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Â鶹ÊÓƵ has been shortlisted for six prestigious national public sector awards.

Entries in five categories have made it onto the official shortlist of this year's Association of Public Sector Excellence (APSE) service awards. That success has meant that the council is also automatically nominated for Overall Council of the Year in Service Delivery.

Â鶹ÊÓƵ has been shortlisted in the following categories:

• Best Workforce Initiative award (for recent Organisational Development work)
• Best Health and Wellbeing Initiative including Social Care (for the innovative Virtual Memory Box for children in care)
• Best Community and Neighbourhood Initiative (for Cost of Living / Anti-Poverty work)
• Best Service Team: Sports, Culture and Leisure Team
• Best Climate Action or Decarbonisation initiative (for Viking Energy Network)
• Overall Council of the Year

Cllr Tracey Dixon, Leader of Â鶹ÊÓƵ, said: "We are incredibly proud of some of the innovative and transformative work we have been doing both within the council as an organisation and to support our communities, and it's fantastic that these projects have received the recognition they deserve.

"I am delighted that the hard work going on behind the scenes to drive this council forward has been nationally recognised by our peers.

"It is testament to the hard work and dedication of our staff and elected members who turn up every day to serve the people of South Tyneside. I am particularly excited that the shortlisting across multiple categories has put us in with a chance of winning Overall Council of the Year."

The Organisational Development Team was created in 2022 as a core component of the 'Our Council Change Programme' and has already helped to accelerate culture change through leadership development, learning, support and wellbeing offers for employees and elected members. Despite being small and relatively recently formed, the team has been a key driver in the Council's transformation to a modern and inclusive organisation. The shortlisting is in recognition of work to bolster organisational development and deliver a range of improvements for the Council's workforce.

The Virtual Memory box developed in partnership with Nebula Labs gives young people in care a reliable, secure way of saving their memories and key moments from their childhood in a safe and secure way. It enables young people to navigate a 'living timeline' of visual, audio and text memories displayed in a scrapbook style, with a chronological timeline to scroll through, or users can search through thematic tags.

The 'Best Community and Neighbourhood Initiative' shortlisting is in recognition of work undertaken with partners to support residents to navigate cost of living pressures including anti-poverty summits, an anti-poverty strategy, support to those with the lowest income, a network of Welcoming Places and the retention of a Welfare Support Team to ensure residents are receiving the help they are entitled to. The team also helps recover benefits at appeal which have been stopped by the Department of Work and Pensions. The team secured more than £8.5 million in the 23/24 financial year.

Â鶹ÊÓƵ's Leisure Services team have overseen a wide array of leisure services in recent years, upgrading facilities, increasing memberships, improving customer services, and supporting residents to improve their health and wellbeing. The new 'green gym' at Monkton Stadium harnesses the power of fitness and turns it into electricity for the building.

The innovative Viking Energy Network is a UK-first renewable scheme which harnesses heat from the River Tyne. Operational since October 2023, the system is already being used to heat council-owned buildings including residential tower blocks, delivering an annual reduction in carbon emissions of 1,035 tonnes. The project has showcased the Council's expertise in low carbon technologies and making a significant contribution to the drive towards net zero.

The Council will find out if it has been successful at the APSE Service Awards 2024 next month (September 2024).