Issue - meetings

To consider the report of the Cabinet Member for Environment setting out the actions the City Council, their partners and Gloucester citizens can take to achieve the objectives of the Climate Change Emergency resolution as adopted in July 2019.

RESOLVED that:

(1)  the report is noted as a roadmap to achieving a carbon net zero Council by 2030 and net zero city by 2050, and that officers continue the work outlined in this report to develop a Climate Change Strategy and bring this back to Cabinet for approval later in the year.

(2)  it supports investigating the projects contained in the ‘quick win’ section of the appendix, subject to Council agreeing to dedicate funds towards such environmental, carbon reduction or adaptation projects at its meeting on 27 February.

(3)  a cross-Party working group, along the lines of the Planning Policy Sub-Group, is set up to support and advise the lead Cabinet Member in the development of this strategy and to review the investigations of the various projects set out in the appendix to the report.

Cabinet considered the report of the Cabinet Member for Environment that set out the actions the City Council, their partners and Gloucester citizens can take to achieve the objectives of the Climate Change Emergency resolution as adopted in July 2019.

The Cabinet Member for Environment summarised the `quick wins’ in the appendix to the report.  He noted that £1.4 million was to be allocated to Gloucestershire to address flooding in the Chancellor’s Budget. The Cabinet Member for Environment announced that from April all electricity purchased to supply the City Council estate would derive from renewable sources.  He commented that this represented a first major step in the Council’s determination to tackle climate change.  The Cabinet Member for Planning and Housing Strategy informed Members how useful he had found the Planning Policy Sub-Group in allowing specific issues to be concentrated upon and that he commended the proposal to follow this model for a cross-party working group (2.1.3).  The Cabinet Member for Environment agreed that climate change was not a party-political issue and emphasised the need to take advantage of all ideas to tackle it.

RESOLVED that:

(1)  the report is noted as a roadmap to achieving a carbon net zero Council by 2030 and net zero city by 2050, and that officers continue the work outlined in this report to develop a Climate Change Strategy and bring this back to Cabinet for approval later in the year.

(2)  it supports investigating the projects contained in the ‘quick win’ section of the appendix, subject to Council agreeing to dedicate funds towards such environmental, carbon reduction or adaptation projects at its meeting on 27 February.

(3)  a cross-Party working group, along the lines of the Planning Policy Sub-Group, is set up to support and advise the lead Cabinet Member in the development of this strategy and to review the investigations of the various projects set out in the appendix to the report.