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WQ.108/2020
WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT BY THE CONNÉTABLE OF ST. MARTIN
ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON MONDAY 9th MARCH 2020
Question
What work will the Minister undertake with the Parishes on additional strategies to develop environmentally-friendly behaviours as part of the forthcoming Climate Action Plan?
Answer
Chapter 4 of the Carbon Neutral Strategy describes a people-powered' approach to responding to the climate emergency and outlines the key role of parishes within this and the development of the long-term climate action plan.
The strategy recognises the importance of the honorary tradition, and reiterates the parish assembly as an institution rooted in direct democracy. Therefore, the people-powered frames and enhanced opportunity to catalyse local community planning and action, to give islanders a clear role and to begin to address climate change from the grassroots.
"Parishes will be invited to build on their early action to lead community climate action networks involving local people and businesses. Eco active will continue to provide support and advice to these networks, and strong ideas that emerge from this work will be considered for future investment from the climate emergency fund"
Parishes are, and have always been, invited to become members of the eco active business programme which would enable them to set actions to increase environmental performance and awareness through a continuous improvement programme. Eco active support includes access to training, information as well as the benefits of being part of a network. To date St Helier is the only parish that has sign up to the programme and has been an active member for several years.
In terms of supporting parishes as part of the Carbon Neutral Strategy, officers are already offering support to parishes who have requested it and this will not just be continued, but increased.
This support for parishes will continue to be available through eco active to build an infrastructure of local delivery and, where they wish, to agree community action plans so that people across the island can play their part in tackling the climate emergency.
Parishes who have declared their own climate emergencies have had officers attend working groups and this is something we are keen to further engage other parishes in and develop other structures to support such action. This might include developing tools such as toolkits for parishes. Before Christmas officers held a workshop that was offered to all parishes to help them calculate Scope 1 & 2 emissions of the Parish entity. The carbon monitoring spreadsheet' is readily available and has been bespoked for Parishes with specific needs. This support was made reference to during the recent debate and Members complimented this service.