I have spoken before about the missed opportunity of not pursuing Social Value, and about the council wanting to lead by example, particularly at a time when the rising cost of living has hit people and businesses hard. 

The point is that we should consider not just the price of the goods and services we buy, but the true value that we can bring to local people, businesses and communities. 

And we are making significant strides. 

How Rotherham is creating real impact for residents  

This starts very simply by spending more of the Rotherham Council pound with local businesses. 

Since the council’s Social Value policy was adopted in late 2019, local spend through contracts has increased by 72% to £77.2m in the three years to 2022/23. This represents nearly 30% of our contracted spend and I’d hope to see another significant increase when the next reporting year ends in November. 

In the past year alone, the council doubled both the Social Value commitments delivered through our contracts, from £4 million to £8 million, and the commitments secured on new contracts, from £13.6m to £27.8m. 

That’s an extra £8 million of value, and a further £27.8m of committed value to directly benefit people and places in Rotherham. 

There are commitments to deliver over 1,500 training weeks – that’s around 30 years’ worth of training. 

There’ll be £1.8 million worth of dedicated hours to support young people into work and the equivalent of 19 full-time long-term unemployed people hired on contracts. 

£135,000 will be donated to local voluntary and community organisations, in money, equipment and resources. 

And we’ve secured commitments to save over 4,300 tonnes of carbon emissions, helping us work towards our ambitious but important net zero targets. 

Taking the public pound further 

I think it’s also important to reflect on how the Rotherham pound is supporting local companies. That increase in local spend I mentioned is generating additional economic value of £10.9 million from the use of local supply chains – a staggering increase of 263% in the last year! 

Social Value in action: East Herringthorpe 

There are lots of examples of this, but a recent one is our housing scheme in East Herringthorpe. 

The main contractor, which was from West Yorkshire, had a target to spend £100,000 with local suppliers. They actually spent £145,000. 

Huws Gray supplied the bricks and mortar, TKL provided the skips, there was concrete from Cemex, paint from Akzo Nobel, Howdens did the kitchens, and, finally, Demex dealt with demolition and asbestos removal. 

Replicate this scenario for the dozens of contracts we let, and you start to see the scale and the impact this can have on the local economy. 

I hope you’ll agree that this represents real progress. 

Changing lives in Rotherham 

Beyond the numbers and that example though, are real stories. Tangible benefits that that are creating opportunities and helping to change people’s lives. 

That could be taking on an extra apprentice on a construction project, who lives right here in Rotherham, to quite literally help in our mission to build a better borough one day at a time. 

It could be going into one of our schools and inspiring our young people with a whole array of new career opportunities before them. 

Or it could be providing some vitally needed equipment to one of our fantastic community or voluntary organisations, who work tirelessly day in, day out, to deliver for local people. 

Each one of these things on the surface might not sound a lot. Even taken as a list of three things you could be forgiven for asking ‘so what?’ 

But beneath that are real people’s lives. 

From the difference it makes to the apprentice who takes that important step onto the career ladder to deliver a much-needed change to our town’s skyline. To inspiring a young person to get into a career where they can fulfil a dream that they’d not even realised they had. And to giving one of our local foodbanks the ability to provide extra food hampers to struggling families. 

Because – whilst these are only three things – all of them play their part in making a difference and having a real impact. 

Social Value in action: Forge Island 

Take Forge Island as an example: it’s our flagship town centre development at the heart of the largest regeneration programme in a generation. Constructed by three locally based companies, it is very much a case of Social Value in action. 

As well as those local companies, 37% of the labour has come from people living within 20 miles and 83% from people within 40 miles. 

Three unemployed local people had a total of 21 weeks on site and a trainee spent 28 weeks on the project. 

A lovely part of the story is the Sanctuary Gardens allotment project. Sanctuary is a community organisation based in the town centre that helps people who are struggling with mental health issues. 

As part of their Social Value commitments, Bowmer and Kirkland Group, one of the Forge Island construction companies, arranged for a local contractor to strim the area and remove all the rubbish, clearing access for the group’s planters. They also donated a strimmer and some furniture and built raised beds that allow for more diverse plantings. A relatively small-scale contribution in the grand scheme of things, but a genuine game-changer for this volunteer-led group, and a fantastic example of what we mean by Social Value. 

Rotherham Council supplier ESH Construction volunteering with local school

Empowering the people of Rotherham

Our commitment to Social Value sits as part of our commitment to community wealth building. Like Social Value, this can be defined in many ways, but it’s a simple concept at its heart. How do we redirect wealth back into the local economy and give local people more control? 

Our procurement-focused Social Value activity, including the ongoing work with our public sector partners as they develop their own approaches, is part of community wealth building. As is the fact that the council, like a growing number of organisations, is a Real Living Wage employer: ensuring that our staff earn a wage that they can live on, above the legally required National Living Wage.  

In the last year alone, this has risen from £10.90 to £12 per hour – which for someone working full time is an extra £40 a week. 

Driving employee ownership  

But we want to do more and look at different aspects of local wealth building. To that end, the council is looking to support the growth of employee-owned businesses. 

As well as wealth being distributed more evenly, with employees benefiting from a share in profits, there is research to show that employee-owned businesses can aid productivity, improve staff retention and reduce absenteeism, as well as making businesses more resilient during times of crisis. 

Our business advisors will be offering specific advice and guidance on this model, and we’ll be promoting the benefits through our various networks and at events like this, as well as exploring how we can create the right conditions for employee ownership through our wider skills and business support interventions. 

Delivering good work  

Finally, our local labour policy, which means that any new major development – ones that will create at least 15 jobs – will include a local labour agreement as part of the planning process.  

This will help to ensure that, either as part of the construction or when the scheme is completed and in operation, efforts are made to provide employment and training opportunities for local people. That’s at the beginning of our mission to ensure we’re securing Social Value not just though public expenditure, but through private investment in the planning process too. 

Working together for Rotherham’s future 

So, you can see that we’re not standing still on this agenda. Our efforts were recognised at last year’s Social Value Awards, and far more importantly, local communities are now really feeling the benefit. But we can and will go much further. 

Whether we call it Social Value or community wealth building, this is about understanding the real value of what we do and how we define success. There’s a role for everyone and I know our local stakeholders are all as committed as I am to driving this agenda forward – delivering more jobs and opportunities, and improving the quality of life of residents across our borough.