Day 2 of Council being back from Recess & we're in the thick of a Policy & Sustainability Committee – @CllrBenParker @Alex4Craig_Dudd & I are representing the @EdinbughGreens today, planning on talking about 🏭carbon 🪩 Night time economy 🏫Council buildings 💳Poverty & more.

@CllrBenParker @Alex4Craig_Dudd Meetings start with going through the workplan & business bulletin (papers: https://t.co/EkyRs35rpP) & we pressed officers on their progress on work around biodiversity, embedding equality in participatory climate budgeting, in-sourcing of facilities management, & women’s safety.

First agenda item is Best Value Review Audit - in 2020 the Council was given a number of key areas to improve upon. This update report shows that the Council is...not doing great on progress towards these.

We have an addendum calling for the next report to actually include an action plan towards addressing each recommendation, with target completion dates (radical!)

Unfortunately a lot of the conversation descended into party political sniping, but it did lead to an unguarded comment from Labour’s Finance Spokesperson saying that she felt public consultation on the budget was unnecessary and unhelpful (😱).

We all pretty much agree with the key point that the Council needs to do more, & it’s a bit frustrating to be caught in the middle of willy-waving from leaders of other parties talking about what might or might not have happened several years ago, rather than making progress now.

Everyone accepted our addendum, but I tried to propose a composite amendment (a ‘smoosh’ to use the technical term we prefer) which removed a bit of the SNP’s proposal to make the Council Leader apologise, but accepted everything else.

We thought other groups might go for this, as that seemed to be the main thing they disagreed with, and we’re still not quite sure why they didn’t! But it’s always good to try for consensus where we can.

The next report was an action plan on @Plant_Treaty which we were pleased to convince the Council to support last year. The treaty focuses on the climate impact of food systems - following the Council’s endorsement, we requested this action plan to accompany the endorsement.

The action plan has lots of positive ideas in it around carbon labelling of menus, food waste reduction & sustainable procurement in Council contracts which we are happy to support. It's a big win (even if it led to @SteveAMBurgess being accused of 'starting a vegan revolution')

Today (because a win can always be made better) @CllrBenParker also submitted an addendum calling on catering for Councillors at Full Council meetings to be made plant-based once a year during #Veganuary to show leadership and commitment to the treaty.

Unfortunately, this was not accepted by Labour, Lib Dem or Tory Councillors, despite most of them supporting the endorsement of the treaty in the first place - do as I say, not as I do? (this seemed to rest on concerns about the pies, which they apparently can't live without...) https://t.co/d0nm6QDh4Q

We're now talking about a paper on the Integrated Joint Board, following the all-party motion which was brought to Full Council in November calling for changes in how we fund and govern social care services in the city https://t.co/ALRdJ6ltjL

As you would expect, lots of questions and scrutiny of what work is being done (this is one of the first committee meetings that the new Chief Officer of the IJB) and how we can make improvements, and it’s one of those rare occasions where all parties tend to be on the same page.

We were back to climate for the next item, with a chunky report on the City-Wide Carbon Emissions & 2030 Climate Strategy Update, which showed that the council is making some progress towards our climate justice aspirations but (of course!) we need to do much more.

We had an addendum, focusing on how & what we spend on tackling the climate & nature emergencies. The report showed that while some of our spending has a positive impact for climate, 40% of Council spending is either destructive or neutral towards our climate ambitions.

For a Council which supposedly prioritises action on climate & nature, how can it be that 40% of the budget is not being spent on actions to deliver against these? That 40% represents a very large missed opportunity - something our addendum called to change by setting a % target.

Alas, Tory, Labour and Lib Dem colleagues voted against this suggestion, demonstrating a concerning lack of understanding of the severity of these crises. Even more disappointing was their support for a Tory amendment which sought to water down the Council’s climate targets.

Last year our interventions at budget time saved the Council’s climate team from being axed by the administration – whilst we were pleased to have it confirmed today that those posts are secure,

it seems like it will be an uphill battle to convince administration parties to put money into actions to address the climate and nature emergencies, despite being happy to say that they recognise the vital importance of taking action.

The next item is a big one for us, as it’s talking about the potential introduction of a Night Time Co-ordinator. This is off the back of work by @Alex4Craig_Dudd to call for this post, & action by Greens in other committees to support work for women’s safety and workers' rights.

The big question on this is how it will be funded - the paper presents a number of options including making it a voluntary role, funding it now, or planning to use #TransientVisitorLevy money for it.

We called for it to be funded straight away, but have now proposed a compromise amendment with Labour, saying we can wait until an upcoming Finance & Resources Committee. Crucially, we say that the post should be funded by - but independent of - the Council.

We make the point clearly that a really important aspect of this work is to improve women's safety in the city, & I secured agreement from Officers in the meeting that they will specifically engage with @FairHospitality on the Get Me Home Safely Campaign to embed workers' views.

And it passes! Green/Labour amendment with SNP accepted as an addendum - Tory proposal to delay further falls by 15-2.

A brief pleasant diversion to talk about the Union Canal Strategy refresh (@CllrBenParker asked about bats 🦇) and we're on to the next item with amendments - an update on the the Corporate Property Strategy in response to a previous Green motion about accessibility and net zero.

@CllrBenParker Pleasingly, following our request, a budget of £1.2m has been created to support accessibility improvements across the Council estate - a big win which we hope will make a huge difference to ensure everyone can utilise Council-owned properties.

@CllrBenParker There's less good news in the report about the Council's aspirations to become a net zero city, so we've got an addendum calling for a Corporate Property Retrofit Strategy - making sure we're proactively retrofitting buildings & not simply selling off anything that looks too hard

Booo. Labour refused to accept our proposal for a Corporate Property Retrofitting Strategy (they accepted some other bits of our addendum about monitoring and evaluation) so another win for Lab / LD / Tory and a loss for stronger action towards our net zero targets.

What's worse, the Tory addendum (accepted by Labour) called for "information about the current utilisation of the Council estate...[and]... plans for disposal, or alternatives, of those specific parts of the estate". Can anybody say 'selling off council assets'?!

The next report gives an update on the Council’s Advice Shop and talks about changes to service delivery which have been seen, especially since COVID. The Advice Shop is where people can go for support with social security payments, housing, debt etc https://t.co/HSYvpnN01o