To debate a Motion submitted by the Administration in accordance with Rules 11 and 13 of the Council’s Constitution. The debate will last for a maximum of 30 minutes.

 

Councillor Asma Islam moved and Mayor John Biggs seconded the motion as printed in the agenda.

 

Councillor Rabina Khan moved and Councillor Andrew Wood seconded the following amendment to the motion as set out in the supplementary agenda:

 

To be added to the existing text:

 

The Council Notes:

 

•    Friends of the Earth claims that the environment movement is “still overwhelmingly white and middle-class. It further states that we need a “diverse range of voices to solve global problems and achieve social justice.”

•         In January 2020 in Davos, Switzerland, Ugandan climate activist, Vanessa Nakate, posed for a photo with Greta Thunberg and three other white climate campaigners. However, when Vanessa subsequently “struggled to find photos” that included her, she discovered that the Associated Press news agency had cropped her out of the image with Greta and that none of her comments from the press conference were included.

•      Theo Cullen-Mouze, an Irish climate activist was appalled that Africa is “deliberately removed from the picture. He said: “Africa has contributed the least [carbon emissions] but will suffer the most from climate breakdown.”

•     The Archdeacon of Croydon, the Venerable Dr Rosemarie Mallet, is a leading figure within the Church of England on climate change. Her aim is to give a voice to those who are keen to bring about change, but fear the repercussions of doing so. During Extinction Rebellion protests for example, people from BAME backgrounds fear being targeted by the police in a less favourable way that white protesters.

•     When Lucy Craig, a 73-year-old white activist was asked whether she thought that being a middle-class, well off white woman helped her within the protest, she said: “Absolutely. Everything is fuelled by white privilege.”

 

The Council Believes:

 

•             Despite the fact that BAME people have been involved in climate activism for decades, their views and efforts seem to be excluded from debates. International climate lawyer, Farhana Yamin, for example, was a lead proponent of the net zero emissions by 2050 goal in the Paris Agreements. She was tired of the promises made by the carbon emission trading system. “I wanted to think bolder and bigger – no more mucking around with carbon budgets. These gases are toxic. We shouldn’t create trading systems for toxic pollutants.”

•             Although people from BAME backgrounds have been invisible in the climate debate and protests, they are disproportionately affected by air pollution, not least because areas of London with the highest levels of pollution are occupied by a large BAME population. Most people will recall the tragic case of Ella Kissi-Debrah, the 9-year-old whose mother believes that her daughter’s fatal asthma attack was linked to illegal levels of pollution.

•         In August 2020, Anjali Raman-Middleton set up the pollution advocacy group Choked Up with three other students. Anjali had attended the same primary school as Ella.

 

The Council Resolves:

 

•         The council proposes a programme called Tower Hamlets Diversity in Climate Change Engagement to deliver effective engagement with all communities, particularly the hard-to-reach communities and people from Black, Asian, Minority and diverse communities, people with access and mobility requirements.

•         To engage with organisations such as Climate Reframe, which amplifies diverse voices in the UK Environmental Movement, and Choked Up.

•         The programme also works with faith communities to look at how faith and climate change can work together. During Ramadan, for example, families and communities come together to celebrate and help each other. Muslims deliver food packages to the needy and recognise the importance of never wasting food, which in turn benefits the environment.

•         That the council actively seeks climate change campaigners from Black, Asian, Ethnic Minority, Diverse and disabled backgrounds to speak at climate change events and become involved in the third sector, thereby empowering other marginalised communities to participate and make a valuable contribution to tackling climate change.

 

Councillor Andrew Wood moved and Councillor Peter Golds seconded the following amendment to the motion as set out in the supplementary agenda

 

Amendments showed underlined:

 

This Councilnotes:

1.          In March 2019, Tower Hamlets became one of the first councils in the country to         declarea climate emergency, more then three years after the Paris Agreement was signed;

2.          That the Oxford English dictionary defines emergency as a“situation requiring immediate action”

3.          The Council has committed to becoming a net zero carbon Council by 2025 and a  netzero carbon borough by2050;

4.          The Council is implementing its Net Zero Carbon Action Plan which sets out theaim to do all we can to reach zero carbon by 2025, including actions around thenew Town Hall, procurement, the electrification of the council’s vehicle fleet,amongst other actions. The Net Zero Carbon 2025 action plan sets out ourcommitment to tackling the climate emergency:https://democracy.towerhamlets.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=165906

5.          The council is delivering against its climate emergency ambitions through a numberof actionsand decisions including:

 

1.          Switching to a renewable energy supplier – in October 2019 LBTH  transferredto a100% renewable electricitytariff more than ten years after it was possible to do so.

2.          The Pensions Committee have actively engaged with the climate changeagenda and are looking at revising their investment strategy towards agreener portfolio

3.          Commenced a Sustainable Workplace programme to instil sustainablebehaviours for council employees including: promoting resource efficiency(reducing energy use; moving to paperless working); reduction in single useplastics including elimination of plastic cups from buildings; and introduction      of food waste collection to council offices to reduce waste being sent tolandfill and incineration.

4.          Tower Hamlets has one of the worse records in the country for dealing with litter and punishing fly tipping.

5.          Adoption of TowerHamlets TransportStrategy whichsets outour visionand priorities for travel in Tower Hamlets from 2020 – 2041 throughsustainable meansof transport

6.          Which will include enforcement of parking restrictions on double yellow lines as opposed to the recent situation in Blackwall where  a resident parked a vehicle so regularly on double yellow lines, without penalties that it could be seen on Google Maps. Ensuring that parking fines are collected, rather than the situation where one person alone ran up unpaid fines of over £30,000 for a single vehicle and when the council describes no residences as car free, this means that rather than the current situation whereby the developments and surrounding streets are clogged with residents ignoring the car free status because of the lack of enforcement by estate management and the Council.

7.          Commenced the Liveable Streets programme which aims to improve thelook and feel of public spaces in neighbourhoods across the borough andmake it easier, safer, and more convenient to get around by foot, bike and  publictransport and it seems delay the arrival of ambulances through blocking roads rather thanproviding lockable access.

8.          Continuing to deliver our tree planting programme to deliver over 1,000  streettrees. Thisprogramme will increase carboncapture

9.          That the Council continue to agree to the cutting down of mature trees well in advance of construction work taking place including on sites it owns despite being areas of low air quality.

10.          Agreeing to the removal of two mature trees on what is becoming the densest road in the UK for a temporary sales office;

11.          Our programme ofinstallation ofelectrical vehiclecharging pointsacross the borough, with 159 new points to be installed between February andApril 2021 but none installed in 2019 and 2020 after the emergency was declared except for some test sites. That there are over 30,000 parking bays on Tower Hamlets streets.

12.         That there are no electric vehicle charging points in any Council building

13.          That the Council still only operates two all-electric vehicles, neither of them road worthy as can only be used in a park and the other at the transport depot. That it only has a couple of hybrid vehicles.

14.         That the Council spent £10 million on a fleet of new diesel refuse vehicles a year ago while our neighbours in the City of London now have an all-electric refuse fleet.

15.          That the Council after it declared a climate emergency installed new diesel storage tanks at its transport depot.

16.          That an increasing number of local petrol stations are being lost which has the short term impact of creating more traffic as drivers have to drive further to refill.

17.          That the new Local Plan 2031 only requires new developments to have 40% electric vehicle charging in their parking bays, most new development going through planning now won’t complete until close to 2030.

18.          Tower Hamlets Councils record in recent years of locating new schools and permitting new housing right next to major roads..

19.          Adopted Local Planpolicies thatrequire allnew developmentsto achieve            net-zero carbon status.

20.          Only one Council building has a solar panel or other form of renewable energy.

21.          That solar panels are extremely rare in Tower Hamlets and even rarer are wind turbines.

22.          Commenced a review of Council Assets for Zero Carbon retrofit feasibilityand successfully bid for the public sector decarbonisation fund to tackle ourhighest emittingbuildings

23.          Completed initial feasibility for decarbonisation of Barkantine district heating  network

24.          Undertaking a review of design standards for new council development toensure that requirements align to the climate emergency declaration anddeliver net-zero carbonobjectives

25.          Developed a draft Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) for waste andrecycling developments, currently out for consultation, which aims to reviseplanning policiesto encourage andenforce waste reduction andrecycling

26.          That the recycling rate in Tower Hamlets has been falling for years from 28% in 2016/17 to 19.9% in Q2 2020/21.

27.          Commenced a review of Tower Hamlets Homes properties for Bio-solar  retrofit

o      Other retrofit initiatives as set out in the housing capital programme, and the  NetZero Carbon Plan

o      Continued delivery of carbon reduction projects: grants programme forschools to deliver carbon reduction measures; grants programme for SME’s  forenergy efficiencymeasures; residential heatingefficiency project

o      Undertaking a review of new civic centre proposals to ensure design is asenergy efficient as possible and the operating environment and systems are     low carbon which we should have already done.

o      Continuing to roll out the phased programme of LED street lighting  upgradesto replace alllamp columns inthe borough and missing the opportunity in the early phases to equip them with EV chargers in the base when located next to parking bays.

o      That Brent Council has more EV chargers in its Town Hall car park then Tower Hamlets Council has in the whole of the Borough.

o      Focus on delivering the proposal to roll out flats recycling package, asrecommended by the Resource London project “making recycling work forpeople inflats”.

 

This Councilalso notes:

 

1.  The Climate Engagement Event organised for 17th March to raise awareness and demonstrate progress made by the Council and its partners since the Climate Emergency Declaration as we realised two years were up and we had not done very much yet.

This Councilbelieves:

 

1.          We continue toface aclimate emergencyand needto take immediateaction ata local,national and international level;

2.          That since the declaration of a Climate Emergency in Tower Hamlets, the Councilhas made significant progress but must continue to focus on this as a priority issue  forthe borough That since the declaration of a Climate Emergency in Tower Hamlets, the council has made little progress except in publicity and must therefore focus on actual delivery;

3.          The Council mustcontinue tolead byexample butgiven itaccounts fora relativelysmall amount of the borough’s carbon, it is vital that we use our communityleadership role to encourage and work alongside residents, businesses andpartners tomake changes in order to addressthe crisis;

4.          Tower Hamlets isknown forits diversityand wewill usepositive approachesto engageBAME residents withthe climateemergency agenda.

 

This Councilresolves:

 

1.          To deliver its Net ZeroCarbon ActionPlan;

2.          To continue to work with local residents, businesses and council partners toachieve our net zero commitment, including developing an action plan to meet ourtarget;

3.          To review ourrecycling targetsand reviseour wastestrategy;

4.          To make pink recycling bags easy to access;

5.          To set up a new waste and recycling board representative of the Borough and not just the administration to enable us to work with our partnersand residents which will work towards mitigating issues and help us work towards  theaims ofour waste strategy;

6.          To adopt a targeted campaign strategy to decrease contamination and encouragerecycling amongst residentsand businesses.

7.          To stop cutting down its own trees or permitting others to do so until there is no other choice, to look instead at pruning trees rather than cutting them down as a compromise and with the knowledge that replacements are being grown in nurseries elsewhere in the country

 

Following debate, the amendment moved by Councillor Rabina Khan was put to a vote and was defeated.

 

The amendment moved by Councillor Peter Golds was put to a vote and was defeated.

 

The substantive motion was put to a vote and was agreed.

 

RESOLVED:

 

This Council notes:

 

1.          In March 2019, Tower Hamlets became one of the first councils in the country to declare a climate emergency;

2.          The Council has committed to becoming a net zero carbon Council by 2025 and a net zero carbon borough by 2050;

3.          The Council is implementing its Net Zero Carbon Action Plan which sets out the aim to do all we can to reach zero carbon by 2025, including actions around the new Town Hall, procurement, the electrification of the council’s vehicle fleet, amongst other actions. The Net Zero Carbon 2025 action plan sets out our commitment to tackling the climate emergency: https://democracy.towerhamlets.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=165906

4.          The council is delivering against its climate emergency ambitions through a number of actions and decisions including:

o   Switching to a renewable energy supplier – in October 2019 LBTH transferred to a 100% renewable electricity tariff

o   The Pensions Committee have actively engaged with the climate change agenda and are looking at revising their investment strategy towards a greener portfolio

o   Commenced a Sustainable Workplace programme to instil sustainable behaviours for council employees including: promoting resource efficiency (reducing energy use; moving to paperless working); reduction in single use plastics including elimination of plastic cups from buildings; and introduction of food waste collection to council offices to reduce waste being sent to landfill and incineration

o   Adoption of Tower Hamlets Transport Strategy which sets out our vision and priorities for travel in Tower Hamlets from 2020 – 2041 through sustainable means of transport

o   Commenced the Liveable Streets programme which aims to improve the look and feel of public spaces in neighbourhoods across the borough and make it easier, safer, and more convenient to get around by foot, bike and public transport

o   Continuing to deliver our tree planting programme to deliver over 1000 street trees. This programme will increase carbon capture

o   Our programme of installation of electrical vehicle charging points across the borough, with 159 new points to be installed between February and April 2021

o   Adopted Local Plan policies that require all new developments to achieve net-zero carbon status.

o   Commenced a review of Council Assets for Zero Carbon retrofit feasibility and successfully bid for the public sector decarbonisation fund to tackle our highest emitting buildings

o   Completed initial feasibility for decarbonisation of Barkantine district heating network

o   Undertaking a review of design standards for new council development to ensure that requirements align to the climate emergency declaration and deliver net-zero carbon objectives

o   Developed a draft Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) for waste and recycling developments, currently out for consultation, which aims to revise planning policies to encourage and enforce waste reduction and recycling

o   Commenced a review of Tower Hamlets Homes properties for Bio-solar retrofit

o   Other retrofit initiatives as set out in the housing capital programme, and the Net Zero Carbon Plan

o   Continued delivery of carbon reduction projects: grants programme for schools to deliver carbon reduction measures; grants programme for SME’s for energy efficiency measures; residential heating efficiency project

o   Undertaking a review of new civic centre proposals to ensure design is as energy efficient as possible and the operating environment and systems are low carbon

o   Continuing to roll out the phased programme of LED street lighting upgrades to replace all lamp columns in the borough

o   Focus on delivering the proposal to roll out flats recycling package, as recommended by the Resource London project “making recycling work for people in flats”.

 

This Council also notes:

 

1.          The Climate Engagement Event organised for 17^th March to raise awareness and demonstrate progress made by the Council and its partners since the Climate Emergency Declaration.

This Council believes:

1.          We continue to face a climate emergency and need to take immediate action at a local, national and international level;

2.          That since the declaration of a Climate Emergency in Tower Hamlets, the Council has made significant progress but must continue to focus on this as a priority issue for the borough;

3.          The Council must continue to lead by example but given it accounts for a relatively small amount of the borough’s carbon, it is vital that we use our community leadership role to encourage and work alongside residents, businesses and partners to make changes in order to address the crisis;

4.          Tower Hamlets is known for its diversity and we will use positive approaches to engage BAME residents with the climate emergency agenda.

This Council resolves:

 

1.          To deliver its Net Zero Carbon Action Plan;

2.          To continue to work with local residents, businesses and council partners to achieve our net zero commitment, including developing an action plan to meet our target;

3.          To review our recycling targets and revise our waste strategy;

4.          To set up a new waste and recycling board to enable us to work with our partners and residents which will work towards mitigating issues and help us work towards the aims of our waste strategy;

5.          To adopt a targeted campaign strategy to decrease contamination and encourage recycling amongst residents and businesses.