Message from Chief Executive, Alan Russell—Friday 27 October
In this month's blog, Alan celebrates a successful 2023 Royal National Mòd and highlights the work involved in tackling the impact of recent heavy rainfall and preparing for winter. He also provides an update on our change programme and invites colleagues to have their say on our supporting menopause approach.
I hope those of you that took some time off over the October week, managed to get some down time. Though I do appreciate for many, with families off school, you may be glad to get back to work for some peace and quiet!
It's been a very busy time for our colleagues in the events team with the 2023 Royal National Mód coming to a triumphant close last weekend. The week-long celebration of Gaelic language, sports, art, and culture saw approximately 8,000 visitors gather in Paisley with the newly re-opened Town Hall hosting many of the events. It's estimated to have generated over £2 million for the local economy.
The feedback from the organisers has been excellent, with many declaring it the best Mód yet, so congratulations to all our colleagues including at One Ren and our volunteers for all your hard work.
I'd also like to thank our civil contingencies team and EH&I colleagues for their efforts in keeping people safe and Renfrewshire moving, during this month's heavy rainfall. Our roads teams worked tirelessly to tackle priority areas of flooding to minimise the impact on residents and businesses by pumping water and clearing roads and gullies.
With the temperature dropping, and Winter just around the corner, our Ready for Winter preparations are well underway so we can meet any challenges we face while continuing to offer the high standard of services local people rely on.
Each winter, from gritting the roads to help with financial wellbeing and energy costs, colleagues across the Council provide a variety of services that can be a lifeline for the people of Renfrewshire throughout the colder months.
Similarly, our colleagues in Renfrewshire Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) have begun the roll-out of their winter vaccination programme. I got my flu vaccination earlier this month, and I would encourage anyone who is eligible to get a vaccination and help protect yourself, your family and council services, this winter.
I spent a day with the Corporate Management Team this week to review our current change programme and future opportunities that will help close the council's future funding gap. The proposals show innovation and a commitment to service improvement and drawing from best practice elsewhere and we recognise we will need to do more.
It remains our main focus to consider what services the council should prioritise most in the future and how best we can deliver those services, and to ensure this is informed by evidence - of local need and patterns of service use. I will keep you update on our progress, and I ask that everyone continues to contribute to the process where possible.
October is World Menopause Awareness Month and we've come a long way since the launch of our Supporting Menopause policy in March this year. The feedback from colleagues who have completed the training or attended a RenTalks session has been great, and our first RenTalks session for men took place earlier this week. The team are keen to hear your thoughts on our approach and would appreciate if you could complete this short survey to help inform next steps by Friday 10 November.
Thank you.
Alan
Published Friday 27 October 2023
Supporting menopause staff survey
Menopause support
