As has been widely reported, the funeral of Dawn Sturgess was held in Salisbury on Monday. Jane Scott sent flowers on behalf of the whole council and our sincere condolences go to Dawn’s family and friends at this difficult time.
The community spirit in both Salisbury and Amesbury has been remarkable and recognised by His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales in a letter thanking local people for their resilience after the recent incidents. You can read the letter here.
If you are a resident in the county, over the next few days you should receive a letter from Carlton, in his capacity as Electoral Registration Officer, asking you to respond to the household enquiry form. These letters are being sent out as part of our annual canvass – a huge logistical challenge which involves around 220,000 letters being sent out to Wiltshire households and the responses collated to ensure that our electoral register is accurate and up to date.
Please return your response online and encourage your friends and family to do the same.
The canvass itself is really important to ensure that anyone who is eligible to vote is actually registered. Please don’t miss out on having your say. Our thanks go to the elections team at this busy time for them.
The consultation on the future of special educational needs schools came to a close this week. We received more than 850 responses and the team will now begin the process of going through the responses to gain a better understanding of views on an issue which people understandably feel very strongly about. Once this has been done, a report will be considered by Cabinet in the autumn to agree the next steps.
The Families and Children’s Transformation Programme Board met at Springfield Community Campus in Corsham this week. Members discussed a number of updates on the programme – including a proposal to create an Early Support Hub (which would sit alongside the Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub), how partners can work more closely in their approach to commissioning services, and also how we tell people about the great work the programme is doing.
We are pleased to be able to tell you that the new waste and recycling contracts started on Monday as planned with relatively little disruption to services. Our thanks and congratulations go to the waste teams who have worked hard to achieve this, especially over last weekend. There was also great support from Fleet Services, Highways, Finance, HR, Legal Services and Communications to ensure that everything was in place for the commencement of new services. Thanks also go to Customer Services who are now working with residents, the waste service and our contractor Hills to deal with any missed collections and help iron out any wrinkles as the new collection services become established.
On Tuesday we met with our current broadband providers BT Plc and Gigaclear Plc. These quarterly meetings are an important part of the robust contract management process we have in place, that to date has allowed us to deliver a fibre broadband service to over 88,000 premises across Wiltshire on time and within budget.
We also honoured achievements in the field of adult education at an awards ceremony held as part of the Family Learning project. The scheme supports less confident learners who may have missed opportunities in life due to educational, social or emotional circumstances. Students – all parents aged 19 and above – were recognised for the enormous strides they made in the past year as part of our Family Learning project. More than 100 award winners and guests attended the ceremony – well done to everyone involved.
Finally, following interviews last week for Director Education and Skills and Director Adult Care Learning Disabilities and Mental Health we have made offers to successful candidates, and once we have completed the appropriate checks and clearances we will announce who has been appointed.
Alistair, Carlton and Terence
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