Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill 20 05 25-
Renfrewshire Council · 20 May 2025
Back to Economy and Regeneration Policy Board — 20 May 2025 and its agenda
Text extracted from the council's PDF. Layout and reading order may differ from the original.
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___________________________________________________________________ To: Economy and Regeneration Policy Board On: 20 May 2025 ___________________________________________________________________ Report by: Chief Executive ___________________________________________________________________ Heading: Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill 1. Summary 1.1 The Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill was published on 20th March 2025. It is at stage 1 of the three stage process and is anticipated to become an Act in spring 2026. 1.2 This paper provides a brief overview of the Bill and sets out the duties for specified public bodies, including local authorities. ___________________________________________________________________ 2. Recommendations 2.1 Board members are asked to: • Note the introduction of the Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill and the future actions required by Renfrewshire Council. • Note that further updates on the Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill and Council actions will be reported to a future meeting of the Board. ___________________________________________________________________ 3. Background 3.1. The Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill was introduced on 20th March 2025 and the full documentation can be found on this link:
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https://www.parliament.scot/bills-and-laws/bills/s6/community-wealth-building- scotland-bill 3.2. The lead Parliamentary Committee for the Community Wealth Building (CWB) Bill is the Economy and Fair Work Committee which is now running a call for views (until 23rd May 2025) to help inform its examination of the Bill. Council Officers have already responded positively to this call and will update the response if there are further comments from the board. 3.3. The Bill provisions are part of the Scottish Governments’ Programme for Government 2024–25 legislative commitments to ensure consistent implementation of the CWB model of economic development across Scotland. 3.4. CWB is both a policy approach and practical model of economic development. It is designed to tackle long-standing economic challenges and transform local and regional economies by considering the ways in which the public sector, in partnership with the private, third and community sectors, can ensure more wealth is generated, circulated and retained in communities and localities. 3.5. At its core, CWB seeks to rebalance wealth inequality by focusing on practical actions that can be taken across five key priority areas: local ownership, local finance and investment, local employment, local purchasing and locally owned land and assets. 3.6. The Scottish Government has been working with local authorities and other partners to build capacity to help drive forward the implementation of CWB at the local and regional level. In partnership with the Improvement Service it has established a CWB Practitioners Network to aid consistency and practice sharing. 3.7. To support the development of legislation, the Scottish Government has also established a CWB Bill Steering Group to provide oversight as legislative proposals have been developed. The Group is chaired by the Minister for Employment and Investment and brings together key stakeholders across the public, private and third sectors. The Group played a pivotal role in the consultation process for developing the Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill. ___________________________________________________________________ 4. Overview of the Bill 4.1. The duties in the Bill seek to ensure universal implementation of the CWB economic development approach across Scotland whilst allowing for local, regional, and organisational flexibility in line with the Place Principle. 4.2. Scottish ministers have a duty to publish a Community Wealth Building statement within 18 months of the Bill coming in to force. This statement must be reviewed within a period of 5 years and every 5 years thereafter. 4.3. To align with the pillars of CWB, the CWB statement will set out measures to:
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a. use public procurement to facilitate or support such generation, circulation and retention, b. promote i. employment opportunity, ii. workforce development, iii. equality in the workplace c. diversify ownership of land or other assets by facilitating or supporting community ownership, d. bring vacant and derelict land back into use in a way that provides financial, social or environmental benefit to the community, e. encourage local business start-ups or entrepreneurship, f. promote or support the development of employee-owned businesses, co-operatives or social enterprises, g. such other measures as the Scottish Ministers consider appropriate. 4.4. Local authorities and relevant public bodies (to include Territorial Health Boards, Regional Colleges, Scottish Enterprise, South of Scotland Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Skills Development Scotland and Regional Transport Partnerships) are to work together as a “community wealth building partnership.” • CWB partnerships will have a duty to prepare a CWB action plan for the area of the local authority within the period of 3 years beginning with the day on which the Bill comes into force. • The CWB partnership must keep their CWB action plan under review and may revise it as they consider appropriate however, the CWB action plan must be reviewed within the period of 5 years beginning with the day on which the plan was last published. • The CWB partners must, so far as reasonably practicable, implement the measures set out in the plan in the area of the local authority during the period to which the CWB action plan relates. The core policy intention of the CWB action plan is to provide a means for these organisations to collaborate on joint actions, supported by their combined spending ability and broader powers. • Each local authority must publish the CWB action plan agreed with the CWB partnership. 4.5. Economic Development is not a statutory function of local authorities (although local authorities recognise their role in economic development as being an important aspect of their work to provide services that support economic growth and skills development) and so an element of funding will be provided to cover the anticipated costs to local authorities to discharge their duties under the CWB Bill. ___________________________________________________________________
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5. Next Steps for Renfrewshire Council 5.1. An introductory paper was presented to the March 2025 meeting of this Board in anticipation of the Bill being published. The actions in that paper align well with the current Bill and so the next steps for Renfrewshire Council will be: • consult with partners specified in the Bill (Territorial Health Boards, Regional Colleges, Scottish Enterprise, Skills Development Scotland and Regional Transport Partnerships) along with other local partners from the public, private and third sector in Renfrewshire on the principles f CWB and requirement to establish a Renfrewshire Community Wealth Building Partnership • deliver a CWB workshop for elected members (as previously requested) to explore the opportunities that CWB presents for Renfrewshire. The workshop will be scheduled for early autumn 2025. • Develop a Community Wealth Building Conference around autumn 2025 to bring together local partners, community organisations and businesses who can contribute to CWB in Renfrewshire. The conference will provide opportunity to discuss the key themes and agendas of CWB will encourage greater networking and collaboration to promote local partnership working. • Establish a future CWB partnership group and governance structure to agree, implement and deliver a CWB action plan for Renfrewshire. • Identify specific key actions for Renfrewshire Council. 5.2. Further information to elected members and reports to board will be brought forward as required. __________________________________________________ Implications of the Report 1. Financial – The Bill identifies that some funding will be made available to support the new intentions, and work related to, Community Wealth Building. 2. HR & Organisational Development – There are no implications 3. Community/Council Planning – CWB is mentioned across the current council plan, procurement strategy and community learning and development plan. 4. Legal- The council will have an obligation to publish a CWB action plan within the period of 3 years beginning with the day on which the Bill comes into force.
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5. Property/Assets- There are no new implications however, land and assets are a key theme of CWB with a particular focus on community asset transfer and the inclusion of a CWB provision within the National Planning Framework (NPF4) published in 2024. 6. Information Technology – There are no implications 7. Equality & Human Rights- There are no implications 8. Health & Safety- There are no implications 9. Procurement - There are no new implications however, procurement and the tracking of the public pound and local spend are a key focus of the spending pillar of CWB. 10. Risk- There are no implications 11. Privacy Impact- There are no implications 12. COSLA Policy Position- COSLA strongly supports the concept of Community Wealth Building (CWB), advocating for its implementation across Scotland through legislation and collaborative efforts with local authorities, businesses, third sector organisations, and communities to ensure wealth generated within communities is redistributed and benefits local residents; essentially seeing local government as a key "anchor institution" to drive CWB initiatives. 13. Climate Risk - There are no implications 14. Children’s Rights - There are no implications ________________________________________________________ List of Background Papers • “Community Wealth Building in Renfrewshire”; Economy and Regeneration Policy Board, 25th March 2025 ___________________________________________________________________ Authors:: Morag Doig, Community Wealth Building Coordinator, Renfrewshire Council email: morag.doig@renfrewshire.gov.uk Ruth Cooper, Economic Development Manager, Renfrewshire Council Email: ruth.cooper@renfrewshire.gov.uk