Ending the Punch and Judy show: How to get a more cooperative politicsThere is an uncomfortable fact for those who oppose moves to a fairer voting system: all the chaos we have seen in Westminster over the past few years has been under the ‘strong and stable’...Posted 30 May 2019
Ending the Politics of Division – How We Can Build a New DemocracyTen years on from the expenses scandal that rocked trust in our politics and nearly three years since this Brexit deadlock began, Britain’s broken political system remains largely unchanged. No one can deny it: the...Posted 25 May 2019
ERS in the Press – April 2019As we geared up for a big round of local elections in England and Northern Ireland, we’ve been putting reform of Britain’s out-dated politics firmly on the agenda. Fair votes now As the Brexit process...Posted 01 May 2019
SNP delegates pack out ERS Scotland fringesOn Sunday at SNP spring conference, delegates showed their interest in a deliberative and local democracy by packing out 2 events hosted by ERS Scotland. The first, a discussion around the merits of citizens’ assemblies,...Posted 01 May 2019
ERS in the Press – March 2019Brexit might be dominating the news, but the rolling constitutional crisis that we call Westminster is still up to its usual tricks. We’ve spent the last month getting press attention for some of our biggest...Posted 29 Mar 2019
Local citizens’ assemblies could break our political deadlock – but the government have vetoed themLast summer, ministers announced genuinely exciting plans for piloting ‘deliberative democracy’ across the UK. The plan was to use a series of citizens’ assemblies to engage people with politics, to tackle complex and contested topics,...Posted 22 Mar 2019
Scotland needs new institutions to transform our local communitiesCan you remember a time you were talking with someone and the response you got back meant that it was blatantly obvious that they hadn’t understood what you were saying? You try again, but again...Posted 27 Feb 2019
What is a Citizens’ Assembly?Citizens’ Assemblies are often in the news, from the assemblies that led to the referendums on equal marriage and abortion in Ireland, to the Citizens’ Assembly of Scotland and local council climate assemblies. While the...Posted 24 Jan 2019
Local government in Scotland is top-down and distant – but we can change thatIf there was once a connection between elected councillors in Scotland and the communities they supposedly represent, this has long since fallen away. City halls are often worlds apart from the communities within their apparent...Posted 01 Jan 2019
Long Read: What’s gone wrong with our democracy – and how do we fix it?This is a time of high political anxiety. No one seems to be very sure of much anymore. Not that long ago it all seemed so different. The twentieth century was a time of tremendous...Posted 14 Aug 2018