When Scotland first went into lockdown in March 2020, a wave of uncertainty and fear was felt throughout society as people were told to stay at home, to save lives.
But as schools, shops and offices closed, communities did not.
Local people and grassroots groups were quick to come up with innovative ways to help during the crisis. Social action accelerated and became a central feature of Scotland’s response to the lockdown and ongoing challenges of coronavirus.
In July 2020 Social Action Inquiry partners commissioned The Collective to lead on a short-term piece of research to capture the stories and lessons learned from communities coming together to help.
From food drop offs to phone calls to isolated neighbours, volunteering and wellbeing support, the research brings to life the ways people developed creative approaches to make a difference.
The final research report Together We Help is now available and shines a light on the power of communities to mobilise and initiate social action in response to the issues that matter to them.
Eighteen community researchers gathered insights from 367 people involved in social action in their local areas, asking what inspired them to be involved and what lessons can be learned to build a fairer Scotland.
The research suggested that the stigma associated with accessing support such as food banks in times of need may have reduced as demand for these vital services increased dramatically throughout lockdown in 2020.
Community researchers also found that offering support and participating in local responses to the coronavirus crisis was both a ‘blessing and a curse’ as while it helped people to feel more connected to their community it also increased awareness and feelings of frustration at the growing levels of inequality on their doorstep.
This independent inquiry will look at how communities take action and will try to contribute to a Scotland where social action is valued and is able to make change happen in communities.
It was wonderful to see the clean air movement come together for Clean Air Day 2020 at the postponed date of 8 October. For clean air has never been more important.
This report showcases what businesses, schools, community groups, charities, NHS organisations, universities and champions got up to on Clean Air Day 2020.
We want to thank everyone who took part in the day, from those who left the car at home to walk, scoot or cycle to school or work, to those who closed roads, from those who wrote to their MP, to those who planned or attended digital events, thank you for making Clean Air Day 2020 such a huge success.
A reminder Clean Air Day 2021 will be held on the 17 June.
We’ll be in touch later in the year on details of the campaign, if you have ideas or suggestions of activities you’d like to see as part of this year’s campaign, please do share them with us at cleanerair@globalactionplan.org.uk.
A panel of the public convened by the Scottish Parliament’s Covid-19 Committee has reported its findings to MSPs.
The 19-member panel, which broadly reflects the demographic make-up of Scotland, met over four Saturdays to consider the question ‘What priorities should shape the Scottish Government’s approach to COVID-19 restrictions and strategy in 2021’, hearing from experts to help inform its findings.
Key conclusions in its report include:
* The panel believes the Scottish Government should focus on stopping the spread of virus, ideally by pursuing an ‘elimination’ strategy.
* The panel believes elimination would provide the fastest way back to ‘normal’, but also recognised that this needs maximum cooperation across UK, as well as accepting travel restrictions;
* If this is not possible, the panel recommends a ‘maximum suppression’ strategy should be adopted, with a reinvigorated Test and Protect to keep case numbers low once they have dropped. The panel concluded that by tackling the direct harm of the virus head on, other harms (economic, societal, other health problems) will also reduce;
* Priority should also be given to supporting a green recovery, young people’s economic opportunities, town centres, and continuing support for businesses;
* The Scottish Government must therefore define what it is aiming to achieve and tell us what its strategy is moving forward. Key to understanding this is what it deems to be an acceptable level of infection in the population, so that it is clear what restrictions will be effective in 2021.
The panel also considered wider issues associated with the pandemic within its deliberations. It agreed:
* Previous lockdowns happened too slowly – resulting in longer lockdowns and more deaths;
* Communication and explaining strategies is key to public acceptance and understanding. This is most effective when scientists and clinicians can take centre stage;
* Globally, no one is safe until everyone is safe.
Members of the panel will give evidence to MSPs on the Covid-19 Committee about their report today (Thursday 18 February).
In the coming weeks, the report will also inform MSPs’ consideration of the possible extension of the emergency Coronavirus legislation, which is currently due to expire at the end of March.
Covid-19 Committee Convener, Donald Cameron MSP, said:“The Committee is very grateful to the members of the public and experts who gave their time to participate in deliberations.
“The steps taken to counter this virus are so drastic they would have been unimaginable a year ago. It is therefore vital we gauge the public mood as we enter into the next phase of managing the pandemic.
“The considered priorities of this broadly representative group, who have looked at the issue with fresh eyes, will help inform us as we begin to look at the likely extension of the emergency powers, and work to ensure the efforts of Government are focused in the right place.
“We are looking forward to hearing more from panel members, and testing their conclusions, at our next meeting.”
The panel was announced and first met on 16 January.
The full report and further information on the panel will be online here.
The UK Government has been urged to hold firm on its commitment to boosting the minimum wage over the course of this parliament, in order to give low paid workers a much needed pay rise. But the government must also take wider measures to boost job quality and tackle poverty, and provide additional support for employers to adapt to higher minimum wage.
New research published by the Carnegie UK Trust and the Learning and Work Institute argues that despite the pandemic and the recession it has triggered, the ambitious minimum wage targets of the next four years are both deliverable and vital for low paid workers.
In 2019, the Government pledged to increase the National Living Wage – the legal minimum wage for workers aged 25 and over – to two thirds of median pay by 2024, and to extend this rate to workers aged 21 and over. Polling commissioned by Learning and Work Institute and Carnegie UK Trust shows that a majority of workers (66%) and businesses (54%) support the move.
The report argues that increases in the minimum wage must be part of awider mission to support ‘good work’ across the economy.
Polling of employers as part of the research found that 22% of employers with a high proportion of workers on low pay said they may respond to a higher wage floor by using more insecure job contracts, with 17% saying they would cut back on non-pay benefits. 12% of low pay employers said they may remove supervisory or managerial roles in response to a higher minimum wage, risking more ‘bunching’ of workers at or near the wage floor and making progression more challenging.
The report calls for the increase to the minimum wage to be part of a wider strategy for good work, including promoting sectoral collective agreements in low pay sectors, in order to agree common standards beyond the minimum wage.
While recent increases in the minimum wage have been successful in reducing the number of people on low pay, the number of people in in-work poverty has continued to rise.
This is in part because increases in the wage floor have been accompanied by cuts to in-work benefits for those on low incomes and with high living costs, which have pushed more working people into poverty. Any increases in the wage floor need to be accompanied by better support through the social security system, including through retaining the £20 uplift in Universal Credit which is due to end in April.
The report considers support needed to help employers who are hard hit by the coronavirus pandemic to adapt to the new wage floor.
It calls for a temporary re-balancing of employer national insurance contributions (NICs) as a transitional measure to support employers to adapt and minimise any risks to employment of a higher minimum wage.
Through both increasing the threshold at which employers start to pay NICs, and increasing the rate at which NICs are paid, government could reduce the tax burden on employers who are impacted by the increase, supporting them to adjust to higher wage costs, whilst protecting overall revenue for the Treasury.
Douglas White, Head of Advocacy at Carnegie UK Trust, said:“Good work has a vital role to play in supporting wellbeing – and decent pay is of fundamental importance. Many low pay workers have been on the frontline during the pandemic and we were pleased that November’s spending review confirmed a rise in the minimum wage.
“Our report sets out a path towards future sustainable minimum wage increases – providing support for employers as they recover from the pandemic and ensuring that workers receive the pay rise that they deserve and need.
“We also urge government to be ambitious in driving forward other crucial aspects of their good work agenda, including supporting workers to train and re-skill and making progress to build back a resilient labour market from the pandemic”.
Joe Dromey, deputy director of research and development at Learning and Work Institute and author of the report, said: “Government can still achieve its commitment to boosting the minimum wage, but this will be trickier after the pandemic. A temporary rebalancing of employer national insurance contributions would help businesses to adapt to a higher wage floor, minimising any potential job losses.
“While increasing the minimum wage would deliver a much-deserved pay rise to millions of low-paid workers, this alone will not tackle the scourge of in-work poverty. Government must ensure sufficient support through the social security system, starting by retaining the £20 increase in Universal Credit.”
We have published the final report in our series looking at the future of the minimum wage, and exploring its impact on workers, employers and the economy.
The UK’s minimum wage is widely regarded as a successful policy which has achieved broad political support over the last two decades, and successfully reduced extreme low pay without damaging employment.
Despite these successes, a rising minimum wage has not been enough to tackle in-work poverty.
And even before the pandemic inflicted severe pressures on the economy, there was a need to understand the ability of businesses to adapt to a higher wage floor, and ask whether changes made by employers to accommodate higher pay might compromise other important aspects of job quality, such as progression or terms and conditions.
Our report makes recommendations about the future path of the minimum wage, and sets out proposals for how an increased minimum wage can be delivered as part of a wider labour market strategy that promotes good work and tackles in-work poverty.
We would be delighted to hear your views on the ideas in the report.
You can get in touch with us on Twitter @CarnegieUKTrust, using the hashtag #MinimumWage or you can let us know your thoughts by emailing Gail Irvine, Senior Policy and Development Officer, ongail.irvine@carnegieuk.org.
Scotland’s first Citizens’ Assembly has published its report setting out a shared vision and 60 recommendations for the country’s future.
The vision and recommendations were agreed by an overwhelming consensus of members, and cover a wide range of areas including future Citizens’ Assemblies, incomes and poverty, tax and the economy, health and wellbeing, support for young people, sustainability and further powers for the Scottish Parliament.
Doing Politics Differently: The Report of the Citizens’ Assembly of Scotland can be read online at www.citizensassembly.scot
This report has been submitted to the Scottish Government and Parliament. It will be laid in Parliament for debate, with an action plan from the Scottish Government to follow.
To accompany the report, a short film on the Vision and Recommendations agreed by the Citizens’ Assembly of Scotland, and featuring the voices of members is here: Our Vision and Recommendations – YouTube
All of the materials including evidence from previous weekends, an interim report and range of supporting papers covering previous work and articles and videos about the impact of COVID-19 are available on the Assembly website
Keep Scotland Beautiful: make Scotland ‘litter-ate’
Environmental charity, Keep Scotland Beautiful, has published a new report on Scotland’s local environmental quality highlighting an avalanche of evidence from its audits from the past two decades which points to a looming litter emergency – hidden in plain sight.
The charity is calling for eight urgent actions to make Scotland ‘litter-ate’ and is urging key stakeholders and communities to join efforts to change the way we behave to tackle unacceptable levels of litter, dog fouling, graffiti, weeds and detritus.
The report ‘Time for a new approach to tackling litter‘ highlights an accelerating decline in standards from 2013 to 2020 – with only 16% of audited sites being recorded as litter free last year compared to 31% in 2013, and dog fouling now found on 3% more streets that in 2013. In addition, results also showed a more marked decline in Scotland’s poorest neighbourhoods.
Local environmental quality standards in Scotland were already in decline before the pandemic, now nine months on, as we rely on good quality neighbourhoods for our health and wellbeing, our polling has highlighted that 30% of people believe the overall condition of their local neighbourhood deteriorated during lockdown.
Yet, despite the impact of this ‘lockdown effect’, where people have noticed an increase in the severity and prevalence of poor environmental quality, improved connections have been made with the environment and local neighbourhoods.
And, positively, Keep Scotland Beautiful has come together with others to tackle the rise in flytipping, dog fouling and littering during a challenging year. Building on this as we enter a new year is key to tackling the behaviours behind the looming litter emergency.
This is why the charity has outlined an eight-point cross sector agenda for change to tackle the complex interlinking problems leading to the decline. This includes calls for an: education and behaviour change programme to create a Scotland that is truly litter-ate; a review of the failing model of enforcement; and further collaboration to bring together a reinvigorated Scottish network working together to jointly reverse the decline.
Barry Fisher, CEO of Keep Scotland Beautifulsaid, “The increasingly visible new litter type – the single use face mask – has become a symbol of our disregard for Scotland and our fellow citizens.
“The simple truth is that we need to all start questioning our own habits – what we consume, what we throw away, and how we look after our local neighbourhoods – and we need to address the looming litter emergency head on by changing our own behaviours and working together with key partners, to build on the successes of this year.
“We must respect and look after the places that we love if we are to have any hope of solving the global climate and nature crises. Tackling the first can help the latter. We need you to join us to make our communities, businesses and individuals truly litter-ate.”
Iain Gulland, chief executive of Zero Waste Scotland, said: “Our relentless consumption of materials is Scotland’s biggest contributor to the climate crisis. The extraction, manufacture and transport of materials is a huge source of carbon emissions and something we could affect by reducing our demand for single-use items.
“It is particularly upsetting that people continue to pollute our streets, parks, streams and rivers, where they continue to cause damage for months and years to come. This needs to stop and we will continue to work with Keep Scotland Beautiful and other partners to find solutions to these issues.”
Keep Scotland Beautiful is committed to continuing efforts to support communities, local authorities, businesses, and national agencies to reverse the decline in environmental quality across Scotland – from rural to urban settings – but your support is needed.
The time to act is now. Scotland is beautiful, and we must all commit to do more to protect and enhance the places we care for.
At the start of 2020 there was a gathering momentum to conversations about the role of kindness and compassion in health and social care in Scotland. When COVID-19 happened, the healthcare system entered a period of rapid transformation in which many of the previously insurmountable ‘barriers’ to kindness appeared to fall away. In this context, it felt important to capture what was happening.
The courage to be kind draws on a series of reflective conversations, conducted between April and September 2020 with five medics working in different parts of NHS Scotland.
The conversations reflected on what can be achieved when there is a common purpose, and when work is underpinned by relationships and collaboration. But alongside the opportunities presented by changes in practice and a renewed focus on wellbeing, there was concern that these may be lost amidst a focus on remobilising and ‘getting back to normal’.
The voices in this report offer a particular perspective. But the depth of reflection, and the clear message about the need to ease some of the pressure in the system in order to ensure the wellbeing of staff and patients is one that resonates with many other conversations and is relevant and urgent right across the health service.
At the end of a year that has demanded so much from our health service, we hope that this report adds to our collective understanding of the impact of COVID-19.
As we look to develop this work, we would really value your thoughts and reflections, which you can share withben.thurman@carnegieuk.org or by joining the debate on twitter @CarnegieUKTrust.
A new report has calculated that churches across Scotland have delivered 212,214 acts of support during lockdown.
The Stories of Hope report, which was requested by the Scottish government and produced by the Evangelical Alliance and Serve Scotland, found that these acts were delivered by 3,212 volunteers and impacted 55,671 beneficiaries.
The study details how churches in over 180 locations, often in partnership with others, developed support networks and established projects to support the most vulnerable and isolated in their communities.
Projects were active across the country from the Highlands to the Borders, across the breadth of denominations and in partnership with a number of charities including CAP Scotland, the Bethany Trust, and Glasgow City Mission.
Kieran Turner, Public Policy Officer for the Evangelical Alliance in Scotland said: “2020 has been a year of disruption for all of us and churches, like many other essential services have had to adapt.
“This report has highlighted the significant impact churches up and down the country have had in supporting the most vulnerable in society.”
The report also highlighted the importance of churches partnering with local businesses and other agencies as more than two-thirds of the projects identified were delivered in partnership to provide support to those in need.
Supermarkets, community councils, businesses, NHS boards, housing associations, voluntary support groups, and food banks have all worked with churches on the ground in these projects. In addition, 11 local authorities were identified, sometimes by multiple projects, as providing emergency funding for weekly support costs.
Kieran Turner continued: “Churches have re-purposed existing services and staff and volunteers have been quickly redeployed. New projects have been set up to deliver food, phone the elderly and isolated, support those homeless or claiming asylum, and connect with children and young people who were struggling with their mental health.
“For many, these services were literally a lifeline – often the only contact in a day when all other normal support networks and buildings were closed.”
Case study: MARIE
Marie is a young mum who lives with her partner and four children in a two bedroom flat in a tower block in Aberdeen.
She first connected with Seaton Community Church through the Mums & toddlers group. When lockdown happened as she faced real financial hardship with a young baby she turned to the church’s packed lunch project for help.
The church provided daily meals and also supported the family through this daily connection with mental, emotional and spiritual support. This lifted a huge financial and emotional pressure off her shoulders and Marie has now become part of the wider church community, watching church online as well building deeper friendships with others locally.
The online survey was gathered data from May 2020 to July 2020 by the Evangelical Alliance with the aim of understanding the range and focus of church-based projects taking place across Scotland during the pandemic.
The report draws together findings from over 80 conversations with people across the UK during the first six months of the COVID-19 pandemic. It focuses on how organisations and communities were adapting to meet the changing needs of the people around them, as well as the evolving relationships between different sectors.
The report reflects that at the onset of the pandemic, it was often communities who stepped up to offer essential support, such as food and checking in on isolated individuals. The report calls for more partnership working between the public and voluntary sectors and communities: investing in communities to unlock their power.
Looking to the future, the Trust considers how to maintain working together and sharing power across sectoral and professional boundaries. The report highlights actions taken in the pandemic that could be a springboard for moving towards long-held ambitions of partnership working and more people-focused and preventative public sector services.
You can read the full report here and an accessible version is available here.
A blog on the report’s key messages is also available on our website.
We would be delighted to hear your views on the ideas put forward in the report, and you can share the report with your networks over Twitter using the hashtag #COVIDConversations.
Best wishes
Sarah
Sarah Davidson Chief Executive Carnegie UK Trust
For regular updates on all of the Trust’s projects and activities click HERE to subscribe to our bi-monthly e-newsletter.
More than 1,000 children have been waiting more than a year for treatment
The Scottish Children’s Services Coalition (SCSC), an alliance of leading independent and third sector providers of children’s services, has warned of a “mental health emergency” as new figures indicate that more than 1,000 children and young people have been waiting more than a year for mental health treatment.
The figures from Public Health Scotland also indicate that only one Scottish health board is meeting the Scottish Government’s waiting time target of 18 weeks from referral to treatment over the quarter to September 2020 and two out of five are not being seen within this 18 week target.1
The SCSC has called on the Scottish Government to redouble its efforts and for a “national crusade” to tackle this emergency as the number of referrals return to pre-lockdown levels.
It has also backed calls by the Royal College of Psychiatrists in Scotland that £145 million from additional £1.1 billion COVID-19 funding granted in the autumn be applied to mental health services.
While 4,032 children and young people were treated over the period July to September 2020 by child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS), only 60.6 per cent were seen within the 18-week waiting target and only one health board, NHS Ayrshire and Arran met this target.
The report also highlights that in September 2020, 1,060 children and young people had been waiting more than a year for treatment, up from 632 on the same point last year.3 In addition, 365 had been waiting over a year prior to treatment compared with 220 in the same quarter the previous year.
The SCSC has warned that mental health services will face an overwhelming and unprecedented pressure due to pent-up demand created by the COVID-19 lockdown, coupled with a cut in youth support services. This could potentially lead to a “lost generation” of vulnerable children and young people who are missing out on the support they vitally need.
It has called reiterated its call for a “national crusade”, with the Scottish Government working closely with authorities, including the third and independent sectors, and investing significantly in mental health services. The coalition has also urged that greater awareness is made of the services on offer, especially those at a community level.
The SCSC has warned that self-isolation and social distancing have had an impact on young people struggling with issues such as anxiety and depression. It has noted that even the most resilient children are going to need additional support as they navigate this transition back into whatever is the new normal, and some will need a lot of extra support.
A spokesperson for the SCSC commented: “These latest figures are deeply troubling and point to a highly challenging environment for both our young people and our mental health services.
“While referrals are beginning to return to pre-lockdown levels, it is vital that children and families are provided with the support they so desperately need, especially given the impact of the pandemic on mental health. The fact that more than 1,000 of our most vulnerable children have been waiting more than a year for treatment in this respect is deeply troubling.
“We would urge the Scottish Government to look to not just the NHS, but the third sector and other independent organisations to play a key role in this. Our mental health services must receive the funding they vitally need or we face a ‘lost generation’ of vulnerable children and young people.”
Waiting times (with adjustments) for people who started their treatment from July to September 2020, by NHS Board of treatment:
Health board
Total number seen
% seen within 18 weeks
NHS Island boards
62
83.9%
NHS Dumfries & Galloway
95
88.4%
NHS Ayrshire & Arran
233
91.9%
NHS Lanarkshire
248
62.1%
NHS Lothian
518
59.5%
NHS Grampian
343
85.7%
NHS Fife
274
63.9%
NHS Forth Valley
182
40.1%
NHS Borders
32
71.9%
NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde Valley
1,451
47.6%
NHS Highland
198
74.2%
NHS Tayside
396
57.8%
NHS Scotland
4,032
60.6%
The number of young people waiting for Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) in Lothian has dramatically increased since March this year.
The number of young people waiting 0-18 weeks for mental health support has dropped from 1,223 in March to 963 in September this year. The number of young people waiting over a year to be seen for mental health support has risen from 381 in March earlier this year, to 581 in September, an increase from 14.8% to 21% of young people having to wait over a year.
Waits for young peoples mental health support have been growing over the last two years, but have significantly increased over the last 6 months since Covid-19.
At the start of this year NHS Lothian invested £3 million to hire 40 extra staff including, clinical psychologists, registered nurses and occupational therapists
In September this year Edinburgh Council and Midlothian Council, in partnership with MYPAS, announced pilot schemes for counsellors to be place in schools for this academic year.
Lothian MSP, Miles Briggs, said:“In Edinburgh and the Lothians we were already facing a mental health crisis for young people, which has only got worse since Covid-19.
“Young people having to wait over a year to be seen for mental health support is very distressing for the person who is note getting the support they need and their family.
“CAMHS staff work tirelessly to provide invaluable mental health support, but they must be further supported by SNP Ministers and NHS Lothian to meet the high demand for their services.
“Remote mental health support is not the right solution for everybody, but where appropriate this must be fully utilised to reach and support as many young people as possible.
“SNP Ministers have been in charge of our health service for over 13 years, during which time mental health service waiting times for young people have got significantly longer.”
