Information from the commission: “We are an independent Commission that has been set up to look at what democracy in Scotland might look like, whatever the result of the referendum in 2014. The Commission is chaired by Councillor David O’Neill, President of the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities.”
In the Social Enterprise Scotland response we set out what we believe should be the broad, guiding principles for reform, as below (for the full response click on the link above).
- Services are best delivered at the most local level possible, with the greatest level of democracy possible.
- We need to empower our streets, neighbourhoods and community organisations in concrete and practical ways.
- We need to understand that democracy is not just about elected representatives or local authorities but is also about direct community democracy.
- We need to begin the process of a real shift in the delivery of services from the public sector to community control and ownership.
- We need to redefine what we mean by “public service” and understand that social enterprises and third sector organisations are also public service organisations.