Annual Report (2022 to 2023)

Reflecting on our achievements for 2022 we can be proud of all that’s been achieved. Together with our partners we continue to deliver our ambitions and priorities to make Buckinghamshire the best place in which to live, raise a family, work, and do business.

Buckinghamshire is widely known as an affluent county with great outcomes. However, we know that this overall picture masks some significant variations in outcomes, with some areas experiencing significant hardship. ‘Opportunity Bucks - Succeeding for All’ provides a framework for bringing partners together to focus our collective resources on tackling those local priorities that will make a difference to the outcomes of residents. Moving forwards we will continue to deliver services and improvements for our residents, whilst addressing significant variations in outcomes and opportunities.

Our commitment to localism is a key strength that we can draw on. We recognise that our communities are distinct places, with their own local sense of identity, and their own definitions of success. Local residents need to be at the core of what we do. In developing levelling up plans, we will work with residents at a local level to ensure that action builds on local strengths and responds to the needs, ambitions and experiences of the specific individual communities.

As part of the new health and care integration arrangements for the Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire Integrated Care System, we have worked with partners to establish a place based partnership for Buckinghamshire. Formalising existing informal arrangements, this will assist senior leaders across health and social care to oversee and tackle key strategic issues for health and care integration in Buckinghamshire and support the delivery of the Buckinghamshire Joint Local Health and Wellbeing Strategy. The place based partnership, known as the Buckinghamshire Executive Partnership, will start meeting in April 2023.

In February 2023, Cabinet agreed to establish a Place Based Growth Board which will ensure close working with some of our key partners towards an agreed vision for future economic growth and development in Buckinghamshire. This board will provide a more streamlined and integrated place based growth approach and furthers Buckinghamshire’s ambition to lead the way in defining what best in class integration looks like for economic delivery. The areas of strategic focus, each with their own board sitting beneath the Growth Board, are: Place & Regeneration; Opportunity Bucks; Skills; Enterprise & Investment.

As we move to an integrated place based growth model it allows for a strategic review of our approach to economic prosperity across Buckinghamshire in which thematic activity including health, economy and physical environment may be coordinated to best effect. This will include the creation of a pooled investment fund to help catalyse investment linked to agreed priorities and following agreement of our regeneration framework and plans for Aylesbury, Chesham and High Wycombe, we have the foundations to regenerate these key towns within our county.

By using resources wisely, embracing new technology and working in collaboration with our partners we will continue to shape our services around people and communities.

Our local strategic partnerships continue to place us in the best possible position across the whole of Buckinghamshire to co-ordinate a strong response to whatever scenario presents. It means we can adapt quickly to situations and offer a warm welcome to people displaced from their homes through war or other factors, ensuring targeted wrap around support is available to ensuring that refugees are facilitated to set up a new life here in Buckinghamshire.

We want to ensure that all Buckinghamshire residents have the opportunity to succeed in life, to play their part in and share in the success of the county.