Lib Dems secure action on local delivery of climate change projects

Surrey Lib Dems secured agreement from Surrey County Council at its meeting on 12 July that it would look again at how best to coordinate public engagement on climate change projects such as the installation of electric vehicle charging points.

Surrey County Council has a target to reduce emissions by 1.38m - 2.4m tonnes of carbon per year by 2025, just 3 years away. The two major contributors to carbon emissions in Surrey are household heating and transport, primarily private car journeys. Effective communication and engagement are crucial to achieve this target. Ordinary people will be encouraged to make changes to their behaviour, for example to replace their gas boiler with a heat pump or to use public transport instead of travelling by car. At the moment there is no mechanism to bring together the general public, relevant local organisations, and elected representatives to air their views on how best to implement schemes locally.

A Surrey Lib Dems motion was agreed at yesterday's full council meeting committing to the establishment of a cross-party working group to consider how this can be done effectively in order to accelerate activities to reduce the current level of carbon emissions.

In his speech to propose the motion Lance Spencer, (Goldsworth East and Horsell Village) said:

"My grandson will be 11 years old in 2030 when we will no doubt look at what impact our various measures have had and, I suspect, we will have much more evidence of the massive impact climate change will be having on the population of this planet. He might rightly ask the question what I was doing back in 2022 when we knew how much impact we were all having on the climate, why we had not done more to address the issues."

The working group is tasked with reporting back to Surrey County Council Cabinet in Autumn 2022