Edinburgh Conservatives promise a Third Sector ChampionAT the third of our #TwililghtTalks on Tuesday, with representatives of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party, three candidates who are currently councillors put forward the Conservative approach to Edinburgh’s Third Sector and responded to a range of issues raised by Third Sector representatives present. Looking forward to the Council Elections on Thursday 3rd May […]

If it’s Tuesday…It must be time for #TwilightTalks! Indeed, it was. Yesterday evening, EVOC welcomed the Edinburgh Labour group – in the form of Forth Councillor Cammy Day and Craigentinny/Duddingston Councillor Ewan Aitken – for a wide-ranging and stimulating discussion about the Third Sector’s aspirations and Edinburgh Labour’s ambitions for the Council Elections 2012. The Edinburgh Labour […]

WE had a super Tuesday!Quick Quiz, folks! Which political party – first up at EVOC’s Twilight Talks – outlined the following ambitions for Edinburgh?   “Economic Growth on its own is NOT what the Council should be for – What do we really value?”   “We want to shift the balance away from profit-making activity.”   “We want to […]

Embrace the Change!Change is in the air. The relationships between different levels of Government – the City Council, the Scottish Government, Westminster and Europe – are developing fast. The Scottish Government clearly has ambitions for Community Planning to engage more meaningfully with its constituent parts, driving Public Service Reform built upon the principles of Prevention and Integration. […]

Endings – sometimes toughI’ve always been rubbish at endings, and so the last few weeks has been challenging – with the end of the Charity Law for Advisors Project. Since May 2010 we have trained over 160 advisors of charities across Scotland in the intricacies of charity law, funded by the Big Lottery Fund through SCVO’s Supporting Voluntary […]

A Third Sector Fit For The Future  AT a time of considerable change – economic, social, political – how does the city’s Third Sector need to change and grow? This is the core question facing the newly-formed Third Sector Strategy Group (TSSG) when it meets on Friday 24th February. For the first hour or so members will embark on a process […]

A Week Is A Long Time…WOULD you believe it was only last week that the World Economic Forum, the annual trade fair for capitalism with its seemingly-penitent politicians in hair-shirts and its photogenic protesters bare-breasted, took over the sleepy Swiss town of Davos? Just over a week since President Obama’s election-year State of the Union address, with its promise of […]

By all accountsAs EVOC’s Business Manager, I’m very pleased that this year we decided to publish our Annual Accounts on our website.  A lot of work went into producing these documents and I think they should be readily accessible, for anyone to see.  There is a great deal of information contained with these Accounts, both for EVOC […]

Act Local – Reduce the GapI must confess to being rather taken by Twitter. It’s easy-to-use, very portable, and – best of all – it’s really helping my education. For example – here’s a coupla ‘fun facts’ I discovered in the last few days. Did you know: – that Pope Pius XII invented subsidiarity? Yes, that hallowed European principle that […]