Agenda item

The report was noted.

The report Miles Willis, Strategic Development Manager at Swansea University lead delivery partner of the project introduced the report and accompanying PowerPoint presentation to inform members of the progress made and status of the Swansea Bay City Deal Campuses Project. He gave an overview also on how from the sports angle, they link the sporting world with the medical world and the route taken for this is via the technology world linking in with the city deal outputs around regeneration, looking at community involvement and general health of people and linking with businesses such as startups and sports technology.

Members commented that the Ashley Road Playing fields (Swansea) are within the fields of trust as is the King George V playing fields which is part of the Ashley Road Playing fields. Members noted that the development encompasses all of Ashley Road and asked what the legal process that has happened in relation to the development and these playing fields as they are used for football rugby and cricket and members who represent Swansea haven’t had an update on this in their scrutiny committee.

Members also asked about Miles Willis statement in the presentation that the area has got lots of land and it's relatively cheap as opposed to Oxford and Cambridge, members wanted to know what officers meant by that and where did they mean?

Officers explained that the Ashley Road playing Fields are mixed ownership which includes not just Swansea University and Swansea Council but also third parties. Officers explained that within the process they recognised and have no intent to do anything on King George 5th playing fields.

Members were advised that it is held in trust and is badly drained meaning children are unable to play football there. Officers advised that anything that they can do to help with that process they will do and advised that it had suffered for a while due to a lack of investment.

Officers stated that anything they can do around the poor changing facilities while cognizant of its trust status they will.

Officers also explained that this would come out of a piece of work that has been undertaken currently with shared prosperity funding around what can the council and the university in this case do around that whole demise. This is why Miles Willis included King George V playing fields in that as well as the university’s own land and the council’s land within it.

Miles Willis advised that he was hopeful to allay any fears that they are not building there and have no plans to. but whatever the university can do to help with that community angle they will do their utmost to work with the Council to do that.

In relation to the question on land, Miles Willis advised that in the consultation with the company Archus they identified where the private sector sports and med technology companies are based and how to draw them to the Swansea area. Oxford and Cambridge are in the golden triangle where these companies would want to put factories but because they can’t find locations suitable there as there is no space or cheap enough land available.

Swansea in comparison has plenty of relatively cheap land and used Velindre as an example that if they partner with academic institutions and the commercial partners of them and work with them to tell them to come to the region and look at the sorts of places available. Officers haven’t done a land association around there, but they do work with the council to understand where these spots are around, both from mega factory size to small unit.

Miles Willis noted that Baglan Technology Centre that's recently opened as part of the city deal has three companies that are either spin outs of the university or have been incubated within the university. Members were advised that the university does have a role to play in all this and particularly if they work with projects like Tramshed where they are an integral part of it. The university need to acknowledge that more and need to work out how they move these businesses into that next phase from the incubation labs to a factory because that's where the jobs are going to be.

The market Intelligence that officers have had is that sports tech and Med tech companies particularly need to be either embedded in a university or embedded in a hospital that that's the rubbing shoulders with professors and clinicians, that is what officers reacting to that that need.

The Chair asked why this hadn’t come through scrutiny yet in Swansea. The Member from Swansea said he would call it in.

The report was noted.