February 24th, 2021.

LDC Conservative Group release:


Lewes District council has been urged to declare an Ecological Emergency in preference to backing the Climate and Ecological Emergency Bill which is sponsored by radical environmental group Extinction Rebellion.

The call comes from the largest group on Lewes District Council as Conservatives there pressed the ruling coalition to “think local and act local” to tackle ecological issues facing the area.

At a meeting of the full council on February the 22nd, alliance members proposed a motion to support the Bill which would ride roughshod over Parliament by creating a citizens’ assembly whose recommendations would bypass the usual parliamentary approval process.

“The danger with this approach”, said Cllr Isabelle Linington, Conservative Group Leader and environmental spokesman, “is that the ‘experts’ advising the citizens’ assembly could propose one solution, but an alternative, or combination of approaches, may provide a better solution.”

Cllr Linington continued: “The council has just spent 18 months developing its Climate Change and Sustainability Strategy. One of the action points of this is to develop a Biodiversity Strategy. A far better approach to combat the present issues, and one we would have wholeheartedly supported, would have been the immediate declaration of an ecological emergency across the district, and the incorporation of the necessary actions to deal with ecological issues into the Biodiversity Strategy.”

The meeting rejected the Conservatives’ call and instead voted to back the controversial Bill which probably won’t be debated again in the current parliament.

The ruling coalition at Lewes were criticized by Conservatives as missing the chance to achieve something locally through their own actions. “This would be so much better than wasting time, energy, money and resources posturing towards something that is unlikely to come to fruition”, said Cllr Linington. “Actions really do speak louder than words and I’m afraid the ruling coalition has missed a valuable opportunity here.”