1. Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015
Lee Haxton
Community Support Manager
Cairngorms National Park Authority

2. Points to Cover Background Key Provisions Community Asset Transfer
Participation Requests

3. Background Confident communities Funding priorities
Protecting services & assets
Community success
Funding priorities
Budgetary pressure
Government policy
Push Factors
Funders increasingly looking to invest in community-led solutions. Community bodies have access to a wider range of funding pots for work of this nature
Public agencies seeking to reduce costs and improve service provision at the same time
Government policy seeking to give communities greater control and influence (Christie Commission)
Pull Factors
Communities becoming more confident, ambitious and demanding
Communities seeking to protect services and assets which they feel are important to them
Recognition that communities, acting with support, can deliver transformational and sustainable change

4. Background Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015
Statutory Guidance & Regulations
Provisions become “live” 2017
Further legislation
Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2016
Planning (Scotland) Bill 2017
Decentralisation (Scotland) Bill 2017
The Act seems to have been around for some time now! It was given Royal Assent in June 2015
Since then civil servants have been preparing the necessary guidance and regulations to accompany the Act
The intention is for this to go before Parliament this month, to be approved before the local elections in May
If all goes according to plan, community groups should be able to start making use of these provisions in March-April
More legislation has recently been passed, or is being considered over the next few months. All of these are designed to give communities greater control or influence over the decisions, assets and services which are most important to them

5. Key Provisions National Outcomes
The National Performance Framework was introduced in 2007 and revised in 2011
It provides a national purpose, as well as a list of national objectives and outcomes that the Government wish to focus on
The Community Empowerment Act makes this a statutory requirement, so Scottish Government are now legally required to revise this every five years, report on progress and consult on any proposed changes

6. Key Provisions Community Planning Aberdeenshire Council NHS Grampian
Scottish Fire & Rescue Service
Police Scotland
Scottish Enterprise
Cairngorms National Park Authority…
Marr Community Planning Group
Community Planning was introduced in 2003 as an attempt to improve joint working between public services and give service users more influence
The Community Empowerment Act requires more agencies to get involved and a sharing of responsibility to make this work – previously the onus was on the local authority
The “core” agencies who must be involved are listed in bold and there are a number of additional agencies (including National Park Authorities) who are also required to get involved where appropriate
There is also a stronger emphasis on community engagement in the Community Planning process and a requirement on agencies to provide sufficient resources to make this happen through Local Community Planning Partnerships
Marr Community Planning Group is very active and has recently produced the new Marr Community Plan. MAP is a key partner in this group and one of the priorities in the new Community Plan is to increase direct community involvement in the work of the group

7. Key Provisions Community Right-to-Buy “abandoned and neglected”
The Community Right-to-Buy was introduced under the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 to give rural communities (less than 10,000 people) the chance to register an interest in land and buildings; and then have first right of refusal if the land or buildings was put on the market
The Community Empowerment Act extends this right to all communities in Scotland
The Act also introduces a new provision to allow communities to register an interest in “abandoned and neglected land.” There is no strict definition of what abandoned and neglected land is, but examples will be provided with the guidance. The onus will be on the community to convince Scottish Ministers that the land or building is abandoned and neglected
The Scottish Land Fund has been reopened to support purchases of land and buildings

8. Key Provisions Public Participation in Decision Making
This was a late addition to the Act and the wording is a bit unclear
It is essentially an attempt to ensure that participatory budgeting can be legislated for in future – a future target of 1% has been imposed on local authorities and this process is already underway in Marr

9. Community Asset Transfer
Purpose
Support
Aberdeenshire Council
Marr Area Partnership
Aberdeenshire Voluntary Action
Most local authorities (including Aberdeenshire Council) have had CAT policies in place for some years. The purpose of CAT is to transfer use, management or outright ownership of a building or land to an appropriate community group who can make a sound social and economic case for doing so
The Community Empowerment Act makes the production of a CAT Policy a statutory duty and places this on a number of public agencies, not just local authorities, e.g. NHS, Police and National Park Authorities
The Act allows particular groups to apply to take on the use, management or ownership of the asset
There is a presumption in favour of the application being approved

10. Community Asset Transfer - Exercise
Consider
What are the main priorities for my community?
What physical assets does my community have?
What are they used for and who owns them?
Can our priorities be addressed through the use of any of these assets?
Ask participants to work in pairs and work through these questions/prompts
Allow 5-10 minutes maximum
If ideas come forward then encourage that person/group to contact one of the support organisations

11. Participation Requests
Purpose
Process – Two Stages?
Support
Aberdeenshire Council
Marr Area Partnership
Aberdeenshire Voluntary Action
Scottish Community Development Centre
The purpose of Participation Requests is to give community groups the right to request to get involved in an “outcome improvement process” – which is corporate speak for discussions about how to improve a service that is important to the community
This duty applies to a number of public agencies, including local authorities and the National Park Authority
A community controlled group (including a community council) can submit a participation request and must provide the following information:
Details of the group
The outcome they wish to improve
Why they feel their group should be involved
The knowledge and experience their group has
The improvement they expect to happen as a result of their involvement
There is a presumption in favour of the request being granted

12. Participation Requests – Exercise
Consider:
Which service(s) are most important to your community?
Could that service be improved? How?
Would your group be willing to get involved in discussions to improve that service?
What would you want to achieve?
Ask participants to work in pairs and work through these questions/prompts
Allow 5-10 minutes maximum
If ideas come forward then encourage that person/group to contact one of the support organisations