Composite S (covering Motions 8 & 9)
Support for Local & Regional Just Transition Campaigns
“That this Congress recognises a need for regional, place-based Just Transition plans, developed by workers and our communities across Scotland. These plans should be adopted by all levels of government, and used as a basis for regional policy, funding decisions, public sector grants, and subsidies. Regional oversight committees, including local trade union and community representatives, should be established to ensure delivery of these plans.?
“Congress applauds all trade unions, trades councils and communities that have united in solidarity to campaign and organise on local Just Transition issues, including the Torry community’s campaign to retain St Fitticks Park, an award-winning park they helped create over the last 25 years. Torry is a working-class community with multiple deprivation and associated health problems. St. Fitticks Park is their green lung, their breathing space.?
“A business consortium ETZ which includes Aberdeen City Council wants to develop St. Fitticks Park as an industrial estate, even though Aberdeen has extensive areas of vacant fully serviced industrial land sites that could be developed instead.
?“This re-designation was fiercely resisted by the people of Torry, but the Scottish Government refused to intervene, and the re-designation became part of the Aberdeen Local Development Plan.?
“A planning application for the industrial estate on St. Fitticks Park was made in 2024 by ETZ. Despite objections by the people of Torry and their allies, the Scottish Government Minister again declined to call it in, and the application was approved. No decision has yet been made to sell the St. Fitticks parkland to ETZ.
?“Congress believes communities across Scotland need a just transition, not a mining of public sector grants to further entrench private sector business interests.?
“Congress affirms the role of Scotland’s trades councils in Just Transition campaigning and planning. Trades councils bring together local union branches - who are the experts in their respective fields - and act as an interface between the local trade union movement and wider community. This makes them an appropriate forum for organising around complex, interconnected transition issues in a given locality - such as training, energy, transport, home retrofit, and extreme weather adaptation.?
“Congress calls on the General Council to:
- Work with the Aberdeen Trades Union Council, and the Torry Community to hold the Scottish Government and city council to account in order to save their park and to expose how the Just Transition Fund is administered and delivered;
- Encourage affiliates to affiliate to their local trades councils, and to support and inform trades councils’ Just Transition activities;
- hold discussions around the Just Transition process with the trade union councils to support the delivery of a communities led Just Transition process; and?
- continue to grow the STUC Just Transition Campaign.”
?Mover: Aberdeen Trades Union Council
Seconder: Moray Trades Union Council
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