New engagement programme to assist in climate decision-making

Lancaster City Council is hosting district-wide conversations on tackling and addressing the climate emergency following the successful bid to join the UK’s Local Climate Engagement Programme (LCE).

We are making great strides towards this aim and through projects such as the decarbonisation of Salt Ayre Leisure Centre, the purchase of electric vehicles including bin trucks, and improving the energy efficiency of our buildings, we aim to be net carbon zero by 2030. More details on what are doing can be found on the council website here.

However, the city council’s emissions are only a small part of the bigger picture. One of the major contributing factors of climate change is how we travel around. We all need to be able to access the things that are necessary to lead a good life but how do we do this at the same time as reducing the emission of harmful gases? Although roads and transport fall under the responsibility of Lancashire County Council, here at Lancaster City Council we want to lead the conversation and help to find solutions.

That’s why, during May and June 2023, we carried out online conversations using the Polis tool to answer the question “How can we as residents of Lancaster district access the resources we need to lead a good life by moving around freely and at the same time reducing emissions?”

Next Steps - Deliberative Workshop

During September 2023, we will run a number of workshops. Together, these sessions will provide the opportunity for the council and members of the community to discuss and debate the issues raised during the engagement exercises.

Along with our other engagement work, the results will be presented to elected councillors and Lancashire County Council to help make informed decisions in the future. We’ll also post all the results on our website in the early autumn.

If you have any questions, please contact us at climate-emergency@lancaster.gov.uk

Background

Polis engagement

Polis is a real-time system for gathering, analysing and understanding what large groups of people think in their own words. More details on this can be viewed in the FAQ.

Community Explorers

Community Explorers are a way of involving members of the public about an issue by encouraging them to share ideas and opinions. They are helped by experienced facilitators who make sure everyone has a fair say and that the task is achieved. Recruitment and training for the Explorers was organised by Shared Future and includes jury people members. During May and June 2023, you may have come across the Community Explorers, asking for your views on the question: “how can residents of Lancaster district access the resources they need to lead a good life by moving around freely and at the same time reducing emissions”.

Previous News

Message from Mark Davies, Lancaster City Council Chief Executive can be viewed here
View the press release - 16 May 2023
Facebook post - 26 May 2023
Twitter post - 26 May 2023

Lancaster district Climate Change People’s Jury recommendations

Lancaster City Council declared a climate change emergency in January 2019, setting out a commitment to becoming net zero carbon by 2030.

This puts tackling climate change at the heart of all the city council’s policies. Actions taken to date include the purchase of new electric vehicles, developing plans for new solar farms, and a review of council assets to reduce energy consumption.

The People's Jury was formed to examine the response to the climate emergency so far and produce recommendations that will be used to guide the future work of the council and a range of other organisations across the district.

The question considered by the Lancaster district Climate Change People’s Jury was ‘What do we need to do in our homes, neighbourhoods and district to respond to the emergency of climate change?’

Jury statement

The following statement was written by a group of jury members and then edited and discussed by the rest of the jury. All of the 26 jury members who voted on the recommendations either strongly support or support the statement:

We are facing a climate emergency which makes us concerned and worried about the future.

We have heard from a range of experts and we now believe that if we take immediate action, we have the tools and the hope that we can address this emergency.

We believe that the only suitable response will be one that brings many organisations and individuals together to work collectively and not separately. This is bigger than Lancaster.

We recognise that many difficult decisions lie ahead but that we must act immediately and not allow a quest for perfection to get in the way of making progress. We need to take action today, not in 30 years time. A journey starts with a small step which all of us can achieve.

The people of the Lancaster district need to see confident leadership, positive changes made and a clear plan for the future.

Our city and county councils must accept that progressive change to fight the climate change emergency will have financial implications. Not being able to fund the recommendations we have listed here is no reason for inaction as money won't matter in a world that won't exist as we know it.

The response to the climate emergency needs to be one that moves away from politicians making all the decisions but instead reaches out to the wider public and communities for ideas of how to achieve our recommendations. It's time for our councils to listen to the people of Lancaster and district and take action now, leading the way to make changes in response to this emergency.

View the People's Jury final report (PDF, 2.7MB)

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