Civil Service in the news

The Government announces a commitment to cutting carbon emissions

Sir Gus O'Donnell

The Government has committed to cutting emissions and working in a more sustainable and environmentally responsible way in the future. To make this happen, the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Gus O'Donnell has announced a new centre of excellence to help departments achieve ambitions targets for reducing carbon emissions and waste.

The new centre will be called the Centre of Expertise for Sustainable Procurement (CESP) and will continue to respond to the increasing targets that the government has set for itself. The Centre is a direct response to the Sustainable Development Commissions latest report on how the Government is meeting its own sustainability objectives for tackling climate change.

Sir Gus, who took personal charge of work in this area last March, has made sustainability of the government estate one of his four priorities for the civil service. He said:

'The Civil Service must be fully committed to sustainable working, reflecting the increasing priority placed on environmental responsibility by the public we serve. We must find new and innovative ways of raising the bar for sustainable working, planning and procurement.'

Part of this includes several key measures that the government has initiated, including:

  • From April 2008 all departmental heads will have a specific objective to meet Sustainable Operations on the Government Estate (SOGE) targets, against which their performance will be assessed
  • A major Green Government IT programme will be launched in the summer
  • From 2010 all central Government departments will be included in a pioneering emissions trading scheme, the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC), which will compel them to improve their energy efficiency. This mandatory emissions trading scheme will cover around 5000 public and private organisations, including government departments, retailers, banks and local authorities, which combined account for 10 per cent of the UK economy's emissions
  • Action to achieve the work space efficiency standard of 12 square metres per FTE will be published in April 2008
  • From this summer all new vehicles used by ministers and permanent secretaries (except a small number exempt for operational reasons) will have carbon emissions below 130g/km
  • The use of bottled water for meetings and other official business is to be phased out across the whole government estate by the summer.

While the report reveals a small improvement in overall performance against its key 'eco' commitments, the commission has called on the government to urgently build on initiatives already taken to ensure targets can be met and demonstrate that the government is leading by example on the sustainability agenda.

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