Councillor Laing (Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Children’s Social Care, Culture and Communications) gave the following updates in Councillor Cresswell (Cabinet Member for Education, Skills and Apprenticeships) absence:

a)     Building Plymouth had been crowned winner at the Constructing Excellent Southwest Awards 2024;

b)    Building Plymouth’s Aspiring Rising Talent Network won the People and Culture Award 2024 at the Constructing Excellence Southwest Awards, which were held on 18 July at Aerospace Bristol.

Councillor Dann (Cabinet Member for Customer Services, Sport, Leisure and HR & OD) gave the following updates:

c)     Over 200 boats took part in the Youth Cadet World Championships, all of which were crewed by young people between the ages of 7-17;

d)    Visitors for the Youth Cadet World Championships had come from Argentina, Germany, Belgium, Australia, South Africa, India and more;

e)     It was the Council’s responsibility to ensure the water was safe for the public to use and there was still time to sign up to the partnership between  the RNLI, Swim Safe and Plymouth Active Leisure, which taught young people how to be seen and safe in the water;

f)      Plymouth Active Leisure’s Active Lifestyle team had a responsibility to encourage young people to be healthy, active and fit;

g)     The first of the four Fit and Fed Programmes was held in Victoria Park with 1000 people attending and 750 lunches were served. Partners from across Plymouth were present at the Fit and Fed Programme including Family Hubs, promotion for the Library services, Peninsula Dental, Community Builders, C-Tech Plus, Plymouth Energy Community and Livewell Southwest;

h)    The Fit and Fed sessions in the parks were for anybody in the local community to attend.

i)      Thousands of school clubs were being run across Plymouth and were aimed at young people with special educational needs, young people who receive free school meals or have other requirements to ensure families can access activities for their young people during the school holidays;

j)      The new Petanque facility at Stonehouse Creek opened on 21 August 2024;

k)     A new hockey pitch had been provided for Brickfields in partnership with Stoke Damerel and was scheduled to finish by next Spring;

l)      A Public Health Officer from New Zealand visited Brickfields to get a better idea on how Active Health is run in Plymouth;

m)   PCC were a key partner to the building of the Brickfields Hub and it was the biggest investment in sport that the city had had since the Life Centre;

Councillor Haydon (Cabinet Member for Community Safety, Libraries, Events, Cemeteries and Crematoria) gave the following updates:

n)    The British Firework Championship was set to take place on 14 and 15 August 2024 and had been running for 27 years;

o)    The West End Carnival would take place in the streets around Plymouth Market on 24 August 2024;

p)    Seafest Plymouth would be taking place on 14 and 15 September at the Mount Batton Centre, Tinside Lido, the Royal William Yard and Mount Edgcumbe;

q)    In 2018 it was discussed that two of the aged crematoriums needed to be replaced with new facilities with better access for people with disabilities and to create a better place to support bereaved families;

i) The new site would include three ceremony rooms designed to meet the varying needs of the public and would suit a number of mourners and desired style of the ceremony;

ii) The new site would also include high quality audio visual equipment for the ceremony to allow those who would not be present to take part;

iii) The waiting areas, alongside the flow of people throughout the building, had been designed to ensure that each funeral party received the highest quality experience when saying goodbye to their loved ones;

iv) New planting had been designed to be sympathetic of the environment and a café had been added to offer an additional wait facility;

v) The café was separate from the crematorium, and could be used by people visiting memorials of loved ones;

vi) The site was a peaceful setting which was now ready to welcome the bereaved and their families and friends;

vii) Thanks were given to all involved in the new crematorium project, including Ruth Harrell (Director of Public Health) and Graham Smith (Head of Bereavement Services);

viii) An open day was being held for all to come and view the new facility;

ix) The walls at the new facility could change colour to meet the needs of the individual.

Councillor Briars-Delve (Cabinet Member for Environment and Climate Change) gave the following update:

r)     Plymouth Summer of Nature was an initiative launched by the Council to help people of all ages connect to the city’s blue and green spaces through free events;

i) Plymouth’s Laureate of Words, Rosemarie Corlett, had held a foraging event and letters to the ocean walks at Ernesettle Creek;

ii) Eco-therapy for young people with special educational needs and disabilities had taken place;

iii) Community composting workshops had been held at Poole Farm;

iv) A Bio-blitz had taken place at Devonport Park to aid with pollination;

v) A beach clean and shark egg case count had taken place at Tinside;

s)     18 more events were planned before the start of September, all related to nature and blue and green spaces;

t)     £1 million from the Council’s Climate Emergency Investment Fund was being used for improvements for two of Plymouth’s Youth Centres both in Honicknowle and Efford, and would include installation of solar panels and roof and wall insulations to create lower emissions for those buildings.

Councillor Penberthy (Cabinet Member for Housing, Cooperative Development and Communities) gave the following updates:

u)    Sterling House in Honicknowle was a release of surplus Council owned land, and was a long-vacant nursing home. It was demolished by the Council using a combination of land release funds from the Government and the Plan for Homes budget and came to more than £700,000;

v)     The vacant health centre adjacent to Sterling House was purchased by the Council and demolished and the combined site was advertised to developers in February 2021;

w)   The site was sold to Live West for £1, who proposed to deliver 25 affordable, high quality homes, 12 of which would be made available to service veterans self-builders;

x)    The Council part-funded a veterans charity, Alabaré, to help support self-builders through the construction process right up into moving into the completed homes as tenants;

y)     Construction was completed last week and the quality of the buildings was clear for everybody to see;

z)     Live West had organised an event to officially open the housing later in 2024;

aa)  The surplus storage yard in St Peter’s Close in Plympton was repurposed by the Council as a housing site under the Plan for Homes Programme;

bb)The site was released to Westward Housing Group in 2022 for £25,000 following the submission of a proposal to build five bungalows, three of which had been made available at social rent, and two for shared ownership. One bungalow had been built specifically for a wheelchair user, and the other four were accessible;

cc)  The three social rent bungalows allowed applicants to ‘right size’ their accommodation in order to release under occupied family homes;

dd) There had been positive feedback from tenants, one of which had fed back that she was in her dream home and was now reunited with her dog. This showed the importance of partnerships and turning unused land into used land;

ee)  All of the bungalows had air source heat pumps, solar panels, bird and bat boxes, and electric car charging points;

ff)     Thanks were given to Westward Housing Group, the builders, the Council team and Homes England who made financial contributions;

gg)  The Council built open market housing which was high quality, design lead, environmentally friendly and viable in the city at Broadland Gardens;

hh)Broadland Gardens had met all of the Section 106 obligations, it was financially viable and surplus made on the site would support more affordable housing in Plymouth;

ii)     Alderwoman Pengelly’s family had agreed to the Council planting a memorial tree for her in the green at Broadland Gardens.