The Scottish Parliament election in 2026 is crucial for the Scottish Co-operative Party, we must build on the gains we have made since the election of the Labour and Co-operative-led government in Westminster in 2024.
We want to hear the voice of our members, please let us know your views.
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Scotland has a historic co-operative tradition, with approximately 600 co-operatives generating £1.9bn in revenue and serving 700,000 members. The Scottish Co-operative Party believe the co-operative model can play a bigger role in delivering a more equitable, inclusive economy. The Scottish Government should look to deliver at least a doubling of the size of the co-operative economy – with development across diverse sectors.
The Scottish Government can play a leading role in ensuring Scotland has a world-leading co-operative development system. To achieve this, co-operative development must be put at the heart of business support services and economic development strategies.
Policy Recommendations
Community owned renewable energy can help to transform Scotland’s energy system and our relationship to it. Locally owned and generated energy puts Scotland’s communities in control of their energy usage – facilitating the shift to net zero in a just and fair way. Whether its solar, wind or hydro, community energy projects are already delivering for communities across the country. The Scottish Government can do more to support their growth, ensuring every community has a scheme and access to clean, green energy.
Employee ownership is a growing sector across the UK economy – providing workers with an ownership stake in their workplace. This model delivers a range of benefits to both workers and businesses – leading to improved productivity, business resilience and job satisfaction.
As many business owners prepare to exit from their workplace, the Scottish Government can play a pivotal role in ensuring workers across Scotland can capitalise from the benefits of employee ownership. New support, funding and publicly available information could make a step-change in increasing the rate of employee ownership across Scotland.
Many Scottish communities are under served by existing public transport provision – leading to lack of access to public services, work opportunities and social activity. The Scottish Government will need to look beyond existing models of public transport – to incorporate greater co-operative and mutual models at the core of provision.
Many residents across Scotland struggle to access high quality, affordable housing. The Scottish Co-operative Party believe co-operative and community-led housing can play a far greater role in delivering long-term affordable and secure housing to residents. Co-operative housing delivers a unique combination of benefits – affordability, resident empowerment, community development and long-term tenure. These combined benefits have been co-operative housing a leading and attractive tenure in countries across the world, including Norway, Germany and Switzerland. There’s no reason why Scotland should have the same.
Land ownership in Scotland is more concentrated than almost any country on Earth, with an estimated 67% of Scotland’s private rural land owned by just 0.025% of the population. Previous Scottish Labour & Co-operative Government’s have advanced legislation to improve equity and access to land, including the Abolition of Feudal Tenure 2000 and the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003. These acts advanced citizens and communities’ rights to a fairer land system and it is now time to go forward in creating a land system which works for modern Scotland.
Local authorities across Scotland have been taking a leading role in enacting community wealth building strategies, using public procurement to support local co-operatives and expand the social economy. Supporting the development of diverse ownership business models helps to retain wealth generated from economic activity in the local economy. Promoting community ownership and co-operatives also works to achieve the decentralisation of power – empowering local authorities and communities to shape their local areas.
Scotland deserves a health and care service fit for the future, meeting the diverse needs of residents across the country. The primary care and social care system suffers from a crisis in accessibility and availability – meaning health issues often go untreated and worsen. Co-operative alternatives in primary and social care can empower patients and staff – creating a more democratic and accountable system. The Scottish Government can play a leading role in incentivising the development of a more co-operative care system – in social care, dental care and GP practices.
Community ownership empowers residents to reshape and reimagine their local areas, establishing new institutions and saving much-loved existing ones. For too long communities have felt powerless to ensure their local areas have the goods, services and amenities they need. A Scottish Labour Government can commit to strengthening community rights further – empowering local community groups to purchase a wider variety of assets more rapidly to drive community-led regeneration.
‘Football without fans is nothing’ – in the famous words of Jock Stein. But for many supporters they feel increasingly alienated from the football system and their historic clubs. The Scottish Government should look to ensure the voice of fans remains strong within clubs and the wider football system. Fan ownership – commonplace in Spain and Germany – should be supported and encouraged by the Scottish Government.
Mutual financial services can be transformative to the lives of their members – enabling people to save and invest in themselves and their loved ones. Scotland has a growing credit union sector, with around 90 credit unions, serving over 400,000 members, with assets of £629m. A Scottish Labour Government could boost financial inclusion for people across Scotland by promoting the growth of credit unions and building societies to meet the needs of underserved communities.
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