Green in Govan: New Trees, April Council Meeting

Newsletter #26 - April council meeting on the disposable vape ban, disability funding, health and social care cuts and women's safety. Also notes about new trees and a public meeting on active travel

Tree Watch!

I wrote a few weeks ago about the new trees in Plantation Park and how this is part of Glasgow’s Tree Plan. Well, we’ve had more new trees appear! This time on the wee park space between Edmiston Drive, Merrick Gardens and Ibroxholm Avenue.

This time we’ve got 2 Caucasian Limes, a Nordmann Fir (which I may hang tinsel on in December) and a tree I’ve not yet identified. There’s load more sites across Greater Govan that this will be happening in so if you see them go in - please let me know so I can race down and check them out!

Newly planted Nordmann Fir with Ibroxholm Oval high-rise in the background.

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Active Travel Public Meeting

I’ve written a few times about active travel and the plans that we’re looking at currently in Govan. Most recently just a few weeks ago - you can read what I said here. You can also access all the plans for Greater Govan here.

I’ve noticed some posters go up across Govan this week advertising a public meeting on Tuesday 15th March at 6.30pm at the Pearce Institute which is advertised as stopping these neighbourhood improvements.

The poster doesn’t say who is organising the meeting but it would be really helpful for this to not be a one sided conversation so if you want to see these works take place at all. Please join me at the meeting!

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April Council Meeting

The council works a bit different from the parliament in that we only meet as a full meeting of all 85 councillors every 6 weeks. Outwith that we have committees, boards and most importantly community meetings. If you have four and a half hours to spend - you can watch the whole meeting here!

Questions

First up on the full council agenda is normally questions. These are from across the chamber and are answered by the SNP councillors in the cabinet, normally by the one with the most relevant portfolio. You can see a full list of the questions here and the written answers should be up in a few days time.

I had a question in about the upcoming vape ban which comes into force on the 1st June 2025. Specifically about how the council will be enforcing these rules because we’ve had similar rules about single-use plastic cutlery for three years and they’re still everywhere you look. The administration seem confident but time will tell!

Motions

Normally we hear four motions in a meeting. First up was the SNP motion, this time it was about the Labour UK government and their cuts to disability benefits. Second up was a Labour motion about women’s safety in the city. Third up was the Green motion about the need for change in funding for the health and social care sector in the city. The last motion of the day is normally reserved for the Conservative group but since there’s currently only one of them and the other one has now joined Reform, they haven’t brought motions in a few years. This means that last motion this time was by the SNP on automatic voter registration.

If you want to have a look at the motions - you can read them all here. I participated in the debate about Health and Social Care funding - I posted this to Instagram which you can watch here.

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Surgeries

I run advice and support surgeries 3 times a month, you don’t need an appointment, just turn up! Next dates are:

• Thursday 17th April - 5pm - Kinning Park Complex, Cornwall Street

• Friday 25th April - 11am - Clyde Community Hall, Whitefield Road

• Tuesday 13th May - 4pm - Maslow’s Community Hub, Shaw Street

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Upcoming Community Councils

• Govan East - Riverside Hall - 15th April - 6pm

• Kinning Park - Kinning Park Complex - 21st April - 7pm

• Drumoyne - Govan High - 24th April - 7pm

• Govan - Pearce Institute - 12th May - 7pm

• Ibrox and Cessnock - Clyde Community Hall - 21st May - 7pm

These are all public meetings so you can just turn up at your relevant one. They’d all be very happy for someone new to join in! I’m aim to attend at many of them as possible so hopefully see you there!

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