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was one of the founders of Castlemilk Against Austerity, a group established to harness political activism following the independence referendum.
She said: “We couldn’t let that energy, self-belief, creativity and imagination go back inside. It had to be built on and made better.”
Her fellow activists have been manning a stall outside the Braes shopping centre and passers-by regularly stop to wish Cathy good luck.
Her stall is 100 yards from the memorial garden to lost lives, which remembers youngsters who have died in the area, some through accidents, violence and drugs.
In the other direction is a row of shops replicated across Scotland. The bookies sits beside the Citizens Advice Bureau, then another bookies and another, then the pub next to the job centre, followed by a funeral directors.
The job centre is about to close, which will mean two bus trip to Newlands, three miles away, and sanctions for those late for appointments.
Though Castlemilk has benefited from millions in regeneration, there is no work and less hope.
It could be a setting for I, Daniel Blake, the Ken Loach film that highlighted the human cost of austerity but Cathy said fact is worse than the fiction.
She said: “The film only shows the tip of the iceberg. There are worse scenarios being played out every day. Then we get the moral tone being set, about ‘skivers’ and ‘shirkers’.
“Many of the people facing struggle here are working poor, some are women working three jobs and youngsters trapped on zero-hour contracts.”
A former youth worker, her sister died from deep vein thrombosis in 2000 when she was 35. Cathy took on her two children, to care for with her own son.
The kids are now a journalist, chef and nursery worker but it has been a hard slog.
Grief pushed Cathy to a nervous breakdown and she lost her job in 2009.
She had to claim benefits but her mental state was assessed by a physiotherapist from Atos, who refused her entitlement to employment and support allowance.
“Fear of the brown envelope” is common parlance, referring to a DWP rejection that can mean the difference between barely surviving or not.
Cathy said: “My experience woke me up to how badly people on benefits are being treated. My illness was exacerbated by the degradation and humiliation.
“Life on benefits is full of misery and despair. At one point I was left to live on £47 per week, for 10 months. I was frightened and isolated.” Her benefits were eventually agreed but she still struggles with depression and anxiety. Cathy has urged people to vote because she believes good councillors can make a life-changing differences in communities. Turnout in the 2012 council elections was 39.6 per cent – low in comparison with 52.8 per cent in 2007 and 49.6 per cent in 2003. She said: “In this area, we have supported each other through hardship and encouraged people to have a voice. Don’t sit back and let someone else do it. “We need you. Don’t leave it to party politics.”