Democracy, Local Government, Scotland
Sometimes We Win
Posted on January 20, 2012 by Alyson Macdonald | 3 Comments
After the heartbreaking defeats of several popular anti-cuts campaigns in the last few months, we can sometimes forget that campaigning isn’t always a futile activity. But yesterday, after a six-month-long campaign by local residents, the City of Edinburgh Council voted to reject proposals to privatise two major service areas. The proposals were part of an [...]
Cuts and Privatisation: Still on Edinburgh’s Agenda in 2012
Posted on January 9, 2012 by Alyson Macdonald | 3 Comments
In November 2011, the City of Edinburgh Council took the decision not privatise environmental services (that’s waste and recycling, street cleaning, and parks maintenance), following pressure from a local grassroots campaign. I’ve been involved in the campaign from the early stages and it has been amazing to see how a little bit of public scrutiny [...]
Edinburgh’s Not for Sale – Time to Stop Privatisation Plans
Posted on October 27, 2011 by Peter McColl | No Comments
Today City of Edinburgh Councillors are making the most important decision of their political careers. The Liberal Democrat-led administration has proposed a dramatic change in the level and mechanism of service delivery. While there’s been a lot of discussion of the Edinburgh Trams this change, if implemented, promises to turn vast swathes of Council services [...]
Privatisation and the SNP
Posted on October 27, 2011 by Alyson Macdonald | 1 Comment
While Alex Salmond received a hero’s welcome at the SNP conference in Inverness last weekend, controversy has been brewing back in Edinburgh. On Thursday, the City of Edinburgh Council – led by a coalition of the Liberal Democrats and SNP – will be taking the first of a series of votes on whether council services [...]
The Cost of Efficiency Savings
Posted on August 8, 2011 by Alyson Macdonald | 1 Comment
Of all the dirty tactics that the Conservatives have deployed since coming to power, using the localism agenda as a cover for massive austerity measures has to be one of the dirtiest. Local authorities, which provide the public services that so many people use on a day-to-day basis – social care, housing, schools – have [...]
Save Our Services: East Edinburgh Edition
Posted on July 30, 2011 by Alyson Macdonald | 2 Comments
Sometimes, something happens that restores your faith in activism, and humanity in general. This week, I had one of those moments at a public meeting for Save Our Services East Edinburgh. I’ve been to a lot of meetings since the Coalition government came to power, and not all of them have been terribly interesting or [...]
2011 Election Night Liveblog
Posted on May 5, 2011 by Alasdair Thompson | 10 Comments
Tonight we’re going to try something different (well, for us) here at Bright Green and attempt to live blog the results of today’s elections as they come in. It’s not something we’ve done before, though we have live tweeted one or twice, so bear with us if the technology doesn’t always quite work or if [...]
It’s better to break the law than to break the poor
Posted on February 23, 2011 by Alex Wood | 3 Comments
Brenner’s unemployment mortality rate formula suggests that the cuts will result in the deaths of approximately 20,000 people due unemployment alone. What we are witnessing then is the nothing less than a genocide of the vulnerable. In the face of such brutality the only moral position open to councillors is to refuse to act as the executioner for this government of millionaires. We must create a campaign similar to those in the 1920′s and 1980′s based upon the setting of illegal no cuts budgets.
Countering Council Cuts: Local Alternatives to Austerity
Posted on February 22, 2011 by Alasdair Thompson | 3 Comments
This post was first published 3 weeks ago, but we’ve decided to re-post as a response to this controversial piece on Liberal Conspiracy. Photo courtesy of Guardian Edinburgh via flickr While we’ve rightly been focussed so far national campaigns, defending welfare and education, we mustn’t overlook the fact that many of the cuts we are [...]
10 things you may not have known about RBS
Posted on February 21, 2011 by Adam Ramsay | 12 Comments
10 things you may not have known about the bank you own: We own 84% of RBS. They’ll be announcing their profits this week, and UK Uncutters across the country will be sitting in branches to remind everyone who it is that caused this crisis – and who is paying for it. But I thought [...]
keep looking »