PAS (previously known as Planning Aid for Scotland) aims to help people to engage with the places they live in, providing impartial planning advice, training, education programmes, facilitation, community visioning and awareness raising to ensure everyone has a voice in creating positive communities.

They are holding an event around loneliness and isolation, Loneliness and Isolation, Planning a Solution, on Tuesday 27^th November, 9:20am – 3:20pm, Saracen House, 139 Saracen Street, Glasgow, G22 5AZ.

Following The Equal Opportunities Committee report on Social Isolation and the responses to Scottish Government’s consultation on this issue, evidence shows that social isolation and loneliness can affect anyone at any age or stage of their lives, and a national strategy is recommended in order to tackle this problem.

Feelings of loneliness have been demonstrated to have wide ranging consequences for those affected, and has been shown to lead to depression across all ages, as well as cognitive decline and dementia in older people. There are also serious physical health implications.

The design and planning of public spaces and communities has the capacity to be a tool in tackling this issue with community engagement, consultation and inclusion in the planning process having the potential to create communities, both rural and urban, with opportunity for and facilitation of social interaction through innovative approaches and new strategies such as co-housing.

The event aims to facilitate further discussion between the relevant government agencies, central government, local government, registered social landlords (RSLs), planners, development trusts and other private, public and third sector stake holders. The outcomes from these discussions then have the capacity to help inform responses to this consultation.

There will also be discussion on how the new Planning Bill and the planning system can play a role in creating a more joined-up approach to improve outcomes for communities, alongside the implications of the new Fairer Scotland Duty and the National Performance Framework when tackling social isolation.

Tickets are: