Examination of Witnesses (Questions 360-379)
Tuesday 13 May 2003
Ms Penney Poyzer, EcoTeam, Ms Alison Goodchild,
Tom Reacher, Elizabeth Braund, Ms Sarah Braund,
Mr James Kraunsoe
Q360 Mrs Clark: When you first talked
to friends and people in your class at school about EcoTeams and
the environment, did they say things like "Yuck, people who
are interested in that area all middle aged dropouts wearing tie
dye t-shirts, eating beans, with sandals and long hair and beards"?
Elizabeth Braund: I think they
might have thought that but they did not say it to me. I think
I managed to change their minds.
Mrs Clark: So it has gone from being
uncool to cool. It seems as though you are on the way to convincing
your friends. Thank you.
Q361 Mr Ainsworth: I am fascinated
to hear about the ability to convert people because the point
is that people who are inclined to do the right thing are not
the sort of people that the Government or anybody else is trying
to get at, they are already half-way there. It is the people who
turn their backs and turn away that are the difficult ones. You
say that there are quite a lot of people who are quite interested.
How many of those people are going to get actively involved and
do the same sort of thing that you have been doing?
Elizabeth Braund: I think it depends
on how easy it is to get involved. I do not know how many of them
would go out of their way to find out about one, but they may
do if it was there for them to get involved with easily.
Q362 Mr Ainsworth: Was it easy for
you to find out about it?
Elizabeth Braund: Yes, because
we have got a society in Flintham called the Flintham Society
and because it is quite a small community they knew who would
be interested anyway.
Q363 Mr Ainsworth: So if Penney had
not come along you still would not know about it, it would not
have happened?
Elizabeth Braund: No.
Q364 Mr Ainsworth: So everything
depends on a few individuals making the effort to go out and convert
others. You are keen to persuade other people to get involved,
are you?
Tom Reacher: Yes.
Mr Kraunsoe: Even in a household
you do not necessarily have everyone convinced. My wife took a
bit of convincing. I used to take out all the tins that she put
in the normal bin and put them in the recycling bank, although
now she does it. It takes a little bit of effort. People often
think it goes in the bin, someone gets rid of it, so why should
I make the effort. We have had discussions with other people in
the group who have teenage children about how to convince them
to do anything and it is difficult to start with, but they catch
on very quickly when you start to link it in with global warming
and you think we can start to do a little bit and most people
are aware of this. It is a question of whether they choose to
take it any further. You do rely on someone to come round and
give them a bit of a platform.
Q365 Mr Ainsworth: We heard from
an academic a few weeks ago who has done a lot of work on this
and the psychology of it and she made the point that behaving
in an environmentally friendly way is actually behaving abnormally.
There is a certain amount of self-consciousness here. This is
obviously a good way of doing that. I was wondering how much time
it takes up. It is quite a major commitment. Does it take a lot
of time?
Tom Reacher: No. It takes about
five minutes every Monday morning to weigh the rubbish and check
the meters, that is all.
Q366 Mr Ainsworth: The meetings themselves,
how long do they last for? I suppose it depends who is there.
Ms Goodchild: Generally it is
about one and a half to two hours once a month for an evening.
So really you are committing yourself to meeting with your group
once a month over six months or seven months, it has been shortened
slightly, but that helps you to have a focus. I think it is very
difficult otherwise to get a focus in your everyday life and concentrate
on one particular subject like waste and think what kind of changes
am I going to make. So it focuses you on the things that you need
to do. I would say once a month is not particularly difficult
for people and then just during their daily lives people would
decide to take three small actions every month. It could be something
very simple like making sure your light switches are switched
off. It is really changing habits and changing the way you do
things and getting you to look at your life and just trying to
re-evaluate what you are doing, it is about making the change,
but sometimes it is difficult for people to make that change.
Once they have done it it becomes part of their everyday life.
Q367 Mr Ainsworth: We heard from
Tom and Elizabeth that there was a very very low dropout rate.
Is that your experience, James, as well?
Mr Kraunsoe: There were six of
us initially, one did not start and one had to drop out half-way
through as they could not make the meetings. I do not know whether
that is normal.
Ms Poyzer: The dropout rate has
not been bad at all. A very well known national agency dealing
with the environment did try to set up a team and unfortunately
that collapsed, which was a great shame, but I guess they do know
a lot about environmental issues. The Environment Agency locally
has been very interested in what we are doing and they have this
board and it has now reached the Environment Agency at national
level, which is very encouraging and we have been asked to participate
in their forthcoming conferences. So they are spreading the word.
As Alison was saying, the point about the programme is recognising
that you cannot make huge changes straightaway, it is just not
human, so it is very much a step by step process. It is small
changes, it is focussing on behavioural change and, as everybody
has said, the fact that you are supported through it, but people
do have to engage with it, they do have to give presentations
and whilst we have simplified the programme considerably and we
are going to produce a workbook, the difference that it makes
beyond the home is really significant. The key thing is about
sustainable development, social, environmental and economic. We
believe that EcoTeams really do hit those three things. People
will quite often join because they are new to the area. We have
had a lot of people join because they say it is a safe way of
getting to know people, it is a safe way of it being okay to say,
(I have had a bit of a problem with the composter. Can we have
a coffee?( It really is about rebuilding the communities that
we have lost to a very great extent.
Q368 Mr Ainsworth: The focus of it
is really on dealing with waste and energy saving and so on. I
was wondering whether your involvement in this programme had led
to other changes in your diet, for example. Have you been more
attracted to eating organic food? Have you looked at the issues
to do with diet and food and healthy living as a result?
Ms Goodchild: Food definitely
comes into it. One of the topics was the issue of shopping and
food is obviously a big issue within that because of locally grown
produce, organic food and so on. So really by concentrating on
that people become more aware of why there is a need to buy locally
produced produce and maybe look at organic produce as well.
Q369 Mr Ainsworth: Has it done anything
to change your attitude towards McDonalds, for example, or did
not you have much of a positive attitude in the first place?
Elizabeth Braund: I had changed
my mind about McDonalds anyway through newspaper articles and
so on. I do think more when I am buying stuff and if you only
buy one item of something, do not put it in a plastic bag and
then weigh it, just weigh it and reduce the use of plastic bags.
It has changed the way I think about stuff a bit.
Ms Goodchild: I think it definitely
makes you think about where things come from. There was an adult
in my group who did not know what plastic was made from, they
did not know it was made from oil. Because of the way our modern
lives are we do not make those connections quite often.
Ms Braund: One of the spin-offs
for our group has been that Tom invested in more chickens and
ducks and he has more eggs to sell round the village, but there
is another boy in the village whose parents have a big farm and
he is quite keen on gardening and he has started growing his own
organic food which he is now selling as well at a big event where
local producers also are selling. That is extending to the whole
village the idea of think about where your food comes from. If
you can buy it from somebody within the village you are giving
these lads pocket money. I do not know if that would translate
from being a cute little village to something on a larger scale.
Ms Poyzer: In West Bridgford one
of the spin-offs was that there was a shared allotment scheme
with 14 families involved. They reclaimed five allotments which
were completely derelict.
Ms Goodchild: I think half the
membership came from EcoTeams to begin with who helped set it
up.
Ms Poyzer: They spend a couple
of hours a week and they grow a huge amount of produce. People
are also using local trading schemes, such as a scheme called
Chippers and a lot of the core membership were EcoTeams. It is
dropping a pebble in the pool. I think the reason why that continues
is because it is a sustained programme. With the best will in
the world, the Government's "Are you doing your bit by switching
the light off?" had some effect, but we all know that education
is a long-term process and has to be. Although we have now shortened
the programme to four months and we have been testing this out
with other teams, we have not found that there has been any loss,
in fact there have been certain gains in the way that we have
redeveloped it, but it has to be about investing in people. We
hear this phrase if you want people to do stuff you need to invest
in them first and that is why with EcoTeams we have coaches who
come out of the EcoTeam process. Quite often people will be in
an EcoTeam and say what else can I do, I am not sure about coaching,
I will leaflet or talk to the CVS. It is like green pyramid selling,
it is spreading fingers across the whole community. So we are
going to be setting up EcoTeams in disadvantaged areas as well.
There is a number of very deprived estates in Nottingham, one
of which is called the Broxtowe Estate and we are going to be
setting up EcoTeams there. We will be incentivising people more
there in that we will be providing them with things like low energy
light bulbs and hippo bags and making compost bins and we will
even run workshops there teaching people how to compost. We will
be providing créche facilities to make it as easy as possible
because if you are a single parent family you might like to go
to stuff but you cannot because you are tied down by the kids.
We are trying to break down barriers to make it as inclusive as
possible so it is not just the preserve of the middle class or
affluent rural communities, it is something that can embrace everybody.
Q370 Mr Challen: Can I ask if people
involved are already politicised to a certain extent or whether
this is politicising people? I do not mean party political, I
mean in the broader sense of how you work with councils, MPS,
other authorities.
Ms Goodchild: No, I do not think
I am personally. I really joined as an ordinary mother of two
householder who really just had a concern about the environment
and a concern about what my children's generation may be facing.
I just wanted to be able to do my bit as a householder. When I
saw how the programme worked I was quite enthused by it and that
is why I went on for another year with it. Me and another person
got 68 households to participate in the following year. I do not
think I would ever have done anything like that in my life before,
I never have, but it was something that I believed in.
Q371 Mr Challen: Looking at the history
of EcoTeams coming over from Holland, as you said earlier, Penney,
has there been any kind of English or British mutation of the
scheme? Has it grown organically in a different direction from
whence it began in Holland or America for that matter?
Ms Poyzer: It was originally set
up in 1992 and society and methods of educating have moved on
since that time. The things that we have changed have really only
occurred in the last nine months when we have been looking at
how we could make it more applicable. I think we were quite aware
that before it was quite heavy on measuring and working out and
that is fine if you are really quite highly numerate and literate,
but it was not necessarily as accessible as it needed to be. I
think that is why we looked at how we could simplify the programme
and make the measuring process a lot simpler. I think the key
thing has been to find out how we can make it more accessible.
Q372 Mr Challen: How about your neighbours,
have they just been curious or do you have to go out and knock
on their door, or do they see taxis with MPS coming up or TV crews
and think, "Oh, something is going on there, let's go and
have a look"?
Ms Poyzer: Gareth Gates keeps
coming up and we just keep turning him away! The street is really
interested in what we are doing. My neighbour's little girl next
door was doing a bit on the environment, she is about nine and
she said to her mummy, "I stood up and said I live next door
to the greenest house in the world". There is pretty widespread
awareness of EcoTeams, we are in the media a lot. There is a local
thing called Wot's Wot? which everybody reads and EcoTeams
are in there. We have a monthly slot on BBC Radio Nottingham where
I do a 50 minute phone-in on anything to do with environmental
stuff, I am the (green doctor(, and things like the national press
pick up on it. The Flintham team was reported on in The Guardian
last year and that article was reproduced in Waste Not Want
Not, the Government's strategic document last year which said
this is a good example of how local people can get involved and
make a difference.
Q373 Chairman: In terms of other
government schemes on the environment that you are connecting
to, could you just give us an insight as to what they might be?
Ms Poyzer: To be honest, at the
time that EcoTeams was happening I think people really got involved
because there was nothing else. I think there really was a perception
that you either do it on your own or what. Local authorities have
put in recycling centres, they are setting up things like twin
bin schemes, but at the time there was really very very little
and I think that this kind of grass-roots action should be supported
by local authorities and indeed central government because it
is totally supporting the strategic aims of the local authority
and central government in CO2 reduction, in waste reduction and
the waste in particular. It is not just about recycling, it is
about reducing, it is putting a huge emphasis on reduce and re-use
and then recycling as the final option.
Mr Kraunsoe: It is much more concerted,
it is not just one message here. You start with shopping, how
much you buy, how much packaging it comes in and you then think
about what you are going to do with the packaging. It is a much
more concerted programme to think about the environment in a much
broader sense than taking bottles to the bottle bank.
Q374 Mr Challen: Can I ask Alison
how long you spend each week on being an EcoTeam co-ordinator?
Ms Goodchild: I am not one at
the moment. I did it for the year. I did not tot up my hours,
but it felt like a full-time job to be quite honest. It was quite
a lot because I had to go to meetings with every group, so you
would have to do about three meetings of each group plus you are
doing an initial setting up meeting, an awful lot of door knocking,
trudging the streets, putting information together, all sorts
of things.
Q375 Mr Challen: I am wondering what
the greatest challenge was of being a co-ordinator.
Ms Goodchild: It is difficult
to say. I would have said before I went out and did it it would
have been knocking on the doors and saying to people do you want
to do this, but once I had done it I did not find it that hard.
I found that in every road we did it was possible to set up a
group, which I was quite surprised by because I expected it to
be harder in some ways, but you always managed to get at least
six to eight people who were willing to take part.
Ms Poyzer: Very few people are
rude, are they?
Ms Goodchild: You might get the
odd one. People were interested, they really did want to hear
about it. Obviously there were those who did not want to do it.
I would not have said I got a very negative response particularly
or anything like that. I think people were a bit intrigued as
well as to what it was about and there is the aspect of the neighbours
all getting together and people wanting to find out more about
what is going on.
Q376 Mr Challen: So there was a peer
group pressure involved after it was started perhaps?
Ms Goodchild: No, not really,
I would not have said there was a peer group pressure. You have
got people who genuinely wanted to do it.
Mr Kraunsoe: It is a question
of what is right and wrong here. People do know that the more
you throw away the more litter you generate. It is a question
of whether it is going to affect you in your lifetime and whether
you can be bothered to do anything about it. If you are giving
people the ability to do something about it then people will think
this is the right thing to do. Where people did not join basically
it came down to the fact that they did not have the time. It was
not whether they thought it was a good idea or not, they all said
it was, it was just a question of whether they could get round
to doing it. The easier you make it the more people will do it.
No one really disputes that you should not throw everything out
into the streets or whatever.
Q377 Mr Challen: What is the website
address because I think we ought to get that on the record?
Ms Poyzer: The website for the
house and Global Action Plan, which is a really good method of
finding out about how you can live more sensibly, is www.msarch.co.uk/ecohome,
and for Global Action Plan it is www.globalactionplan.org.uk.
Mr Challen: Thank you.
Q378 Mr Chaytor: The activities that
you have described so far have centred on themes of energy reduction
and waste reduction and organic produce, but you have not really
touched on transport. If someone turns up at one of your EcoTeam
meetings driving a Range Rover does that then become part of the
discussion?
Ms Poyzer: We would use Tom's
eggs to pelt it!
Q379 Mr Chaytor: This is the most
difficult question for neighbours to discuss amongst themselves,
is it not?
Ms Poyzer: It is a really tricky
one. I think with transport what a lot of people feel is that
without the infrastructure, well, what difference can I make,
but when we do talk about to each other we give a load of really
interesting facts and figures because people are quite turned
on by groovy facts. It is things like 20 per cent of the cars
on the road in the morning are for the school run, do you really
need to do that, can you share with another parent? We have informal
suggestions of car sharing. We had this great thing where Centreparcs
actually donated 30 of their bike trailers, which they did not
make a song and dance about. You can get two school age kids in
one, and they will also put the recycling in there, they will
cycle up to the shops and more often than not when you go round
West Bridgford you will see people doing that. They are using
the bicycle and the trailer more as a vehicle because it cuts
congestion, it is easier to get around. We also do things like
publicise train timetables and bus timetables. There is a fact
sheet on how to make your car run as efficiently as it possibly
can. So we are educating people all the time. Whatever you are
using, use it to the absolute optimum efficiency. We will also
point out things like the Power Shoot Programme, we will talk
about the implications of converting to LPG, we will talk about
car-pooling or using electric bicycles, on of which we have here.
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