I have always imagined that paradise will be a kind of library

 This is one of my favourite quotes about libraries, written by the Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges. It seems particularly appropriate during Libraries Week. Coincidentally, I contributed to a pan-European study this week on libraries, highlighting some of the challenges facing the public library service in Scotland and the UK.

I am very fortunate to own several thousand books in what I call my library and a frequent target for my wife's decluttering initiatives! However, it isn't a library. It is a collection of books, even if they are carefully organised and entered into a database. A public library is much more than a collection of books, more than a service; it is an integral part of the community. What I called in my Reid Foundation paper, Building Stronger Communities, social infrastructure.

Despite my 'significant' collection of books, I am a member of the British Library, the National Library of Scotland, the Mitchell Library in Glasgow, and arguably most importantly, my local library. I am not keen on the saying 'use it or lose it', although I understand the importance of demonstrating community support for public services. I always have a book on loan because even in my small local library, I can find a book that I wouldn't have bought, which stretches my thinking into new fields.

Under the Public Libraries Consolidation (Scotland) Act, as amended in schedule 21 of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973, local authorities in Scotland have a statutory duty to provide "adequate library facilities" for all residents in their area. The problem is that 'adequate' is not defined. I recall seeking counsel's opinion on a possible legal challenge some years ago, only to be told that the test could probably be met by one public library in the local authority area. There are some local acts on libraries, but they are no more substantial. Several local authorities have also outsourced their libraries to culture trusts, further blurring the statutory duty.

Like other local government services, libraries are under financial pressure. 83 public libraries have closed in Scotland since 2009/10, with spending cut by 30 per cent over the same period. This is despite yearly visitor numbers increasing by over 40 per cent. Many more libraries have cut their opening hours and reduced staff. Around 20% (700+) of all public libraries in the UK have no professional staff. They are spun as 'volunteer led', a euphemism for blackmailing communities into running libraries under the threat of closure. 

There has been a welcome move towards abolishing library book fines, although the data is limited. Glasgow Life has recently done this, arguing that it reflects a growing global movement to abolish late book fines, recognised as a barrier to participation, particularly for families from low-income households. A progressive move after they controversially closed several libraries, later reopened after great community campaigns.

The importance of professional staff is reflected in the wide range of services and activities in our libraries. It also provides an objective voice in selecting books and other resources. I am sure there would be no shortage of well-meaning middle-class people in my town who would be prepared to help run the library. However, they would have little idea of the wider community's needs. This is becoming a genuine concern in the USA as books are banned because some ideologue doesn't like the content. My experience as a UNISON official was that librarians made fearsome negotiators, always well prepared. A skill that even Donald Trump is discovering as he faces legal action for keeping files from US government librarians. I am also in awe of the work being done by "Crazy Ukrainian librarians" in the most difficult of circumstances.

The broader value of public libraries as a community resource is being recognised in the concept of 'warm banks' in response to the energy crisis. Librarians have always recognised this well before the current crisis. The consumer champion Martin Lewis has commissioned a best practice guide on this. A recent survey showed that 60% are actively considering participating in a "warm bank" scheme, offering heat and shelter to vulnerable people, as another way to help during the cost of living crisis.

In England, Baroness Elizabeth Sanderson has been appointed by the UK Government to help develop a new strategy to ensure public libraries provide the best possible service for their communities. There have been some understandably cynical responses to this initiative, but we will see. Almost one in five (18.6%) children in England between the ages of five and eight do not have access to books at home. Authors and publishers have urged the new prime minister to abolish "the last remaining tax on reading", and ensure schools have funding for author visits and invest in libraries.

So, please use Libraries Week to show your support for a vital public service. And challenge your elected representatives to strengthen the statutory duty, employ more library staff, invest in resources and keep our libraries open.

Governing With Purpose - a guide for charity trustees

 As someone who works with and serves on several third-sector boards, I have sometimes wondered why anyone does this. External criticism and internal squabbling are not unknown, and thanks are not always forthcoming. Moreover, when personal time has rarely been so squeezed, it isn't easy to get people to volunteer for this role, even if around a million people in the UK have risen to the challenge. Larger charities provide training when you become a trustee, but it can be limited for smaller ones, leaving the new trustee slightly overwhelmed.

In this context, a new book about governance in the charity sector should be welcomed. Brian Cavanagh, who has extensive experience in the public and third sectors, has written Governing with Purpose: How to lead a brilliant board – a guide for charity trustees. This is not a subject exactly brimming with previous publications. There are plenty of corporate governance books, but few focus on the charity sector.

Like Brian, I have seen examples of good governance and, sadly, some pretty poor ones. Charities have collapsed due to poor governance, and others grind on with little regard for their founding purpose. As many charities have become providers of services paid by the state, they sometimes lose their cutting edge as advocates for change, believing that they must acquiesce to government policy. It is not unheard of for a charity Chair or CEO to get a phone call from a Scottish Government minister after public criticism. As Jenny Starling said in an Open Democracy piece yesterday, 'Too fixated on doing ‘good’ and being polite, charities have stopped fighting for social justice.’

The book starts with first principles. What is good governance, and why it matters. Focusing on the big picture, vision, values and strategy rather than the minutiae of day-to-day operations. I have mentored a few senior staff in charities from other sectors, who have been surprised at the level of detail board members wanted to engage in. On the other hand, I have seen boards that nod through whatever is presented to them. Brian uses the concept of governing with purpose to suggest a different approach. He promotes the idea of governance as leadership, graphically portraying the interconnectedness as the governance square. 

This isn't just a theoretical concept. He goes on to give practical examples of how to develop good governance. The regulatory framework is not forgotten either. Something that could be stronger in Scotland. The chapter on strategy versus scrutiny is also helpful.

There are chapters on the roles of the Chair and CEO and the importance of the relationship between them. Again, in my experience, that can range between acquiescence and micro-management. I recently supported one charity when the Chair said, 'I could do her job better.' She might well have, but that was missing the point. This book has some good advice for both parties in this relationship and practical tips on how to Chair a meeting and related duties. Getting the board to focus on the 'why' of the charity is good advice.

The final section of the book is entitled ‘Re-imagining purpose’. As Brian puts it, ‘It includes bringing energy and dynamism to drive the charity forward. It is also about ensuring the ethos and purpose are not just words, but are put into practice, across the board and the rest of the charity.’ This includes stating uncomfortable truths, particularly when there needs to be alignment between what the organisation says it stands for and how it puts that into practice. The strength of trustees is that they can bring a diverse range of lived experience and expertise to the role. The final chapter in this section highlights the importance of recruitment, succession planning and board renewal. We can probably all think of the board member, or Chair, who has been there too long and recruits more people like them.

I found very little in this book that I disagreed with, and I tried! You might find some concepts a bit theoretical, but they are backed up with practical examples. Hopefully, it will spur some focus on governance in these difficult times for the sector. Unfortunately, I noticed the Scottish Government-backed 'Good Governance Award' had attracted very few takers.

For all the sage advice in this book, we should remember that being a trustee on a board should also be an enjoyable and rewarding experience. This book should help you achieve that goal and do some good on the way.

Tackling drug deaths - Scotland's national disgrace

Scotland's drug-related death statistics are a national disgrace. In 2021, 1,330 people in Scotland died due to a drug overdose. That was more than three times the rate of the rest of the UK and the highest in Europe. As the chart below shows, this isn't a new problem.

This month I was looking at drugs policy when drafting a response to Paul Sweeney MSP's proposal for a Drug Death Prevention Bill. This will enable the establishment of overdose prevention centres, including establishing a licensing framework for centres to prevent death due to drug overdose; and create a new body for the oversight of drug policy development and implementation to improve health by preventing and reducing drug use, harm and related death. He argues that preventable death due to drug overdose has become one of Scotland's major public health emergencies. Urgent practical action is required to address this health crisis, and this Bill is intended to be part of the solution, one contribution to a multi-faceted effort to tackle the problem.

Drug use is inextricably linked to poverty; it is not simply a 'lifestyle choice'. People living in the most deprived communities in Scotland are around 18 times more likely to experience problem drug use compared to people in the least deprived communities. As the Poverty Alliance argues, "That means redesigning our economy so that people are able to access decent work, and investing in our social security system and public services, so that people have the income they need to live in dignity and security."

The Scottish Drugs Death Taskforce has called for more resources to be spent fighting Scotland's drug-related deaths problem after calling current resource levels "woefully inadequate". Their report (21 July 2022) outlines ten key principles and 20 recommendations underpinned by 139 actions. These call for greater funding, efforts to tackle the stigma of drug addiction, and a higher degree of responsibility for drug-related deaths in both health boards and Scottish and UK governments. The report states, "The First Minister has publicly recognised that her government 'took their eye off the ball'. The question now is whether the government will provide targeted funding to enable services to deliver transformational change – not a return to the funding of the past, but an ambitious and radical commitment to making people's lives better."

While there is a case to review the UK Misuse of Drugs Act and for devolving the legislation, we must focus on what we can do in Scotland using devolved powers. As the former head of Scotland's drug deaths taskforce (Professor Catriona Morrison) has said, Scottish Government ministers should stop blaming Westminster legislation for the high number of people dying through drug misuse and focus on what can be done to address the problem. 

Scottish Government cuts in funding for Alcohol and Drug Partnerships in 2015 resulted from the pervasive stigma and the demonisation of people with a drug problem. Cutting  £15 million of funding for the most marginalised and vulnerable people in Scotland is a classic example of ignoring the benefits of preventative spending as recommended by the Christie Commission. Scotland's drug strategy should focus first on keeping people alive, but we also need to help not just to stabilise their drug use but get help with the wider aspects of people's lives.

Paul Sweeney's Bill is not a 'magic solution' but could help as part of a range of measures. Drug consumption facilities have been introduced in at least 14 countries across more than 130 sites. They provide a safe environment for the most vulnerable to use drugs under the supervision of trained professionals. A study in The Lancet shows fatal overdoses decreased in areas where overdose prevention centres were introduced alongside other beneficial outcomes, including reductions in self-reported high-risk injecting practices and increased engagement with drug treatment services. They may also help reduce drug use in public places.

This Bill will provide a necessary focus on the drug crisis that has sadly been missing in recent years. It also focuses on what we can do now, in Scotland, to address these issues - always recognising that the drugs crisis is part of wider inequalities in Scotland that also need to be tackled.

Lessons learned from the pandemic for social care

I was in Stockholm this week speaking at a workshop looking at Europe-wide experiences of the pandemic on social care. The On the corona frontline – Lessons learned, promises broken? event was hosted by Kommunal (UNISON’s sister union), Arena idé and the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. It was a follow-up to the paper they published last year, and I wrote the Scotland paper in the series.

As the BBC reported just this week, increased demand and staff shortages mean at-home and care home services across Scotland are overstretched. But unfortunately, the pandemic isn't over, and social care challenges haven't gone away. This was reflected in all the presentations from across Europe at the workshop.

This was the case for our hosts in Sweden, which pre-pandemic had an undervalued, high turnover workforce and health and care that is not integrated. There is a mixed economy of care, although much less private sector involvement than in Scotland - there are 290 councils in Sweden! Their COVID-19 Inquiry has already reported and highlighted structural shortcomings in residential care, including staff training, sick pay (80% of salary after the first day), and precarious employment. However, in terms of action, it is business as usual, although they are hopeful of new legislation soon.

In Norway, social and primary health care is a local government responsibility, and only 10% of providers are in the private or charity sector. Moves to rationalise the numbers of councils (over 400) have been halted. They generally have good conditions, including full sick pay for one year, thanks to strict employment legislation and a strong union movement. However, they have skill shortages and had similar pandemic issues as us over infection control, PPE and testing. Overall, they appear to have managed the pandemic better than most.

My colleague in England described similar issues to Scotland, with all the previous challenges exacerbated by the pandemic. Staff shortages are getting worse and not helped by Brexit, with increased use of expensive agency staff. A significant increase in unpaid carers has taken more workers out of the economy.

Spain has a decentralised care system to the regional level and a mixed economy of care, with 70% of care homes in the private sector. As in Scotland, the pandemic hit bigger care homes harder, and the lack of official data makes analysis difficult. A Dependency Shock Plan has been agreed upon with the government and the unions to reform the long-term care system, including accreditation of residential homes, raising workforce standards, more funding and integration of health and care. However, structural implementation has been slow, while some workforce changes like reducing precarious work have made progress.

Portugal's system is similar to Spain's, with similar data issues. There is considerable reliance on families who get little financial or other support. When the family 'fails', institutions (often the church and charities) may step in, although state support meets less than 40% of residential costs. This has led to a growth in unlicensed nursing homes, which are often small (less than 20 beds) due to regulation thresholds. Their demographic challenges are even worse than Scotland's, leading to skill shortages. There is minimal social care and health integration and little unionisation, leaving most workers at minimum wage levels.

In Germany, the private insurance system couldn’t cope with the costs of the pandemic, so the government stepped in. There is now a debate around how the system should change with less privatisation. Residential care costs are doubling, partly because wages have increased by a third – raising the legal collective agreement in long-term care, with better leave and other conditions. However, church institutions (major care providers) are exempt from collective agreement laws. Mandatory staffing levels are increasing while the workforce is ageing, with 500,000 retiring in the next ten years.  

My presentation reflected the Scotland paper I wrote last year. I explained how social care is funded and organised in Scotland, focusing on the workforce and employment standards. I emphasised that Scotland faced significant challenges in delivering social care before the pandemic. Not least an ageing population, budget cuts and limited workforce planning. The pandemic highlighted these challenges and created some new ones. The transfer of untested patients from hospitals to care homes resulted in half the first wave of deaths being in care homes. Home care packages were abandoned or reduced, causing further excess deaths. For the workforce, there was poor PPE, and they were not routinely tested for four months. 

I outlined how trade unions had responded to the organising challenges with greater use of social media. Important campaigns on paying the Scottish Living Wage, sick pay, death benefits, COVID tests, better PPE and access to the vaccine demonstrated the importance of trade unions to the workforce. At this stage of the pandemic, it is essential that these lessons are incorporated, along with tackling the workforce shortages. Finally, I explained the proposed reforms to social care around a National Care Service, although delivery is still some way off. Therefore, there is a need to focus on a new workforce strategy, funding recovery plans and strengthening communities being undermined by council cuts. 

The Scottish COVID-19 Inquiry needs to examine the lack of preparedness and why the lessons learned from pre-pandemic exercises were not fully implemented. It also needs to consider the broader structural and systemic issues in relation to patterns of disadvantage and inequality as well as care system capacity and capability. The research papers prepared for the Scottish COVID-19 Inquiry are worth a read. 

A paper is being prepared after this event and that should contribute to that Inquiry. The pandemic highlighted similar issues across Europe. Poor preparedness, inadequate funding, and an undervalued workforce existed before the pandemic. The pandemic highlighted these issues and made them worse. We need to learn the lessons and take urgent action.

A New Scotland

In the book, A New Scotland, leading activists and academics lay out the blueprints for radical reform, showing how society can be transformed by embedding values of democracy, social justice and environmental sustainability into a coherent set of policy ideas.

This is not a conventional book on economic policy. The first theme that struck me is the breadth of the factors that make up the nation's wealth. When I first studied economics, we were taught a range of formulas that calculated everything from a nation's output to the money supply. In this book, the contributors demonstrate that the wealth of a nation depends on much more than mathematical calculations. 

More than anything else, it is inequality that holds back our economy. Equal societies do better on almost every measurement. Then we have arguably the most significant challenge facing our society, environmental and climate justice. This also reminds us that we live in an interconnected world, which involves action beyond our borders. Some chapters cover subjects that are not traditional economic concerns yet are essential to a functioning economy. These include housing, education, transport, land, health and decent work. Land ownership is a particularly Scottish concern, with a disproportionate share held in the hands of very few individuals and bodies. 

Then there are chapters on the structural factors that undermine our economy. These include the need for economic democracy that challenges the elite domination of wealth and economic decision-making. As well as addressing the weak forms of political governance. Several contributors highlight the development of a highly educated, socially unrepresentative professional-managerial class, which has banished all talk of ʻcapitalismʼ, ʻclassʼ and ‘exploitation’ as obsolete - leaving little appetite amongst the political elites for change. Chapters on culture, human rights, race and gender also point to complacency in what we like to think of as Radical Scotland. 

The second big theme for me is that a better Scotland is possible. If the analysis might depress us, the possibilities are also there in buckets, from a new approach to bottom-up public ownership and investment in worker-owned business to individual economic rights, public participation and deliberation of the economy itself. This wouldn't be a book about Scotland without referencing our national obsession, constitutional change, and the authors hold a range of views on this issue. Whatever constitutional path is taken, Scotland will remain embedded in a complex web of economic relationships across these islands, Europe and the world. 

My chapter moves away from traditional macroeconomics to focus on the local economy. Scotland has one of the democratic world's most centralised forms of government and one of the least 'local' local democracies. Economic development in Scotland has focused on attracting inward investment. This has resulted in the wealth generated by workers, local people, and businesses being extracted by often distant shareholders as profits and dividends in our communities of place. These firms are often the first to flee when the economic cycle shifts. Community Wealth Building seeks to address this by encouraging plural ownership of the local economy, increasing investment using fair employment, progressive procurement and the socially just use of land and property. 

I also argue that outsourcing of public services has fragmented delivery and extracted wealth from communities. I make a case for the collective provision of a wide range of local services based on plural forms of democratised and decentralised common ownership. The cooperative movement and other forms of community ownership could also play a much larger role in regenerating the local economy. The problems facing our high streets and town centres will not go away after the pandemic. Consequently, we need to rethink our town centres as places where people live and work, not just shop. This should include a level playing field on taxation. I listened to an interesting IFS debate last night about an Online Sales Tax to offset the business rates for high street retailers. There are always challenges in implementing a new tax, but this issue needs to be tackled now.

This book highlights some challenges for traditional thinking on the left in Scotland. We should be proud of our radical history while applying the lessons to a Scotland in thrall to a neo-liberal economic orthodoxy with weak governance systems. The solutions cannot be dictated from the top; they must be developed and organised from communities of interest and place. This book offers a different vision for Scotland and signposts new approaches to our enduring challenges.    

ScotRail - the start of a new journey

Today is a special day for rail campaigners who have been making a case for bringing Scotland's railways back into public ownership for the 25 years since privatisation. ScotRail is back as a public service. While this has been a long journey, with every Scottish Government since devolution, it is not the final destination. Public ownership is not enough on its own. What matters is what we do with it. And let's not forget that ScotRail is only part of Scotland's railway system; privatisation is still with us. Anglo-Scottish high-speed rail is still a pipe dream.

There have been the predictable doomsayers who claim ScotRail will "turn out to be CalMac on wheels". The ferry fiasco certainly hasn’t enhanced the Scottish Government’s reputation for running anything. However, those who argue that there is some magic formula for success that only applies to the private sector clearly haven't been following the P&O debacle or the costly absurdities of rail privatisation over the past 25 years. Even the Tories have called time on their privatisation model, although typically, their new model just tinkers around the edges.

If we are to avoid another CalMac, the First Minister needs to get serious about the promised 'national conversation for the future vision of the service. We also need some immediate action, not another long grass strategy. Fortunately, there are already some good contributions to get us started. For example, the rail unions have published their vision for Scotland's railways with help from Unity Consulting. These proposals include expanding the service, introducing proper staffing levels, and improving industrial relations.

Railfuture Scotland has suggested a pretty good mission statement for ScotRail, ‘The trains need to go where people want, when people want and at a reasonable price’. Unfortunately, this will not be achieved through cuts in rail services and ticket office closures. Electronic ticketing is still unreliable, and many prefer or have no option but to use a paper ticket. I regretted using an electronic ticket last year when I had a long battle with Avanti, only resolved by going to the Rail Ombudsman. A closed ticket office is also a closed waiting room and toilets.

The key to the future of our railways and climate change is to get us out of our cars and onto the train. It has been estimated that we need to double pre-covid passenger numbers to achieve net-zero. Quite a challenge when commuting numbers are likely to fall with greater use of flexible working. There will be more focus on leisure travel and ensuring rail is the first choice for long-distance journeys. As there were twice as many seats provided each day as passengers travelling pre-Covid, rail is in a unique position to accommodate transfer away from the car without further increases in cost to the taxpayer.  

Railfuture has also produced a list of 50 new stations for reopening on existing lines that would generate significant numbers of new passengers. The same applies to rail freight. I recently did a paper for a European think tank on this issue, highlighting how far behind we are. In countries like Switzerland and Austria bus and rail use has been rising every year. Several bids for freeports or greenports don’t even have a rail link, suggesting they will be served by even more lorries on our roads. While all this will require significant investment, the costs of not doing it could be considerably more.

The railways also need to be part of an integrated transport system, which policymakers have discussed for many years and some cities have delivered. Sadly, not in Scotland, where it took the Scottish Government years just to establish a forum. We need a coherent network of interconnecting bus and rail services across the country. One break in that service and the car becomes the default means of travel for many. For example, I am flying from Edinburgh Airport on Monday and I would have preferred to go by rail and tram. However, my recent experience of cancelled trains means I will probably have to drive to be sure of catching my early morning flight. I will not be alone in that, looking at airport car parks.

Today is a cause for celebration, but it's just the start of the journey. The end destination must be ensuring the Scottish Government delivers a model of public ownership for ScotRail that is genuinely world-class. 

Putting the local into reducing health inequalities

While national strategies are essential in reducing health inequalities, we need to emphasise local action. 

This week the Scottish Government statistics division published its long-term monitoring of health inequalities. Spoiler alert, it doesn’t make happy reading. Male Healthy Life Expectancy at birth was 46.8 years for those living in the most deprived areas, 23.7 years lower than those living in the least deprived areas (70.4 years), and it’s getting worse. For women, the gap was almost identical at 23.6 years. Moreover, in 2020 the premature mortality rate in the most deprived areas was four times higher than the rate in the least deprived areas.

So, what is the Scottish Government doing about it? Well, there was a public health ‘review’ in 2015. There are many glossy documents and websites that say they are ‘working towards’ reducing health inequalities, ‘defining’ their priorities, and a lot of similar guff. What’s missing is any sense of urgency to actually implement these plans.

Let me give just one small example. The Scottish Government rightly says that Fair Work is an important tool in reducing health inequalities, and procurement is an important lever. Last year, SHA Scotland spotted that NHS Education for Scotland (a health quango) had awarded a contract to Amazon. Given Amazon’s notorious employment practices, they wondered how they passed the Scottish Government’s Fair Work criteria that are supposed to be applied to the evaluation of contract bids. So, they sent off an FoI request and were told that the Fair Work Criteria wasn’t applied to this contract. Here we have a government health quango who couldn’t even be bothered to apply the policy. It is no wonder that there is a considerable gap between rhetoric and policy delivery.

Important though national action is, many of the services and actions required to reduce health inequalities need to happen locally. No serious plan to tackle health inequalities in Scotland can ignore the pivotal role of local government. Councils make a vital contribution to weaving the social fabric of their areas and seeking to create and sustain healthy places for people to be born, grow, live, work and age. 

I drafted a paper that SHA Scotland launched this week, which sets out some of the ways that local government can make a difference. Planning, public spaces, leisure and cultural services all make up the vital social infrastructure that promotes wellbeing in our communities. This helps tackle poor mental health through stronger social cohesion and social support. They can also create sustainable communities tackling air pollution and food poverty. However, this cannot be achieved while the Scottish Government cuts councils' funding by nearly a billion pounds. Fair funding for local government is crucial to tackling health inequalities. In addition, centralising services in Edinburgh, as with the proposed National Care Service, is also the opposite of what is needed to reform social care.

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Local action on health inequalities requires councils to lead the way with a community health strategy that puts reducing health inequalities at the heart of everything they do. When we focus on the social determinants of health, we see that local government services are health services. Without local government, adults and children would die sooner, live in worse conditions, lead lives that made them ill more often, and experience less emotional, mental and physical wellbeing than they do now.

The Scottish Government should set the framework for reducing health inequalities and take appropriate actions at the national level. That doesn’t mean micromanaging from Edinburgh. They must also ensure that the local government is funded fairly, not just pass on Tory austerity to councils while protecting their budgets. Local communities understand what needs to be done in their area, and they need the leadership and resources to do it.