Council teams named as APSE Awards finalists

Council teams named as APSE Awards finalists

Aberdeen City Council was in the spotlight recently as several of its teams were highlighted as being among the very best in local government in a prestigious awards ceremony held at Cardiff International Arena on 10 September.

From the hundreds of submissions received, three council teams were shortlisted and succeeded in being named as finalists at the APSE awards - one of the leading award schemes for local authorities.

Officers Allan Whyte, Sue Davidson, Shona Manson and Theresa Dines attended the glitzy ceremony as representatives of the teams being recognised by APSE.

Allan Whyte said: "The event was well organised and had a great atmosphere; everyone had a fantastic evening."

Councillor Jim Kiddie, who also attended the ceremony with the officers said: "Congratulations to the employees who made it to the finals. It's a tremendous achievement to be nominated for such a prestigious award as an APSE award is seen as a measure of best practice."

APSE is a not-for-profit local government body that promotes excellence in public services. It enables a council to benchmark itself against the rest of the councils in the UK.

The APSE finalists were:

The Achieving Reintegration Team (ART) - finalists in the 'Best Social Care Service' category
The ART team was created in August 2008 with the main aim of supporting the transition of young people living in secure accommodation and residential schools back into the local community or their family homes. Programmes were also developed to help stop other children at risk from entering into residential or secure accommodation in the future.

The Healthwise Project - finalists in the 'Best Healthy Living Initiative' category
Based within the council's Adult Learning Service, the project has a proven record of delivering high-quality learning opportunities and of working effectively with project partners. The key goal of the project is to increase the skills, knowledge and understanding of learners in relation to health and health care. Work is focused on three main areas of developing educational programmes for learners, developing existing resources for adult literacies tutors and raising awareness of health literacy issues amongst local health workers.

Housing Repairs team - finalists in the 'Best Information and Technology Initiative' category
Use of the IT system Consilium means that the council provides a highly flexible, effective and efficient way of scheduling repairs to over 22,000 council homes and properties. After winning the APSE Construction Team of the Year award in 2008, the service continued to be developed which resulted in this year's nomination.

Date Posted: 18 Oct 2009