Memorandum from the Royal Society for
the Protection of Birds
The RSPB is Europe's largest wildlife charity
with over one million members. We manage one of the largest conservation
estates in the UK with more than 180 nature reserves, covering
more than 100,000 hectares.
The RSPB is the UK member of the BirdLife International
Partnership, a global alliance of independent national conservation
organisations working in more than 100 countries worldwide. The
BirdLife International Partnership strives to conserve birds,
their habitats and global biodiversity, working with people towards
sustainability in the use of natural resources.
The RSPB's policy and advocacy work covers
a wide range of issues including climate change, energy, education
for sustainable development, marine issues, water trade and agriculture.
The RSPB also provides financial and technical support to BirdLife
partners in Eastern Europe, Africa and Asia and supports community
based projects to help deliver local benefits from sustainable
natural resource management. The RSPB were actively engaged with
the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) and are now
working to ensure sustainable development is central to policy,
decision making and action at all levels.
1. EXECUTIVE
SUMMARY AND
INTRODUCTION
The UK Sustainable Development Strategy, "a
better quality of life", as well as its annual assessments,
have acted as a driver for and kept sustainable development firmly
on the table within government, and for the wider policy community.
Against specific indicators, the Strategy and its assessments
have usefully shown where progress is being made and where it
is lagging.
We believe that the current review of the Strategy
offers a very important opportunity to ensure sustainable development
is at the heart of Government, the devolved administrations, other
public sector bodies, and importantly to share the responsibility
for delivering this with all stakeholders without shirking their
own crucial role. Ensuring global well-being and long-term security
(including environmental security) for present and future generations
will necessitate cultural, behavioural and value changes that
require political leadership and courage. To this end, the RSPB
welcomes the opportunity to contribute to this inquiry.
We believe that:
— The review process should ensure
a Strategy Framework for the UK that has coherence, consistency
and connectedness and that provides guidance on collectively acknowledged
top-level priorities for the UK as a whole. Further to this, it
must ensure an action plan for the UK Government addressing sustainability
in all non-devolved duties and process. At the same time, it must
allow sufficient flexibility to be interpreted and enacted in
the light of regional and local differences, without sacrificing
core principles and objectives.
— All government departments, devolved
administrations, agencies and regional bodies must embed and mainstream
sustainability in all their processes and actions—this
should become an explicit duty.
— Any definition for sustainable development
must reconcile the pursuit of economic growth with the non-negotiable
imperative of learning to live within the Earth's biophysical
constraints and carrying capacity. Economic progress should be
seen as a means to human and environmental well-being, globally
and long term, and not as an end itself. This should be further
reflected by key objectives giving equal provision to economic,
social and environmental progress, as well as the prudent use
of natural resources.
— A revised strategy must provide clear
guidance on how key objectives should be prioritised, and
how inevitable trade-offs should be made when two or more
are in conflict. It must show how to make sustainable choices
between the short- and long-term costs and benefits, between costs
and benefits that are in the interest of society as a whole and
those of particular groups, and between those which are not properly
reflected in prices. If the strategy does not provide such guidance,
it will be provided nowhere else, and decision-makers will inevitably
default to prioritising the economic objective.
— The Strategy must also make a commitment
to create and amend economic, social and environmental policy
itself to enable sustainable development. We need a policy framework
that:
(i) changes prices by internalising external
costs. This could be achieved in various ways including higher
regulation and standards, rational use of the planning system,
liability for damage costs, environmental tax reform, and setting
clear, safe targets based on ecological need and assessment;
(ii) includes a massive commitment to
changing values and behaviour through public education, awareness
raising and political leadership. This could include significant
spending on a concerted awareness raising campaign; effective
and regular use of Ministerial speeches; integrating sustainable
development into the heart of the education process, and leading
by example through government procurement;
(iii) is inclusive of all relevant cross-cutting
issues, costs and benefits etc, including environmental and health;
and
(iv) is explicit in assigning responsibility
and duties to all relevant decision-makers, actors and systems—including
Government departments and agencies, the economic regulators,
and the planning system—and has a follow-up process to ensure
action and delivery.
We fully recognise the political constraints
and challenges inherent to creating a new social and economic
paradigm, we applaud government for the progress and commitment
it is showing in many areas. We believe that sustainable development
is key to well-being and security and to a safe, healthy, just
and equitable world for present and future generations—richer
or as rich in biodiversity. We are keen to work with Government
and the devolved administration to ensure this.
2. (Q. A) THE
DEFINITION OF
"SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT"
2.1 A clear, comprehensive and practical
definition is crucial for achieving a shared understanding and
commitment to delivery of sustainable development. Sustainable
development is an inherently complex and challenging concept that
tests the way we think, plan, work and live our lives. Arriving
at a concise definition that satisfies everyone and captures in
comprehensible and usable form principles that are often quite
abstract will not be easy, but concrete examples could be usefully
used to illustrate it.
Does the definition of "sustainable development
matter"?
2.2 The Brundtland definition, although
broad and conceptual, has international acceptance and embodies
the key tenets of sustainable development policy—most notably
taking a long-term, future generation perspective. Suggesting
that the Brundtland definition puts undue emphasis on environmental
concerns questions one of the fundamental premises of sustainable
development, the need to work within the ecological carrying capacity
of the planet on which we all ultimately depend.
2.3 Based on this premise, a definition
that favours the economic or the social over and above the environmental
would undermine the concept of sustainable development itself;
a concept that relies on a balanced and precautionary approach
to development and progress. World poverty and environmental threats
have been recognised through successive international conferences,
including the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD),
as the most significant challenges confronting us globally. In
response to this, economic growth has been highlighted as essential
for solving social and economic problems in poor countries.
It must, however, be recognised internationally as only a tool
to achieve sustainable development; it should not be seen as an
end in itself. There are limits to the natural resources of our
planet and to its ability to absorb pollution and environmental
damage caused by unfettered growth—ignoring this will cost
us all dearly.
2.4 Linked to the above, one concept that
is not included within the Government's current set of principles
for sustainable development is that of "equity", both
within and between countries and within and between generations.
This is a significant and serious omission; the concept of equity
needs to be central to any definition.
2.5 Any definition of sustainable development
should not be so narrow or prescriptive that different bodies
cannot respond appropriately to their own situation, or so broad
and generic that it is impractical. The challenge of defining
(and enacting) sustainable development is both political and methodological,
ie how can it be done in a way that is acceptable to very different
types of stakeholder and points of view, as well as in a way that
is comprehensible, consistent and practical.
2.6 It is important to make sustainable
development relevant to all and to ensure everyone understands
the part they play. To support this, a broader conceptual definition,
such as Brundtland's, may be interpreted or "operationalised"
through different lenses (eg sectoral, social, economic) to make
it relevant to different "audiences" more specifically.
Nonetheless, there is still the need to ensure "buy-in"
to an overarching vision.
Is meeting the four key objectives at the same
time realistic?
2.7 The Government characterises sustainable
development as meeting four main objectives at the same time:
— Social progress which recognises
the needs of everyone.
— Effective protection of the environment.
— Prudent use of natural resources.
— Maintenance of high and stable levels
of economic growth and employment.
Whilst recognising that: "no one of
these objectives is more important than the another"
it acknowledges, "that there can be tensions between achieving
them, although in the long term success in one is dependent on
the other". Sustainable development is inherently about
balanced and prudent decision-making for today whilst recognising
future needs. It is not about prioritising one over the other,
and we would stress the need to work safely within ecological
limits as the ultimate bottom line.
2.8 Addressing this and making the right
trade offs (see below) is particularly challenging when the prevailing
national and global paradigm is skewed towards achieving high
levels of economic growth and ensuring competitiveness, as demonstrated
by the emphasis placed on trade liberalisation per se,
rather than on developing a trade system that facilitates the
necessary exchange of goods and services in ways that do not harm
the environment and benefit society.
Is political support for the concept based on
its ambiguity?
2.9 Even if political support for sustainable
development has partly been based on its "ambiguity",
it has nevertheless served to ensure that sustainable development
has been embedded as a broad concept and term. However, we have
reached a point where the concept needs to be focused and acted
upon. The threats of climate change, increased deforestation,
biodiversity loss and social inequity are becoming increasingly
real. Sustainability rhetoric needs to become concerted action—"Sustainable
development is the only security policy for the future" (Klaus
Topfer, UNEP 2004).
Making and managing trade-offs
2.10 A central political challenge is that
trade-offs must be made among competing objectives, each championed
by sets of stakeholders with different levels of economic and
political influence, and by decision-makers with differing political
preferences and allegiances. Little guidance is given in the present
strategy on how objectives should be prioritised, or how
inevitable trade-offs should be made when two or more are in conflict.
In particular the strategy does little to explain how to make
choices between the short- and long- term costs and benefits,
between costs and benefits that are in the interest of society
as a whole and those of particular groups, and between those which
are not properly reflected in prices. Whatever guidance the strategy
is able to give, it will be even more important actually to amend
and create policy that enables decision-makers to make trade-offs,
and the strategy should signal a clear commitment to do this.
The principal way of enabling the integration of multiple public
objectives into decision making will be to reflect external costs
and benefits in prices—either through regulation and standards,
environmental tax reform, or the establishment of ecological limits
that can be flexibly met by a variety of market mechanisms.
2.11 The challenges of both today and tomorrow,
including reversing negative trends, will involve hard political
decisions and choices among different stakeholder perspectives.
It will need balanced and transparent decision-making—taking
into account local, global and long-term concerns, based on sound
science and robust analysis. To this end, the existing Strategy's
10 principles (plus equity) for sustainable development should
be more coherently and vigorously applied. This would moderate
the prevailing tendency to privilege economic over social and
especially environmental goals whenever a conflict occurs.
2.12 Finally, it should be stressed that
the aim is not to diminish the importance of economic development,
but to stress the need always to test policy decisions made primarily
on economic grounds against the social and environmental consequences
they will have. Wherever possible it is important to use economic
techniques that calculate—and incorporate—external
and future values fairly. The Treasury's recent discussion of
a lower social discount rate is interesting in this regard. Another
key challenge in this context is a better understanding of the
value of ecosystem services—exactly what is the economic
cost of the wild nature we are destroying—and including
this value in appraisal tools and policy decisions.
3. (Q. B) HAS
THE STRATEGY
ACTED AS
A DRIVER
OR DOES
IT OCCUPY
A LIMBO
EXISTENCE WHICH
HAS LITTLE
IMPACT ON
DEPARTMENTS' REAL
PRIORITIES?
The Strategy as a driver for sustainable development
3.1 The Strategy, as well as its annual
assessments, have no doubt acted as a driver and have kept sustainable
development firmly on the table. Against the chosen criteria,
the Strategy and its assessments have usefully shown where progress
is being made and where it is lagging.
3.2 In terms of "driving" sustainable
development forward, it is important to distinguish between the
two distinct roles the strategy has played. The first has been
to describe what the UK has done and is doing in relation to sustainable
development, at the sub-national, national, EU and global levels.
As such, it has provided a useful (although incomplete) compendium
of facts and figures and a measure of progress. The second role
has been to indicate the direction that the UK will take on sustainable
development by setting objectives, articulating principles, identifying
priorities for action and establishing targets for and indicators
of progress. In this role, much more work is required (and at
the appropriate level post devolution).
3.3 It is difficult to distinguish between
the written Strategy and the various agencies and processes by
which the strategy is enacted. Each serves as a catalyst to strengthen
and reinforce the other. The written strategy has though served
as a focal point, and could be viewed as the principal driver
galvanising sustainable development over the past five years.
It has helped raise the profile of sustainable development and
to make it more meaningful for different policy makers—aided
recently by the WSSD process. It may even have contributed to
the cultural change increasingly visible within Whitehall. However,
overall, there appears to be little evidence of any government
department embedding and mainstreaming sustainability in all
their processes and actions—although some are doing better
than others.
3.4 It is commendable that the UK government
has met its international commitments to produce a national sustainable
development strategy and has in fact helped lead the way for others.
Its greatest strength has most likely been its simple existence.
In both form and content, it has already served as a benchmark
against which other national strategies are measured and has been
a tool by which civil society can hold government to account.
Specific impacts of the Strategy since its introduction
3.5 There has been demonstrable progress
on several aspects of sustainability in the UK since the Strategy
was produced. This has been most recently shown in Achieving
a Better Quality of Life (ABQL 2003) and highlighted recently
by the UK Sustainable Development Commission[1]
Several aspects of government policy have been modified to some
extent by the requirements of sustainability, including through
the Energy White Paper, the Strategy for Sustainable Farming and
Food and the Framework for Sustainable Production and Consumption.
However, others have only incidentally served to advance sustainable
development, and some have sent it in the opposite direction—for
example the Aviation White Paper.
3.6 Whilst the Strategy has no doubt encouraged
other lower level strategies, the lack of strategic clarity within
any one strategy (national, regional or issue-specific) has been
compounded by the tensions and contradictions between them, and
almost no means for policy makers to determine a hierarchy among
them when conflict occurs. There are also too few examples of
joined up approaches where plans are manifestly linked, eg between
housing, energy, water and waste. In general, there is a fundamental
problem, from the global to the local community level, of too
many plans and processes with too little linkage and coordination
amongst them.
3.7 Sustainable development appears to be
becoming more widely recognised as a key policy goal but both
government and society as a whole have not been unified and driven
by a single central concern to achieve a more sustainable society
for the future. A number of the key indicators of sustainability
are moving in the right direction, but not all and many have caveats
attached to their success (see below Section 4). There is a greater
understanding of the need for a more sustainable society amongst
the public, business and in schools and colleges, but the strategy
has not been widely enough owned and supported to enable it to
drive positive change or to resist those changes in society that
are moving in an unsustainable direction.
3.8 More specifically, the introduction
of the Climate Change Levy and the extension of the Landfill Tax
have been valuable contributions to addressing some of the challenges
of sustainable development. However, further progress on introducing
other green or environmental taxation measures has been held back
by fears about the potential impact on short-term economic growth
or the UK's short-term competitive position. Opportunities and
pressing need exist in a wide range of other policy arenas, including
pesticides and peat.
Influence on departments' "real priorities"?
3.9 The above examples highlight the concern
that the Strategy has worked as long as the solutions have been
easy and fit within a department's "real priorities".
It suggests that more is needed to drive pressing and difficult
decisions towards sustainable solutions. There have been incremental
changes but few, if any really major shifts in policy or action,
with the possible exception of energy policy and some real progress
in agriculture. Whilst this may be a politically expedient approach,
the need for leadership and action on issues such as biodiversity
loss require bigger and more demanding solutions. Achieving sustainable
development needs to become every department's "real priority"—commitment,
consistency, coherence and leadership from the top down and bottom
up are crucial to ensuring this.
3.10 The attempt to build sustainable development
into the major cross-departmental review processes such as the
Comprehensive Spending Review, the Public Service Agreements (PSA),
the Budget and structure of taxation has been commendable, but
more needs to be done to ensure sustainable development is at
the heart of all government policy and action.
The Strategy's impact on mainstreaming the environment
3.11 There is little evidence that the environment
has been mainstreamed in terms of objectives and targets set for
individual departments in PSAs, departmental strategies and business
plans. In several sectors, policies and funding for the environment
are still generally bolted on piecemeal to an underlying policy
system with which they may be fundamentally at odds. Investments
that might reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gases, for
example, are rarely given the priority and scale of resources
they deserve, often because they are evaluated solely in terms
of short-term economic payback instead of long-term impact on
sustainability. Similarly, the impacts of depletion of natural
resources, build-up of long-term pollution and growing burdens
of waste, are still not adequately reflected in prices or in the
spending and policy decisions that are made. The result of this
is an assortment of relatively inefficient environmental measures
that cost more than they need and perform less effectively than
they should.
3.12 Given their rapid development over
the past few years, a significant weakness of the current Strategy
is its relative lack of recognition of the importance of sustainability
assessment, strategic environmental assessment and integrated
policy assessment. Ensuring good and coordinated use of such tools
could go a considerable way to addressing many of the shortcomings
above.
Can a UK Strategy amount to more than a set of
principles and aspirations, particularly in the context of devolved
government? Is it needed? Should it focus on a small number of
key themes and targets?
3.13 Obviously, the original Strategy was
developed before devolution had been fully realised. It will therefore
be important to consider the continuing role of a UK Strategy,
and whether a strategy is necessary for England. One key consideration
(and challenge) is to ensure that progress made to date is not
disrupted or jeopardised, and that what comes out at the end of
the day serves to make headway in changing our approach to external
and future values. Providing a national framework, defining principles
and giving a "vision" is vitally important to this.
The role and mandate for the new UK Strategy or framework should
however be clear, and should prevent undue plan proliferation
and conflict.
3.14 Coupled with a national monitoring,
review and reporting function to enable feedback to international
processes such as the UN Commission and Sustainable Development,
a UK Strategy should help drive the sustainable development agenda
forward in a coherent and effective way. It should provide best
practice and guidance on how to make the necessary but
difficult trade-offs for long-term sustainability. It should explicitly
place expectations on key actors such as the economic regulators,
regional decision-making bodies, agencies and departments to ensure
sustainable development is a core duty. Above all, it should provide
leadership and momentum, for example, through political airtime
for sustainable development and related key issues through Ministerial
speeches at the highest level and at every available opportunity.
3.15 Devolution should enable interpretation,
action and implementation to take place at the most appropriate
level but within a coordinated framework linking the local to
the national, to the regional and to the global.
3.16 To this end, whilst agreeing a definition
and vision for sustainable development, a UK Strategy process
should allow for consolidation and simplification. This should
include a collectively agreed set of top-level countrywide priorities,
goals and targets for issues that are crucial to progressing sustainable
development across the UK and to meeting our international commitments,
including sustainable production and consumption, reducing the
rate of global biodiversity loss, and arresting climate change.
It should also provide flexibility for local, regional and country
interpretation in light of local needs, so long as overarching
objectives are not compromised to this end.
3.17 Priorities for Whitehall, through a
UK Government Action Plan, should also focus on their non-devolved
duties such as such as international development and trade, as
well as any added value they can bring through countrywide leadership.
3.19 All Strategies, plans and frameworks
should be arrived at through informed, transparent and participatory
decision-making.
4. (Q. C) HOW
EFFECTIVELY DO
THE INDICATORS
REFLECT THE
UK'S "SUSTAINABILITY
GAP"?
4.1 The government's indicators have been
an extremely significant and practical tool to make many sustainable
development issues real for both decision-makers and the general
public. The government's headline indicators have perhaps done
more than anything else to publicise and monitor progress on several
priority issues. We have supported and continue to do so, the
"basket" approach and the need for a small but comprehensive
set of headline indicators to gauge progress. Consistent, robust
datasets available over time and into the future have been central
to the success of the UK's indicator set, and we would stress
the value of maintaining datasets and consistency long term.
4.2 Although commendable as a means to encourage
integrated and long-term thinking on sustainable development,
it is questionable if the Government's indicators are being usefully
assimilated together to assess the overall "sustainability
gap". If the focus of sustainability is "a better quality
of life", there are many studies that suggest our consumer-led
lifestyles and aspirations are moving us in the opposite direction—longer
working hours, less family time, increasing levels of obesity,
high suicide rates, increasing poverty gap etc.
Could the Government have made greater use of
indicators to drive policy and set targets?
4.3 The Government can be applauded for
its commitment to the use of indicators and, where a trend is
unacceptable, to adjusting policies and looking for others to
join in and take action. However, it is clear from the "Quality
of Life Barometer" and other more detailed analysis (eg Assessment
of Progress Against Headline Indicators, Sustainable Development
Commission, 2004), that several significant trends are negative,
for example road traffic volume and household waste. Further to
this, some indicators have narrow definitions, which paint a false
picture, such as the river water quality indicator, which is insensitive
to pollution from nutrients and does little to drive action to
tackle diffuse pollution.
4.4 More use could have been made of indicators
to drive policy and set targets in departmental business plans
and PSAs, many of which still have a long way to go to reflect
sustainable development. For example, the Department for Transport
(DfT) should be required to sign up to the 20% carbon reduction
target; the waste PSA looks at recycling rather than waste minimisation
and contains nothing on resource production and consumption; there
are no departmental targets for large-scale habitat recreation
to reflect biodiversity priorities, and no targets for protecting
the marine environment.
4.5 On a strongly positive note, Defra's
commitment to reversing the long-term decline in the number of
farmland birds by 2020 through a PSA target, may be applauded.
We also believe that the existence of the farmland birds indicator
may have contributed to the Government's willingness to maximise
the extent to which it can modulate agricultural support to fund
agri environment schemes.
To what extent do the headline indictors properly
reflect "the extent to which the UK is still unsustainable"?
What additional or alternative indicators could address this gap?
4.6 In terms of "the extent to which
the UK is still unsustainable", the indicator basket (and/or
its interpretation) has been insufficient on four counts:
(i) There is no way to link "consumption"
issues and their problems back to the economic indicators (which
suggest all is going well). The Government's consultation on decoupling
indicators for sustainable production and consumption was a welcome
start in addressing this problem. Further consideration needs
to be given to the development of indicators that enable inferences
to be drawn about how lifestyles and consumption practices (ie
behaviour) are actually changing. It is ultimately these behavioural
responses, which will determine how successful we are in attaining
a genuinely sustainable path of life.
(ii) As addressed in the previous parts of
this submission, it fails to redefine economic progress in ways
that reveal the very real social and environmental impacts of
the current economic growth model.
(iii) There remains a need to address the
UK's international impacts and to reflect these in the indicators'
basket. Sustainable development will require market transformation
affecting both the supply and demand side of the economy in both
domestic and international trade, investment and development spheres.
For example, imported products may have a wide range of environmental
or social impacts overseas, from the depletion of local habitats
(such as forest conversion for oil palm plantations or the destruction
of mangrove swamps for intensive shrimp farming) to the greenhouse
gas emissions generated from the long-distance transportation
of products.
(iv) A key natural resource sector and environment
is arguably missing—the marine environment. Protection,
where necessary restoration, and careful management of the use
of natural resources forms the basis of sustainable development.
There is an urgent need for a marine indicator to demonstrate
that we are moving towards this. This indicator could readily
be derived from the set of indicators for "coasts and seas"
developed for the England Biodiversity Strategy.
5. (Q. D) HOW
CAN THE
CONCEPT OF
SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION
BE INTEGRATED
WITHIN THE
STRATEGY?
Should Sustainable production and consumption
be seen as only one constituent part of sustainable development,
or as another way of looking at sustainable development itself?
5.1 Sustainable production and consumption
(SPC) is a fundamental element of sustainable development. This
was as recognised at UNCED (Rio Earth Summit) and encapsulated
in Agenda 21, and again at the WSSD where it is one of the chapters
of the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation. International commitments
to SPC have thus been defined and conceptualised within the broader
context of sustainable development. However, sustainable production
and consumption, whilst a very significant field intimately connected
to equity, well-being and quality of life, do not embody all of
the elements of sustainable development, especially those that
relate to culture, and imply a rather mechanistic view of sustainable
development. In addition, SCP is primarily a responsibility of
the developed, rather than the developing world, both to improve
its own record, and to help developing countries avoid falling
into a similar trap.
5.2 For the UK, as a developed country with
high consumption patterns, SPC should be addressed comprehensively
and as a critical part of the sustainable development strategy.
"Globally, the 20% of the world's people in the highest-income
countries account for 86% of total private consumption expenditures—the
poorest 20% a minuscule 1.3%".[2]This
shocking inequality in consumption patterns illustrates the significance
of the SPC agenda both to the UK and it place in the wider world.
What is the role of government with regard to
encouraging changes in consumption?
5.3 The UK Government have a crucial role
to play in addressing sustainable consumption (and production).
Fundamentally, this means challenging our current high-consumption-based
economy, culture and way of life—the dominant model of progress
and growth. It means driving the resource productivity agenda
forward even more aggressively. But it will also mean going beyond
this—policies for sustainable development based solely on
increasing the "resource productivity" or "eco-efficiency"
of the economy will be useless if improvements in efficiency are
cancelled out by economic growth leading to greater absolute consumption
and resource use. In fact, the overwhelming consensus amongst
academics, think tanks and NGOs is that resource productivity
will not on its own be enough to reconcile the pursuit of economic
growth with the non-negotiable imperative of learning to live
within the Earth's biophysical constraints and carrying capacity.[3]
5.4 Recognising the challenges and political
difficulties inherent to this agenda, the Government must be congratulated
for at least opening debate. However, the scale of the sustainability
challenges, including addressing ecological limits, and the gravity
of the consequences of not meeting them, need more and broader
coverage than they have received so far, especially among the
general public. The Government has a clear and central role in
awareness-raising of this kind. Progress will require a massive
Government commitment to changing values through individual political
leadership, straightforward advertising, and building sustainable
development into the heart of the education system and national
curriculum. Business and the voluntary sector must also play their
part.
5.5 Other ways the Government can influence
consumption and change consumer behaviour include:
(i) Leading by example through its own procurement
policies and those of the public sector, including on international
issues such as illegal logging.
(ii) Sending the right pricing signals through
internalising external costs. This could include:
— Higher regulation and standards,
especially for buildings and appliances.
— More aggressive use of the planning
system.
— Liability for damage costs (polluter
pays).
— Environmental tax reform.
— Economic systems that minimise
waste rather than focus on efficiency.
(iii) Addressing demand management—crucial
to transport, water and energy issues and to commodities.
(iv) Facilitate good choice and offer viable
alternatives to less sustainable options, for example by provide
affordable public transport.
(v) Address upfront and adequately issues
of social inequity (such as fuel poverty) to ensure the less advantaged
can benefit equally from sustainable choices and are not penalised
through low income. This should enable policy to be set along
rational economic lines.
(vi) Reflect seriously on the implications
of rising gross national product (GNP). As the sum total of goods
and services produced by a given society in a given year, it is
principally a measure of the success of a consumer society, to
consume. It does not say anything about how good or bad that consumption
is and in many instances reflects negative externalities and impacts
positively. Further to this, a Fabian report, commissioned by
the Sustainable Development Commission[4]
cites evidence that rising GDP is now associated with declining
well-being. It argues that economic policy should no longer aim
at increasing economic growth as measured by GDP, but should use
more direct measures of quality of life and environmental sustainability.
What difficulties does it face in encouraging
changes in consumption?
5.6 Many of the difficulties in progressing
a sustainable consumption agenda have been alluded to above—they
are inherently political. Convincing people that they should consume
less is obviously difficult, and might have fundamental implications
for the economic system, including the possibility of lower incomes,
and lower tax revenues necessitating lower public spending. The
private sector, which largely depends on our consumption, will
also be resistant to change. Progress in the corporate responsibility
and accountability sphere will be crucial here, as well as a continuing
move from a manufacturing to a service economy that does not depend
simply on exporting industrial resource use and pollution overseas.
5.7 It should also be recognised that sustainable
production and consumption, as evidenced through UN, WTO and the
WSSD processes, has been an issue of North-South tension. Developing
countries fear that moves towards sustainability in the industrialised
world could lead to "green protectionism" in trade,
further declines in commodity prices and new constraints on their
lifestyles and development paths. An imperative step towards SPC
in the UK is working with and delivering positive benefits to
developing countries. This will require efforts towards, for example,
poverty elimination, environmental regeneration and conservation
as well as resources, technology transfer and capacity building
at all levels. These steps are vital if international mistrust
and policy deadlock are to be overcome.
6. (Q. E) ORGANISATIONAL
STRUCTURES AND
COSTS
Do the present organisational structures and policy
mechanisms within Government contribute to the effective implementation
of the Strategy? What improvements could be made?
6.1 The Sustainable Development Unit must
move beyond being primarily a communication centre and would benefit
from being given greater political influence. To achieve effective
communication and cooperation across Whitehall will require
the introduction of a number of components, some of which are
currently only embryonic. It would be helpful, for example, to
have structures and processes explicitly charged with enabling
departments to interact, and to foster a cultural willingness
to change, and an openness to new ideas. Departments and other
actors should also be held to account if they fail to meet sustainability
objectives that have been set and communicated. This could be
achieved through the wider use of PSAs and targets, especially
shared targets. In this context, the Treasury's assessment of
departmental spending bids for the CSR against sustainability
criteria, highlighted earlier, is again a very welcome step forward.
6.2 The Green Ministers group is an example
of good communication at ministerial level, but it should be energised
to be made more effective. The Civil Service interdepartmental
contact group that was convened to prepare for the WSSD was an
excellent and highly effective example at the staff level and
should be continued and strengthened to support effective implementation
of the Strategy on an everyday basis, not just at critical moments
or for key events.
6.3 There is also a real need for an active
network of individuals explicitly charged with joined up thinking
across departments, sectors and issues, including from the Treasury.
The Prime Minister's Strategy Unit, formerly the PIU, and the
Sustainable Development Unit obviously have an important role
to play in investigating the potential for valuable inter-sectoral
integration. Obviously, the Treasury has a crucial role in making
sectoral integration a reality, and the sustainability overview
of the Comprehensive Spending Review is an important step in this
direction.
6.4 The establishment of the UK Sustainable
Development Commission, resulting from the Strategy, has helped
drive forward the agenda and generate creative thinking. Sponsored
within the UK Government by the Cabinet Office and reporting to
the Prime Minister, the First Minister in Scotland, the First
Secretary in Wales and the First and Deputy First Ministers in
Northern Ireland, the Commission has a potentially influential
role particularly in ensuring joined up thinking between and amongst
the devolved administrations and central government. However,
there is still the need to see that the Commission's advice is
being taken into account, most notably concerning the over-emphasis
on economic growth and consumption.
6.5 Perhaps an intractable challenge in
this context also, is the inherently political nature of sustainable
development decision-making. Political cycles are short. They
discourage long-term goal-setting and disrupt long-term goals
when they are set. An interesting approach has been taken in Israel,
which has a Commission for Future Generations. This is a professional
non-political institution that acts as a special agent for Parliament,
to ensure that the country's primary and secondary legislation
takes into account the needs and rights of future generations.
Is there a need for a more consistent approach
to incorporating sustainable development as an overarching objective
in all Government organisations?
6.6 Yes. At the very least each department
should have a sustainable development strategy; this would ideally
and perhaps eventually become one and the same as their departmental
strategy, embedding sustainability into all areas of their work.
As previously noted, a sustainable development duty should also
be placed on key government or quasi government actors such as
the economic regulators, regional decision-making bodies, agencies
and departments.
Has the lack of government financial support for
programmes and policies hindered the implementation of the Strategy
in any way?
6.7 It is very apparent that additional
resources and government financial support could have progressed
the Strategy and developed associated projects, programmes and
initiatives. Research carried out by the Policy Studies Institute[5]identified
the resources required to deliver Government's existing environmental
policy targets (Annex A). As the extract in Annex A shows, significant
funds (totalling £1.7-1.9 billion) are required to deliver
these targets. Additional spending and the reallocation of resources
is necessary, although reallocation to one environmental issue
(such as waste) must not come at the expense of others, such as
biodiversity or rural spending. If Government is unable to make
sufficient resources available to deliver current commitments,
then there is little prospect of achieving objectives, such as
"the sustainable use of natural sources" (Defra PSA
target 2), which are necessary conditions for sustainable development.
May 2004
Annex A
EXCERPT FROM "PUBLIC SPENDING ON THE
ENVIRONMENT. REPORT TO GREEN ALLIANCE." POLICY STUDIES INSTITUTE
(2003)
"The table below brings together the public
spending proposals for SR2004. The proposals would apply to Defra
and DTI, which are the departments with primary responsibility
for these policy areas. The total annual figure for each area
is the sum of the individually costed ideas set out in each section
of the report.
| Area | Proposal for Additional Spending (£/year)
|
| Energy | £300 million per year
|
| Biodiversity | £175 million per year, assuming the CAP transfers discussed in this report
|
| Waste | £1 billion per year focused on meeting regulatory targets
£250 million per year for other related measures
|
| Marine | £50 million |
| Farming | £~ No proposals made but essential that current financial commitments are followed through if momentum is to be maintained
|
| Total | £1.7-1.9 billion
|
| |
This would create a total spending proposition of £1.7-1.9
billion. For 2003-04, combined Defra and DTI spending amounts
to approximately £8 billion. It should be noted that over
half the spending proposition consists of the £1 billion
estimated to be required to meet EU requirements in waste management,
an area in which the UK is acknowledged to lag behind comparable
EU countries and in which a major new source of revenue (the landfill
tax escalator) will soon be available. In the energy field, the
proposition seems modest, given that it is directed to fulfil
the aspirations expressed in this year's Energy White Paper, and
especially in the context of the very large sums of money that
continue to be made available to the nuclear industry, which plays
no role whatever in the White Paper's view of sustainable energy
developments. This then leaves the sum required for the related
areas of terrestrial and marine biodiversity, and the fishing
and farming industries. These are areas in which the Government
has already started on an ambitious programme of reform (most
advanced in farming, through the implementation of the Curry Report,
but also through developments in the Common Fisheries Policy and
the establishment of marine protected areas, such as the Darwin
Mounds, in the context of its "Safeguarding Our Seas"
strategy). An extra £225 million seems very much in line
with the kind of policy momentum which the Government has already
generated in this area."
Further to this, we would like to stress that funding
for waste minimisation must not come at the expense of biodiversity
spending or at the expense of rural spending. Regarding farming,
current financial commitments must be followed through if momentum
towards more sustainable farming is to be maintained.
1
Shows promise. But must try harder, Sustainable Development
Commission, 2004. Back
2
Human Development Report, United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP), 1998. Back
3
Redefining Prosperity, Jonathon Porritt, 2003. Back
4
A Better Choice of Choice, Quality Of Life, consumption and
economic growth, Roger Levett et al., Fabian Society,
2003. Back
5
Public Spending on the Environment. Report to Green Alliance.
Policy Studies Institute (2003). Back
|
