Meeting of the Parliament 14 May 2019
In advance of today’s debate, I took the time to read the Scottish Government’s three-page factsheet that explains the place principle. The nub of it is that folk want to shape their own lives and change them for the better. We all need to find ways to ditch the silos that exist within and across services. Of course, the real test will be how we put all of this into practice and demonstrate the place principle in the real world, as others have said, by being able to point to more than anecdotal or isolated examples or projects. It needs to move from being the exception to being the norm.
Like others, I think that it is important that the Scottish Government keeps the Parliament informed of progress. It is good to see ministers leading the debate today, but there is a role for others, and there are opportunities for local government and other public sector partners to show leadership. We need to recognise that empowering communities is not a two-dimensional approach or a top-down process. We must also accept that, if we really listen to communities, it will not always be comfortable and they will challenge orthodoxy. The local governance review is particularly important in that regard, and I ask the minister, in her summing up, to update us on its progress. The review will be important in establishing the next steps for meaningful community empowerment.
Others have alluded to the need to harness and make best use of our resources, because of austerity. As a result of austerity, the debate feels partly like a necessity, but good public sector reform and community empowerment must be far more than a cost-cutting exercising—in fact, they should not be about cutting corners. We must recognise that it is the right thing and the smart thing to have sustainable public services and to mainstream the asset-based approach that has been championed by Harry Burns because it is good for people’s psychological and physical health. It is also the gateway to establishing good preventative services on the basis of what actually works for communities.
This week, we have spent much time celebrating the past 20 years of the Parliament. There is much to celebrate, but, if I had to point to one negative, it would be that the public sector reform journey should have been started far earlier.
The child poverty delivery plan “Every child, every chance” has a central focus on earnings, the cost of living and social security policy, but it also recognises the importance of a “place-based approach” to improving quality of life and actions to prevent young people who are growing up in poverty from becoming parents who, in turn, have to bring up their children in poverty. In the plan, there is a commitment to invest £2 million in the innovative children’s neighbourhoods Scotland programme, the first such neighbourhood being in Bridgeton, in Dalmarnock. There were ambitions to extend the programme, and I would be grateful if the minister—if she has time—could update us on that.
In my constituency, there are many local community organisations, such as Fauldhouse and Breich Valley Community Development Trust Ltd and West Calder and Harburn Community Development Trust, which has a fantastic vision for the old co-operative bakery building in West Calder. There are social enterprises such as Kidzeco and the school uniform bank in West Lothian, which are responding to very harsh and real community needs. In my mind, it is such organisations that are the successors to the co-operative movement, which has a proud history in West Lothian. For many years before I entered the Parliament, I was a front-line social worker, and I will never demur from the importance of investment in public services. However, over the course of my career, I have recognised that how and by whom services are delivered is as important as how much we invest in them.
16:37