The meeting began with a short breakout session into smaller groups.
My group had a delegate, Sarah Nolan from Elmsbrook Eco-Town (NW Bicester) , built to high sustainability standards according to the Eco Towns Planning Policy statement (2009) since discarded in 2015. It is an exemplar of what could be achieved given sufficient planning impetus; it was interesting to hear how the community has endeavoured to remain self-supportive.
Here is a link
We continued with the main part of the Agenda:
A report from Henry Owen, who sadly will be leaving CAG Oxfordshire at the end of 2021 but intends to remain in touch. Highlights:
The CAG has increased its membership from 75 to 97 groups over the past year. It held or sponsored 5000 events with 38,000 attendees .
Over £1m in funding and income was generated by the network last year – the CAG although not a charity has been recognised as such by HMRC for tax purposes.
The various CAGs repaired 1433 bikes and diverted 52 tonnes of food from waste.
The Collaborate groups have been very successful with 9 new groups in the Repair Café. network, repairing 1325kg out of 1427kg WEEE collected
Look out for “From the Ground Up” an exhibition celebrating 20 years of the CAG Oxfordshire Project – August 28 th to October 9 th Old Fire Station https://www.from-the-ground-up.co.uk/
There was a vote to elect two members to the CAG board. Both candidates, our own Nicola Schafer and Phil Mousley from Sustainable Didcot were successfully elected after compelling presentations . Congratulations Nicola!
There followed a presentation by Councillor Pete Sudbury from Oxfordshire County Council entitled “Stepping Stones to a Better Future”
This was a powerful sobering piece presaging the IPCC report which has just been released. It began with a quote from William Gibson “The future is here, it’s just not evenly distributed” with a slide showing the various cataclysmic weather events that we are recently familiar with. He showed graphs depicting the inexorable rise in Greenhouse gas emissions; a stark reminder that even if current pledges are adhered to, the World will experience 3C of warming during this century.
What can we do: -
Prepare for mitigating effects of climate change
Encourage decarbonisation – mostly energy supply – make it electricity from renewable sources – support the CEE Bill.
Encourage the circular economy
Make it easier for people to do the right thing:- walking/cycling – public transport - car sharing
CAGs can help make this happen locally