30/05/23: Scottish Parliament evidence session on Community Councils

Edinburgh Association of Community Councils

EACC: Important Links

1] CEC support for Community Council elections March 2025, including 'drop-in' events; see https://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/community-planning/community-councils/3

2] Search the CEC Community Council directory at: https://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/community-planning/community-councils

3] Keep in touch with the CEC Consultation Hub . (Use the 'search' functions for quick access)

4] Search the CEC Committee Meetings schedule and access Agenda Papers and Reports.

5] Check the current CEC Webcast Diary on Home - City of Edinburgh Council Webcasts (public-i.tv) .

6] Find background support from: the Improvement Service at: https://www.improvementservice.org.uk/about-us ; the Scottish Community Development Centre (SCDC) at: https://www.scdc.org.uk/who ; Planning Aid Scotland at: https://www.pas.org.uk/

7] To find material on recent EACC Meetings, go to menu-bar item EACC Papers and browse Meetings 2024.

Event: 23 May 2023: Scottish Parliament committee Hearing

The Scottish Parliament Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee held a three-hour evidence session on Community Councils in their 50th year.

What's been achieved? What needs to be done?

EACC was represented by Steve Kerr (Chair), sitting alongside representatives from four other CCs, three other regional CC Associations, Cheshire Association of Local (Parish) Councils, The Improvement Service, the Scottish Community Development Council, and Dr Oliver Escobar (Senior Lecturer in Public Policy) of Edinburgh University.

See the full report under Consultations.

Consultations (edinburghcommunitycouncils.org.uk)

End/KR

EACC into 2025:

1. EACC moves through its AGM in late November. It has to structure itself to help community councils with their transition through the elections in February 2025. We all have the opportunity to participate in meeting with CEC to push for strong promotion of a positive community council message beforehand. Community councils will have to play their own part in promoting their image and their purpose, along with finding new, active members and supporters to help them deliver their community undertaking. It’s an important time. Here is an interpretation of the key issues.

2. Recognition and purpose: From the Scheme Framework, community councils have a wide remit as ‘key community representative bodies’. That goes well beyond ‘planning and licensing’. The public need to know this. A well-functioning community council is a bridge to City Chambers, to Elected Councillors, to public agencies and to local business. If people don’t speak up on local issues, they can’t be heard. If they aren’t heard, they won’t be listened to. The community council’s job is to knock hard on the doors that matter. CEC’s attitude must be to welcome the call, not resent the intrusion.

3. Keeping posture and balance: A CC has to be apolitical and has to guard against being used or ‘gamed’ by special interest groups. I like the line taken by Ian Doig (Merchiston Chair) that community councils should position to stand as ‘critical friends’ of CEC, marking the Council’s cards as independent partners in the quest to make the city a good place in which to live and work. Community councils have to work together to ‘push back’ on CEC when it’s right to do so, challenging ‘tick box’ Council consultation conclusions or its cursory dismissals of studied local views offered on (say) planning and transport issues, negating the related CEC working assumptions of ‘community compliance’. This is difficult and exasperating at times. However, as ‘key community representative bodies’, that is what community councils are charged to do.

5. Having the right structure: Community councils have to work to get rid of the ‘talking shop’ image. They have to be seen as more purposeful and resourceful. The right approach is to set up as you would a ‘small business enterprise’, to be structured and run on as ‘professional’ a basis as possible. That means a big focus on ‘back office’ resourcing (secure tech, desktop publishing, communications and social media use, underpinned by accessible professional support). It also means a sharp focus on the ‘business objective’, getting things done. It really means having the financial backing to meet all reasonable operating expenses, from accommodating the community council’s meeting programme to accessing the kit it has to have.

6. The business objective: I see this as being to reach proactively into the community, establish how residents feel about what is happening in their city and around them, then to deliver purposefully that range of opinion back to CEC and other public agencies; all of this on a rolling basis. The community council needs to be the first mover. The function is close to that of a communications and opinion polling enterprise. I know that needs skills, experience, kit and backup not readily to hand in many cases, but a start can be made on the journey to acquire them. Let’s see what emerges from the discussions with CEC on their new commitments to community council promotion and support.

(KR: 8 Oct 24: In shaping this personal statement, my thanks to Richard Allen, Colin Anderson, Ian Doig, David Houston, Bill Krol, Tommy McLean, Bill Rodger, Peter Scott, Nick Stewart, Douglas Tharby.)