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Building a Sustainable Scotland: Sustainable Development and the Spending Review 2002
FINANCE AND PUBLIC SERVICES
To improve the delivery of public services and promote local democracy
LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Local government plays an important role in ensuring a more sustainable Scotland and improving the quality of life in our communities. This applies across the range of local authorities' responsibilities, not only in their strategies for dealing with waste and environmental and planning issues, but through education, transport, economic development, tourism, etc.
Ensuring Sustainable Development
All local authorities have developed Local Agenda 21 strategies. In working to secure Best Value we would expect all local authorities to build in consideration of sustainable development. The Scottish Executive priorities for sustainable development - making best use of resources and minimising waste, reducing energy use and reducing the need to travel - are all relevant to securing continuous improvement in the performance of local authority functions. Similarly, the power of wellbeing and the statutory underpinning of Community Planning will enable local authorities and their partners to work together in a more holistic way that supports sustainable development.
Sustainable Capital Investment
The new prudential system for local authority capital funding will give local authorities more flexibility and responsibility over their capital investment decisions and will allow them to make full use of the various options for financing improved infrastructure. The new arrangements will require authorities to plan investment more strategically and take a more rigorous approach to asset management. As part of these arrangements, we will encourage local authorities to build sustainable development into their investment appraisals and planning.
Innovation
Modernising Government Fund projects help to reduce or eliminate the need to travel to access public information, advice or services, for example through contact centres, one stop shops and video conferencing.
Quality of Life
Local authority services have a significant impact on the quality of life in our local communities, especially in more deprived communities. During 2002-2003, the Scottish Executive has allocated an additional 95 million to local authorities, on top of their general grant allocations, for investment in initiatives to improve the local environment and the quality of life of local people, in particular for children and young people. In allocating these resources, local authorities were given the flexibility to direct the funds towards local priorities identified at local level.
The initiatives supported from these additional resources include:
investment in footpaths and cycle-ways;
measures to promote re-cycling;
anti-litter and dog-fouling campaigns;
tackling vandalism and graffiti;
"walking buses" and safer routes to schools;
investment in local parks and open spaces;
refurbishing children's play areas;
funding for sports and leisure facilities; and
initiatives to encourage young people to make healthy lifestyle choices.
The Spending Review 2002 announcement confirmed the allocation of further 180 million over the next three years for local quality of life initiatives. These resources will help local leaders to respond to local concerns and to take the initiative to improve the environment in which people go about their daily lives.
EUROPEAN STRUCTURAL FUNDS
The 2000-2006 programmes require that the three key elements of Sustainable Development are built into project development, appraisal and selection for support. European Structural Funds are managed in Scotland with the mainstreaming of sustainable development as a core "horizontal" theme. The Structural Funds are targeted on specific areas and seek to add value to a variety of economic and social development projects. The mainstreaming of sustainable development principles can be seen in such diverse projects as business advisory services, infrastructure projects, and work to support local communities. The project planning and appraisal process encourages applicants to consider a wide variety of sustainable approaches to their projects, for example:
training courses can be designed specifically to include an element of environmental management. For example, Fairbridge in Action provides young people in Edinburgh with an integrated package of measures to develop the skills necessary to participate in the labour market. As an integral part of the project, environmental awareness is promoted among participants;
the restitution of derelict land is carried out with increased sensitivity to the disposal of waste, and to habitats and the natural heritage. For example, ERDF is contributing to Argyll and the Isles Enterprise support of Landcatch Limited's new research and development facility for marine fish aquaculture in Campbeltown. The facility will be constructed on a derelict brownfield site and will include a number of positive environmental effects; and
business advice projects will include relevant advice on energy, waste, or other environmental management/improvement issues. For example, the University of Strathclyde hosts the Scottish Energy Systems Group, an SME industry club, which aims to transfer best practice and research from academia to business, with a particular focus on energy efficiency in the built environment.
The Scottish Executive has adopted an ambitious approach to the inclusion of sustainable development in all five Structural Funds programmes for 2000-2006. The Structural Funds are at heart economic and social development tools, and as such two of the basic elements of sustainable development are clearly embedded in the system. This was recognised in the issue in 2000 of the "key messages" statement, which emphasised the need for projects to also pay particular attention to the environmental element of sustainable development. The same statement recognised that this was likely to be a relatively new approach for many project applicants, and that the process of mainstreaming would therefore be incremental.
Much progress has been made since the issue of that statement. A Scottish-level forum on sustainable development has met regularly, to take an overview of sustainable development issues in the Programmes. Regular feedback has indicated that each of the programmes has made considerable progress in raising awareness of sustainable development amongst partners through programme publicity, and training and awareness seminars for partners involved in the appraisal process and those submitting applications. Each of the Programme Management Executives has instituted a mechanism for discussing sustainable development. Each has a Mainstreaming Action Plan, and most have developed a specialist advisory group on the horizontal themes. The national forum has gained agreement for funding from Scottish Natural Heritage and Scottish Environmental Protection Agency for both local support for the activities of these groups, and a national partnership officer, who can develop a pan-Scottish overview of sustainable development mainstreaming. The partnership officer is expected to have direct involvement in the mid-term evaluations of all five Programmes, in order that any lessons learned about the implementation of sustainable development in the Programmes can be analysed and applied across all Programmes.
We plan that there should also be an element of trans-national comparative work, in that the mid-term evaluations for two of the Objective 2 Programmes will include comparison of the implementation of sustainable development principles in these programmes with the equivalent programme in Nordrhein-Westfalen.
The ambitious approach is expected to continue. Issues for further examination by the national forum in the near future are likely to include:
refinement of the application of sustainable development criteria in the appraisal process;
alignment of the appraisal process with the Scottish Executive statement on sustainable development
Meeting the Needs...; and
examination of good practice in areas where the environmental element of sustainable development has not traditionally featured strongly, such as business development projects.
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