Consultation on Mid and East Antrim Borough Council’s draft Performance Improvement Plan for 2026/27

Our Performance Improvement Plan sets out our Improvement Objectives.

These objectives do not include every improvement we plan to make, but show how we are working on some of the main needs and issues within our borough. 

We also have a bigger plan called the Corporate Plan, which sets out our main goals, as well as other smaller plans and strategies.

All of these plans work together to try to improve our borough and the lives of the people who live here.

How you can help:

We have developed three draft Improvement Objectives, and we want to know what you think about them.

We also want to hear about your own ideas for improvement.

The next pages will tell you more about our draft objectives, including why we have decided to focus on them and some of the ways we could make improvements.

The consultation will end on 8 April 2026.

We will publish our Performance Improvement Plan by 30 June 2026, in line with statutory timescales.

This plan will include a lot more information about the actions we will take to achieve our objectives.

Draft Improvement Objectives:

Objective 1: People - We will work with others to improve the lives of citizens.

Why we have chosen this objective:

Ways we could work on achieving this:

Our citizens’ top 3 priorities for making our area a better place to live in are: Supporting and developing activities for children and young people. Support to reduce poverty. Developing skills and job prospects. (Mid and East Antrim Borough Council Citizen Survey, 2022). People who live here are not very happy with their physical, mental or financial health. (Mid and East Antrim Borough Council Citizen Survey, 2022). Our services and facilities need to be inclusive and accessible. 1 in 4 people who live here cannot do as many activities due to their health condition or disability, and many people feel that their health stops them from having a job. There are also more and more older people living in our area. We need to make sure that people know enough about the different services and programmes that we can offer them. Working with other organisations can help us make a bigger impact.

Supporting people’s health and wellbeing by helping local community and sporting organisations to improve their facilities. Making our spaces, facilities and services more accessible and inclusive by developing our new Equality and Disability Action Plans (2027-2031).

Objective 2: Place - We will maintain and improve our local areas.

Why we have chosen this objective:

Ways we could work on achieving this:

Our citizens’ top 5 priorities for making our area a better place to live in are: Supporting and developing activities for children and young people. Support to reduce poverty. Developing skills and job prospects. Delivering clean and attractive streets and towns. Supporting our parks, green spaces and the natural and built environment. (Mid and East Antrim Borough Council Citizen Survey, 2022). People who live here want our area to have more money and better jobs. They would also like us to help to improve our town centres, and to do more to bring visitors to the area. Our work needs to be fair to all parts of our borough.

Ensuring good quality spaces for leisure by investing in our parks and outdoor spaces. Working with others to help to improve our streets and towns. Delivering a range of programmes to support our local businesses and economy.

Objective 3: Planet - We will reduce our environmental impact and improve sustainability.

Why we have chosen this objective:	Ways we could work on achieving this:
Everyone has a part to play in looking after our facilities, our borough and our planet. Our area is mostly clean, but litter and dog foul are problems in some areas. Household recycling levels in our borough need to improve. Northern Ireland has the lowest urban tree canopy coverage in the UK. To meet wider targets, tree and woodland coverage needs to increase.	Promoting community pride through a targeted communications campaign. Roll-out of our new recycling collection service. Implementing the MEA Tree and Woodland Strategy.

How to respond:

There are 2 ways you can respond to our consultation:

1. You can complete an online survey response form on SurveyMonkey 
2. Or you can complete our Consultation Response Form (Word 32KB) and send it back to us.

We may draw on your responses when explaining how we have used the consultation feedback to agree our objectives.

All personal data will be anonymised.

This consultation will end on 8 April 2026.

Other formats:

If you would like this consultation document in a different format, such as large print or another language, please email: communications@midandeastantrim.gov.uk

Data Protection:

Mid and East Antrim Borough Council is collecting your personal information as part of our consultation on our Performance Improvement Plan for 2026/27.

We will keep your information secure, accurate, and for no longer than is necessary in accordance with data protection laws.

If you wish to find out more about how we control and process your personal data and protect your privacy, please visit our Privacy Notice page.

Ongoing feedback:

You can tell us about your ideas for improvement or provide feedback to us at any time throughout the year. You can do so through any of the following methods:

• By telephone: 0300 1245 000
• By email: performance@midandeastantrim.gov.uk
• By post: Policy and Performance, Mid and East Antrim Borough Council, 1-29 Bridge Street, Ballymena, BT43 5EJ.