Women for Independence

In the second of our blog series by women who have gone into politics via local councils, Cllr Irene Hamilton of Clackmannanshire Council tells her story. Irene is second from the right in this photo, attending a WFI event in Alloa. 

This is the first of what we hope will be a series of blog posts from women who have stood for council.  Our aim is to help women to feel better informed about what is involved and to encourage more women to stand for whatever political party they support.  Here Emma Knox explains what encouraged her to stand as a council by-election candidate in Highland. 

#WFIMediaWatch's champion blogger Kirsty Strickland muses on recent events among the Scottish gentlemanly golfing community, and considers matrimonial opportunities. 

(We are assured this is a photograph of the interior of Muirfield golf club.  We really wouldn't know.)

Maggie Mellon reports from the Sheriff Courts, asking some searching questions about the administration of justice and domestic abuse. 

Award-winning blogger and #WFIMediaWatch supremo Kirsty Strickland writes on last night's Scottish election coverage on the BBC. 

Earlier this week, Edinburgh Women for Indy held an all-women hustings for regional list candidates. Here, WFI National Committee and Edinburgh WFI member Selma Rahman reflects on how EWFI's hustings - done that bit differently - were such a success. 

Prior  to the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, Women for Independence (WFI) used a loosely structured listening exercise to engage with women, and to discuss their hopes for constitutional change.   This proved to be a great way of bringing women together to discuss politics in settings where they felt comfortable and free to speak.

In the run up to the 2016 Scottish Parliamentary elections, WFI repeated this Listening Exercise, asking women what they want from the Scottish Parliament.  Hundreds of women took part in discussions in Glasgow, Dundee, Angus, Edinburgh, Clydebank, Fife, Kilmarnock, Lochaber and Paisley.

This report summarises what women chose to talk about, and what they said. Inevitably, we cannot report on every point made by every woman; that would take a book, not a blog, so this report pulls out the key issues that were mentioned the most frequently, which proved to be very similar all over Scotland. 

Maggie Mellon reports back on her second visit to the courts observing justice in action.

Pat Doran was born and brought up in Dundee and moved to Edinburgh for college and then worked in the university for five years. She had her first daughter in Edinburgh twenty years ago with Martin. They have moved around the UK and now live in Perthshire with one daughter still at home and one at university. She is employed as a Community Link Worker working with children and families in Perth and Kinross.  This is her first time blogging.

Student and feminist Delilah Doe shares her own story of eating disorders, the secret that nobody seems to want to talk about.