Author: George Monbiot, The Guardian

One of neoliberalism’s promises was that it would free us from bureaucracy. By rolling back the state, it would vanquish the stifling power of officialdom, granting us unprecedented freedom and opportunity. This promise runs through the works of Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, and Ludwig von Mises’s book Bureaucracy.

But in place of the old bureaucracy, it has created a state-corporate system more oppressive and intrusive than anything governments produced in the social democratic era. The hybrid nature of this system, protected from challenge by commercial confidentiality, property rights and civil law, places it beyond the reach of democracy.

The intermingling of state and corporate power allows corporations to harness the resources and protection of the state, and the state to hide behind its corporate partners. A classic example is the private finance initiative (PFI): a programme developed in the UK by the Conservatives but greatly expanded by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. Under PFI, private companies finance and deliver public goods that governments would otherwise have provided.

We were told it would produce better services at lower cost, but the contracts have repeatedly put corporate demands ahead of public need. The crippling debts afflicting hospitals and other parts of the public sector, as they are forced to keep paying for services they neither want nor need, were both foreseeable and foreseen.

Labour has now promised, if it takes office, to review all PFI contracts, and buy them out if necessary. But the message has yet to filter through, even to some Labour councils. A few days ago, I visited Sheffield, where, with local campaigners, I toured the battlelines between people and profit.

Sheffield is often described as Europe’s greenest city, but the city council seems determined to change this, through the massacre of many of its famous avenues of trees. In 2012, it signed a contract for what it called “the largest highways PFI programme in the UK” with Amey, a subsidiary of the vast Spanish company Ferrovial.

As part of this programme, Amey earmarked 6000 trees for felling. Among them were magnificent and stunning specimens, treasured by local people, including famous landmarks such as the Vernon Oak, the Chelsea Road Elm, the Western Road memorial trees and the cherry avenues of Abbeydale Park Rise.

The reasons given for destroying them seemed incomprehensible: the lifting of a kerbstone or two, the cracking of a pavement, roots intruding a couple of inches into the road. These are routine issues in any city, which can be easily and cheaply addressed without any need to attack the tree. In the case of the Chelsea Road Elm – a rare survivor of Dutch elm disease, harbouring a colony of even rarer white letter hairstreak butterflies – the residents commissioned an engineer to provide an estimate for addressing the cracked paving, and discovered it could be done, at minimal cost, without felling the tree.

But, the council tells me, ”alternative engineering solutions … are not funded within the contract”. So they cannot be applied, regardless of any cost savings, and regardless of common sense. The terms of the contract were locked in for 25 years in 2012, and cannot be changed. It specifies that the trees must be felled, so down they must come.

Nor can there be meaningful engagement with local people – that too would stand outside the terms of the contract. The council has claimed that the issue is too big and too contentious for a public consultation to handle. In a democratic system, big and contentious are generally considered to be reasons for consultation.

Because a PFI contract must guarantee financial certainty for the corporate partner, it forbids government agencies to learn, adapt and respond. As a result, the landscape architect Steve Frazer points out, Sheffield’s streets, with their rich communities, complex forms and multiple functions, are being reduced to nothing but “conduits for conveying cars and people”. Sterilised, featureless streets are the physical embodiment of a rigid and intolerant mindset, which itself arises from a rigid and unassailable contract. The flexibility that capital demands of the workforce cannot be applied to capital.

If the contract were changed, the council insists, there would be “catastrophic financial consequences”. Exactly what these are is impossible to know, because the relevant sections of the contracthave been blacked out. This, the council tells me, is because such details are “commercially confidential or commercially sensitive to either Amey or the Council.”

It is hard to see why. It seems to me that the information is more likely to be politically embarrassing than commercially compromising. In a twist that comes straight out of a Franz Kafka novel, the schedule to the contract (#30) that explains why parts of it have been deemed “commercially sensitive” has been withheld from public view. The hybrid nature of PFI provides a never-ending excuse for denying information to the public.

As soon as a PFI contract is signed, the public sector must become the guardian of private sector interests. On Friday, two local people, Calvin Payne and the Green councillor Alison Teal, will be tried under another hybrid instrument: a civil case with potential criminal penalties. Sheffield City Council has accused them of contempt of court, by breaking the injunction it served to prevent them from obstructing the felling of the trees they love. It has asked for custodial sentences. They might also, if found guilty, be charged with the costs of delaying the contract, which could amount to hundreds of thousands of pounds and result in the seizure of their assets.

Throughout the neoliberal era, governments and companies have devised new criminal and civil procedures to defend capital from protest. This is the force behind market forces. The enabling state, with its strong public services and robust social safety nets, might have been rolled back, but the security state has expanded, to protect corporate profits from democracy.

Those who defend the neoliberal model insist that such arrangements are a distortion of the programme, caused by government meddling, thwarting their purely commercial utopia. But the truth is that this hybrid, Kafkaesque system is an inevitable result of a model that cannot meet our needs, while providing endless opportunities for clientelism and capture. PFI exemplifies the practice of neoliberalism. It exposes the doctrine for what it is: a gigantic self-serving con.

Author: Crown Estates Scotland

Crown Estate Scotland has committed to launch a new scheme that will enable local authorities, development trusts and other bodies to apply to manage assets in their local area.

The business, which manages land and property including seabed, foreshore, rural estates and more, has appointed Argyll-based Sarah Brown to help us develop new ways of giving local communities more control over decisions regarding Crown Estate Scotland assets. The aim is to trial different models and assess which ones work best in delivering financial, social and environmental benefits.

Sarah will lead on establishing a set of criteria so that organisations can apply to manage assets locally and will also ensure there is a robust process in place to gauge the success of projects that go ahead. A key part of Sarah’s role will be consulting with coastal and rural community representatives and other organisations and individuals who may be impacted.

The commitment to trial local management is in the business’s three-year corporate plan, launched this week, and updates and further information will soon be available at www.crownestatescotland.com

Ronnie Quinn, Chief Executive of Crown Estate Scotland, said, “We’ve made a clear commitment to enable local authorities, development trusts and other community bodies to pilot local management of rural, coastal and seabed assets.

 “This is likely to involve different models of local management taking place over the next few years. It’s an exciting way to explore and test how communities can have more say over how Crown land and property is managed – and even before specific projects are given the go ahead, we will make sure that those impacted have a chance to share their views.

“Sarah’s many years’ experience in the marine sector and working closely with coastal and rural communities makes her an ideal choice for leading this work.”

Ms Brown has carried out community engagement with Scotland’s fishing and recreation and tourism sectors, including undertaking the innovative Marine Tourism and Recreation Survey for the Scottish Government. She was strategic advisor to the Coastal Communities Fund in Scotland and most recently the marine plan manager for the Clyde Marine Planning Partnership.

Crown Estate Scotland manages assets on behalf of Scottish Ministers, including agricultural and forestry land, most of the seabed, just under half of the foreshore and some commercial property.

It works with communities, tenants and partners with the aim of innovating with land and property to create prosperity for Scotland and its communities. All revenue profit is returned to the Scottish Government.

Author: The Economist

The evolution of Preston into the poster child of Corbynomics started years before Mr Corbyn was elected Labour’s leader, says Matthew Brown, who sits in the council’s cabinet and has spearheaded the programme. In 2011 a £700m redevelopment of the city centre collapsed after the economic downturn. So the council turned to other tactics to generate local investment.

First, it set about persuading local public institutions—colleges, the police, a housing association, the university—to consider spending more of their combined £1bn budget locally, as “anchor institutions”. Local suppliers were given advice on how to pitch for tenders that may have seemed out of reach. The Centre for Local Economic Strategies, a Manchester-based think-tank, audited the spending of six such institutions last month and found that they spent 18% of their most recent year’s budget in Preston, compared with 5% in 2013. In cash terms, this meant an extra £75m being spent in the city—around £530 per citizen. The share of their spending in Lancashire doubled from 39% to 79%. It required no extra money nor new legislation. “It’s about collaboration,” says Mr Brown. “You have to be clever in austerity.”

Preston’s anchor institutions feature in a 48-page pamphlet commissioned by Mr McDonnell on “alternative models of ownership”. Brexit, the report suggests, is a chance to rewrite procurement rules and force the public sector to buy some goods and services locally, which is banned by EU law. Labour’s manifesto also promised to use the government’s £200bn in procurement spending as a weapon to enforce social goals. Suppliers would have to maintain a pay ratio of under 20:1 between their highest- and lowest-paid employees, for example. Other wonks think Labour should go further. Joe Guinan of Democracy Collaborative, an organisation that has overseen a similar model to Preston in Cleveland, Ohio, has said the National Health Service could be “the mother of all anchoring institutions”.

Not all are so impressed. Getting institutions to buy locally amounts to municipal protectionism, with money that was once spent elsewhere in Britain spent locally, points out Colin Talbot, a public-policy expert at Cambridge University. “There is no value being added,” he says. An overly confined economy may reduce economies of scale and exacerbate the effects of any downturn. If the Park Hotel goes under, it may hit Preston’s pensioners, too.

Still, the Preston model is “a practical example of ‘taking back control’,” argues Tom Kibasi of IPPR, another think-tank. Like every district in Lancashire, Preston voted to leave the EU. Part of the feeling of lack of control stemmed from a lack of local ownership, argues Mr Brown. The council is trying to correct this. Last month it launched a not-for-profit energy firm, similar to those that Labour’s manifesto promised. It is cajoling the city’s anchor institutions to provide capital for a regional investment bank, much like the ones that Mr Corbyn has proposed.

The council has also encouraged local firms to consider becoming co-operatives—which are owned and controlled by their workers—and lobbied its anchor institutions to deal more with co-ops. Nationally, Labour wants to double the size of the co-operative sector, for instance by giving workers a “right to own” if a firm’s owners sell up. In a speech last week Mr Corbyn asked why Uber, the ride-hailing app, could not be replaced by a co-op. Labour’s obsession with them is window-dressing, believes Mr Talbot. “They do not want to appear to be ‘commanding heights’,” with their plan to nationalise utilities such as gas and electricity, “so they are talking about trendy co-op things as well,” he says.

For all the praise that Labour’s leaders heap on Preston, Mr Corbyn’s team bristles if the city is described as a crucible of Corbynism. Preston offers radicalism on a shoestring, with its council’s annual spending on services cut by a third since 2010, to £20m. A Corbyn government, they insist, would loosen funding constraints and let local authorities go further. But even if Mr Corbyn never reaches Downing Street, Corbynomics will thrive in one corner of Lancashire. “You can begin to democratise the economy, even with a Tory government,” says Mr Brown.

This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline “Jeremy Corbyn’s model town”

Author: Scottish Government

Copy of the Evaluation Report download here

This interim report provides the initial findings and identifies any impact on local communities, local services, and local democracy from local authorities engaged in the process. The extent to which approaches to PB have been formulated and aim to address enduring and underlying inequalities has also been a key focus of the evaluation process.

The original evaluation project was to run from October 2015 to October 2017. In May 2017, a third year was agreed to allow for closer analysis of the implications of lessons to date to inform the proposed expansion of participatory and community budgeting to 1% of local government budgets as set out in the 2016-2017 Scottish Government Programme for Government.

Data is still being generated and analysed, the findings presented here are based on first round interviews with 20 local authorities and more detailed engagement with the six case study authorities. It is not intended to be a definitive analysis as the study is ongoing, but rather offers indicative implications for policy for both the Scottish Government and local authorities, and some considerations for practice development as PB expands in Scotland.

A multi-disciplinary team comprising researchers from the WiSE Research Centre, Glasgow School for Business and Society (Social Sciences, and Risk subject groups); the School for Engineering and Built Environment; and the Yunus Centre for Social Business and Health has engaged in a multi-method approach to the evaluation. This has included a series of structured interviews with local authority elected members and officials; members of local communities; and engaged third party organisations. A first round of interviews with local authorities was followed by a second phase of in-depth observation at PB events; and observation (and some participation) in development groups at local and national level. A series of interviews with officers and elected members from 6 case study authorities was conducted up to June 2017.

The team has also attended and observed a range of activities across Scotland. An action research set of community, public bodies and local authority officers has also been established and provides an opportunity for ongoing data collection, reflection and analysis of the implementation and impact of introducing PB. Focus group discussions and the development of an action research set are ongoing activities.

Between October 2015 and June 2017 the team has conducted:

5 interviews with community reps

20 interviews with elected members

2 focus groups

11 participatory budgeting events across 4 local authority areas.

The cases were selected on a range of criteria to ensure a spread of experience in PB, urban and rural mix, varied funding allocations and policy framing. The six selected local authority cases are Glasgow, Edinburgh, Fife, Pan Ayrshire (North, South, and East), Western Isles Council, and Aberdeenshire Council.

The ongoing evaluation study reveals a range of approaches in use to date by local authorities and variations in community engagement these activities are producing. Given the activity on the current scale is new and emerging, expectations of the impacts on communities, services, local democracy and pre-existing inequalities have to be realistic. The findings from this evaluation of current activity in Scotland reinforce previous conclusions from comparative European research and studies on Scotland in affirming that there is no one model and that significant variations in format and procedure, as well as in strategic intent are common (Sintomer et al. 2008; Escobar and Harkins, 2015).

After almost three years of investment from the Scottish Government and significant levels of activity by the majority of Scotland’s local authorities and a wider range of community based and third sector organisations, efforts to promote and implement PB in Scotland have been vibrant. The extent to which some of this activity is having a transformative impact and is sustainable for local authorities, at least in the way the approaches are currently managed, is however questionable. The extent to which communities, politicians and council officers are engaged and convinced of the purpose and benefits of PB is also mixed.

While evidence of positive impact on the core variables in focus in the evaluation is still limited, other variables are of equal importance at this stage in the development of PB in Scotland. These include the extent to which there is clear and consistent understanding of what is meant and understood by PB; what the strategic objectives and indicators are for local and national government; and what local communities understand and stand to gain by engaging in decision-making on the allocation of resources. To date, the introduction of PB signifies a commitment and investment of time and resource from community applicants and participants as well as on the part of local authorities. Changing the relationship between communities and government at the local and national level means establishing a different contract between citizens and the state. The extent to which this leads to a shift from a transactional relationship (whereby councils provide services or resources in response to expressed needs or direct requests) to a transformational shift in power is a question at the core of developments in PB.

Author: Ulrich Schachtschneider

In her article ‘Unconditional Basic Income is a Dead End’, Anke Hassel rejects basic income as a threat to individual development and social integration, claiming that it would remove people’s motivation to join the labour market. Young people from working class and migrant families in particular would not invest in their general education and vocational training. Even the workplace-centred integration of the growing number of immigrants would be absent if they lose the motivation to join the world of paid work. Hassel’s basic assumption is correct: Work is important to improve one’s skills, to develop self-confidence and to feel acknowledged in society. But is this at risk through basic income?

First, we have to ask ourselves: Do we really know the impact made by fewer coercions to join the labour market? In Finland an experiment has started to explore just this. We should wait for the results. In the ‘Mincome‘ experiment in the 1970s in Canada the labour market supply, measured by the number of yearly working hours, declined between one and seven percent. That sounds not dramatic. Two more results: more young people (especially working class young men) graduated from high school and the number of days spent in hospitals declined.

Second, we have to raise the question whether only paid work can fulfil the important task of personal growth and social integration. In economies dominated by capitalist motivations, societal recognition through work is linked to the need for an income: The need to produce something, make an impact and be recognized is “translated” into the wish for being paid for everything which one does.

A possible starting point for breaking with the capitalist-dominated work society is to separate basic individual and societal needs from paid work. The partial decoupling of work and income that might be at least partially achieved by an unconditional basic income would raise the prospect of a multi-faceted life beyond market structures, including various forms of self-organized individual and communal work.

The qualities which the people will learn in these non-monetary forms of work will cause an even higher demand for “good works” in the labour market. People could refuse work which neither fosters one’s personality nor has social and ecological value, with basic income to back them. The labour market becomes less hierarchical. Therefore, we can designate basic income as an “authenticity lump sum”.

The second argument Hassel makes is that basic income would cause a bad economic redistribution mechanism: The middle class would pay for the basic income but wouldn’t benefit materially. What does she mean by ‘middle class’? However we finance basic income – via an increase in income tax, eco-taxes, consumption taxes, capital gains/wealth tax or inheritance tax – the members of the small richer part of society will pay more than they get back as their own basic income. Basic income is redistribution from the most affluent 20-30 percent to the rest – all financing examples show this.

As Hassel remarks, many low-paid workers who would really benefit from this redistribution reject basic income. But we can argue the following in response: Basic income is a social state for all, not only for those who get subsidies paid from others under today’s system. What’s more, one can point to the fact that, with a basic income for all, the monetary gap between those doing paid work and those getting only welfare benefits will grow.

However, these arguments are theoretical and we have to evaluate the experiments, mainly to do with mitigating coercion to work in return for social benefits rather than a true basic income for all. Of course, basic income which gives everyone more bargaining power, would change the constitution of labour market. The price of labour, which contains less appealing tasks and conditions, would rise. Due to the growing options to say “No” to work seen as senseless in various regards, the share of work which people really want to do and see as required, will grow: We will have more “authentic” work, but probably an overall decline of labour. But why we should reject this possible change? Keynes himself expected that his grandchildren would only need to work 15 hours a week due to technological progress and better satisfaction of needs.

Whatever we think about this basic income, it is a new principle for the social state, and a new chance to re-think work, what it is and what it should be, as Hassel wants as well. Introducing a basic income would be a great transformation and it should be set in train slowly. People and society should have enough time to adapt individuals’ behaviour and amend social institutions. Implementation can go forward step by step, until the full amount of a basic income covering the socio-cultural minimum for existence is reached.

UBIE is researching the idea of a partial basic income, a Eurodividend of €200 a month, paid to every European citizen. This would be both a very necessary contribution to a more social Europe and a first step to the great transformation. Basic income is not a sweet poison but a tonic catalyser for a more authentic working world.

Ulrich Schachtschneider, is an energy consultant, freelance social scientist and author. His main research issues are Socio-Ecological Transformation, Sustainable Development and Modern Society, Ecology and Basic Income and Post-Growth Policies. He is also a board member of Unconditional Basic Income Europe.

Author: Jamie Hailstone, New Start

In the last few years, crowdfunding has become an established and successful way of raising money for anything from craft beer to the latest smart phone apps.

However, crowdfunding can also be used to support community projects, not only by raising money in the first instance, but also by unlocking other forms of match funding, like local authority and public sector grants.

A new report by Nesta looks at the growing phenomenon of ‘matched crowdfunding’, and highlights a pilot programme where £251,500 in matched funding from the Arts Council England and Heritage Lottery Fund inspired crowdfunding donations of more than £400,000.

During the nine-month trial, the website www.crowdfunder.co.uk provided an online platform for community groups to launch their ideas.

The £251,500 match funding was then distributed to 59 projects around the country, who also benefitted from ongoing support, coaching and workshops all provided by the website.

‘The report makes a strong case for local authorities and other grant funding organisations to work with Crowdfunder,’ said the website’s managing director, Phil Geraghty.

‘We can match the UK’s £5.6bn grant money with crowd-raised funds. Importantly, the report outlines strong evidence for doing so.

‘Crowdfunder is now looking for more funders who have a collaborative approach, deep valuable knowledge of their sectors and a shared mission to tackle societal change by helping make ideas happen,’ he added.

The report found the pilot largely attracted new supporters and finance for arts and heritage organisations, rather than drawing from existing sources.

More than two in three of the fundraisers involved also reported that running the crowdfunding campaign significantly improved their pitching and fundraising skills.

And while crowdfunding can help fundraisers easily attract a global audience, in the majority of these cases backers lived less than 20 miles from the project they supported and the majority stated that they were going to see or experience the project in person.

The report recommends arts and heritage groups should explore using crowdfunding both as a fundraising and an engagement tool.

According to the report, crowdfunding is a good way of testing out demand and interest in ideas.

The report adds that the online nature of crowdfunding can also ‘increase transparency’ around what is getting funded, compared to other traditional forms of fund-raising.

Crowdfund London: The report highlights the partnership between the Greater London Authority and the Spacehive crowdfunding platform, which has given local groups a new way of raising funds and bringing projects to life.

Crowdfund London allows projects to gain the support of the wider community and the mayor of London, who uses the website to pledge funding of up to £50,0000 as ‘one of the crowd’.

The platform has now been running for four years and so far, more than 8,700 Londoners have pledged over £1.6m to 77 different campaigns.

These include the Well Street Community Food Market, the Community Brain Community Kitchen in Surbiton and a community art initiative in north London.

The Peckham Coal Line project raised £75,757 from 928 backers and received an additional £10,000 pledge from City Hall to explore how a disused railway track could be converted into an urban park.

According to the report, the fund found it helped ‘improve community cohesion and democratise the urban re-development process’, as well as opening up local government to the ‘wider and less-active section’ of the population.

Crowdfund Plymouth: In 2015, Plymouth council, in partnership with Crowdfunder, used £60,000 of the neighbourhood proportion of their community infrastructure levy (CIL) to setup the Crowdfund Plymouth match fund.

Now in its third year of operation, the fund has distributed £997,260, including more than £140k from the city in matches to projects in Plymouth.

These range from a campaign by the Plymouth Argyle Ladies Football Club to cover cost of kit and playing matches to Sole Discretion – a social enterprise seeking to protect the marine environment through the creation of a dedicated supply chain for ethically caught fish.

An evaluation of Crowdfund Plymouth found that most of the matched projects have taken in the city’s most disadvantaged areas, but that pledges have come from across the city and nationally.

Through this approach the council has sought to make best use of funds open to the community, reduce time and administration required to give out small grants, increase visibility of the fund and provide support to areas reach a new audience by supporting projects and people that would otherwise not have applied for funding.

‘We check Crowdfunder every week, and we’ve seen a lot of projects that wouldn’t have gone through the usual application route which is what we were aiming for,’ said the council’s neighbourhood planning manager, Hannah Sloggett.

‘They can be quite reactive – someone’s just seen a problem and they have set about fixing it. It creates an environment where local people can be supported to develop their own solutions to improving their communities in a supported way.

‘For people that aren’t used to putting funding applications in it can feel more accessible – they can put in a short film or just explain it as they would to their friends,’ she added

Read the full report here.

Author: Elspeth Gracey, CHEX Team

Sadie Gordon – 2017 Winner of Mary Barbour Award

I first met Sadie Gordon in 1990 when she was a ‘lay’ community worker at Possil/Parkhouse Community Health Project. The organisation was famous for its pioneering work on Breakfast Clubs in which Sadie was an active volunteer. I knew then that Sadie was grounded in her community and her knowledge of it and the passion to work for it was her major motivator in life. Meeting her again recently I discovered more of where that passion came from and how she has channelled her energy into bringing people together for positive change in her beloved Possilpark.

As well as her mother, Sadie speaks of many women in her life who have inspired her. Mrs Rattery who raised funds for the Spanish Civil War and who was a founder member of the Citizen’s Theatre asked Sadie to form a residents association through which they got their community hall, and her friend and former colleague the late Ellen Hurlcombe who also worked in the community-led health organisation in Possilpark, went on to become a city Councillor.

Sadie speaks also of her father’s trade unionism and how he challenged illegal money lenders. He used money he received in compensation for an accident at work to offer fellow employees interest free loans. This example of taking action to promote justice and fairness for all is fundamental to the work Sadie still does in Possilpark.

Sadie’s first experience of organising collective action dates back to her school days aged 14. She and her classmates were angered and distressed by the bullying behaviour of a teacher towards a fellow pupil. “She was picked upon, she wasn’t very academic and this particular teacher didn’t like her,” said Sadie. “So, I said to my classmates let’s all stand up the next time she picks on her and tell her it’s not fair.” Although they were all taken to the head teacher to be belted for ‘disobedience’ their classmate was never picked upon again: the first success in effecting change for the better.

Sadie is an unassuming person, not one to blow her own trumpet and certainly not one to court publicity for her role in the community work that she has tirelessly undertaken for more than 50 years. Typical of her was the day I met her. We were in the local community centre that she had been involved in securing. Sadie told me she had been at the Mary Barbour award ceremony on the previous Friday evening in Glasgow City Halls.

However it was only after I had spent more than an hour in her company that she let it slip that she was the recipient of the award! The award is given in memory of Mary Barbour who organised the Glasgow rent strikes during the First World War when landlords raised rents and evicted those unable to pay. Mary Barbour organised local people to resist both rent rises and evictions. Sadie tells me about her mother’s experience in the Second World War “It was in 1947 that my mum and the women from Garscube Road followed Mary Barbour’s example and had a rent strike”. Subsequently the family

If asked Sadie can rhyme off over a dozen local organisations that she is still part of. She is a founder member of many of them. The range of interests she has are wide and varied and often of long standing.

There’s the summer camp, when we take youngsters who would otherwise not get a holiday away. This is my 40th year of doing that. We try to show them a healthier way of living.”

Never one to dwell in the past her most recent venture with other local activists is to bring together a new organisation called Possilpark People’s Trust. She sees this as the structure which will enable local residents to secure community control of local assets and services through the newly available Community Empowerment Act and is keen to see the people of her community benefit from the opportunities contained within the Act. Sadie dreams of a facility in which many local organisations might come together under one roof and benefit from the synergy of being together in a ‘community hub’.

Often, she has been the chairperson of organisations she is involved with “Well sometimes people don’t want to take that on. So I just say yes, I find it hard to say no if asked.”

While reluctantly willing to accept awards given in her name alone Sadie speaks more fondly of awards that recognise the “team effort and team spirit” that characterises much of what she has done across the years.

Throughout her working life whether working in office, factory, the NHS or her local community led health organisation, Sadie has continued to have an active role in her community. Her final decision to retire came when she realised that work was getting in the way of her community activities.

Decades of local action working with her neighbours has allowed Sadie to see the generations following her coming through – some with better life chances than would have been the case without her activity.

However Sadie is realistic that the life circumstances that affect so many of her community cannot be overcome for all.

In my opinion many of the folk that would be in Sadie’s army are there because of her work and the work of people like her who have put in endless hours working with others, showing the way, doing what is needed when its needed, saying yes when others would have said no, bringing people together, helping them to realise the power of collective action. And although Sadie is not fond of awards she is undoubtedly a very appropriate recipient of the Mary Barbour award. Congratulations Sadie!

Author: TFN

Scotland’s biggest funder is disempowering a Scots community, a leading body has claimed. 

As exclusively revealed by TFN this week, Linwood Community Development Trust (LCDT) had a £1 million lottery bid rejected – a move it now says was designed to disadvantage the town.

The trust told TFN it believes lottery bosses rejected its application to “point score” against Renfrewshire Council, which has already backed the £3m Mossedge Village Project with £1.2m of funding.

And now the Development Trust Association Scotland (DTAS) has hit out saying the decision to reject Linwood’s bid has grave implications for similar projects around the country.

Ian Cooke, director of DTAS, said that the Big Lottery Fund’s decision would have repercussions.

He said: “While recognising that the demand for Big Lottery funding exceeds the money available for funding, the decision of the Big Lottery not to fund the Linwood project raises wider implications for community empowerment and community-led development (both national policies) in Scotland.”

Cooke added: “DTAS has long supported the view that the community ownership of assets can be an empowering activity for communities. But it seems the amount of time, effort and money which LCDT have had to expend in reaching this point of rejection, is more dis-empowering than empowering.” 

Campaigners have now vowed the project will go ahead without lottery cash. 

Jeannette Anderson of the trust said: “It really is beginning to look like the lottery isn’t sure at all, as to why they turned down our application.

“We have obtained a copy of the lottery assessment report which showed the Trust scoring “good” across all sections.

“It is beginning to look like that the lottery used Linwood to make a point to Renfrewshire Council.

“We will not allow anyone to use the trust or Linwood in this way.”

Cash would create an urban village including a community hall and an all-weather football pitch with changing facilities, a theatre and a community growing area.

But after a four-year process and over £200,000 spent on the bid, the group slammed the lottery for rejecting the application.

Kirsty Flannigan, the trust manager, said that representatives from Renfrewshire Council, the Scottish Government and LCDT will be meeting to discuss another option for the proposed Mossedge centre.

“The trust is determined to deliver on our plans for Mossedge 3G park, the nurseries and our other activities. We got a real boost on Wednesday with the confirmation of £220,000 from the Scottish Government to invest in the Woodland nursery.

“The trust and Linwood know what we are doing. We will leave it up to other people to make their own assessment of the Lottery.”

A spokeswoman for the Big Lottery Fund said: “Our committee judged that, with two other facilities close by, a new third community building did not offer value for money and they also had concerns for the ongoing sustainability of the project.”

A Renfrewshire Council spokesman added: “The funding would have been the final component needed for the project, which included £300,000 from the council and a further £800,000 which the council had applied for from the Scottish Government’s Regeneration Capital Grant Fund, on behalf of LCDT

Author: The Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture

Leaked internal emails from a whistleblower inside the Scottish Salmon Company reveal the utter contempt foreign-owned salmon farming companies have for local communities in the Western Isles of Scotland. 

Read the leaked emails from the Scottish Salmon Company in full online here and a media backgrounder in full online here

“Let the locals get used to it” is the privately held view of a company publicly listed on the Norwegian Stock Exchange, registered in Jersey and owned by a who’s who of Swiss and Norwegian banks and investors (over 85% of Scottish salmon farming production is now controlled by foreign – mostly Norwegian – interests exported to overseas markets such as China).     

One community on the Isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides is disparaged by the Scottish Salmon Company’s ‘Environmental Manager’ Rebecca Dean as a “vipers nest” despite a company policy which advocates “building strong relationships with the community”.  

“Yes, there is a biomass strategy target, and I am well aware of it and we will max out what we can, where we can,” writes Rebecca Dean.  “But Plocrapol is a guaranteed vipers nest, with the huge delays that will create, and the demands on Council (and The Scottish Salmon Company) time, could be better spent on other sites that may be less oppositional (couldn’t get much worse than Ploc…well, there is always Arran of course…or Toa, but).”

“Let’s spend the energy fighting those battles, and filling the Council’s time,” writes the Scottish Salmon Company’s ‘Environmental Manager’ who recommends focussing on expansion in the Uists.  “We might as well try avoid, for now at least, the ones we are certain will be lengthy, tiring, negative PR battles.”    

“I absolutely agree we look where there is less chance of time consuming opposition,” replies the Scottish Salmon Company’s CEO Stewart McLelland who admits expansion at their disease-ridden Isle of Arran farm at Lamlash Bay is “difficult”.  “This way we ensure we get the good publicity and demonstrate the advantages of working together,” he writes.  “What we need to do is have a session just on the Hebrides to discuss strategy then tactics.”

With these leaked internal documents published via FishyLeaks and the prospect of further revelations, the Scottish Salmon Company’s policy of avoiding what it refers to as “angst” and “hoo-haa” has now come back to bite it on the corporate ass.  

“The Scottish Salmon Company is a venomous snake in the grass,” said Don Staniford of the Global Aquaculture Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture who received the leaked documents anonymously in the mail.  “Thanks to this brave whistleblower the Scottish public can now see the poisonous bile being spewed by this shameless Swiss/Norwegian-owned company.  Local communities across the Highlands and Islands are now fighting back against the deadly diseases and PR poison being peddled by the foreign-owned salmon farming companies choking the lifeblood out of the Scottish coast.”  

“Don’t be fooled by the oily handshakes of corporate Fish Farming PR,” urged the Outer Hebrides Against Fish Farms in November 2012.  “Get the facts from independent sources…but remember a lot of the facts that shame this industry are hidden behind government supported nets of secrecy.”

Author: Tracy McVeigh The Observer / A Thousand Huts

Come and join Scotland’s growing hutting movement on November 18th in Edinburgh to find out how you can make this happen. Hear from campaigners, hutters, woodworkers, and architects. Meet other self-builders, see designs, perhaps even find land to rent or buy, and talk to dreamers like you who just want to get into the great outdoors and put their feet up – in their own But n’ Ben.

BOOK YOUR PLACE HERE! 

Dylan Thomas had one. So did Roald Dahl, Arthur Miller and Norman MacCaig. Virginia Woolf wrote her last words in one and Gabriel Oak had one in Hardy’s Far From the Madding Crowd.

Fishermen and shepherds have long recognised their value and between the wars they were promoted as boltholes, a means for the working classes to escape toxic cities for the good of their health. In Scotland, the hut, whether a mountain bothy or forest retreat, has long been part of both the scenery and the cultural landscape, immortalised in the “but an’ ben” of the Broons cartoon strip – a tiny two-room, one-storey holiday cottage.

But a toughening up of land access rights and a change in attitudes by landowners led to the tradition of the rustic getaway almost disappearing, leaving just sheds for those with gardens, and holiday lets for those who could afford them.

Now a ‘hutting’ revival is predicted after the Scottish government signalled that later this month it will change legislation to exempt huts from building regulations, allowing people to put up these most simple of second homes in the countryside wherever they can rent or buy a plot of suitable land, subject to planning permission.

It is the end of a long campaign by enthusiasts and conservationists, who have been battling for years to re-establish the hutting tradition in Scotland. Karen Grant, from environmental charity Reforesting Scotland, has been working to promote the group’s Campaign for a Thousand Huts which has attracted interest from people all over Scotland and beyond. The group is working on good practice guidelines for the burgeoning trend. New groups of enthusiasts are springing up and architects specialising in small eco-buildings are reporting high levels of interest.

“Some people will just want to quietly build their own hut using whatever they can reclaim in wood and materials,” said Grant, “while others will want to have something designed and built. I know one chap who built his for £200 while others will come in at £15,000 – it’s a sliding scale in terms of cost. And so is the kind of hutting people want – part of a community, maybe, or else out on their own. The important thing is that it’s a simple human dream, to have a place of tranquillity, close to nature, and it’s absurd that it has been outlawed.

“We’ve got a great level of interest from people who have just been waiting for this move so they can go ahead and establish their hut. Building regulations are likely to be relaxed for huts designed for recreational use that are of 30 sq metres or less, and using low-impact materials, generally off-grid.

“If you’re going to want a flushing toilet you’ll still be looking to apply for the right permissions, but we’re hoping most people will be thinking of compost toilets or similar low impact ideas, in keeping with the ethos of hutting.

“We will have to be careful and make sure this freedom isn’t abused: but our primary goal is improving people’s relationship with the forest and the environment while improving mental health and wellbeing.”

Already a pilot project with the Forestry Commission has started in Fife, on Scotland’s east coast, while a community of hutters in Carbeth, which has been established since 1918, has successfully bought the land it occupies to be held in community ownership.

Richard Lochhead, the Scottish National party MSP for Moray, was the cabinet secretary for rural affairs, food and environment until last year and played a key role in pressing the Scottish government to act on easing regulations after meeting with diehard hutters and seeing the impact on their lives.

“A renewed hutting culture in Scotland would be hugely beneficial because it would encourage people, particularly in our towns and cities, to connect with the countryside and our spectacular natural environment. This can only help the nation’s health and wellbeing,” he said.

“There are clearly different models of hutting and we can learn from other parts of the world, such as Scandinavia, where having access to a hut or smaller countryside property is very common. In Scotland, there is potential for both private developers and community groups to play a role in establishing hutting communities, which would also help ensure their sensible use.”

And for those south of the border with a lust for a basic rustic retreat, there is no obligation to live in the country of your hut – “although we would hope their hut would be something people would use regularly, to build a deeper understanding of place, and so you’d maybe not want to live too far away,” said Grant. “It’s a lovely thing that many people dream of: we’ll just have to hope enough sympathetic landowners think so too.”

Chris Cunningham runs a guitar shop in Edinburgh during the week. At the weekend he is a hutter. He bought his getaway in a small off-grid colony of 23 huts on farmland near Peebles in 2011 when it was a ramshackle shell.

“It was a cold January day when my girlfriend and I went to look at it, it was falling to bits and had birds living in it. She turned to me as we were leaving and said, ‘you’d have to be mental to buy that’, but I was already sold. It’s given me something I never thought I’d have, I have a greenhouse and a little allotment there, and you have to constantly think outside the box about how to manage things off-grid. I’ve just devised a solar-powered watering system for the greenhouse.

“There is an ideology, the hutter growing veg and reading by candlelight, but also some who do use their huts as a bolthole for drinking and leaving rubbish about so I do worry there is a risk of how manageable sites will be if hutting is opened up to the masses. We’ll have to see how it pans out”