As a research-based charity whose core purpose is to try to protect children from harm, we cannot ignore the evidence of the significant harm that will befall future generations as a result of climate breakdown. As we have seen from our inaugural blog post by Lena Dominelli, this harm will disproportionately affect children. We therefore believe it is important that we consider our activities and seek to do what we can to reduce our environmental impact as an organisation.
At its most recent meeting the Board of Trustees endorsed this, committing that we will:
- Seek to understand the environmental impact of all our activities and aim to reduce this wherever possible
- Ensure we have an environmental policy in place laying out our expectations for staff, volunteers, and others
- Undertake regular checks to ensure we are making progress, and report on these to the Board
- Share our learning and ideas within the sector as a community united against this threat
- Talk to people within our communities and use our influence to advocate for greater climate awareness and action
As a result we will be taking the following actions:
- consciously consider our activities, choices and manner of operation across all our activities from an environmental standpoint, in the same way we would consider the financial or reputational impact of a particular activity. This might include the amount of travel we undertake and mode of transport used, how we run our meetings, what member products and conference merchandise we invest in, the quantity of printed material we produce, the environmental standards of any printed material, and the energy efficiency of our office practices and physical space.
- actively engage our members in this discussion, for example by consulting on what printed material people would like for events, and what other formats might be more appropriate for conveying information
- develop an environment policy appropriate for our organisation and in line with our stakeholder commitments
- engage with others within our sphere of influence to raise awareness of climate change as a future harm to children and to encourage action
We will hold this responsibility at Board level and report on progress annually.
We would like to invite other children's charities who share our social purpose to make a similar public commitment to do everything in their power to reduce the adverse environmental impact of their activities, and together do our bit to fight climate breakdown.
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