Initial fears that devolution would lead to the centralisation of power at the Scottish national level have been supported by the experience of Scotland's community councils since the establishment of devolution in 1999.
This is the view of the Association of Scottish Community Councils in evidence submitted to the (Calman) Commission on Scottish Devolution. ASCC argued that the major beneficiaries of devolution have been the big players such as the four major political parties, the Scottish Parliament and the local authorities. Scotland's local communities, as judged the experience of Scotland's 1200 local community councils, have not witnessed any major positive improvement in their standing and the modest resources that go to them - and this despite manifesto commitments from three of the major parties in the 2007 Scottish Parliament elections.
The ASCC evidence which was drafted by ASCC Vice-President Norman Bonney and endorsed by the ASCC Executive Council can be found at;
www.commissiononscottishdevolution.org.uk/uploads/2008-09-02-association-of-scottish-community-councils.pdf
Tuesday, 30 September 2008
Friday, 18 July 2008
Community Councils and Community Empowerment
ASSOCIATION OF SCOTTISH COMMUNITY COUNCILS
www.ascc.org.uk
Draft Policy Statement on Community Councils and Community Empowerment
July 2008
Draft for consultation; Please send any comments to the author by 30 August 2008
If the Scottish government and Scottish local authorities are serious about the idea of community empowerment they need look no further than to assist in strengthening community councils. The existing 1100 plus Scottish community councils provide a sound basis for the further development of democratic local community organisations that provide advice on local public services and community issues and which have the potential to undertake a wider range of functions devolved from local authorities to local communities.
Statutory Basis
Community councils are unique Scottish organisations established by an open public process of nomination and election under local government legislation to ‘ascertain, coordinate and express’ the views of local communities to local authorities and other public agencies whose activities impinge on the well-being of their local communities. They are well placed to be in touch with local communities since they represent, on average, local populations of about 4,500 people and their meetings being regularly attended by local authority members are a way for them to keep in touch with local communities. Community councils have special statutory representational rights with regard to development control, planning issues and licensing matters and they regularly make known local views on numerous local issues such as traffic, bus services, litter, anti-social behaviour and youth services.
In some local authority areas they are emerging as important partners in the community planning process.
Cost-effective
Typically community councils exist on a local authority provided budget of a few hundred pounds per annum. This enables them to perform their essential secretarial and representational business. Additional funding for community councils from the Scottish government and the local authorities would make them much more effective, more able to represent their communities and more capable of undertaking local services. Most importantly since they are largely staffed by volunteers and have minimal local authority staff support they are not costly and an expansion of support for them would provide by far the most cost-effective means of empowering local communities compared to the large sums (in the many millions of pounds) that have historically been provided to promote citizen participation in local communities through Scottish government and local authority programmes.
Democratic
While about one fifth of the Scottish population still does not have a community council they can easily be established by an ‘off the shelf’ kit that is provided by each local authority’s community council scheme upon a petition by at least twenty electors in the relevant area. Local authorities that are serious about community empowerment could actively encourage the establishment of community councils where they do not exist and support them more where they do exist.
Community councils are sometimes criticised for not being democratic in the sense that there are usually only sufficient nominations forthcoming to fill the number of vacancies available on a specific community council, thus obviating the need for an election. However community councils are regularly reconstituted, usually every three or four years, by a process of open public nomination. More contested elections would be welcome and ASCC expects this to be the case as interest in community councils grows but it should not be overlooked that community councils provide a publicly accountable framework across Scotland through which over 13,000 citizens are regularly involved in attempting to improve Scotland’s local communities. With 40% of community councillors being female community councils have a better performance in this regard than local authorities or the Scottish and Westminster Parliaments.
The Best Model of Community Empowerment
There is no comparable set of organisations available across Scotland to promote citizen participation. Tenants’ organisations are based on peoples’ housing circumstances. Residents’ associations do not have the framework of public accountability that governs community councils. Local authority forums are based on the agenda and priorities of the local authorities themselves. As the Commission on Local Government and the Scottish Parliament commented community councils are genuinely independent and autonomous local associations of citizens concerned to promote the betterment of their local communities. They exercise their rights as citizens and residents to speak up on behalf of their local communities. They make a significant contribution to local democracy and there is much more that they could do.
The Way Forward
ASCC is working with the Scottish Government to enhance the quality of Scotland’s community councils through the promotion of a National Model Scheme through which community councils and local authorities can promote improvements in their current ways of working. ASCC aims also to work with the Scottish Government and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities to ensure that the community empowerment agenda to which both those organisations are committed is centrally focused on using community councils as the most democratic, available and cost-effective mechanism of delivering community empowerment.
Norman Bonney
Vice-President
Association of Scottish Community Councils
e-mail; activecitizen@blueyonder.co.uk
2.7.08
www.ascc.org.uk
Draft Policy Statement on Community Councils and Community Empowerment
July 2008
Draft for consultation; Please send any comments to the author by 30 August 2008
If the Scottish government and Scottish local authorities are serious about the idea of community empowerment they need look no further than to assist in strengthening community councils. The existing 1100 plus Scottish community councils provide a sound basis for the further development of democratic local community organisations that provide advice on local public services and community issues and which have the potential to undertake a wider range of functions devolved from local authorities to local communities.
Statutory Basis
Community councils are unique Scottish organisations established by an open public process of nomination and election under local government legislation to ‘ascertain, coordinate and express’ the views of local communities to local authorities and other public agencies whose activities impinge on the well-being of their local communities. They are well placed to be in touch with local communities since they represent, on average, local populations of about 4,500 people and their meetings being regularly attended by local authority members are a way for them to keep in touch with local communities. Community councils have special statutory representational rights with regard to development control, planning issues and licensing matters and they regularly make known local views on numerous local issues such as traffic, bus services, litter, anti-social behaviour and youth services.
In some local authority areas they are emerging as important partners in the community planning process.
Cost-effective
Typically community councils exist on a local authority provided budget of a few hundred pounds per annum. This enables them to perform their essential secretarial and representational business. Additional funding for community councils from the Scottish government and the local authorities would make them much more effective, more able to represent their communities and more capable of undertaking local services. Most importantly since they are largely staffed by volunteers and have minimal local authority staff support they are not costly and an expansion of support for them would provide by far the most cost-effective means of empowering local communities compared to the large sums (in the many millions of pounds) that have historically been provided to promote citizen participation in local communities through Scottish government and local authority programmes.
Democratic
While about one fifth of the Scottish population still does not have a community council they can easily be established by an ‘off the shelf’ kit that is provided by each local authority’s community council scheme upon a petition by at least twenty electors in the relevant area. Local authorities that are serious about community empowerment could actively encourage the establishment of community councils where they do not exist and support them more where they do exist.
Community councils are sometimes criticised for not being democratic in the sense that there are usually only sufficient nominations forthcoming to fill the number of vacancies available on a specific community council, thus obviating the need for an election. However community councils are regularly reconstituted, usually every three or four years, by a process of open public nomination. More contested elections would be welcome and ASCC expects this to be the case as interest in community councils grows but it should not be overlooked that community councils provide a publicly accountable framework across Scotland through which over 13,000 citizens are regularly involved in attempting to improve Scotland’s local communities. With 40% of community councillors being female community councils have a better performance in this regard than local authorities or the Scottish and Westminster Parliaments.
The Best Model of Community Empowerment
There is no comparable set of organisations available across Scotland to promote citizen participation. Tenants’ organisations are based on peoples’ housing circumstances. Residents’ associations do not have the framework of public accountability that governs community councils. Local authority forums are based on the agenda and priorities of the local authorities themselves. As the Commission on Local Government and the Scottish Parliament commented community councils are genuinely independent and autonomous local associations of citizens concerned to promote the betterment of their local communities. They exercise their rights as citizens and residents to speak up on behalf of their local communities. They make a significant contribution to local democracy and there is much more that they could do.
The Way Forward
ASCC is working with the Scottish Government to enhance the quality of Scotland’s community councils through the promotion of a National Model Scheme through which community councils and local authorities can promote improvements in their current ways of working. ASCC aims also to work with the Scottish Government and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities to ensure that the community empowerment agenda to which both those organisations are committed is centrally focused on using community councils as the most democratic, available and cost-effective mechanism of delivering community empowerment.
Norman Bonney
Vice-President
Association of Scottish Community Councils
e-mail; activecitizen@blueyonder.co.uk
2.7.08
Tuesday, 17 June 2008
Community Councils and the New Planning Arrangements
Community councils play an important role in the planning and development control process. They monitor planning applications in their area and make representations to the planning authority with respect to them. They are the most systematically organised of community groups in terms of their ability to represent community interests in the planning process because of their statutory rights to be informed of development proposals and to make representations about them. While their representations may on occasion be unsuccessful they often influence decisions in such a way as to secure improvements in the final approved version of the application. On occasion, too, they are unsuccessful in influencing a decision and may sometimes feel aggrieved about the outcome.
One intention of the new planning arrangements is to move from a culture of automatic objections to one of considered representations. The Association of Scottish Community Councils welcomes the greater emphasis in the new arrangements on pre-application consultation by developers. While this happens to some degree at present a more general resort to early consultation over planning and development applications by developers with community councils should enable an accommodation of interests to be reached at an earlier stage of the process. However, community councils which are unhappy with the proposals, may well continue to make vigorous representations through all stages of the process.
Enhancing the community input into planning
Those concerned to enhance the role of communities in the planning process need look no further than in the direction of community councils. In the one fifth of Scotland where they do not exist an ‘off the shelf kit’ to establish one is to be found in the local authority’s community council scheme. Where they do exist they are the only community organisations that can claim to be constituted by an open process of public nomination, accountable to the local community. They conduct their business in public on behalf of the local community and are subject to regular processes of re-election.
Some community councillors are very knowledgeable and skilled in development control and planning matters. Some local authorities already provide training in such matters for community councillors. But wider provision of training for community councillors in the new arrangements for planning and development control, and a more general encouragement of community councils, would greatly enhance the capacity of local communities to participate in a constructive and informed manner in the new planning and development control system.
Extract from a speech at the Holyrood conference on 'Taking Stock: Scotland's Planning System in 2008', 16 June 2008, Edinburgh. www.holyrood.com
One intention of the new planning arrangements is to move from a culture of automatic objections to one of considered representations. The Association of Scottish Community Councils welcomes the greater emphasis in the new arrangements on pre-application consultation by developers. While this happens to some degree at present a more general resort to early consultation over planning and development applications by developers with community councils should enable an accommodation of interests to be reached at an earlier stage of the process. However, community councils which are unhappy with the proposals, may well continue to make vigorous representations through all stages of the process.
Enhancing the community input into planning
Those concerned to enhance the role of communities in the planning process need look no further than in the direction of community councils. In the one fifth of Scotland where they do not exist an ‘off the shelf kit’ to establish one is to be found in the local authority’s community council scheme. Where they do exist they are the only community organisations that can claim to be constituted by an open process of public nomination, accountable to the local community. They conduct their business in public on behalf of the local community and are subject to regular processes of re-election.
Some community councillors are very knowledgeable and skilled in development control and planning matters. Some local authorities already provide training in such matters for community councillors. But wider provision of training for community councillors in the new arrangements for planning and development control, and a more general encouragement of community councils, would greatly enhance the capacity of local communities to participate in a constructive and informed manner in the new planning and development control system.
Extract from a speech at the Holyrood conference on 'Taking Stock: Scotland's Planning System in 2008', 16 June 2008, Edinburgh. www.holyrood.com
Friday, 30 May 2008
The Police and Community Councils
COMMUNITY COUNCILS’ GOOD POLICING PRACTICE HIGHLIGHTED
The regular monthly meetings of hundreds of community councils around Scotland were highlighted as examples of good practice in community policing by ASCC in evidence to the Justice Committee of the Scottish Parliament on 27 May 2008. The regular monthly meetings at which local residents report their concerns to local police officers and the police report back to the community provide one of the most important regular and systematic channels of communication between police and the communities they serve, according to ASCC Vice-President Norman Bonney, who gave verbal evidence for ASCC at the inquiry. In the future, he stressed, building stronger community councils can also assist in improving the quality of local community policing.
In their evidence Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary stated that it saw its role as ‘working with others to improve communities’. This, of course, is much the same role that community councils set themselves and emphasises the close relationship needed between the police and the communities that they serve.
Evidence to the ASCC from its members and from the ASCC Executive Committee indicates that community councils see police attendance at their meetings as widespread and positive although they also shared the concern expressed by some other witnesses about the regular turnover of local police officers and, in a few cases, their non-attendance at their meetings.
A video recording and written record of the proceedings can be found on the Justice Committee pages of the Scottish Parliament website for 27 May 208 at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/ . Some major public libraries also hold the written record of Scottish Parliament proceedings.
The regular monthly meetings of hundreds of community councils around Scotland were highlighted as examples of good practice in community policing by ASCC in evidence to the Justice Committee of the Scottish Parliament on 27 May 2008. The regular monthly meetings at which local residents report their concerns to local police officers and the police report back to the community provide one of the most important regular and systematic channels of communication between police and the communities they serve, according to ASCC Vice-President Norman Bonney, who gave verbal evidence for ASCC at the inquiry. In the future, he stressed, building stronger community councils can also assist in improving the quality of local community policing.
In their evidence Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary stated that it saw its role as ‘working with others to improve communities’. This, of course, is much the same role that community councils set themselves and emphasises the close relationship needed between the police and the communities that they serve.
Evidence to the ASCC from its members and from the ASCC Executive Committee indicates that community councils see police attendance at their meetings as widespread and positive although they also shared the concern expressed by some other witnesses about the regular turnover of local police officers and, in a few cases, their non-attendance at their meetings.
A video recording and written record of the proceedings can be found on the Justice Committee pages of the Scottish Parliament website for 27 May 208 at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/ . Some major public libraries also hold the written record of Scottish Parliament proceedings.
ASCC Executive Document on the Concordat April 2008
Association of Scottish Community Councils
The Concordat between Scottish Local Government and the Scottish Executive Government
The ASCC as the representative organisation of Scotland’s 1200 community councils can assist Scottish local authorities and the Scottish Executive Government to implement their Concordat and National Outcomes and locally community councils can assist local authorities and their community planning partners to implement their single outcome agreements.
ASCC notes that the agreement includes community planning partners and the Third Sector and that community involvement is key for each local authority community plan.
National Outcomes
Community councils bring together local citizens to assess the quality of, and help to improve, neighbourhood public services. There are about 1,200 community councils
(an average figure of 37 in each local authority area) and 12,000 community councillors in Scotland and they cover about 80% of the communities of Scotland. They can contribute in many ways to all of the intended National Outcomes but particularly the following;
9 We live our lives safe from crime, disorder and danger
10 We live in well-designed, sustainable places where we are able to access the amenities and services we need.
11. We have strong, resilient and supportive communities where people take responsibility for their own actions and how they affect others.
12 We value and enjoy our built and natural environment and protect it and enhance it for future generations.
14 We reduce the local and global environmental impact of our consumption and production.
15. Our public services are high quality, continually improving, efficient and responsive to local people’s needs.
National Indicators and Targets
Community councils can assist in achieving some of the national indicators and targets such as;
13 Increase the turnover of the social economy
28 Increase the percentage of adults who rate their neighbourhood as a good place to live
31. Increase positive public perception of the general crime rate in local area
32. Reduce overall ecological footprint
33. Increase to 95% the proportion of protected nature sites in favourable condition
34 Improve the state of Scotland’s Historic Buildings, monuments and environment
43 Improve people’s perceptions of the quality of public services delivered
Local Outcome Agreements
ASCC notes that each local authority single outcome agreement is developed in conjunction with its community planning partners. Community councils are a key voice of local communities within a local authority area and can thus assist the local authority and its partners in achieving their objectives.
Menu of local indicators
1. Business community satisfaction with the local area
12 . Number of people with mental ill health relative to the Scottish average
(volunteering is known to contribute to mental well being)
28. The percentage of adult residents stating fear of crime is having a moderate or great effect on the quality of life
30. The percentage of residents stating they are satisfied with their neighbourhood
31. The incidences of vandalism, malicious damage or malicious mischief
32. The number of people killed or seriously injured in road accidents
45. Increase the proportion of municipal waste recycled
46 . Council area’s carbon/ ecological footprint
52 The number, quality and variety of affordable homes
Conclusion
ASCC is minded to engage with COSLA and the Scottish Government to ensure that community councils can nationally make their contribution to the implementation of the national concordat between those two bodies.
At local authority level community councils are to some extent active, and in many cases could potentially become much more active, in assisting local authorities and their other community planning partners in achieving the implementation of local single outcome agreements.
Norman Bonney
Vice-President, Association of Scottish Community Councils
e-mail; activecitizen22@gmail.com
26.3.08
The Concordat between Scottish Local Government and the Scottish Executive Government
The ASCC as the representative organisation of Scotland’s 1200 community councils can assist Scottish local authorities and the Scottish Executive Government to implement their Concordat and National Outcomes and locally community councils can assist local authorities and their community planning partners to implement their single outcome agreements.
ASCC notes that the agreement includes community planning partners and the Third Sector and that community involvement is key for each local authority community plan.
National Outcomes
Community councils bring together local citizens to assess the quality of, and help to improve, neighbourhood public services. There are about 1,200 community councils
(an average figure of 37 in each local authority area) and 12,000 community councillors in Scotland and they cover about 80% of the communities of Scotland. They can contribute in many ways to all of the intended National Outcomes but particularly the following;
9 We live our lives safe from crime, disorder and danger
10 We live in well-designed, sustainable places where we are able to access the amenities and services we need.
11. We have strong, resilient and supportive communities where people take responsibility for their own actions and how they affect others.
12 We value and enjoy our built and natural environment and protect it and enhance it for future generations.
14 We reduce the local and global environmental impact of our consumption and production.
15. Our public services are high quality, continually improving, efficient and responsive to local people’s needs.
National Indicators and Targets
Community councils can assist in achieving some of the national indicators and targets such as;
13 Increase the turnover of the social economy
28 Increase the percentage of adults who rate their neighbourhood as a good place to live
31. Increase positive public perception of the general crime rate in local area
32. Reduce overall ecological footprint
33. Increase to 95% the proportion of protected nature sites in favourable condition
34 Improve the state of Scotland’s Historic Buildings, monuments and environment
43 Improve people’s perceptions of the quality of public services delivered
Local Outcome Agreements
ASCC notes that each local authority single outcome agreement is developed in conjunction with its community planning partners. Community councils are a key voice of local communities within a local authority area and can thus assist the local authority and its partners in achieving their objectives.
Menu of local indicators
1. Business community satisfaction with the local area
12 . Number of people with mental ill health relative to the Scottish average
(volunteering is known to contribute to mental well being)
28. The percentage of adult residents stating fear of crime is having a moderate or great effect on the quality of life
30. The percentage of residents stating they are satisfied with their neighbourhood
31. The incidences of vandalism, malicious damage or malicious mischief
32. The number of people killed or seriously injured in road accidents
45. Increase the proportion of municipal waste recycled
46 . Council area’s carbon/ ecological footprint
52 The number, quality and variety of affordable homes
Conclusion
ASCC is minded to engage with COSLA and the Scottish Government to ensure that community councils can nationally make their contribution to the implementation of the national concordat between those two bodies.
At local authority level community councils are to some extent active, and in many cases could potentially become much more active, in assisting local authorities and their other community planning partners in achieving the implementation of local single outcome agreements.
Norman Bonney
Vice-President, Association of Scottish Community Councils
e-mail; activecitizen22@gmail.com
26.3.08
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