Under the voluntary scheme, a combination of colour coding and nutritional information will be used to show how much fat, salt and sugar and how many calories are in each product.

The announcement of a new consistent system follows a public consultation last year and months of talks with the food industry and it is hoped the labelling will make it easier for people to make healthier choices about what they buy and eat.

And Hindle, who also takes a national lead in the fight against obesity as Chair of Dietitians in Obesity Management UK, believes the news represents a big step in the right direction.

She said: “I think this is great news and long awaited. For the first time we will have a consistent method of front of pack labelling making it easier for consumers to directly compare different products. Previously retailers used different systems which added to the confusion.

“The clear and obvious colour coding mean consumers can quickly see which products have less fat and sugar, making healthy choices easier to make.

“Because retailers and consumers are keen to give their product a competitive edge, this explicit labelling system is leading them to reformulate products to achieve more amber and green on their labels, this can only be good news.”

The new, standardised food labels will be displayed on the front of food and drink products and they will routinely include the following information per portion of food:

• the amount of energy (presented in kilojoules (kJ) and kilocalories (kcal), known as calories)
• the amount of fat and saturated fat
• the amount of sugar
• the amount of salt

These amounts will be shown as ‘Reference Intakes’ (formerly known as ‘Guideline Daily Amounts’). Alongside the amounts listed above, food labels will show how much of the maximum daily intake a portion of food accounts for.

Food labels will also contain red, amber and green colour-coding to visually show the nutritional value of food portions. This will allow people to see at a glance if the food product has high, medium or low amounts of fat, saturated fat, sugars and salt:

• red means high
• amber means medium
• green means low
• In short, the more green lights, the healthier the choice.

Read more about the terms used on food labels: http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/Goodfood/Pages/food-labelling-terms.aspx

Between July 2011 and September 2012, a total of 145 women who had never previously cycled were trained through the Women on Wheels scheme – staged free of charge at a number of sites across inner city Birmingham.

The success of the scheme has led to many enquiries from several other councils and public bodies, prompting course founder Fareeda Akbar from the council’s Smarter Choices Team to join forces with the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) to create a study to share the city’s findings.

Course participants are able to borrow bikes for the training from community cycle hubs set up by British Cycling in partnership with the city council, and key findings in the report are:

-    145 women have reached the Level 1 cycling standard (safely cycle in a traffic-free environment)
-    8 of those 145 have reached Level 2 (on road standard)
-    85 per cent of women surveyed are keen to progress to Level 2, meaning there is a need for further training between Levels 1 and 2 to ensure more cyclists progress, possibly through a longer Level 1 course or a new intermediate programme
-    Led rides for novice cyclists need to be organised on regular basis to ensure continued progression for bike users
-    The trust between instructors and course attendees is crucial, and can create a ‘virtuous circle’, developing a new generation of course leaders, enabling new schemes to be set up in other locations for even more cyclists

Prior to establishing the courses, meetings were held by members of the BME community, in Sparkbrook and Ward End, two of the city’s most deprived areas, to gain an understanding of the issues that were preventing women from getting involved with cycling.

Fareeda Akbar, Sustainable Promotions Officer at Birmingham City Council, said: “For decades the focus on cycle training has been children, with little resource available for adults – no previous research had ever looked at barriers and possible solutions for women from BME communities.

“But given the council’s aim to encourage sustainable forms of travel and reduce health inequalities, this seemed an idea worth exploring.

“What was obvious that almost all of the women we spoke to when developing the idea of this scheme had an interest in cycling but lacked access to bikes or appropriate opportunities to learn.

“What we have done is put in place a programme that allows them to do this, crucially overcoming many barriers highlighted by women such as the perceived image that you need to have tight fitting clothing or that they had no financial ability to purchase a bike.”

Lindsey Brough, road safety research and evaluation officer at RoSPA, said: “Women on Wheels is an excellent example of how research and evaluation can benefit the design and future planning of an intervention.

“Sharing the findings will help others to replicate the work done in inner-city Birmingham to successfully get non-cyclists cycling, boosting their confidence and helping to improve their health and fitness levels in the process.”

Despite the focus on female cyclists from BME communities, the programme is open to all women, and a similar project was run last autumn for male riders – known as Men on Wheels – with 25 men having now reached Level 1 standard.

And since the period covered by the study, a further 80 women have been on WoW courses, taking the overall figure for those benefitting from the scheme up to 250 men and women.

Fareeda added: “The results have been hugely encouraging and the most pleasing point of all is how we have developed a self-sustaining user-led scheme with high levels of community ownership.

“Women take part, learn the skills, volunteer as course leaders, and then become trained cycle instructors, enabling them to lead new WoW groups elsewhere in the city.

“We fully understand more needs to be done to continue the early progress we have achieved, but WoW is giving the city a great platform to build upon.”

WOMEN ON WHEELS – Development and Evaluation Report

Ends

Notes to editors

About Women on Wheels

The course, delivered without charge to participants by accredited instructors, offers three levels of training;-

Complete beginners: Balance and control
Level 1: Bikeability level 1 to safely and skilfully cycle in a traffic free environment
Level 2: Bikeability level 2 for on-road training over a 4-6 week period of one-hour sessions.

Course participants are able to borrow bikes for the training from community cycle hubs set up as a pilot by British Cycling in partnership with Birmingham City Council.

Women on Wheels aims to:

-    Teach women to safely and skilfully cycle in a traffic free environment
-    Increase women’s confidence to enable them to cycle with their families
-    Encourage women to progress to organised group rides
-    Support women to take up level 2 standard (on-road) training
-    Improve women’s health and fitness levels through participation in physical activity
-    Improve women’s social skills and confidence

About RoSPA

RoSPA is a charity which has been at the heart of accident prevention in the UK and around the world for almost 100 years. We promote safety and the prevention of accidents at work, at leisure, on the road, in the home and in schools and colleges. Visit www.rospa.com

http://www.birmingham.gov.uk/democracy/Pages/Index.aspx

You can view the archive of our new video streaming service here: http://www.birmingham.public-i.tv/core/portal/webcasts

It will follow the start of the wheelie bin pilot project in the ward next week – through which more than 7,000 households are receiving a wheelie bin for their recycling, replacing the old system of blue and green boxes.

Residents can keep the boxes or old bins for other uses if they wish, or take them to the local Household Recycling Centre. Any residents wishing to take advantage of the collection should leave them out at the front of their property before 6am on Saturday 6 July for collection. All of the old boxes and bins will be recycled.

A similar collection has been organised for the other pilot ward of Brandwood, set to take place this Saturday (June 22).

For more information on the wheelie bin project please visit www.birmingham.gov.uk/wheeliebins

Birmingham City Council today published a green paper looking at the future of Adults and Community Services across the city.

The council is facing a big challenge, having to cut the budget we can control by half over seven years. In the past we have often made changes to improve our services and get better value for money. But we now face cuts in government funding on a scale that has never been seen before.

We will need to make big changes to balance the books in the years ahead. These changes will have an impact on everyone in the city, so we want to discuss them with you before going ahead.

The key question we are seeking to answer is: How can we continue to provide essential services to residents and guide the city through such difficult times, whilst supporting greater fairness and future prosperity?

Key points

• Adult care accounts for one of every three pounds spent by Birmingham City Council. It’s the council’s largest area of direct spend;
• If we put that spend in a bubble, the consequences of that for the rest of the council are dramatic. A reduction in community services would mean that people using care services would suffer by having fewer alternatives to residential care;
• The scale of the cuts before us is unprecedented;
• We have no choice but to address the cuts head on. If we don’t, we would leave people with dementia, the frail and the elderly, the mentally ill and those with multiple, complex disability in a downward spiral of poorer care and outcomes;
• We think the answer lies in reducing demand for high cost, high end care. All the data shows that we make more use than other local authorities of residential and hospital care;
• We want to develop services for children with disability that span their lifetime. We cannot accept that dependence is an outcome for so many young people;
• This is why we have reviewed adult care thoroughly, including independent challenge to our spending and activity. We have an understanding of what we need to do to meet the enormous challenge that lies ahead, but need to develop this through dialogue with users, carers and the public.

Background

The city council supports people who have substantial or critical needs. This means that they need a lot of help with five daily tasks – washing, eating, dressing, going to the toilet and getting in and out of bed;

We have given a commitment to work to protect the most vulnerable. We will honour that commitment, but that also means facing up to how hard that is going to be;

Over the last three years, Birmingham’s social care for adults has met reductions of £115m, £52m of which has covered the demographic pressure and £63m has been cash cut from budgets;

We have met this challenge with innovative ideas: the Enablement service (helping people who have been in hospital, had falls etc); www.mycareinbirmingham.org.uk, Birmingham Telecare and the Community Navigators scheme (pilot in Ladywood and Kingstanding to build community capacity). These are all good examples of how we are changing the way we meet need, but the scale of the cuts before us is unprecedented;

The changes that we have already put into place mean that more older people get a service from the council than when we spending more money – 7,500 people got telecare in its first year, 3,000 people each month buy services through mycareinbirmingham. Just these numbers alone are bigger than the number of older people who got social care services in 2009.

The initial proposals arising from the review

• We are considering developing services for children with disabilities which span their lifetime. We will look at incentives to providers to promote earlier planning and independence. This plan will include identifying employment opportunities and creative thinking about removing barriers to living in their own home;
• We want to improve the care management of frail elderly people, across health and care. This looks like better planning for very frail people already in care homes, so that increasing needs at the end of life can be met in the care home, not by transfer to hospital. This plan will set pave the way for better multi agency working for people outside hospital. It will give older people and their families the confidence that they will be cared for appropriately, in their own home. It will also look at providing a more coordinated response to a whole range of events from falls, to strokes, to intermediate care and end of life;
• We are considering a radical new approach by establishing a social enterprise to enable specialist care services to trade outside the council. There are potential gains from this operating model and could save the council around £2.5m in three years;
• We are considering ceasing council owned residential provision for short breaks for people with disabilities and their carers because the alternative of offering individual budgets would provide more choice and a more effective use of resources.

During 2012/13, the average number of days taken off per full time employee was 12.4, higher than the target of 9.25 days. The 12/13 figure is also an increase on the 2011/12 figure of 9.73 days.

However there are encouraging signs, as over the last 12 months the council has made reducing long-term sickness absence a priority – and the policy has yielded dividends, with the equivalent of £700,000 already saved in sickness pay and management time.

Figures show that over the period from July 2012 to March 2013 the number of absences of six months and over was reduced by 44% (from 151 down to 85). At the same time the number of absences over 18 months was slashed by 92% (from 24 down to just 2).

Councillor Ian Ward, Deputy Leader Birmingham City Council said: “Reducing sickness absence is a key priority for the council, and while the latest figures do not yet fully reflect the council’s approach to the issue, we are absolutely determined to build on our early successes in tackling the number of long-term absences.

“But it will take time to tackle the issue at its root. Government cuts have caused a rapidly-reduced headcount, leading to low morale and increased stress among remaining employees who are understandably uncertain about their future, and this has impacted on our figures.

“If we don’t see a continuous improvement in current levels of absence then we will look at further ways of bringing the levels down, but we will also ensure that all of our employees are fully supported in helping the council to respond to the serious challenges that the council and its citizens face.”

Having successfully tackled long-term absence,  significant steps are now being taken to address attendance more generally, with managers being robustly challenged to improve their awareness and control of absence.  This has been aided by an improvement in the quality of the data used, and an improvement in management reporting – the system improvements may in fact have contributed to higher absence rates being reported in 2012/13.

And in consultation with Trades Unions, the individual  case review process when employees are on sickness absence is being reviewed in an effort to make it fit for purpose, with proposals to change timescales for monitoring and processing each case. Currently there is no set timeframe for a final case hearing but the proposals currently with Trades Unions would reduce this process to 14 weeks.

Cllr Ian Ward

Birmingham City Council is set to approve a £58 million programme of investment into its stock of council properties at Cabinet on Monday 24 June 2013.

This follows the allocation of £28 million for a redevelopment and new build programme approved earlier this year

The Birmingham Council Housing Investment Programme for 2013/14 covers redevelopment costs, clearance and improvements at an estimated capital cost of £58.355 million.

The majority of the programme will be paid for using tenants’ rent and reserves set aside from previous years.

Around 9,000 homes will get new kitchens and bathrooms, upgraded central heating systems, door and roof replacements and structural works.

The council spent around £800 million between 2004 and 2010 bringing its residential properties up to The Decent Homes Standard.  All properties that are put forward for the new round of investment will be surveyed to check their suitability.

Deputy Leader of Birmingham City Council, Cllr Ian Ward, said: “We currently own and manage 64,000 residential properties and we have already made considerable headway with improving them.

“The new investment programme earmarked for 2013/14 will target 9,000 properties for further improvement, reducing carbon emissions and lowering tenants’ fuel bills.”

For the full report see birmingham.gov.uk/democracy

Over recent years, Birmingham City Council has recorded a significant drop in overseas travel costs for the local authority.

During 2012/13, a total of 115 visits were made at a cost of £35,842.

A Birmingham City Council spokesperson said: “We have had extremely transparent process for many years through which all of our expenditure on overseas travel is approved by senior officers and published for interested parties to see.

“It is broken down by cost, destination and the benefits gained from making the visits – each of which is a form of investment that ultimately helps improve services or attract future events and fresh business to the city.

“Where possible, we always ensure that the hosts or organisers meet the cost as opposed to the city, as is proven by last year’s figures, and by the longer-term trend for less expenditure on such travel.

“This spend also needs to be viewed within the context of an annual turnover of £3.5billion for the council, which is Europe’s largest local authority.”

At-a-glance:

2008/09 – a total of 108 visits at a cost of £82,537 (average cost of £764.23 per trip)

2009/10 – a total of 74 visits at a cost of £57,721 (average cost of £780.01 per trip)

2010/11 – a total of 114 visits at a cost of £25,484 (average cost of £223.54 per trip)

2011/12 – a total of 127 visits at a cost of £44,792 (average cost of £352.69 per trip)

2012/13 – a total of 115 visits at a cost of £35,842 (average cost of £311.67 per trip)

Birmingham Lord Mayor 2013-14

Birmingham’s new Lord Mayor has taken up office after the Mayor Making ceremony which took place at the Council House on 11 June 2013.

Cllr Mike Leddy, who represents Brandwood Ward, was joined by his wife Lady Mayoress Pauline Leddy.

The 63-year-old Cllr in his role as the city’s first citizen (Lord Mayor) said he is ready for the year ahead and was looking forward to his new responsibilities.

The Lord Mayor spoke about one of the charities he would be supporting – Scout and Guide groups.

Lord Mayor of Birmingham, Cllr Mike Leddy, said: “We want to get groups into the most difficult areas of the city, and that’s not just inner city spots. It’s about what the Scouting and Guiding movement can do for the individual.  I have first-hand experience of this and what can be achieved. They take them, mould them and, eventually, you get a future Lord Mayor.”

At the annual council meeting the Lord Mayor announced his four official charities 2013-14.

The charities supported by the Lord Mayor are:
•    Scouting and Guiding
•    Cystic Fibrosis Trust
•    St Mary’s Hospice
•    Brandwood Centre working with Project for Regeneration of Druids Heath (PROD) to support debt advice and management.

Ends.

For more media information contact Karen Blanchette on 0121 303 6969.

At the heart of the floral display stands the golden rooftop rotunda of the stunning new library around which are four themed gardens.  The gardens tell the story about the £188.8 million Library of Birmingham and local writers Benjamin Zephaniah, Annie Murray and JRR Tolkien, whose book The Hobbit was the first to be placed on the shelves last month by Sir Albert Bore, leader of Birmingham City Council.

Parks Development Manager, Mike Hinton, who project managed the display said: “The team have worked incredibly hard on this stunning display and I am really proud that this has been recognised with three successive wins, first at Chelsea and then at BBC’s Gardeners’ World Live Show. 

“’Enlightenment’ is our take on the new library and some of Birmingham’s most loved writers – JRR Tolkien, Annie Murray and Benjamin Zephaniah.  It moves to Centenary Square in front of the Library of Birmingham next month where it will be judged for ‘Entente Florale’, the European in Bloom competition, and I would urge everyone to come along and see it for themselves.”

-ENDS-

Notes to editors

Images of the Enlightenment display can be downloaded here http://www.flickr.com/photos/birminghamnewsroom/sets/72157633542276860/

To see the Enlightenment display leaflet with full details of the design see https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B3OX4ags5zyuc3JnQ3hYb2NoQm8/edit?usp=sharing

For more media information contact Debbie Harrison on 0121 303 4476