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Ethical Consumer Week, October 2021 | Ecotricity https://www.ecotricity.co.uk › our-news › 2021 › ethical-consumer-week-october-2021 Ethical Consumer Week, October 2021. Press enquiries. If you are a journalist with a media enquiry, please contact our Press Office on 01453 761 318 or you can email pressoffice@ecotricity.co.uk. For all other general enquiries, please call 01453 756 111 or email home@ecotricity.co.uk. By Olly Rose. Sep 24, 2021. In the run-up to the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow this November, Ethical ... Ethical Consumer Week 2021 | Programme https://www.ethicalconsumerweek.com › 2021-event-schedule Ethical Consumer Week 16th - 22nd October 2021. Browse sessions by day. Sat 16th - Housing & energy. Sun 17th - Travel. Mon 18th - Food and farming. Tue 19th - Clothing. Wed 20th - Money. Thurs 21st - Technology. Fri 22nd - Retail. Ethical Consumer sessions. Energy & Housing Saturday 16th October 2021 . To kick-start Ethical Consumer Week 2021 we have sessions focusing on the climate gap ... Ethical Consumer Week 2021: Closing the Climate Gap. https://www.ethicalconsumer.org › ethical-consumer-week-2021-closing-climate-gap Ethical Consumer Week 2021 (16th-22nd October) will look at the gap between current behaviour and where we must head in order to meet international targets, & how we can address the divide. It will consider our roles as consumers, citizens, workers, producers & more - asking what steps we can take towards supporting local, national & global behaviour change. Transformative change. Last ... Ethical Consumer Week 2021 https://www.ethicalconsumerweek.com › ethical-consumer-sessions Tickets for Ethical Consumer Week 2021 are provided on a per-session basis. You can find links to get tickets & sign up to individual sessions on the programme page here. Throughout the week we will be holding a wide variety of sessions on the theme of Closing the Climate Gap. One session each day will be hosted by Ethical Consumer, with many ... Ethical Consumer Week webinar - ethex.org.uk https://www.ethex.org.uk › events › ethical-consumer-week-webinar Ethical Consumer Week webinar. Friday 22nd October 2021 - 11:00AM Zoom Attend by Ethex 2 September 2021 . Join our Ethical Consumer Week online discussion on grassroots solutions to global problems . Join Lisa Ashford, CEO of ethical investing platform Ethex, with Rose Marley, CEO of Co-ops UK and representatives of some community-and climate-driven organisations for an open discussion about ...
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3 keys to public engagement
1. The power of a team On 18 September, the recently formed Beaminster ECO Committee held its first public event – a Big Green Day, which was the town’s contribution to the national Great Big Green Week 18 to 26 September. The aim of the Day was to offer practical ideas on how we can all reduce living costs, cut waste, reduce our carbon footprint, encourage wildlife in our gardens, enjoy local food, plant trees and make our homes more energy-efficient. The Day included children’s activities on The Square and in the Public Hall; a range of displays in the Public Hall; and free refreshments, including excellent soup made of organic vegetables. The displays focused on wildlife in your garden, planting trees, a beehive, the Green Living project, a food project, Open Greener Homes, retrofit of older houses, electric bicycles and an electric car. Most striking was the strength of the wide team which organised the whole event. This team was drawn from the Town Council, Beaminster Area ECO Group, the Church ECO Group, Beaminster School, Young Farmers, Army Cadets, Scouts, Women’s Institute, Prout Bridge Community Centre, Dorset Wildlife Trust, Beaminster Probus and others – a total of at least 40 people directly involved in organising the event. The public response was strong, including many Beaminster people not previously involved in environmental activity. After the event, one of the participants commented “It was a wonderful day and I loved that everyone of all ages just got on with what they needed to do to bring it all together, without anyone seeming to be in charge. Great stuff !” 2. The power of practical examples Beaminster and neighbouring villages have contributed 6 of the total of 50 Dorset Greener Homes within the programme organised by Dorset CAN this year. Two of these homes illustrate beautifully the power of an idea as seen in practice. A newcomer to the Greener Homes family is Ubuntu, a brand-new home on the northern edge of Beaminster created by Sue Wardell and Mark Oppe. It has high levels of insulation and triple glazing to passive house standard, solar PV with batteries, air source heat pump and mechanical ventilation/heat retrieval. Introducing the house, Sue says “We were inspired and encouraged by houses we saw through Dorset Eco Homes”. In the centre of Beaminster is Honeysuckle House, owned by Gillian Perrott and Sue Counsell. Their house, built in 1997, has insulated walls, double glazing and loft insulation, achieving high standards of energy efficiency. The living area is heated by a gas-fired Aga, and a Norwegian Jotul wood-burning stove using timber from this their own woodland. In 2010, they installed 16 solar panels (capacity 3kW) on the south-facing roof of the adjoining barn. This year, they installed an air source heat pump, replacing the gas boiler for heating & hot water. On their first open day, 19 September, they were visited just by one local couple, and spent two hours with them. On their feedback form, the visitors said “It was inspiring to see the equipment in place and to have an explanation of the practical implications, problems and benefits. We intend to arrange a survey related to insulation generally and to installing solar panels and an air source heat pump”. 3. The power of public opinion Parnham House, a fine historic house set in parkland on the south side of Beaminster, has for centuries been a major feature in the life and economy of the town. The townspeople were deeply shocked in 2017 when the mansion was destroyed by fire. They hoped for someone to take on the estate, with the resources to restore the building. So, they were pleased when, last year, James Perkins bought the Parnham estate, with the stated intention to restore the mansion. They welcomed the prospect of a restored historic building, and its sympathetic use as, perhaps, a hotel. Then came an interview in Bridport News in which James Perkins, described as former head of the rave scene promoter Fantazia, spoke of his desire to turn Parnham into an “adventure wonderland where people of all ages can come and enjoy, creating hundreds of jobs in the process”. Local people began to fear what might happen on the estate. In July, the Estate submitted to Dorset Council an application for an entertainment licence, stating the intention to turn the whole estate into an ‘events venue’. The licence would enable it to organise a wide range of activities and events on the estate, including films, plays, musical and sporting events, with significant numbers of people. Included would be late-night activity, running into the small hours, with available alcohol and (on some occasions) amplified music. The estate proposed to build a pub, restaurant, shop and other facilities, alongside the restoration of Parnham House. This application attracted a storm of protest from people living in Beaminster and Netherbury. Dorset Council’s Licensing Committee received an unprecedented number of objections, and very few messages expressing support. The outcome was a Committee Meeting lasting one and a half days, during which objectors argued passionately for restriction in the numbers of visitors, the frequency of events, the hours of opening and the parts of the estate on which large events, the sale of alcohol and the use of amplified sound could apply. In response, the estate manager stated that the normal maximum number of people attending events on the estate would not exceed 130; that events in larger numbers would be very few; and that the estate was ready to restrict the large events to a limited area surrounding the historic house and its associated buildings and formal gardens. Two days after the public meeting, the Committee published its decision to grant the licence, including most of the conditions which had been demanded by the objectors. The next steps are likely to include planning applications for new buildings on the estate, which will be appraised with great vigilance by the local community. They will wish to see an outcome which is productive for the estate and which makes a strong positive contribution to the well-being of the local community and economy. Dave Brown, a founder member of DorsetCAN, has tips on planning a holiday in 2021 and inspiration for anyone who can no longer bear to stand idly by... He writes: This is a crucial year for life on our planet. That’s no exaggeration; if anything it is a colossal understatement. The decisions we make as a species this decade will determine the scale of catastrophe faced by us, our youth and the next generation. We knew that before Covid-19. This year we need to resist the temptation of relapsing into the short-term thinking that the pandemic forced us from. Otherwise we are collectively doomed. With this in mind, my wife and I wonder what on earth a holiday looks like against such a depressing backdrop. Flying for pleasure seems suicidal, ungrateful for this island’s natural beauty and as unlikely to bring pleasure as a glass of wine with an extinguished cigarette floating in it. I am 100% behind tests, quarantines and last-minute cancellations but that does not make them fun. Two events loom large on our shared calendar: the G7 Summit and COP26. We're tired of hearing about critical events like these on the news and accepting the disappointment that nothing has changed afterwards. We want to show up, to make our interest and attention visible. To signal to friends and relatives that it has come to this, and that this is something they can do too. And that it’s fun! The G7 summit is a no-brainer. It’s in Cornwall in the summer and neither of us has explored there much before. We both take time off work, pass a lateral flow test and set off for St Ives. We stop off on the way to break up the journey and to share our mission with the people we care about – for us this is parents, an uncle, and a school friend who I haven’t seen in 10 years. Excellent times all round. (continued below...) After a lot of trial and error, my wife and I agree that for us to make an impact we need our efforts to be sustainable. We're not natural campers. We don't fit neatly into any image of eco-radicals. To succeed, we believe the climate movement must be a Mass Movement, which means that it’s members must be more dissimilar than alike. Believing that “The unfair systems we have now are killing our planet and we need to change that.” is all the unity we will need. We pocket our anxiety that we might not be ‘green’ enough for the other activists there, and take Extinction Rebellion at their word that they “avoid blaming and shaming individuals”. We decide to show up and join on our own terms. We stay in an Airbnb which it turns out is run by a famous climate activist so that’s a reassuring coincidence. We walk to the XR muster point in St Ives, where we accept banners offered to us to carry as well as bust cards in case of arrest. After a brief intro we join the parade through St Ives, marching to the sounds of some joyous Samba drumming. I'm not trying to diminish the efforts of protest and action organisers here, far from it. But this weekend highlights how much room there is for people to just show up and join in. We're thrilled to see locals spontaneously joining the parade and many more cheering from homes and businesses we pass. Did we actually have any impact on the G7 world leaders? I would love to think our peaceful protest could stop the juggernaut of capitalism in its tracks and redirect it. Clearly that did not happen, but we cannot know what the world would be like without our protest. Aside from the protest we had a great time shopping and eating locally. I am now convinced that an action-centred holiday can effectively combine the benefits of protest and recuperation, and we will be at COP26 if we are able to get there responsibly in terms of the pandemic. The message that sticks with me after the G7 summit weekend, was printed on a jacket worn by a rebel, and reads “Despair Ends / Tactics Begin”.  There was great coverage in the Dorset Echo of the questions that we and others put to Dorset Council’s Scrutiny Committee at their meeting on 24th March. Here’s an extract from Trevor Bevins’ piece:
“Caz Dennett, from Weymouth, has criticised the way questions were framed in the council’s climate consultation which, she says, gave respondents no chance to put forward some views about carbon neutral target dates in the short survey. She says that, as result, the conclusion of the report should be declared invalid because the two surveys, in her opinion, asked significantly different questions. Corfe Castle parish councillor Josephine Parish claims that since Covid 19 Dorset Council has not held any ‘genuine two way public engagement’ on the climate and ecological emergencies. She says the authority also missed an opportunity by not sending out information about the issues with recent council tax bills. She says that although Dorset Council held no public meetings, where the public were able to ask questions, other organisations did so, proving that it could be done. ‘Given the response rate of less than 0.5% of residents that Dorset Council achieved in its consultation process, will the scrutiny committee recommend that Dorset Council work closely with Dorset-based climate and environmental advocacy groups and organisations (including Parish & Town Councils) which are clearly able to reach – and communicate with – concerned residents more effectively?’ Other questions to this week’s scrutiny committee ask why there is no implementation schedule for the Local Transport Plan. Helen Sumbler says dealing with transport matters is one of the best ways for the county to tackle climate change. She has also asked for an update on the Rights of Way Improvement Plan.” Read the Dorset Echo article Climate Outreach
Britain Talks Climate is a toolkit designed to support any organisation that wants to engage with the British public on climate change. Its research says this is difficult but that there is currently no ‘culture war’ on climate change in Britain. Britain Talks Climate groups the population into seven different segments based on people’s core beliefs and identifies ways to engage with each one. Here are the seven segments. How many do you recognise?
Read more about the toolkit at Britain Talks Climate website |
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