Campaigners protest over scrapped Climate Change committee and dismissal of Net Zero targets

Environment campaigners rallied at Derbyshire County Council’s headquarters to protest against the Reform UK-controlled authority’s decision to scrap its Climate Change committee and its ongoing policy to deprioritise Net Zero carbon reduction targets.

The Derbyshire residents held a well-attended demonstration outside the council’s County Hall offices before a Full Council meeting on October 8 where the council voted to oppose solar farms and battery energy storage systems on greenfield sites.

Campaigners claim the new council Reform administration is attempting to undermine action to address Climate Change after scrapping its former Climate Change, Biodiversity and Carbon Reduction committee and that it wants to remove all mention of climate and carbon emissions from Derbyshire’s strategic plans.

Protester, Dr Sarah Hobday, a retired consultant paediatrician, said: “Of course we should prioritise solar panels on rooftops and brownfield sites first, that’s common sense. But well-managed solar parks can also deliver for struggling farmers. They bring steady revenue, offer opportunities for wildflower meadows and pollinator habitat, permit mixed grazing under panels, and improve biodiversity.

“None of that is possible with a fracking site, oil well, gas field or coal mine. Reform made it clear they are ideologically opposed to renewable energy and would rather impose destructive and polluting fossil fuel projects on communities that do nothing to lower household bills.”

The council has argued its latest decision to oppose solar farms and BESS schemes on greenfield sites will protect the area’s countryside, wildlife and agricultural food security while preventing a Chinese manufactured eco-desert with imported materials for the schemes.

Council Leader, Cllr Alan Graves, has also claimed that money generated in the green transition comes mainly from taxpayers and it is costing people money and the council’s decision not to pursue efforts to tackle the causes and impact of Climate Change was made due to the cost of Net Zero. 

He told the latest council meeting that the county council is under attack from Net Zero schemes and that battery energy storage systems on farmland disrupt wildlife corridors and threaten future food security with the loss of agricultural land. 

Campaigners fear the Reform UK Party aims to end subsidies for renewable energy, block solar and wind projects and hopes to overturn the fracking ban.

However, the authority has stated it will support the development of energy security, energy efficiency and clean energy and its Cabinet is due to consider council officers’ recommendations to approve a Mayoral Renewables Fund grant of £700,000 for a Clean Energy Facility at the former Williamthorpe Colliery site.

Reform UK Cllr Charlotte Hill has also said that solar parks should only be used on industrial estates instead of scarring the countryside.

But campaigners, who have accused Reform UK of ‘reality denial’ concerning Climate Change, claimed this year’s summer was the hottest ever recorded in the UK, setting new national temperature records and that Britain endured one of its driest springs on record with many reservoir levels depleted and several regions officially entering drought status as dry weather affected water supplies, wildlife and agriculture.

The campaigners argued that heat-driven inflation is pushing food prices higher as harvests and supply chains struggle and the protesters claim that Reform’s attempts to erase climate policy are a direct betrayal of the public.

Protester Derek Honour, a retired vicar, said “The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has brought together all of the world’s leading climate scientists and their research over decades has shown conclusively that the climate extremes we are now starting to experience are caused by human activity.

“Reform’s denial of this is at best unbelievably arrogant and at worst deliberately deceptive. The resultant cancelling of Derbyshire County Council’s Climate Change policies is I believe putting our lives at risk.”

The national Reform UK Party is also considering pursuing gas sources in England which could see a drive to reinstate fracking which is currently banned.

Richard Tice, the national Reform Party’s Deputy Leader and energy spokesperson, has said there is potentially ‘hundreds of billions of energy treasure in the form of shale gas’ and it is ‘grossly financially negligent’ to leave that value underground and not extract it.

Staveley resident Kerry O’Connor, a hotel housekeeper, said: “Reform are copying Trump’s ‘drill baby drill’ politics of death. Look at Texas, where over a hundred people were killed in this summer’s floods. Those deaths are on the hands of politicians who denied the science, withdrew funding and dismantled protections. Reform are dragging Britain down the same deadly road.”

Campaigners highlighted an Institute and Faculty of Actuaries’ statement which outlined that climate and nature risks are driven by human activity and populations are already impacted by food system shocks, water insecurity, heat stress and infectious diseases and if such activities go unchecked, mass mortality, mass displacement, severe economic contraction and conflict become more likely.

Swanwick resident Amy Trewick, an ecologist, said: “Reform talk endlessly about immigration, but if they truly cared about reducing displacement, they’d stop backing the industries driving it. Fossil fuels are forcing millions to flee their homes as areas of the planet become uninhabitable and drive conflict over resource scarcity.”

Reform County Cllr Carol Wood has repeatedly had to defend questions from the public at Full Council meetings concerning the administration’s position on Climate Change and Net Zero carbon reduction targets.

She told the latest council meeting: “We are not engaged in national politics here. We are determinedly giving good common sense and economically sustainable answers and policies for all our constituents as we are demonstrating by various policies on environment to improve clean air and improve future resilience and energy in new homes.”

Cllr Wood reiterated that the council is not adhering to national agendas but it does support retrofit social housing which improves energy efficiency, creates lower fuel costs and reduces carbon emissions and the council does look at reducing air pollution for residents health and well-being.

She added that the council is adopting ‘common sense approaches’ to policies for residents and businesses in Derbyshire and that is their remit as councillors and not to deliver national agendas.

The Labour Government supports the expansion of solar power in its bid to achieve clean energy by 2030 and it also supports battery energy storage schemes which store excess electricity from renewable sources for later use as part of efforts to establish a decarbonised electricity grid and energy security. 

It argues that such schemes support Net Zero targets by reducing greenhouse gas emissions and that they increase energy security and will support economic growth.     

Green Party Cllr Gez Kinsella has said he has ‘major concerns’ about the council’s decision to scrap it Climate Change committee arguing that it puts the council’s legal duties on biodiversity at risk.   

Cllr Kinsella also opposed and criticised the council’s opposition to solar farms and BESS schemes on greenfield sites as ‘ill thought out’ and ‘problematic’. 

He claims that the Council for the Preservation of Rural England and the National Farm Union are eager to protect high-grade farmland from solar farms but are less concerned about the use of low-grade farmland. 

Cllr Kinsella said roof tops and brownfield sites should be used for solar energy as well as any agricultural land where it is least productive and of low quality.

Conservative Group Leader, Cllr Alex Dale, has said the council’s decision to scrap its Climate Change committee was ‘short-sighted’ and even though he understands concerns around Net Zero targets he added that Climate Change is still happening and there are challenges to be faced.

However, Cllr Dale backed Cllr Graves’ motion to protect South Derbyshire’s greenfield sites from solar farms and BESS schemes and he achieved an amendment to include the whole county due to his concerns that not even low-quality farm land should be used for such schemes.

Derbyshire’s eight district and borough councils as well as Derby City Council support a Climate Change policy or strategy with either action plans or Net Zero targets influenced by national policy to reduce carbon emissions.

The Labour-led East Midlands Combined County Authority also has a policy to tackle climate change by becoming carbon neutral by 2050 and it is aligned with national ambitions with a drive towards the region becoming cleaner and more sustainable.