South Edinburgh Greens (SEG) Annual Report

June 2025-26

Introduction

SEG is a sub-branch formed of two wards in the south of Edinburgh stretching from Bruntsfield Links to the Pentlands. There are currently 295 members, 236 in Morningside and 59 in Colinton/Fairmilehead.

Morningside has had a Green councillor since 2007 (Alison Johnstone 2007-12, Melanie Main 2012-22, Ben Parker 2022-).

Morningside has four councillors in total (currently Green , Labour, Lib Dem, Conservative). Colinton/Fairmilehead has three (currently Labour x1 conservative x2).

Colinton/Fairmilehead has never been a target ward, although we do stand candidates there (Helen McCabe in 2022, Daniel Milligan 2025).

SEG Activity 2025-26

The SEG AGM was held on Thursday 13th June 2025 at the Eric Liddell Centre. Jo Phillips and A McNestry were re- elected as Co-convenors

Green News in Morningside

In conjunction with Ben we produced and delivered two editions of Green News.

• Autumn/Winter 2025: 6000

• Spring 2026: 6000

We have a target area which we deliver to consistently . These are the greenest polling districts . (If we were to increase our delivery capacity then we might be able to extend this area in the future).

We have a limited number of delivery volunteers with a few people doing a large amount,

Communication with SEG members

Aideen checks the Forest database for new members and emails them a welcome letter designed by Steve West. She also monitors the SEG Inbox and replies to emails. We have a WhatsApp group with approx 25 members signed up at any one time.

SEG Monthly Meetings

All our SEG meetings were in person this year. Due to an ongoing problem of finding a suitable venue in Morningside - that is accessible, interesting and affordable - in December it was decided to continue to hold fewer meetings a year at the Eric Liddell Community Hub. We invite members to coffee mornings in the Eric Liddell on a Saturday in months where we don’t have a meeting . Ben gives a council update at each meeting . At our Saturday coffee mornings we discuss matters arising and Ben is available to answer questions.

Liaison with the Branch 2025-26

Aideen acted as SEG rep on the branch committee membership group during the year, attending branch meetings and following activity on Slack. Aideen attended Local Teams and Membership working group meetings.

Community activity

Ben is an active contributor to various community groups in the wards and feeds back to the sub branch on these . Various members have attended some community initiatives but we feel we need to formalise some of these.

Membership

Diversity: it seemed that a slightly wider cross section of society was represented at meetings than in previous years, although there is still a lot of work to do.

Membership numbers increased up to and during the Holyrood election.

• June 2021: 242 (198/44)

• June 2022: 257 (207/50)

• June 2023: 252 (203/49)

• June 2025: 241 (196/45)

• June 2025: 295 (236/59)

Finances

SEG did not have a budget (or a Treasurer) for 2025-26 . We decided to keep things simple and we ask suppliers to invoice the branch directly. Members contributed to refreshments at meetings. We received funds from the branch for:

• Eric Liddell Centre meeting room (4 meetings)

Total = £320

The Eric Liddell have recently increased their charges and now charge by the hour.

New team for 2025-26

The SEG AGM was held on Thursday 13th June 2025 at the Eric Liddell Centre. There were 11 people in attendance and Aideen McNestry and Jo Phillips were reelected as co-convenors for 2025-26 . Cllr Ben Parker gave an update of his year as a Councillor and the group discussed future campaigning, including thoughts about the upcoming Holyrood Election. There was a better than average turnout at the AGM and we focussed mainly on the Holyrood election . We planned to start canvassing in December.

Holyrood Elections

We kicked this campaign off with the let’s get started meeting with Adam McGibbon and mainly focussed on the Holyrood election for the rest of the year and into 2026.

SEG with the rest of the branch made every effort to be successful and these efforts were well rewarded.

Our AGM on June 11th focussed on preparing for the council elections next year.

New team for 2026-2027

Aideen McNestry and Jo Philips stood down as co convenors. So far we have not managed to recruit any new members to help run SEG.

Aideen will continue to do the admin, checking mail box and welcoming members etc and Jo will likely stay on as Coco if no one comes forward.

This is an ongoing situation ….

Central Edinburgh Greens Sub-branch Report - June 2026

Status

Final

Sub-branch Committee

The 2025 AGM of the Sub-branch was held on Tuesday 3rd June at LifeCare in Stockbridge. The following office bearers were elected:

• Amanda Grimm - Co-convenor

• Paul Wilson - Co-convenor

• Bob Keim - Membership officer

• Green News Inverleith coordinator - Alan Baker

• City Centre Hub - Claire Miller

Amanda stepped down in August 2025 in order to become East Lothian Co-convenor

Membership numbers

Membership numbers have increased across the Scottish Greens during 2025 to 2026, the Edinburgh branch, and CEG sub-branch. According to the party membership system, from 20th of June 2025 to 26 May 2026 sub-branch membership grew:

• in City Centre from 111 to 184

• more modestly in Inverleith from 101 to 124

• giving a total growth across both wards from 212 to 308

Sub-branch Meetings

CEG continued to meet monthly, alternating between Inverleith and City Centre venues, with a break for December. Instead of the usual July break, an online meeting was convened because of the Holyrood 2026 campaign.

Inverleith meetings have all been at LifeCare in Stockbridge. City Centre meetings moved from The Crannie to Tollcross Community Centre in 2026. Best efforts are made to make meetings hybrid, but this is made difficult by connectivity issues.

Green News Delivery

Autumn / Winter Green News was delivered in both Inverleith and City Centre wards. More were ordered for City Centre but it was a struggle to get enough delivery volunteers.

Holyrood 2026 Campaign

Canvassing

After a pause to free volunteers to support SWEG’s Fountainbridge/Craiglockhart by-election, CEG canvassing was restarted in August, 2 weekends out of 4 - alternating between Inverleith and City Centre. The last 2025 canvassing took place in Canonmills on 7th of December 2025.

From 11th of January cadence was increased to every Sunday, initially alternating between our two wards

The final Inverleith canvassing session of the campaign took place on the 1st of March combined with a stall in Stockbridge. From then until polling day campaign activities were concentrated in City Centre supporting Lorna’s bid for the Edinburgh Central Constituency, increasing cadence to twice a week from the 11th of March, adding Wednesday evenings.

Sunday canvassing attendance rose steadily throughout March up to the elections. Wednesday evening attendance did not pick up until the clocks changed at the beginning of April.

Inveleith canvassing was concentrated in Stockbridge (colonies, St Stephen Street, Saunders Street). City Centre canvassing was meticulously organised by Councillor Claire Miller and covered most of the target polling districts.

Deliveries

Deliveries were done later in the campaign with around 21,000 of 3 types of card delivered in City Centre from February to May, including around 7,000 Eve of Poll cards in the final week.

In Inverleith only Stockbridge colonies and St Stephen Street were covered by the final campaign card and Eve of Poll cards.

Posters

Around 280 posters were delivered to members and G1s in the City Centre ward, as well as posters handed out during canvassing. The number of Green posters visible in City Centre, as well as other areas in Edinburgh, were noticeable and often commented on by members of the public.

Only members (about 110) in Inverleith received posters in Inverleith.

Day of Poll

All Inverleith and City Centre Polling stations were covered by A-boards.

Other Day of Poll campaigning was concentrated in City Centre with 500 designated G1 and G2 doors knocked as part of the Get Out The Vote during the day.

At peak times during the day leafleting was carried out at key polling stations in the City Centre:

• Tollcross Community Centre (SWC09D and SWC11F)

• Novotel (EC11L)

• Lauriston Halls (EC11G)

• Dynamic Earth (EC11M)

Of those polling stations Novotel and Dynamic Earth were suitable for accessible campaigning.

Councillor Reports

Councillor Claire Millar - City Centre

City centre ward casework

Since our last AGM, I’ve logged 252 casework enquiries for residents in the city centre ward. While there have been a large number of cases in relation to ongoing hot topics such as the communal bin review and problems experienced with holiday lets, I have also provided in-depth levels of support on some very serious casework such as homelessness and social care needs. I have continued to hold a monthly drop-in surgery at the Customer Hub and have successfully built some good relationships with residents who have opted to meet me face-to-face for support this year. I look forward to identify how to work collaboratively with Lorna Slater on constituency casework and local projects.

Equalities portfolio

During 2025 we had a mini reshuffle of portfolios in order to utilise our capacity better within the team and I took on the equalities portfolio.

Possibly the highest profile action I took was to table a motion regarding the imprisoned Palestine Action hunger strikers. While ultimately the council forced us to withdraw the motion, it still garnered a great deal of press coverage and so achieved one of the aims which was to bring attention to the poor conditions and human rights violations being endured by the prisoners.

Another focus for me was to work on building support for community cohesion in order to counteract the rise of the far right in communities, see through flags on lampposts and dog whistle events, and to ward off the danger of anti-asylum seeker protests outside hotels being used as temporary accommodation. I worked hard to bring a cross party motion together with the Labour, SNP and Lib Dem groups and have taken an active role in the cross-party Community Cohesion working group that the council has formed.

At budget time, I developed several proposals to support minority communities and hope that we can build on this work in future budget rounds. We were able to propose a package of measures such as improved access to ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages), core funding for organisations supporting asylum seekers and refugees, continued funding for community cohesion work and support for residents with “no recourse to public funds”, as well as our headline-grabbing proposal of free bus travel for asylum seekers.

Councillor Jule Bandel - Inverleith

Sadly, Jule has been unwell since December 2024. Jule has managed to attend some council meetings online, and has maintained her role as a councillor.

WEG Monthly Meetings

During the last year, we have continued our WEG monthly online meetings and enjoy a small but regular turnout at these calls.

The meetings are held online to make them accessible to all members given the large geographic spread of the sub branch, and both Co Convenors have caring responsibilities.

All new members to WEG receive a welcome email from Anne and Chris, and we have welcomed new members along to our calls this year.

Our in-person Let's Get Started meeting in November set us up very well to contribute to the successful Holyrood Campaign - we welcomed c20 members and volunteers on the night and enjoyed the support of these members during the campaign. We would like more members to join us for the LE2027 campaign and will look to encourage this after summer.

Liaison with the Branch

Our sub branch Co Co, Anne Scott was a campaign officer during the last year and is a member of the Edinburgh Branch Committee. She brings updates to each meeting based on any recent activity and topics of interest.

Our sub branch Co Co, Chris Young is an SME on local traffic planning matters and engages with branch reps and councillors on an ad hoc basis, offering his support and working knowledge of the area as required.

Both sub branch Co Co's have led the sub branch for a number of years and are keen to make space for others to step into these roles following the LE2027 election, and bring fresh energy and new perspectives to the sub branch.

Cross team activity

WEG members actively supported with door knocking and deliveries during the Holyrood election campaign and turned out to support candidates across the city.

WEG have still informally supported Pentland ward members in the last year, as they do not have a sub branch of their own. The teams work together to ensure Pentland are included in all WEG member communications to ensure members are informed and included as to opportunities to support and be active in the local area. There still appears to be no real appetite to formally establish a local team but Paul Wilson, SBMS Officer has been very supportive in brokering discussions with SWEG this year, and we understand that they will support the ward in the year ahead.

Membership as at June 2026 is as follows, where numbers in brackets are the member numbers as at June 2025. In line with the rest of the party, we are enjoying an increase in local membership.

Almond: 59 (38)

Corstorphine/Murrayfield: 54 (42)

Drum Brae/Gyle: 43 (27)

Pentland Hills: 46 (34)

Finances

WEG did not spend any funds during the year 2025/6 but also did not hold any WEG fundraisers. We actively promoted and supported Holyrood crowdfunders. In the year ahead, we will participate in LE2027 fundraisers and as we will have a target candidate, will work hard to support fundraisers for our target (and non target) candidates.

Future plans

WEG were pleased to work with the Elections and Campaigns working group over the last few years and are excited that we have our first TTW ward for council elections in 2027. We have focused our GN deliveries more extensively in this ward and centred our Holyrood campaign efforts in Almond too. We actively contacted members within Almond to support a stronger local team to help us achieve our best ever outcome for that ward in the upcoming election cycle. DORAS training was completed in 2026 but we will need to repeat this to position us better for LE2027 campaign and to take the pressure off the one member (Ross Muller - thank you!) who we relied on heavily during the Holyrood campaign. We still have work to do to develop accessible routes across the 3 wards.

Our sub branch AGM was held on Tuesday 9th June. Anne and Chris were re-elected as sub branch Co-Co's for one more year, noting they would be keen to hand this responsibility on next year. Our secretary has had to step down and this position is currently vacant.

South West Edinburgh Greens Report

June 2026

SWEG held a belated AGM in 2025, delayed due to the Fountainbridge Craiglockhart byelection. At the AGM, on 17/9/2024, the following people were re-elected.

Convenors: Nuala Fahey and Dave Owen

Delivery Coordinator: Rob Gowans

Social Secretary: Daniel Milligan

Membership Secretary: Tessa Brown

Online Communication Officer: Gavin Corbett

The sub-branch has met its minimum requirements; monitoring its inbox, delivering Green News, and mobilising for election campaigns, and has deliberately delegated roles so that, for example, we have a dedicated membership secretary to welcome new members.

We have held no social events; with activity dominated by election campaigning. The sub-branch also hosted another Green Walk in January 2026, along the Union Canal and Water of Leith and through Saughton Park

We have continued to create and deliver regular editions of Green News, focusing on smaller areas within the two wards that make up the sub-branch, with a high proportion of locally-generated content.

This year’s AGM was held on 2/6/2026, and the following people elected

Convenors: Nuala Fahey (who will serve for one further term only) and Dave Owen

Delivery Coordinator: Rob Gowans

Social Secretary: Daniel Milligan

Membership Secretary: Tessa Brown

Online Communication Officer: Gavin Corbett

Ordinary Member: Alexander Macrae

Following some participation from Pentland Hills members in our campaigning for the 2026 SP elections, the SWEG committee decided to propose that Pentland Hills be incorporated into SWEG before campaigning starts for the 2027 LA elections, and have prepared a motion for this for the Edinburgh branch AGM in July 2026.

EEG Sub-Branch Report

Wednesday 17th June 2026

Current Membership

• 296 members across the sub-branch

• 152 members in Craigentinny/Duddingston

• 149 members in Portobello/Craigmillar

Outcome of 2026 AGM

• Attendees: 8 members of EEG plus 2 guests

• Co-organisers: Tim Espin and Vera Johansson (comms focus)

• Member Engagement: Mike Williamson

• Community Engagement: Lorenzo Martinico

• Leaflet Co-Ordinators: Nick Gotts (C/D) and Susan Currie (P/C)

2026 Holyrood Election

• Engaged around 30 volunteers across the sub-branch. Around 18 helped on polling day.

• Volunteers were mixture of experienced and new folks

• Some volunteers successfully engaged via Let’s Get Started meeting in Autumn, but not all. Volunteer contact form on Branch website was a fruitful resource though.

• Delivered around 8,000 leaflets and canvassing cards

• Canvassed all streets in target areas in Abbeyhill and Piershill (C/D) and around Portobello High Street (P/C). Extended canvassing areas to two areas of Craigmillar for the first time.

• Contributed to high constituency vote share in ENEL constituency and Edinburgh Region.

• The plan going forward is to build on new areas such as more streets in Craigmillar (P/C) and around Lochend (C/D).

Issues

• Member engagement at non-campaign-related meetings remains low. AGM attendance was especially low.

• We are developing social media and other comms capabilities. The inclusion of Vera on the EEG committee should go some way to helping this.

• We are struggling with a lack of accessible routes in our leaflet routes database. More investigation will be needed to identify suitable routes which are accessible (especially step-free).

Plans for Next Year

• Build on Holyrood election success

• By-election in P/C ward on 3rd September

• Council elections 2027

• Build on existing catalogue of leafleting routes for P/C with catalogue of leafleting routes for C/D. Need a reliable system for counting how many doors on each street.

• Build a library of committee induction materials specific to EEG. Could Branch recommend existing resources for committee inductions?

• Suggestion to the branch to run de-escalation training for canvassers. We certainly could do with this in EEG, but it would probably be of interest to the wider branch.

North Edinburgh and Leith Greens: Annual Report 2026

This report is available as a formatted PDF: https://members.greens.scot/file/nel-greens-annual-report-2025-6pdf

We are pleased to publish a report of North Edinburgh and Leith sub-branch’s activities in the period June 2025 – May 2026.

The sub-branch covers three council wards (Forth, Leith, and Leith Walk), and has a very high concentration of Green members and voters. All wards have a Green councillor: Kayleigh O'Neill in Forth, Chas Booth in Leith, and Susan Rae in Leith Walk.

Contact us at nel@scottishgreens.org.uk

Committee

The subbranch committee was:

• Co-Convenors: Morgane Perez-Huet, Boyan Karabaliev (resigned November

• 2025), James T. Harding (elected November 2025)

• Depute Co-Convenor: Jula Kinross

• Membership Secretary: Mariusz Cebulski

• Ordinary Members: Ian McCormick, Paul Mitchell, Ian Cowan and Colin Brown

Unless otherwise noted, the committee was elected at our AGM in June 2025.

Membership

As of 20 May 2026, the membership stands at 650, which is +46% compared to last year). This comprises 119 members in Forth (+44%), 202 in Leith (+44%), and 329 in Leith Walk (+42%).

The membership secretary continued to engage new members via welcome emails and phone calls.

Meetings and events

The sub-branch held monthly hybrid meetings at Leith Community Centre (with breaks in August and December). There were typically attended by 10-16 members and followed by social drinks at the Lioness of Leith.

Social events included a litter pick in Leith Links organised by Morgane Perez-Huet, a Christmas party organised by Mariusz Cebulski, and post-election drinks at Lost in Leith organised by James T. Harding.

Scottish Parliament Election

The sub-branch was directly involved in three interlinked campaigns:

• The regional campaign for Edinburgh and Lothians East, in conjunction with all of Edinburgh Greens and East Lothian Greens
  • 67877 votes, 21.2% of the total vote share
  • +7.9pp swing compared to 2020 results
  • Elected 3 MSPs: Kate Nevens, Q Mannivanan (NEL member) and Kayleigh Kinross-O’Neill (NEL councillor)

• Contituency campaign for Edinburgh North Eastern and Leith (Kate Nevens), in conjunction with East Edinburgh Greens
  • 10559 votes, 27.8% of the total vote share
  • +17.3% swing compared to notional 2020 results (We did not stand)
  • Finished 2nd behind SNP on 35.8%

• Constituency campaign for Edinburgh Northern (Kayleigh Kinross-O’Neill), in

• conjunction with Central Edinburgh Greens and West Edinburgh Greens
  • 5289 votes, 14.1% of the total vote share
  • +7.6% swing compared to notional 2020 results (We did not stand)
  • Finished 3rd behind Lib Dem (34.6%) and SNP (27.9%)

A large number of volunteers were involved in the sub-branch campaign, peaking with 41 people out and about on polling day. Members from NEL were also involved in key roles across the branch, including comms, finance, volunteer management, events, candidate support, and even one of the lead campaign officers.

Door-knocking was the most popular campaign activity, with 15 full sessions taking place and myriad additional mini-sessions hosted by Kate Nevens and other candidates. Attendance ranged from 6 to 17. We recorded a total of 1247 doorstep conversations, of which 681 (55%) were rated G1 or G2.

We took the approach of splitting door-knock organisation into different roles: Route Wizard, Doras Wrangler, Marketing Maven, Clipboard Juggler, and The Face. Special thanks to Soh Xi Ken for organising the most door-knocking days. Pauline Ward much improved accessibility for door-knocking by conducting access surveys in some key areas of Forth.

Over 30 thousand campaign cards, posters and canvassing cards were hand delivered.(This does not include targeted letters or freepost sent by the party.) Deliveries were ably coordinated by Lennie Sefton, Ian McCormick, Mariusz Cebulski and Ian Cowan.

Special campaign events included a Let’s Get Started campaign launch at St James in Leith in September, and an all-day stall at Leith Police Box the weekend before polling day which featured live music by Rosie Bristow and Toni Santoyo McLeod as well as the brand-new Edinburgh Greens-branded gazebo. NEL members were involved in the branch fundraiser Celidh, the Queens for Greens drag night, the Songs of Care concert, a community meal at Hibs Stadium, and a variety of engaging Green Talks.

A-boards were provided by the branch and were cleaned and fixed up together with East Edinburgh Greens. Ian McCormick acted as coordinator for distribution, creating routes to maximise efficiency for distribution and collection.

On polling day, Ian and Katherine McCormick kindly hosted a NEL HQ in their flat, creating a space for volunteers to collect materials, refuel and recharge. Jula Kinross organised snacks and drinks for volunteers, culminating in dinner for twenty in the evening.

The three most key polling stations were attended continuously from 8am to 8pm on polling day, with volunteers handing off materials in relay. Other polling stations were covered on a more flexible basis, with volunteers collecting materials from HQ and attending as availability and energy levels allowed. A camping chair was available to assist with attendance, and polling-place staff granted access to baby-change facilities at Leith Library.

We undertook GOTV tactics for the first time, which involved revisiting people who were previously door-knocked to remind them to vote and address any last-minute questions. Most of the routes were done twice, once in the morning and once at 5pm.

On count day, five NEL members were involved in ballot sampling and gathered valueable data which can be used to further optimise campaign activity going forward.

Green News

The sub-branch wrote and delivered two editions of Green News during the year period.

Finances

The sub-branch budget for January to December 2026 is £350 and we are projected to be in surplus by the end of the year.

The largest expense is meeting-room hire at £150 annually.

A gazebo was purchased using the branch participatory budget.

Plans for the coming year

The coming year is included in the Strategic Plan for 2026-27.

The influx of new members and volunteers represents an exciting new opportunity for the year ahead, which includes a Council Election with the potential to elect a record number of Green councillors. The sub-branch aims to capitalise on and continue this momentum, making it easier, more accessible, and more fun than ever before for members and volunteers to get involved, and promoting the wellbeing of those who choose to do so.

This report covers SEEG (South East Edinburgh Greens) sub-branch activities over the period June 2025 to May 2026.

Membership

Our sub-branch membership grew nearly 40% from 221 to 308.

We have 77 members in Liberton/Gilmerton ward and 231 members in Southside/Newington ward.

As well as a growing active membership, we have some non-member volunteers who were active in the Holyrood election campaign.

Meetings and events

Regular sub-branch meetings

Our monthly meetings were mostly occupied with Holyrood election campaign planning, Green News delivery, and Branch events (e.g. the Sub-branches Away day). They were all in-person at Nelson Hall (hybrid meetings don’t work well because of the room acoustics).

Our Southside-Newington councillor, Steve Burgess, gives a regular update on both city-wide and local Council matters. We also get occasional Community Council updates and have discussed progress of the Friends of Holyrood Park initiative.

We tried out a new format, intending to have full meetings and more relaxed discussion groups on alternate months. This has been well-received, although election campaigning meant we only had two of the social discussion type. We will get back to these when election campaigning pressure eases off.

Green News

We delivered 6,000 copies of a Summer 2025 edition in Liberton/Gilmerton, and 10,000 copies of an Autumn/Winter edition in Southside/Newington.

The Holyrood election campaign plan didn’t include Spring editions.

Our delivery organisation network is a bit patchy. We no longer have local delivery organisers to manage volunteers in some parts of Southside/Newington, where in previous years we regularly delivered 12,000 to 14,000 copies. However, our capacity has improved in Liberton/Gilmerton, where in the past we sometimes only managed 3,000 copies.

Holyrood election campaign

We held a 'Let’s Get Started' meeting in October, which attracted some new people, both members and non-members. From there, we started running canvassing sessions, holding two in late 2025, then gradually ramping up frequency to two per week by April 2026.

Our canvassing operation had to start from scratch, as we previously relied on the late John Palmer to organise and lead sessions. Also, we had done very little canvassing in Southside/Newington ward for several years (apart from the Westminster 2024 campaign). However, we gained experience and confidence, and by the end of the campaign had a solid group of experienced canvassers.

Our canvassing, leaflet delivery, and polling day operations generally went well - it was certainly our biggest-ever campaign. Volunteer numbers increased as the campaign progressed, but were still a constraint limiting our activity. The most visually impressive part of our campaign was getting Vote Green posters up in windows, particularly in the Southside.

The successful election campaign has greatly boosted our confidence and capacity, standing us in good stead for the forthcoming Southside/Newington by-election and the 2027 Council election.

Appendix - Office Bearers 2025-26

• Joan Carter - Co-Convenor

• Guy Johnson - Co-Convenor

• Breck MacGregor - Branch Committee Representative

• Zara Lazarov - Minutes Secretary

• Stevie West - Membership Secretary

• Al Neathey - Admin Secretary

• Caroline Barr - Social Secretary

Edinburgh Branch to bring "Creation of a regular Scottish Greens Newsletter" motion to Autumn 2026 conference of following text:

Preamble

The Scottish Green Party prides itself as a democratic grass-roots movement, yet communication between members and branches is extremely limited. Outside of Slack with its limitations and council meetings with agendas full to the brim, there is virtually no space for members to share ideas, successes, read about other branches or just communicate.

The party needs an efficient way for members to communicate, because we are not just individuals with similar ideas, we are a community.

Motion

The Scottish Green Party will establish a monthly members newsletter which would be sent to all members and would be available on the members portal.

Any member can provide content as long as it follows all internal party rules, but priority will be given to: Council co-chairs, Party leaders, Representative Groups, Association of Green Councillors, MSP group, branch convenors. Each of those groups excluding branch convenors would be limited to one article per month.

Constitutional motion: Reforming National Executive

Preamble

There is compelling evidence that the National Executive needs reform.

The party went to the crucial 2026 election with more than a hundred thousand pounds less than planned in our strategic plan and had to resort to a 150 thousand pound loan from the Green Party of England and Wales .

Autumn conference left the party with an almost 25 thousand pound overspend showing lack of proper oversight of party staff.

The cultural review which has been agreed years ago only now is treated with some urgency.

Finally the fact that in the seven years Executive existed, the position of co-char, which is one of the most important posts in the party, for years was left empty or was suddenly vacated by members frustrated with the way it works.

There are many reasons for this.

Most information is kept secret from both committee and ordinary members. Staff key performance metrics, staff responsibilities, finance information, invoices, contracts are only available to co-chairs, preventing committee members from making informed decisions and providing effective oversight.

Co-chars being the only ones with sensitive information and responsible for managing staff and other committees, are overloaded with tasks and at high risk of burn-out, especially since the posts are unpaid.

We need to reform the National Executive to make it more democratic and efficient, spread the workload while focusing more on good governance.

Motion

Replace point 3.4.3.2 of Constitution with:

“SGP Executive shall be responsible for procuring legal services as required. Access to legal advice by other office bearers, members and staff shall be at the discretion of the Executive, subject to the Executive's obligation to protect legal privilege of advice to the greatest extent possible and with the exception of the legally required officers, who shall have the automatic right to access legal advice unless they have a relevant conflict of interest.”

Replace point 3.4.3.3 of Constitution with:

“SGP Executive shall present written reports to each Council meeting and shall send a representative to Council meeting to answer questions on the report. Reports by the SGP Executive, must be delivered to the Co-Convenors of SGP Council no later than ten days before each Council meeting, and made available to members at least one week before Council meetings.”

Replace point 3.4.7 of Constitution with:

“SGP Executive will consist of:

a. Eight elected members of National Executive none of whom can be an elected Member of Parliament or Councillors;

b. The Co-Leaders of the SGP;

c. The Co-Convenors of SGP Council;

d. The Treasurer of the SGP;

e. One delegate from each active SGP Representative Group;

f. One delegate from the SGP Parliamentary Group;

g. One delegate from the SGP Association of Green Councilors;

h. One delegate from the SGP Trade Union Group;

i. One delegate from each other SGP National Committee established by a General Meeting or SGP Council, possessing no voting rights;

j. The senior member of SGP Staff, possessing no voting rights;

k. Additional members as defined by the Standing Orders for SGP Executive, possessing no voting rights.

l. The Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion Officer of the SGP.”

Remove point 3.4.8.1 of Constitution.

Amend point 4.3.3 of Constitution.

4.3.3 There will be eight members of SGP Executive, elected for two-year terms, responsible for:

a. Ensuring the membership responsibilities of the SGP Executive as defined in

the Constitution and Standing Orders are carried out;

b. Ensuring the general operation of the SGP;

c. Ensuring the effective working of SGP Executive;

d. Ensuring the effective line management of SGP Staff;

Amend point 4.3.3.1 of Constitution.

4.3.3.1 The members of SGP Executive may serve for no more than three consecutive terms.

The Edinburgh Green Party will bring to Autumn 2026 conference a motion with following text:

Preamble

In the 1960s the American Civil Rights Movement succeeded in ending official segregation of people of colour, but failed to truly transform the lives of minorities that still had to deal with deprivation, lack of education and systematic racism of the police and judiciary.

As a reaction to the oppression of black Americans, in October 1966, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party. The party was proudly socialist, anti-imperialist and anti-racist, provided food, education and clothing to the communities it was involved in.

Due to internal conflicts as well as government sabotage, which included assassinations of multiple members, the party mostly ceased to exist in the 80s. Sadly one of the reasons their revolution failed was entrenched patriarchy and sexism within the organisation bigotries that should be completely rejected.

Yet its impact on the world is undeniable, as its members, like Angela Davis, Kwame Ture and Fred Hampton, inspire radical movements to this day.

Motion

Scottish Green Party conference celebrates the 60 year anniversary of the creation of the Black Panther Party and acknowledges its lasting impact not only on the USA but the entire world.

The branch formally includes the Pentland Hills ward in the South-West Edinburgh Greens (SWEG) sub-branch.

Section 3.2.1

Clarify the level of meeting required to form or dissolve a sub-branch. Insert branch before AGM or EGM

“The formation and dissolution of a Sub-Branch shall be agreed by a simple majority of those present and voting at a quorate and properly convened branch AGM or EGM”

Section 3.4.1

Pluralise the first instance of ward as sub-branches all cover more than one ward.

[The responsibilities of Sub-Branches are to:]

“Implement campaigns and election strategy on behalf of the Branch in their wards and other wards if required (e.g. distribute leaflets, run stalls, canvassing)”

Section 3.5.1

As sub-branches consist of multiple wards and are not all in Edinburgh City Council area, change

[Sub-Branch membership can consist of:]

“All members of the Scottish Green Party within a City of Edinburgh Council ward area”

to

“All members of the Scottish Green Party within the sub-branch’s council ward areas”

In the Constitution section on AGM and Meetings,

delete “(at least one of whom must be a woman),” from:

2.9 At each AGM, the Branch will elect two Co-Conveners (at least one of whom must be a woman), and a Treasurer. The Branch shall inform the SGP Party Office of all new post holders within two weeks of their election. This shall equally apply to any changes in office bearers throughout the year, for example resignations.

The revised clause will read:

2.9 At each AGM, the Branch will elect two Co-Conveners and a Treasurer. The Branch shall inform the SGP Party Office of all new post holders within two weeks of their election. This shall equally apply to any changes in office bearers throughout the year, for example resignations.

In the Constitution section on Office bearers, add new section:

[title] Gender balance

3.1 All positions of leadership or convenorship in Edinburgh Green Party and its sub-branches will be shared by persons who will, so far as is possible, be of different genders. No trans or non-binary person shall be denied the opportunity to hold an SGP office due to their gender. A formal gender balancing process will not be adopted. Where gender balance has not been achieved by an election, members who are elected are invited to consider whether their acceptance of office aligns with SGP's purpose and direction.

Re-number the following sections accordingly.

In the branch standing orders section on Office bearers,

Delete “If the Sub-Branch elects Co-Convenors, at least one of them must be a woman.” from:

3.7.1 Sub-Branches are encouraged to elect office bearers, but are not required to do so. If the Sub-Branch elects Co-Convenors, at least one of them must be a woman.

The revised clause will read:

3.7.1 Sub-Branches are encouraged to elect office bearers, but are not required to do so.

AGM agrees that based on analysis of the 2026 Holyrood election results, the branch will:

Add Pentland Hills as a target ward, in addition to the 13 existing target wards in Edinburgh, for the 2027 local elections.

Run second Green candidates in the following wards in the 2027 local elections – Leith Walk; Southside/Newington; City Centre; Morningside; and Leith.

In the branch standing orders, add new section:

2.4.8 For a period of one week following the AGM, if any officers or ordinary members step down, the vacated position will be offered to the next runners-up in the results of the voting.

1. Notes that the Green Councillor group agreed a motion at their AGM to seek to update the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the branch in order to reflect changes to the Councillor group's long term sickness, and conduct and complaints policy.

2. Notes that the Councillor group Standing Orders (11.2) dictate that changes to the MoU must also be agreed by the branch.

3. Agrees to support the changes to the MoU as set out in the agreed motion at the Councillor group AGM.