A walk for climate and nature will take place on 16th July to highlight the anniversary of the council supporting the motion to declare a climate emergency three years ago in July 2019. Also to raise awareness of the climate and ecological emergency.
Meet at Basingstoke train station at 11am on 16th July, the walk will proceed through the town to the Council Offices and end in a picnic in War Memorial Park! Come along and support the transition to a greener more sustainable Basingstoke!
Everyone will have to make changes in the coming decades to ensure we keep global warming to safer levels. The JUMP is the movement that everyone can take part in, by trying six shifts. Eat Green, Dress Retro, End Clutter, Travel Fresh, Holiday Local and Change the System. The JUMP is for anyone worried about the state of nature but are not necessarily ‘environmentalists’. For anyone looking for constructive, positive and impactful steps we can take in our own lives. Check it out and make The Jump yourself now! Find out more here: https://takethejump.org/
While world leaders meet in Glasgow for the COP26 global climate talks, people all over the world are mobilising for climate justice. Basingstoke Transition Network is calling on all on world leaders for strong and just climate action at COP 26. Show your support for climate action at COP26 and come and visit the BTN stall at The Malls in Basingstoke town centre on Saturday 6 November! Meet the BTN team and find out more about COP26, the climate crisis and what you can do to help!
Find out more about the Global Day of Action here and the COP Coalition 26 demands for COP26 here.
Basingstoke Transition Network is calling on all on world leaders for strong and just climate action at COP 26. The climate and ecological crisis is the greatest threat we have ever faced. Climate change is a crisis multiplier that has huge implications for international peace and stability and our safety and security. We cannot afford to wait to act and nations must work together to protect the planet and ensure a stable and equitable future. The science is clear that current action and policies are not delivering the required change as carbon emissions are still rising. The UN advises that carbon emissions are on track to rise by 16% by 2030, rather than fall by half, which is the cut needed to keep global heating under the internationally agreed limit of 1.5C.
At COP26 we ask the world leaders to take the action that we need to keep warming under 1.5 degrees. That governments take the steps needed to deliver on the Paris Agreement commitments and their carbon budgets. We ask for proper investment in solutions that will help tackle the climate and nature crisis. We ask for the cessation of all new fossil fuel projects – we need to keep fossil fuels in the ground. We ask for a swift transition from oil and gas to using renewable energy. We ask for the creation new jobs in energy efficiency, building climate resilience, renewable energy, green homes and clean transport. We ask for legislation to stop banks and investors from funding the fossil fuel industry. We ask for the identification and protection of nature recovery networks, for an increase in tree cover and the genuine protection of forests, oceans and nature. Also, to recognise climate justice and ensure sufficient funds for climate action in countries on the frontline.
The UK must show leadership by investing in the solutions that will help to tackle the climate and nature crisis. The government should commit to investing an extra £30 billion per year in green homes, clean transport and other green solutions to ensure delivery of our commitments and to ensure we can maximise our own benefits from the green transition. It will be more cost effective to act now than deal with the consequences. This is why Basingstoke Transition Network calls for UK and the other world leaders to deliver tougher pledges to cut emissions to keep the goal of 1.5C this COP26.
If you want to show your support for climate action at COP you can attend one of the many events happening across the country. Search this map to find actions and events for the Global Day of Action. Information on events happening in Hampshire is available here.
The 2021 United Nations Climate Change conference, also known as COP26 is going to be held in Glasgow between 31 October and 12 November 2021. The aim is to unite the world to tackle the climate crisis. (COP stands for Conference of the Parties.)
COP26 is where world leaders get together to reach agreement on how to tackle climate change and it’s impacts. The world leaders will also be discussing what progress they have made towards the commitments they made at the 2015 Climate Change conference in Paris.
The talks and commitments made at COP26 are really important to us all as they are a crucial opportunity for global agreements to be made to urgently reduce carbon emissions.
It’s also a time when the public can get together to show how important the climate crisis and reduction of carbon emissions is to us all so we can push the governments to take stronger action.
Success at COP26 is really important as current Governments planned fossil fuel production remains dangerously higher than the Paris Agreement limits. Governments still plan to produce more than double the amount of fossil fuels in 2030 than what would be consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5°C, in is not in line with our climate ambitions and net-zero commitments. A recent report by the UN also found that global carbon emissions are set to rise by 16% by 2030 instead of being cut by 50% which is what is needed.
Find out more here: https://ukcop26.org/uk-presidency/what-is-a-cop/
There’s a motion to declare an ecological emergency being submitted to the next council meeting on 14th October – please write or email your local councillor as soon as possible urging them to support the motion!
This is urgently needed because our landscape and bio-diversity is under huge threat, not just from the changing climate but from huge unchecked developments. The State of Nature Report 2019 highlighted the critical decline in biodiversity in the UK. 15% of UK species are classified as threatened with extinction and 2% are already extinct. We need to protect the natural environment in which we live and it is vital our Council considers the impact on our environment in all its decisions.
Our natural world is essential for the provision of food (with soil and pollinators having a vital role), clean water, fresh air, medicines, and protection from extreme weather, as well as being our source of energy and raw materials. We all derive a sense of wellbeing from a healthy natural environment.
Thanks to strong lobbying from BTN we have persuaded a cross party group of local councillors to submit a ecological emergency motion to the next council meeting on 14th October. But its acceptance is by no means guaranteed. Many local councillors will vote against the motion unless we, the voters, tell them otherwise.
We need your help – please write or email your local councillor as soon as possible urging them to support the motion! Even better attend the meeting and make your views known!
This is the text of the motion:
Motion to Declare an Ecological Emergency
Council Notes:
1. The recent Dasgupta Review on the Economics of Biodiversity confirms that our societies and economies are embedded within nature and are not external to it.
2. Humanity and the economy depend on the services that nature provides. For example, the natural world is essential for the provision of food (with soil and pollinators having a vital role), clean water, fresh air, medicines, and protection from extreme weather, as well as being our source of energy and raw materials. People also derive a sense of wellbeing from a healthy natural environment.
3. Yet the State of Nature 2019 highlighted the critical decline in biodiversity in the UK. 15% of UK species are classified as threatened with extinction and 2% are already extinct.
4. The Environment Bill will require the introduction of a Local Nature Recovery Strategy and Nature Recovery Networks as an aid to planning.
5. Councils of all colours are already declaring an ecological or biodiversity emergency or acting accordingly. These include: Bath & North East Somerset; Bournemouth; Brent; Brighton & Hove; Cambridgeshire; Ealing; Winchester; and Windsor & Maidenhead.
REFERNCES
The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review – Headline Messages, Abridged Version, Full Report & Government Response
State of Nature 2019 – https://nbn.org.uk/stateofnature2019/
https://nbn.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/State-of-Nature-2019-UK-full-report.pdf
Council resolves to:
1. Declare an Ecological Emergency.
2. Maximise co-benefits from addressing Climate and Ecological Emergencies.
3. Add ecological implications alongside those for climate and sustainability in Committee and Council reports, and embed ecological initiatives within all council work areas, including COVID recovery projects and programmes.
4. Work with local communities, county, regional and national partners to promote landscape and habitat protection, restoration, expansion and connectivity, while devolving greater responsibility to genuinely-empowered community groups.
5. Work with stakeholders to provide everyone, and especially children, with opportunities for learning about and reconnecting with nature.
6. Ensure the Ecological (and Climate) Emergencies are strategic priorities for land use planning, planning policies and design guides, and protecting areas for habitat restoration and biodiversity gain. Seek to incorporate biodiversity, nature recovery networks, green and blue infrastructure and ecosystems services into the Local Plan, Neighbourhood Plans and other initiatives.
7. Create a register of natural assets and estimate the ecosystem services derived from those assets.
8. Provide funding to allow for the creation of an Ecological Emergency action plan and annual progress report, which is then reported and scrutinised by Full Council and any relevant Committees.
Basingstoke must do much more to put nature recovery, biodiversity, accessible green spaces and a healthy environment at the heart of the planning process.
The recently published Vision for South West Basingstoke does not conform to national planning policy for protecting and restoring biodiversity and deserves root and branch revision. The issues raised are not just important for south west Basingstoke but the whole Borough, concerning as it does Borough-wide Local Plan policies and decisions about sustainable development and land use.
Council continues to hand landowners and developers the power to choose where development should be located, how much land should be developed and what it is used for. That should no longer be tolerated. Council should shape policy and own decisions on behalf of residents, protecting land that can contribute to plans for natural green infrastructure and other environmental services instead of approving developments that are in conflict.
Basingstoke is located in the Hampshire Downs, a landscape shared with the North Wessex AONB to the north and the South Downs National Park to the south. Natural England has stated that “bridging the gap makes sense from a landscape and ecological perspective”. There is an opportunity to create an important corridor in a gap to the west of Basingstoke and at the same time enable wildlife to avoid crossing the A30, and M3 between Junction 7 and 8.
Despite national planning policy there is no partnership working, no properly functioning Local Nature Partnership, and no credible nature network map for south west Basingstoke to which local communities are able to contribute. Our countryside and wildlife has been fragmented and devastated by a focus on development, intensive farming and the road network. Corridors are to be measured in tens of metres when hundreds of metres or even kilometres are more viable. Reducing fragmentation by joining and expanding Priority Habitats for wildlife abundance and mobility should be at the heart of planning to achieve lasting change.
It is 14 years since the NERC Act of 2006, 10 years since Making Space for Nature and 8 years after the planning system was remodelled by the National Planning Policy Framework. Council must fulfil its planning and delivery responsibilities with a policy framework and partnerships that will halt losses, restore biodiversity and deliver a much healthier environment for all life.
Holistic planning is urgently required; for nature, climate change and community and for genuinely sustainable development. We need a better Vision, with adherence to relevant policies, more science, expertise and partnership working, more decisions in favour of the environment and ambition for restoring biodiversity as well as dealing with climate change.
Paul Beevers
At Basingstoke Transition Network (BTN) we believe we can work together to find ways to reduce our carbon emissions and develop sustainable lifestyles while building a resilient and flourishing local community. We also wish to protect the natural environment and promote improved bio-diversity and nature conservation within the borough.
BTN is part of the Transition Network. Transition is a movement of communities coming together to reimagine and rebuild our world.