On Wednesday I was at DEFRA’s Third Sector Advisory Board. One of the common requests of charities is that they should be consulted at an early stage on policy development. Listening to DEFRA officials it soon becomes clear how difficult this simple-sounding request is to put into practice.

Battered

New policy and legislation hits them from all sides and at very different speeds. One example of this is the thrillingly entitled 'EU Batteries Directive'. This first came into force in 2006, but the impact will only be felt by consumers and retailers this February.

The UK currently only recycles 5% of its portable batteries - one of the lowest rates in Western Europe - the oft ridiculed Belgiums recycle over 41%.

Although small and easily overlooked many batteries contain hazardous substances such as cadmium and lead. Not stuff that you really want floating around landfill sites or put in incinerators. The new Directive has set challenging targets requiring 25% of batteries to be collected and recycled by 2012. 

To hit these targets shops selling more than 1,400 batteries a year must offer a take-back system. It is also likely that the seven different initiatives established to collect the batteries will be trying to persuade offices and schools to set up collection points.

To make the collection system easier to administer DEFRA has scaled back regulations for dealing with the hazardous materials contained within the batteries - probably much to the relief of the major supermarkets.

Most of the collected batteries will end-up being transported overseas as the UK has very little recycling capacity. Yet another example of Mandy’s much vaunted green jobs ending up in other countries.

Where next?

On Friday we held a strategy day with our Board of Trustees. These meetings provide an excellent opportunity for all of us to stop, draw breath and reflect on where the organisation should be heading. 

When Global Action Plan started we were virtually a lone voice in calling on people to cut carbon. Now it is a common message from all sectors of society. Where then does that leave us – should we pack our bags, give up and declare job done?

Perhaps unsurprisingly we decided not to take this option. Fundamentally, Global Action Plan has always been about trying to persuade people to shift their values, attitudes and behaviour. 

We believe that the need for this role will grow in the future. There is a view that technology and legislation will solve all our problems. Obviously they do have an absolutely pivotal role in the shift towards a low carbon future, but they cannot solve the problem on their own.

There is no point retrofitting homes with all the latest efficiency gadgets if people don’t know how best to use them and retain wasteful behaviours. There is no point investing huge amounts of money in more efficient electronic devices if we simply buy more and more of them. 

Changing behaviour is a fundamental part of a more sustainable future and we intend to play a central role in this process.

Resilience

This year has rather stumbled into activity mainly due to the snow. The prolonged nature of the cold snap certainly provided a challenge to the media who were forced to find increasingly desperate angles to keep the story live and interesting. Invariably virtually all of them ended up producing a list of winners and losers. Surprisingly, I found this rather enlightening.

One of the common questions I often get asked is what does a sustainable future look like? It doesn’t take too many sentences for me to sound as hopelessly vague and idealistic as a stoned out hippy in Goa. But the list of winners and losers from the big chill provided a far more precise answer. 

Coping with the snow forced more people to rely on local shops. There were many stories of people providing help and support to friends and neighbours. Employers became far more flexible allowing people to work from home and travel at different times reducing congestion. Conversely the losers included the highly centralised food and dairy industries who suffered due to the enormous distances their products had to travel to reach the retailers.

From the lists it was clear that to cope with the snow people were forced to rely more on the support and resources available within their local community.  This basic message is a key part of the sustainability agenda perhaps demonstrating that sustainable communities will also be more resilient communities.

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