SSW Dub Government Propsoals UNFIT FOR THE 21st CENTURY
01/10/2008 20:45Sustainability South West (SSW), the region’s independent Champion Body for sustainable 
development, considers that the Secretary of State’s proposed changes to the Regional Spatial Strategy will increase both carbon emissions and energy bills, making new housing less affordable and miss out on an opportunity to create new low carbon jobs.
The independent Charity opposes the weakening of the plan’s Sustainable development policies as this signals an irresponsible lack of urgency for action and is inconsistent with government calls to reduce energy use and cut emissions and with Gordon Brown’s conference speech calling for Britain to “lead the world in the transformation to a low carbon economy.”
It particularly opposes the proposal to drop a policy on sustainable construction which would set higher energy standards for new buildings in the region. This, the charity argues, will be even more crucial if the proposed very significant increase in housing numbers in the region is confirmed.
Further, SSW now opposes the proposed increase in housing numbers because if constructed without the higher energy standards of the original plan, will increase the likelihood of a big hike in the region’s overall CO2 emissions.
SSW’s Director Leslie Watson explains, “Without the inclusion of the original Policy G the higher household energy bills of new housing will reduce affordability – already a huge social issue for our region. All plans should now minimise emissions and energy use. A truly sustainable future is one that is ‘healthy, productive, resilient, socially just and operating within environmental limits.’ However the Secretary of States’ proposals will result in the region heading in an unsustainable direction.“
Julian Dennis, Chair of SSW and Director of Compliance and Sustainability at Wessex Water says, “Planning policy must now facilitate the infrastructure to support a new low carbon economy for the region. Policy must support low carbon intra regional connectivity, local safe and secure energy supplies and increased local sourcing of goods and services, rather than increasing our reliance on unsustainable high carbon connectivity (increased air and car travel) and external insecure energy supplies. Given the growing concerns about climate change, energy security and increasing energy and food prices, SSW calls for a final review of the RSS proposals prioritising a low carbon approach.”
Sustainability South West believes that agencies have worked hard to develop a consensus on a Regional Spatial Strategy that offers an enlightened approach - typified by an aspiration to reduce overall carbon emissions and the use of finite natural resources together with specific proposals like Policy G for higher energy standards in construction which would stimulate more low carbon construction jobs and training opportunities. It also recognises that significant precious public resources have already been spent on this decision making process which government asked the region to deliver. It considers that it would be wasteful and irresponsible for central government to respond to an example of forward thinking leadership by reverting to lowest common denominator policy that belongs more to the 20th Century than the 21st.
© 2012 Sustainability South West - UK registered charity, no. 1106125 - info@sustainabilitysouthwest.org.uk.