Agenda item

The committee received a presentation from the Director of Public Service Reform & Inclusive Growth and Head of Environment on the development of a five year plan to help meet the WM2041 net zero carbon ambitions. The committee received this item as an item of pre-decision scrutiny prior to the report being considered by the WMCA Board on 19 March 2021.

The Chair considered that the proposals did not provide a clear understanding of the requirements, nor provided an adequately clear direction or clarity on some transport elements. The Director of Public Service Reform & Inclusive Growth recognised that the Local Transport Plan would play a critical part in addressing regional air quality issues. The committee was concerned that the plan was not ambitious enough and lacked direction in terms of clear and coherent interventions that would lead the region in a net zero carbon environment. It also highlighted that whilst the work on a technical baseline was welcomed, there remained an absence of climate clarity.

Aisha Masood stressed the importance of ensuring systematic inequalities that further disadvantaged certain sections of the population needed to be adequately addressed, and stressed the importance of work on behaviour change. The Director of Public Service Reform & Inclusive Growth reported that work was being undertaken with the behavioural insights team to address issue and he would be happy to share the outcome of that work at a future meeting.

Recommended:

(1)      The presentation be noted.

(2)      The comments made by the committee help inform the preparation of the report prior to its submission to the WMCA Board on 19 March 2021.