A new deal that will transfer money and powers into the hands of local Leaders across Devon, Plymouth and Torbay, has moved a step closer with the backing of the Government's Levelling Up Minister, Dehenna Davison.

Outline approval has been given for a Devon-wide devolution deal which could bring greater local control and allow partners to tap into additional resources to help tackle key local priorities, such as affordable housing, better public transport and connectivity, and providing for the skills that the local economy needs.

The deal wouldn't require a change to the established democratic structures across the area, or the need for an elected Mayor. Instead, new powers would be devolved to a partnership of existing local councils who would deliver on a joint programme working alongside a wide range of other local stakeholders.

Local partners across Devon have now been invited to work together to prepare a final business case to present to Government for approval later in the year.

Any final deal would require local consent with the full agreement of all the constituent councils as well as Parliamentary approval.

You can read more about the new deal in the story on our news page.

Every penny of the extra £9.4 million for Devon, announced in the Chancellor's budget recently, will be spent on improving our roads and making them more resilient.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced the extra cash specifically to fund vital highways maintenance.

Most of it will go towards the Local Area Capital Programmes, which will reflect local priorities identified through our elected members and Neighbourhood Highway Officers.

Using inspections and survey data, the remaining funding will be directed to preventative works to stop potholes forming in the first place.

Prolonged spells of very wet weather and freezing road temperatures this winter have been hugely detrimental to the condition of our 8,000 mile road network. To tackle it, over the past few months, we doubled the number of pothole teams, introduced weekend working and extended working hours across the network. That resulted in up to 2,200 potholes being repaired each week.

You can read more about this in the story on our news page.

There are many teams across the council supporting young people through their transition into adult care services. We are changing and improving the transition pathway for young people in Devon. 

As part of this year-long transformation project, the Preparing for Adulthood (PFA) service is going to be called the Transitions Adult Social Care (TASC) service from Saturday 1 April 2023.

Learn more about this ambitious and complex programme of change that aims to improve the experience of young people moving into adult social care.

Supporting Member Safety

You will have seen that some of the recent bulletins for Members have included articles on the LGA’s Debate not Hate campaign. The thrust behind this is that whilst debate and disagreeing with one another is a healthy part of democracy, abuse and intimidation crosses the line into dangerous territory. It is the right engagement that matters.

There is a new Debate Not Hate toolkit which is designed to provide Councillors with resources to raise awareness of the campaign’s aims. It includes a range of digital and physical resources to use, including brand guidelines and logos, virtual meeting background and social media assets. This is building on from the report Debate Not Hate: The impact of abuse on local democracy.

You can also sign up to receive regular updates on the LGA’s democracy, civility and voluntary sector work.

Read more about how we at Devon County Council are doing work to support this agenda on your Members' Area Sharepoint site.

Changes to iTrent system - new Single Sign On (SSO)

A majority of DCC Corporate Users have now been migrated to Single Sign On (SSO) to access the iTrent system.

To log in, please click on the ‘Organisational login’ button and this will log you into iTrent.

Please do not complete the email address and password fields. These fields should be left blank, as per the screenshot (right).

You can use this link to access your Employee Self-Service iTrent account: https://hr.devon.gov.uk/ess/mfa