Prioities and pounds..

A long meeting yesterday about the Youth Bus saw us agree a new structure and welcome a £20,000 grant from the "cashback for communities" fund which will see us through the next year despite council cuts in other funding.

Today I spent 2 hours discussing the so called "Fairer Scotland Fund". The way this administration has arbitrarily chosen 3 or the 8 national criteria to use for this fund has put several valuable projects under threat, including the Lochend Community Resource Centre, which houses the Credit Union, the food co-op, the benefits advice group and the employment support group. The Community Newspaper the Speaker is also under threat as is the post we created for a community worker who has done a brilliant job developing and supporting local groups who don't have paid staff

The SNP/Libdems just don''t get it. They believe that success can be counted and nurturing communities is expressed by numbers alone. I will fight tooth and nail for these projects because they do make a difference to real peoples lives and if we loose them its the whole community that will suffer.