Edinburgh Labour revised Manifesto published

As regular readers will know, back in November, we invited the Edinburgh public to join us in developing Edinburgh Labour’s manifesto for the Council elections in May.

We did that through the press, meetings and a leaflet through the door.

 

Our central idea was that the Council must change fundamentally; it must stop working for local people and start working with local people in the way we run the city and manage local services.

 

That idea has been welcomed enthusiastically by the many people who have responded to our invitation. They agree the way forward is for Edinburgh Council to work towards becoming a ‘Co-operative Council’.

We’ve changed much of the detail in the light of what people said and have revised our draft Manifesto: “Moving Edinburgh Forward – Together”.

It’s almost in its final form but we would really welcome any more thoughts, comments and reactions. Please do get them to us by Sunday 19th February ...

... our News Release follows below, and the revised Manifesto can now be found at:

http://www.edinburghlabour.com/p/moving-edinburgh-forward-together.html

And many thanks to all those who have responded to date - it really has been appreciated.

NEWS FROM EDINBURGH LABOUR

REVISED MANIFESTO PUBLISHED

Labour’s manifesto for the Council elections in May has now been published in draft form for further consultation with the public.  Councillor Andrew Burns, Labour’s leader in the Capital, says “Consulting the public on our early ideas has had a terrific response from Edinburgh people – almost without exception they’ve been enthusiastic about Edinburgh becoming the first Scottish ‘co-operative council’ and they have added lots of ideas of their own.”

A co-operative Council would see a new relationship between citizens, communities and public services where power and responsibility is shared more equally.

Labour went public in November last year, with its ideas and the draft manifesto is now open for further public comment until 19 February.  The party will then sift through all the ideas before it publishes its final plans in March.

“Consulting the public like this is a first for a political party in Scotland,” says Councillor Burns, “but it seemed to us that if we are to be serious in making the Council truly co-operative, working with people and sharing decision-making about services and the future of our City with them, then we had to do the same with our manifesto.”

Councillor Burns said the Labour manifesto contains no big spending plans.  “I can’t promise to spend more,” he says, “money will be tight and we’ll need to economise.  But I can promise to be better.  I’ll set out to change the way the Council works and, if we are the largest party in the Council, I’ll seek the best talents from all parties to form an administration with us.”

Ends.

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