Author: Kaiya Marjoribanks, Stirling Observer Friday

THE POWER of film is being used at a Fintry event to spark debate about the future of low carbon energy.  The Fintry Renewable Show, FRESH 2012, is playing host on March 9 to Moving Conversations.

Entitled, “Power to the People – the citizen and energy independence”, it brings together ice cream and wind power magnate, Maitland Mackie, localism activist and chair of the Forestry Commission Pam Warhurst, land ownership campaigner Andy Wightman and renewable energy entrepreneur Max Carcas. Each will come armed with an entertaining clip from the Scottish Screen Archive with which they will try to convince the audience of the strength of their arguments.

FRESH 2012 organiser Kelly McIntyre said: “While renewable energy is a serious subject, the village of Fintry wishes to celebrate the success and potential of low carbon technologies, hence FRESH, our third renewable energy show, will offer a wide array of talks, exhibitions, workshops, food, crafts and fun.

“Moving Conversations is the centrepiece of our events schedule and with the line-up of experts, allied to some intriguing film clips, we can guarantee a fantastic wide-ranging debate on Scotland’s energy future. Don’t fight the power, like the power!”

The Moving Conversations debate is set to explore the future of energy generation and use in Scotland. Its particular focus will be on the potential for individuals and households to generate more of their own energy and control that which they use.

A key question will be if we can look forward to energy independence for the citizen, regardless of the political backdrop. To fuel the debate, each panellist will show a clip that they have chosen from the Scottish Screen Archive, the national audiovisual collection, managed by the National Libraries of Scotland.

Organised by the Fintry Development Trust, FRESH 2012 takes place over March 9-10 in and around the village of Fintry. The event runs from 10am to 4pm both days.

As well as talks, the festival includes demonstrations of micro-renewable power technologies, visits to domestic installations, a local food and crafts market, kids’ activities, visits to the woodland classroom, trips around the local Earlsburn wind farm, and much more. For more information visit www.fintrydt.org.uk

Moving Conversations is on from 2.30-4pm on March 9 in Menzies Hall, Main Street, Fintry. The event is free to attend.

Watch the recently released short documentary on Fintry and FDT at: http://windofchangefilm.wordpress.com/

Author: Alan Richardson, The Courier

The red carpet was rolled out in Aberfeldy for the Friends of Birks Cinema after it completed a remarkable feat of fundraising. The Birks Cinema building in Aberfeldy is set for a transformation. A Big Lottery Award of almost £540,000 saw the credits roll on a remarkable effort which has seen more than £2m raised by the community group since August.

The blockbusting total means match funding from the Scottish Government’s Rural Development Programme can now be secured and Aberfeldy will have a cinema at its heart again.

The campaign to restore the Birks as a state-of-the-art cinema has attracted widespread backing, with Aberfeldy-born film star Alan Cumming and Oscar-winner Emma Thompson lending support.

The £539,950 from the Big Lottery Fund also provides revenue support for five years to give the project a jumpstart.

Chairwoman Charlotte Flower said: ”I can’t express just how excited we are to have gained such an award and recognition from the Big Lottery Fund. Discussions are ongoing with the Scottish Rural Development Programme on the project overall and it will take a few weeks to complete due diligence on the whole package — but now that we are able to confirm the Big Lottery Fund award we are very confident.”

Ms Flower thanked all those who had helped.

She said: ”The big grants and major funds from the SRDP, the Scottish Hydro Griffin Windfarm Community Fund and Creative Scotland have been crucially important, but the campaign has been about more than just large amounts of money.

”Some of the most amazing efforts have come from individuals locally. From the child who popped in to an open doors day to donate their pocket money the other week, to the local distillery which has sponsored a row of seats; and local people spending £4,000 in one evening at our postcard auction or attending the packed-out Big B concert — every single act of kindness, support and generosity is equally important and very much appreciated.”

Big Lottery Fund Scotland chairwoman Maureen McGinn said: ”The Big Lottery Fund is delighted to be able to support this exciting local project, which has enormous potential to build on the wave of local enthusiasm and create a real community-owned asset in the heart of Aberfeldy.”

The cinema opened in 1939 but fell into neglect, and the Friends bought it in 2005. When complete, the building could show the latest films, including in 3D and play live broadcast links, with live performances and a cafe bar.

For more information on the Birks of Aberfeldy cinema projects click here.

John Swinney recently announced which  organisations were successful in their applications for investment from the Enterprise Growth Fund. Over 600 organisations applied to the fund but only 60 were successful. They shared a pot of £6m worth of investment to either build on existing work or to develop new ventures.

To see the full list of successful applicants click here.

To see where they are click here.

Community Land Scotland has warmly welcomed the announcement that £6 million is to be available for the next generation of community land buy-outs.

Speaking after the announcement by Environment and Climate Change Minister, Stewart Stevenson MSP, David Cameron, Chairman of Community Land Scotland, the representative body for Scotland’s community land owners, said,

“This is first rate news. With this new land fund comes new opportunity for more communities to share in the benefits of taking control of the land on which they live and work. Already a new confidence has been growing within the communities which have taken control, new economic opportunities are being created, once dying communities are reviving and growing. It is simply great that more communities will now be able to get support to take the opportunity of owning their own land and future.”

David Cameron was speaking following the announcement made at the 5th anniversary celebrations of the last major buyout at Galson, on the island of Lewis.

Community Land Scotland, established only a year ago, has been campaigning for a new land fund and wider policy changes to promote more community ownership. David Cameron said,

“A year ago there was a sense that the momentum had gone out of the movement toward more communities taking over their land, following rapid progress in the early part of the new century. We are pleased the Scottish Government has taken action to ensure that momentum can be regained and I look forward to the new fund being heavily subscribed and used in the years to come, and I hope that, as in the first Land Fund, if demand is sufficient, the fund will be increased to meet that demand.”

Community Land Scotland particularly welcomed the involvement of Highlands and Islands Enterprise in the arrangements to administer the new fund, alongside the Big Lottery. David Cameron said,

“HIE have been the key agency in making things happen in the purchase of land in the past. They understand how communities work and the kind of support they need to progress and we are delighted they are again to have a central role, this can only be for the good and increase the prospects of communities making real progress.

”What we now need is active promotion of the fund to communities who can aspire to a better future, through their ownership and active management of the land they occupy, bringing new investment and the promoting new opportunities.”

The Land Fund announcement comes only hours after community land owners in Scotland were announced as one of “Britain’s New Radicals” in a national scheme recognising, people and organisations leading innovative solutions to established economic and social problems.

Welcoming the recognition by NESTA (National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) and the Observer newspaper, David Cameron, Chairman of Community Land Scotland said,

“We are delighted to receive this recognition and for community land owners to take their place among others who are innovating and leading the way to find new ways to tackle long standing problems.

“Communities in Scotland now control some 500,000 acres of land and are turning round the fortunes of those communities, bringing hope of a better future where once there was despair and decline. New investment is being won for those communities, new opportunities created, and the means to a better future secured.

“What we do is a break from the past, it is radical, and it involves not just inspired individuals, but inspired communities. This recognition is for all those involved in the community land owning sector.”

Professor Jim Hunter, who nominated the community land sector for the Britain’s New Radicals award, said: ‘In the last 20 years, people in the Highlands and Islands have taken into community ownership an area equivalent to that of an English county like Nottinghamshire or West Yorkshire.  That’s remarkable enough. What’s still more remarkable is the way those same people have done things – like reversing population loss and growing long shrinking economies – once thought impossible. This award, I hope, will make these achievements better known – and maybe help persuade other communities in Scotland and beyond to take charge of their destinies in this way.’

Author: Sunday Herald

Detective Chief Superintendent John Carnochan, co-director of the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit, says attempts to tackle society’s problems have become “over-professionalised” in recent years.

He said it was important to provide support to parents and focus on improving children’s lives in the first few years, but cautioned that sending in more workers was not the answer.

“The truth of the matter is we have got enough professionals doing this,” he said. “I would much rather start to see communities moving towards doing things for themselves, so we don’t have community development workers or this or that support worker.”

Carnochan said residents in communities did not often have enough influence in decision which affect their lives, such as the opening times of community centres or schools.

“They might say we would like the school open at 6am in the morning so we can run a breakfast club,” he said.

“Or they might say we would like the school open at night, so our kids can go and play in the playground in there, and it’s safe and we have got a couple of dads who will supervise that. 

“They don’t need any money. They just need you to open the gate for them. It is about people in communities doing things, as opposed to coming home at night, closing their front doors and that’s it.”

He said more support had to be given to “great” voluntary groups which have started in many areas, particularly in deprived communities.

But Carnochan added: “I don’t mean we turn them into professional organisations with evaluations and outcome plans and project initiation documents and business managers – we don’t need that. 

“If there are 10 or 12 young guys who want to play football and a couple of dads who want to help them do that, great, what do they need? Do they need £50 to buy football strips or orange juice every night? Do we need to let them into the school for nothing to do it? We don’t need the big things.”

Carnochan also argues there has been too much emphasis on “value for money” when evaluating the work which has been carried out by professionals such as health visitors and social workers.

“What we seem to have done over the past 20 to 30 years is we have tried to apply business models to everything,” he said. “So what has happened is the only way we value things is about how much they cost. 

“It is not just about that – you can’t say how long a health visitor will need to work with somebody before they establish a relationship, or how long a social worker will need to work with a family to get an established relationship and get results.

“With some it might be an hour, with others it might be two months, and it is that idea we need to understand.

“It is not to say we don’t have to account for every penny we spend –we absolutely must – but we need to be smarter about how we measure value.”

Carnochan made his comments ahead of a major conference on parenting hosted by NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde last week. The three-day event brought together specialists from around the world to discuss the effects of positive parenting and the growing focus on the importance of the early years of a child’s life. 

Peter Taylor, organiser of network body Community Development Alliance Scotland, said listening to communities was already a core aspect of such work and there was increasing emphasis on the building of strong communities to help deal with problems such as violence.

“Clearly there are things which we would like people across a whole range of services and voluntary organisations to get better at, such as listening to people, helping them to develop, and perhaps that has been lost sight of in some services,” he added.

“But I don’t think the actual core of community workers that do exist have ever lost sight of those approaches.”

Author: Third Force News

CHARITIES have this week called for banking giant Lloyds to drop a “shameful” legal bid aimed at avoiding paying over £5m to Scottish voluntary organisations.

Lloyds Banking Group this week announced it will appeal a Scottish Court of Session decision to award the Lloyds TSB Foundation for Scotland £5.25m the granting-giving body claims the bank owes it for 2009 and 2010.

However, Scottish charities this week said that the funds are vital to help boost charities in the current economy and urged the bank, which is 40 per cent owned by the taxpayer, to drop its appeal.

They highlighted that the sum is small in banking terms – Lloyds Banking Group chief executive Antonia Horta-Osorio waived his claim to a personal bonus of upto £5.4m in January – but very significant to community and voluntary groups in Scotland.

Anne Houston, chief executive of major children’s charity Children 1st, said: “The Lloyds TSB Foundation for Scotland has been a friend and supporter of Children 1st, along with other charities, for many years and its involvement is invaluable.

“It saddens and disappoints us that Lloyds TSB Foundation for Scotland’s vital work is threatened by the recent action of, and pressures being placed on it by, Lloyds Banking Group.”

The bank is legally bound to pay a proportion of its pre-tax profits to the Lloyds TSB Foundation.

However, following a major fall-out between the two in 2009, they have been arguing over the definition of pre-tax profits.

The bank argued it had no pre-tax profits in 2009, so paid the foundation just £38,920.

The foundation disputed this, arguing that the assets from the take-over the Halifax Bank of Scotland should be considered and so sued the bank for £3.5m.

In September 2011, Judge Lord Glennie ruled in favour of the bank. However, in December an appeal in front of three of Scotland’s most senior judges at the Edinburgh Court of Session ruled in favour of the foundation.

Earlier this week, the bank announced it is launching a fresh appeal, which will be heard at the UK’s Supreme Court in London.

The Lighthouse Foundation, a small Ayrshire-based organisation working with families affected by drug and alcohol problems, joined calls for it to reconsider.

Its project manager Kathleen Bryson said: “Lloyds Banking Group’s decision to appeal the decision of The Scottish Court of Session will have a devastating effect on many charities who like the Lighthouse Foundation depend on the foundation’s generosity.

“£5 million is not a large amount in banking terms but it is a lot of money when you consider the impact that this decision will have on disadvantaged families and children who reside in Scotland.”

The Lloyds TSB Foundation for Scotland’s chief executive Mary Craig this week asked why the bank was being allowed to waste time and money on legal action against a charity.

“Questions must now be asked as to why a major institution of its size, owned in part by the taxpayer, feels the need to pursue a charitable organisation in this way.”

She added: “Worse still, this shameful turn of events means that monies due to us will be held back for a third year until this further appeal is heard and decided – and that is money we should be awarding to Scotland’s hard-pressed charities, now and in the future, as they are crying out for support at this difficult time.”

A spokeswoman for Lloyds Banking Group said: “We can confirm that we have decided to appeal the Inner House decision and have filed our Notice of Appeal with the Supreme Court in London.

“Lloyds Banking Group is proud of its track record as one of the largest corporate funders in the UK, including Scotland.”

Author: Scotland on Sunday

For a copy of the new report by Respublica click here.

Community-run renewable energy projects should be promoted by ministers to break the grip that the Big Six power firms have over consumers, a leading think-tank director has said.

Philip Blond, the director of Respublica and the man behind David Cameron’s Big Society, has cited examples of community energy projects in Scotland as a potential blueprint for ending the “closed shop” in the energy market.

His intervention comes as the Big Six energy firms, which include Scottish Power and British Gas, are expected to announce bumper profits of £15 billion in the coming weeks. Profits for 2011 are understood to be £2bn higher than the previous year due, in part, to a severe winter and rising energy prices.

The Big Six energy companies currently control 99 per cent of the energy market, and Blond believes that this needs to be challenged. In a new paper by his think-tank, Re-energising Our Communities: Transforming the energy market through local energy production, Blond argues that community enterprises are the best way to tackle the problem by utilising renewable energy sources.

He has highlighted the Isle of Eigg Heritage Trust in the Hebrides, where islanders have managed to produce all their own energy needs through a series of developments since 2008, including wind farms, solar panelling on buildings and building a hydro dam.

The project is now producing profits as well as picking up a £300,000 renewable energy award in 2010 in a competition run by the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts.

The report also mentioned the Fintry Renewable Energy Enterprise near Stirling, involving 15 wind turbines. The villagers will receive £50,000 profit until their loan on the development is repaid and then could be bringing in £400,000 a year for community projects and developments. The report says the UK Government must “broker in the social, environmental and economic benefits of community energy” by putting local communities at the heart of the development of projects and ensuring they enjoy more of the benefits from sustainable energy production.

The emphasis on community projects fits the Big Society blueprint at the heart of the Conservative manifesto in 2010, which the coalition government has struggled to pursue since against a background of cuts. 

Local Community Transport Charity Buchan Dial-a-Community Bus (DACB) was proud to host ‘An Audience with Alex Salmond MSP’ on Monday, January 23. 

The charity decided on the title of ‘An Audience with Alex Salmond MSP’ for their New Bus fundraising event as it gave the scope to invite a variety of people from the community to engage directly with their local MSP and Scotland’s First Minister.

Chairman, Gordon Reid, commented: “We felt that this was a great opportunity to have the First Minister in Maud, speaking to our local community as well as to other voluntary groups, so we realised that we should do our best to ensure that we made it as open as possible.” 

Mr Reid explained that the evening also gave DACB the chance to update people on the developments within Community Transport both nationally and locally, as well as with the charity’s associated Social Enterprise:

“DACB has come so far over the last few years and we’ve no plans to stop yet; there is still a lot to do to enable everyone in our community to live and travel as independently as we would all expect to. 

“It seemed to be sensible to take the chance to update people who perhaps don’t hear about the range of work we do on an everyday basis. 

“And at the same time highlight the amazing work that Community Transport does in Scotland as a whole”. 

John MacDonald of the Community Transport Association asked Mr Salmond whether the Government could consider extending the Scotland-wide bus concessionary fare scheme to the types of services offered by Buchan Dial a Community Bus . Though many users have the concession they cannot use it on most community transport services. Mr Salmond said that there was a good case for looking again at the scheme and that this would be considered by the Government.

Mr Salmond added: “I was delighted to attend this event to help highlight the valuable service Dial-a-Community Bus provides to North East communities. 

“Dial-a-Community Bus offers Buchan residents and groups a variety of support services and is key in the provision of community transport across Aberdeenshire. 

“I’d like to thank the staff and the volunteers who are the real driving force behind the charity, for their continued hard work and commitment.”

Housing associations are enlisting credit unions to stave off an anticipated wave of rent arrears and evictions when the UK Government’s universal credit replaces housing benefit in 2013

Two Ayrshire housing associations have approached local credit unions to seek their services for tenants, and the issue has been raised at a national meeting of housing association chief executives, according to Carol McHarg of 1st Alliance (Ayrshire) Credit Union.

The news comes as the Scottish Government has expressed an interest in capping the rate of interest that high-cost payday lenders such as Wonga.com can charge borrowers. Enterprise Minister Fergus Ewing told a parliamentary debate on payday lenders: “If there is a cap for credit unions, why is there no cap for other lenders?” Ewing also attended a meeting of the Cross-Party Group on Credit Unions on 18 January to discuss a potential levy on payday lenders to fund the promotion of credit unions.

Speaking to Holyrood, McHarg said: “It’s really hard for people on benefits to budget sometimes, and all of a sudden having this extra money coming in creates harder choices – do you buy your kid a pair of shoes or do you pay the rent that week?” Reforms to benefits included in the Welfare Bill currently making its way through Westminster will lead to a universal credit paid directly to social housing tenants, rather than to housing associations and private landlords, as housing benefit is now.

A COSLA briefing on the implications of the Coalition Government’s welfare reforms had previously warned of “an increase of rent arrears and evictions, sending households spiralling into debt and facing homelessness”. The Scottish Federation of Housing Associations warned its members to “take action in the interest of your tenants” ahead of the introduction of the reforms.

Andy Young, policy and strategy manager at the SFHA said: “Housing associations and co-operatives in Scotland promote a range of financial-inclusion initiatives to help tenants on low incomes to manage their finances. These will become more important as tenants’ incomes are threatened by unemployment, wage freezes and welfare reforms.

“SFHA promotes a range of tenancy sustainment initiatives to our members. Our 2010 publication Preventing and Alleviating Homelessness Guidance highlights financial inclusion issues and the existence and scope of credit unions “However, the welfare reforms currently being proposed by the Westminster Coalition Government will limit the Housing Benefit of some of the most vulnerable tenants and make life more difficult for them financially, and in paying their rent.

“That is why we are urging the UK Government to consider a number of changes to the reforms, including continuing to give tenants the right to choose to have their rent paid directly to their landlord to avoid getting into arrears.”

New challenge for civic Scotland

The Future of Scotland coalition has launched its website www.futureofscotland.org.  We are an alliance of civic society organisations in Scotland. Civic society is independent of government and works with citizens to promote the interests and views of communities.  Our group includes organisations from the third sector, unions and churches. 

Partners

Action of Churches Together in Scotland

The Church of Scotland

Centre for Scottish Public Policy

Faith in Community Scotland

Institute of Directors Scotland

NUS Scotland

Reform Scotland

Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations

STUC

Scottish Youth Parliament

The new website will create a space to open up the debate on the constitutional future of the country to people across Scotland. The site launch is just the beginning of the Future of Scotland’s online presence, with facebook and twitter accounts set to follow soon.

Alison Elliot, Convener, SCVO, said: “The website will help people keep up to date with the latest activity around the referendum debate. It will include exclusive Future of Scotland comment and opinion, and redirect visitors to other interesting articles and blog posts.  We encourage people to visit the site and register to get involved in the debate. A forum for visitors to post their own content will be available soon along with vox pop style footage of people from across Scotland sharing their views on the kind of Scotland they want to see.”

“People can also get involved by signing up online to attend our conference in Glasgow on 1 March. Both the conference and this new site will help us to build momentum for the debate, grow our coalition and bring this discussion about Scotland’s future to people in every part of the country.”