Agenda item

Purpose:

To provide a brief update about work happening at a regional level to build on wellbeing assessments and inform well-being plans.

Recommendations:

Members are invited to use this update to enhance their understanding of how regional working can help the Public Service Board (PSB) meet the requirements of The Act.

Key Issues:

1 The Well-being of Future Generations Act came into force in April 2016. It requirespublic bodies to carry out sustainable development. This means the process ofimproving the economic, social, environmental and cultural well-being of Wales bytaking action, in accordance with the sustainable development principle, aimed atachieving the well-being goals.

2. Officers representing the five Public Service Boards in Gwent have been meeting in the Gwent Wide Strategic Well-being Assessment Group to share learning and identify opportunities to collaborate on areas of common interest. This work initially focused on the development of the well-being assessment and has continued to strengthen the development and implementation of well-being plans. It has also been an opportunity to work with colleagues leading on the implementation of The Social Services and Well-being Act.

3. On 28th February 2017 Welsh Government made available £74,026 of funding for the five PSBs in the Gwent area to undertake work to build on work completed as part of the assessments and to help build towards the development of the well-being plan.

4. Gwent partners identified two areas of focus: To develop enhanced measurement of well-being at the local population level and to commission further work on future trends which was an area that was commonly identified as needing development in the majority of the well-being assessments in Wales. An update on the progress with the two pieces of work is provided below:

Happy Communities

5. The five Public Service Boards within Gwent region have jointly agreed to use the

Happy Communities tools in order to better measure, understand and improve the wellbeing of their populations. Happy Communities provides two tools: the Happy

Communities Index (now called Thriving Places Index in Wales) which measures the local conditions for community well-being and the Happiness Pulse which is a measure of personal well-being.

6. The Index draws on a number of indicators from various sources to understand and assess the local determinants of well-being and where to target interventions to create the conditions for people to thrive. Following initial work in Gwent on the thriving places index, Data Cymru have worked with Happy City, and the five Public Service Boards across Gwent, to adapt the tool for the different context and data available in Wales and expanded it to include all local authorities in Wales. Data Cymru published their first release of the Thriving Places Wales Index in April 2018.

www.thrivingplaces.wales/

7. The Index is a framework of local authority level indicators which builds a picture of an area summarised under the broad headings of local conditions, sustainability and equality. The Scores within Thriving Places Wales are shown at a local authority area level, however they do not measure the success, or otherwise, of individual organisations because the measures used in Thriving Places Wales cover such a wide range of issues, they fall way beyond the responsibility or remit of any single organisation, or group of organisations. Much of the information for Monmouthshire reflects the analysis presented in the well-being assessment and where Monmouthshire’s well-being scores are lower this is mainly in domains that align with the issues the PSB has focussed its objectives on.

8. The Happiness Pulse measures personal well-being in communities through a resident survey. The survey provides a well-being score for people who completed the survey under three areas, Be, Do and Connect and helps people understand how to improve their well-being. The survey was carried out across the five Gwent PSB areas in January and February 2018 and was launched with the ‘beating the blues’ campaign. Extensive promotion was undertaken across Gwent, in Monmouthshire this included a variety of activities in local communities to help residents beat the winter blues. A range of methods were used to inform and engage residents, including, press releases, social media, making the survey available in Community Hubs across the County and working in partnership with PSB partners to encourage as many residents as possible to complete the survey. In collaboration with Monmouthshire Youth Service and Engage 2 Change (E2C), the County Youth Forum, a short film was produced for social media. Young people from local schools and a variety of community group including Action 50+ and The Access for All meeting were all encouraged to contribute.

9. In Monmouthshire a total of 1,178 resident and 462 Monmouthshire County Council staff responses have been collected. An analysis of the data by Happy Cities is awaited to understand the demographic breakdown of the results, evaluate well-being within Monmouthshire and allow comparisons with other areas in Gwent. We will also be able to investigate if we can utilise these results to better understand well-being in specific areas in Monmouthshire. Further analysis will be produced when the results of the Happiness Pulse survey are available and are able to complement the Thriving Places Wales Index. This analysis will also be used to inform local decision making including the development and monitoring of the PSB well-being plan action plan. Consideration will be given to how to communicate this to members of the public and staff who contributed with their experiences of well-being in Monmouthshire, as well as reporting the analysis back to the PSB and PSB scrutiny committee.

Member Scrutiny:

The Performance Manager introduced the report then Select Committee Members asked questions:

·         A Member enquired how happiness levels were tested and it was explained that the Happiness Pulse is used to measure wellbeing based on factors that have an influence on an individual’s wellbeing e.g. social interaction, physical activity, charitable work. It was accepted that the survey represents a snapshot as feelings of happiness can change over even quite short periods of time.

·         Regarding response rate, approximately 1.28% of the Monmouthshire population responded.  When further survey results are available we will be able to compare the results in Monmouthshire to other areas in Gwent and investigate the potential of comparing to other areas in England who have been part of the survey.

·         It was questioned if the survey was exclusively been carried out online and confirmed that the survey was made available in a range of formats such as online, paper surveys in Hubs, engagement with groups e.g. Youth Forum, Engage to Change and Action 50+.  The survey was promoted on social media.

·         It was confirmed that the focus is not to track the wellbeing of individuals but is a broader measure of wellbeing.

·         Two thirds of responses were from females.  The age profile of respondents was:

·         The Chair reminded that one of the Monmouthshire Public Service Board priorities is to ensure that children are getting the best possible start in life.  With the involvement of the SE Wales Education Achievement Service (EAS) in SE Wales and a regional approach, it was questioned how Monmouthshire’s priorities will be adequately served.  It was responded that the evolving regional approach will highlight differences in regional footprints and the involvement of partners won’t be consistent e.g. city deal involves 10 authorities and the EAS covers 5.  The core business of CYP Directorate will be distinct from any topics identified across the region that would be better served by partners working collaboratively. 

·         The suggestion that sixth form students could be involved in carrying out surveys was welcomed noting that the PSB Engagement and Participation Group actively considers means of maximising opportunities.