Cllr. Val Walker (18 Apr 25)

I learned yesterday afternoon of the death of Cllr. Val Walker, Convener of Edinburgh Council's Culture and Communities Committee. Cllr. Walker has been a warm, understanding and sincere support to the city's community councils and to EACC. She spoke at our events. She was a strong advocate for community councils in her committee work. She promoted their cause in the press and media. We have been the better for the lead she gave us. 

Once more ... (5 Mar 25)

What's it all for? (15 Jan 25)

This community council diet is running to its close. The hallmarks now are fatigue and a thinner fabric of member participation and local support. There's a continued undercurrent of exasperation. It's difficult to get things done; it's difficult to make the mark that community councils are supposed to make; it's difficult to command attention and to get beyond lip-service. What's it all for?

We've passed the point where Edinburgh's community councils can afford another year of the same. With new elected member and local interest group drive, they surely have to equip themselves to shout loud enough to be listened to, not just heard. To what end? To put themselves firmly in the frame where decisions on how this fast-growing city changes shape are themselves shaped by local community interests.

Elected councillors and the Council's managers have their own agendas, political and management. Their priorities are not necessarily the same as the priorities of the people who live and work here. A new balance needs to be struck. If 'local democracy' is to mean anything (and it's a phrase on the lips of Scot Gov and, now, of Scottish Labour, ahead of the 2026 elections), then its time for community councils to put new, meaningful checks and balances on both elected councilors' and the Council's endeavours, ambitions and often blinkered drive. (KR)

EACC into 2025: (8 Oct 24)

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)