Click here to view the reuse map of Leith

Author: BBC

Ayr United generate £8.6m and Spartans £5.2m each year for their local communities, says a Uefa pilot study.

The clubs – from the Scottish Championship and Lowland League – were chosen to pioneer a football adaptation of a programme designed to calculate social impact.

Scottish FA chief executive Ian Maxwell hopes it will help community clubs attract investment and sponsorship.

“It demonstrates the bang for the buck that we get from football,” he said

“The numbers that come out the other end from an economic, social and health benefit perspective are huge.”

Maxwell said Ayr and Spartans were chosen because Uefa recognised “the good work Scottish clubs are doing in the local communities”.

It follows a national study in 2018, when it was revealed that participation in grassroots football delivers more than £1.2bn of “positive value to Scottish society”.

Ayr United Community Value

£4.15m    in subjective wellbeing

£0.432+   in improved mental health

£0.238      in tackling dementia

£0.216      in combatting school absences

£0.303m   in education attainment

“Our clubs do a huge amount and it’s not just football related,” Maxwell told BBC Scotland.

“Obviously there is participation and people physically taking part in games of football, but there’s a lot of activity that goes on that uses football as the hook but is not necessarily linked to playing.

“Football covers a huge amount of society and it’s important that we recognise that.”

Maxwell admitted that many would be surprised at the impact a part-time club like Spartans can have on areas such as local infrastructure, mental wellbeing and even health problems like diabetes.

“When you look at the study and understand the different areas it looks at – the cost of people getting to training, venue hire, the amount of volunteer hours that these clubs put in if those individuals were getting paid, those numbers are huge,” he said.

“If you take those numbers across Scottish football and the thousands of clubs that do similar work, the overall impact is massive and it’s important we get this model around as many clubs as possible and that each club can go and tell its own story.”

Spartans’ community value

£2.16       Infrastructure investment

£0.86       Value of volunteering

£1.3m      in subjective wellbeing

£0.147m in improved mental health

£0.086m in reducing diabetes

People living in a picturesque village on the banks of Loch Lomond are calling for action on tourist traffic.

Some of the 120 residents of Luss are threatening to block roads unless the council imposes traffic restrictions.

Locals have already taken direct action by erecting five large signs asking motorists not to drive or park in the village.

Argyll and Bute Council said it was working with the villagers to find a solution.

The council already operates a pay and display car park near the village, but campaigners say more needs to be done to cater for tourists.

It has been reported the village attracts 750,000 visitors a year – more than Edinburgh Zoo, Stirling Castle or the Falkirk Wheel.ue village attracts large numbers of visitors

The Luss and Arden Community Council has discussed a range of measures with the local authority including a ban on tourists driving in the village itself and forcing them to leave their vehicles at an as-yet-unbuilt car park in a nearby field.

However, community council members say these have not been implemented and are appealing to the Scottish government to intervene.

Council convener Dave Pretswell said: “Residents can’t leave their homes on a sunny summer day, emergency services can’t get in, deliveries to residents can’t get in and residents are frequently subject to abuse in trying to stop the worst of the parking chaos.”

Luss resident Alison Walker added: “We feel the time has come to take matters into our own hands; Holyrood talks endlessly about the importance of tourism to the Scottish economy and it’s time ministers stepped in to take control.”

The Scottish government said it had invested £281,000 on measures to alleviate pressures – but that said that traffic management was a matter for the local authority.

A spokesman said: “While tourism is of vital importance to Scotland’s economy, it must also meet the needs of local communities.

“We understand our partners at Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Authority are aiming to help implement an agreed solution as soon as possible.”

A spokeswoman for Argyll and Bute Council said: “There are many differing views on what would be a good solution for Luss and we have been working with the community to find one that is acceptable.

“We have supported the development of another car park by Luss Estates and encourage them to bring this proposal forward.

“The council is currently reviewing how it engages with our local communities on traffic regulation orders, and more widely. We look forward to finding a solution that serves the interests of Luss.”

Author: Vicky Allan, The Herald

WHEN Dave Stinson began clam diving off the coast of Norway in 2002 he was struck by the quantity of life he was seeing. Sea cucumbers, flatfish, corals, sea urchins. It reminded him of what he found off the coast of Scotland when he began diving 45 years ago. Here was a vibrant seabed, teeming with life. Unlike our own, which, he says, now often “looks like the bottom of a quarry”. What, he wondered, were they doing differently in Norway?

Stinson had often tried to explain to others the loss of life he had witnessed from our seabeds in recent decades. When he did, he would sometimes wish he had a “before” photograph of a pristine never-dredged bed. What he found and photographed in Norway – though different in texture from the Scottish seabed of his memories – seemed almost like that. “I say to a lot of people, I’d like to show you a ‘before’ and ‘after’, but on the west coast of Scotland there’s no area that shows ‘before’,” he says. “Every inch in the sort of grounds where the scallops are has been towed over 100 times by dredgers and bottom trawlers.”

At first, Stinson was unaware of Norwegian restrictions around dredging and trawling and wasn’t sure why their seabed should be so different to ours. “It was only when I saw a set of scallop dredging gear and somebody said it had never been used because it had been prohibited that I started asking more,” he says.

The Norwegian government has prohibited scallop dredging and bottom trawling within 12 nautical miles of the shore, with some exceptions. Such restrictions weren’t put in place for conservation reasons – but to manage what are called “gear conflicts”, between those towing mobile gear and others with static nets.

Norway also has a 2009 Marine Resources Act, at the heart of which, according to Per Sandberg of the Norwegian fisheries agency Fiskeridirektoratet, is “an ecosystems approach” to fisheries, as well as a “precautionary” one.

“In general, we are concerned that the fishery should not harm the environment,” he explains. “In the 1960s and 1970s, there wasn’t too much concern that we were fishing too much – the idea was that the ocean was plentiful. But then, suddenly, we got the collapse of herring. It took us 20 years to regain stock. One lesson learned: you need to manage the resources.”

Stinson rails against the use of “mobile gear”, a term for dredging and trawling equipment towed behind a boat, which in Scotland can be used right up to the shoreline. “The most damaging,” he says, “is the scallop dredge with its teeth and heavy metal bar that digs into the seabed.”

Since that 2002 visit to Norway, Stinson has been back many times, in a bid not just to fish but to find out what we can learn about how we should be managing our fisheries. Armed with a GoPro camera, he has taken hours of underwater footage and interviewed fishermen, restaurant owners, fish processors and bureaucrats.

Among them is Jim Lorentsen, who has owned a fishing boat for 17 years and talks of how good the fishing is right now. “We get good prices and a lot of fish,” he says. “It wasn’t always like this. In the early 1990s and 1980s it was really bad. They hadn’t regulation of the fishing so they used to fish and fish until it stopped. It’s unbelievable how much more fish we see now.”

Or there is Alf Roald Sætre, who runs Cornelius, a destination fish restaurant outside Bergen. “The main thing here is that we have nobody destroying the seabed,” he says. “They are not allowed to dredge … The whole approach is ecosystem-based. The last two years in Norway, in the north, we have been beating records. We are fishing extraordinary amounts of cod for fish and chips to England.”

Stinson says: “My campaign is to get somebody to acknowledge that the Norwegians have done what we need to do and it’s been to the benefit of the coastal communities. One fisherman said ‘This is great for us. There are 120 people on the island of Nesøy and 20 are employed on fishing boats.’”

He believes that part of the Norway fish stocks improvement is down to their seabed protection. “Research supports the idea that the seabeds are crucial habitats in some of the life stages of our larger commercial fish,” he points out. “But in Scotland we’re destroying spawning grounds. That’s probably one of the reasons why the herring are not returning. People will say there’s nothing wrong with scallop dredging, it just needs proper management – no it doesn’t, it just needs totally eradicated.”

The research he refers to includes a study by Dr Sophie Elliott linking cod, haddock and whiting survival to seabed biodiversity. It’s particularly relevant given last week’s news that, following warnings about precarious cod stock levels, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) has removed its blue tick on North Sea cod.

Stinson is just one of an older generation of divers who are witnesses to what decades of scallop dredging and bottom trawling have done to the Scottish seabed. His early years of diving were done in the wake of the lifting in 1984 of the three-mile limit which prohibited dredgers and trawlers from round our coastlines.

But divers are not alone in having such concern. Nick Underdown, of the campaign group Open Seas, believes the government must urgently adopt a precautionary, seaward limit approach that protects the entire coastal zone, similar to the Norwegian one. He observes: “Scallop dredging and bottom trawling are regarded as the most damaging fisheries in Europe and yet they continue to have a widespread footprint in Scotland’s inshore waters, suppressing the recovery of our collapsed inshore fish stocks.

“The Scottish Government’s review of these fisheries must account for the damage done to our coastal seabed over the past 30 years, not just protect a few small areas. By restricting trawlers and dredgers in inshore waters, these businesses would be able to continue in deeper waters, while creating a massive opportunity for low-impact fishing and increase the number of better-paid jobs in the inshore.”

Alistair Sinclair, national co-ordinator for the Scottish Creel Fishermen’s Federation, has long campaigned for a return of the three-mile limit. He points to a Scottish Government graph of the drop-off in fish stocks in the Clyde in the period following it. “The fish stock levels were reasonably healthy in the Clyde and in a short space of time – 20 years – they were at ground zero.”

Sinclair dramatically compares what has been done to our seabed to the “recent burning of the Amazon forest”. “The decimation that actually has gone on and the degradation on the seabed is unbelievable, unforgivable.”

But, as Elspeth Macdonald, chief executive of the Scottish Fisheries Federation says, this is a significant industry, approaching £40 million in value, with many jobs attached. She points out that only 5% of these are hand-dived and that the vast majority “is met through scallops landed from areas that have been fished for many years and that remain productive, so it’s clear that that there is room for both types of fishing”.

Macdonald adds: “The industry is working through the Scallop Industry Consultative Group on management proposals that cover a number of measures, including licensing. We fully recognise the importance of protecting sensitive marine species, habitats and features, and work closely with government and other stakeholders on issues including evidence-based Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), and the development of appropriate management measures within MPAs.”

Stinson, however, wants to see an end to scallop dredging – although not immediately. Having worked on a couple of scallop dredgers, he is sympathetic to the fishermen who fear such an abrupt assault on their livelihoods. “I don’t think they need to be put out of business overnight. I think it needs to be managed over 10 years, to shut it down. I would say we need to declare a moratorium on the further issuing of any scallop licensing – so no further boats.”

What he discovered in Norway, he believes, indicates that such measures would, far from being bad for our industry, return it to its vibrancy. “Mobile-gear defenders always say we couldn’t compensate for the jobs which would be lost if dredging was banned, but they have themselves destroyed the jobs of others by their destructive practice. As scallop dredging declines you would see a rise in other populations and other types of fishing would become economically possible.”

Why our North Sea cod is off the menu

1. The North Sea cod fishery was given its blue sustainability label too early. When, in 2017, the MSC awarded it sustainability status there were actually fewer fish than the InternationalCouncil for the Exploration of the Sea had calculated. Stocks had not fully recovered. As Robin Cook of the University of Strathclyde put it in an article in The Conversation this week, “Now ICES has revised its earlier estimates, showing that the cod recovery plan should never have been abandoned.”
2. We need to pay more attention to cod habitats.

The seabed really does matter for a species which inhabits inshore areas during their life, commercial inshore species like cod. Dr Sophie Elliott, lead author on a University of Glasgow study which linked cod survival to seabed biodiversity, observes, “The problem about the way we undertake quotas and stocks assessments is that we just look at the fish abundance but we don’t take into consideration their habitat, where they live. Habitat is one of the largest factors that effects species survival, so by not taking it into account you’re just looking at half the picture and you can have super crashes in populations.”

Essential habitats such as where the fish spawn and also their nursery grounds should be focus areas for protection and stock regeneration. “You need to be able to understand what these are, where they are, to be able to provide a greater protection.”

3. Climate-change is having an impact. Fish species are migrating north.

Read full report here

Local authorities face a growing crisis, with deep cuts and rising demand. Over recent years, the dominant response has been to try and find savings by outsourcing services at scale.

But many local areas are now suffering from ‘scale fail’: poor quality services that don’t deliver the outcomes promised and don’t deal with people’s problems at source.

However, a growing number of local authorities have been doing things differently. They recognise the distinctive role that community organisations play both in the local service landscape and in the wider social fabric of their places. So rather than crowding them out with bureaucratic commissioning and standardised services, they are seeking to support and nurture them – by building partnerships, sharing power, and maximising local strengths.

This report provides new evidence and understanding of exactly what makes the work community organisations do in their local neighbourhoods unique. It shows the benefits that can be realised if local areas plug into this ‘power of community’ – not only providing high quality services for local people but also bringing communities together at a time of ongoing social division. And it highlights the trailblazer councils who are leading the way by Keeping it Local.

Through co-design with councils and communities, the Keep it Local principles guide policy and practice within local authorities.

Keep it Local Principles

• Think about the whole system and not individual service silos.
• Coordinate services at the neighbourhood level.
• Increase local spend to invest in the local economy.
• Focus on early intervention now to save costs tomorrow.
• Commit to your community and proactively support local organisations.
• Commission services simply and collaboratively so they are local by default.

BIG ideas are important. Boris Johnson is talking about infrastructure projects, committing to HS2 and spending £106 billion of taxpayers’ monies. He also this week announced a review into the feasibility of a 20-mile long Scotland-Northern Ireland bridge that will cost £20 billion.

Irrespective of the merits of these projects, and the obvious point that the Scottish-Northern Irish bridge has next to no chance of ever being built, they mark a different kind of politics at least rhetorically from that of Boris Johnson’s immediate Tory predecessors.

These announcements raise big questions about the role of government, public spending and what is deliverable, feasible and believable. One strand which many on the left will understandably want to resist is that Johnson’s government is embarking on an era of raising selective public spending, a more interventionist state and greater role for government, amounting to a different kind of Conservatism compared to recent decades.

This brings up challenges for Scotland. What do we want to be defined by? What do we want to collectively organise and mobilise to do? What do we want to do which brings lasting change and directly transforms lives – beyond the constitutional question and independence?

Boris Johnson’s proposed 20 mile long Scotland to Northern Ireland bridge would cost £20 billion

Scotland has done ambitious things. Take the early decades of post-war Scotland. Government and state mobilised to engage in huge slum clearances in our biggest cities. New towns were built to create attractive, clean environments in the likes of Glenrothes, East Kilbride and Livingston. Public health programmes eradicated diseases such as polio. Comprehensive education expanded opportunity to those previously denied it; and huge hydro-electric schemes were carved out in the Highlands of our country.

Peter Kelly of the Poverty Alliance observes that: “Slum clearance and new towns, public health campaigns, the NHS, comprehensive education, social housing – it was the combined effect of these ‘big things’ that transformed the lives of millions.”

2020 is the 21st anniversary of the Scottish Parliament. It has done many positive things. It has enacted legislation such as free care for the elderly, no tuition fees for students, the smoking ban, minimum pricing for alcohol, and baby boxes.

Twenty-one years on is an appropriate moment of maturity for the Scottish Parliament to reflect and ask whether we have done enough, could we do more ¬– and can we aim higher? I asked a range of public figures, policy experts, academics and campaigners what one big policy they would like to implement to make Scotland a better and more vibrant society.

This could be at any number of levels including the macro-level. We could aim to “escape the legacy of the divine rights of kings and the British Empire by remaking the state from the bottom up [with] a confederation of democratic local governments” in the words of Willie Sullivan of the Electoral Reform Society.

It could see us build on existing commitment such as the “incorporation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which the Scottish Government intends to bring into Scots law in 2021 [and] will, for the first time, set a clear and accountable framework which will require all adults to treat all children with respect for their human dignity”, according to Cathy McCulloch of the Scottish Children’s Parliament.

Even more ambitiously some want Scotland to position itself internationally in a very different place: “I want to see Scotland at the forefront of transforming regressive, xenophobic, racist, ecologically destructive, and securitised international policy to form a coalition of small and brave states”, says Katie Gallogy-Swan, a voluntary sector worker.

OTHERS want Scotland to recommit to the values of its public services. Niven Rennie, head of the Violence Reduction Unit observes that “most of our multiple areas of deprivation house the one percent of the population that require the greatest level of expenditure by public services – yet we tackle the issues they present in isolation” and that this has to urgently change.

Dr Anne Mullin of Govan Health Centre comments that we should “strengthen General Practice services by championing the localised and autonomous practice that is accountable to the population it serves” and support “continuity of care and time to care” to advance holistic community-orientated health.

The writer James Robertson wishes to see “a huge programme of improvement in public transport infrastructure, including reinstatement of key railway lines, proper co-ordination of bus, train and ferry timetables”.

The insecure world of work and the rise of inequality is another theme with Peter Kelly stating: “If clean water was essential to improvements in public health, then income adequacy plays the same role for poverty reduction. Having a secure source of income, sufficient unlock thousands of people from poverty, would have a transformational effect on society.”

Alex Bell who worked as a former First Minister’s head of policy states that we need “a generational effort to even up society.” Jim McCormick from Joseph Rowntree Foundation would like to “see employers make a commitment to Living Hours as well as Living Wage – to offer at least 16 hours a week to all those who want this.”

Harry Burns, the former Chief Medical Officer observes that “the circumstances in which children are born and raised determines how they make decisions and their outcomes in life. Tackling child poverty and supporting families through a Citizen’s Basic Income would transform Scotland.”

ISABELLA Goldie of Deafblind Scotland makes a similar comment, saying that: “The one big thing would definitely be about ensuring that everyone was able to retain their dignity whether they had a disability, a sensory impairment, a mental health problem through giving everyone a universal basic income”.

Joyce McMillan, journalist and theatre critic, says that Scotland should “launch a world-leading, job-creating programme for mass home insulation up to Nordic standards, and replacement of all carbon-fuel home heating systems with electric ones, or – where possible – community combined heat and power.”

How we look after the architecture and heritage of our cities, towns and communities is a priority for Niall Murphy of Glasgow City Heritage Trust: “My big idea for changing the lives of Scots takes its cue from Patrick Geddes in seeking the renewal of our cities, towns, villages and neighbourhoods via retrofit, repair, repurposing and enhancement of our existing buildings to reduce their carbon footprint while making them easier to heat and more resilient to climate change.”

A key area is how government and public bodies support people, their relationships and ability to thrive and fulfil their potential. Anne Callaghan of the Campaign to End Loneliness commends the notion of “a life coach system for all, that is funded, and which supports people of any age to build confidence, grow social skills and provided a sounding board for concerns and issues. Let’s invest in building people’s confidence and giving them a sounding board to try out ideas before mental health starts to erode.”

Sue Palmer, author of “Toxic Childhood” and founder of Upstart Scotland wants to see the introduction of “a Nordic-style kindergarten stage for children aged three to seven, with plenty of time spent outdoors.” Alan Sinclair, an early years advocate agrees and asks: “What infrastructure is most important – roads, houses or people? Parents need support to be better parents and to enjoy their children. That means coaching and support from preconception, during pregnancy, birth and the first two years in life.”

There is a wealth of energy, insights and ideas in modern Scotland but we need some key ingredients to aid their success. First, the dead weight of Westminster has to be acknowledged, but not used as a barrier to our ambition and imagination.

Second, 21 years on, despite a plethora of Scottish Government papers and pronouncements there is no over-arching vision or set of agreed priorities for what Scotland should be working towards.

Robin McAlpine of Common Weal observes that “the one thing I’d do is stop believing that Scotland as a nation is only capable of doing one thing at a time. We’re big and rich and diverse. We can reform our banking system and build better housing at the same time. But there is an overwhelming priority just now which is climate change” – the demands of which he believes should run through every policy and activity.

Third, is the question of capacity, delivery and interface between policy and practice. It is very well having a great policy or idea, but it takes leadership, advocacy, learning and a mixture of pragmatism and stubbornness to implement.

Fourth, ideas need to be nurtured and developed and Scotland has a paucity of resources and spaces where ideas such as the above can be worked out beyond government. Our think-tank environment is paltry, with two offshoots of London operations – Reform Scotland and IPPR Scotland – while the pro-independence Common Weal relies on crowdfunding. Trade unions and voluntary organisations, once key reservoirs of ideas and energy, are now more stretched and over-committed.

This can lead to a phenomenon seen across the West of policy being reduced to media management and sound bites. John Carnochan who set up the Violence Reduction Unit observes: “Media and commentators seem now to be viewed as the sole channel to communicate all ideas, policies and progression, they are not. They have forgotten they are not the consumers of services, meanwhile the real consumers are annexed, excluded, isolated.”

FINALLY, for all the talk of politics as being owned and driven by citizens, party politicians have for the past 21 years tended to draw their ideas and policies from within the system and the senior civil service to the point of exhaustion. This is a challenge for the future, for in an independent Scotland we will need a plurality of voices and resources to enrich public life and aid better public policy.

There is a mindset of policy and change which has to be tackled according to James Mitchell of Edinburgh University: “There remains a strong sense amongst much of Scotland’s political class of the ‘lever pulling notion of policy-making’, i.e. get elected, pass a law or make a policy statement in Holyrood and all will be well. The other side of this public policy illiteracy is the notion that when things go wrong then it must be the fault of the governing party or some minister.”

The future Scotland is being created in the here and now. Twenty-one years on is an appropriate point to gather our resources, commitment and ideas and focus on the country and future we want to create. Seismic change such as addressing climate change, inter-generational inequality and bringing up children, cannot happen by stealth or accident. It requires committing resources, providing leadership, deciding priorities and having a short term and long view.

The conceits of limit government, taxation as a burden and regulation as a break on economic freedom, have been tried to exhaustion and discredited the world over. It is time for Scotland to think big and dare to chart a course creating a different future.

Author: Malcolm M. Combe, Jayne Glass and Annie Tindley

A stimulating review of contemporary land reform in Scotland

Offers a holistic approach to land reform in Scotland

Draws on case studies of land policies in the UK, mainland Europe and the USA to allow comparison and contextualisation of Scottish land reform with other models

Examines the significance of right to property on the land reform process, and looks at how it is now being used as an impetus for economic and social rights reform

Land reform is as topical as ever in Scotland. Following the latest legislative development, the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2016, there is a need for a comprehensive and comprehensible analysis of the history, developing framework and impact of Scottish land reform. Scholarly yet jargon-free, this landmark volume brings together leading researchers and commentators working in law, history and policy to analyse the past, present and future of Scottish land reform. It covers how Scotland’s land is regulated, used and managed; why and how this has come to pass; and makes some suggestions as to the future of land reform.

Introduction Malcolm M. Combe, Jayne Glass and Annie Tindley

Part I: History

Chapter 1: Land, labour and capital: external influences and internal responses in early modern Scotland. Allan Macinnes

Chapter 2: Agricultural enlightenment, landownership and Scotland’s culture of improvement, 1700-1820. Brian Bonnyman

Chapter 3: The impact of agrarian radicalism on land reform in Scotland and Ireland, 1879-1903. Brian Casey

Chapter 4: ‘The usual agencies of civilisation:’ conceptions of landownership and reform in the comparative context in the long nineteenth century. Annie Tindley

Chapter 5: Still on the agenda? The strange survival of the Scottish land question, 1880 to 1999. Ewen A. Cameron

Part II: Law

Chapter 6: History, law and land through the lens of sasine. Andrew R. C. Simpson

Chapter 7: Legislating for community land rights. Malcom M. Combe

Chapter 8: Towards sustainable community ownership: a comparative assessment of Scotland’s new compulsory community right to buy. John A. Lovett

Chapter 9: Property rights and human rights in Scottish land reform. Frankie McCarthy

Chapter 10: The evolution of sustainable development in Scotland – a case study of community right to buy regimes, 2003 to 2018. Andrea Ross

Chapter 11: Scottish residential tenancies. Douglas Bain

Chapter 12: Crofting law. Eilidh I. M. MacLellan

Chapter 13: Agricultural tenancy legislation and public policy considerations in Scotland. Hamish Lean

Part III: Policy

Chapter 14: Planning and rights: are there lessons for town planning we can borrow from land reform? Robert G. Reid

Chapter 15: Crofting policy and legislation: an undemocratic and illegitimate structure of domination? Iain MacKinnon

Chapter 16: Does size really matter? Sustainable development outcomes from different scales of land ownership. Jayne Glass, Steven Thomson and Rob Mc Morran

Chapter 17: Agricultural models in Scotland and Norway – a comparison. Annie McKee, Heidi Vinge, Hilde Bjørkhaug and Reidar Almås

Author: Ian Birrell

For a few years at the start of this century, Juan Nevarez tasted the American dream. Having moved a few miles across the border from Tijuana when he was nine-years old, his close-knit family of Mexican migrants slogged away to make a better life for themselves. They were working people: his dad was a welder, his mum worked in shops and Juan, after leaving school, built a small concrete-pumping business. They did not have much money, but they were content and the future looked bright.

Soon after the arrival of the new millennium, the family ploughed all their savings into a four-bedroom house in a nice neighbourhood in southern California. No deposit was required — banks wanted customers, everyone was buying property and prices were rising — but monthly payments were tight. They hoped to refinance after a year to ease the pressures, as promised by the salespeople, but somehow that never happened since the house was never worth enough for such a deal.

Then came the crash. Prices began to falter in 2006, then plummeted as panic set into property markets. Little did this family know their humble mortgage was the sort of sub-prime loan being passed around by sharks in the financial sector. Banks chopped up such loans and sold them in complex mortgage-backed packages to investors who thought they were buying safe products. Instead, these 100% mortgages, often flogged to low-income citizens, helped spark a financial contagion that is still resonating around the world today.

“We thought we were upgrading,” said Juan, 40. But the house that his family had bought so proudly for $500,000 went under the hammer at an auction for $225,000, losing them about $150,000 — money they had worked so hard to save in order to clamber onto the lower rungs of the property ladder. “We never knew that prices would collapse and we’d lose all our money. It was very difficult for us all.”

Today, Juan lives in the ‘Siesta’ trailer park in Imperial Beach, barely 10 miles but a world away from his birthplace on the other side of the border. He showed me his mobile home — white with a maroon stripe along the side — which sits among 103 spaces on the tidy five-acre site filled with rows of similar vehicles. One resident has been settled there for four decades while many others have spent years on the site. “I like it here,” said Juan, though he admitted it was cramped. “These parks are one of the last places where you can live in a good community. In my big house I never knew my neighbours, but here we all talk.”

His new home costs $650 a month. This is about one-third of average rental prices in Imperial Beach, where rents are rising fast and at a higher rate than the national average. Little wonder that amid a housing crisis that spans the United States, there are 22 million Americans — an astonishing one in 15 of the population — living in what is politely termed ‘manufactured housing’. Most own their trailers but rent the land beneath them. Some sites look like the dishevelled Hollywood stereotypes, filled with noisy families and tatty trailers, but many are neat and homely.

Trailer parks reflect affordability rather than mobility these days, with most residents earning under $50,000 a year. I visited another one near Los Angeles that looked like the sweetest suburbia, filled with lovingly-tended plants and even white picket fences. Yet as Juan’s story shows, they also reflect the gaping inequalities of the world’s richest nation — along with the continuing impact of a financial crisis that left many working people so embittered against elites, fuelling a sense of dislocation that led to Donald Trump’s election.

Increasingly, trailer parks reflect something more sinister as well: the rapacious nature of unchecked capitalism that sees the homes of poor people as an asset to be bled, rather than pockets of humanity that deserve protection. Private equity firms, hedge funds and rich speculators are muscling in on the parks, sensing higher returns than on many other property investments. They are buying out traditional ‘mom and pop’ operators — a state of affairs that alarmingly echoes the sub-prime crisis that forced many families from their homes. And it is sparking loud claims of exploitation as low-income tenants complain angrily of rising rents and reduced maintenance.

Many residents have been left terrified. They fear that if rising rents force them to move out, they might end up among the bedraggled armies of homeless people on the streets or, at best, squeezing into the homes of siblings or parents. Inevitably, this is becoming a hot political issue seized upon by progressives. Senator Elizabeth Warren, for instance, visited one site in Iowa where people were fighting a 70% hike in their rents after it was taken over by an investment firm. “They come into parks like this with a vacuum and see how much money they can take out,” said the Democratic presidential candidate.

Last year, the tranquillity of Siesta — which lies less than one mile from the Pacific waves — was shattered by the news that their owner was planning to sell the land for condominiums. “We were given a letter saying they wanted everyone to attend a meeting,” said Juan. “When we got to the meeting there was a lawyer who said the park was being sold and you guys must all leave. He said we had six to 12 months to get our stuff and go. He had no feeling about how this would affect our lives. No feeling for the people in wheelchairs, with families or the elderly people.”

They were offered relocation assistance, including $500 in costs. Yet while it is called a mobile home park, the average age of its trailers is 25 years old and many parks will not take a vehicle older than five years. New ones can cost $100,000 and fresh arrivals often face higher rents. “We were all so scared,” said Tricia Harrelson, 59, who has lived there more than two decades after moving from Boston due to her former husband’s military service. “Some people think everyone living in these parks are stupid, that they’re idiots, because they are lower class citizens. But it’s been like a family here.”

Harrelson — like many of those at the park — is on federal benefits, since she suffers severe health problems sparked by trauma. She faced two armed robberies in quick succession when working as a supervisor at a credit union. She told me her rent had surged $300 in seven years after rising just $50 over the previous 18 years, while also claiming the site had become run down prior to its proposed sale. “We wanted to fight back but didn’t know how to do it,” she said.

Juan decided to try. He organised a meeting and, to his surprise, 42 other residents turned up. “Everyone felt angry and the same way,” he said. “People were telling me I would be kicked out of the park but I thought I’d nothing to lose since we were going to be thrown out anyway.” They started to enlist support from local politicians, attending city hall meetings to press their case, and made enough noise that shortly before Christmas the owner’s plans for redevelopment were withdrawn.

We’ve won a battle but I do not think the war is over,” said Juan. I was not surprised when he told me later that he wants to see Bernie Sanders win the presidency for he thinks their struggle is symptomatic of important wider issues confronting the United States:

“Rich people are out of sync with the rest of the country. They should see that without the working class, the people in these parks, they would not be able to afford all the good things they possess. These finance firms want to put poor people out on the streets so they can replace them with middle-class properties. But if the rich woke up, they would see that we are not bad people just because we are poor.”

Many other residents on the site share his distaste for predatory capitalism — but some prefer an alternative brand of political populism. “I don’t like big corporations buying land and tearing down trailer parks where people live. I also don’t like what rich people do when they have money,” said Maria Hirneisen, 57, who has lived in Siesta for 22 years, having moved from New Jersey. But she is a fan of Donald Trump. “I like what he is doing. Trump does not care what people think. People wanted something different to the usual politics and he has stirred up a few dust clouds.”

To appreciate the scale of the US housing crisis, consider this finding from a survey last year, quoted in the Financial Times: median-priced homes are too expensive for average wage earners in three-quarters of the country. In Imperial Beach, the median sale price last year was more than $620,000. Meanwhile mobile home sites are often sitting in prime real estate locations; many started as housing for returning troops after the Second World War, and were built on the outskirts of towns and cities before becoming enveloped by urban sprawl over subsequent years. Thousands are situated near the sea, lakes or other desirable attractions.

Analysts believe the need for more affordable housing is increasing, especially among millennials and pensioners. It is estimated 10,000 Americans retire each day — half of them without savings and with average social security benefits of about $1,300 a month. Yet Mobile Home University, run by one of the biggest investors, advises how to boost profits in “the hottest arena in real estate” by raising rents and cutting back amenities. “With 20 per cent of Americans trying to live on $20,000 or less, the demand for mobile homes has never been higher — and the big winners are the owners of mobile home parks in which these customers reside.”

Frank Rolfe, the body’s founder, boasts that trailer parks have the highest yields in commercial property, as he churns out publicity promoting such investments. “One reason that mobile home parks have long held their value is the simple fact that virtually no city or town in the US will allow new parks to be built,” said one article. “Why? Nobody wants a mobile home park as a neighbour, and their vocal dislike eliminates any chance of political approval. In the entire United States, it is estimated that less than 10 new parks are built each year — below the number torn down for re-development.”

In a couple of states — South Carolina and New Mexico — mobile homes comprise about one in six housing units. The three biggest owners have more than 50,000 sites each, while private equity firms such as Blackstone and Carlyle and sovereign wealth funds have been snapping up sites — to the alarm of activist groups such as Manufactured Housing Action. “We exist to counteract predatory investor schemes,” said Kevin Borden, the executive director. “They usually increase rents and decrease maintenance. These people are making profits of 20 to 22 per cent from some of the poorest people in our country.”

Borden believes trailer parks are vital to national well-being — at a time when gentrification and rising house prices are driving low-income citizens from city centres. “If you look at our country’s housing situation you can see that we’ve not figured out a strategy since the 2008 crisis for people to have decent and affordable homes. Mobile home communities offer something good for all those people getting pushed out of urban areas.”

One man who shares his concerns is Qui Vuong, 57, who came to the US after the fall of Saigon and today lives in a community largely filled with elderly Vietnamese migrants, beside a Catholic church in Santa Ana. The sleek Mercedes parked by his three-bedroom home indicates a prosperous past. He tells me over coffee how he thrived in finance in Texas before costly heart surgery, followed by a promise to care for his terminally-ill partner, landed him in a Californian mobile home park.

“I had no concept of what a trailer park was because I could always afford homes, especially in Houston where the cost of living is so low,” said Vuong. “There is a stigma associated with them because they are for people who can’t afford houses. But these are not bad people, just people with limited resources or scaling down. Yet you seem to have no rights and no laws to protect you

During his time running pension funds he was at one point approached to invest in trailer parks. “They saw it as another source of excess returns to beat the market.” Now he is fighting to protect residents from price-gouging after seeing typical rents at his park rise from $600 to $800 in just four years. “People here are scared,” he said. “There are people on the final edge of the safety net for survival. If they face another $50 in rent, they must turn to their families for help.”

Vuong nurses ambitions to set up a fund to protect rather than exploit such places. “I think I’m in the right place for a reason,” he said. He is highly critical of the predatory owners of trailer parks. “They say it is the market and that it is capitalism but they are too stupid to see how it is hurting their own self-interest since it is simply not sustainable.”

Then this affable man takes a sip of his coffee before adding: “This shows how capitalism has lost its soul.” As I walked around the homes in his community, many with neat little gardens and wheels hidden by fake brick facades, it was hard to argue.

Author: GINA DAVIDSON, The Scotsman

New funding needs to be established by the UK and Scottish governments to kick start a “community energy revolution” if climate change targets are to be met, a major new report has claimed.

The report by WPI Economics and SP Energy Networks calls for the UK and Scottish governments to collaborate to support community groups who want to generate their own energy

But the report comes as the two administrations are at loggerheads over the COP26 climate conference due to be held in Glasgow later this year.

The Future of Community Energy document maps out the benefits the sector could deliver if given support, suggesting that over the next decade the number of community energy organisations could rise to around 4,000 across the UK – bringing a possible £1.8bn boost to local economies and creating over 8,000 jobs.

The schemes could also play a key role in meeting climate change targets by saving 2.5m tonnes of carbon emissions, while community solar panels or wind turbines could power up to 2.2m homes across the UK, and cut energy bills of households involved by up to £150m a year. A Citizens Advice Scotland report has found that one in eight Scots say their energy bills are unaffordable.

According to the report, the government should establish a national community energy strategy with a community energy fund; create new, regional funding streams; and give greater support and resource to groups who want to set up schemes.

Frank Mitchell, chief executive of SP Energy Networks said the report showed “just how much potential there is within our communities in our drive to a zero- carbon future, lowering emissions with the additional benefit of driving up skills and jobs across the UK.”

Last week MSPs on Holyrood’s economy and energy committee were told that more investment was needed if a broader range of people were to benefit from the decarbonisation of energy. A recent Climate Emergency Response Group report also said the Scottish Government needed to generate public and private investment of between £1.8bn and £3.6bn a year, to achieve its carbon emissions goals by 2045.

Community and local energy schemes are being encouraged as a way to increase renewable energy production, taking strain off the national grid, and creating new revenues for local areas. Today the Scottish Parliament also agreed to give rates relief to district heating schemes to encourage more be established.

Mr Mitchell said: “The report also shows what might be possible by highlighting the innovative efforts of communities – notably in Scotland and Wales– where sustained government support and a strong backing from third sector organisations has enabled local energy to lead the way, not only in a UK context but internationally as well.”

He added: “But we’ve only just scratched the surface. Communities across the UK increasingly want to generate their own, low carbon power. As the provider of the energy networks that make this possible, SP Energy Networks is committed to doing more. But we need government and regulators to allow us to do so.

“It is time for communities to be given a stronger voice in how their areas reach Net Zero. And as this report makes clear, we need new funding streams and reduced regulation in licensing planning to meet this vision”.

Scotland’s Energy Minister, Paul Wheelhouse, said: “Our support for community energy is beyond question – indeed it is internationally recognised. We had a target for 500MW by 2020 which we have exceeded by far, and indeed we voluntarily increased it to 1GW for 2020 and 2GW for 2030.

“Progress has been good against higher target. To date, there are more than 700MW of community and locally owned projects installed, with a similar quantity in the pipeline, but we have been undermined by removal of Feed In Tariffs by UK ministers and have urged them to reconsider reinstating them.

“We have put in place Non Domestic Rates reliefs for community hydro and wind projects and continue with CARES support, but UK ministers ultimately control the ‘route to market’ and have withdrawn any subsidy for onshore wind. We continue to explore and have been encouraging shared revenue models as a means of increasing community involvement in larger projects.”

He added: “We welcome this report and SPEN’s growing interests in community energy. Many of the recommendations included in this report are similar to what we have recently consulted on in our draft Local Energy Policy Statement, for which SPEN submitted a response.

“We are currently reviewing the responses to the consultation with the intention of publishing a final statement, including a delivery framework, in the spring.”

SP Energy Networks said it would launch an “educational toolkit” to provide communities with the information needed to get schemes off the ground and connect to the grid.

Author: Glasgow Eco Trust

From Australia’s bush-fires, to Puerto Rico’s hurricane and UK floods, when a crisis hits, stories of mass destruction often dominate the headlines, but we also see the extraordinary power of communities coming together

WHAT IS THE EVENT?

Join Glasgow Eco Trust along at Yoker Community Campus for our latest Community Environmental Forum where we will explore how communities pull together in the face of emergencies and hope emerges in unexpected places.

The event, which is the next in our series of Community Environmental Forums, will start with a film screening of “The Response: How Puerto Ricans are restoring power to the people” introduced by Tom Llewellyn, leader of The Response Project for Shareable.net

This 30-minute micro-budget film from Shareable.net, an award-winning non profit media outlet, action network, and consultancy. In the wake of Hurricane Maria, a quiet revolution has been percolating on the island of Puerto Rico. What began as an impromptu community kitchen meant to help feed survivors in the town of Caguas quickly grew into an island-wide network of mutual aid centers (Centros de Apoyo Mutuo) with the ultimate goal to restore power — both electric and civic — to the people.

WORKSHOP

The film screening will be followed by a Q&A and workshop with Tom Llewellyn exploring how we might reimagine existing community spaces (churches, community centres, gardens, etc.) as “Resilience Hubs”.

WHO IS IT FOR AND WHY SHOULD I COME?

This event is for community activists and organisations, charities, community centres and hubs including churches as well as all those interested in exploring ideas for community-led resilience in emergencies.

TIMINGS

Registrations will open at 9:45am with the event starting promptly at 10:00am. Light refreshments and lunch will be provided. The event will finish by 1:00pm.

BOOKING

The event is FREE to attend but we ask that people book in advance –  book tickets.

SHAREABLE

Shareable is an award-winning non-profit news, action and connection hub for the sharing transformation.

What’s the sharing transformation? It’s a movement of movements emerging from the grassroots up to solve today’s biggest challenges, which old, top-down institutions are failing to address.