You can read about the record-levels of public feedback, which we received to the consultation on our draft proposals, in this earlier blog-post and the links therein.
The actual Reports for the Budget debate are now all available on-line via here, along with the Coalition Motion.
I think the motion speaks for itself ... and it will now be debated at the Budget Day Council Meeting, 10am on Thursday 21st January, to be webcast here.
There's just no doubt that, for the whole 17-years I've been a local Councillor, this is the most challenging budget we've ever had to set ... my own words, and those of the Council's Deputy Leader, made after receiving confirmation of the financial settlement, remain entirely valid:
Council Leader, Andrew Burns, said: “A reduction in revenue funding of the scale now being proposed, will undoubtedly have a negative impact on a whole range of vital services that local government is responsible for delivering: the children in our care, the elderly struggling with dementia whom we look after, and vulnerable adults whom we assist daily; all these individuals rely on the support that only a council can provide.
Council Deputy Leader, Sandy Howat, added: “A revenue cut of this scale would be very damaging for jobs and services within Scottish local government generally, and here in Edinburgh specifically – the harsh reality is that this will translate to real job cuts that hit real families, in real communities throughout our capital city. Everyone will be hurt by this.
I'll now replicate the 'main text' of our final draft motion for 2016/17 below (along with the two Appendices, which follow paragraph 5):
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MOTION by the CAPITAL COALITION
Revenue Budget 2016/17, Capital Investment Framework 2016-2024,
Housing Revenue Account 2016-2021 and Budget Framework 2016-2020
1.
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Introduction
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1.1
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Last year’s Capital Coalition budget was set in the context of continuing
financial constraint and rising demand for Council services.
In 2016/17, we know that there will be even more challenges.
As the UK Conservative Government
Spending Review was delayed until 25 November 2015, the Scottish Government’s
Draft Budget was consequently later than usual. The Capital Coalition has sought to set a
four-year budget framework to enable us to target services at the areas of
greatest need and to provide stability to staff and citizens over future
service provision. However, because of
the UK Government’s cut in the Scottish Block Grant, the Government’s Financial
Settlement sets out expenditure plans only for 2016/17. Consequently the City of Edinburgh Council,
whilst setting out a four-year budget framework, is only able to agree the
finalised budgetary detail for 2016/17. For following years of the framework we will
need confirmation of future UK and Scottish Government financial settlements.
We
have taken account of the Scottish Government’s commitment to continuing the
council tax freeze. Along with its
funding for health and police, which taken with the decision by Westminster
to remove the National Insurance rebate and additional teachers
superannuation costs, means that local government funding overall will reduce
by around 7% in real terms in 2016/17.
The Commission on Local Tax
Reform reported in December on the back of which the Scottish Government
announced that they would publish their plans to reform local taxation in the
New Year. Health and Social Care continues
to demand greater resource. Education
and care for children remains a priority.
We do not intend to cut services however, what we do want to see is
efficient and effective ways of delivering them. This is exactly what the Capital Coalition
has implemented through the transformation programme – greater efficiency and
effectiveness. With Scottish Government
spending priorities focusing around health, schools and police we as a
Council have tried to prioritise areas of spend where we know the citizens of
Edinburgh want us to invest.
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1.2
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Despite the challenging financial
situation, the Capital Coalition has prioritised a programme of specific
investment over the last 12 months based on our six strategic themes:
highlights of this work are listed in more detail in Appendix 1.
But the biggest change of all has
been the transformation of this organisation, which employs over 18,000 staff
and provides a wide range of services, each one touching the lives of many
citizens. Appendix 2 also illustrates
the wide-range of efficiencies that the Capital Coalition has developed,
within the context of an extremely challenging financial environment.
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1.3
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The UK economic environment is improving
and increasing employment is helping to offset spending pressures. Edinburgh’s economy continues to do well
although the climate for local government funding is becoming even more
challenging. The pressure of a further
£16.7million reduction in our overall budget, in addition to £68.7million
already assumed, has led to the Capital Coalition reviewing savings proposals
while protecting key services and outcomes.
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The projected challenge we face
is to make budget savings of £85.4million for 2016/17 and at least £147million
over the period to 2020. The Financial
Settlement increases the savings requirement in 2016/17 by £16.7million. These additional savings will be made by:
·
Removing the additional £5.9million
demography money included within the Council’s budget for social care given
the £250million increase provided by Scottish Government to Health and Social
Care partnerships;
·
Accelerating savings of £3.1million through
the transformation programme, bringing savings forward from 2017/18;
·
A revision to the additional Health and
Social Care framework investment, recognising the current year’s monitoring
position providing £3million;
·
Amending the level of required provision for
pay awards given planned staff reductions providing £0.9m;
·
Using £3.3million of the budget ‘headroom’
to close the funding gap with the remaining sum of £2.5million being used to support
council priorities;
·
Saving an additional £0.5million to be
funded from reduction in energy consumption and
·
Agreeing that any remaining gap to be funded
by an increase of 4% in charges.
Other activity includes:
·
Working with partners to improve
infrastructure such as roads, parks, cycleways and pavements so we can all
get around the city;
·
Designing services to meet growing demand
from vulnerable older people and rising school rolls;
·
Analysing the City’s future transport
requirements;
·
Funding changes to both National Insurance
and Teachers pensions which requires £10million and £1.3million respectively
in 2016/17;
·
Reducing energy consumption by 10% in
2016/17 to deal with rising costs and carbon taxes;
·
Alleviating fuel poverty by working in
partnership to deliver an energy plan for the city in 2016/17 and
·
Continuously monitoring our debt and
investment portfolios to ensure we are operating effectively and efficiently
and that any savings in interest payments are fed back into services.
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1.4
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Outcome of the consultation
In line with previous years, the
Capital Coalition has given the people of Edinburgh the opportunity to have
their say in the budget process. The
consultation was launched on 1 October and once again Edinburgh’s citizens
have risen to the challenge with over 4,000 responses. The quality of information received has been
extremely high and allowed us to refine our proposals.
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As a direct result of the
consultation we have:
·
Removed the draft proposal to reduce street
crossing patrols;
·
Reinstated the night noise team;
·
Removed the draft proposal to reduce the
size of in-house home care service;
·
Concluded that the redesign of day care
services for adults with learning disabilities should not proceed;
·
Removed the proposal for a reduction in
community centre staff;
·
Agreed to continue to provide music tuition in schools in 2016/17;
·
Amended the proposal to review support staff
in special schools, ensuring maintenance of both staff numbers and service
delivery;
·
Removed the £0.5million proposal to review
family and pupil support;
·
Invested £15.069million in roads, pavements
and cycleways to continue to make it easier for people to get around the city;
·
Funded the Cycling, Walking, Safer Street
Initiative to a level of £540,000;
·
Allocated 9% of both the net capital
expenditure and the net revenue expenditure of the Transport Division of the
Council to cycling and
·
Listened to the comments coming out of the
‘Invest to Save’ exercise and as a result limited the council rent increase
to 2% in 2016/17.
As a Capital Coalition we have also decided to:
·
Increase the funding available to invest in
our property estate by £3million;
·
Invest in a new state-of-the-art CCTV
system;
·
Realign and revise our strategy on income
maximisation to generate £1million of additional funds in 2016/17 and
·
Work with partners to ensure that the
Council receives appropriate remuneration from its portfolio of companies
including increased dividend payments.
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1.5
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None of these decisions have
been taken lightly. We do, however,
continue to take forward the six strands which form our Contract with the
Capital and into that we have woven the Council’s transformation programme –
these proposals are all contained within Appendix 2.
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1.6
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Capital
Additional capital expenditure
of £13million was approved last year for 2015/16. An estimated £3.95million will be available
over the period of the capital investment programme This budget will focus on delivering in
2016/17:
· £15.069million
on roads and pavements;
· £9.8million
on street lighting including LED replacement programme;
· £11.6million
on the Water of Leith Flood Prevention Scheme phase 2;
· £19.5million
on National Housing Trust;
· £30million
on schools;
· A robust
business case to replace the ageing Meadowbank Sports Centre;
· £4million
on Royston care home and
· £24million
on property maintenance and asset management.
Continuous monitoring of the
Council’s capital programme will be undertaken to ensure projects are
delivered on time and on budget. This programme will be reported through
Finance and Resources Committee and referred to the Governance Risk and Best
Value Committee for scrutiny.
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2.0
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Savings
As indicated earlier, the
economic environment may be improving with a growing economy and increasing
employment, but the climate for local government funding is becoming even
more challenging. The pressure of a
further £16.7million reduction in our overall budget, in addition to over
£60million already assumed, has led to the Capital Coalition reviewing
savings proposals while protecting key services and outcomes.
Savings have thus been the
subject of much debate over the last four months and will concentrate on:
·
Workforce Transformation;
·
Reductions in fleet;
·
Reducing sickness absence;
·
Property rationalisation;
·
Reduction in carbon tax;
·
Transformation;
·
Procurement;
The total being £85.4million in
2016/17.
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3.0
|
Risks and Challenges
The Council continues to face
significant challenges which are clearly defined in the Revenue Budget report
2016/17, Risks and Reserves (Appendix 7).
These will be actively managed and reported through
Council/Committee. The Council’s top 4
risks are as follows:
1. maintenance of property
infrastructure;
2. cyber security and data privacy;
3. integration of health care and
social services and
4. increasing service demand due to
demography.
It should be noted
that to mitigate these risks the Council has invested £12million per annum.
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4.0
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Future Budget Development
The Council further agrees to:
·
Prioritise and target areas of spend in order to provide the best
quality services for the people of Edinburgh through funding of the
localities model:
·
Continue with the implementation of the transformation programme
focusing on the following areas:
o Business Support;
o Asset management;
o Customer services and
o Locality working.
·
Reduce the headcount of the organisation by using, as far as possible,
the mechanisms of Voluntary Redundancy (VR) and Voluntary Severance (VS) and
by doing so focus the outputs of the Council into the areas of service
prioritisation;
·
Continue to work with partner agencies to co-produce, maximise outputs
and deliver the highest quality integrated services;
·
Work with the Health and Social
Care Integrated Joint Board to deliver improved services;
·
Use any potential underspend in Property Conservation to fund
infrastructure repairs in the Council’s asset portfolio;
·
As part of the drive towards greater partnership working we instruct
the Chief Executive to prepare a report for the March 2016 Finance and
Resources Committee on the benefits, outcomes, management and improved
transparency of various funding streams including grants, co-production and
contracts for the voluntary sector;
·
Continue to investigate alternative sources of income in line with the
findings of the Commission on Local Tax Reform report;
·
In 2016 close off the Property Conservation legacy issue which has
caused such reputational damage to the Council;
·
Instruct the Chief Executive to allocate £100,000 to develop and
maintain a Common Good Asset Register and deliver a report to the Council in
June 2016 detailing progress;
·
Continue to work with Police Scotland through the agreed Service Level
Agreement to ensure that we get the support we require both as Scotland’s
capital city and a city of communities each with their own specific needs and
instruct the Chief Executive to review the Service Level Agreement with
Police Scotland annually to ensure efficient and effective delivery of
service;
·
Reduce energy consumption across the Council estate by 10% in cash
terms in 2016/17 and to work with partners to develop an energy reduction
unit in the Council which will deliver net savings of £1million in 2016/17;
·
Work with communities, organisations and individuals to ensure greater
commitment to participatory budgeting firstly at a local level then moving on
to a strategic level and
·
Establish a mid-term budget review meeting of the Council which will
monitor progress against the Coalition financial commitments and act as an
early warning system to highlight potential risks.
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5.0
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Conclusions
Council notes:
·
The report by the Acting Executive Director of Resources setting out
the Revenue and Capital Budget framework;
·
The report by the Acting Executive Director of Resources setting out
the potential Equality rights and Carbon risks associated with the Revenue
Budget framework;
·
The consultation undertaken and the continuing commitment to increasing
participatory budgeting in setting future budgets;
·
The continuing review of the role of the Third Sector including
partnership working, grants and the mechanism for future delivery of services;
·
The impact on the Council’s estate of the implementation of the
Community Empowerment (Scotland) 2015 Act and
·
The outcomes of the transformation programme and the operational
function to deliver high quality, efficient and effective services within a
pre-determined budget limit.
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Council approves:
·
Appendix 1
·
Appendix 2
·
The Revenue Budget set out in the reports, subject to the adjustments
in Appendix 3 to this motion;
·
The 2016/21 Capital Budget as set out in the report by the Acting
Executive Director of Resources;
·
A band ‘D’ Council Tax of £1,169;
·
The Council Tax and Rating Resolution set out in Appendix 4 to this
motion;
·
The schedule of charges for Council Services as set out in Appendix 5 to
this motion;
·
The prudential indicators as set out in Appendix 6 to this motion and
·
The recommendation by the Executive Director of Place to increase rents
by 2% and the outline 5-year Housing Revenue Account Capital programme for
2016/2021.
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Moved by
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Councillor Alasdair Rankin
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Seconded by
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Councillor Bill Cook
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APPENDIX
1
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Ensuring every child has the
best start in life
Ensuring that every
child has a first-class education is one of our most important pledges. We currently spend £234million on education
and we will be increasing this funding by £1.8million a year to meet the
costs of an increasing number of school pupils. We believe that we can generate additional
income by opening up our school facilities to appropriate groups and individuals.
Inspectors have judged education
services in Edinburgh to be good. They have commended the strong political
and managerial leadership of schools, improving exam results, strong
leadership of the Curriculum for Excellence and good engagement of parents and
pupils. Exam results are improving every year:
·
85% of pupils in S4 achieved 5 or more awards at Level 3, an
increase of 3% since 2011;
·
93% of pupils achieved Level 3 in Literacy and Numeracy by the
end of S5, an increase of 12% since 2011;
·
61% of pupils gained 1 Higher or more by the end of S6, an
increase of 7% since 2011 and
·
47% of pupils gained 3 Highers or more by the end of S6, an
increase of 5% since 2011.
School leaver destinations have seen significant improvement year on
year with the number of young people leaving school in October 2015 to a
positive destination in education, employment or training at the highest it
has ever been at 92.3%.
In addition, the Council is
investing in new accommodation for primary schools:
·
£6million to secure the cost of land to provide a
permanent solution to primary school capacity and accommodation pressures in
South Edinburgh;
·
£5.3million
to provide a new gym and dining hall, ten new class spaces and a new 3G pitch
at Kirkliston Primary School;
·
£3million
to provide new halls at Cramond and East Craigs and extensions at Sciennes
and Towerbank;
·
£4.1million
to provide replacement gym and nursery facilities at Leith Primary School and
make the remainder of the existing Duncan Place building secure and
·
£0.6million to provide a new gym hall at Buckstone Primary School.
The wave
3 school replacement programme involves total investment of around £128million:
·
£32million
for a new Boroughmuir High School;
·
£38million
for a new James Gillespie’s High;
·
£38million
for a new Portobello High School including £1million to deliver a new park on
part of the existing site;
·
An
estimated £12million for a new St John’s RC Primary School and
·
An
estimated £8million for a new St Crispin’s Special School.
In addition:
·
The
Council has approved funding of £11million towards the estimated total cost
of £30million to replace Queensferry High School and
·
The
Council has approved £0.7million towards the early design fees for a new
secondary school in Craigmillar with delivery of a new facility within a 5
year programme.
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Reducing poverty, inequality and
deprivation
We continue to provide
assistance to people who find themselves in difficult circumstances. Through the Emergency Fund we have retained
our pledge to ensure that no-one is evicted from their Council tenancy
through rent arrears due to the Under Occupancy Tax.
Our commitment to developing the
economy and helping people back to work will enable individuals to train for
the types of jobs which will support both them and the wider city region
economy.
By working with the Third Sector
we will grant aid projects to develop community hubs which will have
additional funding of £250,000 to allow them to meet local needs. This additional funding to come from the
Department of Place through budget realignment.
We have protected services for vulnerable
children by:
·
maintaining
strong child protection services which are judged by the Care Inspectorate as
being amongst the strongest in Scotland;
The quality of our residential
children's homes is consistently judged to be very good and we are rebuilding
two homes over the coming years.
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Providing for Edinburgh’s
economic growth
The Edinburgh Guarantee is a vision that all sectors in the city will work together to ensure that every young person in Edinburgh will leave school with the choice of a job, training or further education opportunity available to them.
The Modern Apprenticeships are a key part of the Edinburgh
Guarantee. To date the Council has
supported 210 apprentices.
Last year 39 apprentices graduated and this year that
number has risen to 54. The Council also
has 78 apprentices who are still working towards completing their
apprenticeships.
To date, Economic Development Service (EDS) has assisted
around 3,190 people into work and learning.
In 2015, EDS has supported the creation and safeguarding of
2,952 jobs.
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Investment
The Edinburgh 12 has demonstrated
that the value of the Council’s collaborative working with the development
community. Considerable progress has
been made in advancing all 12 sites.
Projected economic outputs are:
·
Approximately
1,822 residential units
·
Gross
Value Added (GVA) of approximately £2billion;
·
Up
to 19,021 FTE jobs and 6,777 construction jobs;
·
Approximately
2,074 hotel bedrooms;
·
Approximately
128,400 sq ft of Grade A office space and
·
Approximately
120,400 sq ft of retail and leisure space.
Examples of
achievements to date as a result of this partnership working include:
·
Edinburgh St
James - partnership working between the Council, Scottish Government,
developer and investors resulted in the creation of the Growth Accelerator
Model (GAM). The value of the works funded via the GAM will be £61.4million;
·
New Waverley -
collaboration between the Council and developer has resulted in a fund of
£200,000 being made available for physical improvements to the site and
surrounding area, which will benefit residents, businesses and visitors;
·
The Haymarket
Edinburgh - the Council has facilitated high-level discussions between the
developer and Network Rail, which have enabled progression of this build and
·
King’s Stables
Road and India Buildings are progressing well and will release significant
capital receipts.
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Small Medium Enterprise (SME)
opportunities
Creative Exchange Leith provides 80 workspaces for
individuals, groups or businesses and is a hub for creative talent in the
city.
Business Gateway also
supports SMEs and offers access to free business support services, gives
assistance and impartial advice to people starting or growing their business.
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Creative Industries and SMEs
The official opening of the Edinburgh-Shenzhen Creative
Industries Incubator in Shenzhen, China took place in May 2015. The opening was attended by 10 Edinburgh
Companies and six of them are planning to occupy space within the incubator.
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City Region
The Council is working in partnership with neighbouring authorities
(East Lothian, Fife, Midlothian, Scottish Borders, and West Lothian Councils)
and other partners on the development of a City Region Deal bid to the
Westminster and Scottish Governments.
This City Deal aims to accelerate regional economic growth and reduce
inequalities, by securing additional investment and decision-making powers
from the United Kingdom and Scottish Governments to stimulate private sector
investment, drive innovation, unlock synergies, and deliver the improvements
to our regional infrastructure and skills base necessary to achieve a step
change in economic performance.
An outline bid was submitted to the Westminster and Scottish Governments
on 4th September 2015, with further information provided on 18th
December 2015, and we are now awaiting a formal response so the proposition
can be taken to the next stage of development and any budgetary implications
for the Council quantified.
On award of a City Deal in 2016/17 further detailed work will be
undertaken to provide a financial strategy to support the project.
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Strengthening and supporting our
communities and keeping them safe
The
budget motion of 2014 identified £1million capital to upgrade the current
Public Space analogue CCTV system to a new digital platform. The CCTV Investment Project Manager is
working with the Council’s new ICT partners CGI to produce an Outline
Business Specification, which will set out the proposed options for upgrading
the system.
The
development of an open protocol operating system will allow integration of
other Council CCTV services to provide a single more efficient service; This
integrated model will also include our partners who currently have access to
and usage of the system from their respective locations – Lothian Buses,
Police Scotland, Scottish Fire and Rescue Service and Urban Traffic Control. Consideration will also be given to working
more closely with other CCTV providers, such as tram and business improvement
districts.
The high cost of privately renting
or owning a home in Edinburgh is increasing the cost of living for many
families on low to middle incomes already struggling to cope. This is why the HRA budget sets out the
Capital Coalition’s ambitious plans to tackle the city’s housing crisis by
expanding the Council led house building programme to build 8,000 new
affordable homes over 10 years. This
investment will generate benefits to the local and national economy of around
£2billion, sustain 1500 new jobs and bring in additional council tax revenue
at a time when the council’s resources are severely constrained.
Discussions have taken place with not-for-profit
Housing Associations who have agreed to match the council’s commitment bringing
the total number of new affordable homes in the city up to 16,000 over 10
years.
Existing council tenants are among
the most hard pressed financially and we have consulted widely with them in
preparing this budget. The
consultation showed that increased house building was the top priority for
tenants, followed by investment to reduce their energy costs through
replacement heating, cheaper energy and better advice services.
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The strategy will also look at other measures that will
have a big impact on tenants cost of living, including cheaper broadband,
discount cards and making land available to support tenants to grow fruit and
vegetables.
All this will be achieved through a
combination of making the housing service leaner; making efficiencies in
service delivery and through modest rent increases of 2%, ensuring that we
keep rents affordable, whilst delivering tenants priorities to reduce their
cost of living.
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Ensuring Edinburgh and its
residents are well cared for
·
The Shared Repairs Service enters a new
phase of its development following a successful pilot scheme in 2015. Phase 2 of the Shared Repairs roll-out
commences in April 2016;
·
The Castle Crags day care and respite service for people with autism and a
learning disability is now operational and is the first of its kind in
Scotland, offering 20 day support service places and overnight accommodation
for six people;
·
The Council working with its partner
organisations opened the Milestone residential unit for people with alcohol
related brain damage (ARBD);
·
The Firrhill Technology Hub has
developed an innovative approach to help disabled people maximise their
independence by using mobile computing devices;
·
The Royston care home for older people will
open by June 2016, offering state of the art facilities from 60 beds and able
to look after residents whose higher levels of need mean many other Edinburgh
care homes are unsuitable;
·
Use the integration of Health and Social
Care and the establishment of the Integrated Joint Board to deliver effective
services at a lower cost;
·
Improve services for people with complex
needs through the “Inclusive Edinburgh” review, many of whom may struggle
with homelessness, unemployment, drug and alcohol problems, mental or
physical ill-health, and who are often the victims of violence and
·
Tackle domestic abuse though a range of
process improvements across all relevant agencies to ensure services
intervene early, engage with all family members, coordinate provision and
deliver better outcomes.
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Maintaining and enhancing the
quality of life in Edinburgh
The changing face of libraries is reflected in the wide
range of services on offer. The
Capital Coalition continues to support the services which our libraries
provide and whilst a review of library buildings will take place, the service
will continue to develop along the lines of the projects which are
highlighted below:
·
VIP – award winning service for visually impaired people;
·
GET online: BYOD (bring your own device) digital training in 6
neighbourhood libraries and other community settings and
·
YouthTalk: award winning youth engagement partnership project. YouthTalk provides opportunities for young
people to have a say and involvement in the delivery and development of local
services.
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Investment and
importance of festivals to the city
Edinburgh is the world’s leading
festival city, attracting over 4 million visits to the capital each year which
delivered an economic impact of £170million for Edinburgh and £260million for
Scotland. Edinburgh’s festivals are a
unique cultural phenomenon and only the Olympics and football World Cup
exceed the number of tickets sold in the capital each year. Including Hogmanay, the Council invests £4.3million
in 11 of the 12 annual festivals which results in the creation of 5242
full-time jobs in Edinburgh and contributes £170million to the Edinburgh
economy.
Sports infrastructure
improvements:
· Meadowbank Sports Centre is the
biggest sport infrastructure project being progressed by the Council at
present. The latest report, indicates a total cost of £41.1million. The Capital Coalition will consider the
funding package for this project on the basis that Sportscotland contributes
at least £7million;
· A new cycling hub at Hunters’ Hall
Park continues to make good progress with the Council investing £1.2million. Once complete, facilities at the new
cycling hub will include an outdoor velodrome, cycle speedway track and bmx
track as well as two 3G pitches;
· The National Performance Centre for
Sport at Heriot-Watt University’s Riccarton campus is making excellent
progress and is scheduled to be completed in 2016. The new venue will include an indoor
full-size 3G pitch with spectator seating, outdoor grass and 3G pitches as
well as an indoor sports hall, gym and sports science facilities. The total
project cost is over £30million with the Council investing £2.7million in
partnership funding and
· After many years in development we
are now moving toward opening up the Council’s sports assets to the wider
community with the management of many facilities transferring to Edinburgh
Leisure. Edinburgh Leisure is
developing a detailed business plan on this transfer and a progress report
including a timeline for a phased changeover is scheduled for Spring 2016.
------
|
APPENDIX 2
Despite the challenging financial
situation, the Capital Coalition has prioritised a programme of specific
investment over the last 12 months based on our six strategic themes:
highlights of this work are listed below:
·
Expanded the council-led house building programme
started in 2008, to 22 sites in the city building nearly 3,000 homes and making
it one of the largest house builders in the country;
·
Signed a 7-year £185million ICT contract with CGI
to improve services across the board from payments to schools access;
·
Delivered a balanced budget in 2014/15 in spite of
huge additional pressures such as the growth in demand for adult social care
with a balanced budget projected for 2015/16;
·
Commenced construction on new high schools at
Portobello, James Gillespie’s, and Boroughmuir, a new special school - St
Crispin’s and St John’s new Primary
School;
·
Developed a transformation programme which is
targeted at delivering at least £73million in annual savings by 2019/20;
·
Developed a successful Service Level Agreement with
Police Scotland which is delivering localised police services where people want
them, in the heart of the community;
·
Worked with Edinburgh Trams to ensure that the Tram
service exceeds patronage and revenue targets;
·
Put in place a mechanism to improve our generation
of income through new and innovative sources with a target of £1million set for
2016/17;
·
Discussed with the Scottish Government issues following
publication of the Commission on Local Tax Reform report;
·
Established the Health and Social Care Integrated Joint
Board for better, more efficient delivery of health and social care services;
·
Moved towards a substantial resolution of the
complex legacy issues surrounding the Property Care and Property Conservation
services and initiated the new Shared Repairs Service;
·
Established a register for the City’s Common Good
assets in order that they be monitored and protected;
·
Continued to support economic growth;
·
Improved employment levels especially among school
leavers and those seeking employment;
·
Developed a culture of promoting sustainability and
published a Sustainable Energy Action Plan;
·
Proposed a detailed implementation plan for the
re-structuring of Asset Management including facilities management, estate
rationalisation, the Council’s investment portfolio and asset conditions report
and
·
Started work on a further new care home;
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