Town and Parish Councils

Town and parish councils guide to net-zero

Whilst town and parish councils may have more limited resources than the district or county authority, town and parish councils can still be a very important force for good in their local areas to address the climate and ecological emergency.

The purpose of this section of the website is to provide some advice for those town and parish councils who want to do their bit to help South Hams and Devon become net zero by 2050.

This guide will continue to be updated as new information arises so do check back. Alternatively, if you have any ideas or suggestions yourself, send them to climatechange@swdevon.gov.uk and we may be able to feature them here!

Starting fresh

As with any council commitment, it’s best to start with a motion. Your motion should set a mandate to act and set clear priorities and aims. 

A suggested motion is provided below which you can adapt and modify:

Example Council Motion

Example Council Motion/Declaration

The Council acknowledges the importance of tackling the climate and nature crisis as a local Council, it is a key influencing organisation for local people. It is therefore critical that the Council helps the Parish/Town of XXXX to become net zero; to restore damaged natural systems and to work with local partner organisations and Councils. 

In recognition of this and to lead the way, the Council resolves to:

  • reduce the carbon footprint of its own operations Town and Parish Council's own footprint XX% by YEAR
  • commit to working with partners to aim to reduce the Town/Parish of XXXX carbon emissions to net-zero by 2050 at the latest
  • aim for a XXX% Biodiversity Net Gain in the habitat value of our public open space
  • Promote and embed sustainable and energy efficient practices throughout the Town/Parish and to promote behavioural change across the area
  • Establish a Climate and Biodiversity working group to report and monitor on progress
  • As with any council commitment, it’s best to start with a motion. Your motion should set a mandate to act and set clear priorities and aims. A suggested motion is provided below which you can adapt and modify
  • The Council acknowledges the importance of tackling the climate and nature crisis as a local Council, it is a key influencing organisation for local people. It is therefore critical that the Council helps the Parish/Town of XXXX to become net zero; to restore damaged natural systems and to work with local partner organisations and Councils. 
  • In recognition of this and to lead the way, the Council resolves to;
  • reduce the carbon footprint of its own operations Town and Parish Council's own footprint XX% by YEAR
  • commit to working with partners to aim to reduce the Town/Parish of XXXX carbon emissions to net-zero by 2050 at the latest
  • aim for a XXX% Biodiversity Net Gain in the habitat value of our public open space
  • Promote and embed sustainable and energy efficient practices throughout the Town/Parish and to promote behavioural change across the area
  • Establish a Climate and Biodiversity working group to report and monitor on progress

Carbon footprints

Understanding the carbon emissions of your area

First, you may want to understand where the carbon emissions associated with your area are coming from.

  • The Centre for Sustainable Energy, working with the University of Exeter, have also produced a parish council carbon footprint tool to help you understand the sources of carbon emissions in your area. The National Association of Local Councils (NALC) has resources to help local councils tackle climate change including case studies. It’s important to remember the figures are based on calculations for a larger area, so you’re level of influence will vary at a local level, but it’s an important understanding to get from the start
  • In addition to this, there is also the 'place-based carbon calculator'* which is a free tool recently made available which estimates the per-person carbon footprint for every Lower Super Output Area (LSOA) in England. LSOAs are small statistical areas with a population of about 1,500 - 3,000. It draws on a wide range of data and research to give a representative view of how carbon footprints vary across the country. You can access the tool by clicking here.

*This tool was produced with funding from UK Research and Innovation through the Centre for Research into Energy Demand Solutions. The site is operated by the Centre for Research into Energy Demand Solutions (CREDS) project on behalf of the University of Leeds and the University of Oxford.

Understanding the carbon footprint of your town or parish council

The Local Government Associated created a Greenhouse Gas Accounting Tool to help organisations with this.

You’ll need to decide whether you only want to report and decarbonisation emissions which you have direct influence over, these can be broken down as follows:

  • Scope 1 - Parish/Town Council building heating
  • Scope 2 - Parish/Town Council electricity use and owned transport fuel use (fleet rather than staff personal vehicles
  • Scope 3 - Emissions that an organisation doesn’t have full control over, such as purchasing, leasing, contracts, ‘staff’ vehicle business mileage, material use and any outsourced activity (consultancy, paid services etc).

Deciding on the reporting scopes will determine what data you need to collect, once that’s decided, you’ll need to decide on a baseline reporting year, usually the preceding financial year or calendar year or the year you have the most complete data set for. Collect the data for that year and enter the figures in the accounting tool.

Action examples

Select the headings below to see examples of actions that communities can take to help make energy improvements across their town or parish:

Leading by example

  • Save energy - you’ll want to ensure your buildings are as energy efficient as possible. Swapping out bulbs for LED lighting is a quick easy win. Getting an energy audit is also worthwhile. Loans are available through Salix funding. You can find avenues for funding at the end. You can even look at generating renewable energy for your building(s). In addition to LED lights you could take out a contract with a supplier that only offers 100% renewable energy
  • Improve Biodiversity - Many town and parish councils manage their own bridleways, burial grounds, open spaces and village greens. All of these can be managed in ways to improve their biodiversity, such as reduce mowing. Buglife have many guides on this subject which can be found here. There’s a new biodiversity red list of threatened bird species in the UK (published 01 Dec 2021), species such as swifts and house martins are on this. On any suitable Council premises you could install some swift and martins nest boxes (RSPB and BTO both offer good advice).
  • Land use and hedge cutting.  Promote and suggest the growth of trees (about every 50 metres or so) along standard field and lane hedges where no trees mature at present. The annual Autumnal hedge ‘cutting’ prevents trees from maturing. This is such an advantageous way to grow more trees without the necessity to plant anew, it saves a long wait for saplings to grow and is cheaper. It’s an easy win to survey and mark a few good looking potential trees along boundaries. This requires councils to have positive and effective conversations with landowners (and highways). 
  • Plant some trees - Planting trees can be really empowering for local communities, trees, if managed properly after they are planted can absorb carbon dioxide, improve air quality and help to cool particularly warm parts of otherwise built up areas. The Woodland Trust often offer out free trees for communities, information on that scheme can be found here. In addition, the Woodland Trust also have information about how to properly manage your newly planted trees here. 
  • Make climate friendly decisions - a town or parish council could begin to assess the climate change or nature implications of any decisions they make, a framework for assessing this could be developed by your working group.

Reduce transportation emissions

  • Councillor and Staff mileage - Councillors and staff could move around locally by bike or e-bike, opt to switch to an EV or use public transport. Timing meetings around available public transport times could encourage these choices, as can changing meeting times in the winter so councillors can safely walk or cycle. Opting to have more virtual meetings can also reduce transportation emissions. 
  • Aim to make walking and cycling the natural choice for short journeys within and between settlements. Parish footpath maps and signed routes encourage tourists to explore on foot. Parish councils can identify and advocate for improved footways and safer junction design. Cycle racks and lockers at public facilities help normalise cycling and encourage touring cyclists to stop. Facilitate events to encourage people to cycle, eg via the Big Bike Revival. The Slow Ways project aims to identify a national network of walkable routes. Sustrans publishes guidance on cycle infrastructure. 
  • EV Charging - We are currently building a database of Town and Parish Councils who are interested and have land or buildings available, for EV chargers. An open survey can be found here  ​​
  • Encourage use of public transport where it is available, and lobby for increased provision where it is not. This could include raising awareness of bus timetables (see https://www.traveldevon.info/bus/) among residents, businesses and tourists and ensuring bus stops are safely located and comfortable to wait at.
  • Speed Limits - Advocate for lower speed limits where this would improve road safety or residents people to have confidence to walk or cycle.
  • Create a lift-sharing scheme - not everyone can afford to switch to an electric vehicle or cycle to where they need to go. You could promote or use something like Liftshare Devon.
  • Car sharing schemes. Although they have yet to place vehicles and bikes in many of our towns and villages, promoting their services can demonstrate demand for services in your area. As a District Council we did run a survey with CoCars and CoBikes over the summer of 2021 and have some data available to show areas of interest. Please email climatechange@swdevon.gov.uk if you would like information for your area.

Be a change enabler

  • Encourage community participation - allow members of the community to join your climate and biodiversity sub group to build participatory climate solutions. Also find out how community organisations in your area are already acting for climate and nature invite them to collaborate. Examples include wildlife groups, Transition towns or villages, Eco-Churches, schools and youth organisations.
  • Promote action by local people - People can only hear and absorb so much information, much of the change we are required to see needs to happen from everyone, but behaviours can be a tough change. Social science research has shown that normalising sustainable behaviours can often be the best way to strengthen a collective commitment and accelerate change, the Climate Change Committee published a report on this subject which can be found here.
  • Normalise action - While most people now recognise the need for change to protect climate and nature, actually changing behaviour is difficult.  Showing sustainable choices as normal can strengthen collective commitment and accelerate change. For example, the Council could help showcase local examples of reducing home energy use, rewilding gardens, or reducing food waste.  
  • Talking and Support - People sometimes find it hard to talk about climate change. Parish councils are well placed to raise the issue in ways that chime with local values and experience. Climate Outreach provide useful guidance -eg “Rural Attitudes to Climate Change” and “Climate Visuals.”
  • Invite experts - There are a number of ‘green’ technology advice groups (such as the Big Energy Saving Network and local community energy groups such as Tamar Energy Community) who can be invited to Council meetings and events to provide information. In addition local residents who have already installed such renewable heat devices can be invited to discuss and recommend based on their own domestic energy changes.
  • Neighbourhood Planning - Whilst the Neighbourhood Planning process is very time consuming, it is often led by the town and parish councils. You can use this process to create climate friendly policy such as walking and cycling route designations or site allocations for community renewable development for example. The CSE have a guide to help.
    • Already have a Neighbourhood Plan? - conduct a 'green health check' of your Neighbourhood Plan using the Centre for Sustainable Energy's points-based scheme for parish councils to assess their neighbourhood plan for carbon resilience. This tool can be found here.
  • Commenting on planning applications - as a statutory consultee familiar with the local context and geography your Council can scrutinise and challenge claims made by developers about the sustainability of proposals. This might include drainage, the orientation of homes relative to the sun, distance to public transport, and routes for pedestrian and cycle access. In terms of assessing an application against Joint Local Plan Policy DEV32 (our low carbon policy), for major developments, some guidance can be found here and a checklist for minor planning applications can be found here.