38 Degrees Scotland

Campaigns (40)

• 

  Speed Awareness Course to educate drivers

  A speed awareness can modify and change driving behaviours, fines /points are less effective. Might save more lives on the road!

  11 of 100 Signatures

  Created by Maggie proctor
• Edinburgh
  Let's Talk About Darryl.....

  Darryl could be any one of hundreds of people in this city. He has clearly fallen through the cracks and is caught up in some Kafkaesque bureaucratic nightmare. He needs a home. He is not alone.

  7 of 100 Signatures

  Created by jonathan richards
• 

  Keep McGills Number 26 serving the new Glasgow Hospital

  It is important to families of disabled children, those of us with sensory or mobility needs. Those visiting a sick relation. For many having to use two buses is just too much. This will have a huge impact on the most vulnerable. Transport should serve the public not put profit first. Please sign and share.

  51 of 100 Signatures

  Created by Sandra Webster
• 

  No MP's should be members of secret societies.

  It is important that the people in legal, civil service positions and those managing the country on behalf of the electorate have the people and country's best interests at heart and have no hidden agenda or secret loyalties that may influence their decisions in ways that may not be the best decision for the people and the for the country. This petition relates to MP's, Judges, Lawyers, Police and Civil Servants in all positions who are members of secret societies, including the Masonic Order, and have sworn an oath or "obligation" to the society putting it before everything and everyone else and swearing an oath to help members of the society in all situations, or face death if they do not. These societies meet behind closed doors and have secret agendas which mean the member cannot fulfil any roles honestly because they have an overriding loyalty to the secret society before anything else.

  331 of 400 Signatures

  Created by David Banner
• 

  Danger to sea-life from oil spills

  The major thing that Scotland’s got is it’s stunning beauty, but you just know that someone’s going to make a mistake with this. When that happens, big business may suffer in their pockets, but it’s not their environment that’s going to suffer, it’s not their gills that will be full of oil. We can get by without doing this, it’s riding roughshod over everyone and all of our wildlife in order to promote business. Ships would be transferring oil at a rate of two tonnes per second and indiscriminate dumping of ballast waste endangers shellfish stock and wildlife including bottlenose dolphins, porpoise and seals. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enU9wtbLWCA

  105,800 of 200,000 Signatures

  Created by Ros Curwood
• TO STOP THE SHOOTING OF WILDLIFE IN FINDHORN BAY, MORAY, NORTHERN SCOTLAND

  All animals and wildlife need to be cherished & protected.

  25 of 100 Signatures

  Created by Mary Vines
• 

  Sell the yachts pay the pensions

  11,000 staff and 20,000 pensioners of BHS will find that their pensions are affected by BHS going into administration. During the 15 years that the Green family owned BHS they are reputed to have taken nearly £600m out of the company. They live in Monaco, have 3 yachts, a helicopter, and a private jet. They hold extravagant parties in exotic locations. All this whilst people who worked in a low wage industry are going to suffer (and you can only be on one yacht at once!).

  263 of 300 Signatures

  Created by Lin Macmillan
• Barrhead
  Sort our roads

  The state of these roads costs the drivers a fortune in car repair and is a danger to the public and vehicles.

  14 of 100 Signatures

  Created by Ian Mcdermott
• Dundee
  

  MAKE DUNDEE A NO-WORKFARE CITY

  This is an idea that received unanimous support from the Dundee Fairness Commission. The Scottish Unemployed Workers' Network is calling for it to be translated into action. People unable to find work are increasingly being made to work for nothing on pain of losing their benefits and being left destitute. There have been various different work-for-your-benefits schemes - including Community Work Placements that mandate people to work unpaid for 30 hours a week for 6 months, a total of 782 hours, or more than 2 ½ times the maximum community service given as punishment for a crime. The DWP doesn’t actually use the term workfare, which comes from the United States where this approach was developed, but it is a convenient word to use to cover all the different schemes that both punish and exploit the unemployed. Very few of these schemes provide anything at all in the way of useful experience, and the people forced to do them are often treated like skivvies both in the work they are made to do and the attitudes shown to them. Far from building their confidence, as official documents suggest, this forced labour saps the spirit and wears down people’s mental health. And if they deviate at all from what they are being instructed to do they can end up sanctioned and penniless. In addition, rather than increase the numbers of people in paid work, these schemes actually cut across the creation of paid jobs. Why pay someone to work when you can get the labour for nothing? They also provide unfair competition to businesses who want to do the right thing by their workers. These schemes are a major source of worry for everyone who is faced with them, but they have not gone unchallenged – and challenges have elicited widespread support. Naming and shaming of companies and organisations who have exploited this forced labour has persuaded many well-known names to pull out of these schemes, and the Government refuses to publish the names of organisations involved as this would expose them to protests. Keep Volunteering Voluntary has persuaded large numbers of charities and non-profit organisations to sign up to their promise not to use forced labour. Workfare is an integral part of the ‘welfare reform’ juggernaut that is destroying our welfare state. We don’t have the power to change the rules, but a concerted programme of resistance organised at city level could provide a significant contribution to making them unworkable, and also highlight what is happening to those not already aware. We see the first (simple and easily instigated) steps as falling under two headings: 1/ We call on the City Council to agree that it will not itself be party to any workfare schemes and that it will make non-participation a condition for any organisation in receipt of council funding. 2/ We also call on the Council to give official backing to a well-publicised campaign to give formal recognition to all businesses and organisations who agree not to participate in these schemes. This would be similar to the scheme operated by Keep Volunteering Voluntary (who are very interested in the idea of a no-workfare city), but would include commercial organisations and not just voluntary ones. Organisations who have agreed not to exploit workfare would be listed in a well-publicised website and licensed to display a ‘no-workfare city’ logo on their window and publicity materials so that the general public would know where they could go without patronising organisations that use forced labour. This sort of opt-in scheme would avoid the difficulties of getting the accurate and up-to-date information needed for a name and shame list. However, it does need to be very well publicised so that organisations feel under sufficient pressure to take part. Publicity would also help prevent small voluntary organisations from being persuaded by misleadingly worded DWP documents into thinking that by participating in these schemes they are helping unemployed people. It would enable them instead to provide real help that people can access on a voluntary basis.

  188 of 200 Signatures

  Created by Sarah Glynn
• Asda fines disabled customers

  Once a month, I take my blind amputee brother to Asda supermarket in Perth. During our last visit to the store, we were appalled at our treatment following the use of a disabled parking space. I discovered a fine which had been imposed on the grounds that my brother (who has lived in a care home for many years and cannot drive for obvious reasons) does not have a blue badge to display. Why should a genuinely disabled person be fined in an Asda car park for not displaying a blue badge? Blue Badge Scotland clearly state on their website: "The Blue Badge scheme is for drivers or passengers with severe mobility problems. The scheme provides a range of on-street parking concessions enabling Blue Badge holders to park closer to where they need to go. The scheme does not apply to off-street car parking, for example in privately operated car parks at supermarkets or airports." I immediately contested this fine with the store management and was shocked to discover that Asda have no power to waive these fines under any circumstances. This is because Asda allow a private company - Smart Parking - to run many of their car parks across the country. This company exploits the blue badge system under their "contract" agreement and employ their own staff to cowardly affix parking fines to windshields without care or consideration for who could be using this space. By allowing such a company to run their parking areas, Asda are complicit in this greedy money making exercise. Following my formal complaint, I had a call from an Asda corporate employee who claims to be among the highest echelons of customer service representatives. This individual showed no understanding or compassion whatsoever, responding to my issue with cold bureaucracy. This employee showed (as with any other member of Asda management that i have discussed this issue with) utter incompetence in understanding the difference between criminal law and contract law. I have been persistently shamed as having “broken the law”, which is absolutely not the case. Perhaps the most shocking revelation during this call is that Asda have confirmed they DO NOT provide their own spaces for disabled people who do not have (perhaps have forgotten or never had the need for) a blue badge. Their best suggestion was that I use the drop off point at the front door. This shows an incredible lack of understanding as they expect me to leave my blind, wheelchair bound brother unattended while I find a regular space. My brother is effectively barred from Asda as there are no suitable spaces to allow safe access to their stores. This amounts to discrimination against disabled customers, as confirmed in my correspondence with Citizens Advice Scotland. They have suggested that there is a strong argument here for the discrimination against the disabled and they have notified trading standards with regards to this issue. I am grateful to have guidance and support of local mps and msps on this matter in addition to a local newspaper that intends to run our story. PLEASE SIGN this petition to help prevent other people from suffering this discrimination, humiliation and indignity while visiting their local Asda store. N.B. Tesco have confirmed that they do not treat their disabled customers in this way and are equally shocked by the conduct of Asda.

  73 of 100 Signatures

  Created by Bill Cuthbert