News and Events

As part of the Festival of Politics 2010, this Carnegie sponsored event will be held in the Main Chamber of the Scottish Parliamant from 16.00 to 17.00.

There is a strong tradition of both pragmatism and ethics in international affairs.  The idealism of past generations established the League of Nations in attenpts to reduce conflicts and aggression.  Politicians have to wrestle with the national interest, the security of citizens and their own principles- amongst many competing pressures- before coming to momentous decisions.  Sir Malcolm Rifkind QC MP and Joel Rosenthal, President of the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs. will debate the idea of just war, peace, and security in a modern global society.  Chaired by The Very Reverend Graham Forbes, Provost of St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh.

The Carnegie UK Trust is proud to be supporting this year’s Festival of Politics programme which was announced on Monday 5 July 2010.

In sponsoring three different events at the Festival, the Carnegie UK Trust is playing an active in role in ensuring that the award winning Festival, now entering its sixth year, continues to thrive and that the overarching theme of the Festival, Changing Politics, can be a positive one. 

New Independent Voice for Community Land Trusts

The Community Land Trust movement across England gets a huge boost today with the unveiling of a new National Community Land Trust Network to provide support and services to communities wanting to deliver new affordable homes.

The UK’s new Government is to take forward a key policy initiative championed by the Carnegie UK Trust.  

The partnership agreement for the first time coalition government in almost 70 years commits the Government to creating “new trusts that will make it simpler for communities to provide homes for local people”. 

The Carnegie UK Trust is probably best known for its early investment in libraries and books for libraries. However the Trust has a long history of innovative investment and risk taking. Here we highlight an aspect of such thinking from our archives.

In 1932 – at the height of the depression – the Trust was investing in the Workers’ Educational Association and the British Institute of Adult Education.

One of the UK’s longest established “silver surfer” groups has just celebrated its tenth birthday. The Airlie Cybercafé in Angus in Scotland has been bringing together older people with time on their hands, to learn computing skills and develop new friendships.

Carnegie UK Trust’s Honorary President William Thomson CBE, Great Grandson of Andrew Carnegie took part in the celebrations. He was joined by Trust Chief Executive, Martyn Evans, who said:

This year's CILIP Carnegie Medal Shortlist puts eight page-turning novels about survival in the spotlight. Their stories deal with some of life's most challenging issues in an intelligent and highly accessible way, offering heroes and heroines that young readers can relate to and a life affirming sense of hope.

The judges received 54 nominations for the Carnegie UK Trust-funded prize and 48 nominations for Kate Greenaway Medal from CILIP (Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals) members.

The Carnegie UK Trust is working with the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust and the City Parochial Foundation to develop ways to unlock the potential of organisations to influence change on behalf of their communities. 

The Carnegie UK Trust is using “power analysis” to help organisations in London and Yorkshire to build on what they are already achieving to ensure real change is achieved.  The Trust will use a mix of workshops and mentoring to enable organisations working at the grassroots to understand where their strengths lie and then to examine ways to exercise that power.  

The findings of the Commission of Inquiry into the Future of Civil Society are to be placed centre stage in a debate on how civil society can build a fairer, more responsible and sustainable financial system.

As part of Foundation Week from 31 May to 4 June, run by the European Foundation Centre in Brussels, the week-long series of presentations, debates and exhibitions about the role of foundations across Europe, a two hour open debate will examine the role civil society can and must play in reshaping the financial sector. 

I joined the Carnegie UK Trust as Chief Executive in November 2009 having been the Director of Consumer Focus in Scotland, the advocacy body formed through the merger of the Scottish Consumer Council, Postwatch and energywatch. Prior to the merger I was, for 11 years, the Director of the Scottish Consumer Council, a consumer research and policy organisation. 

My career before saw me spend five years as the Director of Shelter Scotland and then the Chief Executive of Citizens Advice Scotland for a further five years.