Resilience initiatives in the UK

Three case studies of resilience initiatives within the U

New Forests and Woodlands

This article examines the characteristics of some of the recent new forest and woodland forest schemes within the UK, and looks at the relationship between new forest and woodland creation and plannin

Water resource issues and spatial planning

This article considers the evolution of water resource management within England, and reviews current water resource challenges and how they are being addressed in emerging new spatial development plans

The sustainable development goals and business

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) agreed at a United Nations General Assembly in 2015 embrace an ambitious and wide ranging set of global environmental, social and economic issues designed to effect a transition to a more sustainable future. The United Nations called on all governments to pursue these ambitious goals but also acknowledged the important role of the business community in addressing the SDG’s. This paper offers a preliminary review of the efforts being made to encourage businesses, and more specifically the consumer goods industry, to address the SDGs and offers some wider reflections on the challenges business face in engaging with the SDGs

The development of solar farms in the UK

The UK Government is committed to meeting 15% of the nation's energy needs from a mixture of renewable sources by 2020. As solar power is more abundant than wind, water and biomass, the recent development of solar farms is seen to have a role in helping to achieve this target. This article outlines the characteristics of solar farms, their geographical distribution and locational development criteria within the UK. It also examines some of the planning issues raised by solar farm developments. The findings reveal that the development pressure for solar farms is greatest in the southeast and southwest of England; and examples of proposals to develop solar farms in England and Wales help to illustrate the wide range of environmental, social and economic issues in these areas. Finally, the article indicates, that while obtaining planning permission has not been a major constraint on solar farm development to date, a study of the planning issues they raise can provide a valuable lens through which society's changing relationship to energy production and consumption can be viewed

Commentary on Planning Reform Proposals

In the ministerial forward to the ‘National Planning Policy Framework’ (Department for Communities and Local Government 2012) The Rt. Hon. Greg Clark, Minister for Planning in the Coalition Government focused on two themes namely sustainable development and allowing people and communities back into the planning process. He claimed that ‘the purpose of planning is to help achieve sustainable development’ and in looking to offer a definition of sustainable development he suggested that ‘sustainable means ensuring that better lives for ourselves don’t mean worse lives for future generations’ while development means growth’ (Department for Communities and Local Government 2012). The Minister also claimed that ‘in recent years planning has tended to exclude, rather than to include people and communities’, that ‘in part this has been largely a result of targets being imposed and decisions taken by bodies remote from them’ and ‘in part people have been put off from getting involved because planning policy itself has become ……. the preserve of specialists rather than people in communities.’ More positively the Minister argued that the new planning policy framework would change that by ‘allowing people and communities back into planning’ (Department for Communities and Local Government 2012). Less than four years later a House of Commons ‘Briefing Paper’, entitled ‘Planning Reform Proposals’ (Smith 2016) clearly sets out the current Conservative Government’s proposed approach to the planning system. One of the proposals outlined in the briefing, namely the Housing and Planning Bill 2015-2016 has received critical comment within the planning profession (Town and Country Planning Association 2016). This bill has been described, for example, as ‘possibly the most radical and wide ranging piece of planning legislation for a generation’ (Dewar 2015). However the briefing paper covers a wider range of other forthcoming planning reform s and changes, which will mainly apply to England, and which collectively may have a major impact on many communities and environments. This article provides a short outline of some of these other changes and offers some reflections on the Government’s planning reform proposals specifically with an eye to allowing people and communities back into planning and to sustainable development

Sustainability: a briefing paper

The aims of this briefing paper are to examine the origins and development of the concept of sustainability, to outline some of the current approaches to sustainability reporting and to offer some reflections on both sustainability and sustainability reporting. The paper draws attention to the contrasting and contested meanings of sustainability, to the theoretical frameworks developed to conceptualise sustainability and to the growing interest in sustainability reporting. In their discussion the authors explore some of the challenges police authorities may face in looking to develop and formalise their approach to sustainability as an integral part of their continuing commitment to protect and enhance the communities and environments in which they wor

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY AND THE UK CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

This paper offers a preliminary exploration of the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) issues being addressed and reported by some of the UK’s leading construction companies. The paper begins with a short discussion of the characteristics and origins of CSR and this is followed by brief outline of the construction industry and some of the challenges it is currently facing. The empirical information for the paper is drawn from the CSR reports and information posted on the World Wide Web by some of the leading construction companies. The findings reveal that each of the companies has its own approach to CSR and that there are substantial variations in the nature and the extent of the reporting process. More specifically the paper focuses upon six sets of CSR issues namely those relating to environment; health and safety; human resources; supply chain management; customers and communities; and governance and ethics. More generally the paper suggests that although construction companies report their recognition of the importance of CSR and their commitment to integrate it within their businesses they make relatively limited use of Key Performance Indicators and have low participation rates in general benchmarking exercises

The Environmental, Social and Economic Impacts of Cruising and Corporate Sustainability Strategies

As the popularity and geographical reach of ocean cruising continues to increase so its environmental, social and economic impacts are growing in scale. With this in mind the aims of this paper are to offer an exploratory review of the extent to which the leading ocean cruise companies are addressing and reporting on their sustainability strategies and achievements and to offer some reflections on sustainability within the cruising industry. The paper begins with an outline of cruising and the cruising industry and a short commentary on the sustainability challenges the industry faces. The information on which the paper is based is drawn from the leading cruise companies’ corporate web sites. The findings of the paper reveal a marked variation in the extent to which the leading cruise companies publicly report on their sustainability strategies and achievements. While the two leading cruise companies, namely the Carnival Corporation and Royal Caribbean Cruises, published extensive sustainability reports which covered a number of environmental social and economic issues, the other leading cruise companies published more limited information on sustainability. More critically the authors argued that the cruise companies’ commitments to sustainability are driven by the search for efficiency gains and are couched within existing business models centred on continuing growth than on maintaining the viability of natural ecosystems and communities