MAgazine
Because we forgot how to fight
A 40 year campaign to make you believe that monopolies are just an aspect of nature has led us to believe that you can’t do anything about them. This is total nonsense and all we have to do is remember.
How to make “Public Control” mean “Public Ownership”
The Scottish Government has taken a step towards better buses in Scotland but “public control” isn’t the same as “public ownership”.
How taxing land can help us find out who owns land
One of the barriers to creating a land tax in Scotland is the fact that our Land Register is incomplete and we don’t know who owns Scotland. Instead of seeing it as a barrier though, it may be an opportunity to compel owners to properly value and register their land.
Burnham’s National Care Service plans are a warning to the Scottish Government
The Scottish Government should adopt Andy Burnham’s approach to policy-making: to build up the detail of a proposal for change before setting the timeline to launching it.
Finally, Local Government Reform - But it must be done right!
The Scottish Government’s sudden push for local government reform should be welcomed but their proposal as it stands needs a lot of work to make sure that it’s not a chaotic mess or a recipe for corruption and centralisation.
Let’s try and abolish prisons then…
A politician has been mocked for calling for the abolition of prisons, but our prisons are definitely failing. Could ‘abolish prisons’ make any sense - and what would it look like?
To save us all, invest in meat space
There is a youth loneliness crisis but it hides itself so we must look for its signs strewn across our culture. IF we don’t acknowledge this, behave like it matters and do something about it, we’re in trouble.
The Programme for Government 2026
The first Programme for a newly elected government is a good time large ambitions. The ones included in this year’s PfG certainly are large, but not necessarily good.
Giving to those who already have
Why is the Scottish Government creating a housing subsidy it knows will mostly go to the wrong people? In Common this week argues strongly against another help to buy scheme.
Forget ‘opportunities’; what about lives?
Being young has never been easy but it used to be a transitionary stage towards a decent adult life. If that adult life is less and less available, what does our politics offer young people?
Six more ideas to revitalise the high street
One of Andy Burnham’s first initiatives as Prime Minister appears to be to revitalise high streets in our towns and cities. He’s suggested one policy - regulating vape shops - but if he wants to go further, here are six ideas than could do much more.
A ride to nowhere in Glasgow
Adham Fisher is a public transport campaigner for England who has gone to various cities and tried to ride as much public transport as he could in a set period of time to describe how successful it is. He was in Scotland for the Commonwealth Games so gave Glasgow a shot - this is what he found out.
John Swinney Is Acting Like a Climate Denier
John Swinney is actively lobbying for oil companies to get a tax cut so that they can make more money. This makes him more extreme on oil subsidies than vocal climate denier Donald Trump.
Save the CCA for Artists
Guest writer Georgia Grainger calls for the Centre for Contemporary Arts in Glasgow to be retained as a cultural hub for artists via community ownership rather than being lost to the private sector.
Everything wrong with the new 'Universities Defence Alliance'
In this week’s In Common, Rory Hamilton adds a new layer to the saga of university management in Scotland, where three leading Scottish universities have signed up to a charter which asks members to promote the defence industry to students and creates a dependent relationship between defence sector funding and university research priorities.
Retrofit is on a roll, Let’s keep the momentum going
Keith Baker gives us an update on the progress he’s making on helping to improve Scotland’s home energy efficiency standards by having the Scottish Government adopt principles that he and Common Weal have been pushing towards.
Despite the challenges, football can still unite us
The World Cup shows much of the worst about football - along with much of the best. It may be captured by big business and political agendas, but so long as kids can kick a can in a playground, it remains our game.
Why you should Get to grips with data centre politics
The backlash against data centres is only just reaching the UK but it would be a big mistake to mistake this for ‘just more Nimbyism’. Unless you understand what is different about this backlash you will miss one of the most significant things happening in politics right now.
Scotland’s houses are crumbling around us
New statistics from the Scottish Government reveals that more than half of Scotland’s houses do not meet minimum standards of quality and state of repair.
How the Scottish Government drove a wedge between care experts and the cared for
Mark Smith and Marion Macleod from Common Weal’s Care Reform Group discuss their latest academic paper on how the Scottish Government overused the “lived experience” of cared for people to shield themselves from expert advice about the National Care Service.