November 2024

I hope, like me, you are all starting to feel festive now that the lights are switched on in all three of the borough's town and our villages, but before we look ahead to the Christmas period, I wanted to take some time to reflect on a very busy November.

As always, I was proud to see so many members of our communities gathering together to pay their respects to the armed forces both past and present at the various Remembrance parades and services held around the borough. It is always a humbling and emotional occasion paying tribute to those who have sacrificed so much.

I joined colleagues from the public, private and voluntary sectors for the North East Combined Authority's Child Poverty Summit. Sadly, there are staggering levels of child poverty in South Tyneside and the wider region and it's vital that we work collaboratively to bring about lasting change. Having already hosted the first child poverty summit in the North East here in South Tyneside, the issue has long been a priority for us and there is a huge amount of work going on to tackle it.

A package of measures to cut unemployment, reduce the cost of travel and help children in hardship were announced at the NECA summit, which highlighted the commitment and determination of people to work together to turn the tide on this issue which for too long has blighted our region.

Details of our fourth monitoring visit from Ofsted were published earlier this month and I'm pleased that inspectors recognised the further progress and improvements being made in Children's Services. We've also expanded our Mockingbird programme to support our fantastic network of foster carers who make such a difference to the lives of the children and young people they care for. That difference was highlighted by Fatima Whitbread, who herself grew up in care, at an event we hosted where she gave a moving talk about her own experiences.

We once again marked White Ribbon Day this month to raise awareness of violence against women and girls. White Ribbon Day is a reminder of the devastating effect domestic abuse can have and that is why we are doing everything we can to tackle this issue head on, supporting thousands of victims and their children, but also working with perpetrators to reduce incidents and break the cycle of abuse.

The management of housing services was brought back under direct council control at the start of the month, following an independent review and consultation with tenants.

The Regulator of Social Housing has made significant changes regarding the standards tenants can expect and as a responsible landlord, we will continue to listen to tenants and deliver the best possible homes and services.

I visited Simonside to see how we have converted outdated bedsits into modern two-bedroomed houses. One-bedroomed flats had become unpopular in this location so I was impressed to see how we had invested to transform them into the kind of affordable homes which local families wanted.

We're continuing to lead the way in our battle against climate change, as we progress with the biggest ever rollout of EV chargers in the North, and with both our groundbreaking renewable energy networks having been operational for a year. I'm so proud of how we continually innovate to reduce our carbon emissions. But despite all our efforts, we, like many other councils, are at risk of not achieving our target of carbon neutrality by 2030. We updated council on our latest position this month.

Beaches in the borough were also rated for their bathing water quality in new annual figures, with Sandhaven and Marsden Bay rated 'good', while Littlehaven was unfortunately rated as 'poor', as is common with newly-classified bathing water sites. We're already working on an action plan with our partners on how to improve this.

I wanted to put on record my congratulations to Bede's Helping Hands food bank at Jarrow after they received the highly-prestigious King's Award for Voluntary Service.

This award is well-deserved recognition of the fantastic - and vital - work they do for our communities. Well done to the whole team.

So now the festive season is in full swing, with next week's Winter Parade promising to be as big a crowd-pleaser as ever. I hope you and your loved ones are able to enjoy the wonderful programme of Christmas events, including a fabulous selection of festive fairs and markets in the borough.

Councillor Tracey Dixon
Leader of South Tyneside Council