levels of many of our residents. A recent open day at the Aquarena saw 367 new memberships – almost one for every minute of the open day!
I have no doubt that this success is being driven by the replacement Aquarena Project. After many years of discussion it is finally becoming a reality with ground works complete we are now starting to see structures emerge. Whilst recent cold weather has seen concrete pouring paused we are still on track to open in the Spring of next year. In these difficult times this major capital expenditure is boosting local employment and creating confidence from others in the private sector. We hope to see construction of the steel frame begin in the next few weeks.
Your council’s climate change officer has obtained interest free funding to improve energy efficiency and co2 emissions in our buildings. Sixteen schemes have been completed with another 18 planned. Projects such as LED lighting, voltage optimisation, and modern building management systems are all moving us in the right direction. The Environmental Protection Team has obtained funding from DEFRA for a Nitrogen Dioxide Monitor which has recently been installed near the Grove Lodge roundabout. The Cities Outlook 2012 report published recently by the Centre for Cities shows Worthing with the joint third lowest co2 emissions per capita when compared with 64 major urban areas.
Your Council has again provided sponsorship and in-kind assistance for high profile and popular events such as Worthing Birdman, the Steyne Gardens Ice Rink, and Worthing Open Houses. Attendance at the Ice Rink was disappointing again this year resulting in a significant financial operating loss. However, as Ice Skating is still very popular with some of our younger residents we are in early discussions with another company who may provide us with a larger covered rink next winter without any requirement for taxpayer subsidy.
Planning consent was granted for major schemes at Teville Gate and West Durrington. When complete the West Durrington housing development will provide over 200 affordable housing units which we all know are urgently needed. On the subject of affordable housing work is well advanced on 51 affordable units on the old Columbia Drive St Barnabas site.
Between October 2010 and October 2011 a net 14 empty homes have been brought back to use mainly as a result of work by the Empty Property Officer. We propose to increase officer resource in this area in order to speed up this process.
The economic climate has seen a continued increase in Housing Benefit claimants. I am pleased to report the successful implementation of new legislation together with improved claim turn-around times.
Savings have been delivered by bringing graffiti removal in house with excellent service standards maintained.
The Adur/Worthing Family Intervention Project has expanded its remit and is now rolling out the scheme across the rest of West Sussex. The criteria for the scheme has been amended to work specifically with families within the most deprived wards and super output areas.
The Worthing Wellbeing Hub has been successfully setup. Funded by Public Health and managed by the council this is a new service aimed at improving local people’s health and wellbeing, particularly in our areas of most need. We are also busy developing new exciting projects funded through this money to tackle cardio-vascular disease and cancer. The transfer of these functions to the local authority is to be welcomed.
Work on the Accommodation Strategy continues as we focus on moving from three to two administrative buildings. We are looking to embrace new ways of working with flexible office space and home working. Officers and members have visited council offices in Brighton and Eastbourne to learn from their recent experiences.
The Tourist Information Centre has moved to its new permanent home utilising one of the vacant shops at the Dome. We plan to increase the retail offer in order to defray the costs of this important service for visitors. A new front counter and refurbished shop have also been provided at the Museum.
There have been continued calls from retailers and residents for cheaper town centre parking. In response to this parking is now available on Saturday’s for only 50p per hour at the Civic Centre Car Park.
Following discussions with the Leader of WSCC Worthing has been allocated £800k of infrastructure funding. Whilst this is not as much as I hoped or asked for it still represents one of the largest awards to district and borough partners.
We have done everything possible to try and assist Worthing College with their planned move to the vacant Aviva site. Members will know that the college has already failed to secure two previous bids for redevelopment. Having been so badly let down by the Learning Skills Council they are left educating 1600 students in a facility originally designed for only 600. Many of the students are being educated in temporary huts which should have been demolished decades ago. Following discussions with the college it became apparent that the s.106 planning contributions required were making the move unviable.
With this in mind I asked West Sussex County Council to direct £500k of the infrastructure fund to assist the college with its plans. However, with no government funding towards the development I understand the viability of the scheme still remains on a knife edge. I very much hope the college will be successful but should the scheme fail to gain planning consent later this month I have been assured that the £500k of infrastructure funding will return to Worthing for another project.
Amongst my other requests to West Sussex County Council was the long awaited repaving of Montague Street. When trying to attract big name stores to Worthing I am often told that investors are dissuaded by the street scene with negative comments about the shabby paving which is inferior to that provided in almost every other West Sussex shopping centre. The £300k allocated for the town centre will not cover the entire cost. I asked the County Council Local Committee to consider allocating unspent s.106 highway contributions to bridge the gap but it appears they have set their priorities elsewhere. Therefore, we are in discussion with partners to see how the money can best be spent to boost visits to the town centre. I am very keen to see this funding spent as soon as possible.
In a bid to reduce the Theatres budget and in response to the publics wish to see all the current venues continue a procurement process was launched seeking external operators. Despite a number of innovative bids the cross party working group overseeing the process concluded that none of the bidders could deliver the required savings in the first few years. Indeed the bids increased the budget subsidy required with most proposing closure of one or more of the venues. For this reason we have tasked our new senior management team with preparing a business plan which will reduce the budget by at least 25%. The first step will be to bring catering back in house which according to market data should produce a very significant bottom line improvement. In principle agreement has also been reached to allow the community backed Worthing Theatres Trust an advisory role in the future of the venues.
I have recently attended the first meeting of the Worthing and Adur trust which has been set up to bring advice from community trustees whilst allowing them to work with the external funding officer to seek external monies which would not be available to a local government authority. Whilst the intention was to focus on one or two small areas initially the meeting saw our new trustees full of ideas and enthusiasm in many areas of the council’s business. I look forward to working alongside them.
The cross party community engagement taskforce has been working with the Worthing Youth Council. Following Cabinet discussions last year on how we can develop a local approach to the Big Society, the Task Force has helped to oversee the production of the A&W Big Society Action Plan which was approved in early February.
It recognises and promotes the role of the Council not just as a provider of services, but as a key agent for change in our communities. For example the opportunity we have to promote volunteering; supporting the voluntary and community sector; increasing work experience and training opportunities for our young people through placements and apprenticeships; engaging with our communities in new ways through social media; and to support the rehabilitation of offenders through community payback schemes.
Turning now to next year’s budget.
The table shown on page 10 of the draft revenue budget shows our core government grant has further reduced to £5.248m. On looking back at the 2010 budget papers the figure was £7.95m. This brings into sharp focus the size of the budget challenge we have been required to meet in order to assist the Coalition Government in dealing with the national debt. As I have already said it is even more worrying to hear that even deeper cuts may now be heading our way.
Whilst we need to play our part I have questioned the fairness of the formula used to calculate Worthing’s grant. I have met and discussed these concerns with Secretary of State Eric Pickles and separately with Local Government Minister, Andrew Stunnel. I have written to Bob Neill to ask how it is fair that Brighton & Hove grant funding is £452 per resident, Eastbourne’s is £319 whilst Worthing’s is only £204.
I am sorry to report that these actions have not produced any improvement in the grant for 2012/3 but I have received assurances that the data used in the formula, some of which dates back several years, will be refreshed. I hope this together with the 2011 Census results will see Worthing’s current needs reflected in future settlements.
Our partnership with Adur District Council has once again allowed us to meet this year’s budget challenge with no cuts to services. The partnership has recently reported total savings in excess of £10m. For the next municipal year Worthing has benefitted from its share of new savings amounting to approximately £1m per annum.
To help hard pressed taxpayers we have kept our promise to freeze council tax for the second year running. This pledge was made in April last year since which the Government has helpfully offered to cover the first years cost. However, this unexpected grant will drop away next year. Therefore our work this year will stand us in good stead for the difficult future ahead.
The budget contains growth bids which are essentially investments to create future savings and income. These include additional hours for the External Funding Officer, The mainstreaming of one Business transformation and one Energy and climate change officer.
With regard to the proposed Council Tax for the Borough for the forthcoming year, I would remind the Council that Worthing’s average (ie. What people actually pay) Council Tax per household is already the lowest in West Sussex and it should remain so.
I would like to thank the Officers, particularly Sarah Gobey and her team, who under enormous pressure from Governmental policy have helped us produce an extremely helpful budget for 2012/13.
I would also like to congratulate the Cabinet member for Resources for his excellent work on the budget and for helping myself and other Cabinet colleagues to set priorities.
I’m grateful to the Cabinet for the diligence they have shown in maintaining and improving services within their portfolios.
Madam Mayor, colleagues and Members, I now move the adoption of the Civic Budget and the formal Tax Resolution as set out in the papers before you.