Conversion failed when converting the varchar value ‘simple, ‘ to data type int

In order to avoid such error you could use CASE + ISNUMERIC to handle scenarios when you cannot convert to int.
Change

CONVERT(INT, CONVERT(VARCHAR(12), a.value))

To

CONVERT(INT,
        CASE
        WHEN IsNumeric(CONVERT(VARCHAR(12), a.value)) = 1 THEN CONVERT(VARCHAR(12),a.value)
        ELSE 0 END) 

Basically this is saying if you cannot convert me to int assign value of 0 (in my example)

Alternatively you can look at this article about creating a custom function that will check if a.value is number: http://www.tek-tips.com/faqs.cfm?fid=6423