Mind the Gap – Top Down / Bottom up

1. Mind the Gap – Top Down / Bottom up Peter Davies Sustainable Futures Commissioner for Wales Chair of the Climate Change Commission for Wales

2. The Sustainable Futures Commissioner • establishing the practical actions that Welsh Assembly need to take to deliver its legal duty to promote sustainable development • building consensus on the action that is needed across all sectors and communities in Wales • reporting back to the Assembly Government on the blockages and recommending solutions for the delivery of policies and programmes to make Wales more sustainable. • providing advice on the long term arrangements for the provision of independent advice on sustainable development • Hosted by Cynnal Cymru

3. The Sustainable Futures Commissioner • Build up, share and use expertise and evidence in support of sustainable development, in particular through drawing on best practice and lessons learnt from other parts of the Uk and internationally • Liaise with UK Government, Scottish Government and Northern Ireland Executive concerning ways in which sustainable development is being promoted in other parts of the UK • Provide commentary and feedback to the Assembly Government on the progress being made to a more sustainable Wales, including on the blockages and impediments to action and solutions to these • Provide independent commentary within the Assembly Government’s statutory Sustainable Development Annual Report

4. Climate Change Commission for Wales Mobilise action across sectors Build consensus across sectors

5. It is widely acknowledged, six years on, that Wales has established the strongest claim to leadership on Sustainable Development within the UK” The Greenest Government Ever”: One Year On - A Report to Friends of the Earth Jonathan Porritt May 2011

6. Mind the GapRhetoric and Reality

7. Mind the GapLearning from past experience • Raft of consultations – responses from usual suspects • Policy decisions –a lag at worst a gap to implementation • Lack of focus on engagement – the golden thread – cannot be left to chance or others • Top down – parachuting in of programmes and plans with programmes reaching the ground as discrete projects disconnected • Challenge of short term funding programmes • Lack of bottom up long term capacity building – Need for trusted intermediaries • Lack of engagement with the private sector • Importance of the gateway issues – eg local environmental quality • Connect major initiatives eg single use carrier bags ; technology - broadband, smart metering

8. How do we want the rest of the world to see us? “Wales has the advantage of being one of the most picturesque places in Europe and it is bang on people’s doorstep. If it could be viewed as the New Zealand of Europe [with] a clean, green and safe image… it would have a huge impact on its future”

9. Learning from New Zealand? “Sustainability is very important to Kiwis, but it’s sustainability in its broadest possible sense. It includes its communities, language, culture and produce as well as its environment. So, can the sustainability agenda in Wales also take this approach, with a focus around its communities, language, culture and produce? In other words, get to the heart of the people, the way they live, feel and think?

10. People: • For a sustainable Wales to develop, the people of Wales have to be at the heart of the agenda • But how do we make it something that the Welsh people feel passionate and proud of, and how do engage their spirit and the spirit of Wales in the agenda? • How do we develop a truly Welsh agenda?

11. Follow uppeter.davies@cynnalcymru.competer@pdpartnership.co.uk