Name John Nichol
Political Party Scottish Green Party
Ward Liberton/Gilmerton
What is your story?
Having grown up in Cumbernauld, my dad’s job brought me to Edinburgh when I was 15. I’ve worked on the railway for the last 25 years, and have been a member of the Greens since 2009. I’ve held various roles within the party both at a local level and nationally, and was the National Membership Secretary when we experienced the huge surge in membership immediately following the independence referendum in 2014.
I moved to The Inch in 2015 and was almost immediately involved in local issues as the Council were threatening to close Inch House Community Centre. I was voted onto the Management Committee there and thankfully we were able to see off the threat of closure from Edinburgh Council. When the Council zoned the plant nursery in Inch Park for housing in the CityPlan 2030 (arguing that despite being in the middle of a park, it wasn’t in the middle of a park!), I joined the fight to save that green space and again we were successful in forcing the Council to change their minds.
I’ve also been a Community Councillor with Gilmerton Inch Community Council since 2016, and stood as the Green candidate in the last local elections for the same ward in 2017.
What are the main issues you will campaign on?
Liberton/Gilmerton has some unique challenges. Being on the southern edge of the city, it’s under constant threat from developers who would rather build on the Green Belt or greenfield sites than on a brownfield site in the centre of town. At one point there were 22 proposed housing developments in and around the ward! Of course, none of the developers actually wants to provide the necessary infrastructure that should come along with so much new housing, so there is a distinct lack of amenities such as doctor surgeries and local shops in the area.
On a citywide level, there’s no getting away from the fact that Edinburgh seems to be doing the bare minimum to tackle the climate emergency that we are faced with. We need a city that doesn’t shy away from the hard choices that it absolutely has to make, including providing warm, safe homes for people and expanding public transport so that the private car is not the first choice for travel.
What do you consider to be your or your party’s achievements or legacy during the last council session?
Greens have shown in both Edinburgh Council and at Holyrood that constructive opposition, rather than opposing things just because they didn’t come from your party, works. Thanks to us, Edinburgh has declared a climate emergency and is one of the first cities in Scotland to be regulating short-term lets. We ensured that tenants were not evicted for rent arrears in the middle of the pandemic, and we’ve been pushing for the Council to stop renting out our parks and green spaces to the highest bidder for events such as Hogmanay that locals would rather see scaled back to a more sustainable level.
What is the thing that few people would know about you?
There are currently 31 books on Ancient Roman history on my shelves! I grew up near the Antonine Wall and I’m fascinated by that time period, and continually amazed that we know so much because of the meticulous record-keeping and letter-writing of the Romans. I’m never happier than when I’m staring at a pile of rocks that someone called home 2,000 years ago!
