Lancashire County Council have recently published their Framework for 2050, including their Environment and Climate Change ‘ambitions.
Although they present this ‘framework’ as having been agreed by all of the local authorities in Lancashire, the truth is very different, as all of the opposition led ones re unhappy with the contents.
All but two of the local authorities in Lancashire have declared a ‘climate emergency’ and most have set a 2030 deadline for achieving net zero, either for their own emissions or for their whole area. Lancashire County Council themselves stated in 2022 that “Protecting our environment is our priority and taking action to reduce CO2 levels is key.
In December 2020, we agreed our ambition to:
“Transition the Lancashire economy away from carbon by 2030, address the biodiversity crisis; while also protecting against poverty and improving social inclusion.”
When I saw this ‘Lancashire 2050′ I was shocked at how their ambition has reversed, so that even the UK Government target of a 68% reduction in carbon emissions by 203’ is not reflected.
I have been working through the conventional political structures since becoming a Lancaster City Councillor in 2017, and Deputy Leader in 2019. However, I am standing down in May 2023 so am free to express my dissatifaction in more ‘unconventional’ ways.
I decided to alter the document to reflect ‘Lancashire 2030’ and my first attempt was to correct the document as though I was a teacher, with a lot oif red pen. I used Adobe Elements for this.
I then decided to rewrite the document to reflect iumproved ambition, with a view to putting it out looking as though Lancashire County Council have listened to criticism and rewritten the document. To make this appear authentic I decided to have the document reflect government policy rather than make it as radical as is necessacy. They would then have to deny that they are supporting Governmnet policy’ in denying that the ‘Lancashire 2030’ document and website have anything to do with them.
I have started to rewrite the document, using ‘Foxit’ PDF editor, and set up a Lancashire2030 website and Twitter account. One of the difficulties I have encountered so far is that I couldn’t find what font they has used for the logo, even though I tried all of the ‘image font’ recognition websites I knew. However I was eventually able to identify it as ‘Segoe’.
This is a work in progress, but I hope to complete this project in the next few days. I think the best way to release it is to make it appear to come from consultants, as it will be difficult to make it appear to come from the County Council themselves.