June 2024 marked a celebration of our Local Climate Engagement (LCE) programme’s first two years — a programme which has helped local authorities and partnerships to plan, commission and deliver high quality public engagement in their climate decision-making, in a way that benefits everyone.
During a sold-out sector event, we discussed lessons learned from the programme and asked:
❓How can local authorities engage the public on climate decision-making and what are the impacts when they do?
Read some thoughts from our Director of Capacity Building and Standards, Carly Walker-Dawson from the night.
The Local Climate Engagement (LCE) programme was conceived in 2020. A lifetime ago in local authority terms. Since then, we have seen several local authorities trigger 114 notices. In short, that means no new expenditure over and above statutory requirements. Local authorities across the UK are feeling the squeeze more than ever on budgets and staffing, rapidly shifting priorities, and a crater of division around the introduction of initiatives like Low Traffic Neighbourhoods.
The LCE programme is operating in a vastly different environment compared to four years ago, one where public engagement in decision making is ever increasingly seen as a luxury. This is the backdrop against which the What Next for Local Climate Engagement? event lay.
Our collaborators, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, hosted our event at their office-cum-art-gallery in Hoxton Square. Seeing as the first segment of the LCE programme has come to a close, we wanted to provide a space to reflect, take stock, and think about what is needed next when thinking about local engagement in climate decision making. We hoped to hear from collaborators and colleagues in the fields of climate and net zero, public engagement, or both to come together to give their thoughts, reflections and provocations on what is needed in the future of public engagement in local climate decision making. And our hopes were very much met.
1. Whatever happens nationally following a general election, it’s local authorities that will be delivering on net zero targets day to day. Local authorities are the most trusted government institution with the public. And we have a wave of MP candidates who have a solid local government background — a record number, in fact. This is an opportune moment to leverage these people’s on-the-ground experience and understanding of local community needs and local authority cultures to reshape the relationship between Westminster and local authorities. And perhaps they can also help restore trust in politics on a national level.
2. Inequities and an intersectional approach need to be at the centre of local climate engagement work. We need to approach climate as part of a wider systems change approach with an interconnectedness to other acute issues, like the causes and consequences of the poverty and the cost of living crisis. We must go beyond siloed working in local authorities and see climate and net zero as an issue that cuts across other areas. How do we do this? We need to work across local authority teams, and focus on how to embed culture change as well as specific engagement programmes.
3. We need to put forward a clear and convincing business case about why local climate engagement work is important. We know how time-poor many local authority officers and elected members are, so we can’t expect them to find the information for themselves about public engagement in local climate decision making. We must do the groundwork for them and make it easy. This includes an economic case — we must highlight the co-benefits of involving residents in climate decision making locally, including the cost benefit of getting decision making right first time round without backlash.
4. We need to be radical, we need to offer immersive processes, and we need to engage with people organising on climate outside of local authorities to have a joined up approach. We need to consider how to activate and engage with people to demand for local climate engagement. Only working with local authorities is not enough. We need to be radical in our approach to meet the scale of the climate crisis. Working with institutions and communities is not mutually exclusive. One of the best examples of a climate engagement process that had the greatest impact in results was the Kendal Climate Jury, which came from community demand and the result was an activated group of over 300 residents who supported the local councils to implement its recommendations. Let’s be more like Kendal (and big shout out to Shared Future for making it happen).
5. We need to support local authorities to create a vision of an ongoing, meaningful relationship between their institutions and the people. This goes beyond one off interactions and processes but is a wider culture change that needs to be embedded. This takes work, doesn’t happen overnight and can seem like a daunting task. Getting the right people involved from the start is vital — senior officers, elected members and the officers doing the work on the ground. Programmes must go beyond a one off intervention, they must put people at the centre through building and making the case locally, putting people at the centre of programmes, offering capacity building and spaces for peer learning, and creating self-organised community of practices. Cross-council working can offer a vital solidarity structure too.
Someone asked me towards the end of the event — during the networking part — what we can do with local authorities, and do we need to cut our losses and focus our energies elsewhere. I said no — there is still a huge willingness within local authorities to do this work, even if resources are scarce. One of the panel speakers reflected that they have never met an elected representative with the climate portfolio who doesn’t fundamentally believe in their work and doesn’t want to make change. From my experience, I have seen there is a cohort of young, fresh faced council officers spearheading climate engagement early in their careers. Their drive comes from values and an ideological commitment to combating climate change locally.
But what we need is to find different ways of engaging with local authorities — through existing networks like the LGA, through nationally-funded programmes like Thriving Places (the first Innovate UK programme to fund local authorities, led by Involve) and by considering how to work more closely with combined authorities and the metro mayors. There is still a need, we just need to be more creative in our solutions.
The next stage of our Local Climate Engagement programme responds to the needs of local authorities by creating a LCE resource bank. We will give local authorities a wealth of open source materials that can help them and their communities in their journey towards net zero. This will include case studies, mini training modules, how to guides, videos, animations and much more. Our partners, UK100, will be leading a parallel awareness raising programme with targeted advocacy to scale up local climate engagement on local and national levels. Get involved or find out more by keeping an eye on our socials.
A big thank you to all of our speakers at the What’s Next for LCE event: Paula Black (Involve), Sally Cupitt (Sally Cupitt Consulting), Brianna Francis (London Borough of Waltham Forest), Christopher Hammond (UK100) and Louisa Hooper (Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation). And special appreciation to Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation (UK Branch) for hosting our event and their continued support of the Local Climate Engagement programme.
Below is a video reflecting the overall programme, showcased on the night.