Springfield Community Campus preview

The holidays have finally arrived which when we were in the depths of the floods during the first quarter of the year seemed a long way off. For those of you going away over the next few weeks, have a very peaceful, safe time with your families and friends.

Last night I attended the Corsham Area Board where the community previewed the first phase of its new campus. It is a truly spectacular building – bringing together previously separate council services located in different, expensive buildings, the Police, the voluntary sector and a myriad of different community groups. Children and young people toured the new facilities first – they were surprised and delighted when they saw the climbing wall right next to the library space. In a moment of madness I seem to remember challenging one of our elected member to a climbing completion when it opens in a few weeks time. I’m hoping Cllr Packard forgets. There was a real buzz about the place which was exactly what we wanted to create when we started this project 3 years ago.

Last week we had the Local Enterprise Board (LEP) which comprises 12 business leaders from across the county together with the two elected leaders from Swindon and Wiltshire. This group is charged by the government with leading economic growth and increasing jobs, housing and delivering increased employment land for the county. The boards plan – the strategic economic plan (SEP) has just been given the green light from government and we have been awarded around £120m over the next six years to deliver our economic projects and create many thousands of new jobs. This is great news for the county and our communities. We were awarded the third largest amount per capita across the 39 LEPS in England.

Speak again soon when I hope we can celebrate a first English test victory of the summer (I may have said that last time and the time before that, but it didn’t happen and I remain optimistic). For daily updates, discussion, personal opinion, comment or just to connect or keep in touch you can follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/#!/drcarltonbrand.

Carlton

Busy week around the county

 This week has been fun – lots of out and about around the county. On Tuesday I was privileged to meet Lord Heseltine with our Leader Jane Scott to discuss our strategic economic plan for Wiltshire. He is always insightful and I do like the way he sees life, whether political, social or economic and is able to expertly link these areas of public policy. The government will be announcing on Monday which aspects of our economic plan they will support. We are expecting a positive outcome from which we can get on and deliver the projects that will provide additional high value jobs and homes throughout the county for the next six years. This is important for all service areas as people and families in good jobs are able to thrive and live their lives as they wish.

On Wednesday I visited one of our Chippenham depots (we have two… one ex district and one ex county – I’m on that case) to meet our waste service loaders and drivers. We do this a couple of times a year where we share the sort of information and discussion that we have in the staff forums that we recently ran across the county. I’m very proud of our waste service – it touches every household every week and provides a very high quality service right across the county. It’s also one of the biggest services we provide – costing us around £30m per year to collect and dispose of our waste.

Next week I am meeting up with political leaders and chief executives from across the country at the Local Government Conference in Bournemouth. This is an important opportunity to shape national and local government policy and to ensure the voice of Wiltshire, its communities and residents is heard loud and clear on the national stage. Most Wiltshire Council political group leaders are attending for the same purpose.  

Speak again soon when I hope we can celebrate a first English test victory of the summer (I may have said that last time, but it it didn’t happen). For daily updates, discussion, personal opinion, comment or just to connect or keep in touch you can follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/#!/drcarltonbrand.

Carlton