Vivienne Westwood, Rory Bremner and Jane Horrocks among the famous faces supporting unprecedented call for action
Some of the UK's most famous faces have given their ideas and backing to plans to tackle climate change and make the capital more energy efficient. The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, has called on others to join the debate and has pledged to incorporate the best ideas in the city’s climate action plans (9 February, 2010).
To kick-start a mass public consultation, City Hall will host an exhibition of portrait photographs featuring well-known people taken by leading portrait photographer, Cambridge Jones. Each image will include a caption from the subject giving their thoughts on climate change – these will also feature on a new website where Londoners can give their views. People who have contributed include: Vivienne Westwood, Richard E Grant, Bear Grylls, Rory Bremner, Laura Bailey, Michael Sheen, Adrian Lester, Mariella Frostrup, Jane Horrocks, Emma Thompson, Stephen Mangan, the Archbishop of Canterbury – Rowan Williams, Anthony Howell, Alan Titchmarsh, Keeley Hawes, Rosie Boycott, Rageh Omar, Gary Lineker, Colin Salmon, Talulah Riley, Dylan Jones, George Harris and Gillian Anderson.
The innovative website (www.london.gov.uk/climatechange) enables people to easily submit their views on climate change. It marks a pioneering approach to public consultation by a government organisation in the UK, exploiting the expanding use of social media to enable far more people to easily participate in the development of policy making. The site enables people to upload ideas, give their views and vote on the other proposals including those contained in the Mayor’s own climate strategies. The Mayor has pledged that the best of these responses will be reflected in the final versions of two draft documents launched today.
These set out his detailed policies on climate change adaptation and on becoming more energy efficient, including the use cleaner forms of energy such as renewables to cut carbon. The consultation includes a short film of the Mayor explaining the issues and personally asking for Londoners' views, which will be distributed online. The Mayor has pledged to set the capital on course to cut its carbon footprint by 60 per cent by 2025 and attract tens of thousands of green jobs to the city.
The Mayor, said: 'To improve our quality of life, care for our planet and save money from our pockets, we need to adapt our homes and workplaces, moving London to an energy efficient future. This has a host of broader benefits including the creation of new jobs and industries.
'This cannot be tackled only with top down solutions from politicians but through a collective response. We want to galvanise Londoners into giving us their thoughts and views. Gone are the stuffy consultations of the past, instead we are harnessing the power of new technologies to make it easier than ever before to influence important decisions about our city. I urge everyone to give it a go.'
Most scientists agree that London is predicted to expect hotter summers, with most summers being as hot as the 2003 heatwave and wetter winters – January is rainfall expected to increase by 25 per cent by 2080. The North sea is also predicted to rise by up to one metre this century. The good news is that London is one of the world’s best protected capitals, thanks to the Thames Barrier and a system of defences along the river. Even with the rising sea levels, the Barrier should protect the city for another 60 years. But London can still do a lot more to ensure we stay protected from flooding.
Mariella Frostrup and Jane Horrocks have both voiced their support for the campaign to get Londoners to give their views.
Mariella Frostrup, said: 'One of the ways to meet the challenge of climate care seems to be an obvious one - we need to get on our feet. You'd be amazed how much exercise can be crammed into our normal working day; saving gym membership, cutting down on obesity and benefiting our health and the health of the city we inhabit.'
Jane Horrocks, said: 'Invest in a washing line or a whirligig and peg your washing outside inside of putting it in the tumble dryer. We've also got a water butt in the garden to collect rainwater for watering the plants and all the bits of pond life it collects fascinates the kids.'
The Mayor's climate change adaptation strategy is published today for public consultation. It contains a range of proposals as to how Londoners, organisations and government bodies can work together to ensure London is ready for predicted climate shifts now and in the future. This includes taking steps to enhance and increase London's green spaces, improving water efficiency (Londoners use more water than the national average yet only one in five Londoners have a water meter and more than 600 million litres is lost in leakage daily), increasing awareness of who is at risk from flooding (one in six Londoners live and work on the former floodplains and only one in five Londoners at risk has signed up to the Environment Agency's free warning service), and taking steps to cool the city to cope with heat wave (during hotter weather, central London can be up to nine per cent warmer than the greenbelt - air conditioning is predicted to more than double by the 2030s).
The Mayor's climate change mitigation and energy strategy 'Delivering London's energy future' is also published today for consultation with the London Assembly and Greater London Authority functional bodies. The Mayor has already kicked off a range of programmes to make London one of the world's leading low carbon cities, creating new jobs and industries and attracting inward investment. The strategy details plans to cut carbon from London's transport, homes, workplaces, and new buildings; it also shows how London can deliver much more of its energy from local green sources, for example by turning the capital's waste into energy. Examples include offering a free carbon makeover to 200,000 homes by 2012, developing 10 low carbon zones, cutting energy use in public buildings to save money on city energy bills, generating cleaner forms of energy locally, introducing a public bike hire scheme, and laying the foundations for wider uptake of electric vehicles. The Mayor will also work with the GLA group (Transport for London, the Metropolitan Police Authority, London Development Agency and London Fire and Emergency Service) to set targets to reduce emissions across the group.
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