Local democracy is under the spotlight - Alys Mumford

This is a testing time for Edinburgh City Council

Edinburgh Council went into recess at the end of last year just after a meeting which saw Labour retain leadership of the administration - despite their new leader refusing to make a statement until pressed to do so by a Green councillor and one of Labour’s own members.

The people of Edinburgh were given no sense of the vision for the city, nor what solutions Labour would be offering to try to change course from the failures we have seen over the past two and a half years. Councillors from the Liberal Democrats were clearly under instructions not to speak in the debate, with only their leader contributing that they had decided the status quo would be a better outcome for them – if not for the city.

And of course the council is still missing two people until a by-election happens at the end of the month, after members from other parties decided to swap their duties as a councillor for Westminster, the Scottish Government and...Dubai.

A third by-election is also possible if the former council leader resigns his seat, as anticipated, following the conclusion of inquiries into his conduct. So from all we know, it looks like more of the same from the leadership of Edinburgh Council – £30 million of cuts, a growing homelessness crisis, chaos in health and social care, and a deficit of ideas. Of course, this doesn’t all rest at Labour’s door. Over a decade of Westminster austerity, passed on to local government by Holyrood, mean councils across Scotland are in crisis.

But when a party’s priority is maintaining power rather than seeking solutions, it doesn’t paint a glowing picture of local democracy or an optimistic outlook for the year ahead. For your Green councillors in Edinburgh, our priority remains to work for climate and social justice wherever and however we can. This year, that will look like fighting against any watering down of the visitor levy scheme, working with the third sector to prioritise the human rights of the most vulnerable, and pushing for the council budget not to ignore the growing reality of climate change as it has so often in the past. Wish us luck.

Alys Mumford, Scottish Green Party Councillor for Portobello/Craigmillar