Been a while since I blogged so here goes as a few things spring into my mind.
Firstly, we had our first meeting in an outlying area , in Onich. The hotel we had it in was very accommodating, and although I always worry we’ll have nothing to talk about, we ended up running over! Loads of vibrant chat about campaigning, and educating, and empowering ourselves. I always come away from these meeting feeling more enthused, more inspired, by the amazing women that gather – to continue getting out there and keeping the fires burning! Saying that – here’s what we are doing next : –
Then we held our first event, where Lesley Riddoch visited us as part of her Highland White Blossom Mini Tour. Everyone helped out with setting up, baking, making teas and coffees, promoting, arranging PA’s, making leaflets, taking tickets, and clearing up – making it a very successful night, with approx. 100 attendees. This was just the sort of thing Lesley talked about, co- operatives and making things happen – people power. Lesley is a very strong speaker and spoke with authority and humour. She spoke about a lot of the subjects in her book ‘Blossom’ (i’ll touch on some briefly, read the book!) – including the community buy out of Eigg, and West Whitelawburn Estate – where the tenants basically bought their own property (using a grant available at the time) as a co-op and now use the rents to improve it. All pretty amazing stuff when you think that just ordinary people achieved these things. Not lawyers or politicians, but ordinary folk – clubbing together for the better good of their communities. Makes you wonder. And Land Reform came up, which Lesley has been recently campaigning strongly for. With just fewer than 500 people owning half of Scotland, we should all be taking an interest and getting involved. (Land festival anyone?)
Unfortunately I missed the Jim Sillars talks, but from all accounts he was incredibly inspiring and brought a tear to the eye! I will also be away for Ivan McKee when he’s here on the 10th of April – again a well versed man who will be talking about The Economic (and Social) case against Austerity.
I was also at a Lochaber Greens meeting, where local man John Hutchison was also talking about Land Reform – having been involved in it for many years. John was involved with the community buy out on Knoydart (and Eigg) and is also involved with The Scottish Rural Parliament now. I’ve only just recently met John, but he is extremely knowledgeable on the subject (and many other things to boot!) and is a good advocate for talent on your doorstep!
And after all that – we have Tommy Sheridan and Lesley Jarrett in Ballachulish on the 18th of April! Love or loath him – you can’t deny Tommy is a powerful speaker!
So, generally a busy time here – and having never been involved in politics before – i’m wondering now – is it always like this? Do we normally have all these talks and meetings in the area in election year, or are we really in changed times? I hope its the latter, everyone seems so engaged, the campaign is vibrant and exciting – how could I have missed this in the past?
Lochaber Women for Independence 