The Big Climate Conversation was a public engagement programme about climate change held over six months across Scotland as part of the Scottish Government’s Climate Change initiative.

Here is the feedback note for the event, attended by 24 people in the Village Hall, East Linton, on 21 October 2019.

Read the Scottish Government’s report on The Big Climate Conversation initiative online here or download the full report here (45Mb).

Overall, how much does the group know about climate change, net-zero, and/ or the climate emergency?

The group largely self-identified as knowing a moderate to large amount. Their answers suggest a good general awareness of the issues and high degree of engagement.

Are members of the group already acting, if not how could this be further supported?

This is an engaged, motivated, and active group. Many reported being motivated by their values – wanting to make the world a better place, to influence others to make positive change and to feel like they are making a difference.

Many reported barriers of personal capacity, including finance, time, headspace, knowledge, and skills to make further changes, as well as a fear of being overwhelmed by the problem. One particularly pertinent comment was, “To face it means our hearts break open. That’s too much.”

They also reported wider systemic barriers of political/societal culture (e.g. what is seen as a priority or considered a sacrifice) and what access they have to solutions needed to take action (e.g. what infrastructure and regulations are in place to drive wider change, motivate action and enable more sustainable options for them to choose – particularly given that this is a rural community).

What does the group think that Scottish Government should be doing to mitigate climate change? What can the Scottish Government do to engage people more on climate change?

The group consistently placed the following actions as a high priority from the range of options:

• Divesting from fossil fuels and phasing out the North Sea oil and gas extraction

• Creating a circular economy

• Increase in renewable energy (e.g. offshore wind)

• Tree planting

Other suggestions from the group included:

• Better awareness raising being honest and truthful about the situation, publish statistics regularly, educate the public, promote consuming less and eating less meat

• Invest in housing stock for sustainable housing: retrofit all homes that need it (which creates jobs), solar panels for all new builds, provide more funding and incentives for individuals to invest in more renewables

• More efficient transport systems: improve public transport, create safe cycle routes and cycle/pedestrian friendly towns and cities, e-bikes/cargobikes, public transport in cities to be free

• Stronger regulations: e.g. change the law on all aspects of reducing CO2, building regulations, planning, recycling, number of flights allowed, ways businesses operate e.g. planned obsolescence, for all public places and shops to keep the door closed if the heating is on, stop the removal of sea kelp

• Introduce incentives and schemes: e.g. workplace sustainability projects, get money off your council tax the greener you are, support local produce and local jobs, invest in enterprises that support reducing Co2

• For the Government to explore new ways of generating environmentally friendly wealth

There seemed to be an attitude of ‘polluter pays’ (e.g. fly more, pay more) and conversations consistently included concern over the distribution of impacts/burdens from policies (i.e. how policies affected individuals, most importantly the poor/least able to cope). The group seemed largely pro-regulation/legislation for implementing change, with some recognising this to support a wider cultural shift.

Many times, in conversation/feedback the importance of creating a positive vision was discussed for what a sustainable (‘green’) and fair Scotland could look like. Given that people frequently brought up communal values and a feeling of grief and being overwhelmed, we also feel that recognising/acknowledging these feelings would be critical for deepening engagement. 

Which actions did the participants feel would be the hardest to adopt/ change? How can the Scottish Government help to facilitate changes in those actions?

Participants most often brought up personal capacity issues (e.g. time, headspace, knowledge, feeling overwhelmed, affordability/costs) and cultural issues (e.g. acting in the face of peer pressure, and working against widespread norms of over consumption and waste) as being barriers that were hardest to overcome.

Creating financial incentives to enable investments in renewables such as solar panels were suggested and to make sure sustainable options remain affordable for those in poverty. Enabling people to act by education and helping equip people with the right knowledge was also mentioned several times. Stronger regulations and legislation which would enable change to happen across society also frequently came up.

Focusing ‘top-down’ government action on enabling ‘bottom-up’ action: i.e. strengthening people’s capacity and empowering them to make changes (e.g. enabling them to meet their everyday needs so that they have the time and energy to take further action, and involving them more in decisions).

Any further comments:

This is a group which sees the climate crisis as a priority issue for Government.  75% of participants stated it the climate crisis was 10/10 as a priority.

The group also felt that the Scottish Government needed to be more ambitious in their targets. 73% of  participants stated the Scottish Government’s current target of 2045 for net zero emissions was not ambitious enough.

You can download detailed data on what was said and how people felt at the event in the Village Hall here.