Glasgow City Council recently renewed calls that Scottish Greens have been making for the past ten months - for a full Scottish Government bail-out to reopen all of Glasgow’s libraries and community venues, and a new funding model for Glasgow’s cultural assets that reflects their national importance.

While communities faced with venue closures wait on those vital funds, this whole episode has exposed concerns over the Glasgow Life model of arms-length management of public assets.

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Glasgow Life was set up in 2006 by the then Labour-led Council, opposed by Greens. Along with other arms length external organisations (ALEOs) it was expected to minimise costs and access other external funds, but was criticised by trade unions and others as a tax wheeze and a chance to undermine workers.

Glasgow Life has done good things. It has established cultural high points like Glasgow International and Celtic Connections, created some of Scotland’s favourite visitor attractions like the refurbished Kelvingrove and the Riverside museum, developed new cycling facilities with the Velodrome and BMX centre, and led valued work in local communities.

It’s right to recognise achievements - but also highlight how things can be better.

Scottish Greens support the Glasgow Against Closures campaign, which as well as demanding that all venues reopen, and that their apparent firesale via People Make Glasgow Communities is halted, also wants the Council to reassert its democratic control over how they are run.

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They say the threat to venues has exposed the lack of transparency and accountability in the ALEO model.

Bringing everything back in-house would be costly because of the reliefs Glasgow Life qualifies for as a charity. It would need a special mechanism to mitigate that. Greens are open to options, but we also believe steps can be taken right now to put the public’s interests first. We’re calling for three things.

Firstly, truly local venues, like libraries and community centres, are not and should never be expected to be profit-making. Nor should they be forced into voluntary management, or have to be subsidised by concert ticket sales to simply exist. They need guaranteed, sustainable, ring-fenced funding, and a plan to address chronic under-investment stretching back more than a decade.

Second, change the Board. Glasgow Life should be run by those who rely on its services, not by investment bankers and city grandees. Its political make-up also needs to reflect the council as a whole, instead of handing the majority of seats to a minority of SNP councillors.

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Finally, Glasgow Life needs a new purpose. One that’s all about stewarding our public assets, and managing them, with maximum transparency and democratic oversight, in the interest of our long-term health and well-being. That means rejecting the kind of neoliberal thinking that saw it back a Trident-linked arms fair, until Greens put a stop to that earlier this Council term.

The immediate priority remains getting the funding needed to reopen all venues, and to stop their turbo-charged outsourcing under the guise of community empowerment.

But this crisis must also be a reminder that ‘People Make Glasgow’ is not a marketing slogan, it’s a statement of where power truly lies. It’s our duty, as elected councillors, to uphold that.