RSS Parrot

Public policy in Scotland needs to start paying attention to our ownership crisis

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-9che4

Published: April 18, 2025 08:58

News this week that the Wood Group – an oil engineering firm probably best known to readers of this column for its pronouncements on the projected lifespan of the Scottish oil sector being inversely correlated with how high support for independence was…

Discussion around Scottish tourist taxes ramps up

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-nrbhp

Published: April 17, 2025 08:50

Argyll and Bute Council has concluded a public consultation on a visitor levy (or tourist tax) with more than 3,300 responses taken following a similar consultation in Highlands that drew 4,000 responses. These responses are now in the process of being…

Scotland’s housing sector is unaffordable for young people

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/16-04-2025-kd

Published: April 16, 2025 16:15

Kaitlin Dryburgh says we desperately need rent controls to make it affordable for young people in the housing sector.

There is an easy way to make political pay seem fair to ordinary people

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-xarcj

Published: April 16, 2025 09:09

The predictable fall-out from the decision of Scottish Government Ministers to accept £20,000 pay rises continues, today linked to the various industrial disputes at risk of breaking out in Scotland. This is a perpetually-recurring issue which both dogs…

A big consultancy is once again fined for malpractice – but is still writing government policy

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-2lwja

Published: April 15, 2025 07:25

The large consultancy firm EY has just been fined for an ethical breach, quality control failures and a failure of obligations of independence in its auditing of a Scottish water company. It was fined half a million pounds. This comes less than a week…

More children are leaving school early and it's not like there haven't been warnings

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-pb2jn

Published: April 14, 2025 09:06

There is a fairly sharp rise in children who are leaving school in S4, the same in S5 and so a resulting drop in those leaving in S6. Before the pandemic about 11.4 per cent of pupils left school in S4 and this has risen to 14.4 per cent, a 26 per cent…

A National Mutual Energy company and how to actually build a district heating system

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/13-04-25-rm

Published: April 13, 2025 14:45

Robin McAlpine speaks to our joint symposium with Heriot Watt University on the nuts and bolts of implementing a decarbonised district heating system, and argues it can be done through a publicly-owned National Mutual Energy Company.

The Trump chaos is just beginning and it looks like Starmer will give him whatever he wants

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-23bax

Published: April 11, 2025 09:08

The chaos around Donald Trump's ignorant and capricious 'economic' policy is not over but just beginning. There is no question that having produced a tariff policy based on the flimsiest of economic calculations, the disastrous early impact resulted in a…

New Edinburgh housing development shows why Scotland has a housing crisis

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-as6g7

Published: April 10, 2025 09:31

A new site in Edinburgh with the potential for 200 homes has been brought to market in Edinburgh City. What has been marketed as an investment opportunity in the capital city demonstrates why Scotland, and in particular Edinburgh, is in the midst of a…

Finding the political will to decarbonise heating

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/09-04-25-rm

Published: April 9, 2025 11:54

Head of Strategy Robin McAlpine speaks to our joint symposium with Heriot Watt University about what is needed to decarbonise Scotland’s heating in actuality.

Scotland's carbon footprint show consumption is the problem we aren’t dealing with

https://www.commonweal.scot/daily-briefings/briefing-7zlxa

Published: April 9, 2025 09:24

The most recent data on Scotland's 'carbon footprint' has just been released and while it is pretty depressing, there is a substantial caveat. However, there is then a caveat to that caveat...In the most recent year for which data is available, Scotland's…