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Report on greening government reveals "shambles"

15 July 2008

A parliamentary committee report shows that government targets aimed at making its own departments greener are in chaos, the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) claims.

The environment audit committee (EAC) report Making Government Operations more Sustainable: A progress report follows a report by the government’s independent watchdog the Sustainable Development Commission earlier this year.

Both reports are very critical noting that the government’s performance is “extremely poor” and that very little progress has been made since the committee's last report in 2005.

The report says the government’s record is “very disappointing” and concludes that government needs to “demonstrate leadership by making rapid progress”.

One serious area of concern says PCS, which submitted evidence to the EAC inquiry, is accuracy of the data collected.

Government departments and agencies have to report on a series of targets that were set in 2006.

These include targets to reduce carbon emissions by 12.5% by 2010/11, to increase recycling by 40% by 2010 and to reduce water consumption by 25% by 2020.

However in the case of one department, the Ministry of Defence, operations that have been privatised were included in the data.

This artificially boosted the overall carbon reduction figure to 4%. When these MOD figures are removed carbon emissions are shown to have reduced by less than 1%.

The EAC report reveals confusion over how green electricity is treated for the purpose of calculating carbon emissions as well as uncertainty at the heart of government over what the term ‘carbon neutral’ (one of the key targets for the government estate by 2012) actually means.

PCS welcomes the EAC’s recommendations that the Office of Government Commerce, now responsible for monitoring departments’ delivery of the targets, should work with civil service unions to ensure that staff are trained and empowered to take a leading role in greening government departments.

Commenting on the EAC report, PCS assistant general secretary Chris Baugh said:

“This report shows that the government’s targets for greening its own departments are a shambles. It is inexcusable that the MOD should include figures for part of its operations that have been privatised and shows that insufficient attention is being paid to the importance of making government more sustainable.

"If the government cannot clean up its own act how is going to convince the rest of us? The report strongly supports our evidence to the committee of the failure to engage with staff at all levels . To address this the government should give legal rights to green reps as a matter of urgency.”

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