MPC(24)10
Reports from Outside Bodies
Burness Parish Room Management Committee – nothing to report
Melton Trust – Things have been quieter for the Melton Trust over Christmas with no new applications.
Melton Primary School – there was supposed to be a meeting with SCC to discuss the new nursery building and the concerns about the design but this has been postponed to next week.
The new morning routine is a success. All children who were struggling with transition in the mornings are now coming through the Dock Lane gate and are having a fantastic time playing before school starts. Parents have adapted to the change and children are loving the opportunity to play, chat to friends and be out in the cold, winter air.
The new Family Support Worker has settled in really quickly and is going to be a fantastic asset to the school.
The Choir are off to the O2 on 30th January to sing in the Young Voices Choir (8000 children).
Melton Messenger – Editorial deadlines are 16th January, 16th February and 15th March 2024.
Suffolk Association of Local Councils (SALC) – nothing to report
Suffolk Disability Forum – next meeting is the 23rd January so there will be a report for the February Full Council meeting.
Melton, Woodbridge and Deben Community Partnership – see item MPC(24)03.03
Woodbridge and Melton Society – The Society’s Active Travel Woodbridge Working Group lead is in ongoing conversation with the SCC project team about the list of proposals put forward by the group. SCC has promised a further meeting once their project proposals are finalised. The detailed response to the proposal can be found on their website:
Deben Estuary Partnership – Cllr Packard to report
Adaptive Action Group – Peter James
Community Planning Workshop for Climate Action & Nature Recovery
The one-day workshop was held at Waldringfield Village Hall on the 30th August 2023 for councillors, town clerks and stakeholders and facilitated by Professor Hobson*. The aim and objectives shown in the vision statement below:
“To promote regenerative action and implement plans which create a sustainable environment in the East Suffolk and Deben Valley is protected and renewed, where biodiversity is regenerated, and ecological threats are minimised so that the human impact on our natural environment is optimised to the benefit of both people and planet.”
Tools and strategies have been developed by Peter Hobson and others to assist in planning and management of ecosystems. This system comes under the heading of MARISCO which stands for Adaptive Management of Vulnerability and Risk at Conservation sites.
MARISCO is a methodological approach used to facilitate the integration of the risk and vulnerability perspective into the management of conservation projects and sites. It is designed to take into account the impact of climate change in the strategic management of protected areas, although it is not confined solely to climate change. While other scientific approaches to vulnerability assessments focus on prediction models based on biophysical data, MARISCO integrates both scientific data and information of other stakeholders, such as indigenous groups. Key to this method is the input of multi-stakeholder groups which get together and discuss ecosystem services, likely impacts of climate change, as well as other direct and underlying threats. This discussion is supported by further knowledge, such as scientific data that is collected beforehand and presented in an easy to understand way during the stakeholder get-together.
This approach may be useful in assisting Melton in the management of green spaces, preserving and improving biodiversity and assessing more robustly the impact and mitigating the effect we have on the environment by possibly incorporating more sustainable methods of house building, energy use and food production.
I understand Woodbridge Town Council is building in some of these strategies and it is hoped that Melton Parish Council could work with them on areas where there is common ground.
It is understood that Peter Hobson would be prepared to talk to Melton Parish Council further about this if the council so wished.
I aim to keep in touch with the Woodbridge Climate Emergency Committee on what progress is being made at their monthly meetings. Please let me know of any queries and I will try my best to find the answers.
Climate change is already happening and appears to be gathering pace especially over the last two to three years and any action taken to adapt to these changes however small is probably worthwhile if our children are to have any future at all.
* Professor in Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainability, Writtle University
