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BBC News
2 days ago
- Business
- BBC News
Co-op's Biggleswade depot has thousands of solar panels installed
A supermarket firm has installed almost 7,000 solar panels on the roof of its largest regional distribution said the panels on its depot in Biggleswade, Bedfordshire were part of its journey to increase the amount of renewable power that it procures approximately 6,744 solar panels are expected to generate 2,500 MWh of renewable energy annually to help power its Thomas, group property & sustainability director at Co-op, said the project was a "landmark moment" and demonstrated "how businesses can make impactful changes to protect the planet". Co-op said the project reflected its ambition to lead the charge in businesses investing in renewable energy and to continue to combat climate retailer has committed to reaching net zero across its operations by 2035 and entire business by zero means no longer adding to the total amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere."By harnessing renewable energy, we are not only reducing emissions but also setting a strong example of best practice on how sustainable energy can be effectively integrated into day-to-day business operations" said Ms Thomas."We believe every business should be playing its part in accelerating the greening of the grid, by reducing energy demand and investing directly in renewable electricity generation." Co-op recently published research with Green Alliance on the role of businesses as energy organisation has previously announced it planned to install solar panels on up to 700 sites across its food, funeral services and logistics portfolio over the next three years. Follow Beds, Herts and Bucks news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
New Statesman
11-06-2025
- Politics
- New Statesman
Letter of the week: Building Britain's future
Photo by FPG / Archive Photos / Getty Images Anoosh Chakelian's Cover Story (6 June) depressingly explains how poorly houses are being built in the UK and how few protections buyers have. Setting this against the government's aim of building 1.5 million homes in its first term, the problem is even more concerning. House-building needs to be changed to meet that target and create better houses. We need to look more creatively at high-density housing to avoid acres of identikit suburbs. (One model could be the Montreal development, Habitat 67: rather than towers it formed a landscape of housing units, hills and vales.) We also need bigger houses to reduce the number of moves, so people can stay longer and build communities. Cladding in timber and materials other than brick would reduce cement manufacture and lock in carbon. Such changes would be a true revolution, make real change and reconfigure housing for a better future. It might even enable the government to build 1.5 million homes, some of them council houses. We need homes for the future, not houses looking back to the past. David Cockayne, Cheshire Home to roost Congratulations to Anoosh Chakelian for highlighting the lousy quality of much of our new housing (Cover Story, 6 June). We need to build many more new homes, particularly affordable ones. But the assumption that weakening the planning system will magic up the homes we need is deeply flawed. Planning liberalisation, promoted over the past 20 years by developer-funded think tanks, is viewed as a panacea by many on the centre-left. But as Chakelian suggests, we need more planning and better-enforced building standards, not less. Let's build – but let's build homes people will want to live in and ones we can be proud in years to come. Shaun Spiers, executive director, Green Alliance Stocks and scares The UK government, with its own currency, need not 'balance the books' (Leader, 6 June), as the late economist John Weeks and others have made clear. The 2008 crisis, for example, was born not from public debt but from the unbridled growth in private-sector debt. The warning sign was the acceleration in lending. Refusing to provide 'greater funding' is a political choice by Rachel Reeves. The Treasury has acknowledged there is no aspect of the government's banking arrangements that can prevent government expenditure from being realised once it has been authorised by parliament – with its large majority, it should be easy for Labour. The British government is not exposed to the risks of 'running out of money', defaulting on debt obligations, the sentiments of bond markets or a need to reduce levels of government debt below those demanded by the economy. The government can and should spend to invest. Angela Rayner's housing project would be a good place to start. David Murray, Wallington, Surrey In defence of Healey Jason Cowley rightly praises John Healey's personal integrity and his commitment, manifest in the Defence Review, to improving the living conditions and terms of service personnel (Newsmaker, 6 June). That is both right and fundamental: if service personnel are not looked after, they will – as they are at the moment – leave at a faster rate than recruitment can replenish. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe The Prime Minister may aim to turn the UK into 'a battle-ready, armour-clad nation'. But the resources that Healey will have at his disposable – 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027 – will probably only, as the head of the German Armed Forces put it describing Olaf Scholz's similarly miserly defence increase, 'fill the potholes'. To meet our security and defence needs, as Cowley points out, will require something more akin to the proposed Nato targets: 3.5 per cent of GDP on defence, and a further 1.5 per cent on defence infrastructure, and it needs to happen sooner than sometime after 2030. Money, however, is not everything. If, as Keir Starmer said at Govan shipyards earlier this month, this is about 'everyone playing their role… Doing their duty to the nation and to each other to preserve our way of life' – a national effort, in other words – then a lot more storytelling will be required. The Prime Minister has lit the rhetorical touch paper. I'm not sure he is clear where the firework is going to go off. I wish John Healey luck. Simon Diggins, retired colonel, Rickmansworth Solving inequalities In his excellent letter in response to the Gordon Brown guest edit on child poverty, John Lowell asks 'What has happened?' (Correspondence, 6 June). The answer is quite simple: a huge growth in inequality. Richard Wilkinson has produced overwhelming evidence over the past 20 years that inequality is the main driver of most of our current societal crises: poverty, declining mental and physical health, homelessness and so on. The Tories and the right-wing media endorse growing inequality as a necessary corollary to higher economic growth. The rest of us know that this is false. And so do the OECD, the IMF and the World Bank. These bodies have publicly stated that growing inequality constrains growth. That makes reducing inequality an economic imperative, not just a moral one. I am certain Rachel Reeves knows this too. The challenge for the Labour leadership is how to combat the hysteria of the Daily Mail et al around the fear that, among other things, if we pursue redistributive policies, we might find billionaires fleeing from the UK. If the IMF does not see this as an economic problem, then why should we? Dick Brown, Buxted, East Sussex F-AI-rweather friend? I read Megan Nolan's article (Personal Story, 6 June) with interest and agreement. This new tech kid on the block has us all rattled, and not in a good way. Nolan is correct that no one wants an AI bot pretending to be their best friend. Friends in the real world offer sane and sensible advice, proffer help and bequeath solidarity when all the world appears to be against one. Nolan's own friendships, which she writes so well about, are down to Earth, proactive and sustaining, not like the sycophantic ones conceived in Silicon Valley. Judith Daniels, Norfolk Lawless lands Megan Gibson rightly states much more should have been done by the international community much earlier in respect to the Netanyahu regime's policy on Gaza (World View, 6 June). Israel has not just flouted international law, but violated the four fundamental aspects of it. These are the Genocide Convention; international humanitarian law (IHL), which covers war crimes; treaties concerning nuclear weapons, which cover the development, testing and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction; and the UN Charter on interventionist actions against sovereign states. The Genocide Convention, for example, condemns 'inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part'. And blockades that prevent the flow of medical and food supplies are in direct violation of IHL. International law either needs to mean everything or nothing. Failure to enforce it is a stain on the conscience of those with influence, just as their negligence (or complicity) has been from the onset. Jordan Scott, Newcastle upon Tyne Wealth vs health One can only share Rachel Clarke's incredulity and disgust at the deprioritisation of certain patients and agree with her that the NHS needs greater investment, not less (Health Matters, 6 June). The same applies to social care, especially for those with dementia. The government has announced instead another inquiry because it can't face up to the cost of fair and proper public provision. There is one obvious solution for these problems. The Chancellor should gracefully tell us that she only meant she would not increase taxes on working people, and that now is the time to tax wealth. Properly done, wouldn't that also be a way to solve a lot of other problems too? Michael Chanan, Windsor Rachel Clarke, in her profoundly sad but excellent article, uses one term with which I find myself in disagreement: 'deficit'. Deficit would be appropriate if the NHS were a business, but the clue is in the name. It is a 'service' and it is – and has been for years – underfunded. Were it a business, it wouldn't do hip replacements after old people break the neck of their femur; a business could say, 'Why bother, they're going to die soon anyway?' The NHS needs to be properly funded and we need to tell the truth about how that needs to be done: a properly calculated progressive system of taxation. I'm old enough to remember the time before the NHS. We do not want to go back to anything like that. Jim Maloney, Wigan Write to letters@ We reserve the right to edit letters [See also: Mike Berners-Lee: 'Being a billionaire can make people go nuts'] Related
ITV News
02-06-2025
- Politics
- ITV News
'Flaws' in Welsh Government plans for new environmental law 'must be corrected'
Plans to introduce a new independent body to monitor the Welsh Government's compliance with environmental laws need to be rethought, according to campaigners. The Green Alliance, an organisation that campaigns for more political action on climate change, said it largely welcomed the Welsh Government's draft Environment Bill as a "major milestone" but "flaws in the bill must be corrected". If the law is passed, it would require Welsh ministers to consider environmental impact more thoroughly when making policy and see a body established to monitor, report, and enforce environmental law compliance from Welsh Government and public authorities. It would also introduce a biodiversity target setting framework, which includes requirements to evaluate, monitor and report on progress. Huw Irranca-Davies MS, Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Climate Change and Rural Affairs, said his government's plans represent a "significant step forward" in their efforts to protect the environment. The Environment Bill is described by Welsh Government as enshrining environmental protection within all areas of policy-making. Natural Resources Wales and Senedd ministers would need to think about prevention, a precautionary approach and that "the polluter pays" principle, when making policy that impacts the environment. Other key parts of the Bill include: The establishment of the Office of Environmental Governance Wales, ('the OEGW') - a statutory body that will provide strategic oversight of environmental law. It will monitor, report, and enforce environmental law compliance. A biodiversity target setting framework that includes requirements to evaluate, monitor and report on progress. Welsh Ministers will be required to lay draft regulations before the Senedd that set targets that focus on reducing the risk of extinction of native species; the effective management of ecosystems; reducing pollution; and the quality of evidence to inform decisions relating to biodiversity, access to that evidence and its use and application. Welsh Ministers must take steps to promote awareness of the importance of biodiversity and the threats it faces. The Deputy First Minister said the bill signifies a commitment to protect the environment for future generations. The Bill has been mostly welcomed by environmental charities and groups. The RSPB said it was "delighted" the Bill had "finally" been laid out but it would like to see the legislation go even further to address the nature emergency. That is a sentiment echoed by the Green Alliance, who have raised questions over how the independence of the OEGW will be protected. The Green Alliance claimed: "At present, there is no provision in the bill to safeguard the body's independence or financial security, as there is in English and Scottish legislation. "The Welsh Government is also proposing to require the OEGW to cede power on its enforcement decisions to a panel which will include people appointed by Welsh Ministers. This would undermine the body's governance and must be removed from the final version of the bill. "No information has yet been provided on the timetable for setting up the new body or the transition from the non-statutory Interim Environmental Protection Assessor for Wales." Ruth Chambers, senior fellow at the organisation said the Welsh Government has "swerved the issue" of the new body's independence. She added that instead of ensuring independence, it instead holds "direct government control over its board appointments, budgets and enforcement decisions. Equivalent bodies in the rest of the UK are independent". "Wales should rethink now if it really wants a body with teeth that can do its job properly," she said. The Green Alliance also criticised the planned biodiversity target framework as not urgent enough, "with the first targets not due until three years after the bill has passed". The Environment Bill will be introduced to the Senedd on Monday 2 June, with the Climate Change Secretary making a further statement on the plans in the chamber on Tuesday 3 June.
BBC News
07-05-2025
- Politics
- BBC News
Complex discussions over who runs Worcestershire County Council
Complex discussions over who runs council - Reform 11 minutes ago Share Save Phil Wilkinson Jones Local Democracy Reporting Service, Worcestershire Share Save BBC Reform won 27 seats on the county council after last week's elections "Complex" discussions are taking place to determine who will control Worcestershire County Council, Reform UK has said. The Conservatives lost control of the council at last week's election, but no single party won the 29 seats needed for a majority, leaving the local authority in no overall control. Reform is the biggest party on the council now with 27 seats. Alan Amos, who won the Bedwardine seat for the party, said: "These are the most complex set of discussions I've seen. I've seen people having conversations who I've never seen talking to each other before." He said his party wanted a stable majority "as you have to be able to plan ahead in order to get things done". "Nobody knows what's happening yet. There are furious and desperate attempts to form an anti-Reform coalition that haven't been successful," he added. It would make sense for the other parties "to admit they won the election to give them the chance to run the council", he said. The Tories lost 33 councillors in the latest elections, but remain the second largest party Matt Jenkins, who won re-election in St Stephen, said he would continue as the leader of the Green and Independent Alliance at county hall. Alan Bailes, the new independent councillor for Alvechurch, has joined the group, which already includes Tom Wells, the long-serving independent councillor for Powick & Longdon. "Our group is up to 10 now, so we have more clout. The independents are still independent, but we work together on motions and ideas," Jenkins said. "We are in discussion with other groups. Reform are very close to the magic number of 29 and we expect them to try to form a minority administration. "We have full council on 22 May and don't want to be in a rush, but discussions are still ongoing." Adam Kent, former cabinet member for economy and skills, has been elected as the new Conservative group leader having held his seat in Wythall. The group is much-diminished with 12 councillors, having had 45 following the elections in 2021. Kent said he was awaiting the results of other parties' leadership elections. "Once group leaders are in place, we'll be able to have more constructive discussions," he said. This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations. Follow BBC Hereford & Worcester on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
BBC News
29-04-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Farming Today 29/4/25 Energy infrastructure, growing pulses for animal feed, horticulture report
One of the government's major objectives is to deliver greener energy across the UK; but to do that, thousands of acres of farmland and wider countryside are being affected, as electricity generated from offshore windfarms and solar developments is routed to the national grid. In a new report, the Institution of Engineering and Technology has outlined the specific costs of pylons and cables buried underground and on the seabed. The report estimates in the next decade there will need to be five times more onshore transmission infrastructure than has been built in the last 30 years, and four times the amount that currently exists offshore. All week we're looking into pulses. Many of us eat peas, beans or lentils as part of our diet. Pulses also make up a major part of animal feed in the form of soya. That comes mostly from South America where rainforest is often cleared to grow it. The Nitrogen Climate Smart Programme is a project looking to replace imported soya with home grown pulses. We visit a farm taking part in trials to grow pulses. The UK economy could get a boost if everyone ate more UK-grown fruit and veg according to a new report by the Green Alliance, a think tank which works with environmental groups. It says we currently import five sixths of our fruit and half of our veg but expanding horticultural production could add £2.3 billion to the national economy and create more than 20 thousand jobs. Presenter = Anna Hill Producer = Rebecca Rooney
