South East Division Biography
The South East Division encompasses the largest population of all Environmental Protection UK's Divisions, as it includes London and surrounding counties as far as our 'corners' of Hampshire, Oxfordshire, Essex and Kent. The Division also looks to extend its influence to our near French neighbours, and has successfully bid for EU funding to work with them and to help solve local shortfalls.
The Division has over 220 members, around one-half as individuals and one-third as local authorities, one of the Division's current priorities is to increase membership. In 2008 we welcomed Eastbourne-based, Dr. Peter Kayes as our new Honorary Secretary, and he has brought not only his industrial background but also a passion for involving our members. With Philip Thompson of the Corporation of the City of London as the Division's Chair, and kindly offering meeting space, there is a good balance of town and country leading the Divisional
Committee.
Issues of concern for the South East range from those of pollution in the inner city to climate change effects in the countryside, and although the South East may be the 'engine room' of the UK economy, it has deep pockets of deprivation in parts of London and coastal towns. We aim to organise event on issues of regional concern on a regular basis. Concerned at the slow reaction to extensive floods in our area of October 2000, the Division organised a successful conference in 2004 with issues now taken up on the national agenda.
For the past 10 years the Division has been working with French partners in Upper Normandy and Picardy on mutual air quality issues, with three projects supported by the EU INTERREG. Emissions from stacks in the refineries of the Lower Seine, can cross the Channel in a day or two, contributing to the regional ozone problem from which this corner of Europe is particularly prone. The most recent project (the ARMO project) looking at the problem, and which also involved a number of schools in the South East, concluded with a major conference in 2006 in Brighton. It is hoped to secure more funding for further work on air quality problems both sides of the Channel.
At the Division's 2008 AGM, members considered the new National Indicators (NI) for local government on which all local authorities now need to report annually – up to 35 indicators* must be adopted in multi-agency "Local Area Agreements" by which Government agrees priorities with local government and other agencies (a relatively new idea here copying the French "contrat de plan"). It was noted that the City of London was alone in adopting NI 194 in its LAA (the reduction of NOx and PM10) as a result of its operations, but that NI 186 (the reduction of CO2 from the area, not just the council), had been the 5th most popular NI in LAAs, adopted by 100; members wondered what role Environmental Protection UK might have at national or divisional level to set improvement challenges for these indicators, as none had been set within the targets.
Find out more southeast@environmental-protection.org.uk