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Cardiff Council Update: 15 March 2024
Here is your Friday update, covering:
- £1billion investment in delivering affordable homes for Cardiff
- Council pledges to combat racial discrimination in the workplace
- Travel advice for Wales vs Italy on 16 March in Cardiff
- Plans for a ‘Green Paper' into Green Energy investment revealed
£1billion investment in delivering affordable homes for Cardiff
Building new council homes at a time of unprecedented demand for housing and homelessness services remains paramount for Cardiff Council over the coming year.
In its Housing Revenue Account (HRA) Business Plan for 2024/25, the authority sets out the key priorities for its wide range of Housing services, helping to deliver the strategic commitments set out in the Council's ‘Stronger Fairer Greener' vision.
Following an extremely challenging year in which the Council declared a housing emergency due to exceptional pressures and unabating demand for homelessness services, delivering more affordable housing at scale and pace is at the top of the list to address the significant levels of need.
An ambitious development programme that will ultimately deliver more than 4,000 new homes over the next 10 years reached the 1,000 new council homes milestone in 2023, with the Council's stock now up to 14,000 homes across the city.
Work to increase the number of sites within the development programme is ongoing, to ensure the delivery of 2,800 council homes and 1,200 homes for sale.
Dealing with homelessness features heavily in the plan, both in terms of preventing households from losing their home and alleviating homelessness when it does happen.
The rapid installation of modular homes at the Gasworks site in Grangetown to support homeless families demonstrates the innovative solutions the Council is utilising to increase temporary accommodation while the alignment of Housing Solutions, Homelessness Prevention and Advice services now provide a complete package of help and support to people who are experiencing homelessness issues.
Council pledges to combat racial discrimination in the workplace
Cardiff Council has become the latest local authority to sign up to UNISON's anti-racism charter.
The charter, which aims to tackle racism in the public sector, commits organisations and their leaders to having a clear and visible race equality policy, as well as to a programme of anti-racism initiatives.
It was developed in response to a survey by UNISON - the largest public sector union - of 1,000 black workers in London which revealed that only 30% felt their employer took race equality seriously.
Included in the charter are a series of pledges committing the council to introduce measures within the next 12 months, including:
- Recognising the need and benefit in championing a racially diverse workforce
- Challenging racism internally and externally wherever it arises in the organisation
- Providing unconscious bias and anti-racism training for all staff members
- Reviewing recruitment processes to identify and address race disparities in equality of opportunity, and
- Being anti-racist, not just non-racist in everything it does
Travel advice for Wales vs Italy on 16 March in Cardiff
Wales will be taking on Italy on Saturday 16 March at Principality Stadium.
With the kick-off taking place at 2.15pm - there will be a full city centre road closure from 10.15am until 6.15pm to ensure all ticket holders can get into and out of the stadium safely.
The M4 motorway is expected to be very busy - please plan ahead - and avoid the congestion in Cardiff by using the park & ride at the former Toy's R Us site car park in the Sports Village.
Gates open at 12pm, those attending the rugby match are strongly advised to plan their journey and get in early. Please pay attention to the prohibited items listed at principalitystadium.wales, in particular the bag policy (no large bags permitted) before travelling into the city.
Plans for a ‘Green Paper' into Green Energy investment revealed
Plans for a ‘Green Paper' to explore investment opportunities around the green energy transition linked to Cardiff Council's response to the climate emergency and carbon neutral targets have been revealed.
The Green Paper aims to provide a clearer picture of:
- the scale of funding required to meet carbon neutral targets;
- the economic opportunities of a green energy transition; and
- the impact of national policies and initiatives.
Carbon emissions generated directly by Cardiff Council have reduced by 11.7% since work began on its One Planet Cardiff strategy in response to the climate emergency in 2019/20, but a report due to be discussed at a Cabinet meeting on March 21st, outlines a number of significant emerging challenges.
The report also highlights the risk to Cardiff from flooding as a result of climate change, regardless of the city's efforts to reduce emissions. To mitigate this risk the Council is in the process of developing a number of flood prevention schemes including a major coastal flood defence scheme on spanning 1.5 kilometres along the foreshore.
