Letter to Herald - Queen’s Park

How Queen’s Park could be a pioneer

The decision to delay any development at Glasgow’s Queen’s Park really should allow the heat to be taken out of the issue. No need for the continuing shenanigans, whether by pretending that the SSP is the only party which has taken an interest, or indeed by dismissing its members as “Workerist Trots”.

What exists now is an opportunity to flesh out the community’s own ideas for better use of the area, taking into account the needs of all. If this process is handled properly, using a participative approach from day one, we could end up with a greatly enhanced public amenity which would hold the genuine affection of local residents.

If that was the end of it, we’d be taking up space on your pages with a small local issue for Glasgow’s south siders. However, there’s no reason why a new facility in Queen’s Park couldn’t pioneer the “social economy” model on which the Scottish Executive now seems so keen. This has the potential to create a first-class venue for events, a focus for community activity, sustainable jobs with their roots in the local area, and a progressive example of a development that has human beings as the bottom line.

This must be done with environmental sensitivity (in both local and global terms) so I hope that few people would support the inclusion of the car park. Light pollution, noise levels, and preservation of the park’s biodiversity must also be addressed. But let’s not put a damper on the idea of turning our public parks (all of them - large and small) into the beautiful, dynamic, exciting places they should be. If Glasgow can meet this challenge, it will be something to really shout about.

NEWS RELEASE - ‘Tsar’ for teenage pregnancy welcomed

GREEN MSPs’ NEWS RELEASE

For immediate release Tuesday 12 August 2003

‘TSAR’ FOR TEENAGE PREGNANCY WELCOMED

Glasgow’s Green MSP said today that the appointment of a ‘tsar’ to tackle teenage pregnancy in the city was a very positive step for sexual health services.

Patrick Harvie said it was encouraging that both the NHS board and council were committed to a programme based on access to family planning and sexual health services, and a coherent approach to sex education.

“This is the approach which really can bring about reductions in the number of unwanted teenage pregnancies, and improved support to teenage parents as well,” said Mr Harvie.

“We’re still all on tenterhooks for the Scottish Executive’s sexual health strategy, and it’s a shame that local authorities have to go it alone for now, but they are due credit for doing so.

“But we also need to see the explicit support of ministers for an approach to sexual health that’s based on education, empowerment, access to services, and overcoming social inequality.

“Malcolm Chisholm really must reject the recent calls for a return to the bad old days of sexual ignorance and isolation.”

FOR FURTHER information, contact Jill Boulton at the Green MSPs’ press office on 0131 348 6360 / 07919 210 126.

Meeting with the Catholic Church’s Parliamentary Office

There’s no point in pretending that the Catholic Church and I are going to agree on a lot. Their leadership condemns me (and all people who have same-sex relationships) as evil and disordered. For my part, I find their approach to sexual health dangerous and offensive. Given that both of these subjects are likely to come up in Parliament this session, it doesn’t seem likely that we’ll become friends.

But there are two good reasons for my meeting with John Deighan, their Parliamentary Officer.

For starters, there will always be conflicts in politics. I don’t want to fall into the yah-boo style of politics which we see so often. If I disagree with someone, I intend to do it directly, honestly, and with an expectation of mutual respect. Communication is everything, and my opportunity to debate the Vatican’s statement on Civil Partnerships on Newsnight Scotland last week didn’t give much chance to really exchange views. When the camera’s pointing and the lights are glaring there’s no time to be reflective, thoughtful or detailed.

The other reason is that there are plenty of issues on which an atheist like myself can find common cause with the Church. You can see from their website and recent newsletters (www.rcpolitics.org.uk) that trade justice and concern for asylum seekers and refugees are among the issues they’re working on.
While we might disagree about the need to reduce the world’s human population to prevent environmental degradation (as demonstrated by the Brundtland Report) they do recognise the impact of overconsumption -

“Western materialism makes far more demands on the planet¹s physical resources than the populations of the developing world. The USA has less than 7% of the world¹s population but uses one third of its raw materials. The wealthiest 20% of the population consume 70 times more than the poorest 20%.”

I won’t hide the fact that I’ll disagree with the Catholic Church on a whole range of issues, from family law to women’s reproductive rights, from euthanasia to segregated education. But if the Church - or anyone else - wants to work together to oppose war, injustice, or the insane drift toward environmental collapse, I’ll work with any ally I can get.

Concern over Queens Park bandstand plans

Glasgow City Council has drawn up a marketing brief for a development at Queens Park. Tonight I attended a meeting of a campaign group which has formed in response.

I don’t think anyone would disagree that some kind of redevelopment at the bandstand area could be a great idea, but the group has several concerns about the new proposals:

the suggestion that a car park will be sited within Queens Park, increasing local traffic levels in residential streets, causing pollution, and losing an area of green space;

the scale of the building which is proposed - a two-storey bar/restaurant adjoining a newly redeveloped bandstand;

the limit on community usage of the new venue - 25% of usable time in any year;

the private, for-profit nature of the development;

the loss of mature trees;

the lack of community consultation.

I agree with many of these points. All too often ‘consultation’ only happens after plans are in place. It should happen at the start of the process, so that the people affected by the end decision are the ones driving the process. In this case it seems to have fallen to the community to invite themselves into the discussions about the development.

It would be a shame though if this led to conflict - because there really is potential to create a fantastic venue at the bandstand, which could benefit the community at large. I’d like to see the brakes put on until the community can draw up its own proposals. It would be possible to develop something with a ’social enterprise’ model, to use the Scottish Executive’s jargon, and it would be a mistake to push through a proposal which people don’t like until this option has been explored.

You can find out more about the campaign group at

http://hometown.aol.co.uk/savequpark/savequpark.htm

Another group, called Friends of Queens Park is also taking an interest in the issue, and I’ll be trying to get a meeting with them soon to hear their views.

Open source questions

I have lodged a series of written questions to discover the Executive’s attitude to Open Source software and some related issues.

The questions are:

To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is in relation to Open
Source software in public sector IT procurement, and what guidance it issues to public bodies on this matter.

To ask the Scottish Executive how much money it has spent on Microsoft software licenses in the last three financial years.

To ask the Presiding Officer how much money has been spent on Microsoft software licences for the Parliament’s own IT systems.

To ask the Scottish Executive whether and how the principles of Open Source are included in the teaching of IT and programming.

To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is in relation to the use of proprietary and non-proprietary document formats, specifically where documents are to be made publicly available, and what guidance it issues to
public bodies on this matter.

You can read background information on Open Source at www.opensource.org or www.gnu.org

Website finally launched!

Here we go…