Agenda item

CALL-IN OF CABINET DECISION: HAVERING CLIMATE CHANGE ACTION PLAN

Report attached.

Minutes:

In accordance with paragraph 17 of the Overview & Scrutiny Committee Rules, a requisition signed by six Members representing more than one Group (Councillors Carol Beth, Keith Darvill, Linda Van den Hende, Paul McGeary, Ray Morgon, and Graham Williamson) had called-in the Key Executive (Cabinet) Decision dated 10 November 2021.

The Climate Change Action Plan covering report and the Climate Change Action Plan were built upon previous plans and set out the next strategic stage in tackling climate change in Havering.

The report was bold and included ambitious actions and targets, which would be based on emissions evidence and best practice. The action plan contained clear actions and milestones which would continue to lead to improvements across the Council’s services.

The action plan was constructed to enable an annual review which would allow changes in circumstances and evolving regional and national plans to be incorporated into the strategic target for the Council and Borough to be Carbon Neutral by 2040, ten years ahead of the national goal of 2050.

Representatives of Extinction Rebellion, Havering Cyclists, Friends of the Earth, and Havering Quakers all spoke to the call-in and stated various concerns. They provided various comments including the following:

· the language used was passive instead of active and did not match up to the urgent action that was required;

· walking structure resources, infrastructure, low emission neighbourhoods, car club providers, school streets with restrictions, or e-cargo bike hires were not mentioned in the plan;

· the report required more detail as other London Boroughs have done more work and the public needed to be involved;

· the report should have been broken down into targets, as it is too vague, lacks transparency and the targets cannot be qualified or quantified.

The Corporate Projects Manager responded to the groups’ concerns and made the following comments:

· ways in which progress would be monitored was addressed on page 63 of the Agenda Pack;

· the walking and cycling strategy was on page 93 of the Agenda Pack;

· a feasibility study was included on Page 96;

· it was not accepted that the language used lacked urgency;

· the annual report could be updated and a more detailed action plan existed in other documents;

· the public needed to be involved and made the focus of the plan and the Council had a well-developed network of voluntary groups to assist with this.

It was agreed that any further questions which were not answered at the meeting would be referred to relevant officers, work stream Leads and/or Heads of Service for response.

Furthermore, it was agreed that the representatives of the groups attending the meeting would be invited to a meeting of the Environment and Climate Change Topic Group where more detailed discussions could take place.

The Leader agreed it was important to get the right approach for Havering and that Climate change was a fast and evolving situation that would benefit from the Overview and Scrutiny process.

The responses to the requisition grounds by officers were contained in the Supplementary Agenda.

A Member calling in the decision, considered that there was confusion around the language and labelling of the document. It was labelled an action plan but it was in essence a strategic plan. Therefore if it were divided into achievements and immediate gains more positive outcomes would have been created. He also acknowledged that a lack of national funding structure was causing problems for many Councils for who wished to set out ambitious Climate change plans. He suggested that an update of the environment plan was required over 2 years ago and as such would have brought the Council in ahead of the game.

The Corporate Projects Manager emphasised that there was a need for an overall framework for improvement and that the action plan had prudent and ambitious targets.

The Leader clarified that the delays to the plan were caused by the pandemic but that the scrutiny functions of the Council were able to operate and hence requisition the decision in this way.

Another Member calling in the decision, suggested that communication was going to be key and there was going to be a requirement to explain exactly what the Council was doing, the cost, the impact and the benefit to people’s lives. He also felt the document needed to be broken down further into sections to better reflect the progress and impact.

The Corporate Projects Manager reiterated that the document had been broken down into manageable parts and he aimed to explain the model better. He was extremely confident the plan would move forward and suggested that Members would be briefed and have training as required to ensure they were all at the same level of understanding. In terms of costs, he believed there would be grants and other funding that the Council would have access to.

A Member put forward that a risk assessment framework would be required as the Council would not be able to self-fund and an understanding of where the funding would come from needed to be taken into consideration. He also felt that changes in behaviour of residents would require extensive PR campaigns.

The Corporate Projects Manager suggested that things that couldn’t be controlled but could be influenced and that once the language of Climate Change was normalised residents would do their part. He believed that there was a need to follow the science which would then transform into action.

It was proposed that the debate be stopped and that a vote on the requisition occur immediately. The Chairman used his discretion to allow Members of the Board to vote on this matter. It was agreed that the debate be stopped at this point by 8 votes to 7 with 1 abstention.

Members voting for the debate be stopped:

Councillor Robby Misir

Councillor Philippa Crowder

Councillor John Crowder

Councillor Christine Smith

Councillor Maggie Themistocli

Councillor Ray Best

Councillor Judith Holt

Councillor Carol Smith

Members voting for the debate to continue:

Councillor Ray Morgon

Councillor Barry Mugglestone

Councillor Christopher Wilkins

Councillor Linda Hawthorn

Councillor Keith Darvill

Councillor Natasha Summers

Councillor Graham Williamson

Members voting to abstain:

Councillor Darren Wise (Chairman)

The requisition was NOT UPHELD by 9 votes to 7.

Members voting not to uphold the requisition: