Community benefits from net zero energy developments consultation: engagement findings report

Appendix 2

Review of Good Practice Principles for Community Benefits from Renewable Energy Developments - Community conversations session programme (3hr)

Timing / Item

5.45pm Arrive

6pm Welcome and introductions

Scottish Government Presentation (pre-recorded and narrated by SCDC)

6.20pm Part 1: Your experience

Advise participants the timings for each key question. Realise there’s people with experience and some who are new to community benefits, but the questions apply to all.

• What does your experience tell us about community benefits?
• What has/not worked well, and what can we learn from that?
• Who should benefit from onshore projects?
• Who should benefit from offshore projects?
  • Facilitator prompt: Are there particular areas or groups to consider?
  • Facilitator prompt: Are there other factors to consider about who should benefit?
• How should decisions be made about community benefit arrangements?
  • Facilitator prompt: Who should be involved?
  • Facilitator prompt: How can we make sure decisions are fair and transparent?

7.20pm Comfort break

7.30pm Part 2: Making an impact

Led by SCDC, Sandbox pre-populated with on/offshore sections). Advise participants that we have 20 mins for each key question. Realise there’s people with experience and some who are new to community benefits, but the questions apply to all.

• How can we get the most out of community benefit funds?
• Are there particular types of projects community funds should or should not be used for?
• What needs to be in place to make sure that communities get the most out of community benefits funds in their area?

8:20pm Part 3: Good Practice Principles impact

• What impact could the Scottish Government’s refreshed Good Practice Principles for community benefits have on you and/or your community?
  • For example, on any protected characteristics or on any other specific groups in Scotland, particularly: businesses; rural and island communities; or people on low-incomes or living in deprived areas.
• What are the challenges that the policy could address?

8.40pm Reviewing the session

8.55pm What happens next

• Reiterate and encourage participation in the wider consultation
  • For interested participants, links can be shared to resources such as the existing Good Practice Principles, Local Energy Scotland’s website, the Community Benefits Register, and other stakeholders, such as Foundation Scotland.
• Outputs from the sessions will be covered in ‘you said, we did’ response to the consultation.

9pm Thank you and finish

Community conversations session programme (for online 1.5 hour session)

Timing / Item

12.50pm Team online

1pm Welcome and introductions

Scottish Government Presentation (pre-recorded and narrated by SCDC) Quick explanation of Sandbox tool

1.15pm Part 1: Who should benefit?

Realise there’s people with experience and some who are new to comm benefits, but the questions apply to all.

Q1. From your perspective:

• Who should benefit from onshore projects?
• Who should benefit from offshore projects?
  • Facilitator prompt: Are there particular areas or groups to consider?
  • Facilitator prompt: Are there other factors to consider about who should benefit?

Q2. How should decisions be made about community benefit arrangements?

• Facilitator prompt: Who should be involved?
• Facilitator prompt: How can we make sure decisions are fair and transparent?

2pm Part 2: Making an impact

Q3. How can we get the most out of community benefit funds?

• Are there particular types of projects community funds should or should not be used for?

Q4. What needs to be in place to make sure that communities get the most out of community benefits funds in their area?

2.25pm What happens next

• Outputs from the sessions will be covered in ‘you said, we did’ response to the consultation.

2.30pm Thank you and finish

Community Conversation Facilitation Process

Both online and in-person sessions followed the agreed session plans and continuity of SCDC staff was ensured across all events. Within the sessions, SCDC staff clarified their role as neutral facilitators aiming to capture views from all participants, and that it was not necessary to reach a consensus on any issues raised. Rather, that differences of opinion and perspectives was acceptable and would be captured.

Online events were hosted by SCDC on Zoom due to its usability for community members and in-person events were organised and arranged by SCDC following advice taken from local community-based contacts in the areas.

Online sessions were facilitated by up to four members of staff from SCDC and utilised a virtual tool called Sandbox (virtual flipchart) whilst in-person sessions were facilitated by two members of SCDC staff and used Flipcharts and sticky notes as creative tools.

Following each session, a copy of what was discussed (notes or sandbox files) was sent to participants to sense check information captured as being accurate and a true reflection of sentiments expressed. This also allowed participants to use the information gathered to create or inform their own unique submission to the online consultation which was encouraged in all sessions.

Engagement figures varied across each session and are provided in the following table.

**Those identified as not eligible to attend included local authority employees, elected members, renewable energy developers and/or community benefit management organisations – and have been removed from registration figures detailed above**

The information provided indicates a significant drop-off rate, especially in online sessions. This was explored with non-attendees following the initial online sessions and discussed by SCDC and the Scottish Government team on several occasions. A range of mitigation measures were taken which included:

• Contacting registered attendees to explore whether non-attendance was related to session length.
• Increased direct contact with registered attendees leading up to sessions (where there was sufficient lead in time) including the provision of planned discussion questions.
• A basic site promotion and contact document was put in place to monitor ongoing activity and potential mitigation actions.
• Two additional online engagement sessions, at a reduced length, being made available to a national audience which took place following the official close of the public consultation (11th April). This included people who signed up for local conversations but were unable to attend and individuals who attended the information webinar but subsequently found there was no local conversation they could participate in. Although the consultation was closed, the Scottish Government provided a mechanism for these participants to submit their responses to the consultation questions.

Whilst engagement figures experienced a significant and unexpected drop-off rate, mitigation actions taken enabled a total of 116 local individuals to take part in conversations.

During registration, participants were asked to identify their experience of community benefits. This information was not gathered from people who attended sessions without registering, and a few who registered did not provide the information. Participants could select more than one option, and figures are shown in the table below.

SCDC followed up with conversation participants, providing them with:

• A record of the notes taken at the conversation
• A link to the online consultation
• Links to other resources including the renewable energy planning database map that shows all onshore and offshore developments, and Local Energy Scotland’s community benefits toolkit and overview of community benefits projects, community shared ownership projects and community and locally owned projects