We need a policy agenda designed to tackle climate breakdown, inequality and centralism, writes the chief executive of North Kesteven DC.
Fill a room with people from local government these days and it won’t be long before the conversation lurches towards policy options for the new parliament. From local government finance, planning, housing and waste, through to health and care, leisure, climate change and many other areas, it is not long before a list of policies, regulatory changes or investment options emerges.
In that spirit, the District Councils’ Network has produced the excellent Closer to Communities, a prospectus for change, balancing long term ambition and transformational change with ‘quick wins’ for tweaking this or that policy or regulation.
All too often, much of the conversation is tempered by the deadening constraint of what is deemed ‘politically realistic’. Ambition gives way to the incremental and the things that ‘won’t cost anything’ or rock the proverbial boat.
The key question is whether incrementalism is going to cut it over the next five years. The answer is almost certainly no. If we are to address the challenges of now and the next five years, we need a policy agenda designed to tackle climate breakdown, inequality and centralism. For policy development to be effective, we need to plan for a net zero, flourishing, local future.
A net zero future
We are way off track in achieving our goals on climate change. We need to see a minimum 50% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 if we are to stand even a 50% chance of remaining within the Paris Agreement aspiration for no more than a 1.5C increase in temperature above pre-industrial levels by 2100.
The future is not a trade-off between traditional economic activity and a net zero agenda
At present, however, emissions continue to rise, with 77% of climate scientists of the view that a 2.5C increase or more is likely. We have breached six of nine known planetary boundaries, including those related to climate change, biosphere integrity, land system change and biogeochemical flows: we are already living outside the known safe operating space for humanity.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has called for nothing less than the transformation of economic and political systems. Our current economic models have taken us to the brink of climate breakdown. A new regenerative model of economic development is urgently needed, creating a safe operating space for humanity within defined planetary boundaries, focused on facilitating the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals for 2030.
The future is not a trade-off between traditional economic activity and a net zero agenda. Without rapid and immediate cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, there is no economic future. Recent studies assessed that a 1C increase in temperature reduces economic output by 12% of GDP, whilst a 3C increase will cause “precipitous declines in output, capital and consumption that exceed 50% by 2100”. A net zero future is fundamental to a sustainable economic future.
An evidence compliant policy agenda needs to champion net zero homes and buildings, rapid decarbonisation of economic activity and transport systems, sustainable land management, and immediate transition away from fossil fuel extraction to renewable energy generation. Our award-winning Local Plan at North Kesteven establishes a net zero compatible framework for the future of the district. Our investment programmes create homes based on passivhaus principles and drive a major retrofit programme for existing homes and buildings. It is a significant start, pending developments in national policy and resource allocation.
A flourishing future
Our current economic models result in crumbling public services, antiquated infrastructure, and gross inequality. We live in a world where the richest 1% of the population ‘own’ 25% of all wealth, whilst the least wealthy 50% ‘own’ just 5%. Intergenerational justice is also a significant challenge. In the UK in 2010, those under 40 held £7.20 of every £100 of all wealth. By 2020, this had dropped to just £3.98.
We need to renew our vision for public services and the tax system as an engine for social justice and greater equality
The consequences are stark in terms of health and wellbeing, participation in education and equality of opportunity, access to housing and employment, the rise of populism and geopolitical instability.
We need to renew our vision for public services and the tax system as an engine for social justice and greater equality. We need to break out of the doom loop we find ourselves in to generate investment in infrastructure and regeneration of local places. We need to inspire investment in local housing solutions and local economic development.
And we need to develop a system-based preventative model of public service delivery designed to address the social determinants of health, inequality, demographic and technological change.
Lincolnshire districts have a positive collaborative strategy for health and wellbeing linked to the social determinants of health. Our delivery plan for North Kesteven shifts the dial towards a preventative agenda through developments in active travel, the creation of a health hub and the transformation of ‘leisure’ programmes into ‘active wellbeing’ services. Once again, it is a significant start, pending a transformational pivot to prevention in the visioning and commissioning of services within the health and care sphere.
A local future
England has the most centralised governance structure in the OECD and the relentless concentration of power in Whitehall is damaging to the health of democracy. It delivers poor outcomes, and it disenfranchises communities in determining their own future.
We need distribution of power in every direction if we are to safeguard and nurture our democracy
Furthermore, the evidence suggests that a more localised decision-making framework delivers better outcomes, reduces inequality and revitalises communities.
We need distribution of power in every direction if we are to safeguard and nurture our democracy.
We need a step change in our ambition for devolution, to create legally and financially independent local government under democratic oversight, in compliance with the Council of Europe Charter of Local Self Government. This must include joined up audit, inspection and peer challenge systems that are of local government, by local government, for local communities.
The debates about the policy and regulatory change related to local government will no doubt continue throughout the new parliamentary term. Many positive and purposeful proposals will be debated and put forward, including those in the DCN Closer to Communities publication. But without urgent and substantive change in our economic system, renewed vision for the public square and a new constitutional settlement, we are bound to fail.
The consequence? Climate breakdown, unacceptable and unjust levels of inequality, and unchecked centralism.
Throughout history, philosophers and the more enlightened few fortunate enough to acquire responsibility for leadership have championed the role of the state thus: “Keep the nation secure, and champion the wellbeing of the people, for justice is the bedrock of the kingdom”.
Now is the moment to renew our commitment to those values and redefine the future.
Ian Fytche, chief executive, North Kesteven DC
11 October 2024
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