Diary of the First Half!

Howdy! For the Edinburgh programme, we have been told we must keep a journal to make sure we're making proper use of our time. I figured that I could post that up here to keep everyone up to date! It's not as exciting as fancy trips or anything, but if anyone feels like reading a whole bundle on exactly what's going on, here ya go!

Week 1
This week I got settled in Parliament while studying for finals; with tests on Friday and the Monday after, it was a bit of a juggling act to get acquainted with my 3 MSPs and prepare for the UK and Scottish Politics assessments. If I had any advice for future programs at this point, it would be to perhaps start the internship a week later, and cram all three assessments into one week (but at least we would be able to focus entirely on them during that time). Trying to read and analyse all these journal articles, even after keeping up with the reading, was quite difficult to squeeze in after dinner every night.
So far, though, the work has been satisfying! David Stewart MSP has me working on the Forth Road Crossing Bill, and I’ve been diving into the SPICe reports and other summaries helpfully provided by Liza (a researcher to the three Labour H&I MSPs). I’m now up on the issues at hand, the various proposals that were sorted through, the reasons for design decisions made, etc. Best of all was when I got to attend the committee meeting Wednesday and actually understood what was going on; they were throwing around all sorts of proposals for public transit options for the bridge, and knowing some of the answers to the MSPs’ questions prior to the answers by Transport Scotland and others was most excellent.
The only worry I have is that there’s not a whole lot I can contribute to the process. I can help go over David’s questions for him, suggest lines of inquiry, etc., but it’s not like I could actually do a research paper that forges new ground on this. The plans are already put together, the decisions currently made seem justified… besides helping with the procedural progression of the bill, the remaining work falls entirely to civil engineers, contractors, and the agencies that can actually conduct the sort of number-crunching that would be needed at this point.

Week 2
Peter Peacock MSP has given me direction towards what might work out to be a more viable project. He’s looking at the extension of broadband internet to the more remote regions of Scotland (being an MSP for the Highlands and Islands) and figuring out viable ways to make the leap from existing infrastructure to full access to the rural population. There is already an existing Pathfinder network deployed to cover schools and libraries in H&I, and any viable plan would be extending that connectivity to surrounding neighbourhoods.
There has been a successful program (known as the Tegola test bed project) that used relay towers to extend and magnify a wireless signal from a Pathfinder-connected exchange. Compared to the meagre 5km or so that standard copper wire can extend from an exchange normally, the vast spans covered by Tegola present a very real possibility for affordable, reliable connection across great distances and difficult terrain. My job, then, is to find out what other countries have attempted in this situation, how much public spending was required before private investment was viable, etc. Peter has seemed genuinely interested in my findings, here, and apparently this is work that hasn’t been exhaustively done but is something well within my purview.
I’ve also taken over RSVP duties from the other intern in my office, which is only reasonable given my extra-junior status. It takes a wee bit of time and organisation since I’m dealing with the diaries of three separate MSPs, but it’s nice to have something deliverable to handle when I open my email. Not bad at all, having an easy box to check!

Week 3
Continued work on FRC and broadband. I have had a few good experiences investigating constituent issues, like some disputes in Inverness about public busses being used as school transport; there have been questions about whether legal recourse can be taken by the Parliament or even the local councils if the educational authorities have not been supervising pupils closely enough on their way to and from school.
Also, I met with Kieran (the other intern) and Mike Robb, a Labour candidate to contend for a LibDem seat in the election. It’s currently held by Nick Clegg’s chief of staff, so a victory there would be most excellent. Hopefully we’ll get to visit the district and help with the canvassing operation as the campaign heats up!
Peter has also given me a massive amount of correspondence on the broadband project. I’m off in Inverness on Monday of next week (22 March) for a meeting with the entire H&I Labour MSPs organisation, which conveniently coincides with a meeting between Peter and some of the folks on the Pathfinder project. I hope that by poring through all those emails I might be up to speed and come with some questions prepared; this is my chance to actually break some ground on how the network is currently built and how much consumer traffic it might be able to support.
I’ll make an effort to write in the journal in various daily segments rather than once weekly, to make sure I don’t miss anything by jotting it all down on a Friday afternoon.

Week 4
Monday: With the Forth Crossing Bill Committee meeting for objections coming up on Wednesday, I’m looking through massive objective binders to assess the issues raised by the particular witnesses that will be at the meeting. This will be a great chance to draft some sharp questions, if all goes well, so I hope to devote myself to some critical analysis today and seize the opportunity to actually make a mark on this massive bill. Also continued sorting through the 25 Mb of broadband email from the last four or five months.
Thursday: Forth Crossing Committee went quite well yesterday; David had some excellent questions for Transport Scotland, making progress on hammering out some sticking points on the bidding process, but TS was able to address all the constituent objections rather effectively.
I’ve also been sorting through how different countries are approaching the rural broadband issue; Norway is promising.

Week 5
Went up to Inverness on Monday to meet the constituency team! It was great to get in touch with all these people that I’d met on the phone. I also had the opportunity to join Peter on his meeting with the Highland Council to find out of LEADER or SRDP (programs for rural development) funding could be secured for broadband, as well as if it was possible to gain access to Pathfinder for the project.
Besides more work on that, there’s been a great variety of things to do this week. I got to contribute some website design mock-ups for the Hill Tracks Campaign (to regulate the cutting of service roads), put together a wee sheet explaining how to get free energy-efficiency advice/consultation for the constituency office, tracked down potential celeb endorsers and their agents, and all sorts of other things. The diverse, accomplishable tasks are quite satisfying.
I’ve also been looking around for the last few days at digital literacy programs around the world. Between UK, EU, and other efforts there are all sorts of good practices that have been laid out for training people with ICT (Information and Communications Technology). If we can find gaps in Scotland’s efforts on digital inclusion, it would be important to patch them to make the most of the new opportunities being extended to rural residents.
Phonebanking on Tuesday night! Everyone was exceptionally polite, even when in opposition. All you weenies that chewed me out when I called you for No on 8, take note. A bit of courtesy makes such a difference.
Also, this’ll take a while to explain, but it’s another campaign I’m looking into. Basically, every five years, businesses are revalued. This valuation defines what share of the total business tax they pay; it doesn’t define independently the tax rate, but it defines what slice of the pre-determined pie they are responsible for, so the total tax revenue is fixed. Anyway, petrol stations have been entirely re-classified with the valuation being done on the amount of financial turnover rather than the square-footage that used to be the basis for the value, like all other stores. While this seems like a reasonable way to assess the tax (by profitability and value rather than… physical space), it was done in such a way that petrol stations used to be nearly tax free and independent owners could cope with gas taxes and things. Now, though, their valuation has doubled or tripled, and they’re suddenly responsible for a massive amount of business tax, estimated by some to be up to a 450% increase. In England and Wales, at least, there is a transition program that smoothes the move from the old rate to the new one. Scotland has no such program in place, creating a tax shock that will kill what remains of the independent petrol stations.
…whew. So yeah, I hope to find a better way to summarise that and get a bit of publicity for it, which will be fun.
Finally, I’m going off to Inverness to help campaign Monday-Wednesday next week. I’m excited, because it is just gorgeous up there.