Public consultation.

WCBC has a statutory duty under the Childcare Act 2006 to secure as far as reasonably practicable, sufficient childcare for 0-15 year olds to meet the needs of working parents/carers or parents/carers education or training that will lead to work.

Integral to this duty is the requirement to complete a Childcare Sufficiency Assessment (CSA). The objective of the CSA is to identify gaps in the provision of childcare and to set out actions to narrow these gaps moving towards a position of ‘sufficiency’ across the County Borough

Wrexham Council currently has 3 dog control orders which cover the entire County Borough or specific areas:-

• The Fouling of Land by Dogs (WCBC) Order 2009
• A Dogs Exclusion (WCBC) Order 2009
• A Dogs on Lead by Direction (WCBC) Order 2009

An informal Public Spaces Protection Order consultation was held from March 21^st  until June 26^th, 2016. The survey was available to be completed online and paper copies were also distributed at the Park Visitor Centres and park staff interviewed visitors to gain their views using the standard survey form. Community Councils were also supplied with posters to put up on their noticeboards to encourage the local community to participate in the survey. A total of 871 responses were obtained from the on line and paper surveys.

The intention will be to replace the current orders, with a  new Public Spaces Protection Order covering the County Borough. The existing dog fouling requirements for owners to remove their dog’s faeces in public areas, the exclusion zones for dogs on bowling greens, marked sports pitches and  play areas (apart from owners with assisted dogs) and a dogs on lead by direction order to all applicable land, allowing an Authorised Officer to instruct owners to place and keep a dog on a lead when necessary, would also continue. The results of the informal public consultation indicate that there is support for this approach. 

The more controversial section of the Public Spaces Protection Order, covers dog control in the parks and dogs on leads along a public road and pavement. Consultation on this section of the proposed order, indicated strong support for some control of dogs in designated areas in the parks, such as around visitor centres and car parks (such as Ty Mawr Country Park and Alyn Waters Country Park), but not for dogs on lead in the parks generally. There was strong support for dogs on leads on a public road and pavement.

The feedback was very useful in determining the policy that members adopted on the new dog control and dog fouling Public Spaces Protection Order.

The results of informal public consultation were as follows. There were 871 responses. Around 69% were completed by dog owners and the majority lived in Wrexham. When asked to rank the enforcement proposals, the greatest support was given to controlling dog fouling, followed by excluding dogs from sports pitches, children’s play areas and bowling greens. The third greatest support was for enforcing dogs on leads on public roads and pavements. There was very strong support (86%) for continuing with the areas covered by the present Dog Control Orders covering dog fouling, exclusion areas and placing dogs on leads when requested by an Authorised Officer. There was very strong support for dogs being required to be kept on a lead along a public road and pavement (89%). The majority of respondents felt that dogs should not be required to be kept on leads in open spaces and parks all times (68%). However, there was strong support for dogs to be kept on a lead around defined areas of parks, such as visitor centres and car parks (76%).   

It was clear from the feedback that there was strong support for dogs on leads on pavements adjacent to roads, some form of dog control around the visitor centres in the parks, but not in the parks in general.  The feedback fed into the Public Spaces Protection Order report in which members considered the public consultation results. This was instrumental in helping shape the final PSPO. It is now adopted ready for the 1st of March 2017 implementation date.

The LA has a statutory responsibility to ensure that there are suitable and sufficient school places available in Wrexham. By regularly reviewing the number of school places in Wrexham, the authority can address the changing forecast of demand and respond to rapid changes in demographics. This ensures that there are enough school places, of the right type, in the right location

Local authorities continue to face reductions in funding from Central Government, which means that Councils must continue to find ways to function and deliver services whilst budgets continue to reduce. In Wrexham we estimate that we need to save a further £5million over the next year. This is in addition to the £25million already saved over the last three years.

We are committed to delivering the services outlined in our Council Plan. We continue to look for ways to improve our services, making them more efficient in order to prioritise, as far as possible, our frontline services.  These improvements include modernising the way we work, and reviewing staffing levels and structures to reduce costs whilst effectively delivering our reshaped services. We are also committed to ensuring that we are able to answer your enquiries at the first point of contact wherever possible, and (in keeping with the world around us) increasing our online services.

More than 1,000 people took part in the consultation and gave their views about the proposals we made, as well as making some suggestions of their own.

We'd like to thank everyone who took part for their time.

The results from the consultation were presented to Elected Members in order to shape the decisions they made about Wrexham County Borough Council's budget for 2017/18.

The 'You Said, We Did' report details what decisions have been made about each of the proposals presented for consultation.

There are long-established practices in Welsh Local Authorities regarding how a service-users means should be treated when calculating their contributions (if any) towards the costs of their care. The Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act  2014 imposes some mandatory changes on Local Authorities in this area but also allows for some discretion. Wrexham Council is now considering exercising some of this discretion.  

Any changes to the discretionary elements of the charging policy would be done to ensure fairness and equity for all service-users; would remove some long-standing anomalies; would go some way to redressing the negative financial impacts to the Council of the mandatory changes; and ensure that the best possible services are provided/procured for those who need them.      

For further information regarding the SS & WB (Wales) Act and what it says Council`s must and may do in relation to paying for Social Care, see –

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/anaw/2014/4/contents/enacted and

http://gov.wales/topics/health/socialcare/act/code-of-practice/?lang=en

For Wrexham Council`s current (pre Act) policy and information regarding charging for Social Care provision, see

http://www.wrexham.gov.uk/assets/pdfs/social_services/leaflets/paying_for_socialcare_services.pdf and http://www.wrexham.gov.uk/assets/pdfs/social_services/leaflets/financial_information_guide.pdf

Proposed Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO) The Town Centre, Wrexham and Bellevue Park Wrexham.

As a resident, visitor or business owner in the area it is likely that you will be aware of issues of anti-social behaviour which occur in these areas.

Examples of this behaviour include;

•Rough sleeping;

•Drug abuse; and intoxication from that

•Drinking alcohol and under the influence of such

North Wales Police, Wrexham County Borough Council and partner agencies have tried over the years to find a solution to this problem to alleviate the disturbance and detrimental effect on the quality of life of residents and also those who wish to use the park and/or visit the town centre.

In October 2014 the Anti-social Behaviour Crime and Policing Act 2014 was introduced. As part of this legislation comes the introduction of the Public Spaces Protection Order. (PSPO) This enables Local Authorities to impose prohibitions or requirements to specified areas to enable law abiding citizens to enjoy public areas without being affected by Anti-Social behaviour.

The new PSPO, will introduce additional prohibitions and will enable Officers from North Wales Police and designated officers within Wrexham County Borough Council to deal more robustly with offenders at the time of occurrence. The intention is to provide a deterrent to those considering participating in the activities outlined above. Officers will have the power to request people to leave, issue on the spot fines or report people for summons.

Following the Wrexham Town PSPO consultation on Your Voice Wrexham and other face to face consultations it was clear that the public were very supportive of a PSPO for the town centre, and were also supportive of the following prohibitions: 

• Behaviour causing harassment, alarm, nuisance or distress
• Consumption of alcohol or possession of an open container of alcohol
• Loitering in a state of intoxication or through drug induced activity
• Eating, drinking, inhaling, injecting, smoking or otherwise using intoxicating substances
• Urinating or defecating
• Sleeping in Kings Street bus station or public toilets during the hours of darkness

As a result of the consultation, the boundaries of the map were extended to pick up other areas where there had been evidence of anti social behaviour.   A result was taken to our Executive Board for approval of the Wrexham Town PSPO and the PSPO was put in place for 1^st August 2016.

Since the PSPO has been in place over 50 PSPO tickets have been given by North Wales Police and Council Enforcement Officers.  Public awareness of the Wrexham Town PSPO and how to report anti-social behaviour has also been raised.  The PSPO has been implemented along with other initiatives so support the visible vulnerable into recovery services.  A further report is due to Executive Board in early 2017 to update the public on the Wrexham town PSPO.

Wrexham County Borough Council is proposing to continue Additional Licensing to cover all Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs) in the County Borough.

This public consultation document explains the Council’s proposal, how the scheme would work and the continued benefits of operating such a scheme. Anyone completing this questionnaire should read the consultation document to familiarise themselves with the proposed scheme.

Arson has been a recurring problem in Wrexham for a number of years.  There is a significantly higher level of deliberate fires in the county compared to the rest of North Wales over the past 5 years.  43% of all arson in the North Wales area occurred in Wrexham; increasing to 47% in 2015.

Wrexham’s Public Services Board (PSB), Partnership Delivery Board 3 has been awarded £10,000 from the Police and Crime Commissioner to support the development of an action plan to reduce arson offences in Wrexham.

Partners are already working together to develop responses to address this issue, this one-off funding may be used to enhance the current provision.

An important part of this work will be to educate and raise awareness of the negative impacts of arson so that we can influence behaviour change, and reduce the number of incidents across Wrexham.