To consider any communications to be submitted by the Mayor or the Chief Executive.
Minutes:
(a) Secondary School National Offer Day
The Chief Executive was delighted to say that following the results of the National Placement Offer day earlier this month, over 95% of children had secured their first preference place for their choice of secondary school which was a great improvement on last year when the figure was just under 91%.
A large number of applications, 2,400 had been received for transfer to Secondary School and only 28 pupils had not been allocated one of their preferences, however, it was pleasing to note that all had now been allocated a place at a secondary school for September, 2016.
This placed Barnsley fourth within the Yorkshire and Humber region where more than 9 out of 10 children were allocated an place in their first preference school.
This was a fantastic achievement and congratulations were offered to all those involved in the process.
The Mayor and Members of the Council expressed their congratulations to all concerned in the usual manner.
(b) Local Government Awards
The Chief Executive reported that, as most Members were aware, the Local Government Chronicle Awards had been held last month. It was the 20th anniversary year for this premier event of the year in the Local Government calendar and Barnsley had been shortlisted for a total of five awards:
· Campaign of the Year
· Team of the Year
· Driving Growth
· Business Transformation
· Council of the Year
The success in being nominated for these five awards showed that what the Council was doing was amongst the best across the country and being shortlisted in itself could be classed as ‘being a winner’.
Particular congratulations were offered to Andrew Ainsworth and the Enterprising Barnsley Team and Martin Beasley and the Driving Growth Team and all of the people involved, some of whom were in the Council Chamber this morning, in the success of being the overall winner for Driving Growth which made all the hard work in participating in these awards so worth while.
The Chief Executive reported that all representatives of the Council were extremely proud to be at the awards ceremony. It had been a fantastic night and it was wonderful to see Barnsley ‘on the stage’.
Congratulations were also extended to all those involved with the other category awards, Margaret Essex, Sue Thiedeman and Phil Hollingsworth and their teams who also did a fantastic job.
Special mention was also given to all staff of the Authority and to Members because becoming shortlisted for Council of the year was a really fantastic achievement. It was achieved through innovation, hard work, dedication and lots of planning. It didn’t happen overnight and took a huge amount of work to realise those levels of achievement and the Chief Executive was particularly delighted that the Council was shortlisted and that the Council had also won the Driving Growth Award. There was lots to be proud of.
Councillor Miller, Cabinet Spokesperson for Place thanked the Chief Executive for those comments which he asked to be associated with. He commented that Barnsley Council’s Enterprising Barnsley Programme received the top award at the Driving Growth Category of the Competition. The Council had faced stiff competition from other authorities including Glasgow, Birmingham, Plymouth, Leeds and Wakefield. The Driving Growth Award was particularly important to the Council as it continued to develop a thriving, vibrant economy by encouraging more businesses start-ups and creating more jobs.
Winning the Driving Growth Award was fantastic for Barnsley and he asked to place on record his thanks to all involved in this well deserved achievement. He also took the opportunity to remind Members of the hard work of all Partner organisations including the Sheffield City Region who worked with the Council closely. The development of Junction 36 was referred to and to the work of the Enterprising Barnsley Team who were involved in developing this scheme. Councillor Miller encouraged Members to visit the site if at all possible as this demonstrated the commitment of the Council, its workforce and its partners and showed what an excellent place Barnsley was to live and work.
Councillor Miller then then presented Andrew Ainsworth with the LGC Driving Growth Award.
The Mayor and Members of the Council expressed their thanks to all involved in the usual manner.
Councillor Sir Steve Houghton CBE, Leader of the Council, asked to add his congratulations and thanks firstly to officers within the School Admissions Team in ensuring that the vast majority of pupils obtained their first preference at their first choice Secondary School and secondly to all staff and all entrants involved in submitting entries to the Local Government Chronicle Awards. The Council had won one award out of the five entries submitted so there was clearly room for improvement in the eyes of the judges but to get that far out of hundreds of applications and shortlisted was no mean achievement and the Council would obviously keep working on improving services for the people of Barnsley. He felt that all staff deserved recognition for their hard work in incredibly difficult circumstances and there was no Council that went to those awards or anywhere else that faced the kind of challenges that Barnsley had financially, socially and in the current economic climate of the area. For the staff to achieve the recognition they had was absolutely tremendous and on behalf of all Members they should be congratulated and thanked for all that they had done. Particular thanks were, of course, extended to Andrew Ainsworth and the Team in winning the Driving Growth Award as there some ‘big’ cities had been shortlisted for this award who, compared to Barnsley, had much more resources at their disposal and lots more opportunities and yet Barnsley ‘showed them how to do it’ and this was really good news.
Councillor Cheetham, Cabinet Spokesperson for People (Achieving Potential) asked to add his congratulations to all involved in the Local Government Chronicle Awards but particularly congratulated officers within the Admission Team for the work they had done on school places this year as this was a fantastically complicated process with lots of heavily legislated criteria to take into account within extremely tight deadlines as well as being very emotive for parents. To have increased the rate of success was remarkable and a testament to the work and efforts of everyone involved.
Councillor Platts, Cabinet Spokesperson for Communities echoed the comments of the Leader and paid tribute to all staff involved and, in particular, stated that the Awards Ceremony had been a ‘’nerve wracking’ night. It had been a fantastic achievement to be shortlisted for five awards and amazing to have won the Driving Growth Award.