2025 April Minutes of Inauguration Meeting of newly elected Community Council

Merchiston Community Council — Minutes of Inaugural Meeting

Date: Tuesday 15th April 2025

Chaired by Cllr Ben Parker, Returning Officer, followed by Ian Doig

Location: Merchiston Tennis and Bowling Clubhouse

Present:
Ian Doig (ID), Vivien Kitteringham (VK), Mairianna Clyde (MC), Joan Houston (JH), Helen Zealley (HZ), Bridget Stevens (BS), Roma Menlowe (RM), John McKenna (JM), Raphael Uddin (RU, Minute Taker), Gordon Cameron (GC), Hilary Swanston (HS), Mary Breatnach (MB), Nick Brett (NB), Leah (Max) Edmends (LE)

City Councillors: Cllr Ben Parker (BW, Green)

  1. Welcome and Apologies

Apologies had been received from Daniel Cairns, Klaus Glenk, Vanessa Meadu, Jay Feeney, and Aala Elwadie. Frances Hawarden was unable to attend but sent LE as proxy to sign forms on behalf of Frances.

2.   Declarations of interest

There were no declarations of interest.

3. Announcing Community Council Members as duly elected.

Members in attendance signed the CEC declarations of acceptance form, and BP announced them as duly elected members:

  • Ian Doig
  • Vivien Kitteringham
  • Mairianna Clyde
  • Joan Houston
  • Helen Zealley
  • Bridget Stevens
  • Roma Menlowe
  • John McKenna
  • Gordon Cameron
  • Hilary Swanston
  • Mary Breatnach
  • Frances Hawarden
  • Local Interest Group – Nick Brett was elected as the Local Interest Group representative for the Edinburgh Steiner School.

In addition, the following members who had sent their apologies for being unable to attend this meeting, had prior to this meeting signed their declaration of acceptance form and were also confirmed as duly elected members by BP:

  • Aala Elwadie
  • Daniel Cairns
  • Klaus Glenk
  • Vanessa Meadu
  • Local Interest Group – Jay Feeney was also elected in absentia as the Local Interest Group representative for Bruntsfield Primary School Parents’ Council

4.  Confirmation of Community Council Name

BP asked whether members wished to continue with the previous name of Merchiston Community Council and opened a discussion to explore options.

BS said that there had been much consideration of this in the past. She explained that it was difficult to fully encompass all the areas covered by the wide MCC boundaries in a succinct name. She also highlighted the issues caused because MCC shared its acronym MCC with Morningside Community Council, which has caused confusion when submitting planning comments etc. This previously resulted in Merchiston Community Council requiring a subtitle in any communications to accurately portray the wide range of neighbourhoods which encompasses MCC’s population totalling around 19,000 people, making MCC one of the largest CCs in Edinburgh.

RU said that he had discussed this in recent months with ID and with other members. Merchiston itself only amounts to at most a few thousand of these residents, and many residents in Bruntsfield, Fountainbridge and elsewhere would be unlikely to consider themselves residents of Merchiston. He noted that several community councils have added “and districts” to their name to acknowledge the many areas within their boundaries. Discussion between members continued, and variations on this were considered.

Members agreed to change the name to “Merchiston Districts Community Council’ (MDCC). BP noted this as the first decision made by the new community council and would notify CEC of this decision.

5. Appointment of Office Bearers

BP explained that once the Chair had been appointed, the meeting would from that point onwards be led by the new chair. BP invited proposals for mandatory office bearers, with the following results:

Chair

MC proposed ID as Chair

JM seconded ID

There are no other proposals.

Ian Doig was appointed Chair of MDCC.

Secretary

It was noted that the duties of secretary had previously been shared amongst several members in the previous MCC term, with ID and VK taking on much of the administrative tasks and DC and VM managing social media accounts. However, it was agreed that finding one member to take on the role of Secretary would be preferable.

Daniel Cairns was unable to attend but had offered to continue in a limited range of secretary tasks.

RM proposed JM as Secretary

ID seconded JM

John McKenna was appointed Secretary of MDCC.

Treasurer

BS proposed FH as Treasurer

VK seconded FH

Frances Hawarden was appointed Treasurer of MDCC.

Engagement and Inclusion Officer

ID explained that VK had served in this mandatory position in the previous term, which MCC had successfully combined with the role of Vice-Chair.

VK stated she would be willing to share Engagement and Inclusion workload with other members and suggested re-constituting the previous Communications and Engagement group to work on this in future. Volunteers would be invited and workload discussed at subsequent meetings.

Aala Elwadie had also expressed interest in this role but was unable to attend the meeting.

ID proposed that VK as Vice Chair and Engagement and Inclusion Officer.

JM seconded VK

Vivien Kitteringham was appointed Vice Chair and Engagement and Inclusion Officer of MDCC.

ID then took over as chair of the meeting. He thanked BP for organising the elections as Returning Officer and for leading this inaugural meeting.

6.  Community Council Representatives to attend induction event on 26 April 2025

ID outlined City of Edinburgh Council’s invitation to a forthcoming induction event for community council members at City Chambers. Only two places are available per community council due to venue size limits, and therefore ID suggested that MDCC’s new members are given priority when deciding who attends the event. GC, MB and NB are not available on the 26th April, HS will attend. AE will be asked if she is available and interested in attending, and if not, JM will take the second place available. There would also be an online repeat of the induction event on Monday 28th April, plus other training events later.

[Post-meeting note: Induction events were subsequently postponed by CEC due to the sudden death of Cllr Val Walker, who would have taken a leading role in the Induction Events]

7.  AOCB

ID explained that all CCs are required by CEC to hold an AGM. He proposed that MDCC’s AGM will coincide with the scheduled meeting on 17th June, as May would be too short notice and September would be too late. 17th June was agreed for AGM, subject to the completion of the independent audit of MDCC accounts and subsequent availability of the audited accounts for approval at the AGM.

Discussion then focused on personal introductions, with returning members explaining what roles and activities they have had during past terms of MCC, and new members talking about what encouraged them to join MDCC, and their particular interests in community activities.

This generated a discussion about future plans and what next steps MDCC could take as the new CC term begins, with the objective of greater involvement with, and thus better serve, the wide range of community residents that comprise MCC’s area. Ideas discussed included:

  • RU recapped previously shared plans to provide, in addition to the city-wide induction training for all community councils, an online public meeting focussing on discussing MDCC residents’ community interests. This would not have the usual agenda and would therefore be a space to discuss progress made in the previous term, listen to views of residents, explore ideas for future projects, and convey this information to MDCC’s re-constituted membership and to residents.
  • Dates and times of MDCC meetings will also need to be considered as the new CC term begins. HZ stated she is unable to make many third Tuesdays of each month. It is possible that a different day could be arranged but that would need to suit MDCC’s City Councillors (who attend several ward’s CC meetings on a rota basis). ID stressed the importance of making MDCC meetings a regular day and time each month to avoid confusion and to encourage residents to participate in meetings.
  • This was the first in-person meeting of the Community Council meeting since 2020 (because of Covid, MCC had switched to Zoom virtual meetings). The format of how MDCC will meet in future was discussed. Some members said they would appreciate meeting in-person; however, others would not always be available or find it convenient to attend in person. Members reported varying levels of success with hybrid meetings elsewhere. However, CEC may be able to assist with equipment and if MDCC members could operate the video and acoustics aspects, it was worth experimenting with hybrid meetings. It was suggested that, as members and residents would be more reluctant to venture out in the winter evenings when it’s dark and wet, summertime meetings could have an in-person element (possibly with hybrid meeting equipment), and that meetings as the days grow darker and worse weather more likely, meetings could then revert to solely online.
  • Chair highlighted the fact that no one member could or should be considered responsible for everything and it was important to spread the workload amongst the revised membership. He referred to previous instances where MCC had become over-reliant on a few members who, when they left, this created a considerable experience gap in their absence, such as website manager.

He also stated that every member’s role and contribution is important and empathised the need for members to work together as a re-constituted team and to participate in workload-sharing, rather than just talk about what needs done.

  • JM said that he felt that, to reach residents more effectively and encourage them to assist MDCC, the Community Council must offer residents something of interest in return, perhaps including public events such as the planned local history talks.
  • It was mentioned that the creation of a planning scrutiny group had been explored in the past but had never transpired due to lack of volunteers. With MC and BS both having considered stepping back in due course from Lead roles as MDCC members due to their busy schedules, to have more members involved in planning and licensing scrutiny work is more important than ever. Several new members expressed a willingness to learn more about these roles and to help where they can. ID said that this was encouraging, as with a larger number of volunteers to share the workload and to build capacity, it shouldn’t take up too much of anyone’s time.
  • A Communications and Engagement Group would also be discussed in future, with the objective of sharing workload amongst MDCC members and ensuring consistency. One particularly pressing issue is finding someone to maintain and update MDCC’s website. Perhaps some new members could assist VK in this role?
  • Local Interest Group membership places on MDCC continue to be available. Members are encouraged to suggest further local groups, and in the coming months, MDCC can send invitations to groups to invite representatives on the new community council to broaden representation and strengthen community engagement. However, potential Local Interest Groups application have to be approved by CEC as a first step to obtaining membership representation on MDCC.

The meeting finished around 9pm. ID thanked BP and all members for attending, reminding members of future meeting dates.

Future Meetings of Merchiston Districts Community Council in 2025:

20th May, 17th June, 16th Sept, 21st Oct, 18th Nov 2025