Petition details
Declare a Climate Emergency and become carbon neutral by 2025
Tower Hamlets continues to be one of the highest carbon emitters in the greater London area and to experience illegally high levels of air pollution, caused by burning fossil fuels. It is evident that the current council Air Quality and Climate Change Strategy is not radical enough to achieve necessary reduction in carbon levels, or rapid enough improvements to the air we breathe.
The IPCC’s Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C, published in October 2018, describes the enormous harm that a 2°C rise is likely to cause compared to a 1.5°C rise. Limiting Global Warming to 1.5°C may still be possible, but it would take rapid and far-reaching action from national and sub-national authorities, civil society, the private sector and local communities. It could also help build a fairer and more sustainable society.
Our children’s future completely depends on what we do now. The consequences of global temperatures rising above 1.5°C are so severe that preventing this from happening must be humanity’s number one priority. Yet the UK Government plans fall well short of what is needed.
Local Councils have a duty to limit the negative impacts of Climate Breakdown, and should not wait for their national governments to change their policies. Lambeth has already declared a climate emergency, as has the Greater London Authority, Bristol and many other councils around the UK.
Declaring a climate emergency and taking rapid action could have a special impact in Tower Hamlets. Here, children are growing up with stunted lungs, which will never recover, because of air pollution.
Air pollution is caused by burning fossil fuels, which drives climate change. Tower Hamlets has above legal levels of Nitrogen Dioxide and unacceptably high Particulate Matter, mainly from the burning of diesel engines in cars, lorries and buses, but also from gas boilers and construction equipment. This pollution has severe effects on health of our residents, especially of children. Children in Tower Hamlets have on average 5% and up to 10% smaller lungs than they should.
Air pollution has lifelong and potentially life-limiting effects. It causes breathing difficulties, asthma and lung cancer. Air pollution increases miscarriage rates, harms unborn babies, and can affect intelligence and behaviour in children. 7.4% of deaths of people over 30 in Tower Hamlets are caused by particulate air pollution.
This Petition ran from 13/02/2019 to 21/03/2019 and has now finished.
1175 people signed this Petition.
Council response
Thank you for your petition calling on the Council to Declare a
Climate Emergency and become carbon neutral by 2025.
We recognise that we are in the midst of a climate emergency which
poses a threat to our health and our planet. A recent report from
the UN said there were only 12 years left to avert the most extreme
consequences of climate breakdown.
Tower Hamlets Council notes our climate change responsibilities and recognises that the aims to make Tower Hamlets a zero-carbon borough by 2050 requires further ambitious steps.
Tower Hamlets Council is doing everything in our power to mitigate the risk but the stark reality is that the generation of emissions in the borough is not under the direct control of the council and must rely on partnership working with residents and business and others to achieve such very high ambitious targets and therefore need urgent government action and funding.
As a local authority we have already committed and on target to achieve a 60% carbon dioxide emissions reductions by 2020 from our own operations and we will commit further by setting a target to be zero-carbon by 2025.
We welcome the action by others and will commit to reassess the targets in our climate change strategy and aspire to achieve zero-carbon borough by 2030.
The Council is already taking actions to address Air Quality issues
in the borough through the Council’s Air Quality Action Plan.
These actions include;
• Ensuring new developments have suitable energy efficiency measures installed to reduce the demand for onsite heat generation from boilers & CHP’s.
• Implement a Domestic boiler refit project using the GLA’s RE: FIT energy efficiency retrofit programme.
• Implement a Schools Carbon Emission Reduction Programme, providing funding towards boiler replacements and insulation schemes in schools.
• Lead by example by ensuring the councils new Civic Centre is a best practice example of a sustainable and low emissions development in regards to air pollution and CO2 with both air quality neutral and carbon zero policies being met.
• Installation of 300 electric vehicles charging points on-street including some rapid chargers to help enable the take up of electric taxis and commercial vehicles.
• Investigate reprioritisation of road space to smooth traffic flow, reduce congestion, improve bus journey times, cycling and pedestrian experience, and reduce emissions caused by congested traffic.
• Lobby and work with TFL to reduce emissions from busses in the borough e.g. through green bus corridors;
• Lobby and work with TFL to reduce emissions from TfL controlled roads e.g. through reprioritisation of road space.
• Lobby the GLA to strengthen their Air Quality Neutral Policy and lower the CHP emission limits in current guidance.
In relation to Point 1 specifically:
• A School Street Programme is being finalised to commence in April 2019 with feasibility and delivery of the first agreed 19 schools in the programme by September 2020;
• A Liveable Streets Programme is similarly being finalised and briefings for Members will be held in April which will am to reduce through traffic on local residential roads and thus contribute to improving air quality in those areas;
• 42 Electric Charging Points will now be going live in the borough this month, and 100 more will be delivered by the end of 2019/20;
• The Mayor has lobbied Heidi Alexander in relation to bring forward a cleaner bus fleet in the borough ahead of the TfL London wide targets, including speeding up delivery of the planned ULEV Bus corridor along the A11.
The Council aims to reduce the negative impact of harmful emissions from the vehicles that it operates, as far as is possible.
The Council’s Fleet encompasses wide range of vehicles, and there is currently a procurement exercise to renew existing vehicles, whilst expanding the Fleet to include the Waste Service; when this service is brought in house from