Delivering a Stronger, Fairer and Greener Cardiff

A vision of a Stronger, Fairer and Greener Cardiff and the strategy to help deliver it over the next five years has been revealed by the city’s leader.

In it, Cllr Huw Thomas, the leader of Cardiff Council, will share the vision with invited stakeholders and city partners at an event in Cardiff’s Parkgate Hotel on Tuesday, July 19, where he will tell guests that he is intent on building a powerhouse economy in Cardiff that can benefit everyone as the cost-of-living crisis bites.

Cllr Thomas said: “Back in 2017 we launched our Capital Ambition policy vision and over the next five years we made great progress, bringing more and better jobs to the city, building new schools and improving education standards, but the world has changed significantly over this period.

“The Covid-19 pandemic created new problems and exacerbated existing challenges and, more recently, the war in Ukraine has threatened to prolong the current cost-of-living crisis. With the worst of the pandemic behind us it’s time to focus on leading a city-wide recovery – which is why we are preparing to launch a new, ‘Stronger, Fairer, Greener,’ five-year policy agenda for the city. Cabinet will consider this new policy agenda at its next meeting on Thursday, July 14, and on Tuesday, July 19, I will set out our vision for Cardiff to city partners and stakeholders at an event in the city centre.”

The strategy includes contributions from all of the council’s Cabinet members who outline how they will help deliver and implement it through 10 portfolios of responsibility.

Realising this vision will involve delivering the following:

• A Stronger Cardiff: Attracting new investment and businesses into the city, boosting economic productivity, creating good-quality jobs in Cardiff’s high-value and foundational sectors, and boosting our resilience to climate change and associated environmental threats.
• A Fairer Cardiff : Delivering excellent education, training, into work and social services, as well as transport connectivity, to ensure that all citizens are able to benefit from Cardiff’s growth and the new opportunities it creates.
• A Greener Cardiff: Delivering a robust network of active travel and public transport, making Cardiff a ’15-minute city’, generating renewable energy and enhancing local biodiversity, ensuring that growth is sustainable and aligned with our commitment to becoming a Carbon Neutral City by 2030.

Cllr Thomas said: “We will help create a stronger city with an economy which creates and sustains well-paid jobs, an education system that helps young people reach their potential, a city with good, affordable housing in safe, confident and empowered communities. All supported by well-resourced efficient public services.

“We will create a fairer city where the opportunities of living in Cardiff can be enjoyed by everyone, whatever their backgrounds, where people suffering the effects of poverty are protected and supported, where a fair day’s work receives a fair day’s pay and where citizens feel valued and are valued.

“And we will make Cardiff a greener city, responding to the Climate Emergency through our One Planet programme, which will see us taking strides forward to become one of the world’s leading recycling cities, maintaining our high-quality open spaces, connecting communities by sustainable, convenient, accessible and safe transport options.”

“In this report, we set out the practical steps we will take over the next 5 years to turn this ambition into reality. You will see commitments to our city’s young people. Commitments on providing early help and family support to all that need it, on taking school investment and education improvement to new levels and supporting the transition to the world of work and further education. They are based on caring for our most vulnerable young people and making sure that Cardiff is a great place to grow up for all young people.

“They are based on having great parks, green spaces and play areas for our young people, access to the sporting and cultural assets of our capital city and making sure that the voice of young people is heard in our decision making. In short, we are putting children and young people front and centre of our ambitions for the city.

“Similarly, our programme contains commitments to close the gap between rich and poor in our city and, most urgently, tackle the cost-of-living crisis. We have been clear that education is the surest route out of poverty, and this needs to be complemented by a programme that will make sure that good jobs continue to be available in Cardiff – good jobs, paying a fair wage, with security and the offer of career progression – with the right support available to access them.

“We will tackle the city’s housing crisis. Not only have we built the first Council homes in Cardiff in a generation, but they have been award-winning homes delivered as part of one of the largest Council-house-building programmes in the UK. But we know that we need to go further and faster if we are to meet the scale of the housing challenge facing the city. That is why we are raising our ambitions even further and pledging to deliver 4,000 new homes by 2030.

“We have come through one of the most challenging periods in living memory. As leader of this city, I could not be prouder of how we came together in response to the pandemic.

Now is the time to look to the future with optimism, taking the dynamism and drive, the partnership working and innovation, the passion and commitment of our pandemic response into the great work of renewal.”

Other key pledges in the report include:

TRANSPORT

• Investigating the merits of a road-user charging scheme to help pay for public transport improvements to benefit Cardiff residents
• Introducing measures to deter car travel to school
• Completing five strategic cycleways, including a full route to Newport
• Delivering a robust network of active travel and public transport, making Cardiff a ’15-minute city’ in which most daily tasks can be achieved by either walking or cycling from home

EDUCATION

• Securing UNICEF Child Friendly City status by the end of 2022
• Establishing a young persons’ panel to ensure their voice is heard in council decision-making
• Expanding and enhancing the Cardiff Commitment, recruit new employers, and provide new ways for school pupils to engage with the fast-changing world of work
• Opening new campuses for Willows, Cathays, Cantonian, Fitzalan, and Cardiff High Schools through ‘Band B’ of the 21st Century Schools programme, and opening up to eight new primary schools and two new secondary schools by 2030
• Investing in digital infrastructure, equipment and new learning technologies for schools – aiming for a pupil to ICT devices ratio of 1:1.

CLIMATE CHANGE

• Developing more large-scale renewable energy projects like the Lamby Way Solar Farm
• Converting all 24,000 residential lighting to low-energy LEDs, saving more than £400k a year
• Achieving a 70% recycling performance by 2024/25, making Cardiff a world leader in this area
• Cracking down on littering and fly-tipping and improving street cleanliness by recruiting more front-line staff and exploring further measures, including community protection officers
• Publishing an action plan, including a set of annual carbon reduction targets, that will set Cardiff Council on the path to being a net zero organization by 2030

CULTURE & PARKS

• Developing a major events programme anchored around a home-grown music festival
• Roll out our Coed Caerdydd project with continued mass tree-planting raising the city’s tree canopy and biodiverse areas from 19% to 25% of total land use
• Complete a Playground Mapping exercise to ensure investment in new play equipment and play spaces is directed to the areas of greatest need
• Prioritising public space and assets for local clubs, with an emphasis on under-represented groups
• Use our work on the Music Strategy as a template for a new Cultural Strategy focused on supporting and celebrating Cardiff’s creative talent
• Secure an additional Green Flag Award each year of the administration- focusing on areas of high deprivation- taking the number of Green Flag Parks from 15 to 20

FINANCE

• Increasing the number of council services available to citizens via digital platforms
• Continuing to champion the Real Living Wage across all sectors and employers
• Delivering the recommendations of the Race Equality Task force, supporting career progression routes for ethnic minority employees while ensuring Cardiff Council is a ‘Fair Work’ employer
• Strengthening the council’s Socially Responsible Procurement platform to keep council spending local, more accessible to smaller companies while decarbonising the council’s supply chains
• Place renewed focus on the citizen experience of our services in our service planning and performance, and set high standards for customer care across all Council departments

HOUSING

• Increasing the council’s housing stock by building a further 1,500 units, focusing on zero-carbon homes
• Expanding the targeted multi-agency problem-solving group approach to anti-social behaviour hotspots
• Continuing the ‘No Going Back’ approach to keep rough sleeping at record low levels
• Work with Welsh Government and partners to help address the cost of renting in the private sector including exploring the feasibility of community-led housing
• Expand our Neighbourhood Regeneration programme and deliver even more Community and Wellbeing Hubs including a Youth Hub in the city centre and new provision at the Ely Youth Hub
• Work with partners to tackle all forms of violence against women and girls, domestic abuse and sexual violence, and take action to strengthen the support available to victims

INVESTMENT

• Delivering the new 17,000-seater indoor arena in Cardiff Bay
• Redeveloping the Canal Quarter, including reopening the canal and creating new public and commercial spaces on Churchill Way
• Generating £25m in capital receipts through land and asset sales by the end of 2025/26
• Facilitate the redevelopment of Metro Central and Central Quay.
• Support the completion of Cardiff Parkway and deliver a new Llanrumney Bridge as part of our Industrial Strategy for the east of the city
• Deliver a leaner and greener Council property estate, including reducing its carbon footprint by 30% and generating £25m in capital receipts

SOCIAL SERVICES

• Ensuring that Cardiff is an ‘age-friendly city’ where older people can continue to play a valued and active role
• Further developing the Cardiff Cares Academy to build capacity in the care sector
• Increasing the number of children looked after who are placed with their wider families instead of in out-of-county residential care
• Protecting vulnerable young people from exploitation
• Continue to work towards becoming a Dementia Friendly City which helps people living with dementia

PUBLIC HEALTH AND TACKLING POVERTY

• As a City of Sanctuary, welcoming refugees and asylum-seekers and supporting them to participate in and contribute to Cardiff’s economic, social and cultural life
• Increasing uptake of child immunisation, childhood obesity and bowel cancer screening
• Aiming to become a Stonewall Top 100 employer, as part of a commitment to LGBTQ+ inclusivity
• Developing plans to ensure that school meals are healthy and rely on more sustainable, lower carbon supply chains
• Continuing to support new apprenticeships and training opportunities within the council, with a goal of more than 500 apprenticeships by 2025
• Respond to and implement in full the recommendations of the Race Equality Taskforce

A report which includes all the commitments the council will make on the road to delivering a Stronger, Fairer and Greener capital city is available to view here https://app.prmax.co.uk/collateral/194881.pdf