National Policy Forum - Your Southeast CLP representatives

Sustainable Communities
By Beth Breeze

November 2006 Report

The end of summer and start of Autumn have been a busy time for the Creating Sustainable Communities commission, including telephone conference calls, emails and meetings both as a commission and with members.

During Labour Party conference in Manchester we held a series of open meetings that I found extremely impressive both in terms of the quality of contributions from delegates and the attendance and ‘listening mode’ of the many ministers that were present. In the seminar on the environment, transport and energy policy, delegates raised a variety of important questions and made some helpful suggestions, not least that the NPF should put its own house in order and cut down on paper usage to help contribute towards environmental goals. We also learnt that when Tory councils claim to have better recycling figures than Labour councils, that’s usually because their constituents have big gardens and garden waste is so heavy! What’s that saying about lies, damn lies and statistics?

On energy, Malcolm Wicks explained that energy efficiency policy has the dual aim of contributing to climate change targets and also reducing our reliance on imported energy. Malcolm agreed with contributions from the floor that it is frustrating when the public’s general enthusiasm for renewable energy is accompanied by opposition to specific renewable projects, such as wind farms.

On transport, Douglas Alexander noted that many of the problems we face are a result of increased affluence. As more people can now afford to run cars and travel abroad more often, we need to develop responsible transport policies that reflect these changed circumstances. He went on to warmly support measures to increase cycling. His department has doubled the budget of Cycling England and plans to do more to encourage children to cycle safely in hope that they will continue cycling when they are adults.

Finally, David Miliband made it clear that he regards his brief as Environment Minister as a humanitarian issue because so many lives are affected by climate change. David suggested that campaigns along the lines of ‘Make poverty history’ ought to take place to help people appreciate the scale of the issues and to encourage everyone to understand how their own daily lives contribute to climate change.

It has been a busy few months but the upshot of all this activity is a gradual and very real process of improvement to our first year consultation document.
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