During a meeting with Willie Munro, our Area Manager for Kincardine & Mearns, I was asked if I would be willing to join a group going to Sweden to share information as part of the SusSET (Sustaining Small Expanding Towns) project.

By the following Monday morning, (after a weekend of wondering if I was able to manage my already full diary enough to put everything on hold for three days and contribute sufficiently after only five months in post!), I was committed to going and we flew out as a group on Wednesday 7 th September to Gothenburg and then by bus on to Stromstad. I joined colleagues from the business, community and public sectors from Stonehaven (the town I was representing), Ellon and Inverurie.

We attended a whole day Conference in Stromstad and then split into 3 groups to take a look more closely at the towns we were most closely paired with. The Stonehaven group stayed in Stromstad, a very attractive seaside town with a population of almost 12, 000.

INTERREG IIIC is an EU-funded programme that helps Europe ’s regions form partnerships to work together on common projects. By sharing knowledge and experience, these partnerships enable the regions involved to develop new solutions to economic, social and environmental challenges.

The SusSET project involves 12 towns from 4 countries; Scotland , Poland , Sweden and Greece . It’s aim is to produce a strategic ‘good practice’ guide for other European countries, after having discussed and shared all the varying models of governance and current practice used in the member towns. The key question for the project is “What is the best form of strategy for small expanding towns?”
The hope is that by being at the forefront of this research and information sharing exercise, our small towns will be well placed to take advantage of any future EU policy and/or funding opportunities.

On arrival we were invited to a welcome dinner where we met all the delegates from all four countries and sat in mixed groups to begin the connecting and sharing that was to be the hallmark of this trip.

The conference gave us a great overview of the 3 Swedish towns taking part (Stromstad, Amal and Kungalv) with entertaining presentations from politicians, Tourism and Marketing managers. They were followed by a more academic view of the key questions and issues for growth that small towns need to consider, presented by Professor Borje Johansson.

The teams then split into groups to explore the major themes of the project: Tourism and Town Identity, Developing Whole Town Strategy,Long Term Planning, Engagement/Dialogue/Youth, Planning/Heritage/Conservation, Partnership and Town Management, Marketing and Promotion.

Stonehaven is taking the lead on the Long Term Planning theme and Ellon on Engagement/Dialogue/Youth. The other themes are being lead by other towns involved. I attended the discussion about Partnership and Town Strategy which was being lead by the Stromstad team. We heard about the Town Team structure that has been set up in Stromstad since June 2005, in contrast to our own Town Team in Stonehaven which has been around since 1998.

The Stromstad Team is made up from representatives from the municipality, property owners, business organisations and the Harbour Group and is lead by a Steering Group. Members of the steering group are two senior members from their equivalent of our local council and the Tourist Manager for the town.

There was general discussion around the difference in approach to community involvement and consultation, particularly around the issue of Scotland having a different sense of organisations which are representative of the wider community and which have a voice in the official processes of decision making and town management. One of the issues facing Stromstad is how to involve unorganised groups in discussions. The Stromstad team are very enthusiastic and encouraged by their initial Town Team experience.

The conference ended with a round up from all the theme workshops and ending summary from Dr Nick Brown, of Aberdeenshire Towns Partnership, who is the lead partner Project Manager for the SusSET project.

After the Ellon team left for Kungalv and Inverurie for Amal, those of us staying in Stromstad were taken on a fantastic, if slightly rough in places, boat trip out into the Fjord with traditional shrimp supper on board. It was a great opportunity to talk more informally with the others in our coastal town grouping about our cultures, roles and families.

Later that evening the Stonehaven group of four found out just how hospitable the Polish are even when they are not in their own country! Both Polish and Scottish songs were shared, as well as jokes that sometimes did not translate as well as they might.

The second day of our stay was spent sharing in more detail the different types of governance that each country has at a local level, gaining an in depth understanding of the Swedish political system and hearing about the joint collaboration between the municipal council and the business association over recent changes to the towns’ road systems. We were taken on a tour of the town and given a roof top view from the Town Hall. A quick trip to the out-of-town shopping centre was also arranged to help us understand the impact of the close proximity to Norway on local business and economics.

In mixing with delegates and discussions I had with others, I soon understood that there is nothing similar to our structures of community councils or voluntary sector and community group involvement in the other 3 countries. The voluntary sector as we know it does not really exist, particularly in Poland and Greece . Even in Sweden , the concept of the community providing organised services for itself through such groups is only really in its’ infancy. I spoke to a politician from the town of Kungalv about this. She explained to me that there were a few constituted groups being formed to provide services for the elderly, those with disabilities and activities for young people but that this was relatively new. The Swedish state has always provided all services for its’ communities but as funds for this have suffered cut-backs, parents and others have mobilised themselves and realised that if they do not run groups themselves, then their children will go without. These groups face some of the same issues that we are familiar with: sustainability as children grow up and parents move on; new recruits have to be found to run the groups and activities.

The more I spoke to people, the more I realised how the concept of giving our time freely for community projects, to meet people’s actual needs and voluntary action generally is so embedded in our culture that we hardly ask ourselves if this is normal.

There are no support organisations such as K&D Voice in Sweden , providing development, funding and strategic representation for these community and voluntary groups. In this respect, it seems, we are ahead of the game.

Neither did I pick up that there was any formal way of community groups’ views being included in the municipal decision-making processes at any stage, although it is clear that in Sweden they do have a system for public consultation and are more than keen to improve and grow their ability to hold meaningful consultations.

Whilst in Stromstad I did not meet anyone who was involved in engaging with young people and they have identified that this is something that they wish to become better and effective at doing. I am aware that we have good examples and models of youth engagement in Stonehaven itself and that although it has not always been possible to move this kind of consultation forward into things happening on the ground for lots of good reasons, we do already have the expertise and knowledge of how to go about having a meaningful dialogue with young people as well as others in our community, which we can share and show.

I have listened to many of my colleagues who become a bit jaded with endless meetings, the same old same old and it seems it is all too easy to feel that endless consultations often lead to nothing when it comes to provision and it can feel as if the voluntary sector once more picks up the pieces and fills the gaps on little or finite resources.

Hearing and seeing at first hand that other countries do not have our cultural norm of voluntary action and partnership at all levels, I feel we can be extremely up-beat and proud of the models of community engagement and voluntary sector representation that has been developed over a long time in our towns and villages.

I am a positive person by nature and committed in my new role at K&D Voice to developing and growing our own ability to consult genuinely with the community, feedback strategic information and decisions in a meaningful way when we are able to and be rigorous about being representative of all the groups and organisations that we support.

Our Voluntary Sector Policy, a document that governs how Aberdeenshire Council commits to interacting with the voluntary sector as a partner, and developed by the Council and the voluntary sector jointly, may not be widely talked about or referred to in all parts of the Council that we work with as much as we may hope for but at least it does exist. It is evidence of the rigorous and healthy dialogue that has grown up from grass roots voluntary action to impact on the way our governing institutions now include and consult with the ‘third sector’.

The SusSET project is a 30 month-long project and after further overseas trips by other members of our community and Council to both Poland and Greece , participants will come together in Aberdeenshire to hear about how we do things here and experience our culture in October 2006.

It is my hope that we will get the opportunity to show at first hand how the voluntary sector and community is fundamental to the growth, sustainability, imagination and creativity that is the future of any community and small expanding town.

By the end of the trip there was a huge feeling of warmth and friendship amongst the whole group of delegates from the coastal towns and unlike many conferences, goodbyes were accompanied by hugs and much cheek kissing! Sitting on the harbour side in Stromstad the morning we left to drive back to Gothenburg and the airport, I felt I had learned a great deal about the other cultures, understood in much more depth the unique nature of ours, made new friends and connections and also experienced something of the idea that if we think globally and share openly and warmly with our European colleagues then there is much to be gained and nothing lost from this partnership that has been created through the SusSET project.

For further information about INTERREG IIIC go to www.interreg3c and click on the link for More Ongoing Operations. Put in a search for United Kingdom lead projects and you will access a list. The Sustaining Small Towns Project is on the list. Click on this to find the full details.

For a report from George McGillivray from Stonehaven Business Association got to www.britnett-carver.co.uk/stonehavenbusiness/susset.html