Salisbury recovery and positive Ofsted review

Hello,

Hope you all had a nice Easter break, and our thanks goes to everyone who was on call, or had to work over the long weekend.

As a council, our top priority continues to be the recovery of Salisbury and ensuring the city begins to thrive again. A big part of this work is to encourage people to visit the city and support those local businesses who have been so badly affected by recent events. We’re doing everything in our power to provide the city with what it needs and through our #LoveSalisbury campaign, promoting all the many activities that are taking place in the city, particularly over the busy half-term period.

Despite the weather not being on our side over the Easter weekend there’s still plenty of the school holidays left and we hope the many measures we have taken so far, including introducing free parking, will continue to pay dividends and get more and more people into the city and enjoying everything it has to offer. Although it has slightly receded, the national media spotlight continues to be on Salisbury and the work we’re doing, and it has been an incredibly busy and intense time. Thanks again to everyone who continues to support all the Salisbury work and all those affected by it, as it is having a knock-on effect on much of the ‘business as usual’ work we carry out. However, this work with partners will be ongoing for quite some time and we can’t over-stress the importance for us to get this right and ensure that long-term, Salisbury doesn’t suffer.

Last week we were pleased to get the official verdict on our recent Ofsted/Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection into the services to support children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities. We’re delighted to say that overall the report is overwhelmingly positive and that’s testament to all of you who have a role to play ensuring children and young people with SEND get the effective support they need. Some of the highlights include that SEND children achieve well in their early users, there is a strong partnership with parent carers, and that young people are well supported as they move into adult life with integrated teams working closely together. We won’t be complacent though and understand there are areas to develop further and we are working hard to continually make improvements.

We had a glimpse over the weekend just how suddenly we can get the kind of rainfall in Wiltshire that can cause some problems. We had some flood warnings in place and experienced some minor flood-related issues over the course of the weekend and as a precaution the barriers were raised in Bradford on Avon. We know too well the devastation that can be caused by flooding and since 2013/14, when the county was badly affected, we have continued to work with the Environment Agency and local communities to ensure we are as prepared as possible should it happen to that scale again. The weather is extremely unpredictable but with robust detailed flood plans in place, the reaction of ourselves and our communities will be anything but.

Alistair, Carlton and Terence