THE CITY CHAMBERS is a wonderful, historic building and one of the ways it serves the Edinburgh public is through hires for corporate events, weddings and other gatherings.
In theory this subsidises the Council Tax, raising £300k a year, although that is difficult in a competitive market where Council rules stop staff acting as commercially as competitors.
Last week the Greens and a group of campaigners calling themselves “Plant Based Edinburgh” tried to put them out of business. Their ask? A 100 per cent plant-based menu. No meat, but not even any milk, butter or cheese.
Council catering managers carefully explained that they already provided 100 per cent plant-based menu options and marketed these internally to staff and at wedding fairs, but that uptake was low. In part because of much higher cost but most likely because of consumer choice.
The Greens, always wanting to signal virtue rather than take meaningful action, suggested upping the price of the menu that the vast majority choose to subsidise the plant-based products. They ignored that some people have nut allergies and other health issues that mean dairy is essential. The impact would have been customers going elsewhere.
UK meat production is two-and-a-half times more efficient and less emitting than international production – and doesn’t deforest. Meanwhile 85 per cent of Scotland’s land can’t be used for cereal, fruit or vegetable production but works well for meat and dairy farming, the grassland sequestering carbon. See Quality Meat Scotland for the health and environmental benefits.
Because the Council buys local, with 80 per cent of meat and 99 per cent of dairy being sourced from Scottish producers, the Greens’ proposal would directly impact Scottish farmers at a difficult time.
Even the stated aims are rather dubious. The Council’s already impossible-to-achieve 2030 target is Net Zero – not absolute zero – so is this area of food for effectively customer catering a top target? I suggest not, especially when meat in catering is only 0.1 per cent of Council carbon emissions.
I called for this daft idea to be thrown out when first brought as a petition last year, but all the other parties sent staff off to investigate at taxpayer expense when the answer was obvious.
Thankfully you can still get a Scotch pie or haggis, neeps and tatties in the Chambers, as all except the Greens saw sense when faced with the overwhelming facts.
Maybe the phrase of the week in the City Chambers should be “where’s the beef?”
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Photo of Edinburgh City Chambers by dudlajzov
