Chamber and committees

My second question is for Bernadette Monaghan. We heard from the Coalition for Racial Equality and Rights that CPPs may be “race-blind” when it comes to tackling inequalities. What do you do in practice to ensure that fall communities, including communities of interest and identity, get their voices heard in community planning?

I will go to Mark McAteer first. The Community Planning Improvement Board said that councils seem to be focused on consultation and engagement, but not necessarily on empowering communities to make decisions. Will you set out for the committee the difference between consultation and engagement, and empowerment? Do you have any examples from across the country of what genuine empowerment looks like?

Yes, I am finished, convener. Thank you.

I appreciate the impact of the timing of the allocation from the UK Government, but this is a recurring theme. It is a pattern every year in local government budgets: the Government comes to the chamber, tells members that there is no more money left, asks us to identify cuts and, at the very last minute, announces extra money from the back of the sofa or out of a hat. That is treating local council colleagues with contempt.

We will vote for the order to allow councils to get the money that has been allocated to them, but it is clear that it will result in more pain and misery for local communities.

We will not oppose the order today, because we know that it is necessary to get funding allocated to councils. However, as we indicated during stages 1 and 3 of the budget process, we do not support the 2023-24 budget because it is laced with yet more cuts and could lead to rocketing council tax bills and up to 7,000 jobs going from local government.

Councillors in all 32 local authorities and from every political party, including the SNP, are having to make heartbreaking decisions—decisions that are of this Government’s making. Some £6 billion has been cut from services since 2013, but the Government seems to look the other way.

Roads are crumbling, libraries are closing and bins are overflowing. Staff have been left with no option but to strike, which has left schools closed across the country. Now, it is left to councillors to take tough decisions to balance the books. There have been council tax increases of 5 per cent, 6 per cent, 7 per cent and up to 10 per cent across the country.

Not only has the Government passed the buck during a cost of living crisis when food, utility and housing bills are soaring, but the public will have to pay for worse services and foot the bill for the SNP’s neglect of local councils and communities.

In my region, SNP-led Falkirk Council asked its executive to green light a plan to put 133 buildings up for sale. School pools, Grangemouth stadium, sports halls, gyms, park buildings and village and community halls were all flogged to fill a deficit, and with them went 200 jobs. SNP-led Aberdeen City Council’s review could result in swathes of its services, including social work, its welfare fund, council tax collection, health and safety enforcement and free school meals being put up as options for outsourcing.

The smoke and mirrors, political spin and, at times, what verges on dishonest presentation of the budget figures and their impact meant that there was no real debate about the budget; there was only game playing and spin that defied and denied reality. At the time, ministers complained about changes to their budget in real terms, but they talked in the same breath about changes to local government budgets in cash terms.

We spent hours in the chamber, demanding an honest discussion about where we would spend additional funding and where we would cut, but the truth is that, with no honest starting point, we never had a conversation. When the Government claimed during the initial allocation in the budget process that there would be an uplift of £570 million to local government, where was the honest conversation? How could we possibly have an honest starting point when that was the Government claim? Even if that was true and realistic, it was still only half of what the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities had asked for to protect essential services. Even that figure did not make it to the end of the day, because the true number was £71 million once existing policy commitments were taken into account.

The Fraser of Allander Institute set the record straight, making it clear that the Government’s funding proposal would represent a real-terms cut to local government budgets. Even the £223 million that was announced at stage 3 was committed spend; it was not additional funding for councils to spend on protecting services. Councils have been left to continue to make cuts. Like every other year, the SNP said that there was no more money, and then we got to stage 3 and it allocated additional funding at the very last minute.

At that point, some councils had already had their budget meetings and some had already set their budgets. When the Government comes to the chamber on the final day of the stage 3 process to announce additional funding, it shows absolute contempt for its so-called partners in local government.

The Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015 was supposed to strengthen people’s voices and to give them a say in the services that they rely on. Has that been realised at all as a result of the act, particularly in relation to disadvantaged and marginalised communities? What more should we be asking Government to do to realise that and to give those marginalised and disadvantaged communities a voice in the services that they rely on?

My final question, which is a broad one, is probably for all four witnesses. Are people in the groups with which you are involved even aware of community planning partnerships? Do they know what the partnerships do and how to get involved in them?

Thank you for that answer. The other issue that I want to cover is one that the SFHA raised last week. What is the Government’s view of mid-market rent being part of the affordable housing supply programme and being covered by the private sector rent cap? Given the SFHA’s comments last week, is the Government considering amending the type of tenancy for mid-market rent in the housing bill that you plan to introduce after the summer recess?

Thanks for that, Stuart. That leads me on to my next question, which is about how empowered communities feel. The Scottish household survey statistics flagged up that communities feel less empowered. Do people know what community planning partnerships are? Do they know that they exist or what they do? What can we do—or ask the Government to do—to increase awareness of what community planning partnerships do and how people can get involved and have their voices heard, so that people make decisions about their services?

A report on the impact of the Christie commission said:

“community empowerment comes from strong relationships between community members and staff in public services”.

That is obvious and goes without saying.

Since the 2015 act was introduced, has there been a change in how open public service staff are, and how they go out, engage with and build relationships and trust with marginalised communities? Is the culture changing among staff in public services to the extent that we are getting meaningful engagement and participation?