Robs Weekly Round Up 

23 August 2024

Dear colleagues,

Hot on the heels of last week’s A-Level results, yesterday saw the announcement of a fantastic set of GCSE results for the Vale.

The Vale performed better than the Welsh average, with 97.3 percent of pupils achieving A* to G grades, 72.7 per cent attaining A* to C and 27.9 per cent gaining an A or A*. Across Wales 96.6 per cent recorded A* to G grades, 62.2 per cent A* to C and 19.2 per cent A* or A.

First and foremost a very big congratulations is due to all of those young people who collected their results this week – your hard work has paid off.

Once again there are many people who have contributed to this. Our teachers, support staff, youth service, community learning team, and many others in Team Vale will have all have played a role in educating this cohort of pupils and supporting their learning. You should all take pride in this great set of results.

There will I am sure be many pupils and parents now considering their options for the next stage of their education. As part of a national campaign to support families with the cost of living the Council has been asked to remind parents currently claiming Child Benefit that they have until 31 August to inform HMRC if their child is continuing in non-advanced education or approved training in order to extend their payments. If this applies to you then make sure you don’t miss out. More advice on this is available online.

Whatever path they choose I would like to wish all young people the best for the future.

One of the most marked changes in how our Council and schools work in recent times has been the increasing emphasis on providing much wider support to school communities – both to pupils and parents as well as the wider community.

An example of this work was in the spotlight again recently. Earlier this month Welsh Government published a special newsletter celebrating the projects that picked up awards at the 2023 Ystadau Cymru (YC) Conference and Awards.

The publication praised the Bocs Bwyd work presented by Hannah Cogbill-Davies from Cadoxton Primary School in Barry. The work at Cadog’s Corner was described as “both innovative and transformative” and its impact on the local community again received plaudits.

The overall winner of the YC awards was another Vale initiative, the Llantwit Food Project. Welsh Government praised the way in which community and expert engagement, and data analysis, was used to develop a plan to tackle food insecurity in more rural areas. The food project was summed up as “a wonderful example of the strength that can come from a collaborative, community focussed approach.”

Congratulations once again to all those that made these schemes a reality.

It is more examples of work such as this that we shall soon see being delivered as part of the strengthening communities theme within the new Reshaping programme. In this area we’ll be focusing on reconsidering how we work with our communities to deliver differently for and importantly, with them.

Yesterday I met with our newly established Transformation team within Corporate Resources to discuss how they will work to support Reshaping and various savings projects across the Council. The team are raring to go and I look forward to reporting on their progress, alongside that of all colleagues working to transform our services, in these weekly messages.

Sticking with this theme I must highlight the piece with Marcus Goldsworthy, our Director of Place, that was published on StaffNet+ this week discussing the role of economic resilience in the Reshaping programme and Corporate Plan. The piece offered a great insight into how work such as Placemaking and the Council’s involvement with the Cardiff Capital Region enhances the Vale’s economic potential and enables us to leverage funding and other resources to deliver on our objectives. If you haven’t yet had chance to read it then please do check it out

On a slightly different note, I’d like to share the call out from our Winter Services Team for any colleagues with a Category C licence who may interested in assisting with the Winter gritting service. While the weather might have suggested otherwise this week we aren’t quite in Winter yet. However, its great to see our colleagues in Environment and Housing making preparations early to keep the Vale moving when we do get there.

Some of you may have seen this week the first episode of a new BBC television series Saving Lives that was filmed in Autumn 2023 at University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff and University Hospital Llandough in the Vale. The series shows very clearly the pressures public services in the UK are operating under but also how important collaborative working across organisations is in alleviating these pressures and challenges. While it doesn’t directly feature any of our staff I understand later episodes will highlight the importance of the work of our staff, particularly in Social Servies, which enables swift transfers of care from hospital to the community. It will be great to see the value of this work highlighted on national television, as I know it is an area which has been given much focus and one where we have an excellent track record.

Finally, on the same theme, if you have not already seen it, check out the recent episode of Susan Calman’s Grand Day Out which aired on 15^th August and featured the Island in all its glory.  It’s great to see the Island featuring so prominently on national television and provides a taster on even wider coverage when Gavin and Stacy return in due course (no spoilers here!)

Thanks as always to all colleagues for their hard work this week. I hope that all of you heading into a long weekend enjoy the extended break, whatever the weather.

Diolch yn fawr iawn.

Rob.