Arriving in Banbury town centre in late March, the anticipation around Local Government Challenge 3 was heating up for our contestants.

Hosted by Cherwell DC, amongst the leafy green suburban setting, there was a hum of excitement as the competitors arrived at Bodicote House. Taking their seats within the council chamber alongside Cherwell members and officers and kicking off ahead of schedule, the Challenge was opened by Will Brooks, principal adviser for the Southeast Region at the Local Government Association, and Cllr Barry Wood, leader of Cherwell DC. For this challenge, Felicity would be captain of team Thrive and Joe captain for team Catalyst.

The challenge set to the contestants was this: to design a future model for waste services at Cherwell DC. To begin, Ian Boll, corporate director for communities, and Ed Potter, assistant director for environmental services, provided some integral background to the challenge, and stressed how Cherwell DC are bold, ambitious and continually striving to be innovative in all fields. Indeed, their impressive North West Bicester eco town (the first in the UK) and high recycling rate of 56% highlighted how Cherwell have been pioneers in both visualising and bringing to life a greener way of living. Yvonne Rees, chief executive at Cherwell DC, left the contestants with some parting words of advice: Be bold with your thinking.

The contestants faced a full-on timetable. They launched into 50 minutes of team time to knock heads together and make sense of the brief. This was followed by an hour of ‘stakeholder speed dating' with officers and stakeholders, ranging from waste service development managers to head of trading standards and the ICT and digital lead consultant. The contestants worked the room, in quick succession, to gather as much information as possible from the variety of stakeholders.

After panel interviews with key officers, the contestants grabbed bags of PPE and headed out of Bodicote House for site visits. Team Catalyst first headed to the Banbury transfer station where, kitted out with hard hats, steel toe capped boots and hi-vis jackets, the contestants began a guided tour hearing an explanation of how waste was dumped, sorted, collected and transferred from this site. Impressed by the scale of the operation, the team were lucky enough to watch fleet vehicles arrive and dump waste, ready to be sorted. Meanwhile, team Thrive were taken to the ‘New Bicester Depot'; a site Cherwell had recently bought and upon which they would build their new depot. Thrive were inspired by the sheer scale of the site, and excitedly discussed how they could plan to transform the space.

Contestants rushed back to the hotel to squeeze in some more planning and drafting, before a working dinner where teams were able to test out their ideas with two officers and two members from Cherwell. After a late night of planning, they headed back to Bodicote House early Friday morning for the final day of the challenge. The teams split, with some contestants going on more site visits, and others staying behind to finalise reports. With the clock ticking, the contestants were under pressure to get their reports submitted and presentations ready for a rehearsal. Tensions ran high in the council chamber during rehearsals, and with seven judges, the pressure was on!

Both Catalyst and Thrive delivered impressive presentations. In Thrive‘s, the judges were humoured by an appearance from Binbo, Cherwell's recycling mascot, and commended the team for their idea to generate funding via the incoming Deposit Return Scheme. From Catalyst's presentation, the judges particularly enjoyed plans for the newly titled ‘Bicester eco-station' and their pledge to be the first carbon negative waste station. After a lengthy and intense deliberation session, it was finally announced that team Thrive were victorious!

Yvonne Rees, chief executive of Cherwell DC, said: ‘Hosting the LG Challenge was an opportunity to find out how the next generation of local government talent would transform our waste services to help us embrace the challenges that all councils are facing. Selfishly, we were hoping it would also highlight opportunities Cherwell could consider as part of our major transformation programme, which we have embarked upon. 

‘I was hugely impressed by the contestants' energy, creativity and strategic thinking – they are set to make a massive contribution to the culture of innovation in local government in the future.

‘The challenge exceeded our expectations on all fronts and we would do it again in a heartbeat.'

Huge thanks go to Yvonne Rees, Cllr Barry Wood, Alex Robinson, Nikki Barnes, Ed Potter, Iain Boll and Shona Ware.

Frankie Stott is programme support officer – policy at the Local Government Association