‘Our young people need to be involved’

Councillors have appealed for more to be done to get young people involved in climate change discussions.

In November, West Sussex County Council held a monthlong ‘climate conversation’ aimed at finding out how Covid-19 restrictions had affected people’s behaviour and, consequently, the local environment.

While 2,000 people responded to the survey, most were middleaged and very few were from the younger generation.

A report was presented to a meeting of the environment and communities scrutiny committee earlier this month by the council’s sustainability team leader Catherine Cannon.

The council recently adopted a Climate Change Strategy for the next ten years, including a commitment to become carbon neutral by 2030.

To help this along, the plan is to work with the district and borough councils on a campaign later this year to encourage people to change their behaviour to be more climate-friendly.

Describing the work as ‘vitally important’, chairman Andrew Barrett-Miles stressed the need to get young people on board as they would carry the flag once the older generation had ‘disappeared off this mortal coil’.

He told Mrs Cannon: “I think what this shows is the divide between the middle-aged and elderly and the young is something you really have to crack.

“To introduce this change in lifestyle will come more from the younger people than the elder population.

“The young are more in tune with the agenda. We need to work hard on getting them involved.”

Getting the young on board will not be the only challenge.

Mrs Cannon reported that more than 40 per cent of those who responded to the survey said they would be unwilling or unable to travel by any means other than their car.

Only one-in-five said they already shopped locally for groceries, took their holidays in the UK and used local parks and green spaces. And only onein-five said they would like to support local businesses. On the plus side, 90 per cent said they were already cutting food waste by planning their meals.

Heidi Brunsdon (Ind Con, Imberdown) offered a word of caution when it came to breaking down ‘the barriers of change’ and pointed out that, for many people, the challenge of keeping their families fed and paying their bills tended to be more important to them than whether or not their washing machine had a low enough carbon footprint.