Collaborative legislation process
Have Your Say: East Lothian's Poverty PlanIs our key outcome on climate change the right one?
Climate change will impact vulnerable and low income communities the hardest. But people who are living on a low income have a low carbon footprint (through using public transport, eating out less, fewer plane journeys etc). We will take preventative action to protect and support these communities.
Tackling climate change can benefit how we tackle poverty – this outcome will include our actions around the creation of new jobs, tackling fuel poverty, improving our transport links and our housing stock.
YES.
Climate change is already costing households in terms of repair bills for more frequent storm damage, energy bills, etc. This will hit hardest those who can least afford it. Fighting climate change is fighting poverty - East Lothian ought to have a healthy environment that supports a healthy community (and vice versa). Lil would like to see the parallels between climate and poverty explicitly articulated in the Plan, with examples listing (but not limited to) the circular economy, reducing waste, energy security/ insulation, upskilling folk for green jobs, active transport. This will demonstrate ELC's commitment to countering both poverty & climate change, to both internal and external audiences - an important lever for our third sector.
I like the inclusion of this, and agree transport costs and costs of heating/electricity can push people into poverty. You have improvement 15 though which touches on transport, but this is the only one, so I'd like to see improvements on the following included:
1. Improving public transport, including connectivity and potential subsidies;
2. Improving the East Lothian housing stock, for energy efficiency (insulation etc) & renewables - appreciate Air Source Heat Pumps can be expensive to run, but solar PV/thermal panels would bring electricity/hot water costs down considerably. There is contention around wood burning stoves & biomass), but these have the potential to bring heating costs down too (probably district biomass).