Here are statements of support received after the campaign’s official launch on 9 June. This page will be regularly updated and statements added in the alphabetical order of their contributors’ surnames. Click on the pictures to visit contributors’ sites. Contribute a statement.
Julia Harrison, Parliamentary Officer of RSPB Scotland, has contributed a statement of support, along with RSPB Scotland's Head of Conservation Policy, Lloyd Austin.
Lloyd Austin, Head of Conservation Policy, and Julia Harrison, Parliamentary Officer, of RSPB Scotland
“We should seek to improve the quality of life for all, not just the material wealth of a few to the detriment of the natural environment. We support this CPG as a mechanism for discussion of how to move forwards on this crucial issue for Scotland.”
The present global financial crisis is causing huge difficulties for us all. However, it should also raise questions about why we have not managed to achieve economic stability. It is no coincidence that we are the midst of both an economic and environmental crisis, having pursued unsustainable practices with regard to both. RSPB Scotland believes that a move towards a more sustainable economy would be aided by the development and implementation of Sustainable Development Indicators, including measures of social well-being and environmental sustainability, to complement the traditional, but limited measure, of GDP. We have reached the stage of human development where GDP is becoming a hindrance to progress rather than a help, and indeed threatens our long-term future. RSPB Scotland supports the recommendations of the Carnegie Trust report ‘More than GDP: measuring what matters’ including the use of a wider set of indicators in the Scottish Government’s National Performance Framework, and further discussion on this issue is timely. We should seek to improve the quality of life for all, not just the material wealth of a few to the detriment of the natural environment. We support this CPG as a mechanism for discussion of how to move forwards on this crucial issue for Scotland.
Patricia Cleghorn, author, broadcaster and Principal of Orchid
Patricia Cleghorn, author, broadcaster and Principal of Orchid
“…will help engender the confidence, determination and inspiration needed to ensure lasting prosperity, well-being and purposeful living”
The challenges facing Scotland and her people are too important to be left to any one party, on what may be a temporary basis. Both continuity and immediate practical action are necessary. These will help engender the confidence, determination and inspiration needed to ensure lasting prosperity, well-being and purposeful living, for people in all sectors of society. The people of Scotland deserve no less! I strongly recommend that this cross-party group is established at the earliest opportunity.
Dr Richard Dixon, Director of WWF Scotland
Dr Richard Dixon, Director of WWF Scotland
“…the new Cross-Party Group can stimulate an intelligent debate – and produce real recommendations for Government – on delivering not just GDP, but a broader spectrum of environmental and social benefits”
Our economic system has an important role to play in securing a future where we live within environmental limits. While GDP is a useful indicator of economic activity, it also measures and reflects expenditure associated with things we would rather avoid e.g. the clean-up cost after an oil spill, the cost of ill-health or a high crime rate. The Gulf of Mexico oil the livelihoods of many fishing communities. The debate about real prosperity should be a debate about our impact on the world around us, our wellbeing and the quality of our social fabric. We hope that the new Cross-Party Group can stimulate an intelligent debate – and produce real recommendations for Government – on delivering not just GDP, but a broader spectrum of environmental and social benefits.
Cath Ferguson, Glasgow
“The accounting we use accounts only for bits of paper and numbers on a screen. It takes no account of the social or environmental costs of decisions.”
I totally support the cross-party group you’re asking for. Too often we seem to be trying to patch up gaping holes in the system, and the patches only make it worse and ever more complex. There are a whole range of issues that now seem to be converging – inequalities in both poverty and health, a crisis in affordable housing, a crisis in finance and the kind of debt/over consumption model of our economy. And a crisis in the previously cheap fuel that drives such an economy, but also adds to climate change. This convergence gives a great window of opportunity to look critically at the best way forward.
The accounting we use accounts only for bits of paper and numbers on a screen. It takes no account of the social or environmental costs of decisions. Hence we end up with the warped GDP measure that is too often measuring misery but labelling it as “good” because it’s made someone money somewhere.
A cross-party group on joined up thinking that could take a broad overview and look at ways of potential ways of addressing this would be very welcome.
Colin Gajewski, Edinburgh resident
“…essential that efforts are made to draw all political parties and community groups together across any political or ideological divide”
As an ordinary member of the public, I heartily support this initiative. I see it as essential in our current circumstances, that efforts are made to draw all political parties and community groups together across any political or ideological divide.
Pat Kane, writer, musician, consultant and activist
Pat Kane, writer, musician, consultant and activist
“I support this group as an attempt to join up the dots across many areas of Scottish policy.”
The best contemporary social science (see Wilkinson and Pickett’s The Spirit Level, or Christiakis’s Connected) is making it extremely clear that enduring inequality badly affects all members of a society, tight across the classes, and in very physical ways – particularly in terms of mental and physical health. We know this only too well in Scotland, given the often extremely polarised health statistics in our major cities. I support this group as an attempt to join up the dots across many areas of Scottish policy, and I hope it will be the cause of much provocation and thought among our MSPs.
Liz Law, Mediator and Conflict Resolution Practitioner
Liz Law, Mediator and Conflict Resolution Practitioner
“I would like to see a Cross-Party Group work towards a narrative that Real Prosperity is within everyone’s reach and not dependent on material goods alone.”
As a Scot in the middle years of my life I am exhausted by the social pressure I feel to prove financial prosperity as a form of legitimacy. The reality is that contributing to society as a member of my local area, as an employed person, as a volunteer and within loving relationships gives me a sense of Real Prosperity. It seems that financial prosperity is somehow about jumping the queue.
I work in areas of the city that are not picturesque with people who are struggling to live full lives within the means available to them. Sadly this is constantly undermined by marketing, suggesting that a life without the current object of desire is a loser’s life. I would like to see a Cross-Party Group work towards a narrative that Real Prosperity is within everyone’s reach and not dependent on material goods alone. This is the way to a confident and healthy Scotland.
Stewart Murdoch, Director of Leisure & Communities, Dundee City Council
Stewart Murdoch, Director of Leisure & Communities, Dundee City Council
“…we need to develop new measures and new approaches if the goal of social and environmental sustainability is to be achieved”
I write to confirm my personal support for the proposal that there should be a cross-party group established as a forum for debate on the part of those who share a commitment to ensuring that Scotland’s future is socially and environmentally sustainable and prosperous.
I have had the privilege of being associated with work taken forward by the Carnegie UK Trust, “Measuring What Matters”; Oxfam’s Humankind Index; and a study carried out by the International Association for Community Development on “Appreciating Assets”. This experience, and the findings of these various studies and reports, taken together with the work carried out by the new Economics Foundation, convinced me that we need to develop new measures and new approaches if the goal of social and environmental sustainability is to be achieved.
Janine Rennie, Chief Executive of Open Secret
Janine Rennie, Chief Executive of Open Secret
“…substance misuse problems alone cost billions. A joined-up approach is needed to look at the root causes and the consider the human rights of individuals to have a life free of pain and distress.”
In my view we take a plaster-on-the-wound approach in society rather than tackling the root causes for the levels of deprivation. Open Secret works in the prisons in Scotland and the clients we work with have come from a history of sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse and neglect. They live in poverty and have issues of homelessness and inability to find work. In the criminal justice system generations of families are in the system. Add to that the fact that many have been in care and have experienced abuse in care. This leads to severe and enduring mental and physical health problems. Many have issues with substance misuse. The cost to the NHS, benefits system, cost of someone being in prison etc. are huge. For example, substance misuse problems alone cost billions. A joined-up approach is needed to look at the root causes and the consider the human rights of individuals to have a life free of pain and distress.
Dr Rossella Riccobono, University of St Andrews
Dr Rossella M. Riccobono, Lecturer in Italian, School of Modern Languages, University of St Andrews
“…a society strongly based on community is the only way forward to secure prosperity and motivation for all its members”
This is an important and visionary initiative. I support it not only because I believe that a society strongly based on community is the only way forward to secure prosperity and motivation for all its members, but also because fundamentally joined-up thinking, collective awareness and vision are instruments for real change which can empower all of us. I am happy to add my name as an active future member of what I trust will be a highly influential group.
Beth Stratford, Energy and Finance Campaigner, Friends of the Earth Scotland
Beth Stratford, Energy and Finance Campaigner, Friends of the Earth Scotland
“…this Cross Party Group could play a significant role in redirecting our policy makers’ attention towards the things that matter – like wellbeing, solidarity and the health of the ecological system which sustains us all.”
It is no longer controversial to acknowledge that GDP is a misleading and inadequate measure of societal progress, telling us little, for instance, about our vulnerability to financial crisis, the inequalities of opportunity facing our young people, the health of our community life and the ecosystems upon which we depend. It is these sort of problems which really threaten Scotland’s long term prosperity, and which call for a coherent, joined up response. Friends of the Earth Scotland believes this Cross Party Group could play a significant role in redirecting our policy makers’ attention towards the things that matter – like wellbeing, solidarity and the health of the ecological system which sustains us all.
Kevin Williamson, author, and co-editor of Bella Caledonia
Kevin Williamson, Author, and Co-Editor of the online journal, Bella Caledonia
“…we have a golden opportunity to refocus and rebuild our communities”
The real wealth of a society can be measured in the strength and cohesion of its local communities. By any social indicators we care to examine, our communities are not in good health and this is adversely affecting the next generation of young Scots. But we have a golden opportunity to refocus and rebuild them so let’s grasp the opportunity with both hands.
