“Behaviour change essential for achieving climate goals” – House of Lords report
A report published on 12 October 2022 by the House of Lords Environment and Climate Change Committee elaborates on the following key points:
- Behaviour change is essential for achieving climate and environment goals,
and for delivering wider benefits. - The Government’s current approach to enabling behaviour change to
meet climate and environment goals is inadequate to meet the scale of the
challenge. - The public want clear leadership on the areas of behaviour change they
should prioritise, and they want the Government to lead a coordinated
approach to help them adapt by making change easier and fairer. - Priority behaviour change policies are needed in the areas of travel,
heating, diet and consumption to enable the public to adopt and use green
technologies and products and reduce carbon-intensive consumption. - There is a need for greater leadership and coordination across Government
departments and with wider society on behaviour change for climate and
environmental goals. - The Government needs to provide a positive vision and clear narrative on
how the public can help achieve climate and environment goals, and to
lead by example. - Information is not enough to change behaviour; the Government needs to
play a stronger role in shaping the environment in which the public acts,
through appropriately sequenced measures including regulation, taxation
and development of infrastructure. - Fairness is key to effective behaviour change.
- Businesses have a critical role to play in enabling behaviour change
through increasing the affordability and availability of greener products
and services, and engaging customers and employees. - Government should also support and celebrate civil society organisations,
faith communities and local authorities delivering local behaviour change
projects. - Government should learn from examples of where it has effectively enabled
behaviour change, including during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as
from past failures.