Growing public and political interest in urban land reform
People are beginning to realise that land reform in Scotland may become just as important in urban areas as rural ones, especially in tackling urban vacancy and dereliction
Human Rights Inquiry Concludes with Rights On Message for Scotland
Why the next focus for human rights work should be making rights real for ordinary people in their local communities and when accessing public services such as housing, health, social care and education.
Benefit Sanctions and the Rule of Law
The enormous growth in the severity, the scope and the incidence of benefit sanctions in the UK since the turn of the century
Journalism by hype: the anatomy of a house price crisis story
Ken Gibb examines a media story on the housing market, to scrutinise the facts of the story and the quality of analyis.
Challenges faced by Central & East European migrants: welfare and support services in rural Scotland
In advance of the Policy Scotland Welfare Reform Network’s event Dr Holly Porteous writes on challenges facing migrants from Central and Eastern Europe who are living, working and accessing social security services in rural Scotland.
Syria and the Mediterranean Refugee Crisis: A Failure of International Responsibilities
By Dr Kurt Mills, Senior Lecturer in International Human Rights, Convenor of the Glasgow Human Rights Network The crisis of humanity we see in the Mediterranean and Europe is part of a much larger complex of issues related to how the international community deals with war, atrocities and humanitarian crises. The situation where hundreds of…
Indyref One Year On: Rhetoric and Remembering
Reflection on language on the first anniversary of the 2014 Referendum on Scottish Independence.
Local Tax Reform: God and the Devil in the Details
Review of Reform Scotland‘s contribution to the local tax debate.
English Votes for English Laws
Professor Adam Tomkins on the debate over English votes for English laws (EVEL).
Council tax reform is long overdue – so how do we do it?
By Kenneth Gibb, Policy Scotland, Professor of Housing Economics at University of Glasgow. When the council tax was first introduced in 1993, it was viewed as a politically clever fix after the catastrophe of the poll tax. It combined the palatable parts of a tax on property with personal discounts and limited exemptions for certain…