Scottish Green Party 2018 Spring Conference Programme
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Glasgow, Contents the World’s 3. Welcome to Glasgow 10-13. Event Listings Friendliest City! 4. Welcome to conference 14-16. Timetables 5. Guest Speakers 18-21. Event Listings 6-9. How conference works 26. Get Involved 9. Child protection 27. Conference Song The Electoral Reform Society Scotland is an independent campaigning organisation working to champion the Scotland rights of voters and build a better democracy in Scotland. We work across the political divide with all the parties, with local campaigners and with civil society to put voters at the heart of Scottish politics. Join us for our event Greens Leading Local Democracy on Saturday at 5.30pm in the Main Hall. electoral-reform.org.uk Welcome to Glasgow, the World’s Friendliest City! I’m delighted to welcome you all to Glasgow, and this wonderful venue, for our Autumn Conference. When I was fi rst elected as a councillor in 2007, I was caught up in debates about building motorways. Thankfully, conversations have moved on, to planning a network of segregated cycle lanes. Glasgow aims to become one of Europe’s most sustainable cities by 2020. During conference, I hope you discover more about the changes taking place in the Dear Green Place. People are making Glasgow. The city’s population is the most ethnically diverse in Scotland and has risen after decades of decline. The city has been transformed by inward migration, and as a dispersal area for those seeking asylum. Planning issues dominated the work of councillors. Decision-making has determined the regeneration activities reshaping the skyline of Glasgow beyond recognition. The Clyde waterfront is now a vibrant creative sector with the Digital Media Quarter and many movie-makers are choosing Glasgow for their fi lm and TV productions. We have ambitions to be sporting champions! The coming of the Commonwealth Games in 2014 stimulated development that included the building of the Hydro at SEC, the Emirates Indoor Arena and Velodrome, and the Athletes’ Village in the East End. Glaswegians have established a track record of success in delivering world-class sporting events. We are still facing many challenges, including poverty and income inequality. Poverty reduction is inextricably linked to the move towards a low-carbon, resource effi cient, and socially inclusive green economy. Martha Wardrop Scottish Green Councillor for Glasgow’s Hillhead 3 Welcome to our 2018 Autumn Conference! Welcome to Glasgow, and the challenges we face, but we don’t embrace Scottish Green Party’s annual defeatism either. We take action! conference 2018. We hope you’ll So over this weekend you’ll hear about have a great weekend, meeting new the work Greens are doing at local friends and helping to shape the level, putting energy and creativity into direction of our party. their communities and showing that when people feel empowered to act It can often feel as though optimism they can often achieve far more than is in short supply right now. With the they thought possible. Greens in local continuing crisis of Brexit, and the threat government here in Scotland and far of a deregulated, free-market race- beyond are doing this, and we’re making to-the-bottom after it; with the rise of the case to give communities more of the far right and a socially conservative the power they need. backlash against equality; with Theresa You’ll hear about – and decide about May proclaiming the false dawn of the – the way we’re facing challenges like “end of austerity” while continuing to Scotland’s need for a transition to a brutalise benefi t claimants and asylum post-oil economy, and the country’s seekers; and with the starkest warnings future relationship with the wider world yet from the scientifi c community about including our continued commitment to the fast-closing window of opportunity a European future. to act on climate change, while You’ll have the chance to meet and governments continue to subsidise fossil talk with many of the organisations fuel … yes, being an optimist – never which work with us, developing the new mind giving hope to others – is hard ideas our political system needs, and to work these days. share experiences and skills with other But the Green movement cannot Green activists around the country. aff ord to lose its belief that we can do Let’s make this a weekend to so much better than this. Whether we reconnect not only with each other, but focus on our local community, Scotland, also with our shared commitment to the UK, Europe or the world, we are change politics and to change society here to show that Green ideas can make for the better. a diff erence, and can rekindle belief in a brighter future. Maggie Chapman The Greens don’t deny the scale of the and Patrick Harvie, Scottish Greens Co-Convenors 4 Magid Magid Mayor of Sheffield Born in Northern Somalia, Magid came as a child refugee to Britain in 1994. He is the youngest- ever Lord Mayor of Sheffield and the first Green Party councillor Welcome to our 2018 Autumn Conference! to hold the role, he studied zoology and marine biology at the University of Hull. He ran the Sheffield half-marathon dressed as a tree (pursued by a chainsaw- wielding friend), banned “wasteman” Donald Trump from the city, and used his inaugural speech at the Sheffield council to condemn racism and post-Brexit xenophobia. Grace O’Sullivan Guest Speakers Senator, Seanad Éireann Grace is the Irish Green Party spokesperson for Environmental Protection, Natural Resources, and Marine & Tourism. Grace is an ecologist, environmentalist and the Green Party member of Seanad Éireann, where she is a member of the Civil Engagement Group. A former activist on Greenpeace vessels, including the Rainbow Warrior, she was Ireland’s first female Irish national surf champion, and the winner of the 2017 Green Leader Award. 5 HOW Emergency Motions are intended to allow conference to CONFERENCE debate issues that have arisen WORKS since then, and should be sent to [email protected]. The Party’s Constitution and org.uk seven days before the Policy Reference Document start of conference, signed by (PRD) have been voted in, and two members. amended, by a succession of An Emergency Motion relating Party conferences on the basis to events that have arisen of one member, one vote. The since then can be submitted Standing Orders Committee to SOC any time up until noon (SOC) is responsible for ensuring on the first day of conference conference rules are upheld, (also signed by two members). and for guaranteeing its smooth Emergency Motions will be and democratic running. rejected if they could have been If you have an issue relating submitted in time for the first to conference procedures, agenda, or are not concise and please raise it with a member focused. of SOC. SOC reports directly to conference, and its annual OFFICE BEARER REPORTS report – given during the There is a folder containing AGM – must be approved by reference copies of office- conference. SOC has a table in bearers’ reports and accounts front of the stage throughout at the registration desk. Digital conference should you have copies are also available. any queries. LANYARDS / VOTING CARDS MOTIONS Please keep close watch over Motions have to be submitted your voting cards. Please also 11 weeks before conference, wear your lanyard at all times amendments five weeks before. and remember to hand them The intention is that branches back at the end of conference. can debate them and, if wished, agree proxy votes or branch amendments. 6 DEBATES AND VOTING proposed amendment from the Motions are debated and voted floor, as this has not proved to on as follows: be an effective way of deciding • There is a short debate on the party policy. motion itself. • Each amendment is then As a member you may vote at debated and voted on in Yes conference providing that you turn. You have the choice have the red, green and white of voting for, against or voting cards you were given at abstain. registration. Please don’t lose • The final stage is a vote them! They are colour-coded, on the full motion, like traffic lights. as amended (or not amended), and again the Any member who can’t attend choice is between for, Conference may delegate against or abstain. another member to vote on their behalf. This is called a proxy At any point in the debate a No vote. No member may have member may ask (from the more than eight proxy votes. floor) to vote on referring a motion back to the relevant SPEAKING committee. That member Any member may speak during would have to explain a debate. If you think in advance their reasons and another that you’d like to speak, please member would have to fill in a speaking slip and hand it second that proposal. The in to the SOC table as soon as chair may refuse that proposal possible, giving a note of any or may put it to a vote, at expertise or special interest their discretion. Abstain you have in the topic. This will allow the chair Amendments will not be to ensure an equal number of accepted from the floor if speeches for and against, and more than ten members to give priority to those with object, or if the chair background knowledge of the refuses to allow them. subject, rather than just those It is unusual for all other who are better at catching the members to agree to hear a chair’s eye. 7 If you wish to respond to a FRINGES AND EXHIBITIONS point made during the debate, Conference is not just the raise your hand and you will be main sessions organised by called if there’s time.