Extinction Rebellion Hastings & St Leonards protest in Hastings, October 2021. PHOTO: Chris Broughton
Getting serious about the climate emergency
If Hastings Borough Council (HBC) is serious about the climate emergency then it needs to focus on working with others to change national policy, argues Gabriel Carlyle.
Stung by criticism that it has “sat on its hands” since declaring a “climate emergency” in February 2019, HBC has pointed to the fact that it has “pledge[d]” to make Hastings & St Leonards carbon neutral by 2030, “20 years ahead of Tory central gov” [1].
However, HBC has no meaningful plan for making good on this ‘pledge’ which – as it should be the first to admit – currently lies well beyond its powers and resources.
HBC’s March 2020 Climate Emergency Strategy concluded that ‘even with the most optimistic assessment of grid decarbonisation, current national policy, reducing energy demand, switching to low emission transport, and uptake of other efficiency measures and generating renewable energy locally’, Hastings & St Leonards emissions would ‘only’ fall 77% by 2030 [2], well short of HBC’s pledge. Moreover, the Strategy contained no plan for accelerating this process.
In fact, HBC doesn’t even have a strategy for maximising the chances that this ‘most optimistic’ scenario actually materialises. Rather, its current ‘action plan’ is a series of minor measures that could help it to surf a national decarbonisation wave, as and when the latter actually happens [3].
Not fit for purpose
There are powerful reasons for believing that the UK should be aiming to become ‘net zero’ well before 2050 [4]. But there are also good reasons to believe that the Government’s current plan for achieving even its own 2050 target is inadequately funded and not fit for purpose [5].
Changing national climate policy (including funding) should therefore be the #1 priority on climate change for all local councils, including Hastings. Indeed, this was obvious long before HBC declared a ‘climate emergency’.
HBC’s ‘Climate Emergency Action Plan’ pays lip service to this, with a reference to “lobby[ing] central government to provide the powers and resources to help make [the] 2030 target possible”. However, in the three years since it declared a ‘climate emergency’ it appears to have done almost nothing on this front [6].
Even allowing for the disruption caused by COVID, this is a dismal record.
What could and should HBC be doing to help shift national climate policy?
Here are three suggestions:
(1) Hastings Borough Council should do the work necessary to prove that current national policies aren’t fit for purpose locally.
One might reasonably have expected that HBC’s ‘Climate Emergency Strategy’ would map out the powers, funding and actions necessary to decarbonise Hastings & St Leonards by 2030, providing a rough estimate of their likely cost. In fact, it contains little or nothing of this nature. Indeed, there aren’t even costed measures for a 2050 target date.
Yet, if it’s ever going to effectively press national government for more powers and resources, it’s going to need to prove that it needs them.
Take home insulation, for example.
In a typical British house, up to a third of the heat is lost through the roof. The snow-covered roofs on these houses have effective loft insulation, reducing heating costs and (if gas central heating is used) greenhouse gas emissions. PHOTO: F LAMIOT, VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS (CC BY-SA 2.5)
Heating residential properties is one of the major sources of the UK’s carbon emissions. Properly insulating them is therefore an essential step in tackling climate change – a fact confirmed by an analysis commissioned by HBC [7].
Yet it simply isn’t happening at anywhere near the rate necessary [8].
For example, in its June 2018 report, the UK’s independent statutory Committee on Climate Change (CCC) called for all practicable lofts to be insulated by 2022 [9].
So how many residential properties are there in Hastings & St Leonards that have lofts that it would be practicable to insulate, but which are not currently insulated? And what is the estimated cost of installing loft insulation in these properties?
HBC doesn’t appear to know – at least if its response to a question that I submitted to its October 2021 meeting is anything to go by [10].
More generally, some 28,000 local properties are currently below a good energy efficiency rating (ie. an ‘EPC rating’ of C) [11]. All of those properties need to be brought up to that level by 2030. How much will this cost? Again, HBC doesn’t seem to know.
Yet without this most basic information, HBC is left simply hoping for the necessary funding to materialise.
In its October 2021 ‘Annual Update’ on its climate emergency plan, HBC notes that it helped obtain national funding to bring 275 local properties up to an EPC rating of C [12].
At that rate it would take over 100 years to accomplish what needs to happen in ten.
(2) Hastings Borough Council should actively support national campaigns like the New Economics Foundation’s ‘Great Homes Upgrade’.
The New Economics Foundation (NEF) has recently launched an ambitious community organising initiative, with the aim of building a mass movement to demand a ‘Great Homes Upgrade’ for the UK [13].
Its ultimate goal is for all of the UK’s housing stock to be ‘zero carbon’ by 2050, with everyone living in well-insulated homes, heated by clean, green energy, whether they rent a flat or own a castle.
IMAGE: Great Homes Upgrade
In the near-term this means getting 19 million UK homes brought up to a good standard by 2030, with 7 million homes – including all social housing – brought up to this standard by 2025.
This would improve the lives of millions of households (who would have warmer homes and lower bills). And it would also create hundreds of thousands of jobs across the economy and play a significant role in cutting the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions.
NEF have estimated that achieving this would require the investment of an additional £11.7bn during this parliament on home insulation and low-carbon heating, as well as tax changes to encourage retrofit and the provision of cheap finance to enable families to upgrade their homes.
HBC could and should actively support this campaign.
To be clear: I don’t mean that it should agree a symbolic motion of support and then never do anything else about it. Rather, HBC should be taking bold local and national action to help push this issue to the forefront of the political agenda.
A little creativity could go a long way.
For example, to get started a cross-party delegation of local councillors could hand-deliver a message to the Prime Minister on a roll of insulation material, or lead a Jarrow-style march of local residents to London [14].
(3) Hastings Borough Council could join forces with other local councils to challenge the UK Government in the courts.
Under the Climate Change Act, the UK has made a legally-binding commitment to become net-zero by 2050.
If it’s true that the UK government’s plans are not currently fit for this purpose (let alone for de-carbonising the UK on a faster time-scale) then they can and should be challenged in the courts [15].
Last October HBC was asked if it would consider mounting such a challenge if it determined “that national policies are making it impossible for it to meet its share of the UK’s obligations under the Climate Change Act”?
HBC responded that the Council’s Monitoring Officer had advised that taking such legal action was ‘not a matter for which HBC has a power, duty, function and moreover the funds to enforce.’ [16]
This is throwing in the towel before the fight has even begun.
Moreover, if it acts collectively, such legal action probably needn’t cost HBC a penny.
To date, over 300 local councils have declared a ‘climate emergency’ [17]. If just a third of these councils were prepared to chip in £10k each, then that would create a fighting fund of £1m – which I’m guessing might be enough for mounting a joint legal challenge. And win or lose, the political impact of 100 local councils suing the government over its climate policies would clearly be immense.
£10k is less than 0.1% of HBC’s annual budget – and less than a third of what the Council is currently spending simply reviewing the emissions produced by its own assets [18].
However, with a bit of initiative, even this expenditure could probably be avoided. After all, the Electric Palace recently crowd-sourced £15k in a matter of days [17].
A time for bold action
What we do – and what we fail to do – during the next ten years will be crucial in determining whether or not we avoid catastrophic climate change.
At present, HBC is like the drunk in the joke who knows that their keys aren’t under the lamp post but is still searching there because ‘that’s where the light is’.
The keys to obtaining the powers and resources to decarbonise Hastings & St Leonards by 2030 (or even 2050) simply aren’t under the lamp post of small-incremental-changes-and-applying-for-funding-as-and-when-it-becomes-available [18].
This is a moment for bold action to change the rules of the game that all local councils are currently playing under. Hastings Borough Council should seize it [19].
ENDNOTES
[1] Facebook post by Cllr Maya Evans, HBC’s lead member for the environment, 28 January 2022, https://www.facebook.com/maya.evans.54922169/posts/949349302358678
[2] Climate Emergency Strategy 2020, Hastings Borough Council, March 2020, https://www.hastings.gov.uk/content/my_council/decisions_how/policies_strategies/pdfs/Climate_Change_Strategy_March_2020.pdf, p.7
[3] For example, “develop[ing] a Whole House Retrofit pilot program with partners in the region” and “investigat[ing] the potential for a low carbon heat network in and around the Bohemia area”. See items 3.4 and 3.5 in HBC’s March 2020 ‘Climate Emergency Action Plan’, https://www.hastings.gov.uk/content/my_council/decisions_how/policies_strategies/pdfs/Cabinet_Final_Climate_emergency_action_plan_march_2020_v2.pdf
[4] See eg. ‘Even ‘climate progressive’ nations fall far short of Paris Agreement targets’, University of Manchester, 16 June 2020, https://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/even-climate-progressive-nations-fall-far-short-of-paris-agreement-targets/. This is a press release about the academic paper ‘A factor of two: how the mitigation plans of ‘climate progressive’ nations fall far short of Paris-compliant pathways’ by Kevin Anderson, John F. Broderick and Isak Stoddard. One of the latter’s key conclusions was that “Paris-compliant carbon budgets for developed countries imply full decarbonization of energy by 2035-40, necessitating a scale of change in physical infrastructure reminiscent of the post-Second World War Marshall Plan.”
[5] See eg. ‘UK’s net zero plan falls short on ambition and funding, say critics’, Guardian, 19 October 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/19/uk-government-reveals-net-zero-plan-create-jobs
[6] Regarding the action ‘Lobby central Government to provide the powers and resources needed to help make 2030 target possible’, HBC’s October 2021 ‘Annual Update on Hastings Climate Emergency Action Plan’ states that: “Through Team East Sussex and, the Clean Growth Working Group of SELEP and the regional Energy Hub – Hastings and partner LA’s continue to lobby for resources and keep us on the map for resources incl. financial” (pp. 32 – 33 of https://hastings.moderngov.co.uk/documents/g4438/Public%20reports%20pack%2004th-Oct-2021%2018.00%20Cabinet.pdf?T=10). No more information is forthcoming (including on outcomes, if any). None of this activity appears to have made a significant difference to the powers and resources available to HBC or other local authorities. In October 2021 the UK government finally published its ‘Heat and Buildings Strategy’ – part of a broader attempt to explain how it would make good on its commitment for the UK to reach net-zero by 2050. But despite head-line grabbing announcements on heat pumps, when it came to insulation the Strategy mainly reiterated pre-existing policies. One expert told the CarbonBrief website that while there was a focus on efficiency measures “in the rhetoric” there were “no substantive policy announcements in there on energy efficiency that [they] could pick up” (‘In-depth Q&A: How will the UK’s ‘heat and buildings strategy’ help achieve net-zero?’, Carbon Brief, 20 October 2021, https://www.carbonbrief.org/in-depth-qa-how-will-the-uks-heat-and-buildings-strategy-help-achieve-net-zero).
[7] The analysis commissioned by HBC for its ‘Climate Emergency Strategy and Action Plan’ found that, in the ‘optimistic scenario’ referred to above, demand reduction in buildings coupled with grid decarbonisation would lead to a 52% drop in local Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 2030 (see page 11 of https://www.hastings.gov.uk/content/my_council/decisions_how/policies_strategies/pdfs/Climate_Change_Evidence_Base_March_2020.pdf). The same report noted (p. 31) that: “As the existing building stock accounts for such a high proportion of total emissions, and considering the technical constraints to decarbonising heat, reducing our energy demand is a high priority for achieving net zero. In addition, for low carbon technologies such as heat pumps to work properly, it is essential that energy efficiency measures are carried out first.” (emphasis added). Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions are those produced locally through combustion in boilers & vehicle engines and those associated with local electricity consumption respectively.
[8] For example, speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on 10 February 2022, Chris Stark, the Chief Executive of the UK’s independent statutory Committee on Climate Change, rated the UK Government a ‘D’ on insulation, describing the Government’s policy as “very, very ineffective” and noting that “this year we’ll be in the tens of thousands of installations – we really need to scale that up to something like half a million a year and to do that quickly over the next four or five years.”
[9] ‘Reducing UK emissions: 2018 Progress Report to Parliament’, https://www.theccc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/CCC-2018-Progress-Report-to-Parliament.pdf, p.39. In a follow-up report in June 2021 the CCC noted that: “[t]here ha[d] been little of the necessary progress in upgrading the building stock”, with insulation rates remaining “well below the peak market delivery achieved up to 2012 before key policies were scrapped.” Indeed, “installations of loft and solid wall insulation [were] … only a third of the rate needed by 2021 in the CCC pathway” for the UK to meet its climate change targets. (‘Progress in reducing emissions: 2021 Report to Parliament’, https://www.theccc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Progress-in-reducing-emissions-2021-Report-to-Parliament.pdf)
[10] See answer from Cllr Maya Evans to question from Gabriel Carlyle, ‘Public Document Pack: Council Meeting, Wednesday 13th October 2021’, https://hastings.moderngov.co.uk/documents/b15569/Public%20Questions%20to%20Full%20Council%2013.10.21%2013th-Oct-2021%2018.00%20Full%20Council.pdf?T=9.
[11] Energy Performance of Buildings Data: England and Wales, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities, https://epc.opendatacommunities.org. Data accessed on 1 February 2022.
[12] See p. 17 of https://hastings.moderngov.co.uk/documents/g4438/Public%20reports%20pack%2004th-Oct-2021%2018.00%20Cabinet.pdf?T=10.
[13] https://greathomesupgrade.org
[14] It should be noted that there is already widespread public support for the creation of a national retrofit taskforce to upgrade the UK’s homes to a good standard by 2030. Indeed, a September 2021 poll for NEF, conducted by Opinium, found 65% backing for the idea, with only 7% opposing it. This poll found widespread support for the policy across all genders, age ranges, regions and voting intentions, with even 64% of Conservative voters expressing support. See https://neweconomics.org/2021/09/65-of-people-support-a-national-retrofitting-taskforce-with-only-7-opposing-the-policy-new-polling-shows.
[15] Similar challenges are already being brought by Client Earth and Friends of the Earth. See ‘UK government sued over ‘pie-in-the-sky’ net-zero climate strategy’, Guardian, 12 January 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jan/12/net-zero-climate-strategy-uk-government-sued. Significantly, the UK Government is refusing to release the calculations for the expected emissions savings for the measures in its Net Zero Strategy – see ‘UK still won’t say how much CO2 its strategy will cut’, New Scientist, 29 January 2022, https://www.newscientist.com/article/2305476-the-uk-still-wont-say-how-much-co2-its-net-zero-strategy-will-save/
[16] See See answer from Cllr Maya Evans to question from Andrea Needham, ‘Public Document Pack: Council Meeting, Wednesday 13th October 2021’, https://hastings.moderngov.co.uk/documents/b15569/Public%20Questions%20to%20Full%20Council%2013.10.21%2013th-Oct-2021%2018.00%20Full%20Council.pdf?T=9
[17] As at 11 February 2022, 335 of the 409 local councils listed by Climate Emergency UK have declared a climate emergency: https://data.climateemergency.uk/councils/
[18] See pp. 38 – 39 of https://hastings.moderngov.co.uk/documents/g4438/Public%20reports%20pack%2004th-Oct-2021%2018.00%20Cabinet.pdf?T=10
[19] https://www.gofundme.com/f/save-the-electric-palace-cinema-hastings
[20] For HBC to simply ‘borrow [the money] now’ – as Extinction Rebellion Hastings and St Leonards – have suggested (https://hastingsonlinetimes.co.uk/hot-topics/campaigns/xr-demand-climate-action-from-hbc) doesn’t seem like a realistic option. A back-of-the envelope calculation suggests that, if all of the work was to be funded by HBC, the cost of local retrofit alone could be as high as £½bn. It seems unlikely, to say the least, that a council with an annual budget of £14m is ever going to borrow such a figure.
[21] On the other hand, given the immense scale of the challenge, HBC should definitely not attempt to big-up miniscule achievements as major victories. A textbook example of this is the recent web ad produced by Hastings Labour Party, claiming that HBC is “making a massive reduction in cost and carbon” by “changing every light bulb to energy saving LED bulbs”. The ad states that: “The amount of CO2 saved just from replacing the bulbs in the ESK car park is 1 tonne a year, the equivalent of 300,000 worms. Layed end to end they would reach from Hastings to Eastbourne.” It is all too clear that this tortuous ‘explanation’ has been chosen to obscure the fact that 1 tonne of CO2 is only 0.0004% of Hastings and St Leonards’ annual Scope 1 and Scope 2 CO2 emissions (ie. emissions produced locally through combustion in boilers and vehicle engines and emissions associated with local electricity consumption). According to HBC’s own 2020 ‘Climate Emergency Strategy and Action Plan’, Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions for the Borough of Hastings were 249,400 tonnes in 2017. (1 / 249,400) is 0.0004% to four decimal places. See https://www.hastings.gov.uk/content/my_council/decisions_how/policies_strategies/pdfs/Climate_Change_Evidence_Base_March_2020.pdf, page 7, table 1.
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