Shaping our voice in Parliament: your views needed for 2026-28

Every three years, Friends in Scotland help to discern our priorities for engaging with the Scottish Parliament. This consultation helps ensure the work of the Parliamentary Engagement Working Group (PEWG) remains grounded in the concerns and leadings of our Quaker community. As our current three-year period of work concludes in December 2025, we are seeking your guidance on where we should focus our efforts for 2026-2028.

The priorities are discerned by GM, and this is likely to come to our GM this November, but as preparatory work, Parliamentary Engagement Officer (PEO), Sarah Komashko, together with Carolyn Burch and Richard Raggett (Co-Convenors of PEWG) have been visiting Area Meetings in early 2025 to hear your thoughts. These conversations will help shape how we speak truth to power, informed by our testimonies to Peace, Equality, Truth, Integrity, Simplicity, and Sustainability. They will also help us represent you as we approach all the political parties in Scotland this year to put forward our hopes for their 2026 election manifestos. Whether you're already involved in political witness or just beginning to explore this aspect of Quaker work, your insights are valuable to this discernment process.

If you cannot or could not attend when we visit your Area Meeting, we welcome your input by email - see the key questions and contact details below.

The role of the PEO and the PEWG

Our parliamentary engagement work seeks to bring Quaker values and witness to Scotland's lawmakers and civil servants. The PEWG seeks to build trust and work collaboratively to inspire positive change. PEWG focuses on issues where there are clear Quaker positions, opportunities for impact, and where we can offer fresh perspectives, while remaining adaptable to emerging needs. Different PEWG members have different specialisms and particular interests that they bring to the work.

This work is supported by our PEO (employed for 24.5 hours per week), who helps build and maintain relationships with decision-makers while keeping Friends informed through fortnightly email updates. The PEO also liaises with recognised Scottish Quaker bodies such as the Community Justice Working Group and with Quakers in Britain to inform them of issues arising in the Scottish Parliament.

Our principal ongoing work

Recently, a big focus has been on Climate and Economic Justice, advocating for solutions for loss and damage funding with a Make Polluters Pay focus; and working to promote truth and integrity in politics, particularly in relation to Carbon Capture and Storage and Hydrogen plans, carbon budgets, and health and climate links. We work with allies such as Stop Climate Chaos Scotland and Christian Aid in relation to this priority.

Another main priority was Peacebuilding, with a big focus on expanding peace education provision in Scotland; and in relation to advocacy on Scottish Enterprise investment (especially in relation to arms industry in terms of human rights aspects and carbon accounting).

These priorities complement the wider work of Quakers in Britain, who focus on peace education, climate justice, and promoting democracy and truth in public life. You can learn more about this work at www.quaker.org.uk/our-work/political-engagement.

Upcoming relevant legislation and work focuses in the Scottish Parliament

Looking forward this year and into the next, building on our work to date would likely mean involvement in:

• Climate Change Plan (expected in spring-summer 2025)
• Heat in Buildings Bill (Government bill, expected spring 2025)
• Human Rights Bill (delayed to next Parliament and subject to SNP electoral success)
• Ecocide Prevention Bill (Member’s bill, with cross-party support)
• Wellbeing and Sustainable Development Bill (proposed Member's bill with SNP support)

The next strategy will cover the period of the next Scottish Election, and therefore priorities of the government may change depending on who’s in power after May 2026. Being clear on Friends’ priorities will also be helpful as we engage with manifesto-writers and help Friends speak to candidates for the next election.

Understanding Scotland's Powers: Where Can We Make a Difference?

When discerning our priorities, we need to consider which matters the Scottish Parliament can actually influence. While we primarily focus on devolved issues (those within Scottish Parliament control), we sometimes ask MSPs to advocate with the UK government on reserved matters that align with our concerns.

Questions which we invite you to reflect and share feedback on:

1. Within the devolved/reserved constraints, do you feel the current/ongoing work of the PEWG and PEO reflects your meetings’ concerns?
2. Should the PEWG/PEO change how we communicate our work to Friends?
3. What is your area meetings’ (and/or local meeting’s) relationship with your MSPs, and can we help?
4. At the end of a PEWG/PEO encounter with a politician, what would you hope would be their impression of Quakers in Scotland?

If you are prevented from speaking to us at Area Meeting, please share your thoughts by email to Sarah Komashko (sarahk [at] quaker.org.uk). We welcome responses throughout the first quarter of 2025 as we prepare the new workplan, which will then be brought to General Meeting in November 2025.

Your input will help ensure our parliamentary engagement remains grounded in the leadings of Friends across Scotland. Whether you have extensive experience in advocacy or are new to this work, your perspective matters as we discern our way forward together.