At the Full Council meeting on 25 November 2019, Elected Members unanimously adopted a new and ambitious Environmental Policy for the County Council, which sets out how the Council will meet its climate-related commitments over the coming period, including working in partnership with our district councils and key organisations across East Anglia.  The ambitious targets were backed up by new investment which will be used both to engage people at a local level and to match-fund investment from Central Government and other major funders.

A copy of our new Environmental Policy is attached.  Also attached is a copy of the specific actions agreed to support the Policy, including investment of over £1m.

At the same meeting, the Council also agreed a Motion to work with communities, landowners and partners to plant 1 million trees over the next 5 years as part of our carbon sequestration plans, and as a way of improving wildlife and biodiversity in Norfolk, also helping to provide valuable new green space to improve the lives of Norfolk residents for years to come.

As part of the development of the new Environmental Policy, we set up a cross-party Member Working Group and we met with many groups and organisations including Extinction Rebellion, the Broads Authority, the University of East Anglia and our colleagues at a District Council level.

Moving forward, I will be Chairing a cross-party Member Oversight Group to ensure we progress the obligations set out in our new Environmental Policy.  In the work we do over the coming years, I wish to work in partnership to achieve the best outcomes we can for the people of Norfolk and to include the latest best practice in our planning and delivery.

We are currently auditing our carbon usage across our organisation and this up to date information will be used to help inform our new climate action plan, which will be formally considered by Members  in the spring.  Our approach will be informed by the latest science and the work of experts in this area, including colleagues from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at UEA.  However, you may be aware that Norfolk County Council has already made significant changes in the way it works, from the delivery of large-scale environmental projects and significant investment in Norfolk’s green networks, to removing plastic cutlery and disposable cups from our staff canteen.

I hope that you will be reassured to hear that we are closely engaged with Norfolk’s district councils on this vitally important piece of work and that we will continue to work with Central Government, especially around the delivery of ‘A Green Future: Our 25 Year Plan for the Environment’.

 

Norfolk County Council’s Environmental Policy

 

This is Norfolk County Council’s new Environmental Policy. It takes as its starting point the Government’s own 25-year Plan published in 2018 and is structured to reflect the key environmental concerns embodied in that plan. In addition, it is framed to reflect the increasing importance that climate change has on all aspects of the environment, whether the landscape itself, the species within it, or the rich cultural heritage that occupies it.

This policy reflects the areas that the Council sees as key to protecting and maintaining the health of Norfolk’s distinctive environment and its occupants.  The Policy itself signposts to overarching activity that spans a range of environmental interactions that the Council is involved with, including those where it already has its own statutory environmental responsibilities.

As reflected in our current six-year business plan – ‘Together for Norfolk’, we will put at the centre of our efforts, an approach that ensures that the development of Norfolk’s economy is socially inclusive, while championing innovative and sustainable development. It will support investment in green jobs and infrastructure, while ensuring that we both protect and enhance the environment.

 

We will champion resource efficiency in how we conduct our own operations, setting stringent environmental targets, and we will work within the County at large to ensure it goes beyond the expectations of national government, as far as the national ‘net zero’ carbon target is concerned. In this we will align with our partners in the region.

We will continue to ensure that the distinctive Norfolk environment is cared for, both for current and future generations, and that we will continue to explore new ways to make our countryside and coast as accessible as possible, whilst respecting the sensitivities around certain natural landscapes and sites. By continuing to operate a proactive and evidence-based approach, we will ensure that a net improvement (‘net gain’) to biodiversity and habitat creation is the norm.

From now on this Environmental Policy will guide all the Council’s future decision-making.

Goals

We fully support the Goals the Government has stated for its Environmental Plan and have used them as the basis for framing this policy. These are: 

• Clean air for the population
• Ensuring a clean and plentiful water supply
• Encouraging a thriving plant and wildlife community
• Reducing the risk of harm from environmental hazards such as flooding and drought
• Using resources from nature more sustainably and efficiently
• Enhancing beauty, heritage and engagement with the natural environment
• Mitigating and adapting to climate change 
• Minimising waste
• Managing exposure to chemicals
• Enhancing biosecurity

 

Policy – in enacting these goals, the supporting key policy aims are:

Using and managing land sustainably

• Creating and embedding in our strategic planning a more holistic approach to address climate change, particularly within the local planning frameworks
• Embedding an ‘environmental net gain’ principle for development, including housing and infrastructure 
• Improving soil health
• Focusing on woodland to maximise its many benefits for the environment and our communities
• Working with key partners to ensure an adequate water supply, including exploring water harvesting initiatives
• Reducing risks from flooding and coastal erosion where possible
• Expanding the use of natural flood management solutions
• Putting in place more sustainable drainage systems 
• Working to make ‘at-risk’ properties more resilient to flooding

Recovering nature and enhancing the beauty of landscapes

• Protecting and recovering nature 
• Publishing a Norfolk 25-year Environmental Strategy for nature
• Recognising that Norfolk is losing biodiversity, particularly insect populations. Therefore, a Pollinator Action Plan will be produced as a key element of our Environmental Strategy
• Conserving and enhancing natural beauty 
• Providing support for designated sites, including the Norfolk & Suffolk Broads, and the Norfolk Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Natura 2000 sites and species, and County Wildlife Sites
• Respecting nature in how we use water 
• Working to incentivise greater water efficiency, with users, and supporting water companies

Connecting people with the environment to improve health and wellbeing

• Helping people improve their health and wellbeing by using green spaces

• Promoting the opportunities to enhance health and wellbeing that are available through exposure to the natural environment

• Encouraging children to be close to nature, in and out of school

• Working with schools to make the most of their green spaces

• Greening our towns and cities

• Supporting the creation of green infrastructure in our key urban areas

• Planting more trees to improve biodiversity and as a potential mitigation measure for climate change in appropriate locations

• Working with County Farms tenants to move to higher level stewardship and greater biodiversity

• Supporting the community to make sustainable travel choices

  • Working to support alternatives to car travel including promoting sustainable public transport and initiatives that utilise the growing cycling and pedestrian improvements within the County

  • Encouraging sustainable travel on all new developments within the County, through the appropriate planning agreements

  • Helping to develop integrated transport hubs across the County and maximising the opportunities presented through schemes such as Transforming Cities

Increasing resource efficiency, and reducing pollution and waste

• Maximising resource efficiency and minimising environmental impacts at end of life 
• Achieving zero avoidable plastic waste in operations
• Reducing the impact of waste generally in our operations through working with the supply chain regarding single use products
• As part of our statutory function, continue to explore opportunities for improving the management of residual waste 
• Working with partners to maximise the opportunities for recycling waste
• Addressing the impacts that our own use of energy has on the environment by developing an Energy Strategy that takes account of all greenhouse gases produced, whilst exploring opportunities to generate energy on our own estate
• Working with our supply chain wherever possible to reduce the environmental footprint created

• Reducing pollution

• Supporting initiatives that lead to clean air, such as developing new proposals within the forthcoming Local Transport Plan and its supporting strategies

Securing clean, healthy, productive and biologically diverse seas and oceans

• Working with key agencies to ensure that our offshore areas and coastline contributes to the network of well-managed Marine Protected Areas (MPAs)

  • Focusing on delivering on the statutory duties with respect to the Wash, and North Norfolk European Marine Site

Protecting and improving our global environment 

• Understanding that the consequences of the decisions we take can have global significances and developing a greater awareness of the complex network of inputs and outputs of our actions, all of which have a local, national and international consequences. In this area, our activity will focus on the following:

  • Working with those sectors of the community that have the greatest carbon footprint to help them mitigate their impact

  • Working with a wide range of partners including academia, the business community, local authorities within Norfolk and our neighbouring authorities where appropriate, as well as with the community themselves

  • Embedding the ethos and practice of supporting ‘clean growth’ within the economy, including investigating opportunities which help to develop the green/renewable energy sector

  • Ensuring that each project the Council undertakes is assessed for the contribution it will make towards achieving our environmental targets

  • Working, where possible, with our partners to plan, resource and implement measures that together achieve the overall targets for Norfolk, underpinned by a robust approach to monitoring, measuring and reporting on the outcomes

  • Striving to meet this collective global challenge, we will work with our neighbours within the region, specifically Suffolk County Council and the Broads Authority, to collectively achieve ‘net zero’ carbon emissions on our estates by 2030, but within our wider areas, work towards ‘carbon neutrality’ also by 2030

     

     

 

 

 

Specific Actions agreed by Norfolk County Council Members – 25 November 2019

 

1. To agree that the County Council’s Environmental Policy should form part of the Policy Framework set out in Article 4 of the Council’s Constitution (noting that responsibility for approving the Policy Framework and the strategies and policies that sit within it lies with Full Council).

    

2. To approve the following recommendations from the Infrastructure and Development Select Committee:-

 

1. Approve the new Environmental Policy for Norfolk County Council, as set out in Appendix A.

 

1. Approve implementation of the following actions associated with the delivery of the new Policy:

    

1. To establish a Member Oversight Group chaired by the Cabinet Member for Environment and Waste to develop and oversee the obligations contained in the Environmental Policy (including actions (b) to (e) below). The Terms of Reference for this group, including reporting processes, to be agreed.

    

2. To task officers to audit the NCC carbon footprint, using appropriate Greenhouse Gas Reporting protocols).  In addition, identify processes to engage with partners and neighbours to address the collective footprint of the area.

    

3. To task officers to develop a number of early action demonstrator projects that showcase environmental excellence - such as developing ‘rewilding’ and carbon sequestration projects (including strategic tree-planting), subject to available funding.

    

4. To task officers to take steps to actively bid for external resources through the emerging funding streams supporting the wider environmental agenda.

    

5. Identify revenue funding to enable dedicated resource to be put in place to progress actions associated with the Policy and to support the Member oversight group to ensure synergy across the whole of the Council.

 

1. Agree to make provision of £1m in the Council’s capital programme that can be used to match fund appropriate capital projects to support delivery of the Policy.

    

2. To support the allocation of £350k revenue funding to the Community and Environmental Services Department to enable relevant resources to be put in place to support delivery of the Policy.  This provision will be proposed as part of the budget setting process for 2020/21 that will be considered by Full Cabinet in February 2020.  In the meantime, Officers will continue to provide support from within existing resources.