The essence of my response is sadly contained in the key part of Giles Watts' and Mike Allen's own response above, which is that this is a 'huge lost opportunity' for vital real change, viz: • The sustainability checklist is advisory only when it should be mandatory • There are no additional standards or targets set • The scope of the checklist is unambitious and does not include transport, infrastructure or ecology issues. Thus, as they conclude, 'despite the fine words it does not feel that climate change and sustainable issues will in fact carry any more weight in planning decisions than they currently do.' Oh dear oh dear! Richard

Thanks Rachel, very glad to hear that. Shaftesbury's Neighbourhood Plan (SNP), produced by the town council and adopted by Dorset Council in May 2021, is an ideal vehicle for local people to effect real climate change mitigating measures. It feeds into the Dorsetwide Local Plan and has legal force. The rules say the SNP can be reviewed again in 2023. That means the people of Shaftesbury should start putting pressure now on its local councillors - town and county - to develop the conversation started at the 'Shaftesbury 2030: Choosing Our Future' symposium at Shaftesbury School last month for a comprehensive review of the SNP to produce real and lasting physical infrastructure benefits for the town - be it the installation of wind turbines for energy, rewilding of natural areas, the cultivation of local food, an insistence on solar panels and electric vehicle charging points on all new housing, new energy efficient house building, or even a limit on more residential housing. The people to talk to are the chair of the town council's planning and highways committee (and deputy mayor for 2022-23) Virginia Edwin-Jones and its vice-chair John Lewer. Contact them via the town council's website (http://shaftesbury-tc.gov.uk) or come to their meetings in the town hall on the first Tuesday of every month and tell them what you want to see happen in person. The next meeting is at 7pm on 7 June.

Thus no doubt proving what an imperfect system democracy is...

Are the Conservatives the least climate concerned of the four main parties? Their candidate Simon Hoare certainly gave that impression in his answers earlier on this forum - so make sure you ask questions on Thursday night to pin him and them down such as: Is there an emergency - yes or no? And if yes what will your party do about it now, starting today? Is it time to go on an effective wartime footing?

A welcome improvement, thanks.

No LibDem-Greens pact operating in North Dorset which will presumably split both the climate action and Remain vote on 12 December. With Nigel Farage having ordered the Brexit candidate to stand down here it looks like a clear run for Simon Hoare for the Conservatives unless Pat Osborne makes a strong fist of it for Labour.

What's more interesting is that sex came after dog, Brexit and tea!

So no surprise there then!

So bring it to the attention of the town council by telling them at their next meeting on 18 June and make sure you feed your comment into Shaftesbury's neighbourhood plan due out for consultation on 15 July.

But how soon and will it be enough?

Maybe time for the now outdated petition on this site to be changed to demand that Dorset Council now takes whatever actions are necessary towards limiting carbon emissions in Dorset to whatever level is essential by 2025 as its top priority?

Here's a taster of one: 'Can I ask if the climate action was solely due to the eco-warriors (terrorists ) lazing about on the grass outside the council offices. If so, you have been played by a bunch of terrorists. Climate changes have been happening with the plant [sic] was evolved from dawn of time.' As the new chairman of the council (Pauline Batstone) and the new leader (Spencer Flower) both tried to block the climate declaration yesterday watch out for what happens at the next council meeting on 18 July when this will be discussed again.

Hate to spoil the celebrations but if you want a cold hard reality check just read some of the 50 plus comments on this declaration on the Dorset Council website at https://news.dorsetforyou.gov.uk/2019/05/16/dorset-council-ushers-in-new-era-by-declaring-climate-emergency/ They're far more terrifying than climate breakdown!

At the drop-in day at Shaftesbury youth club Lidl held a couple of weeks ago, their head of property told me that the company had no plans to install either solar panels or electric charging points on the grounds that the planning authority (now Dorset Council) are not insisting on it. Commercial developers rarely, if ever, do anything proactive unless they have to or there's more money in it for them. Both Persimmon and Redrow gave exactly the same excuse recently for not building sustainability into their plans for development in Shaftesbury.

@Lady Ellah Try copying and pasting the URL here in reply to this...

@Lady Ellah Sorry, can't find the video. Can you supply a link?

Think global, act local...

You should - and let us know what you find. It remains a great pity there are no Green Party or Planet Shaftesbury candidates anywhere in N Dorset.

I baulked at scoring each candidate out of, say, five for awareness, knowledge, commitment, speed of reply, and enthusiasm on the climate change issue but then decided why not? So for what they're worth here's my scores - purely personal and subjective of course: Awareness Knowledge Commitment Speed Enthusiasm Total score Derek Beer (LD) 2/5 3/5 2/5 3/5 2/5 2/5 Alex Chase (Con) 2/5 2/5 1/5 3/5 1/5 2/5 Tim Cook (LD) 2/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 Melanie Costas (Lab) 2/5 2/5 3/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 Lester Dibben (Ind) 2/5 1/5 3/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 Andy Hollingshead (Ind) 3/5 3/5 2/5 4/5 3/5 3/5 William Kenealy (Lab) 4/5 3/5 4/5 4/5 4/5 4/5 Julian Prichard (Con) 2/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 Lester Taylor (UKIP) 1/5 1/5 1/5 0/5 1/5 1/5 Steve Unwin (UKIP) 0/5 1/5 0/5 0/5 0/5 0/5 Peter Yeo (ind) 2/5 2/5 3/5 2/5 2/5 2/5 All candidates may score highly on other issues but on the climate change issue, generally speaking, I found most candidates to be uninformed and tentative.

So who will?