Talks and Tales: The Childhood Writing of Christine Orr
21 August 2019 – 22 March 2020
Writers’ Museum, Lawnmarket, Lady Stair’s Close, EH1 2PA
Free admission
The Writers’ Museum is now exhibiting two beautiful manuscript illustrated magazines produced in Edinburgh by Christine Orr and friends between 1911 and 1916. Continue reading Revealed: the childhood talent of Christine Orr
Ambitious plans for redefining health and social care services in Edinburgh have been published.
The Edinburgh Integration Joint Board (EIJB), which oversees the delivery of services which support the wellbeing of adults in the Capital, says it will radically transform the way Edinburgh delivers its health and social care services over the next three year planning cycle and beyond. Continue reading “First step on a long journey” – EIJB strategic plan approved
Edinburgh Tory councillor Cameron Rose told school student climate strikers yesterday that he was “sceptical” about the science of climate emergency.
This is despite overwhelming and compelling scientific evidence recognised by almost all environmental scientists and the United Nations. Continue reading Tory councillor schooled on climate breakdown
Council Leader Adam McVey describes the Capital Coalition’s programme for the next six months, which aims to deliver substantial progress for Edinburgh …
As we pass the midpoint of another bumper festival season, our focus rightly remains on making the case for new powers, such as a visitor levy, to support future investment and to manage the impact of tourism in the city – as well as a licensing regime to regulate short term lets.
There are now 12,000 Edinburgh properties listed on AirBnB alone and, earlier this summer, our enforcement team found a lettings company running 40 unauthorised residential lets in one block in Western Harbour.
Put simply: we need more power to take stronger action.
Major public realm projects like the re-imagination of George Street and its surrounding streets – which just scooped a fantastic £20m in Sustrans funding – as well as the City Centre Transformation, City Mobility Plan and proposals for Low Emission Zones are hugely ambitious and will move substantially ahead as we move towards Christmas.
As well as transforming the way we get around and spend time in our city, we also need to move with the times and respond to changing retail trends. Towards the end of the year we’ll report back on our ongoing major consultation on the future of retail in the city centre, including Princes Street, which aims to make sure we’re making the most of our world famous thoroughfare.
Autumn sees the Transport Bill reach its final stages in Parliament, which amongst other things, will give local government the power to decide on a Workplace Parking Levy.
We believe that these powers, which have been used to such great effect by Nottingham Council, will allow us to invest in better and more public transport, reduce congestion and help to improve air quality – all contributing towards achieving our super-ambitious (but achievable) target of becoming a net-zero carbon Capital by 2030.
Tackling poverty and inequality are also vital to enabling everyone to share in this great city’s success. The Poverty Commission, which we brought together late last year, is already taking great strides in its work and is due to bring back its final recommendations early next year. There is no doubt these will be challenging for us as council – just as they will be for the city as whole.
We are continuing to invest heavily in our young people and in the buildings where they learn. Over the summer we’ve carried out extensive repair and maintenance across our school estate alongside work on other Council facilities and buildings. And later this month we’ll see spades in the ground for a brand new primary school in Broomhills – Edinburgh’s first new primary school in a generation.
In Early Years, we’ve got 3,000 pupils already receivng the additional hours and have recruited 360 new staff to help plan for the full rollout of 1,140 funded hours next August, with 79 partner providers on board and five forest kindergartens up and running by late October to add to the mix.
Meanwhile, work is due to get under way on the new Castlebrae High School towards the end of 2019, and four new classrooms at Queensferry Primary School will open next month, when we also expect to hear if we’ve been successful in our bid for funding for the next wave of of new schools, with Currie top of the list.
Health and Social Care services and the way they’re delivered are set for a shake-up with the rollout of a bold new vision that is modern, sustainable and tackles inequality. The Edinburgh Integration Joint Board’s ‘Strategic Plan’ aims to take our health and social care services to a place where, for the first time, we have our own ‘Edinburgh Model’ of health care, best suited to our people and our communities.
Our ambitious house-building programme is delivering results across the city and along with our housing association partners we currently have 2,300 affordable homes under construction. This autumn, we’ll submit a masterplan to create an exceptional new neighbourhood on the land around the new Meadowbank Sports Centre, comprising mixed tenure housing with a minimum of 35% affordable homes for social and mid-market rent.
Before Christmas, we’ll consult on a pivotal strategy to inform the city’s future development – the City Plan 2030. Starting in December, the Choices for City Plan 2030 consultation will gather residents’ views to help shape a sustainable, inclusive and successful Edinburgh for generations to come.
Planning ahead for Edinburgh’s future, while simultaneously driving up service standards in the here and now is critical for us. It’s vital we get the basics right and we’re continuing to drive up performance in waste and cleansing services and in our roads. Meanwhile, we’ll work to improve further on our best road condition score since 2014; major roads resurfacing schemes this financial year include £2m worth of investment in Lothian Road, Gilmerton Road, Portobello Road and Liberton Gardens.
Our 2050 Edinburgh City Vision will launch later this year having had the highest response of any previous engagement activity ever conducted by the Council with nearly 55,000 distinct visions were received from residents and organisations.
So, the next six months will be busy. A new vision for the city, substantial progress on the delivery of our Programme for the Capital and further improvement in the core services that we all rely upon. We remain committed to ensuring all residents can all share in its success with an inclusive economy and City.
As we move towards the half way point of our administration, we’ve not lost sight or drive in delivering on that agenda.
The council leader himself will be absent for part of that six months, of course. Adam and his partner have adopted two boys and Councillor McVey, Edinburgh’s youngest ever council leader, is taking a six-week paternity break from council duties – he’ll be back in October.
When: Wednesday 21 August at 6pm
Where: Craigroyston Community High School, 67 Pennywell Road
Sign up and join us for a cup of tea, a bite to eat and a chat with people in your area. We want to understand what services you use and value to help us spend and save in the right areas.
Help us shape your city’s budget and register for the session at edinburgh.gov.uk/change
How would you spend £1 billion? What Council services would you prioritise where you live and citywide? This sounds like a lot of money, but it has to go a long way to meet the needs of our growing population. We want to provide the best services we can with the limited resources we have.
The Council are hosting open sessions where citizens will be invited to take part in group discussions with other people in your area, designed to raise awareness of where the Council invests its resources now.
So, what do you think we can do differently? What services are used and valued by you, your family, your community and fellow Edinburgh residents?
If you are interested in having a cuppa and a bite to eat with people in your area, and giving us your views about the future of Council services, please register using the link below.
Please note, spaces are limited and will be allocated on a first come first served basis.
Education, Children and Families Convener Councillor Ian Perry writes about the positive progress being made in meeting the increased 1140 hours early learning and childcare in a year’s time:
Last week heralded one year to go before we have to meet the ambitious target of providing an additional 1140 hours funded early learning and childcare in Edinburgh. Providing double the number of hours for three and four-year-olds plus eligible two-year-olds is a huge undertaking.
It presents many challenges but thanks to innovative thinking by the Council and early years staff and full Scottish Government funding we are making positive progress towards meeting this ambitious target.
Our exciting and forward-thinking plans, underpinned by four key themes of quality, flexibility, accessibility and affordability, are transforming the early years learning and childcare landscape in the Capital.
Unlike some other local authorities Edinburgh started implementing the additional hours two years ago giving us plenty of time to take on board any lessons learnt and adapt our plans going forward.
We already have over 3,000 children benefitting from the extra hours and our proactive approach to taking our partner providers with us on this journey has resulted in 79 of them coming on board and five forest kindergartens up and running by late October to add to the mix.
There’s no doubt that two of the biggest challenges are recruiting staff and providing the necessary infrastructure.
Through our recent national recruitment drive we have an additional 360 staff already in place ranging from senior early officers and practitioners to modern apprentice trainees. Add to this our own Early Learning and Childcare Academy which is helping grow and develop our workforce by delivering training and upskilling staff.
Our new state-of-the-art early years settings are all designed on sector-leading research to support children’s learning and development and aim to be nurturing environments which are homely, inviting and calming.
New buildings have already opened at Corstorphine, Davidson’s Mains, Ferryhill and Leith primary schools with early years centres also opening at Granton and Tynecastle.
We are currently on site building five more nurseries this coming year at Craigentinny, Granton, Nether Currie, St John Vianney and St Mark’s primary schools. Each of these will provide between 64 and 137 places and are expected to open their doors in Spring 2020.
Other innovative ideas to meet the additional hours include our partnership with the Scottish Childminding Association and our successful Forest Kindergarten project which is going from strength to strength.
We now have three fully operational forest kindergartens sites at Laurieston Castle, Cammo and Cliftonhall and a further two sites will be ready in October at Craigmillar and Newbattle providing a blended model of early learning and childcare for around 200 children.
There are now 11 local authority settings open from 8am to 6pm all year round and we are considering proposals to open more settings for 50 weeks a year.
Obviously, we will continue to engage with the community as our plans progress and are always wanting to hear innovative and new ideas.
This is an exciting time for early learning and childcare in Edinburgh. We and our partners are grasping this opportunity with both hands to ensure our children get the best possible start in life on their journey to becoming successful learners, confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors.
A Met Office yellow warning remains in place until 6pm this evening. Forecasters say heavy rain possible in the Edinburgh area, perhaps leading to travel disruption and some flooding.
This severe weather follows several instances of exceptional rainfall throughout June, July and, most recently this week, resulting in localised flooding and surface water around the city. Continue reading Be prepared warning as more rain forecast
The Council has agreed a timetable to progress its next local development plan, City Plan 2030, to help shape a sustainable, inclusive and successful Edinburgh.
Continue reading Planning Ahead: city council working on plan for 2030
Edinburgh’s pupils head back to school next week after the long (too long, say some harassed parents!) summer holidays. The chances are the children will have their brand new uniform, pencil-cases and gym stuff … but pupils at Ferryhill will have one extra item to remember – a snorkel!
Pupils at the Drylaw primary school are taking part in an exciting new ‘Active Routes to School’ pilot organised by the city council – and part of their daily routine will be a swim on the way to school!
The city council’s Education vice-convener Alison Dickie – herself a former teacher at Ferryhill School – explained: “We have been encouraging parents and carers to avoid taking their children to school by car, but the uptake in alternatives like walking and cycling has been disappointing.
“”We know that children love to swim, so we thought that introducing a ‘natural fairy pool’ water feature to streets in Drylaw would encourage the children to take a dip before and after school. Everyone knows swimming is very good for your health and of course it’s great fun too!
“Using the latest Edinburgh People Survey results we were able to ascertain that no less than 103.5% of people in Drylaw favoured the free scheme – and only 02.35 were against. You can’t argue with wtatistics like that, so we are now planning to ‘dive in’!
“We believe this is a first for Scotland and once again Edinburgh’s Capital Coalition leads the way!”
Trials took place at Drylaw Neighbourhood Centre earlier this year (above) and they were such a success that the pilot will be introduced at the start of the new term. The first public ‘pool’ opens on Easter Drylaw Avenue next week.
The Scottish Government fully supports the initiative. A spokesperson said: “Public health is our number one priority. Especially tackling obesity. So is education, that’s our number one priority, too, so this scheme really ticks all the boxes. An added bonus is that it costs us nothing so we are delighted to pass these savings on to our stakeholders, who are our top priority.”
While there may be some inconvenience for local residents, it’s believed that the benefits of ‘Swim to School’ far outweigh the disadvantages. There are some benefits for local businesses too.
A spokesperson for Farmer Autocare said: “Business has been booming over recent years with the damage potholes have been doing to cars on the city’s roads. Drivers will know to their cost just how expensive suspension repairs can be!
“Closing some roads may cause a slight ‘dip’ in profits – excuse the pun! – but the waterlogged roads could provide us with new business when cars’ electrical systems pack in. That can be a very expensive repair, too so, all in all, while it’s misery for the motorists it’s a win, win for us! Happy sailing!”
The Met Office has issued a yellow warning for rain for much of the UK, including most of Scotland. It is in place until midnight tonight, and follows localised flooding after heavy rain on Wednesday.
The city council has received more than 8,000 consultation responses to the consultation on major changes proposed for Edinburgh’s city centre. The capital’s population is now aroung half a million people.
The Council went out to consultation on three different proposals over the summer: Edinburgh City Centre Transformation, Meadows to George Street and Low Emission Zones during May, June and July. Continue reading “Tremendous response” to three council consultations
