The Plan
Outcome: Healthy and active communities
Programme: Improving everyone’s health and reducing inequalities.
Description: This programme will deliver interventions to empower our communities, in particular those most disadvantaged, to adopt healthier behaviours and better cope with the impact on the wider determinants of health on their general wellbeing.
This will include:
- addressing the factors that influence health and wellbeing, such as the cost of living, employment, housing, and access to green space
- embedding ‘Make Every Contact Count’ (NHS Health Education England’s approach to behaviour change) with a focus on the voluntary and community sector
- delivery of public health services focused on tackling inequality.
Measures of success:
- Rate per 100,000 of self-reported 4-week smoking quitters aged 16 or over (cumulative)
- Excess weight in 4 to 5 year olds
- Excess weight in 10 to 11 year olds
- Percentage of women initiating breastfeeding within 48 hours of birth
- Number of new settings which are dementia friendly (cumulative)
- Percentage of children and young people achieving a lifestyle improvement as a result of completing a young people weight management service
- Proportion of people who self-report high levels of life satisfaction.
Outcome: Resilient families
Programme: Children's Services Improvement Plan
Description: To develop Children’s Services to be a ‘Good’ service and continue to strengthen our early help offer.
Measures of success:
- The average number of days (over the last 36 months) between a child entering care and moving in with adoptive family (fostering adjusted)
- Number of children in care per 10,000 children
- Number of child protection cases per 10,000 children
- Average caseloads in assessment teams
- Average caseloads in post-assessment teams
- Completed initial child and family assessments which started as S47, where the child was visited within one working day
- Completed initial child and family assessments which started as S17, where the child was visited within 5 working days
- Percentage of children with long-term fostering as a plan, where the child, carer and service have agreed for the placement to last until the child is ready to leave care
- Rate of open child in need cases per 10,000
- The percentage of Children's Social Care audits graded good or outstanding
- The percentage of Children's Social Care substantive posts not filled by permanent social workers.
Programme: The best start in life
Description: Support families to give their children the best start in life by developing an integrated approach to our healthy child and early years programmes.
Measures of success:
- Percentage of pregnant women smoking at time of delivery (SATOD).
Outcome: Older and disabled people living independently in their homes
Programme: Improve support for vulnerable adults by working with partners and communities.
Description: Improve support for vulnerable adults by:
- working with partners and communities to develop integrated care pathways
- maintaining and prolonging independence by using technology-enabled care services in an effective preventative way
- developing and improving local safeguarding arrangements through Medway Adults Safeguarding Partnership.
Measures of success:
- Percentage of long-term packages that are placements
- Percentage of clients receiving a direct payment for their social care service
- Proportion of adults with a primary support reason of learning disability support who live in their own home or with their family
- Permanent admissions to care homes per 100,000 population: 18 to 64
- Permanent admissions to care homes, per 100,000 population: 65+.
Outcome: All children achieving their potential in education
Programme: High quality education provision for all
Description:
- Raise standards in education across all phases
- Improve the percentage of children in schools that are ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’
- Improve the quality of leadership, governance, and teaching
- Engage young people as active citizens.
Measure of success:
- The percentage of children permanently excluded from school (upheld only)
- Partnership measure: Percentage of all secondary schools judged good or better
- The percentage of special schools in Medway judged to be good or better
- The percentage of children who were persistently absent from school
- The percentage of children who achieved the required standard or above in reading, writing and mathematics at KS2
- The percentage of children who achieve the required standard or above in reading, writing and mathematics at KS2 in maintained schools only
- Partnership measure: Percentage of all primary schools judged good or better
- Average attainment 8 score.
Outcome: A clean and green environment
Programme: Enhancing the public realm, street scene, parks and green spaces.
Description: Working with the public and partners to enhance and protect Medway’s high-quality public realm and street scene
Measures of success:
- Satisfaction with parks and green spaces: direct users Citizens Panel
- Improved street and environmental cleanliness: litter
- Satisfaction with refuse collection: Citizens Panel result.
Programme: Replacing Medway’s streetlights.
Description: Increase the energy efficiency of Medway’s illuminated assets by using LED technology and supporting the SMART Cities ambition.
Programme: Improving air quality in air quality management areas in Medway.
Description: To co-ordinate and monitor delivery of actions contained within the council’s Air Quality Action Plans.
Programme: Climate change.
Description: Work with partners and the public to minimise emissions of greenhouse gases and reduce Medway’s contribution to climate change to net zero by 2050. Success will be measured by:
- emissions
- air quality
- energy
- transport and housing
- fuel poverty.
Outcome: Put Medway on the map
Programme: Medway, a great place to live, work, learn and visit.
Description: Built around our culture, tourism and regeneration strategies. By building on what makes Medway unique - the river, our heritage, our creative community and sporting legacy - Medway on the Map promotes our area as a great place to live, work, learn and visit.
Outcome: A strong diversified economy
Programme: Inward investment and business growth.
Description:
- The development of Innovation Park Medway and commercial premises across the area to provide the right infrastructure for business success
- Ensure Medway’s regeneration agenda delivers economic growth, increasing high value businesses and high-quality employment and creating jobs and inward investment
- Continue to progress and then implement a strategy suite refresh, covering skills and employability, town centres, innovation and the emerging Medway wide 2037 strategy
- Continue to encourage and help facilitate the growth of all business in Medway, via development of the new Business for Medway group, participation in town centre forums, support for Creative Medway Compact and the Town Centres Cabinet Advisory Board
- Support the resilience and recovery of our high streets and town centres, including participation in the High Streets Taskforce support scheme.
Measures of success:
- Percentage of square footage let at Innovation Centre Medway (ICM)
- Percentage of square footage let in council-owned business units
- Growth Value Added (GVA) per job – Medway.
Outcome: Residents with jobs and skills
Programme: Jobs, skills, and employability.
Description:
The Medway Skills Board, established in 2017, is to champion skills development to all ages. The Skills Plan for Medway was adopted by Cabinet in March 2019 and refreshed in 2022. The plan's priorities consist of:
- Raising and responding to employer demand
- Developing progression routes for young people
- Building an adaptable and resilient workforce
- Ensuring opportunities for everyone
- Leading by example.
Medway Adult Education learning programme to boost local skills level for people who want to access employment, retrain or gain new skills. This also includes the new numeracy scheme Multiply, enabling those without a Level 2 Mathematics qualification to engage with numeracy in a wide variety of ways.
Measures of success:
- Percentage of 16 to 17 year olds who are not in education, employment or training or whose status is ‘not known’
- Percentage retention rate
- Achievement rate (pass rate)
- Number of jobs created and safeguarded (cumulative).
Outcome: Preventing homelessness
Programme: Preventing homelessness.
Description:
- To prevent homelessness through a council-wide approach
- To continue to deliver the priorities of the rough sleeper initiative
- To work in partnership to support residents to access the right support and housing options.
Measures of success:
- Number of households living in temporary accommodation
- Number of households with dependent children in bed and breakfast (B&B) accommodation who have resided there for 6+ weeks
- Number of private sector properties improved as a result of the council’s intervention.
Outcome: Delivering new homes to meet the needs of Medway’s residents
Programme: Delivering new homes to meet the needs of Medway’s residents.
Description:
- Progress the development of Medway’s Local Plan in order to meet our housing need up to 2040
- Work with landowners and developers to promote the delivery of appropriate housing on identified sites in Medway, to meet our housing requirements and support Medway’s future growth
- Deliver the Housing Infrastructure Fund Bid.
Measure of success:
- Net additional homes provided.
Outcome: Getting around Medway
Programme: Tackle congestion hotspots by transport and public realm improvements.
Description:
- Maintain a Level 3 status for Highway Asset Management to achieve 100% Incentive Funding from the Department for Transport (DfT)
- Transport and public realm improvements for the Medway towns
- Support the implementation of the Chatham package programme, made possible via successful Levelling Up Fund and Future High Street Fund bids.
Measure of success:
- Average journey time along 5 routes across Medway (minutes per mile).
Financial resilience
Measure of success:
- Unmodified audit opinion on statement of accounts
- Unmodified value for money (VFM) conclusion from external auditors.
Digital enablement
Creativity and innovation
Tackle climate change
Working together to empower communities
Child-friendly
