Priorities
Our focus for the next four years will be to ensure we all play to our part to:
Tackle the climate emergency
As well as making the Council a greener organisation, we will work with businesses and communities to ensure that our borough reduces its carbon footprint and that future generations are protected from climate change. We have a shared responsibility to act and there will be a real urgency to our response. While this is a real challenge it presents great opportunities to build a green economy, more active residents, less congestion, warmer homes, and a more efficient use of our resources.
Tackle the climate emergency
Grow our local economy and deliver good jobs with fair wages for our residents
Our economy is doing relatively well compared to other areas, with lower levels of unemployment and higher levels of productivity. We have ambitious plans to build on this success with higher levels of growth, well supported businesses, dynamic town centres and excellent local skills. Our challenge is to make sure that more local people can access these local opportunities and secure good jobs.
Grow the local economy and deliver good jobs
Support children and young people to make the best start in life and achieve their full potential
Our borough is a great place to grow up for many but not for all. Our vision is for more children and young people to feel included, listened to and to live in safe communities. We will also do everything we can to support children, young people and families to go on to lead fulfilling lives whatever their circumstances.
Support children and young people to get the best start in life
Enable more adults to live longer, healthier and happier lives
The majority of our residents benefit from good health and wellbeing throughout their lives. However individuals from more deprived areas are more likely to be in poorer health and we need to think differently about how we meet the challenges of people living longer and maintaining good mental health. Joining up with our local NHS and care providers, we want to work closely with communities and build on people's strengths and capabilities to make this happen.
Enable more adults to live longer, healthier and happier lives
Make our neighbourhoods even better places to call home
Our local neighbourhoods are central to our quality of life and are places where people come together and contribute as a community. We will work with communities to ensure our neighbourhoods are safe, well maintained and we have good range of homes that meet a diversity of needs.
Make our neighbourhoods better places to call home
An efficient and empowering Council
We will continue to deliver the best possible value for money by engaging with local people and stakeholders, prioritising our resources and through more innovative ways of working. We will continue to make savings through better contracts, reducing our building costs, and streamlining our processes. We will also look to digitise more services to make them more accessible and cost effective. We believe that better data and intelligence will help our services to be more focused and for us to better understand what communities and individuals want and need, as well as the difference we are making. We will also review our approach to engaging with communities to ensure they are listened to and empowered to play their part.
Be an efficient and empowering Council