Leith Festival Society's Mary Moriarty, Queen of Leith, has issued the call. Spread the word. Leith Pageant will be back on Leith Walk for Summer 2012.
Leith Councillor, and Festival Society Chair, Gordon Munro said "This is the result of the goodwill and hardwork of the board and other dedicated Leithers. I couldn't be more delighted". Leith & North notes that this will be a great boost for the hard hit people of Leith, and a triumph for the persistence of Mary Moriarty and others who have worked hard with Leith Councillor Gordon Munro, as well as Councillor Rob Munn, to keep the Festival alive and kicking. Newslink: Statutory repairs scandal - cost to City could surge past the £30 million mark: Evening News, April 2nd >>> No Leith Biomass Plant latest: There will be NO Leith Biomass Plant
Forth Energy have announced they no longer intend to build a Biomass Plant in Leith. This marks another triumph for committed local campaigning.
A press release reads "Forth Energy announces today (Thursday, 9th February 2012) that, in light of new proposals to develop the Port of Leith as a hub for offshore renewable energy manufacture and support and the consequent demand for space at the Port, it has written to the Scottish Government’s Energy Consents Unit withdrawing its current application for permission to build a combined heat and power (CHP) plant at Leith". Newslink: Historic Leith buildings among those at risk: Evening News, April 3rd >>> N30: Public sector pensions rally: By the time we got to Holyrood we were 10,000 strong
^^^ Above: Thousands packed The terraces and greens of Holyrood and the Parlie to defend their pensions.
Full picture story to follow soon Newslink: David Cameron's "damp squib" dazzles in Scotland: Evening News, December 1st >>> Greater Leith residents join the growing cry "Our City's Not For Sale!"
^^^ Above: Cathy defends children's services in North Edinburgh as Duncan Smith from UNISON, and others, watch on
Left >>>: Matt Wheatley of disabled rights group Black Triangle. Matt is also a founding member of Greater Leith Against the Cuts. Leith and Leith Walk area residents gathered on a rain drenched Festival night, August 16th, to express their outrage and horor about the LibDem-SNP Council's Alternative Business Model (ABM). Almost all informed observers argue that this plan represents an official led drive to privatise Council services and that administration Councillors utterly fail to grasp how serious the threat to services is.
Labour Councillors Gordon Munro (Leith) and Angela Blacklock (Leith Walk) came along and backed the campaign, while statements were read out from LibDem Councillor Marjorie Thomas explaining the financial challenges facing the City, as well as brief comments from Councillors Rob Munn (SNP, Leith) and Deidre Brock (SNP, Leith Walk). The meeting was urged to contact all their local Councillors to share their feelings, and there was a call on the unions to for a mass march, which the public could get behind.
Full Council will debate plans very soon - on October 27th - two contracts covering several services, thousands of jobs, and up to £1 billion pounds - could be agreed with most Edinburgh Council Tax payers having been told little or nothing about it.
A meeting of Greater Leith Against the Cuts to build the campaign in the Leith and Leith Walk area has been organised for Tuesday August 30th at the Pilmeny Resource Centre, starting at 7.30pm.
Download flyer about the Greater Leith Against The Cuts meeting >>>
Learn more on the UNISON web site >>>
Sign petition to LibDem Council Leader Jenny Dawe >>> Newslink: Edinburgh bus fares forced up, as Scottish Government cuts grant: Evening News, February 1st >>> Leith Festival 2011 (Leith Tattoo, Hafla & The 3rd Peter Smith Cup still to come!)
Read the picture story on Leith & North >>> Newslink: Stay of Execution for Stockbridge Trees: Evening News, November 22nd >>> MELA 2011 preview: Anna Freemantle's first Fashion Show
Pictures of the Fashion Show at Edinburgh MELA 2011 on Leith & North >>> Newslink: Broughton Spurtle, November 2011: Download #200 here >>> Montgomery St Park Summer Fun Day 2011 (coming soon)
Friends of Montgomery Street Park web site >>> Newslink: Read latest news from Mark Lazarowicz, Edinburgh North & Leith MP >>> Royal Botanics hosts sculpture event of the year!
^^^ Above: Penny For Your Thoughts by Jane Morgan Jungle City is at the Botanical Gardens til September 3rd
Botanics becomes home for joking Jungle City animals, The Scotsman, August 17th >>>
Jungle City web site >>> Newslink: Waverley Staton escalator breaks down on Day One: Evening News, February 1st >>> Amorphophallus Titanum is coming!
Amorphopallus Titanum, the rare and celebrated corpse flower, is set for a June bloom in the West Tropics House of Edinburgh's Royal Botanical Gardens.In 2003 the corm (a type of tuber) the size of a small orange of an Amorphophallus titanum was gifted to RBGE in 2003 by Hortus Botanicus Leiden, Netherlands. In May 2011 a flower shaped bud emerged and the RBGE staff are watching over it like anxious first time parents.
You can pay it a visit between 10.00am and 5.00pm daily, and your entry fee will entitle you to see all the other wonders of the glass houses.
On the other side of the Botanic Gardens, the £15.7 million John Hope Gateway Centre has been named the most sustainable building in Scotland in this year's prestigious Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors in Scotland awards.
Follow Amorphophallus Titanum on the RBGE web site >>>
You may have heard of it before at the Huntington >>> Newslink: ... and now it's guerilla sculptors!: Evening News, August 26th >>> Power to the People? A Forum Theatre event from ACTive INquiry
Read the full picture story on Leith & North >>> Newslink: High Noon for trams at City Chambers on Friday September 2nd: The Scotsman, August 30th >>> Grass Roots bring Africa to Redbraes (coming soon)
Newslink: Pavement Lanes for cyclists?: Evening News, July 27th >>>
International Workers Memorial Day: Princes St Gardens, April 28th 2011
^^^ Above: Protest in Harmony, led in singing by Penny Stone
Flags were lowered over the City Chambers, relatives and trade unionists gathered round the memorial tree in Princes St Gardens to remember those who have died in the workplace. As Craig Marshall of Prospect said, "We came here remembering the dead. Let us leave ready to fight for the living".
Key themes this year are Government cuts to the funding of the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) and local authority funding and enforcement activity, attacks on journalist throughout the world, and the power workers of Fukushima - who "whatever you think of nuclear, had the simple right to be able to go home at the end of the working day". Craig Marshall also stressed the importance of proactive enforcement and decried that the Government is looking for fewer inspections for dock workers, as well as electrical, agricultural and quarry workers, as part of a drive to cut "red tape" for businesses.
Left <<<: John Stevenson (Edinburgh UNISON) after laying a wreath .Right >>>: A wreath is laid on behalf of Ian Murray, Labour MP for Edinburgh South.
"The aim is to free businesses from unnecessary bureaucratic burdens and the fear of having to pay out unjustified damages claims and legal fees". Lord Young
Protest in Harmony sang "The William Morris Song" by John Young, "The Hiroshima Song" by a survivor, urging us to "tell the children, so what happened won't happen again", and "Stand Firm". Hilary Horrocks spoke of the 97 journalists who were killed in 2010 alone, with Pakistan and Mexico being the most dangerous countris in the world: "the threats to journalists are everywhere and impunity looms"; a timely reminder that while the Murdoch acolytes debase the profession, hundreds all over the world are risking their lives in the pursuit of truth and justice.
John Stevenson of UNISON Edinburgh declared "Prosecution and the chance that you might have to pay damages is one of the few things that focuses the corporate mind on health and safety. Without that, regulations are toothless".
"The collapse in inspection, investigation and enforcement has dramatically reduced the chances of businesses being detected and prosecuted for committing safety offences". Institute for Employment Rights
John Stevenson's speech in full on the UNISON web site >>>
Scottish Hazards Campaign web site >>>
Protest in Harmony web site >>> Newslink: Broughton Spurtle, September 2011: Download #198 here >>> Port o' Leith bar: Re-PUB-lican Party
Do you recognise the cheery Executioner? Find out who it is on Leith & North >>> Newslink: Apocalypse TIE?: Evening News: June 7th >>> Edinburgh sends fascists home to think again
Read the full picture story on Leith & North >>> Newslink: The Roxy Lives Again!: Evening News, July 26th >>>
February's photo: No Leith Biomass lobby outside the Scottish Parliament
BBC News: Edinburgh & East Scotland home page >>>
Met Office: 5 day forecast for the Leith area >>>
Listen live online to Leith FM >>>
