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‘With Reform tipped to win in other parts of the country, the west of England has a chance to change the narrative’
The specific phrase “green skills” has been used 46 times in the House of Lords since the start of 2020, by members from all sides of the chamber, with general agreement that they are sorely lacking in the UK. It is a term that often refers to refurbishing buildings for energy efficiency, or creating high-quality new structures, but should also take in land management and care for the natural world.
In a debate on the general subject of skills last year, I pointed to our failure to prepare for a just transition by skilling up our workers which is just part of a wider failure, a collapse in lifelong learning provision that has seen in the past decade four million “lost learners”, those who in earlier times would have been able to study, but now do not have the chance.
Yet in northwest Bristol yesterday, Mary Page, Green Party candidate for West of England Mayor, took me to see the start of a truly innovative, grassroots-driven effort to tackle the problem.
As a beneficiary of lifelong learning herself, having completed an access course and then a degree after a few years in the workplace, she is visibly passionate about the issue, and particularly interested in how the mayoral role can be used to ensure training is provided at times and in places that suit those who have to combine it with employment.
Mary Page and Natalie Bennett visited Ambition Lawrence Weston on Friday afternoon – photo: Hannah Massoudi
We visited Ambition Lawrence Weston, on the northwest outskirts of the city, a community centre that hugely impressed me, for the quality of its building and warm, inviting atmosphere, but particularly for the range of activities – particularly community building activities – that it supports. Friday night is a supper club, community members cooking and eating together, often with produce from the centre’s allotment. It boasts a community library, a “men in sheds” group, a wide variety of physical activities from chair yoga to kickboxing, and strong support for dementia patients and their carers and friends.
The sheer energy of Ambition, its huge success in reshaping options for residents of Lawrence Weston did not surprise me, for I already knew about the groundbreaking community energy scheme that saw the community erect then Britain’s largest onshore wind turbine. In fact I have been talking about it regularly since I spoke on a panel with Mark Pepper, Ambition’s founder, a couple of years ago.
Community-owned renewable energy schemes is something the Green Party, with community activists, has long been fighting for, and after multiple attempts to amend Tory then Labour energy bills, we finally won out in February this year.
But installing and maintaining those turbines, as well as insulating homes, installing heat pumps and caring for the environment will all take skills, and Ambition I was delighted to hear is now in the process of setting up training courses and skill- building activities, working with local colleges and universities. And in its food growing and cooking activities – and wildlife education, the local water vole population getting a particular mention – there is already a solid foundation of knowledge being created.
You would expect me to say that I very much hope Mary wins the election on Thursday – but it is obvious what a great fit she would be as WECA mayor to support efforts such as Ambition’s.
And as I arrived at Temple Meads, a YouGov poll came out stressing just how tight the race is. With Reform UK tipped to win mayoral races in other parts of the country – and getting, as they so often do, a great deal of media focus – the west of England has a chance to change the narrative, to demonstrate that it can further pioneer positive political directions for the UK by electing Mary as mayor on Thursday. With only this single post up for election, turnout will be key, every vote matters.
Politics is about much more than voting. What Ambition is doing is very much small-p politics, people getting together to build positive change. But voting matters too, demonstrates that people care, and can be hopeful for the future. So please do vote on Thursday, and vote for a positive, caring voice.
This is an opinion piece by Baroness Natalie Bennett, former leader of the Green Party who now sits in the House of Lords
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Main photo: House of Lords
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