On Thursday 9th May, 6:30 pm, BANZAI will be showing a new documentary: Why Not Scotland? The screening will be held at Bruntsfield Evangelical Church, 70 Leamington Terrace, Edinburgh, EH10 4JU.
Event Details
6.30 pm: Doors open 7.00 pm: Film (60 mins) 8.00 pm: Discussion and close
The event is free but ticketed. Please register on Eventbrite.
There will be refreshments, by donation. If possible, please bring cash.
Why Not Scotland?
Why Not Scotland? is a brand new feature-length documentary from SCOTLAND: The Big Picture. As we stand at a vital crossroads in the future of our land and seas, the film explores the Scottish landscape through the eyes of Flo, a young Scot from Glasgow. Seeing the depleted state of nature across her own country, Flo feels dispirited and, like many of her generation, increasingly fearful about an uncertain future. However, on a journey around Europe, Flo encounters a different story, finding places where nature is making a dramatic comeback and revitalising human communities. Encouraged by these stories of hope and renewal, she is prompted to wonder: if this is possible elsewhere, then why not Scotland? We really hope to see you for this informative and inspiring event.
Rewilding Scotland
Why Not Scotland? is the central pillar of the Rewilding Nation campaign, led by the Scottish Rewilding Alliance. The campaign calls on Scotland to declare itself the world’s first Rewilding Nation, committing to nature recovery across 30% of land and seas — for nature, climate and people. If you want Scotland to become the world’s first Rewilding Nation, please support the campaign by signing the charter.
On 13th March, BANZAI organised a local screening of The Oil Machine, a powerful documentary made available to us by Edinburgh Climate Coalition and directed by local documentary filmmaker Emma Davie. After the film, a panel consisting of Councillor Ben Parker (Morningside Ward), local activist Annie Lane, and Outreach Coordinator Rachel Caplan shared their thoughts, and locals asked questions, leading to some stimulating and thought-provoking discussions.
One of the key topics was how to manage the energy transition, taking into account practical issues of appropriate technology, the need for politicians to recognise the urgency of taking action, and the importance of ensuring that the costs are spread fairly across communities and socio-economic groups.
Ben Parker was asked about the feasibility of requiring new housing developments in Edinburgh to adopt low-carbon heating infrastructure from the outset. He commented that this had not yet been explored but pointed to steps towards district heating systems such as Edinburgh’s first net zero development at Granton Waterfront. He touched on the difficulties of interacting with commercial developers and how the City of Edinburgh Council is currently focussing on the challenge of retrofitting its own housing stock.
In response to the question of how to persuade Councillors to give more priority to the climate emergency, Ben suggested that writing to them personally could be very effective, as was requesting face-to-face meetings with specific Councillors.
After the event, I wrote to Ben and mentioned a great retrofit initiative called Energiesprong for council housing — this started in the Netherlands but is now in the UK too and he said he’d make some enquiries.
Annie Lane discussed the importance of giving a platform and voice to those who have been marginalised but increasingly affected, e.g., by the cost-of-living crisis which sees people needing to choose between feeding their family and heating their homes. The idea of a Just Transition is that no one gets left behind.
She also spoke about how being a climate activist can be lonely until you find local groups and communities to act with and support/be supported by. She encouraged people to connect with local groups and bring a pal along to events. This was nice to hear and made me appreciate the BANZAI community and events like this — of which I know we’ll hold more.
The discussion highlighted the need for places and spaces to talk and how these have diminished as funding has been squeezed. This is so critical and part of being a community; it seems to me that the more time and space we allow ourselves, the more impactful and empathetic our actions can be. Again this made me appreciate the space BANZAI is holding here and the importance of maintaining and growing this.
Whilst The Oil Machine is a sobering film, the post-film discussion was extremely valuable: such an important example of the time and place we need to engage about the greatest issues we’ve ever faced as humanity.
On 23 September 2021, we organised a film screening plus discussion as part of Climate Fringe Week as well as for the European Day of Sustainable Communities (EDSC21). The event took place 6.30pm–9.00pm and was kindly hosted by Bruntsfield Evangelical Church (with generous assistance in person from LT resident Fraser McLaren), which provided first-rate facilities for seating, screening, food and group facilitation. We received a small grant to help cover costs from EDSC21, via their local representatives, the Scottish Communities Climate Action Network (SCCAN).
The film we screened was Not Without Us (12+, 72mins), a documentary following seven grassroots climate action campaigners from across the world, before and during COP21, Paris 2015. The film was made available to us at minimal cost through What the COP?, an initiative organised by Take One Action. After the film, we held open discussions in four small groups to air ideas on what aiming for Net Zero might mean to us as a community and what actions we could take locally.
A total of 50 people attended the event and most of them stayed through to the end (when there was a draw for some honeycomb and honey generously donated by Jeanna Brady from her family’s back-garden hives). Here’s a breakdown:
39 people registered via Eventbrite, of whom 27 turned up.
Of the total attendees, 29 were previously unknown to us.
25 were from the Bruntsfield area; others came from nearby parts of the city, plus some from Leith, Granton and Dunbar.
External representation at the event came from Dig In and from the Hiya Car car-sharing scheme.
The Event in More Detail
Mick Patrick from the LTA group welcomed everyone and introduced the idea of the event, of BANZAI and the planned structure of the evening.
The film was interesting. Despite being made only six years ago, the world portrayed — pre COVID, pre Greta Thunberg, pre-Extinction Rebellion etc – seemed so different from now. And yet, so much that needs to change remains the same. The film focused on individuals working at a high level to help encourage systems change, rather than local change. However, it stressed that change at all levels is required, and clearly showed how working together helps people stay positive and create change.
After the film there was a chance to grab some more refreshments before dividing into four smaller groups, roughly based on home neighbourhood. Each group was facilitated by one of the organising team in discussions and idea-sharing for about 30 minutes. In each group session there was an opportunity for everyone to introduce themselves and to consider the kinds of net zero supporting actions that might be suited to small community groups and that they’d like to see. Topics that came up included:
reducing home energy consumption (e.g., insulation, heat pumps);
coordinated campaigning for measures such as street-level EV charging;
and many more.
The facilitators made notes of the group sessions and the organising team will consider everything that came up, and work out how to proceed.
What Next?
We will encourage the many attendees and BANZAI followers from neighbourhoods other than the Leamington Terrace to consider setting up their own street-level community groups to act on Net Zero. We will use the information gathered at the event to put any near-neighbours from such areas in touch with each other to make that a bit easier. We hope that BANZAI will work as an umbrella organisation to help the various groups share ideas, resources, experience, campaigns etc. It should be noted that BANZAI is not yet formally organised, constituted or funded in any way.
We also have the notes from the discussions on the kinds of actions that people consider might be attractive and successful at that level, which are being used to seed our planning.
In the meantime, BANZAI’s online presence provides opportunities to continue to spread the word, garner interest and facilitate further discussion and sharing of ideas. A website is also being created which may be useful in future.
Further work will be done to make the Leamington Terrace Area group for Net Zero action more organised and distinct from the broader BANZAI concept. The LTA group will then consider what ideas to proceed with in our community. Some members will also work on the development of BANZAI, at least in its early days, until responsibilities can be shared among members of a wider collection of street-level groups.
