by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Environment Minister Dan Norris announced £1m funding for the third sector to inspire sustainable living as part of the government’s legacy action plan for the London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games
A £1 million fund available to third sector organisations that help the UK live more sustainably was announced on March 29, 2010 by Environment Minister Dan Norris. The Inspiring Sustainable Living fund is part of Defra’s responsibility to deliver the Government’s commitment to use the power of the London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games to inspire sustainable living.
Third Sector organisations who can apply for this funding will deliver one or more of the following; energy efficiency and usage in the home, waste and recycling, water efficiency and usage in the home, promoting more active travel via walking and cycling, greener spaces and sustainable consumption. The funding will be made available to groups who can demonstrate they have the ability to deliver initiatives creating behavioural change, and that they have the reach to do this at a grassroots and community level.
Environment Minister, Dan Norris said: “The London 2012 Games will no doubt inspire many people to think not only about their health but also the environment they live in. This funding announced today is being made available to those third sector groups who have the ability to change our lifestyles for a more sustainable future. Government alone is not able to deliver change and embed greener living behaviours, so by working with the third sector and using their networks it enables greater reach and the potential for longer lasting pro-environmental behaviour change.”
The Inspiring Sustainable Living fund was announced as one of the Defra actions in Shaping our Future, the recently published report from the joint ministerial and third sector Task Force on climate change, the environment and sustainable development. The funding will be available for projects operational anywhere in the UK in the run up to, during, and after, the London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games.
Third sector organisations looking to apply for the funding will need to robustly demonstrate that they understand the motivation of their audience, how they can measure and evaluate progress and most importantly, how the inspirational benefits of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games will help their project.
It is the Government’s ambition that the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games will be genuinely sustainable, with the Olympic Park a blueprint for sustainable living. It presents many opportunities to try new technologies, low carbon materials and innovative solutions. Energy efficiency and water efficiency have been central to the design of the Olympic Park in East London. The aim is to reduce carbon emissions from the built environment in the Olympic Park by 50% by 2013. The second strand of the Government’s sustainability plan is to inspire sustainable living, whereby individuals are encouraged to live more sustainably as a result of the 2012 Games.
It is just such a shame that the government made actually no provisions for cycling and walking to the different venues of the 2012 Olympics.
We remember all the great promises and then found that nothing in that area was being even considered, let alone be implemented.
The best idea would have been if the Olympics would have been, in fact, been kept away from London and Britain as a whole.
It has not benefited the local community and certainly is also not going to benefit the local economy of the areas concerned.
One particular community, that of the Romany-Gypsy who have lived for decades and even a century or such in that area, was completely relocated, more than likely so that the state of the government-run Gypsy Caravan Sites there would not be seen by the world's media. Same as what happening in Spain and in Greece during the Olympics in the recent times.
Also those Gypsies that had scrap businesses and haulage businesses have been forcibly relocated, often to areas so far away that their business has stopped being viable.
So much for all the promises as regards the 2012 Olympics.
© 2010
