Amesbury update

As you’ll be aware the eyes of the world’s media are once again focused on Wiltshire following a major incident being declared in the early hours of Wednesday last week and last night we heard the tragic news that Dawn Sturgess had died as a result of coming into contact with the nerve agent Novichok. 

Having a death occur in our local community; particularly in such extraordinary circumstances will undoubtedly affect local residents and we will continue to support them and our partners in any way we can whilst the police carry out their investigation into this dreadful crime.  

A public meeting will be held in Amesbury tomorrow evening (Tuesday 10 July). Local and national partners will be attending to update and provide support and reassurance to the town. The Prime Minister has also committed support to helping the local communities of both Amesbury and Salisbury. Salisbury has shown such stoicism and resilience since the first incident occurred in March and we will continue to provide help, where it is needed, throughout this extremely difficult period for both of these local communities.

As we have said previously we need dedicated resource to support Amesbury and Salisbury and we recognise that we also need sufficient resource to continue to deliver council services and the important programmes that are vital to transforming how we work in the future. We are therefore discussing appropriate interim arrangements to ensure we have resource allocated where it is needed for the foreseeable future.

We will keep you updated you on the incident and recovery situation and please remember that the guidance from Public Health England remains that there is not a significant health risk to the wider public.

Last week cabinet met and discussed our improvement in adoption performance, future ownership of traveller sites, and housing provision in the county (an issue which will be discussed again at Full Council tomorrow).

We were really pleased that cabinet agreed a further investment of £1.2m for children’s services to help address the expected increase in demand for social care services in the coming years. The increase reflects a national trend and the funding will help provide additional social workers to meet the increasing demand and ensure we can achieve our ambitious plans to improve outcomes for children.

The hot weather looks set to continue and we fully appreciate that County Hall is extremely warm and at times we know it’s an uncomfortable working environment. The air handling system is under extraordinary pressure as a result of the continued high temperatures and some serious technical failures. We’re working to fix the problems and to review what system the building needs for the future. In the meantime, wherever possible consider working in other hubs, or from home whilst this matter is resolved.

And, we must just say a huge well done to senior corporate support officer Kartar Singh, who won the Local Government Challenge at last week’s LGA national conference. This is nothing short of an incredible achievement – for those who aren’t aware, the competition sees the best and brightest local government officers compete in a series of real-life events around the country. The final was held at the annual conference in Birmingham and Kartar really impressed the judges. Well done Kartar a great accolade for you and the council!

Alistair, Carlton and Terence