Latest update from the Chief Executive 19.06

Once again everyone, a big thank you for another week's hard work and your commitment as ever to rise to new challenges.

It was great to see the city centre and other Sunderland high streets start to open back up on Monday and how all the work we put into supporting people to move around safely, really paid off.

It's important we do everything we can to support businesses to reopen and to attract customers, and to do that, people need to feel safe and that they're not putting their health at risk in venturing back to the shops.

The signage, people and traffic flow measures and the advice and guidance to retailers and businesses, as well as making the place look clean and welcoming, has made a big difference and the efforts of everyone involved are much appreciated.

Going forward, responsibility for keeping Covid-19 under control will rest at the regional and local levels, so it will be for us to continue to deploy the types of measures above as well as mitigating against infection outbreaks in key places such as care homes, schools and other places where larger numbers of people gather.

Therefore as requested by the Government, we are working with relevant partners on a comprehensive Covid-19 Infection Control Plan which needs to be ready by the end of June and involves all the necessary governance structures and expertise being in place so that we act effectively in preventing the spread of the virus, and if and when there is a rise in cases or an outbreak anywhere, again we can act quickly and effectively.

As with the majority of impacts and requirements brought about by Covid-19 over the past few months, this work takes us into uncharted territory and this new role for the council will need to be undertaken for the foreseeable future. It will have implications for, and cut across the work of quite a few council teams so again, I'm grateful to everyone who's been involved in pulling the plans and arrangements together to date, and to those who will play a role in delivery.

Thanks again and have a good weekend.