DTA News briefing – 13 December 2010

On 13 December 2010, the Government introduced the Decentralisation and Localism Bill to parliament. The new legislation outlines a set of new powers and measures designed to shift power from central government and into the hands of individuals, communities and local councils.

In particular, the new Bill plans to ‘lift the burden of bureaucracy, empower communities to do things their way, increase local control of public finance, diversify the supply of public services, open up government to public scrutiny, and strengthen accountability to local people’.

Of particular relevance to the community sector, the Bill is set to enact:

A Community Right to Buy

This will require local authorities to maintain a list of public or private assets of “community value”. There will be a mechanism for community groups to put forward land or buildings for consideration. When listed assets come up for disposal (either the freehold or a long leasehold), there will be a moratorium preventing immediate sale, allowing communities time to develop a bid and raise the capital to buy the asset. The local authority will be able to determine how long the moratorium will be. At the end of the moratorium the listed asset would come onto the open market (and therefore community organisations may need to compete against private bidders).

Over the last few years DTA has been arguing for a community right to buy to be introduced in England, following the experience of Scotland. The Scottish mechanism goes further by allowing community organisations a right of first refusal during the moratorium period. However it is also excessively cumbersome, so much so that in Scotland only ten Community Right to Buy applications have succeeded in six years. This new right for England does not swing the balance in favour of community groups as strongly as in Scotland, but because it should be much simpler for community groups to use, it might have a much bigger impact. A key consideration is the length of the moratorium period: DTA has argued it should be at least six months, and we will lobby to have that stipulated in the legislation or regulation.

Overall, the Community Right to Buy is an important symbolic step forward, and it could become an important mechanism for development trusts and other community groups to acquire their own assets whilst increasing their independence and capacity to deliver local services. However as will all forms of community asset development this will not be free from risks and many community organisations will need support to do this successfully. The Asset Transfer Unit (www.atu.org.uk) in the last 18 months alone has provided hands on support to over 100 asset transfer projects and provided guidance and advice to hundreds more; we would hope both central and local government can find ways to ensure such support mechanisms continue to be made available wherever asset transfers are being considered.

A Community Right to Build

This measure will give local communities the power to take forward development in their area without the need to apply for planning permission, subject to meeting certain safeguards and securing 50 per cent support of the community through a referendum. Originally the requirement was 90% support, so this is a considerable reduction, following lobbying by DTA and others.

A Community Right to Challenge

A right for voluntary and community groups, social enterprises, parish councils and local authority employees delivering a service, to challenge a local authority, by expressing an interest in running any service for which they are responsible. A local authority must consider and respond to this challenge. The challenge may trigger a procurement exercise for that service, which the challenging organisation could then bid in, alongside others. In principle, this is very welcome, and is broadly what the DTA and others have suggested, as it creates an important opportunity for community organisations to make the case to take over the running of a service themselves. But there is no guarantee of success, and they may still have to compete in a tendering process, in some cases against private sector competition.

Community Infrastructure Levy

The Community Infrastructure Levy is a tax on commercial developers (charities are exempt from the tax). This Bill will require local authorities to allocate a proportion of Community Infrastructure Levy revenues back to the neighbourhood from which it was raised. This might become an important new source of local finance for local community projects.

Neighbourhood Planning

The Bill will introduce a new right for communities to ”shape their local areas”. Neighbourhood plans will enable communities to permit development without the need for planning applications. Also the Bill will introduce a new requirement for prospective developers to consult local communities before submitting planning applications for very large developments.

Local Referendums

This measure will give local residents, councillors and councils the power to instigate a local referendum on any local issue. Although these referendums will be non-binding, local authorities and other public authorities will be required to take the outcomes into account in decision making.

For more details read Decentralisation and the Localism Bill: an essential guide http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/localgovernment/pdf/1793908.pdf

The full details of the Bill are available on: http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2010-11/localism/documents.html

Dr. Kim McKee spoke at the EVH conference at St. Andrews in November 2010

Dr McKee speech can be viewed here

Her concluding remarks were…

Community housing has been a real positive strength and unique feature of the RSL sector in Scotland. It is premised on respecting the knowledge of local residents; is underpinned by the values of citizen empowerment and direct democracy; and plays a key role in delivering wider political agendas around community cohesion and social inclusion.

We need to focus on the positive elements the sector can deliver for local communities, not place its future under threat. Over the last 35 years CCHAs have been key players in delivering wider action and community regeneration agendas within Scotland’s most deprived communities, in addition to being excellent and responsive social landlords, providing quality, affordable housing for rent.

We should be celebrating the movement’s contribution to housing and social policy agendas in Scotland, not seeing it as ‘easy prey’ in an era of financial austerity and public sector cuts.

BIG SOCIETY AND PUBLIC SERVICES –  Complementarity or erosion?

The two main principles put forward together in big society policy – strengthening the independence of communities, and encouraging them to take over public services – are in contradiction with each other, claims a new study from think-tank PACES Empowerment (www.pacesempowerment.co.uk then click the ‘Big Society and Public Services’ download).

Big Society and Public Services, by Gabriel Chanan and Colin Miller, says that taking over public services makes voluntary organisations more, not less dependent on the state, through contracts with public authorities. The most independent and economical form of community action is the work of community groups which carry out their own activities.

Supporting community groups is economical because they take pressure off public services by spreading their own forms of wellbeing, informal skills, learning, mutual aid and personal responsibility, and require only a fraction of their value through state support.

The national survey of third sector organisations shows that these groups are the great majority of the third sector, but receive only a small proportion of the support they need. (The survey, by far the largest of the sector ever done in England, was commissioned by the Office for Civil Society. See www.nstso.com or www.nscsesurvey.com )
 
Independent of the state, and consisting mainly of members and volunteers, community groups can also express the views of communities and hold public services to account, no matter which sector the services are delivered by. Social enterprises under contract to the state consist of paid staff and cannot perform this role without conflict of interest.

The answer, says PACES, is to make empowering communities the leading big society policy with its own criteria and investment. The main methods would be reformed community development, better amenities for groups and more widely available grants.

Commissioning voluntary organisations and social enterprises to carry out public services should be a supplementary policy, including giving the best chance to genuinely local grass-roots groups which can handle the dual roles separately.

A comment by Les Huckfield on the recent consultation paper from Scottish Government – Securing the benefits from Scotland’s next energy revolution

The Government’s Consultation Paper is somewhat confusing on local community involvement, especially in its choice of examples of the Shetlands Charitable Trust, South Lanarkshire Renewable Energy Fund and East Renfrewshire Whitelee Wind Farm Fund. These are administered through local councils. The document appears to be confused about the difference between local community benefit and local government benefit.

Real Community Benefit
Much of the Consultation Paper looks supportable. However some of examples used are not based on real community involvement. Though there is little disagreement that Scotland should receive a fair share of development gain and taxation from renewable energy investments, the paper offers few real ways in which local communities will benefit and through which they may participate and share.
The following examples from the document show a lack of real community involvement.

SHETLAND ISLANDS COUNCIL AND SHETLAND CHARITABLE TRUST

To illustrate its preferred way forward, the Consultation Document provides unconditional support to the way Shetland Islands have handled community benefit. (Scottish Government 2010)
“29……..Shetland Islands Council showed foresight in securing via, primarily, the Zetland County Council Act 1974, a lasting revenue stream for the benefit of the islands from the development of the Sullom Voe terminal. The result of this Act and subse-quent contractual negotiations is that Shetland today has a lasting legacy of around £216m. This figure is over and above the funds contained in the Shetland Reserve Fund, administered by Shetland Islands Council.
“30. The Shetland Charitable Trust, established in 1974 to manage the income stream accrued to Shetland, today provides funding to a number of charitable organisations and projects where there is a clear benefit to the Shetland community. Over the years, the Trust has made a contribution to creating a modern, positive and healthy community in Shetland. Shetland Charitable Trust’s financial strength has also given it the power to establish joint venture projects to move into the renewable en-ergy generation market.”
Shetland was quick to foresee the possibilities from North Sea oil and gas. 20 years before devolution, the 1974 Zetland County Council Act gave the Shetlands Islands Council full control over oil related developments, enabling a massive oil fund in the following years. Shetland is now one of the wealthiest parts of the UK. Sullom Voe’s oil terminal became the largest in Europe, handling up to 1.4m. Though now past its peak, the terminal is expected to last until at least 2020.
But the Shetland Islands Charitable Trust, set up to administer community benefit, is dominated by Councillors. Most Councillors and members of the Planning Panel are members of the Trust.

The Office for the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) has expressed concern about the close relationship between the Shetland Charitable Trust and Shetland Island Council, which have hired Roy Martin QC to: (Shetland Islands Council and Shetlands Charitable Trust 2010 )

– “determine if the constitution of the Charitable Trust requires to be changed in light of current OSCR opinion and Trust regulations, and
– make recommendations as are necessary for the future governance of the Trust
As a separate issue, the Council is also to ask Mr Martin to provide his legal opinion on the issue of grouping the Charitable Trust and Council financial accounts.”

VIKING ENERGY WIND FARM APPLICATION
Viking Energy has been set up as a 50/50 Joint Project between Viking Energy (a subsidiary of Shetland Charitable Trust) and SSE Viking Energy Ltd (subsidiary of Scottish and Southern Energy) to develop a huge windfarm. The relationship of the Charitable Trust, Council and Planning Panel means that Councillors may have difficulty in commenting appropriately on their own planning application.
The revised Viking Energy Windfarm Planning application submitted on Wednesday 29 September 2010 is for 127 turbines with up to 540mw capacity, a development area of 12,800 hectares and projected cost at £800m. Reponses to the 2009 planning application showed 2026 opposing the wind farm and 518 in support.
The Viking Energy windfarm means that nearly 6000 birds will be killed. The Carbon Payback period is 48.5 years. In opposition, the 750 members of Sustainable Shetland, formed in February 2008, have a clear position: (Sustainable Shetland 2010 )
“We believe that the Viking Energy proposals are everything we do not need in Shetland: they are financially risky and potentially damaging to the Shetland en-vironment.
We want to see sustainable renewable energy projects in Shetland which are fit for scale and fit for purpose, and provide real community benefit.
We are not an “anti-wind power” campaign. However we are strongly opposed to the Viking wind farm proposal. Other projects will be considered on their own merits”.
Despite these significant local problems, including difficulties with OSCR and possible conflicts of in-terest for Councillors involved, the Consultation Document believes that Shetland offers the way forward: (Scottish Government 2010 -d)
“31. The example of the Zetland County Council Act 1974 provides a role-model for the rest of Scotland to follow. It offers a model of local people benefiting from the abundant natural resources which surround them; and a model of how a lasting legacy can be created for the benefit of all”

Community Benefit from Offshore Developments (Scottish Government 2010)
“45. The benefits which might be enjoyed in the future by local communities from
offshore projects are similar to those currently being enjoyed by onshore com-munities with many benefiting from increased employment opportunities, in par-ticular in the initial construction stages.
“46. However, local communities in proximity to an offshore development are likely to encounter the same problems as communities hosting onshore developments when it comes to maximising the levels of community benefit available to them. In addition, they encounter the problem of working out how to define the term “local community” with respect to a project which may be many miles from the coastline. However, it’s clear that a significant development off the coast of, for example, Tiree or Islay ought to bring some benefits to those islands. After all, a local community is likely to be more reluctant to be in close proximity to a development if it cannot see tangible benefits coming back in return. This will be all the more the case if it feels that a development will have a negative impact on existing successful industries.
It is difficult to disagree with or contradict these general principles. But there are significant differences between Fintry as an innovatory Development Trust, Drumderg with a Community Fund administered by Scottish Community Foundation, and Shetland, as described above.

Community involvement and empowerment are critical. For those on Tiree or Islay, these develop-ments will change their way of life forever, whether or not they see community benefits. Scottish Power Renewables Argyll Array Scoping Document is rightly cautious: (Scottish Power Renewables 2010 )
“The Argyll Renewables Communities (ARC) Consortium – a partnership between Tiree Community Development Trust, the Islay Energy Trust and the Kintyre Energy Trust – is in the process of commissioning work into the potential socioeconomic impacts of the proposed offshore wind farms in their area. Scottish Power Renewables will engage closely with ARC on this work.
In addition, Scottish Power Renewables anticipates close working with Argyll and Bute Council on these aspects of the project, building on the strength of the Con-cordat between the two organisations”.
But this Argyll and Bute Concordat appears fragile as a basis for ensuring real community benefit. Its real test will be how this works in practice (Argyll and Bute Council and Scottish Power UK plc 2007 ):
“The exploration of the potential for an Argyll and Bute-wide fund which will draw resources from large-scale wind farm and other renewable energy devel-opments in order to ensure that the entire community of Argyll and Bute benefits from renewable energy”
The Consultation Document’s example of Whitelee Windfarm (Scottish Government 2010), with up to £500,000 paid annually by the developers, is one where administration of community benefit is effectively under local council control in East Ayrshire, East Renfrewshire (the Whitelee Wind Farm Fund) and South Lanarkshire (Renewable Energy Fund). As with the Shetland Charitable Trust, com-munity benefit is effectively at the behest of the local council.
As an antidote to these top down examples, there are Community Trust precedents and examples in the “Guide for Community Groups in Investing for Community Benefit” (The Pool in Scotland et al. 2010 ). Apart from providing detailed descriptions of organisations formed by local communities, this Guide promotes foundation principles for Community Trusts. There are also many other examples in research by the Scottish Community Foundation. (Ruck et al. 2009 )

PROPOSED REGISTER OF COMMUNITY BENEFIT
The Document’s proposal for a Register of Community Benefit looks worthwhile. (Scottish Government 2010)
85. The Scottish Government sees merit in the creation of an open and transparent, publicly accessible register where there would be the publication of the community benefit levels that renewable energy developers offer, have offered or will offer, and other opportunities for communities to get involved in their developments. This would promote best practice commercially among developers of all renewables technologies and provide significant leverage to help communities negotiate on an equal footing.
However, previous research by Scottish Community Foundation and others has already provided sig-nificant background information. (Ruck etal. 2009 ; The Pool in Scotland etal. 2010 ). There is also the intriguing precedent of research for Shetland Charitable Trust by University of Strathclyde (McGregor etal. 2010 )
“The deployment of the increased funds available for community purposes proves crucial to the scale of the estimated impacts. Not surprisingly, improvements in Community Benefit have a positive effect on the host region. However, these benefits are very modest relative to those that could be secured from any shared-ownership scheme. Both types of benefit may prove useful in persuading local communities to host renewable energy projects even given some deterioration in their local environment”.
Though this research shows benefits in the joint venture approach adopted by Shetland Charitable Trust and Scottish and Southern Energy, it reveals little about genuine local community involvement.

The Board of the Carnegie UK Trust has agreed a new five year strategic plan from January 2011.
 
The Trustees’ review of our current and future strategic focus and priorities fits with the requirements of our Trust Deed and Royal Charter to reassess our work every five years.  In doing so the Trust has also taken account of its current and likely future financial position in the light of the economic turbulence of the last three years.
 
To meet the coming challenges, the Trustees have decided there should be a change in the way the Trust works.  We will move from setting up large scale commissions of inquiry to a project-based approach.  From the end of this year, all our current programmes for Democracy, Civil Society and Rural development will be brought to an end and we will close our London office.
 
The Trust has a significant body of work and achievement from the programmes it has run over the last few years and this will play a key part in informing our future work as we move to our project-based operating structure. 
 
Important elements of the current work will continue.  The Trust has re-affirmed its strong commitment to the Carnegie Rural Development Community of Practice (Fiery Spirits), focusing the work of two members of staff on further developing Fiery Spirits over the next two years.  The Trust also remains committed to continuing to support the development of Community Land Trusts over the next two years.
 
The Carnegie UK Trust will continue to place the interests of disadvantaged communities at the heart of its activities as it delivers its work as an operating trust that is committed to “changing minds and changing lives”. 
 
In the New Year we will publish our strategic plan for the period to 2015, launch our new website and recruit a policy and research team.
 
Martyn Evans
Chief Executive

Author: Johnathon Menzies, Stirling Observer

COMMUNITY-spirited Stirling residents gathered in Cambusbarron Church Hall recently to thrash out ideas on how to help shape the area’s future. The inaugural summit brought directors and representatives from Cambusbarron, Gargunnock, Fintry, Thornhill, Kilmadock, and Killearn development trusts together under one roof. Cambusbarron’s committee was set up in July this year with support from the ‘Small Town and Rural Development Group’, who assist other grassroots good causes looking to get a host of projects off the ground.

A series of community triumphs from elsewhere came under the microscope during the evening-long forum. Among those discussed were the Kilmadock Information and Heritage Centre in Doune, the Thornhill out-of-school care kids’ club, Fintry’s renewable energy and insulation project, the £130,000 raised towards ownership and development of Gargunnock community centre, Killearn paths group and the village’s ‘Wee Green’ market.

Roddy Ross, a director of the Cambusbarron community development trust, described the meeting as an “enlightening” experience. He continued: “All the projects that were discussed came about through a combination of community leadership and volunteer effort… it’s an example of central government’s ‘Big Society’ idea right here in Stirling.”

Daye Tucker, the chair of the Killearn community futures development company, said: “We all feel very privileged to be part of this initiative and we’re delighted that we’ve all been brought together under one roof.“This will help to sustain local development trusts and make them even more effective in the future.”

The trusts are community-owned companies with charitable status. Membership is open to all who live or work within a given catchment area, with several directors elected to steer their charges in the right direction.

Cambusbarron’s version currently boasts 117 members. Chair Lesley Campbell said: “As the newest addition to the community trust movement in Stirling, we were delighted to meet up with the ‘old hands’ and share stories. “We hope that this will herald the start of lots more networking – the Fintry branch have already offered to host another evening in the new year.”

For more information go to www.cambusbarroncommunitytrust.org.uk or contact Lesley on lesleyconsulting@fsmail.net

The Scottish Government has today launched a consultation on proposals to ensure Scotland and its local communities benefit from renewable and low carbon energy developments. This is a welcome initiative. The document makes some interesting points but it is evident that the limitations of devolution are inhibiting the authors. I have blogged on this at length before on this topic.

Scotland’s crown lands are separate from England’s crown lands and they are public land defined by the Scots law of property. The only weird thing in the whole set up is that by law (the Crown Estate Act of 1961) these rights (which remember, belong to Scotland) are administered by the Crown Estate Commission in London who also collect all the revenues.

The simplest thing to do is to amend the 1961 Act to the effect that it does not apply to Scotland. This is something the Liberal Democrats who run Scotland in Westminister could effect pretty easily. The question is why MPs like Alastair Carmichael, John Thurso, Charles Kennedy, Alan Reid and Michael Moore are not doing this.

The amendment is shorter than a tweet.

Crown Estate Act 1961 Insert new Section 1(8) “This Act does not apply to Scotland”

All those who want to see control of the seabed and associated crown property rights return to Scotland should make this very simple observation to the Scottish Government in their response.

Author: Vernon Bogdanor, The Times

The stranglehold of party hacks is killing local government: random selection could stop it

We should become more active members of society, rather than mere passive beneficiaries: this is one of the coalition’s central themes. David Cameron’s Big Society seeks to shift power away from the centre to citizens and communities, while the Liberal Democrats have long believed in the decentralisation of power.

Crucial to a renewal of community must be the revival of local government, which ought to be government by lay people rather than professional politicians. In 1894, Josef Redlich, an Austrian politician and and academic, observed that “England has created for herself ‘self government’ in the true sense of the word — that is to say, the right of her people to legislate, to deliberate and to administer through councils or parliaments elected on the basis of popular suffrage . . . and this is the root of the incomparable strength and health of the English body politic”. Local government badly needs to became “self government” once again.

For today it has become far removed from Redlich’s inspiring vision. Indeed, so attenuated is it as a result of the depredations of governments of both Left and Right that it is now a merely marginal element of the British constitution. The main reason for this is the excessive dominance of political parties in most local authorities. Indeed, given the trend towards backbench rebellion in the Commons, discipline is probably tighter in much of local government than it is at Westminster.

It is a paradox that the greater the fall in party identification, the more strongly the parties have entrenched themselves in local government. Many councillors are seen, in consequence, as emissaries of their parties, members of the political class, representing not “us” but “them”.

Although turnout rates for local elections are low, there are striking indications of an unsatisfied demand for participation. Around 40 per cent of us belong to a voluntary organisation, while three million 18 to 24-year-olds, the very generation least likely to vote, volunteer each year. The democratic spirit in Britain is healthy, but it badly needs an institutional path through which it can be expressed.

One way to do this is to select a small proportion of councillors — say a tenth or a twentieth — randomly by lot from the electoral register. Those selected would include the young and members of ethnic minorities, groups markedly under-represented in most local authorities. It would be voluntary in that one could refuse to accept the role, but those who did serve would be genuine independents. They could decide what was best for their communities without being beholden to party.

Fifth-century Athens, a direct democracy, chose its office holders by lot. But there is no reason why the same principle should not be adapted to a modern representative system. This was achieved in British Columbia in 2004, when a Citizens’ Assembly was established to propose a new electoral system for the province, to be put to the people in a referendum.

The Assembly was selected randomly, to include one man and one woman from each electoral district. It collected written and oral evidence, and held 50 public hearings. Its report, Making Every Vote Count, was duly put to referendum. This experiment shows that ordinary citizens are perfectly capable of undertaking complex governmental tasks. Over the 11-month term of the Assembly, attendance was close to perfect and just one member withdrew.

Oscar Wilde once said that the prime defect of socialism was that it took up too many evenings, but the experiment in British Columbia shows that it is perfectly feasible to extend participation in a modern democracy, and such participation need not be the exclusive province of the better-off and the better-educated.

Like most other democracies, we in Britain have hardly begun to harness the potential of the ordinary citizen. What better place to begin than with local government, the Cinderella of our political institutions?

Martin Sime, Director of SCVO gave a presentation

‘Small State, Big Society’, interestingly, was a Chinese Government slogan in the 1990s. The ‘Big Society’ is currently something of an obsession in London, and has created an industry.

The theory as set out by Conservative spokespeople includes several aspects:

• Increased social responsibility by individuals and families (with the state ‘nudging’ people in this direction)

• Localism, including community empowerment

• Mobilising the ‘little platoons’ of civil society

• Increased activity by the third sector and wider aspects of civil society

• A smaller state

• The right to know and to access data.

In England national voluntary organisations are being told that this is not about their role, indeed there are significant cuts to the voluntary sector infrastructure.

Planned initiatives include:

• Training of new ‘community organisers’, who will then have to raise their own salaries

• A national programme offering three weeks National Citizen Service for young people.

• A Big Society Day

Already happening are a number of small local pilot projects, a Big Society Bank ( a repositioning of the ‘dormant bank accounts’ fund) and policies such as self-governing schools.

Other context includes:

• the ongoing marketisation of services such as the Work Programme, and the emphasis on job seekers volunteering (with no additional support other than a Job Centre advisor telling them to do so)

• the English White Paper on Care, which is perhaps the most radical initiative, with its emphasis on ‘self-directed support’, very similar to the current Scottish strategy.

In Scotland, after some initial debate, most of the major organisations backed off quickly, sensing no appetite for such a debate and an identification of it with the ‘cuts’ agenda. Even Tory MSPs say that the programme does not apply in Scotland, though it is a little known fact that the official list of Secretary of State for Scotland David Mundell’s responsibilities is to advance the Big Society in Scotland.

SCVO feels some empathy with the ideas underlying the ‘big society’, but cutting or rolling back the state is not part of their agenda.

However a set of ideas about people tasking more responsibility are a necessity. Current levels of care will break the NHS and swallow our entire economy in a few years, if people cannot be enabled to live in the community instead. It is crucial to build community capacity and networks in order to combat social isolation. Older people are a huge resource.

The ‘big platoons’ of the voluntary sector are entirely involved in a commissioning and contracting culture. But the government needs a new culture of nurturing the sector at community level. Care for older people is an ideal arena to develop this.

However is it really the government’s role to say ‘we will have a big society’ (though that is no doubt how the Chinese Government sees it)?

Discussion

Comments from participants:

Community development has always been based on the argument that current public service delivery models were not sustainable. So how should we respond to this new agenda?

There are difficulties with the source of the ‘big society’ agenda. How will the influences behind it play out in Scotland? We need to find our own language for this.

Volunteering doesn’t happen because governments make it happen. Successful initiatives start with support to one or two people, breaking down social isolation. Where is the practical action to support these sources of community action?

Who can help to shape a new approach? There are many in the civil service who are sceptical about community development, and some about the value of the third sector in general. By contrast, MSPs of all parties want to see some of this agenda supported, but also face a strong demand for priority to be given to protecting ‘acute’ services.

Martin:

There have been 30 years of debates on community-led regeneration, which often amounts to asking people to engage in other people’s agendas. People have to be given their own resources. The self-directed care approach shifts the centre of gravity and requires more neighbour-based solutions.

Comments from participants:

How can we make some of the changes that are happening more systematic? Can we replicate the ‘individual choice’ approach at community level?

Communities have used resources well when given the chance. But this can lead to the development of structures that are not democratically accountable.

Resources and support for communities has often been a response to failing state intervention … No, it has mostly been required in response to the failure of the private sector.

What change agenda is needed to enable people to use their individual resources to achieve collective solutions?

At the heart of our ever growing care system is a broken philosophy – interventions that disempower people and weaken their ability to cope.

This is not about alternative forms of service delivery, but about doing things differently – strengthening individuals and communities.

Martin:

Local government should not have a ‘duty to care’ but a duty to support citizens to look after themselves.

The Change Fund  for community-based health and social care services for older people, announced in the draft budget, could be significant. The Minister has insisted that the reshaping of services involved must involve the third sector, and there is a strand in the programme described as ‘community capacity building’.

The Big Lottery Fund (BIG) wants to set up a new £15 million Trust in Scotland to help disadvantaged urban communities most affected by serious economic decline, market failure and disadvantage to become stronger and more sustainable, through their own efforts. The JESSICA (Scotland) Trust will invest in projects that create opportunities for local people and community-led organisations to develop locally owned, led and controlled assets that will lead to local regeneration. By working in this way BIG will ensure that change and development are strongly shaped by the communities
concerned. The JESSICA (Scotland) Trust projects will need to demonstrate that they can bring together agencies and communities to develop a common
approach to activities and funding, and to ensure that local people have a genuine say in developing their communities. The JESSICA (Scotland) Trust will invest in projects that deliver community assets or assets under
community control where they meet BIG’s outcomes agenda. Once established, the JESSICA (Scotland) Trust will be an independent body working to the stated objectives. The Trust will be governed by a Board of Trustees, who will take the key investment decisions related to its funds as
well as being responsible for the JESSICA (Scotland) Trust’s governance.

The JESSICA (Scotland) Trust is targeted at geographic neighbourhoods of greatest disadvantage (13 designated areas) in Scotland. The 13 local authority areas listed below have been identified as being eligible for support from the JESSICA (Scotland) Trust. The areas’ eligibility will be reviewed every year and any additional area that might become eligible under review may be added to the list of targeted areas. Equally, one of these thirteen
areas could be changed over the life of the JESSICA (Scotland) Trust.

 Clackmannanshire
  Dundee
 East Ayrshire
 Edinburgh
 Fife
 Glasgow
 Inverclyde
 North Ayrshire
 North Lanarkshire
 Renfrewshire
 South Lanarkshire
 West Dunbartonshire
 West Lothian.

Our approach
We want to provide certainty, longevity and a model that can invest and re invest for the long-term benefit of communities. To do this we have decided to
set up a new independent Trust and give it £15 million to invest and spend
over the next 10 years. An independent Trust can plan for the long-term, get money to where it’s needed most and respond quickly to new issues. It can be flexible and respond in different ways, including giving out grants, providing loans, tendering for services or recruiting staff to carry out its
work. A Trust can also raise money from other sources to add to the funds provided by BIG.

The Trust’s powers will have a deliberately narrow focus on distribution of funds to ensure that any investment made is targeted at the designated areas, but wide enough so that the Trust can consider and support any
appropriate aspect of such proposals.