The Leader of the Council, Councillor Phil Davies, addressed the Council on the following matters:

·  National Postal Workers Day,

As today was National Postal Workers Day he, along with three colleagues, had visited Royal Mail Postal Workers at the Wallasey Sorting Office that morning to help celebrate the hard work and dedication of hundreds of thousands of women and men who collected, sorted and delivered letters, parcels and packets, including those working in post offices who collected and managed packets and parcels and many working behind the scenes to make the post a success for everyone across the UK.

It was expected to be one of the busiest days of the year in the postal industry with 130 millions of items in the system and he recorded his personal thanks and appreciation for the fantastic work that postal workers did for the people of Wirral.

·  A554 Tower Road Dock Bridges ‘A’ and ‘C’ Refurbishment Works

Work to the two bridges on the A554 Tower Road between Birkenhead and Wallasey was completed on Friday 14 December 2012, with the road being fully re-opened to traffic before the early evening peak-hour.

These essential works were necessary to ensure that the structures remained safe for the passage of vehicles.

The works had successfully been completed on schedule and to budget, despite several periods of unfavourable weather. In order to meet the demanding timescale for carrying out the work, the Contractor had also worked during the course of a number of weekends and he offered congratulations to all concerned.

·  Merseyside Pension Fund

Merseyside Pension Fund was congratulated on winning the Local Government Chronicle Fund of the Year for funds in excess of £2 bn; it had beaten some considerably larger funds, at the Local Government Chronicle Awards Dinner which had taken place in London the previous week. Councillor Pat Glasman, Chair of the Pensions Committee, had received the award together with staff from the team. It was a real achievement and was the second national award the Fund had won this year.

·  Outdoor Fitness Equipment

The Parks and Countryside Service had been successful with a funding application of £200,000 for outdoor fitness equipment; the funding was to provide 3 Fitness Trails (like the existing ones in Birkenhead and Central Parks) and 6 Gyms, which would consist of a grouping of approximately three or four items of equipment. 

The funding, which was through NHS Wirral’s - Health Innovation fund, was to provide additional freely accessible outdoor fitness equipment in Parks and green spaces, in the most deprived communities in Wirral where greatest need was identified.

·  Ofsted Report

A new report by Ofsted had shown that standards in Wirral’s schools were rising steadily. Ofsted’s annual report into services for children and young people for 2011/2012 showed that:

o  83 per cent of primary age pupils in Wirral attended good or outstanding primary schools

o  72 per cent of secondary age pupils in Wirral attended good or outstanding secondary schools

The figure for primary schools was particularly gratifying as out of 153 local authorities around the country, Wirral came 19th in a table listing local authorities where pupils were most likely to attend a good or outstanding primary school. Wirral was also one of only a few local authorities nationally where there were no schools in special measures or with a notice to improve. These figures were a tribute to the staff and pupils of all Wirral’s schools and he congratulated everyone concerned including the staff in the Children and Young People’s Department.

·  Corporate Peer Challenge

The report of the Local Government Association’s Peer Challenge Team was published recently (a copy was on the Council’s website). The report, by local authority experts, confirmed that the Council’s general approach to tackling its financial and corporate governance issues was right. He was pleased that all parties had welcomed this report and that they had had a very interesting session at the Floral Pavilion the week before last on the findings of the report and what kind of Council the Council aimed to become over the next 5 – 10 years. Member engagement at these sessions had been good, and he asked that those who had not yet engaged to get involved in further events which would be held in the New Year.

·  £1 million Big Lottery Grant for Beechwood

He congratulated everyone involved in securing a Big Lottery grant of £1 million for Beechwood. The funding would be spent on projects to benefit the local community and would help to tackle the high levels of deprivation in this area.