scottish government – Govan Community Project

Govan Community Project has had a busy month of networking, with several opportunities to raise issues with both the Scottish and UK Government in relation to funding, child poverty, impacts of policy on our organisation and the ongoing impact of immigration policies on individuals and communities.

Traci Kirkland, GCP Head of Charity told us more:

“I attended an event in relation to child poverty organised by the Robertson Trust where there was the opportunity to raise concerns with the First Minister around the restrictions No Recourse to Public Funds causes with initiatives in place to tackle child poverty.

I was at an event organised by GCVS, where a gathering of third sector representatives met with MPs to raise issues and concerns they would like them to consider when spending reviews are taking place at Westminster – as you can imagine there were many issues raised including the cost of living crisis, the impact to charities of the change in national insurance employers contribution, the two child benefit cap, immigration policies including the right to work, which was raised by GCP and others present. We were disappointed that only two of the local MPs engaged with the event, however it was still helpful to have the opportunity to raise these issues.

At The Gathering 2025 in Edinburgh, an event organised by the Scottish Council for voluntary organisations, I was honoured to be one of four charity representatives invited to join the First Minister, John Swinney, on stage for a dialogue on issues and challenges being faced by the voluntary sector. In his opening remarks, the First Minister acknowledged the valuable contributions and levels of support provided by the voluntary sector and highlighted that the timescales under which the Scottish Government provides funding decisions and the short-term nature of funding agreements were not good enough. He also spoke about the Scottish Government’s awareness of the challenges facing the voluntary sector in relation to ongoing rising costs.

Following on from this, I took the opportunity to raise the concern shared by GCP and many other organisations that there is a disconnect with Scottish Government awards, which have remained static, yet organisations are expected to meet rising staffing and operational costs. I urged the Scottish Government to not only review funding agreement terms, but also the amounts awarded and use its influence to engage with other large funders on the importance of this issue.

We have also been working collaboratively with colleagues at Glasgow University on sharing learning with trainee GPs on the health inequalities experienced by community members and a huge thank you goes out to our community members who came along and shared their views and experiences with the GPs, providing invaluable input to their ongoing learning. Thanks to Dr Anna Black and her colleagues for inviting us along.”

The Scottish Government announced yesterday (Monday 19 August) it will scrap plans to provide free bus travel for people seeking asylum. Our Head of Charity, Traci Kirkland, reacted to the news.

“We are absolutely devastated at the news of the scrapping of the plans for a bus travel scheme originally announced in the Scottish Government’s 24/25 budget plans.

This scheme had offered a glimmer of light in the limited support New Scots receive, enabling them to access crucial support services to rebuild their lives in Scotland. The cost of public transport is an extreme financial barrier to those we support, forcing vulnerable individuals and families to make decisions between basic needs of food or attending important appointments and it increases the impact of social isolation.

The scheme was also going to take some of the pressure off third sector organisations who understand the importance of travel support to those living on £7 a day or less, and were subsidising travel costs from their already limited resources.

We call on the Scottish Government to rethink this budget cut and fulfil what was promised. This investment should have been viewed as a preventative spend- if other support is more accessible this would actually take some pressure off the public purse, not add to it.”