Agenda item

To receive any comments from the Chair of the Combined Authority’s Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

The Chair advised that following their meeting held on 29 January, the Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee had submitted comments for consideration at this meeting. The comments had been circulated in advance of the meeting and would be available to view on the Combined Authority web site.

Cllr Stephen Clarke, the Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee then presented the comments and highlighted the following points in relation to the report entitled “Update on climate emergency planning” (agenda item 15):

Overall, the Overview and Scrutiny Committee was disappointed with the report and the rate of progress to date.  Members’ specific comments and recommendations were as follows:

a. Immediacy of action: The action taken to date as set out in the report did not indicate, in members’ view, that the authority was taking forward action on the climate emergency with the required pace and urgency.

b. Climate Emergency action plan: Members had noted from the report that the “next steps” included the development, in liaison with the West of England unitary authorities, of a Climate Emergency action plan.  A clear date should be set by which the action plan would be available to scrutinise.

c. Governance:  The report on today’s agenda recommended that a requirement be added to the terms of reference of all the authority’s governance boards to consider the impact of all decisions and advice on the climate emergency. Whilst Overview and Scrutiny members understood that the rationale behind this proposal was to seek to embed tackling the climate emergency into the authority’s governance, they nevertheless strongly recommended that a new Climate Emergency Board should be established by the Combined Authority to drive forward the regional response and to ensure that effective actions / priorities were taken forward as quickly as possible.  The scrutiny view was that the Cabinet lead portfolio member in each of the authorities should comprise this Board.  Scrutiny had an important role in monitoring progress and holding the authority to account but was not resourced sufficiently to take the responsibility for ensuring that the essential urgent action was in place / maintained.

d. Resources:

* Scrutiny members recommended that the Combined Authority should take on an additional employee to concentrate/focus/champion/co-ordinate activity.

* Scrutiny members felt that the £250k currently allocated to support regional climate emergency action was inadequate and should be increased. 

* Scrutiny members were aware that the authority’s £350m investment programme was set before the authority declared a climate emergency in July 2019. Nevertheless, they felt it was essential to maintain an ongoing challenge to ensure that investment priorities were re-assessed in light of the climate emergency declaration.  For example, investment in strategic park and ride sites should be brought forward at the earliest opportunity. Members believed that the Combined Authority should revisit the prioritisation of the major schemes list that was decided before the declaration of the climate emergency and re-assess them in the light of the emergency.

e. The Overview and Scrutiny Committee had also agreed to invite Mayor Bowles to attend one of their meetings to discuss this issue as soon as possible.

The Chair thanked Cllr Clarke for presenting the scrutiny comments.

In discussion, the following main points were raised/noted:

a. With reference to his earlier comments, Mayor Rees reiterated that there was an open invitation for each of the West of England local authorities, including the relevant Cabinet portfolio leads, to attend meetings and engage with the Bristol ‘One City’ Environmental Sustainability Board.  The Board was focused on overseeing evidence-based interventions to ensure that Bristol achieved its carbon neutrality target.

b. Cllr Davies commented that, in his view, a key aspect of tackling the climate emergency would be to reassess the use of the region’s road infrastructure/network; roads should be used to prioritise public transport.

c. In relation to the recommendations from the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, it was noted that these would be considered by the relevant officer/member bodies within the Combined Authority’s governance structure with a view to a response being determined.