Councillor Ken Howard

A few months ago I started working on my latest initiative. That WBC, in furtherance of its Climate Change Strategy and of environmental awareness generally, should deliver education on environmental matters related to global warming and climate change directly into schools.

A working group of 3 Councillors including myself was assembled from members of the Environmental O&S Committee (of which I am the Chairman) and I presented its findings and recommendations to the Committee last Monday.

The task group recommended that a programme should be run by an outside organisation with relevant expertise, aimed initially at the 8-11 year old age group to run for 3 years in order that all schools would have the opportunty to take part.

The accompanying recommendation proposed that it should not be financed from Council Tax money but instead that we should use some of the profits of the Council's energy company, Thameswey and that outside funding could also be sought from various sources.

I'm very pleased to be able to tell you that the O&S Committee agreed to send those recommendations forward to the Executive Committee for their approval before handing it over to Thameswey for implementation.