The council’s vision is to 'build a fairer, greener, healthier and more inclusive Salford for all.'
To help us achieve this vision we identified seven key priorities for the city to tackle the problems people in Salford are currently facing.
These priorities provide the focus of the council’s work until 2028 and are outlined in our corporate plan, This is our Salford, launched in July 2024.
This approach involves us working in a different way, being more open when we can about what we do, getting people involved, listening to their concerns and getting things done.
Our annual performance report
Our 2024-2025 end of year performance report has now been published and is available below.
The report highlights some of our key achievements during the first year of delivering the priorities in our Corporate Plan and what we have been doing to make a difference to the lives of people living and working in Salford.
We will continue to check progress in achieving our priorities and progress reports on how we are performing are available below.
Performance highlights for each priority
See below for highlights from each priority at a glance:
- In 2024-2025 there has been £60 million of public sector and £675 million of private sector investment in Salford.
- 53% of the money the council spends with third party suppliers is spent with Salford suppliers, helping to boost our local economy by £24.8 million.
- The council and our partners have helped ten companies and businesses to relocate to Salford or expand. This has created 1,941 new jobs and will contribute an additional £118 million to Salford’s economy.
- Work began to demolish Eccles Shopping Centre, car park and Eccles Market Hall as part of regeneration plans to revitalise the town centre. The phased work will ultimately result in the development of a modern, vibrant and fit-for-purpose town centre, a place where people can live, eat, meet and play.
- The construction of Salford Rise began. This is part of our Crescent masterplan providing more than 3,000 homes, one million square feet of offices, retail and leisure, a transport hub and vast areas of green space.
- We developed our Step into Salford programme for care leavers and those 16 to 18 year olds who are not in education, employment or training. This includes a work readiness programme and 12 months paid work experience.
- We won an Excellence in Planning award at the Social Value Awards. This was for our innovative approach in embedding social value into the development plan for the city, Salford’s Local Plan. We are the first council to have done this.
- In July 2024, Salford was ranked third in a list of the UKs most AI-ready cities outside London by AI and analytics software firm SAS. This is further evidence of innovation across our city.
- Salford’s prestigious Grade A office development, 100 Embankment, was a finalist in the ‘Remote and Co-Working’ category at the Architizer A+ Awards.
- We were shortlisted as finalists in two categories at 2024’s Digital Leaders 100 awards! These were in the categories of ‘AI Innovation of the Year’ for our work on AI-Powered Planning and ‘Digital Skills or Talent’ Initiative of the Year for our Digital Help Finder.
- We won the Estates Gazette ‘City of the Year’ award 2024. This recognised our achievements in Salford, including economic growth, sustainability projects promoting green spaces and renewable energy and cultural sites like The Lowry and Ordsall Hall.
- 2,759 new homes were built in Salford including 507 affordable new homes in 2024-2025.
- We approved plans to build 25 affordable homes to provide accommodation for young people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. These homes will be owned by Dérive, the council’s own housing company.
- We have increased the number of people we have supported in the prevention stage of homelessness to 903 households in the last year, compared to 463 in the previous year.
- In March 2025, a new housing development opened in Walkden, designed specifically to meet the needs of adults with learning disabilities.
- We developed our new Good Homes in Good Places Strategy 2025-2030. This is our plan to maximise investment, improve housing in the city and increase the number of high quality, affordable and low carbon homes for local people.
- Salford has been confirmed as a Government Vanguard Council for Housing. Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner announced that Salford will become one of ten, specially selected Government Vanguard Councils for Housing. We are the only authority in the Greater Manchester region to be selected and only one of two in the whole of the Northwest. It means we will now have access to new support from the Local Government Association to enhance delivery of council homes and council housebuilding approaches.
- In 2024-2025 the council’s welfare rights and debt advice service helped Salford residents in low-income households access over £11.8 million, a 30% increase on last year’s figure of £9.5 million.
- In winter we launched the Salford Winter Support Payment scheme. Qualifying residents received a one-off payment of £200. The council has paid out over £500,000 to more than 2,500 pensioner households on low incomes.
- We increased the number of accredited real living wage employers in Salford to 119 this year, boosting the pay of local employees.
- We have supported 28,920 customers to get online with digital skills and assistance. We launched our Big Device Giveaway which provided free devices to digitally excluded residents. In total, this year we have provided 1,221 devices, helping people to access education and job opportunities.
- Following the launch of a new assisted enrolment initiative in July 2024, we have supported an additional 506 pupils to register for free school meals, who weren’t previously registered.
- We served 41,342 meals as part of the Holiday Activities and Food programme and provided 1,615 take and make boxes for facilities to cook meals at home.
- In June 2024 our Welfare Rights and Debt Advice Service (WRADAS) won a prestigious Institute of Money Advisors (IMA) award in the ‘Innovation and Impact’ category. This recognition is in response to the exceptional work WRADAS is doing in collaboration with our Supported Tenancies team to prevent homelessness for those faced with rough sleeping and find long term solutions for those in temporary accommodation.
- We worked with our system provider (MHR) for the Project Genesis HR & Payroll system, to become a Real Living Wage employer, and as part of the procurement process, they agreed to commit to obtaining accreditation.
- Some great events have taken place in Salford this year, including the festival We invented the Weekend at MediaCityUK, Swinton Ark – a free family nighttime event, and Sounds Round Town pop up festivals in Walkden, Irlam and Eccles.
- With the addition of Lightoaks park, Salford now has ten Green Flag Award winning parks and open spaces, as well as six designated Local Nature Reserves and an urban wetland space – Kersal wetlands.
- We have established a Heritage Board and Commission to develop future plans for museums and galleries in the city.
- We launched the Safe in Salford website which aims to provide all the support people experiencing domestic abuse need to stabilise their situation and break free from the abuse.
- We held our fourth Spirit of Salford Community Awards attended by over 240 people. These awards celebrate the amazing work of people and community groups in our city who do so much to make Salford great.
- 22 grassroots arts projects have been awarded grants through the Whose Art, Whose Culture project in partnership with Salford Community and Voluntary Services.
- The Trafford Road Improvement Scheme was shortlisted in the Creating Better Places Award category by the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation’s (CIHT) national awards. Every junction, crossing and bus stop along Salford’s two-mile stretch of Trafford Road was improved and upgraded to ease traffic flow and make it safer for all users.
- In June 2024, The Lowry published a social and economic impact report to evaluate its impact on the local community and the economy. The Lowry generated £90 million in visitor spending annually, supported over 600 jobs and delivered an estimated £22 million in social value.
- On Thursday 6 June 2024, we held a special ceremony at the Civic Centre to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the D-Day Landings. This included a spectacular light projection show onto the Town Hall, special sermons, tributes and readings and was very well attended by members of the public.
- In September 2024, improvements were made across our Gateway Centres to enhance accessibility for our deaf customers following a recent audit. This included improving displays and signage and ensuring effective use of hearing loops.
- Salford Youth Zone officially opened its doors in July 2025 and is a fantastic addition to the youth facilities in the city.
- All Salford children’s homes have been rated Good by Ofsted.
- Salford’s Children’s Services was named the most family-friendly in the North West and retained the prestigious gold standard UNICEF Baby Friendly Award, in recognition of the dedication and care that goes into supporting families in Salford.
- We established a new Salford Literacy Hub. Forty-six Literacy Champion volunteers have been recruited and trained to support activities across the city and just over 8,000 books have already been donated to children and families with the greatest literacy need across the city.
- Salford’s GCSE attainment 8 outcomes (how well pupils do in key stage 4) are the most improved nationally with a 5.9% increase on 2019 outcomes.
- We launched our School Attendance Strategy and last academic year (2023-2024) children and young people attended an additional 90,000 days and so far this academic year (2024-2025) children and young people have attended an extra 40,000 school days.
- Salford is committed to becoming a Child Friendly City, listening to the voices, needs and rights of children and building a city where every child can thrive. ‘Child Friendly Salford’ means that children and young people have a voice, can share ideas, talk about what they want, and have opportunities to grow and develop in the city they live.
- In July 2024, our Workforce Panel members approved our new Fostering Friendly Policy which offers greater support and flexibility for our employees who are foster or kinship carers.
- Our recruitment and retention strategy for social care has had good impact; agency spend has reduced significantly through a permanent staff recruitment campaign. Ten agency social workers have converted into permanent employees.
- In 2024-2025, we achieved £1.2m savings on budget position for placements in social care. Placement stability has improved.
- On 10 July 2024, another six Salford Primary Schools were awarded School of Sanctuary status, becoming safe and welcoming places for all. These are Westwood Park Primary, The Deans Primary, St Paul’s CE Primary, Barton Moss Primary, St Andrews CE Primary, Eccles and Holy Family RC Primary schools.
- Lledr Hall, our residential activity and outdoor education centre in Wales celebrated its 50th anniversary in August 2024. Since opening in 1974 the hall in Snowdonia National Park has hosted an estimated 90,000 young people and visitors, with over 1,800 children visiting every year. The centre also earned the prestigious Gold Standard from the Association of Heads of Outdoor Education Centres, achieving a score of 4.85 out of five in its inspection this year.
- Our Care Leavers service (Next Step) is judged as outstanding and leadership support is being provided to other local authorities. The manager for this service was nominated for Employee of the Year.
- The proportion of families achieving overall successful outcomes following a whole family targeted early help offer from our Early Help Service remains above 70%. 80% of families sustain this success and remain at a universal level for a minimum of 12 months after the support.
- In 2024, we committed to planting 8,000 trees over the next four years. So far, we’ve planted 1,718 trees, with 300 more as part of housing developments.
- In 2024-2025 we have saved 1,443 tonnes of CO2 with our solar, fleet and decarbonisation projects.
- We have completed seven installations at council sites as part of our roof mounted solar power programme.
- We have extended our e-scooter trial to the end of May 2026 and extended the trial area to parts of Eccles and Pendleton.
- We were shortlisted for a Local Government Chronicle Award in the Net Zero category. This was for our work on sustainable projects like the Eden Building and Passivhaus standard homes.
- In May 2024, we formally launched the flagship net zero office development, Eden at New Bailey. The scheme was developed in partnership with Muse and the English Cities Fund.
- Along with our partners and communities, we recorded England’s highest uptake of NHS health checks overall, especially for people with a mental illness. The NHS target is 15% of the eligible population and our performance was 20% = 13,251 health checks.
- 83% of Salford Care Quality Commission (CQC) regulated providers were rated as good or outstanding by the CQC.
- Work is underway to bring Aspire (the provider of support for people living with dementia and learning disabilities in Salford) back into the council’s control.
- We are working towards transforming Salford into a Marmot City, which looks at other areas that can affect people’s health including housing, education and employment, to prevent people becoming ill.
- We have developed our new five-year plan for great health and wellbeing in Salford, called the Locality Plan. The plan aims to keep people in good health and improve life expectancy.
- Salford’s Health Improvement Team celebrated its 20th anniversary in July 2024. Key achievements over the years have included setting up outdoor gyms, community orchards and over 100 community groups.
- To coincide with men’s Mental Health Week in June 2024 we offered staff the opportunity to have a free and confidential health check to help them have a healthier future.
- In conjunction with national Carers week, we held a Carers celebration on 13 June 2024.
- Salford ran a successful campaign in 2024 on behalf of the Greater Manchester Cancer Alliance, which significantly increased awareness about the importance of early cancer detection. Targeted health campaigns save lives, and we continue to work collectively to ensure people return for their next health screening and vaccination offer.
- We completed the purchase of Salford Community Stadium and Salford was a host city of women’s World Cup matches in 2025 on 23 August and 30 August played at the community stadium.
- In November 2024, Salford City Council was awarded the ‘Best Place to Work’ award at the Local Government Chronicle Awards. The judging panel were particularly impressed with how naturally our people embrace a people-centred culture, promoting the values that reflect Salford’s rich and diverse communities. Our employees’ passion, enthusiasm and energy were also key factors in winning this award.
- In May we successfully launched our new digital newsroom. Salford City Council News is a space that highlights major projects, community successes, and the local heroes who make a difference every day.
- We have merged our health and safety function with our wellbeing team to create a new health, safety and wellbeing service to ensure a robust health, safety and wellbeing culture across the council.
- On 2 May 2024 we successfully delivered elections for local councillors, our elected City Mayor and the Greater Manchester Mayor. Just a few weeks later, on 4 July we also delivered the voting process in Salford for the General Election. We had only six weeks to prepare for this election rather than the usual six months, so it was an amazing team effort by our staff.
- In July 2024 we launched our new Corporate Plan ‘This is our Salford’ which sets out our priorities for the next four years to help us achieve our vision to create a fairer, greener, healthier and more inclusive Salford.
- Our Internal Audit team’s outstanding work was recognised at the Public Finance Awards as they were shortlisted for ‘Excellence in Public Sector Audit’. The team also had a successful inspection outcome against national standards for public sector internal audit standards.
- We launched Project Genesis – an exciting business transformation programme to improve and transform our finance, Human Resources and Organisational Development, payroll and procurement activities. The programme will ensure that these services are modern, efficient and supported by the right digital and technology solutions so that our staff can work differently and smartly.
Downloadable documents
- 2024 to 2025 annual performance report (Adobe PDF format, 4.2mb)
- Priority progress report, end of year 2024 to 2025 update (1 April 2024 – 31 March 2025) (Adobe PDF format, 278kb)
If you are unable to view documents of these types, our downloads page provides links to viewing software.
This page was last updated on 20 August 2025