One Coventry Plan Annual Performance Report 2021-22 - Print version

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Infographics

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Overview

What is One Coventry?

Our One Coventry approach describes the way that we do things, how we work together with our communities and partners to improve the city and improve people’s lives

One Coventry is a way of working that enables us to focus on the things that people value most of all, helping us to make the biggest possible impact on the lives of local people.

Our One Coventry approach focuses on enabling people to live their best lives in a vibrant and prosperous city. This can only be achieved by listening to, and collaborating with, those who live, work, visit and do business in our city, by having different conversations and building on the great things that are already happening.

What is the One Coventry Plan?

The One Coventry Plan sets out our shared vision and priorities for the city.

The One Coventry Plan is currently being refreshed. This will set out a new strategic vision for the Coventry of 2030. The plan sets out our approach to increasing the economic prosperity of the city and region; improving outcomes and tackling inequalities within our communities; and tackling the causes and consequences of climate change.

The achievement of the vision and priorities in the plan will help Coventry benefit from opportunities presented by levelling-up; address the challenges faced as we recover from the COVID-19 pandemic; and deal with the issues most important to our communities, such as the cost-of-living crisis.

These are things that the Council cannot do alone: we must continue to work in a way that ensures we maintain continued financial sustainability of the Council, as well as strengthening the Council’s role as a partner, enabler, and leader as an anchor organisation in Coventry.

Our new plan is more focused on the needs and aspirations of our communities than ever before. We have listened and reflected on what people have been telling us and considered the key issues facing the City.

Have your say on the One Coventry Plan [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/ocp].

About this report

This annual performance report sets out our performance towards our priorities from April 2021 to March 2022.

As the One Coventry Plan is being refreshed, this retrospective blends our existing One Coventry performance metrics with emerging ones; with the intention to enable this report to provide both a review of the city’s performance, as well as evidence to provide a baseline for the new One Coventry Plan.

As before, for each of the priorities, this report sets out the trends, actions taken, and performance metrics to provide an assessment of the progress made against previous years and with other places.

Metrics

The Council uses agreed metrics to show progress made towards its priorities. This is supported by a wider basket of metrics including equality and perception metrics that help explain the trends and story behind the headlines. Metrics are selected from key strategies and aligned to directorate priorities and equality and health inequalities objectives. Further information including infographics, open data, maps, and the Coventry citywide intelligence hub [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/infoandstats].

Abbreviations & symbols used

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Executive summary

This year, Coventry celebrated its year in the spotlight as the UK City of Culture, which officially ran from May 2021 to May 2022. Early analysis of Coventry’s cultural mega-event saw 389,705 tickets issued for live events with a further estimated audience of 136,916 attending unticketed live events across the city; and over 516,000 online audiences to a cultural programme so far - especially important in a cultural event that took place during an unprecedented lockdown.
The City of Culture programme has seen some £172 million pounds invested into the city including major upgrades to the city’s public realm and cultural assets; and a total of 709 events delivered involving both professional artists and creatives as well as local artists and community organisations, bringing events to all 18 wards of the city, including art, music, dance, and theatre.
The ‘Story of Change’ underlying the City of Culture programme means that, in line with our One Coventry Plan priorities, the programme has been geared towards activities, events, and engagement that bring a long-lasting legacy to the city, from investments to sustain and grow our cultural sector, to involving, engaging, and enabling all communities, especially those who are least likely to access and benefit from publicly funded arts and culture.
The city’s year as the City of Culture, however, happened during a period of continued significant national and international challenges. In May 2021, as the City of Culture year got off to a start, COVID-19 pandemic-related restrictions remained in place. This created difficulties for a cultural mega-event seeking to bring people together. And as a result, plans have had to be rapidly adapted and changed in line with the rules and restrictions at the time.
Now, into 2022, the end of our year in the spotlight has coincided with the worst escalation in hostilities in Europe since 1991 with Russia’s War on Ukraine – which is one of the reasons behind the rapid rise in the cost of living – with UK annual inflation in April 2022 the highest it has been since April 1991. The impact of this cost-of-living crisis on communities across the city is yet to be fully realised, as people right across the city face rapidly rising energy, fuel, food, and housing costs.
The Council has had to respond to the twin challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis by being nimble and adaptable. This has included working with our partners and our communities in new ways. The direct impact has included additional duties for the Council, from supporting residents and businesses during pandemic-related lockdowns and restrictions, to the distribution of energy rebates and grants to Council taxpayers.
Additionally, there has been, and will continue to be, more indirect impacts as residents and communities who previously have never needed local authority support face difficulties which mean that they will find themselves in a position of requiring additional help and support from the Council.

Performance towards the One Coventry Plan 2016-2024

The One Coventry Plan 2016-2024 is measured using 75 metrics, of which 32 metrics improved; 8 stayed the same; 18 got worse; can’t say for 10 metrics; and progress is not available for the remaining 7 metrics. This means, 69% (40/58) of directional metrics (excluding cannot say or not available) improved or stayed the same.

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Baseline towards the One Coventry Plan 2022-2030

This report also includes emerging metrics against the proposed new One Coventry Plan 2022-2030. This plan is currently out for public consultation. Where
available, this report sets out the current metric value and the direction of travel for those metrics over the past year. This is intended to establish a
baseline for comparison in future years. 

Increasing the economic prosperity of the city and region

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A challenging global economic context

While there was recovery in the national economy during 2021, after the negative growth in 2020 associated with the economic restrictions of global pandemic
lockdowns, the current national economic outlook remains challenging and uncertain - and will likely impact on Coventry and its residents.
This time last year the outlook was challenging after businesses and economic activity had taken a large hit, and the extent of the recovery and the speed in which it would come was unclear. The economy has grown gradually but notably in the last year, with spending and other economic activity coming back after COVID restrictions.
At the end of 2021/22 (end of March 2022) nominal national GDP was 11% higher than it was at the end of 2020/21, a real growth rate of 8.7% after taking away the effect of inflation. These are very high annual growth figures compared to normal, however this bounce back comes after significant negative growth in the previous year and the annual growth rate will not sustain. It is estimated that at the end of March 2022 real GDP was 0.7% higher than pre-pandemic levels.
However, growth in the local economy has slowed since 2016, putting the local economy in a worse position from which to recover from COVID-19 and to be
resilient to the current challenges. Nonetheless, local labour market data shows that the net effect on households overall has been less significant so far;
employment and unemployment rates amongst Coventry residents did not change significantly in 2021 and are only slightly worse than they were before the
pandemic. Also, average wages of Coventry residents in employment have continued to increase. Median earnings of Coventry residents in employment (part-time
and full-time together) grew by an estimated 5% last year from £24,645 in 2020 to £25,795 in 2021, a faster growth rate than national and regional averages
and on the back of increases also in 2020.
National GDP growth has been slowing in recent months, in fact starting to fall in March and April 2022. Growing inflation threatens to have a depressive effect on economic activity and thereby GDP growth, with increasing prices threatening household budgets. Consumer spending that was returning after pandemic  constriction will likely stall again as people reduce discretionary spending with the prices of essentials growing rapidly. Increasing costs will also affect local  businesses.
The headline national inflation rate – that is, the rate at which prices are rising, has been increasing gradually for the last year and reached 7.8% in April 2022 with predictions of further increases. This had been driven by, but not limited to, increases in the prices of energy, fuel, and food. Real incomes are likely to fall, affecting Coventry residents' quality of life. This 'cost of living crisis' is likely to have an impact on a wide variety of households and the local economy, along with significant public health implications.
The overall effect may vary by industry in Coventry, the businesses in the city that rely on discretionary household spending on things that might be considered 'luxuries' in the coming months might be disproportionately affected - for example, parts of the hospitality industry might be vulnerable to further damage to add to the pandemic impact suffered.
We will have to wait and see whether the current economic challenges, including widespread industrial action, will affect employment in Coventry and whether
real wages will start to fall if price rises that are affecting residents become higher than wage increases.

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Working with existing businesses in the city to grow and expand

There were 10,120 active enterprises in Coventry in 2021 – same as in 2020. This is a rate of 333 per 10,000 residents; lower than the rates in Warwickshire
and the WMCA average. This makes it particularly important for the Council to work to encourage new business startups and grow and expand existing ones.

Grants to businesses

Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns, 16,750 grants totalling £99,236,500 were delivered to Coventry businesses via the Council’s economic development service and business rates team.
In 2021/22, the Council has awarded £1.72 million in direct cash grants to 482 businesses most affected by the Omicron variant of COVID-19 and awarded £3.97 million in discretionary cash grants to 1,674 businesses in the city.

Business support programmes

The Council continues to run three European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) business support programmes, with support moving to remote video conferencing, alongside online webinars. Grants of £2.04 million were paid out to 127 companies. When taking matched funding into account, this represents a total investment of £7,058,352 to the Coventry and Warwickshire economy.

Investing in transport and digital infrastructure

Coventry Railway Station

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Above: the new station building and car park (clad in orange) alongside the renovated Grade-II listed original station building.
£82m renovation of Coventry Railway Station is now complete, bringing a much-needed expansion to the capacity of one of the country’s fastest-growing stations (by passenger numbers). The project includes a new station building, five retail units, a new 633-space multi-storey car park, and 174 bike storage spaces.
Below: railway concourse inside the new station building.

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Delivering a capital regeneration programme

City Centre South

City Centre South will transform seven hectares of the city through a new mixed use development scheme that will provide over a thousand new homes, a high-
quality public realm environment and modern, forward looking commercial, leisure and retail spaces.
This year has seen outline planning consent for the scheme secured, and a compulsory purchase order made.
Next steps include working with the developer on a scheme design to inform a reserved matters planning application; ongoing discussions and negotiations with property owners to acquire the land for the scheme, funding agreements and governance approvals. This should then allow for initial works to begin in late-2023.

Increasing hotel capacity

The leisure and hospitality sector has been hugely affected by the COVID-19 crisis over the past two years and this has, unsurprisingly, played a significant role in delays to the delivery of new hotels.
After several delays due to COVID-19 restrictions, the Telegraph Hotel opened in May 2021 in the former newspaper headquarters. This formed a key element of hospitality improvements to Corporation Street.
Works on Hotel Indigo, a proposed 100-bed hotel, restaurant, and bar opposite One Friargate is now expected to begin in summer 2022, following new agreements and a repayable loan agreed in principle with its developer, Castlebridge.

Friargate business district

A second office block, Two Friargate, currently under construction, will provide 134,000 square feet of high-quality commercial office space. This is expected to play an important part towards the city’s economic development and inward investment objectives. The building is expected to be ready for occupation by early 2023.

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Delivering a strong and tangible legacy of opportunity

UK City of Culture 2021

Coventry was awarded the status of UK City of Culture 2021 back in December 2017 but saw its start delayed to May 2021 due to the pandemic. Over the past 12 months, some 709 events took place, across all 18 wards of the city. In line with the ‘story of change’, activities and events featured professional artists and creatives alongside community participants.
Early analysis reveals Coventry’s programme saw 389,705 tickets issued for live events with a further estimated audience of 136,916 attending un-ticketed live events across the city. The online audience, so important for the events affected by lockdown, is still growing and is currently estimated at over 516,000 for events created by the City of Culture Trust and its partners.

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Major achievements through the year included: The Turner Prize at the Herbert Art Gallery & Museum; two summers of performances at Assembly Festival Garden; the establishment of the UK’s first permanent immersive digital gallery, The Reel Store; the UK’s longest drone show, Our Wilder Family for a free audience of over 27,000; and the BBC Radio 1 Big Weekend for 88,000 people.

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Coventry – the third holder of the UK City of Culture title – adopted a unique approach of putting ‘co-creation’ at the centre of its programme, valuing local stories and the latent creativity across the city. This deeply rooted way of working, ‘The Coventry Model’, delivered a range of both intimate events and high impact activities to deliver long-lasting social value. Embedding engagement at a hyper-local level, the ‘co-creation’ approach has seen city communities including faith groups, community centres, libraries, schools, community radio stations, the police, and local arts organisations all helping to shape and design the creative programme.
Coventry secured more than £172m of direct investment to support the programme of events, the activities of the Trust, and the major upgrade programme of the city’s public realm and cultural assets.

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The volunteering programme, City Hosts, saw 1,515 local people trained as volunteers to give the biggest Coventry welcome to visitors, assisting with queries and wayfinding over a combined 35,913 volunteering hours. The Hosts have become familiar figures on the city’s streets with most survey respondents agreeing they positively improved the experience of visiting the city.
A final evaluation of the UK City of Culture year is due in 2024 – capturing not only the City of Culture year, but its legacy. The final report will also consider audience and impact analysis for the City of Culture affiliate programme developed and delivered with partner organisations. This will be made available on the City of Culture website (now obsolete) as well as the independent Coventry 2021 Evaluation website currently being set-up by both Coventry University and the University of Warwick, to be made available at https://www.coventry21evaluation.info/ [https://coventry21evaluation.info/].

Following the end of the City of Culture year, the Coventry City of Culture Trust will build on successful programmes delivered during 2021 and will continue to commission new activities with cultural, educational and community organisations across the city.

Supporting the creative, cultural and tourism sector

The Council has won £760,000 in funding from the Community Renewal Fund to support the recovery of the city’s creative, cultural and tourism sectors.
The Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership received £19.8 million from the Government’s Getting Building Fund programme. Of the total £19.8m fund, £11.7m were allocated to projects in Coventry.
Projects completed and nearing completion include:
•    Visitor Information Pods in Coventry;
•    a new Digital Media training centre at Stratford-upon-Avon College;
•    the Catalyst project on Abbey Street in Nuneaton Town Centre;
•    the Commonwealth Convention Centre at the Coventry Building Society Arena improving the conferencing and exhibition spaces in advance of the Commonwealth Games 2022;
•    restorations to St Mary’s Guildhall including conservation and restorations to the 14th century Coventry Tapestry and work to uncover the medieval kitchen in the venue.

Recovery in city centre footfall

The footfall data presents a slightly complicated picture, partly due to the pandemic and the resultant anomalous and unstable trends in footfall. Further future analysis of this data and other new data sources coming online will give a fuller picture of footfall in 2021/22 and how footfall levels changed in Coventry’s year as UK City of Culture.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    Footfall in Coventry city centre was significantly up in 2021/22 (April 2021-March 2022) compared to the previous 12-month period: 94.7% higher. The fact that it has increased by a lot is unsurprising given that it was so restricted due to national lockdowns during 2020/21; footfall was 63.0% down in 2020/21 compared to the previous year.
Footfall levels across the whole of 2021/22 have not recovered to the 2019/20 levels however, the annual total is 29% lower and Coventry city centre footfall remains lower than pre-pandemic levels. The most significant recovery in footfall occurred at the beginning of this financial year, during April to June 2021 as restrictions eased, in they improved to 36% below the 2019 levels. Since then, increases in footfall have been gradual, up to Q4 (Jan-Mar2022) when they were 27% below 2019 levels.
Looking at the data for separate locations across Coventry city centre, all points of measurement experienced large falls in 2020/21, to a similar extent - and all similarly have seen large increases in 2021/22 to similar degrees. All measured areas remained below levels in 2019/20, there are no parts of the city centre that depart significantly from the trend.
Comparing footfall trends in Coventry city centre to data metrics for other towns and cities gives a mixed picture. The main comparison reported here shows that, for a selection of places where Coventry’s data providers also measure, the average increase in 2021/22 was 59.5%, less than the increase of 94.7% measured in Coventry.
However, data analysed by the Centre for Cities shows a less positive picture for Coventry. It compares all cities in the UK, analysing footfall levels at the end of March 2022 and how they compared to pre lockdown levels in February 2020. It shows that, although all cities experience a sharp drop-in activity because of restrictions, some are seeing it return faster than others.                                                                                                                                                                            It shows, as our data does, that footfall in Coventry city centre remains lower than pre-lockdown levels, but also that Coventry ranks amongst the worst 10 cities in the UK in this respect, most cities have higher relative footfall levels compared to pre lockdown levels.         

HMV’s 100th birthday concert   

On 25 August 2021 HMV’s 100th Birthday concert with Ed Sheeran was held at the HMV Empire, Coventry. The music retailer HMV, in partnership with Coventry City Council, also hosted a free livestream of the Centenary Concert at Assembly Festival Garden as part of Coventry’s City of Culture Celebrations.

Godiva Festival 2021

In September thousands enjoyed a fantastic weekend in Coventry as the Godiva Festival returned. Tens of thousands of people flocked to the city’s War Memorial Park to enjoy a weekend full of fantastic live music and family fun in September 2021.
Over 54,000 tickets were sold for the festival, which was making its return after being sadly cancelled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.                                            

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Once again, the festival offered something for all ages, with performances from big names like Craig David presents TS5, Sister Sledge, Supergrass, Sophie Ellis-Bextor and Fun-Lovin’ Criminals, to name but a few, within a diverse music programme.
Festival attendees also enjoyed plenty of fun in the Family Field, with brand new activities like the Actual Reality Arcade and established attractions like the mini petting farm, birds of prey and funfair all proving popular with families.

Festival of Running 2021                                                                                                                                   

On 31 October 2021, the Festival of Running finally hit the streets of Coventry, with over 4,500 runners signed up to take on the Half Marathon or 5K routes around the UK’s City of Culture.
The 5K route saw runners take in the historic Council House, Lady Godiva statue, and some of the city’s historic buildings - while the Half Marathon shared a similar starting route before heading out into leafy countryside lanes up to the highest point before five miles of downhill to the glorious Cathedral finish.
Runners raised tens of thousands of pounds for local, national, and international charities, including the event’s six partner charities: Myton Hospice, Penny Appeal, Coventry Mind, South Warwickshire NHS Foundation Trust, University Hospital and Zoe’s Place Baby Hospice.
The event was operated by Coventry University Students’ Union (CUSU). CUSU’s Sport and Wellbeing Officer, Elvis Zeiluks, said: “The Festival of Running is an incredible way to get all the city involved in celebrating and enjoying fitness. I am very proud that the festival raises so much money and awareness for local charities and is inclusive for everyone. We have some people who have never run before through to elite runners taking part, and a 2.5k wheelchair race too.

Birmingham Commonwealth Games 2022 

As an official Commonwealth Games 2022 host city, in July-August 2022, Coventry hosted Rugby Sevens, Judo, and Wrestling; an athletes’ village at the University of Warwick; and an official Festival Site at the city’s Assembly Festival Gardens.

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International Children’s Games 2022 

The International Children’s Games will take place between 11-16 August 2022.           

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The eight sports taking place are; Athletics, Basketball 3-on-3, Basketball, Climbing, Football six-a-side, Swimming, Table Tennis and Tennis.
Events were hosted in a range of venues around Coventry including The Alan Higgs Centre, University of Warwick, Coventry University and Broadgate Square.
Coventry City Council and MLS, as event organisers, worked to deliver the event with city partners including CV Life, the University of Warwick, and Coventry University.
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Rugby League World Cup 2022     

In November 2021 organisers of the Rugby League World Cup announced the rescheduled dates, including a match in Coventry at the Coventry Building Society Arena on 21 October 2022.  

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National Collections Centre

The Council is working to creating a new shared collections centre to house the local heritage collections alongside national collections, with aligned research and conservation facilities in the heart of Coventry.
A collaboration between the City Council, Arts Council England, Arts Council Collection, the British Council, Culture Coventry Trust, and Coventry University. This work will create a new, shared, national Collections Centre that will provide state of the arts facilities for the management and research of national and local collections, along with associated educational and learning opportunities.
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Helping people into work

Employment rate

The employment rate amongst working age residents of Coventry is estimated at 71.2% in 2021; this is unchanged from last year. Coventry is following the regional and national recent trends; but Coventry’s employment rate remains lower than the regional and national average. Coventry’s lower rate is partly explained by the fact that Coventry is home to a high number of economically inactive full-time students, reflecting the success of the two growing local universities. The employment rate in 2021 remains lower than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic, the estimated rate was 73.0% in 2019 - up to 2019 the rate had been on a gradually increasing trend since 2015.
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Unemployment rate

The unemployment rate reduced slightly from 5.9% in Jan – Dec 2020 to 5.5% in Jan – Dec 2021. At 5.5% the Coventry unemployment rate is higher than both the 5.0% average for the West Midland Region and the 4.5% average for England for Jan – Dec 2021. [https://www.flickr.com/photos/coventrycc/52246900029/in/dateposted-friend/]

Personalised job support

The Coventry Job Shop is continuing to increase its presence in communities whilst maintaining a strong central hub in the City Centre. The Coventry Job Shop now have regular Job Coach support in the Wood End, Henley, Manor Farm and Deedmore area; plus, Canley, Tile Hill, and Willenhall.
Since March 2021, the shop has achieved:
•    2,926 new customers registrations;
•    890 supported in to work;
•    115 New Employers engaged for support with recruitment of local people
•    9,847 visits to the Job Shop face-to-face both booked through the online booking portal and drop-ins following COVID-19 restrictions.

New jobs supported

In 2020/21, with the support of the Job Shop and the Kickstart Scheme, 184 jobs were created – of which 152 were through the Kickstart scheme. This was an increase from the 34 jobs created in 2020/21. The top three employment sectors were administration, marketing, and retail and sales with 25 jobs created in each.

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Actively supporting residents to improve their skills and secure better jobs

Qualifications

The total number of Coventry residents who have qualifications up to higher education level or higher (NVQ level 4 is equivalent to a foundation degree) has continued to increase, reaching an estimated 101,100 in 2021. This amounts to an estimated 40% of all working age residents of Coventry.
More important than just the total number increasing, the proportion with higher level qualifications has been increasing as a trend and continued to increase in 2021, although a moderate annual increase compared to larger increases a few years ago. The total number of residents qualified at level 4 or above has doubled in 10 years and increased from 30% to 40% between 2015 and 2021.
The improving trend in residents being highly qualified is a positive influence on the local economy, for jobs and productivity, and the prosperity of Coventry people. It is, perhaps, both indicative of improving productivity of local businesses and residents increasing having higher paid jobs, as well as a factor that will support these trends in the future.
However, the data shows that Coventry’s improvement has not given the city a competitive advantage in a significant way; similar increasing trends are seen across England overall, across the West Midlands region and in other places like Coventry.
The University of Warwick and Coventry University, in particular their increasing size and success, are local assets that will support the skills and qualifications of Coventry residents.
In the past, research has shown that graduate retention in Coventry from these institutions has been modest compared to some other places; updated research into current levels of retention, how many graduates of the two universities stay to live and work in Coventry, and the factors behind this, may be useful.
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At the other end of the spectrum, 7.6% of Coventry residents (19,100) have no qualifications; compared to 7.7% for West Midlands and 6.4% for England. 7.6% with no qualifications in Coventry is an increase from 7.1% in 2020.
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Training for accredited qualifications

Through Skills 4 Growth, a European Social Funded programme, a total of 108 small and medium-sized enterprises have been supported leading to accredited training and qualifications for 363 employees meeting their identified skills needs.

Apprenticeship Levy

The Apprenticeship Levy, imposed on larger businesses including the Council, helps businesses support their employees’ professional development. This year the Council has continued to build on its success in supporting smaller, non-levy paying businesses with apprenticeship training costs.
We are continuing to prioritise Coventry businesses and residents, particularly apprentices from disadvantaged and under-represented backgrounds. The funds transferred for 2020/21 totalled £74,734 and this increased 31% to £97,976 for 2021/22. The total pledged as of the end of 2021/22 has reached £364,617, supporting 76 apprentices at 21 businesses in the city.

Supporting young people into work

The Coventry youth hub provides a fully integrated service for all young people who are aged 16-29 and claiming Universal Credit, enabling job shop advisors and jobcentre plus staff together to support Coventry’s young people to re-engage with training and the labour market. This year the Coventry youth hub has supported 1,559 young people, with 201 moving into work both part-time and full-time.

Job placements through Kickstart 

The Department of Work and Pensions Kickstart Scheme ran from September 2020 to April 2022. There were delays in implementing the scheme, but the Job Shop got involved at the earliest possible opportunity to act as an official ‘Gateway’ organisation to support local businesses through the Kickstart application process.
Employers were supported to create six-month paid job placements for 16-24 years old on Universal Credit who are at risk of long-term unemployment, with the Job Shop providing additional ‘wraparound’ support to ensure the placements were successful. As a Gateway, the Job Shop supported 100 employers to create over 300 vacancies. 152 of these were secured by Job Shop customers with over 80% of these being retained by their employers after the six-month Kickstart period ended.  

Destinations of school leavers 16+ 

These official statistics show the percentage of school pupils continuing to a “sustained education, apprenticeship or employment destination” after completing year 11. To be counted in a destination, young people must have “sustained participation” for a six-month period in the destination year. This includes attending for the first two terms of the academic year (October 2019 to March 2020) at one or more education providers; spending five of the six months in employment; or a combination of the two.
A sustained apprenticeship is recorded when six months’ continuous participation is recorded at any point in the destination year (between August 2019 and July 2020). The latest figure available is for 2019/20 with Coventry at 93% - which was 1% point below both national and West Midlands results.       

Young people not in education, employment, or training

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The number of young people aged 16 and 17 years old who were not in education, employment of training (or whose status in unknown) is another statistic that monitors the destinations of young people after secondary school, often shortened to ‘NEETs’. This data gives slightly more recent data, for 2021, and allows us to compare further back in time. 
The data suggests 340 young people aged 16-17 in Coventry were not in education, employment, or training (NEET). This is around 4.4% of 16–17-year-olds in the city. This is an improvement on the last four years’ performance and an all-time low. Coventry’s rate remains below (better than) both the West Midlands regional rate and the England rate.

Working with partners to ensure the continued provision of high-quality affordable housing throughout the city

The Council have continued to make progress against the Housing & Homelessness Strategy 2019-24 with partners, including improving the use of existing homes under the empty dwellings initiative and working with private sector landlords under the “Let’s Rent” scheme, whereby the Council provides guarantees for making rent payments and supports the vetting of prospective tenants.
The Council also introduced an improved Homefinder system in September 2021, to make applying, searching, and bidding for social / affordable housing easier for residents. 
 

Increasing the economic prosperity of the city and region metrics

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Improving outcomes and tackling inequalities within our communities

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Effectively delivering the essential services that matter most to our communities

Tackling inequalities is a key priority, as just under 15% of our neighbourhoods are amongst some of England’s 10% most deprived according to the latest (2019) English indices of multiple deprivation.

Cleaner streets, supported by action against fly-tipping

The effect of COVID-19 and the various lockdowns led to many more fly-tipping incidents being reported, notably in 2020/21 when it hit a peak of 10,727. There were rises across the city as residents cleared out their garages, houses and gardens whilst confined to their homes. Enforcement activity also increased during this period with 6,346 actions carried out eclipsing the previous year.

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This trend carried on into 2021/22 however to a much lesser extent with 8,473 recorded incidents. The amount of enforcement actions increased again over this period surpassing the previous year once again with 6,402 actions taken.
As 2021/22 progressed there was an improvement with reductions in fly-tipping, despite an all-out bin strike from early January to the end of the year.

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The impact of COVID-19 really disrupted the work of the street enforcement team as they were unable to undertake patrols and carry out much of our face-to-face enforcement work.
The street enforcement team will continue to target those streets that continue to be blighted by fly-tipping and will continue through education and enforcement to crack down of fly-tipping and littering incidents, as well as carrying out a range of other environmental functions.

 

Strengthening our Marmot city approach, encouraging healthy lifestyles and provide quality healthcare

Life expectancy

The life expectancy at birth of the average person in Coventry is 78.6 years for males and 82.3 years for females. However, this masks significant health inequalities across the city.
Coventry bus route number 7 runs between Brownshill Green in the north-west and Bell Green in the north-east of the city. It crosses some of the city’s most affluent areas, as well as some of the most deprived areas.

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The Coventry map graphic sets out the bus route (in black) across the city; and the base map sets out the neighbourhoods (known as MSOAs (Middle Layer Super Output Area)) of Coventry. The colours represent the average life expectancy at birth of residents in each of Coventry’s neighbourhood areas (MSOA) in 2015-2019.
On the ‘bus stop’ graphic, the height of each bus stop represents the average life expectancy at birth of residents in each area in 2015-2019. Life expectancy serves as a useful summary measure of mortality, as it quantifies the differences between areas in the years of life lived; and therefore, illustrates the stark health inequalities across the city.

Healthy life expectancy

Healthy life expectancy indicates the average number of years a person could expected to live in good health. For 2018-20 Coventry’s healthy life expectancy at birth for females indicates 64.0 years. It has remained stable and compares favourably to both regional and England averages. For 2018-20 Coventry’s healthy life expectancy at birth for males indicates 61.1 years. It has fallen more significantly during 2018-20 and is below both regional and England averages.

Overweight and obese children

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COVID-19 has had an impact on the data collection for the National Child Measurement Programme and 2019/20 (which saw has seen an increase in the rate of overweight or obese children aged 10-11 in the city, a 2.3% increase to 40.6%) remains the most current available data. The National Child Measurement Programme has been reinstated in 2021/22.
The Council is working with school nurses and health visitors to support children and families around healthy eating, being active and wellbeing; including supporting healthy behaviours alongside the buggy workout programme for new mums.
During COVID-19, services were adapted, including running live activity and fitness sessions over Zoom; working with schools to provide activities and online sessions; and, when restrictions were relaxed, outdoor face-to-face sessions in-line with government guidance.
Coventry’s Family Health and Lifestyle service is participating in a study with Newcastle University to test a series of different interventions with parents following on from a child’s participation in the national child management programme. This study is due to end in 2023.

10,000 get active at this year’s Sports Fest

The free, six-day event in August 2021 provided for all abilities, ages and was focused on getting people active and encouraging them to try a new activity in a safe environment. The event saw sports and activities from Coventry Dynamite Cheer, Positive Youth Foundation, British Cycling, Midland Mencap, Coventry Wheelchair Basketball Academy, Tribe Cheer and more.
The Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games team also attended the event, with a day full of activities and a visit from the mascot, Perry. Coventry’s Chelsie Giles, an Olympic Bronze medallist for the Women’s -52kg Judo in Tokyo 2020, also attended the event to meet residents of the city and enjoy the Birmingham 2022 Takeover Day.

A food resilient city where no one goes hungry

The Coventry Food Network is a food partnership that brings together several public, private, voluntary and community sectors partners to address food poverty and its causes in Coventry by taking a city-wide collaborative and strategic approach towards a unified Coventry Food Network and Strategy.

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The network has been working closely with Coventry City Council and partners, to create and deliver a system of emergency food provision because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some of the initiatives that have evolved from this partnership are:
•    Established 15 social supermarkets/grub hubs throughout the city to provide nutritional food and support to those residents in greatest need.
•    Supported the delivery of the COVID-19 Winter Grant Scheme by providing emergency food provision to vulnerable residents who needed additional support with accessing/affording food
•    Supported the delivery and developed a model to support those who were clinically extremely vulnerable (Shielding) re: food and basic support
•    Procured food and distributed food parcels to children eligible for free school meals provision during school holidays
•    Developing a citywide Sustainable Food Strategy which focuses on the links between the long-term sustainable prevention of food poverty, the promotion of public health and the reduction of growing health inequalities.
•    The Network is in the process of registering as a Charitable Incorporated Organisation.

Social supermarkets/grub hubs offer discounted food parcels, typically about £20 worth of food for a cost of a £4 membership per week. Residents do not need a foodbank voucher to access them, but they may have some criteria to ensure they are helping those who need it most.

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At present, Coventry has around 15 social supermarkets / grub hubs, and 17 food banks / emergency food points.

Tackling inequalities through a collaborative approach

Improving how we work with residents and communities

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The Council’s engagement platform “Let’s Talk Coventry” has enabled us over the last three years to generate better connectivity and collaboration amongst local communities. This has been particularly useful in gaining insights from the public throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdowns. Hopefully now we have built a good relationship with local people this will continue to be shown via increased response rates to our numerous engagement opportunities.
The platform has improved our online engagement offer using a variety of deliberative tools as well as surveys. The graph below shows the continued increase in engagement with the platform.

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Engaging local communities

In summer 2020, the Council launched a community-led engagement response to communications and messaging around COVID-19 that has seen the development of more than 320 community messengers across the city. They share information in the way they know works for their communities and neighbourhoods and provide feedback and intelligence about how it really feels on the ground in these extraordinary times.
Community messengers were recruited through existing faith, voluntary and community networks in the city. A series of webinars were held to provide initial advice and training and focus groups were held with young people to help develop specific messaging. A weekly news update is emailed to messengers to share with their networks. The email update is long and detailed, messengers pick and choose the items they would like to share.
One messenger creates a weekly email for her neighbours and rewrites the information we provide into her style. Weekly webinars provide a forum for sharing and discussions for the messengers. The network provides valuable feedback about what is really going on in neighbourhoods. They tell us about the latest false news and disinformation that is being shared on social media on things like the vaccine. It helps us make sure we are myth-busting when we need to.

Community and neighbourhood integration

A community and neighbourhood integration initiative is underway in Bell Green, Wood End & Henley Green area of the city. The council is working together with partners, through trusted relationships to understand and address the priorities and needs of residents and the community. This includes, enabling accessibility through co-locating services in community venues to provide immediate person-centred support, partnering with local school leaders to better enable them to help families and young people in need, supporting our most vulnerable residents through specialist advice in local grub hubs and targeted health and wellbeing initiatives. This will inform further locality approaches in other parts of the city in the coming months, where our focus will be on how we ensure that the work that we do, in partnership with others, has the most positive impact possible on the lives of local people.

Engagement with local stakeholder groups

The Council supports local community representatives to run several local community-based stakeholder groups based in the key neighbourhoods of the city. These were used virtually during the pandemic and now face to face to engage with community groups and organisations. These will also be consulted with for the new One Coventry Plan.

Monthly newsletter

As an additional engagement method, the Community Resilience team have created a monthly newsletter which goes to community groups and organisations across the city this includes very small community groups right up to those running large community centres. The newsletter was set up shortly after the end of COVID-19 pandemic-related lockdowns to continue getting valuable information out to groups in the sector but also to manage the many requests from service areas within the council and partners to get key information about service to the sector once services had resumed.

Meeting the public sector equality duty

The Council has continued at pace to deliver on its obligations under the Public Sector Equality Duty and advance the growth of its diversity and inclusion agenda more broadly. This year has seen the launch of a new set of Equality Objectives for 2022-2025; five objectives have been set which outline how the Council will meet requirements to eliminate unlawful discrimination, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between people of different groups.
The Council has also continued to assess the potential impact of key decisions through its Equality Impact Assessment (EIA) process. 26 EIAs were completed between April 2021 and March 2022. Another key highlight of the past year has been the Council’s success in applying for £120k of government funding to install 3 new Changing Places Toilets in the city.

Health and Wellbeing Awards

24 awards were given at the Treehouse Assembly Festival Gardens venue in September 2021 in celebration of everything great that happens in health and wellbeing services across the city. The event celebrated Coventry’s unsung community heroes, especially throughout the challenging times of COVID-19.

Tackling violence, including domestic abuse and sexual violence

Increase in crime

Total recorded crime in Coventry increased in April 2021 to March 2022 to 40,059 from 31,309 in 2019/20. This is a 27.9% increase; a much larger increase than in 2020/21 which was only 9.5%. In 2021/22 Coventry ranked third highest out of the eight policing areas, accounting for 11.1% of the West Midlands force’s total. November 2021 saw the highest number of offences recorded in Coventry for the year.
Whilst these statistics might appear to be alarming, the increase in crime is not unexpected. The previous comparative year consisted of substantial periods of time where our citizens were in ‘lockdown’ due to the COVID-19 epidemic and therefore comparing one year against the other is not helpful. Coventry’s population is roughly 11% of the total West Midlands force area population and therefore the levels of crime are in line with this figure.
The top three offences for Coventry in 2021/22 were Common Assault and Battery (accounted for 11.6%), Assault Occasioning Actual Bodily Harm (ABH) (6.0%) and Harassment (5.5%).

Reduction in youth offending

Coventry has seen more of a marked decline compared to the current family group and national comparators. This has given opportunity for the Service to have an earlier offer to children at risk of entering the youth justice system. The first-time entrants to youth justice system (rate per 100,000 young people aged 10-17) has reduced to 112 in 2021/22 from 230 in 2020/21.

Hate crime

Police in Coventry take hate crime very seriously and respond to and investigate all reported hate crime in the city. 
West Midland Police (WMP) recorded 1,112 hate crimes in Coventry in 2021/22.

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Coventry ranked fourth out of eight West Midlands policing areas for hate crime, accounting for 9.2% of hate crime across the force – which is low considering Coventry’s population represents 11% of the West Midlands population.
We have continued to deliver training courses to raise awareness of how to report incidents of Hate Crime. Targeted merchandise with details of how to report have been distributed across the city. Staff in family hubs have been trained on reporting incidents and supporting victims in making a report. We are currently running awareness training around the “Stand by ME” campaign [https://standbyme.uk/] that gives anyone the tools to identify discrimination & how to support victims if they witness an incident.

Domestic abuse

The number of domestic abuse (crime and non-crime) reports increased from 10,203 in 2020/21 to 10,957 in 2021/22. The split of crimes and non-crimes was 7,303 and 3,654 respectively. The most common offences titles were Common Assault and Battery, Assault Occasioning Actual Bodily Harm and Malicious Communications.
Female victims accounted for most domestic abuse crimes and non-crimes (75.0%). However, male victims have seen a proportionately higher increase compared to the previous year (18.4% increase for males, 5.2% increase for females).

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Additional support for victims of domestic abuse and their children

The Council is making progress in developing and embedding the provisions required for supporting fleeing victims of domestic violence and their children across all functions to comply with its obligations under the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, which became law on 30th April 2021.
This has included: Appointing a multi-agency Domestic Abuse Local Partnership Board to advise the Council; Assessing the capacity required to fully support victims of domestic violence and their children in safe accommodation and developing, delivering, and evaluating a local strategy.

Work is also in place to extend the “Ask for Angela” scheme, which enables people who feel unsafe, vulnerable, or threatened can discreetly seek help by approaching venue staff and asking them for ‘Angela’, from pubs and bars to shops and retail as well.

Affordable access to heating, and insulation

Increase in the cost of living

A cost-of-living crisis started in the second half of 2021 and is rapidly accelerating in first half of 2022. While this is primarily around energy, fuel for vehicles, and food - it is severely affecting all areas of spending and debt levels. Other areas of concern are mental and physical health, the cost of physical access to services (private and public transportation), and the cost of digital access to services. Therefore, there are ongoing risks to access to; energy, warmth, food, benefits, healthcare, and other services.
Coventry City Council have created a web page that pulls together all of the existing support that is available to the people of Coventry, particularly in regards to the cost-of-living crisis: https://www.coventry.gov.uk/cost-living-wellbeing-support [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/cost-living-wellbeing-support]

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Housing energy performance

Energy performance certificates (EPC) are the standard measure of UK property efficiency. EPCs have been lodged for 729 homes as new dwellings in 2021/22. Of these 6 (<1%) were Efficiency Band A, 494 (68%) were Band B, 191 (26%) were Band C, and 38 (5%) were Band D. Zero were Band E, F or G. This is below the long-term average of 75% Band B and 21% Band C for the efficiency of new build properties in Coventry.
For all EPCs in Coventry in 2021/22 50% were Band D, and 48% were Band C. Properties that were built before 1967, and are band D on their current EPC, still account for 46,314 (52%) of the 88,806 total properties with an EPC in Coventry. 15,268 of these are listed as rentals, and of those 5,321 are listed as social housing. Social housing has more Band C (6,735) than Band D (5,321). Private rentals have similar numbers of Band C and Band D. Homes marketed for sale in Coventry are still predominately Band D. However, the ratio of Band D to Band C is improving. It was 1.6 for EPCs lodged in 2021/22 (1,735 vs. 1,071), whereas the long-term ratio is 2.3 (19,507 vs. 8,432).

Improving the energy efficiency of housing

The Council is helping homeowners improve the energy efficiency of homes. Newly issued EPCs provide one way in tracking progress. For EPCs issued in 2021/22 related to energy efficiency upgrade schemes, 678 EPCs in 21/22 were for the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) bringing the total to 7,508; 22 were for a Green Deal assessment bringing the total to 4,965; 14 were for a Renewable Heat Incentive application bringing the total to 69; and 1 was for a Feed in Tariff (FiT) application bringing the total to 1,617. These schemes were largely inactive nationally in 2021/22, nonetheless there is significant support in place for 2022/23. The Council-run domestic retrofit schemes have increased EPC ratings by 1-2 bands on average.
Foleshill in Coventry, alongside Elmdon in Solihull, has been selected as one of the place-based local areas to share the first £2.8M (circa 50% for Foleshill) of the £19M Sustainable Warmth Competition Funding awarded to the WMCA. The aim of the funding is to reduce domestic energy use by installing the latest fuel-reducing technology free-of-charge to eligible households who apply. 150 homes in Foleshill will benefit from the scheme in this round, with plans to roll out the scheme to a further 1,700 homes across the combined authority in the future.
This initiative is running alongside the Council’s own domestic retrofit projects which can support low income/low EPC rated household applicants across the city. This is with the aim to reduce residents’ fuel bills, as part of the Government’s ambitious plans to support as many homes as possible to have an energy performance rating of A to C.

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Coventry City Council, in partnership with Act on Energy [https://actonenergy.org.uk/], a charity, also run a Keeping Coventry Warm scheme. This scheme provides a variety of support for Coventry residents, including referrals for these and other grants towards insulation, solar photovoltaic panels, and other energy efficiency measures. They can also support with bill advice, tariff switching, and onwards referrals to other agencies if appropriate. Homeowners interested in free energy efficiency measures can contact Act on Energy, who will check eligibility, and provide support through the application process.

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Protecting children and supporting families to give children the best start in life

Reduction in the number of looked after children

Provisional data shows at the end of March 2022, 731 children were looked after by Coventry City Council. This is a reduction of 16 children from March 2021, when there were 747 looked after children. Expressed as a rate per 10,000 children, Coventry’s rate has reduced from 92.0 March 2021 to 90.5 in March 2022.

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The number of looked after children has reduced but remains above comparators. The Family Valued Strengthening Families change programme is designed to spread restorative practice across children’s services. A key element is the focus on Strengthening Families through Relationship Based Practice. There is a desire to empower and enable families to find solutions, to build their own networks and for families to make changes, build resilience and most of all to remain together. The Family Valued project has an aim to reduce the numbers of looked after children and improve the quality of children’s lives in enabling them to live safely outside of care.

Repeat referrals to children’s social care

Repeat referrals to children’s social care remains similar to last year, however it remains slightly higher than comparators. It reduced from 25.0% in 2020/21 to 24.7% in 2021/22. The Family Valued project has an aim to reduce the numbers of repeat referrals and improve the quality of support that children in city receive.

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Looked after children previously looked after

The percentage of new looked after children who were previously looked after has increased in 2021/22 to 9.6% from 5.6%. During the year there has been dip-samples to understand the reason numbers have increased. The result was that discharges home from the first period of care were found to be appropriate and there were no alternatives to coming back into care. The Family Valued project has an aim to reduce the numbers of looked after children returning and to improve the quality of children’s lives in enabling them to live safely outside of care.

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Integrated early help, education partnership work and implementing the Family Valued programme

Children living in low-income families

Children living in low-income families is a proxy measure for poverty and inequality.
The provisional data for 2020/21 shows that in Coventry 22.9% of children aged under 16 are living in relative low-income families, that is 16,737 children. This is more than the England average of 18.5% but lower than the West Midland Region average of 24.6% for 2020/21.
Relative low income is defined as a family whose equivalised income is below 60 per cent of contemporary median income. Gross income measure is Before Housing Costs (BHC) and includes contributions from earnings, state support and pensions.

Low-income family tracker project

Coventry is working on a pilot initiative where we identify and contact families with low-income to understand whether they could be supported to apply for additional benefits to which they are entitled to; and to prevent homelessness. This work will target support to people who need it most now and uncover hidden pockets of poverty; and identify families who are struggling and who may never have engaged with the Council and its partners before.

Supporting families through receiving the right help at the right time

Coventry’s early help partnership's shared vision is: 'Coventry: where children, young people and families matter'. The partnership aims to reach children, young people, and families when the need first emerges, and intervene when there will be the greatest impact.
Training has been delivered to a range of partners to complete early help assessments – which has led to an 138% increase in the completion of assessments by partner agencies – enabling families to access help when they need it.
The early help directory continues to be developed signposting professionals and families to sources of support across the city.

 

Improving the educational attainment of our children and young people

School performance

Nine out of ten Coventry pupil attend a school that is rated good or outstanding by Ofsted, the schools’ inspectorate. In March 2022, 93.1% of pupils attend a good/outstanding primary school in Coventry and the figure for secondary is 85.5%. Both figures are not only better than our ‘statistical neighbours’ but is better than the national average. However, there has been a drop for special schools, at 86.3%, down from 100% in March 2020.

Pupil attainment

In January 2021 and in response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the government announced that it was no longer fair for many exams and assessments to go ahead as planned. It was confirmed that students taking GCSE, AS and A levels regulated by Ofqual would be awarded grades based on an assessment by their teachers. Teachers used a range of evidence to make a judgement about the grade at which their students performed, focusing on the content that students had been taught.
Each school and college were required to put in place an internal quality assurance process, which was defined in their centre policy. Centres’ internal quality assurance included internal standardisation of marking and grading judgements. As part of the external quality assurance, exam boards reviewed the centre policies for all centres. Exam boards also requested evidence from all centres and checked the evidence used to support teacher grades for some students in a sample of centres.
In both 2020 and 2021 grades awarded via teacher and lecturer assessment were significantly higher, overall, than they had been in 2019.
For England, regulator Ofqual has announced that grading in 2022 will again be more generous than it was pre-pandemic [https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/ofquals-approach-to-grading-exams-and-assessments-in-summer-2022-and-autumn-2021], but that grades are expected to fall at a mid-point between those in 2019 and 2021. In future, the plan is for grades to revert to a more normal distribution. As such, 2022 has been described as a ‘transition year’.

Key stage 4

The following table shows Coventry’s GCSE grades for 2021 in comparison to our statistical neighbours and England.

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Key stage 5

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The following table sets out the three key metrics at key stage 5:

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Supporting children most affected by disruption to their learning

School readiness

Prior to the Covid 19 pandemic, school readiness was an area of focus in Coventry. The data taken from 2019 indicated that overall, 69% of Coventry children were ‘school ready’ compared to a national average of 71%.
There were concerns that the pandemic has disrupted school readiness, with feedback from Coventry schools and early years providers suggesting that some children were often more comfortable in learning on their own or with a very small number of other children; overwhelmed by a busy classroom, preferring quieter, more solitary activities; evidence of building unhealthy attachments with adults; language delay and confidence in communication; and with gross and fine motor skills that were less well developed, and balance and coordination were below levels expected.
To address these issues, Coventry is part of a pre-reception ‘Building on Success programme’ to provide high quality training to early years staff to support children who were at risk of falling behind at a critical stage of their development and have nominated early years providers who meet the criteria.

Holiday and food programmes

During the pandemic, free school meal provision, holiday activities, and the food pilot programme were extended for children aged 5 to 16 during the Easter, Summer, and Christmas of 2021. This combined enriching activities with a hot or cold meal, nutrition awareness and signposting, enabling learning to continue over the holiday period.

Expansion of free school meal uptake

Free school meal numbers in the city have increased from 11,683 (21.6% of pupil population) at the start of the pandemic in March 2020 to 12,683 (23.4% of pupil population) in January 2021, and to 13,272 (24.3% of pupil population) by December 2021. This compared with 20.8% of pupils nationally.

 

Enabling people to live independently

People receiving support from adult social care and their carers

The number of people we support with ongoing care and support is a good indicator of how successful we are at enabling people to be independent. As of 31 March 2022, there were 3,531 people receiving long-term ongoing support from adult social care (a rate of 1,183 per 100,000).
The number and rate have stayed at a similar level over the last 5 years and remains lower than comparators.

Satisfaction with adult social care

In 2021/22 62% of people surveyed who use services with their care and support were satisfied, a small reduction from 63.1% from the last survey in 2019/20 but not a significant change or downward trend.

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Adult social care has an equal responsibility for anyone providing unpaid care within the city. Anyone providing necessary care to another adult is entitled to a carer’s assessment.
The survey regarding the overall satisfaction of carers with social services was also delayed a due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Performance reduced from 40.1% in 2018/19 to 32% in 2021/22.
Comparator information is due to be released in October 2022 and we will be able to see whether the reduction is a trend across the different comparator groups and nationally. During the covid-19 pandemic the council implemented ‘enhanced support for carers’ without which the decline may have been larger for this group who were severely impacted by the pandemic.
 

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Short-term reablement services

In 2021/22 the outcomes met short-term reablement services increased to 67% from 60% in 2020/21. This increase in performance is evidence that we are being more effective in enabling people to remain at home as an outcome of this support and strong performance against this indicator is critical to assurance of the effectiveness of our promoting independence approach. However, Coventry’s outcomes met is still lower than the England average of 74.9% but higher than the CIPFA nearest neighbours 2021/22 average of 62.1%.

Impact of adult social care services on self-reported quality of life

Despite not being a statutory requirement a survey of users of Adult Social Care was conducted in past year.
•    93% of people who are vulnerable felt safe and protected from harm
•    93% of people had a positive of experience of care services and support
•    92% of people with care and support needs had enhanced quality of life
These results are very positive and demonstrate that despite the significant challenges of the pandemic adult social care continued to provide effective support to many people.
The work of Adult Social Care continues to be supported by a Stakeholder Group, who meet regularly to discuss any updates and influence the improvements of the service. As a result of the pandemic, these meetings have happened virtually via Microsoft Teams.

Safeguarding adults

Protecting adults to live in safety, free from abuse and neglect is a core duty of Adult Social Care. The rate of safeguarding concerns reported between 2020/21 and 2021/22 has increased from 493 to 872 which indicates an increased awareness of know how to report abuse. Our internal audit process indicates that we are effectively addressing many concerns without the need for an enquiry or investigation.

Supporting people who are homeless

Statutory homelessness

The service accepted more households as statutorily homeless under a Main Duty in 2021/22 than in the previous year. The number of households accepted under a main duty increased from 722 in 2020/21 (5.0 households per 1000) to 800 in 2021/22 (5.5 households per 1000).

More homelessness cases prevented and relieved

The service accepted more households as statutorily homeless under a Main Duty in 2021/22 than in the previous year. The number of households accepted under a main duty increased from 722 in 2020/21 (5.0 households per 1000) to 800 in 2021/22 (5.5 households per 1000).
More homelessness cases prevented and relieved
Despite a 14% increase in case demand on homelessness prevention and relief services in 2021/2022 compared with 2020/2021, the Council delivered the same percentage successful case outcomes, obtaining secured accommodation for 1167 households, compared with 1083 in the previous year and against an annual target of 1150.
Due to the increase and projected further increase in demand for homelessness support in 2022/2023, the Council has invested in additional frontline resources to support more residents facing homelessness issues and have revised and uplifted contracts for delivering additional support with providers, including The Salvation Army, St Basils, and P3 Charity, for households which are not eligible for a statutory homeless duty.

Meeting the needs of more complex cases facing homelessness issues

Launched as a pilot initiative in April 2021, the aim of the Vulnerable Persons Forum (VPF) is to provide a more joined up multi-service intervention to support more complex cases who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. The forum is facilitated by a Council employed VPF co-ordinator and made up from a range of specialist service providers supporting Coventry residents who can refer cases in and meet monthly to review them.
The average duration of the intervention is three months and normally involves around five different specialist services supporting households facing homelessness along with mental health, drug misuse, domestic abuse, physical health, or disability issues, or in contact with the criminal justice system.
In the first fourteen months of operations, 98 clients have been supported by the initiative, with 88% of discharged cases being reported as having an improved status for securing accommodation following the intervention. Learning from the pilot is being used to inform improved provision for the most complex and hardest to resolve homelessness cases.
The Council, as part of their Housing and Homelessness Strategy, has also been increasing the provision of fully supported temporary accommodation for single homeless people with complex issues to help them break the cycle of living in unsettled accommodation or rough seeping, including the new recently purchased and refurbished property on Holyhead Road, which is housing and supporting up to 26 single homeless people at any one time.

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Since the start of the pandemic more than 300 homeless people who were moved into emergency shelter have been moved into more suitable accommodation including flats, house shares and live-in support schemes.

Supporting people experiencing mental ill-health

Supporting children and young people

During the COVID-19 pandemic, mental health services had to rapidly adapt and embrace virtual and remote working to ensure support continued to be provided to local people. Although services had continued to provide a virtual support offer during COVID-19, not all children and young people had the equipment, support, or confidence to access support through a digital platform. This had meant some children and young people had become more isolated, which was likely to have a negative impact on their emotional wellbeing. Estimates suggest that around 9,000 children and young people in Coventry could now have a probable mental disorder.
Kooth, an online virtual support app for emotional wellbeing and mental health, for children and young people aged 11 to 25 went live on 12 April 2021; and as part of recovery planning activities, additional investment had been made by the Coventry and Warwickshire Clinical Commissioning Group for the recurrent growth of the children and young people eating disorder service and the children and young people crisis team.

Transforming mental health services

The NHS Mental Health Implementation Plan 2019/20–2023/24 sets out a plan for transforming mental health services. To support the transformation of local mental health services across the Coventry and Warwickshire footprint, the Council has entered into a partnership agreement with the Coventry and Warwickshire Clinical Commissioning Group and Coventry and Warwickshire Partnership Trust, whereby NHS organisations and local authorities contribute an agreed level of resource into a single pot (the pooled budget) that would then be used to drive the integration and improvement of existing services.

Integrating our refugee and migrant communities

The Council provides support, advice, and guidance to migrant communities in the city to help them along their integration journey. In the past year the city has been pivotal in the UK’s response to both the Afghan and Ukrainian humanitarian crises, supporting people taking up the Hong Kong British National (Overseas) immigration route as well as continuing to respond to the UK Refugee Resettlement Scheme offering safe and equal routes to the most vulnerable refugees across the world.
Key activities in 2021-22 included:
•    integration support including English for speakers of other languages;
•    employment, education, and training;
•    access to education;
•    civic orientation - first city to undertake children’s citizenship ceremony;
•    IT; digital literacy; co-ordination of local organisations working with newly arrived and migrant communities; response to policy and consultation; developing integration strategy for the city; dedicated support to women from newly arrived communities; support asylum seekers;
 

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Migration support in numbers

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Improving outcomes and tackling inequalities within our communities metrics

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Tackling the causes and consequences of climate change

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Sustainability and climate change

Tackling the causes and consequences of climate change

Coventry, as the 2nd largest city in the West Midlands, has an important leadership role to play in tackling today’s most pressing issue – climate change. The Council recognised the importance of this as far back as 2008, having been a founding signatory of what is now known as the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate & Energy. Coventry was also one of the first cities, in 2012, to produce a Climate Change Strategy. The city’s 2012 strategy set a target to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 27.5% by the year 2020. Coventry achieved this in 2014 (six years early). A new Green Futures Strategy is in development, one that ensures ambitious goals that embrace the challenges that climate change and delivering a sustainable future presents with the urgency it requires.
The Council’s draft new One Coventry Plan for 2022-2030 also elevates climate change to the Council’s top priorities - alongside the city’s prosperity and tackling inequalities. It sets out the Council’s relentless focus on tackling the causes of climate change and mitigating the inevitable consequences of this, to ensure the wellbeing of our residents and position Coventry as a leader and pioneer of the green industrial revolution.

Independent Coventry Climate Change Board

In November 2021, the Council facilitated the development of an independent Coventry Climate Change Board to address the major challenges of climate change, development of a circular economy and loss of biodiversity.
The Board, chaired by Margot James of the Warwickshire Manufacturing Group with Councillor Jim O’Boyle, consisting of senior representatives from major businesses, public agencies, charities, and voluntary organisations based in the city to work in collaboration on developing and implementing a strategy and action plan to address sustainability and climate change issues across the City.
Both the City Council and the Board have adopted the ‘International Council of Local Environmental Initiatives’ five Development Pathways which address the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

Five development pathways

The Council has adopted the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives’ (ICLEI) Five Development Pathways:
Low emissions pathway: renewable energy generation; energy from waste; retrofitting properties; electrification of vehicles; public transport; active travel; towards a 15-minute city.
Circular economy pathway: minimisation of waste, and maximising recycling participation.
Nature based pathway: understanding the distribution of species and their conservation status and promoting biodiversity.
Resilient pathway: addressing key risks with the change in climate and a greater incidence of extreme weather events such as flooding, heatwaves, and droughts.
Equitable & people centred pathway: recognising that the effects of climate change and environmental deterioration affect communities disproportionately, particularly those on lower incomes who are most likely to be the first to suffer the consequences of climate change.

Low emissions pathway

Council’s carbon emissions

Over the past year, the city’s total carbon emissions have slightly increased, primarily owing to recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.

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The carbon emissions are broken down into scopes 1, 2 and 3 emissions, the definition of which are:
Scope 1 direct emissions: activities owned or controlled by your organisation that release emissions straight into the atmosphere. Examples: emissions from combustion in boilers we own, emissions from owned or controlled vehicles.
Scope 2 energy indirect emissions: released into the atmosphere associated with the consumption of purchased electricity, heat, steam, and cooling. The most common type of Scope 2 emission is electricity purchased from the National Grid.
Scope 3 other indirect emissions: those at sources which we do not control, and which are not classified as scope 2 emissions. Examples of scope 3 emissions include business travel not owned or controlled by the Council (e.g., use of public transport), commuting, or use of ‘grey fleet’ (employees’ own cars used for fuel expenses).
There is a slight increase in overall carbon emissions of around 0.03% but the data shows that a significant percentage of this increase has come from consumption of heat and electricity (Scope 2) and business travel (Scope 3), which was to be expected with recovery from the pandemic. This is because since lockdowns have ended, people are travelling for work and meetings again and similarly, office buildings are back in use. Scope 1 emissions have seen a reduction, both in council-owned buildings as well as for fleet. The reason for the decrease in building emissions is partly because of the removal of gas oil consumers (such as Whitley Depot Admin Block and the COVID-19 test centres at Moat Street Leisure Centre) this year, as well as the PSDS scheme which has introduced more heat pumps, solar panels and insulation retrofit. For fleet, a quieter gritting season as well as the fuel-crisis around October contributed to the fall in emissions.

Carbon disclosure

The CDP (formerly known as the Carbon Disclosure Project) is an internationally recognised benchmark that helps companies and cities disclose their environmental impact.
The Council is currently achieving a “B” CDP score; and the One Coventry Plan has a target of achieving an “A” score.

Supporting businesses

The Coventry & Warwickshire Green Business Programme supports the shift towards a low carbon economy, delivering a cohesive package of support activities to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) with fewer than 250 employees that facilitate economic growth through SMEs developing and adopting energy and resource efficiency measures, as well as renewable energy. Originally launched in 2016, the Programme was the first integrated package of business support focused on the low carbon agenda and reduction of business carbon emissions that the Council has delivered, and the first such programme in Coventry & Warwickshire.
Coventry City Council provide grants (£1k-£50k based on an intervention rate up to 40%), free energy and resource efficiency audits and a Green Business Network to maximise the energy efficiency and low carbon opportunities of SMEs based in Coventry and Warwickshire. SMEs engaged in the Programme experience a variety of benefits, including reduced energy bills, maintenance costs, waste disposal costs and carbon emissions and increased competitiveness, efficiency, and improvement to working conditions. Since the start of the Programme, we have supported over 288 businesses; saved over 13,595 tonnes CO2 annually; created a network of 1,950 members; supported the creation of 60 jobs; and paid over £2.78m in funding.

Road network quality

Better roads reduce wear and tear on tires, which is a significant source of air particle and microplastic pollution. Better pavements and better cycle routes enable low-cost physical access through active travel options such as walking and cycling.
The 2021/22 survey shows 98% of A roads and B & C roads, as well as 81% of unclassified roads, to be in a good/acceptable condition. However, this is much lower at 46% for footways. The condition of cycleways is currently measured as forming part of a roadway or a footway.
The Council is working on improving its footways – this year’s data has shown a 4% decrease – however this is thought to reflect increased monitoring of more footway sites: national reporting standards only cover high hierarchy footways (school, shopping areas and main routes) and historically this is all we surveyed (on a four-year cycle). We now survey 100% of footways over a four-year cycle. Most of the network will be covered by the end of the 2022/23 survey period.

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Fewer priority potholes

985 “priority 1” potholes were reported in the financial year 2021/22, down from 1,339 in 2020/21. This is a decrease of 354 over the 12-month period. This large reduction may be down to a milder than average winter period.
From February 2022 potholes in Coventry will be repaired and fixed permanently in super quick time after Highways Service purchased JCB’s revolutionary pothole machine, “PotholePro”. The PotholePro can repair a pothole in less than eight minutes. The Council took part in a trial demonstration on Abbey Road, Coventry last summer where the machine repaired more than 100 m of patches in the road in just two hours. A stretch of road that usually takes four days to repair. After closely monitoring the potential impact on road repairs the Council ordered the machine and it is now working on city roads. The JCB PotholePro breaks the road and cleans the hole, without the need for any  hand working, so a permanent repair can be carried out.                                                          

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Road treatment programmes

In 2021/22, 18 miles of carriageway were treated, and 50 footway sites were improved. This is a reduction from the 65 footway sites improved in 2020/21 when we received additional Department for Transport challenge fund monies for footway improvements.

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In 2021/22 £4,455,000 was spent from the previous DfT challenge fund bid for Swanswell Viaduct works.

Zero carbon vehicles

The Council has significantly increased the number of electric fleet vehicles over the past year. By March 2022, we had 72 zero carbon vehicles. This an increase from 4 vehicles in March 2021.
We have now been successful in replacing most of our cars and smaller vans with electric alternatives. We have also replaced the mayor’s civic car with an electric car and will take delivery of our first electric heavy goods vehicle, an 18-tonne gully tanker in June 2022.

Charging points

There are 438 charge points operational as of 28 March 2022 in Coventry. The ratings of these charge points vary from 3kW to 22kW.
20 x 7kW charge points are in Salt Lane car park; 16 x 7kW in the Station Multi Storey car park; and 402 charge points with varying rating (3kW to 22kW) in residential areas under the on-street residential charge point scheme.
 

Circular economy

Recycling and composting

The new material recycling facility is on track to be operational in the summer of 2023, with the exterior building nearly complete as of spring 2022. This is a £58M joint project by 8 local councils including Coventry and Nuneaton & Bedworth - located alongside the existing Binley waste processing site on London Road. This state-of-the-art facility will significantly expand local recycling capacity with the ability to process 175,000 tonnes of recycling annually by leveraging AI enabled robotic sorting equipment.

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The provisional data for 2021/21 showed that the percentage of household waste recycled and composted has reduced from 34.0% in 2020/21 to 28.6%. From the beginning of January and for the remainder of the final quarter of 2021/22 all household waste collections were disrupted. With waste collections coming back on line first, followed by recycling collections from the w/c 21st March and garden waste collections from 19th April. This has had an impact on the city’s recycling rates.

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Coventry is participating in the rapidly expanding global repair movement, alongside the longstanding reduce, reuse recycle mantra. The Coventry FabLab, a joint project between Coventry University, Warwick University, and the Council, has long held occasional repair café sessions – where people can bring a wide variety of possessions for free repair by volunteers. A new dedicated repair café organisation opened their doors in Hillfields in March 2022, significantly expanding access to free repair services in Coventry.

Equitable and people-centred

Air quality

Poor air quality affect communities disproportionately, and targeted support to protect communities most likely to be the first to suffer the consequences need to be prioritised.
Nitrogen dioxide is measured by small plastic tubes with a metal grid at one end which is coated with a chemical to absorb the nitrogen dioxide. The tubes are replaced every 4-5 weeks and sent for analysis at a laboratory. Because of their low cost these tubes can be used in a wide area, and we have about 60 around the city on busy roads and junctions. The results from these tubes are used to determine locations where nitrogen dioxide levels are at, or close to, legal limits. We have a programme of installing real-time air quality sensors at these locations to provide us with real-time data that we can use to determine the best traffic management strategy to limit nitrogen dioxide levels. Typically, this might mean changing the way traffic lights operate to reduce queuing in areas where there is a build-up of nitrogen dioxide for example. There are currently 12 such real-time sensors across the city with more planned in the coming year. The aim is to develop an intelligent system whereby the air quality data automatically drives the operation of the traffic signals to minimize pollution levels.

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Air quality across Coventry’s diffusion tube sites in 2019 (above) and 2020 (below), where green sites have annual mean concentration of nitrogen dioxide of less than 30 microgram per cubic metre (µg/m3); amber sites between 30-39 µg/m3; and red sites with 40 µg/m3 or above. Note that 2020 figures are likely to be an anomaly as lockdowns resulted in a marked reduction in traffic.

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The 40 µg/m3 annual limit for nitrogen dioxide was the World Health Organisation’s former guideline level for nitrogen dioxide up until September 2021. A more stringent 10 µg/m3 limit has since been introduced with the increasing recognition of the hazards of air pollution, and this will be reflected in future reports.

Road casualties

There were 532 road casualties in Coventry in 2021, up from 519 in 2020. This increase could be a result of greater road use in 2021 compared to 2020 which saw road usage reduce most likely due to COVID-19 lockdowns. Annual data for the whole of Great Britain from the Department for Transport supports this view with total road casualties for all road users decreasing by 25% from 2019 to 2020 and increasing 11% from 2020 to 2021.
While there was an increase in the total casualties in Coventry in 2021, this increase was not evenly spread across road users. The percentage of casualties who were car occupants or users of powered two-wheelers dropped from 61% and 6% in 2020 to 58% and 5% in 2021 respectively. On the other hand, pedestrian and cyclist casualties increased from 17% and 8% to 18% and 12%.
This means across Coventry in 2021, there were 311 car occupant causalities, 26 powered two-wheeler (including pillion passengers) causalities, 97 pedestrian causalities, 64 cyclist causalities, and 34 other causalities.
 

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Nature and resilience

A tree for every citizen

Coventry is particularly blessed with a large and extensive tree canopy. In fact, it can be argued that this canopy characterises the city. The Council is responsible for the management of over 45,000 individual trees in parks, highways, and other green spaces and an estimated 200,000 woodland trees. The importance of trees is becoming increasingly recognised not least through global changes which are and will affect everyone on the planet:

•    Trees are important in our efforts to combat climate change capturing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen.
•    They help keep the air in our city clean by absorbing pollutants.
•    They help keep our streets cool and provide shade from ultraviolet light.
•    They hold water on their surface helping with flood alleviation.
•    They provide a valuable food and habitat resource supporting countless birds, animals, and invertebrates.
•    Trees are great for people's health and well-being and for bringing people together.
•    They also have an economic value, provide a potential and sustainable source of energy but they also increase property values.
The Council has committed to an ambitious plan to plant 360,000 trees for every member of Coventry’s population over the life of the strategy: a tree for every citizen.
In 2020, the Council planted 2,100 new trees in a small woodland extension.
In 2021, the Council planted 20,000 new trees in several parks to create new woodland areas.
This year, the Council aims to plant over 20,000 new trees in sites across the city to create new woodland. They also aim to plant nearly a thousand semi mature trees in our streets and parks.

Urban forestry strategy

In 2022, Coventry has drafted its first-ever Urban Forestry Strategy 2022-2032, which seeks to “protect, promote, sustain and enhance our urban forest and to recognise its contribution towards the character, appearance and economy of Coventry for the benefit of all those who live, work and visit the area.”
It has also joined the Trees for Streets National Street Tree Sponsorship Scheme, the national street tree sponsorship scheme from the urban tree charity Trees for Cities, funded by the government’s Green Recovery Challenge Fund and City Bridge Trust. This “Tech for Good” project uses technology to empower people and makes it easy for residents and organisations to get involved in greening their communities.

 

 

Tackling the causes and consequences of climate change metrics

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Continued financial sustainability of the Council

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Balancing future budgets and bridging budget gaps

In-year budget position

The Council’s outturn position for 2021/22 has been balanced overall including measures taken to strengthen the Council’s balance sheet position.

Medium-term financial position

The Council approved a balanced 2022/23 Budget in February 2022. Budgets for future years currently show a deficit and on this measure the Council’s future financial position is not sustainable. It is important to note however that the Council has a strong recent history of balancing its forthcoming budgets through prudent and resourceful approaches.

Percentage of Council tax collected reduced

There has been a 0.4 percentage point reduction in council tax collection in 2021/22 as the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic creates challenging economic conditions. The Council tax collection rate reduced to 94.0% in 2021/22 from 94.4% in 2020/21.

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Delivery of savings targets

The Budget for 2021/22 included £5.5m of new or increased service savings. Of these, £5m were in the 2021/22 financial year.

Investment income secured

In 2021/22, the Council secured total investment income of £2.2m; compared to £1.1m in 2020/21.

Financial position

The business rates rateable value for 2020/21 is £317m and £315m for 2021/22. The total rateable value of Coventry businesses has been stable for several years and in overall terms the movement observed represents a variation of only 0.6%.
There are multiple events and trends that can affect this figure such as the overall health of the local economy and trends within different sectors; including those which may not have a need for a traditional property base. It is difficult to assess the impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on business rates, and it could be sometime before any medium-term trends are clear.
This represents the income achieved from treasury management investments which form part of the task of managing the Council’s cash-flow position and loans to external organisations. It should be noted that the achievement of investment return is only a secondary consideration. The key objective is to ensure that the Council has sufficient cash balances to pay its bills. It is unlikely that this achievement will be sustained over future years, and neither is this a fundamental objective for the service.
 

Enhancing our digital offer

Digital inclusion and accessibility

For gigabit broadband coverage, Coventry is the top-ranked local authority in the West Midlands region and is joint 2nd (with Derby) for all the UK. The telecoms regulator Ofcom measures access to, and the performance of, fixed broadband and the mobile network in its Connected Nations reports.
As of January 2022, gigabit availability covered 94.8% of residential premises in Coventry with 91.9% covered by Full-Fibre, up from 91.5% and 75.4% respectfully in January 2021. Across the UK, 66% of homes can receive gigabit with 33% of homes able to receive Full-Fibre.
Furthermore, 99.5% of residential premises have access to decent fixed broadband - defined by the UK government as a data service that provides fixed download speeds of at least 10Mbit/s and upload speeds of at least 1Mbit/s.
According to Ofcom, the number of residential properties in Coventry in January 2022 was 142,295 with 142,132 matched to a broadband operator.
Overall, average download speeds have improved from 84.3Mbit/s in June 2020 to 106.2Mbit/s in May 2021 with speeds for those for lines 10<30Mbit/s lines increasing from 2.2Mbit/s to 18.3Mbit/s. Meanwhile, upload speeds have decreased from 15.4Mbit/s to 13.8Mbit/s overall and from 17.7Mbit/s to 2.3Mbit/s.
Decent broadband can also be accessed through the mobile network using 4G services. As of January 2022, 86.06% of all premises have a reliable signal for 4G services while indoors from all four network operators (EE, O2, Three & Vodafone), an increase from 83.06% in January 2021.

Digital exclusion

There is no single measure of digital exclusion, however it is possible to measure the risk, or likelihood, of digital exclusion using the Digital Exclusion Risk Index (DERI) tool. DERI, developed by Greater Manchester Combined Authority, visualises the likelihood of digital exclusion for every LSOA (Layer Super Output Area) in England and Wales and every data zone in Scotland.
The tool brings together a broad set of metrics to create an overall DERI score for each area where 0 represents a low risk of exclusion and 10 a high risk. The metrics included are the proportion of the population over 65, Ofcom’s broadband coverage and performance, the unemployment rate, the index of multiple derivation, qualification levels, pension credit claimants, long-term health problems or disabilities, and social gradings.
Coventry’s DERI scores range from 6.12 in the Manor Farm LSOA area to 1.36 in the Gosford and Gulson Roads LSOA. Its average score is 3.44. Compared to its local peers – West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) and Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership (CWLEP) – Coventry is below each peer’s average of 3.55 and 3.59 respectfully. This ranks Coventry as the 3rd least excluded within the CWLEP and 2nd least in WMCA. Further afield, the average within England’s Metropolitan Districts and the CIPFA local authority grouping is 3.53 and 3.51.

Internet user classification

In the latest available dataset (2018), 147 of 195 LSOAs in Coventry are categorised in the lower half of the Internet User Classification scale (out of 10). The largest group by LSOA (57) are classified as passive and uncommitted users; rank 7. These users have limited or no interaction with the internet and tend to reside outside of city centres and close to suburbs or semi-rural areas.
The second largest user group is e-Mainstream (49 LSOAs); rank 6. These users exhibit typical internet user characteristics in heterogeneous neighbourhoods at the periphery of urban areas or in transitional neighbourhoods.
The third largest user group (29 LSOAs) are classified as e-Withdrawn; rank 10. These are the least engaged users and are in deprived urban areas with higher rates of unemployment and social housing. They also have the lowest rate of internet access via a mobile device.
In comparison, the top three user groups by LSOA in Warwickshire are e-Rational Utilitarians (rank 5), passive and uncommitted users (rank 7), and e-Mainstream (rank 6).

Children’s digital accessibility

According to Ofcom’s 2022 Children and parents: media use and attitudes report, 99% of UK households with children aged 0-17 had internet access and used it in the home, with 70% of children, defined by their parents, having access all the time to devices appropriate for online schooling.
However, 36% of parents nationally said their primary school-age children did not always have access to such a device in the home with 17% saying the same for secondary school-age children; approximately 11,800 and 4,100 pupils in state-funded Coventry schools respectively in 2021/22 based on Department of Education headcount.

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The most-cited devices used to go online by 3-17-year-olds were mobile phones (72%) and tablets (69%) with 43% saying they used any device other than a laptop, netbook, or desktop to go online; translating to about 26,100 of pupils in state-funded Coventry schools who do not use a laptop, netbook or desktop computer to go online - based on the Department of Education’s headcount of all state-funded pupils (aged 3-19) in Coventry.

Increase in self-service transactions

In 2020/21 there were 352,751 transactions completed through self-service channels which increased to 415,254 transactions in 2021/22. This increase relates to the introduction of the tip booking process to manage visits during the pandemic. There has been some additional take up of self-serve because of the pandemic, though this has been limited. The intention in the longer term is to revisit our online offerings and incorporate user feedback to ensure that services are simple and easy to interact with. 

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Retaining and developing talented staff

Workforce engagement 

We are committed to ‘growing our own’ talent, and as part of this we have introduced a digital self-development platform called Coaching Culture. The platform aims to help establish a coaching culture within the organisation, by improving the coaching capability of employees and managers, through a series of online modules.
A coaching culture is a place where leaders and managers help people to grow, thrive and perform. Providing this support will improve the coaching capability of our workforce and ensure that we are in a better position to deliver our ‘One Coventry’ ambitions through our One Coventry Plan. The wider benefits organisational benefits are to performance and culture, ensuring the Council:
•    Attracts top talent
•    Develops a growth mindset
•    Increases wellbeing and resilience
•    Builds trust and psychological safety
•    Retains top talent
•    Increases employee engagement
•    Produces higher customer satisfaction
•    Increases productivity and financial performance
The Council’s recognition programme has been developed with the support of employees across the organisation to ensure it is reflective of our diverse workforce and our One Coventry Values. The whole recognition scheme will be made up of three sections, with multiple reward options at each level:
•    Level 1 - Everyday recognition (Cheers from Peers)
Peer to peer, with everyone being able to send and receive for a variety of behaviours and actions at any point in time.
•    Level 2 - Above & beyond recognition (Spire Awards)
Monthly or quarterly awards where you give an award to those that are selected for going above and beyond when it comes to certain behaviours or actions.
•    Level 3 - Best of the best recognition (Spire Awards)
Employee and Team of the year awards.
Cheer for Peers, named by staff, is the first element to be offered and enables a thank you, a welcome to the team or even a happy birthday to be sent by colleague to colleagues and is available in a variety of formats including the staff app. Levels two and three are due to be implemented later this year.
The ICT team considered the feedback received as part of their Customer Satisfaction Survey and recognised the old system was no longer fit for purpose. As a result, they introduced a new customer system in 2022 to replace ‘My Service Desk’ portal. Motion, the new customer portal, helps colleagues to report issues and request new items from ICT and Digital.
ICT colleagues wanted the new system to represent Coventry and what our city is famous for. Coventry was previously the centre of the British car industry and the birthplace of the bicycle, so they wanted our new system to have a name with a strong connection to our city and its residents. Motion is our one stop shop to find information, access resources to help and solve any issues, to report issues, and request anything new.

 

Agile, flexible, and responsive workforce

Further increase in full-time equivalent employees

There were 4,209.53 full-time equivalent (fte) employees in the Council at the end of March 2022, an increase of 133.80 fte compared to a year ago. This is the fourth year there has been an increase following many years of reducing number of employees.
Some of the increase this year will, again, be due to the COVID-19 pandemic - where the additional contain outbreak management funding has been used to staff teams supporting people to maintain self-isolation, support businesses and workplaces with COVID-safe measures, and deliver community testing, NHS test and trace and welfare programmes.

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Increase in sickness absence

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In 2021/22, 12.97 days per FTE were lost due to sickness absence (excluding schools). The top reason for absence was stress, depression and anxiety followed by musculoskeletal problems, which is the same as the previous year. Coronavirus was the third largest cause of absence. There has been an increase in the sickness absence rate from last year.

Agency workers

The spend on agency workers increased in 2021/22 by £2m:

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The five top service areas where agency workers were deployed were: Children Services, Streetscene & Regulatory Services, Adult Services, Law & Governance Services, and Project Management & Property services. Again, this increase can be related back to the impact of Covid.

Workforce profile

All Workforce data is as of 31/03/2022. Whole workforce figures are used, based on headcount, excluding schools and casual workers.
In the City Council, 67.2% of the population is made up of females, this percentage is higher compared to the city’s employed female population of 47.8%. 49.4% of all Coventry’s residents are female.
Coventry has a male population of 50.6% and 32.8% of males are employed in the City Council, this is less compared to the 52.2% male population who are employed in the city and aged 16-64.
78.5% of the City Council’s workforce is White British, this is more than the 71.8% of Coventry’s population, who are aged 16-64 and in employment, and the 73.8% of all Coventry Residents who are of White ethnicity.

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20.8% of Council’s workforce is from Black and Minority Ethnic groups, this is less than the 28.2% of Coventry’s population who are aged 16-64 and in employment, and the 26.2 % of all Coventry residents who are from Black and Minority Ethnic groups. The ethnicity of 11.5% of the Council’s workforce is unknown.
6.9% of the Council’s employees declared having a disability compared to 17.7% of all Coventry’s residents who have a disability. The disability status is unknown for 14.3% of the City Council’s workforce.
75.7% of the Council’s employees are within the age band of 35-64 and this is higher in the Council than it is in the rest of the city - 58.5% of Coventry’s employed population is aged between 35-64.

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Continued financial sustainability of the Council metrics

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