Council Watch October 2025 - how are the new brooms doing?
Nearly half a year ago a new administration took charge at West Northamptonshire Council. In the days after the May election many people voiced concerns about the new Reform leadership - no local manifesto, lack of experience of local government, potentially reluctant councillors who stood as ‘paper candidates’. A more positive view of the change of leadership might have been that West Northamptonshire Council in its first term had simply picked up the baton from its failed predecessors and was heading towards the same fate, therefore a fresh and energetic approach would shake things up in a good way.
CA-WN recognises the critical role WNC plays in all our lives, including to a large extent setting the local agenda on climate and nature issues. It’s always been one of our core principles to be open to collaborating with anyone who shares our objectives, regardless of their political or other affiliations, and we’ve worked hard to build a constructive relationship with the council over the last 4 years.
A few weeks after the election, we wrote to all 76 WNC councillors congratulating them on their election, introducing CA-WN and inviting them to subscribe to CA-WN Exchange. One councillor subscribed in response – of course they will have had a lot on their plate at that time but still….
The new administration inevitably faces the same financial challenges as the old one, with a £9.6m overspend predicted for the financial year, and a local authority has many competing priorities on its to-do list. Nevertheless, the matters of climate change and nature depletion are not only important but increasingly urgent too.
Bearing this in mind, what have we seen from our new council leaders on environmental issues?
Most obviously, their decision to do away with the Net Zero targets introduced in 2022. [Net Zero meaning adding no new greenhouse gases (GHGs) to the atmosphere using a combination of cutting the amount of GHGs generated and removing GHGs from the air]. WNC’s aims had been to achieve Net Zero as a council by 2030 and for West Northamptonshire as a whole by 2045. These targets were always ambitious. In the world of business, it’s often thought better to slightly undershoot a stretching target than easily meet an undemanding one. Having no targets at all seems irresponsible.
The reasons for this decision (from the Cabinet meeting minutes1) were:
1. In line with the policy position of the new administration, the decision has been made to no longer retain the 2030 and 2045 net zero targets.
2. To enable the Council to focus its limited resources on matters which directly benefit local people and businesses, for example the delivery of the Warm Homes: Local Grant scheme for which the Council has been allocated £2.6m of national grant funding.
3. To adopt a position in recognition of the limited ability of the Council to materially affect global warming given the many factors outside of its control and the limited funds it has access to.
4. It is considered the Council can achieve better results for local people and for nature by focusing on matters within its control and for which it has significant influence.
Or to put it a different way:
1. It's our policy not to pursue Net Zero so we're not going to pursue Net Zero
2. We don't think cutting GHG emissions to deliver Net Zero benefits local people
3. We can't fix climate change by ourselves so we're going to leave it to someone else to do something
4. We're putting cutting GHGs and Net Zero in the 'too difficult' bucket
The UK has set a legally binding target of 2050 as the date to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 100% compared to 1990 levels. There is no specific legal requirement on local authorities but of course without them on board, the UK’s ability to meet the national target will be severely compromised.
The loss of WNC’s Net Zero targets was tempered by commitments to ‘environmental sustainability’, and to the Investors in the Environment accreditation earned in 2023. It’s not clear how the council defines environmental sustainability but claiming it without aiming to stop adding more greenhouse gases to the air has limited credibility.
At every level, dealing with the causes of the climate and nature crises and protecting ourselves from the consequences has to be a collaborative effort. In this context it’s a shame that WNC’s cross-party Sustainability Working Group hasn’t met since the election. While the group had no formal powers, it was working to influence policy and actions, and its role as a forum for bringing together officers and councillors of all parties shouldn’t be undervalued.
On the positive side, some GHG-cutting initiatives commenced under the last administration will continue under this one (e.g. an EV charging contract, targets to reduce energy and water use at some WNC premises). The Local Nature Recovery Strategy, which is a regulatory commitment, represents a real opportunity for change. The draft version has been expected out for consultation for some time, and we'll let you know when it appears.
One of the avenues open to CA-WN (and all West Northamptonshire residents) to communicate with the council is to use the public participation element of committee meetings to respond to matters on the meeting agenda. We have done this many times in the past to good effect. If anyone is willing to put themselves forward to attend a council meeting and read out a 3-minute statement on behalf of CA-WN, please get in touch.
1 https://westnorthants.moderngov.co.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=143&MId=2728&Ver=4