MCA’s fourth Hug Green Arts Festival was the biggest and – we think – the best we have yet held. Well over 500 people came though the Foxlowe Arts Centre’s doors in Leek to enjoy a full day of music, poetry, arts and crafts. The sun shone and visitors of all ages flocked from across the district and beyond. The Foxlowe ran out of food for the first time in anyone’s memory.
This year, the central theme was the importance of trees. Participants ran tree-themed activities throughout the day, including the opportunity to construct a tree mandala and drop-in workshops making eco-prints with leaves. The latter were so popular that people did not want to leave.
There was an astonishing variety of things to do with wood on offer. Storylogs saw visitors making small ash logs to create pyrographed artworks; Cheshire Bodgers showed how to – bodge! Anthony Hammond demonstrated willow weaving; Heather Smith whittled; while our own Peter Oakley put on display the gentle beauty of the pole lathe. For those with energy left there was a guided tree ID walk, as well as the launch of the Leek Tree Trail (thanks to Chris Thompson).
The swifts are back! These delightful harbingers of spring and summer have returned to the skies over Leek, with reliable reports of sightings (plus the sound of their distinctive scream) coming from Haregate and several other locations.
Although hugely appreciated by us, they are not the only indicators of a rosier picture in the Moorlands. As we report in our articles elsewhere, there have been many positive developments locally, some already in train, some in the pipeline and some potential opportunities (we hope not mirages) for the future.
On the Energy front, the encouraging news is that parts of Leek have been mentioned as a possible target in a government consultation on Heat Network Zoning, which simply put could provide a community heating system for houses in tightly packed terraced streets. We have also been asked to take part in a consultation on barriers to community energy projects, so please contact our Energy team (
Last month, two of our members, Sally Perry and James Firkins, met our local MP Karen Bradley for a discussion on climate issues affecting the Moorlands. We were delighted to get the opportunity, even though the time available was short, as we’d been requesting a meeting for quite some time. Here are the questions and her summarised replies. See the link at the end for a full downloadable report.
Local Public Transport
We know you’ve very active on getting the Leek to Stoke rail line revived, and we wish you well with that project. But bus services in the Moorlands are in a parlous state. Could you tell us what you’re doing to save what we already have and bring back the kind of routes that can help residents get to work, education or even hospital appointments?
Her response -
This wonderful film is a spinoff project from Save Our Wild Isles that brought together young people from across the UK to tell their story through film, and take action for nature. Over a hundred young people took part in the workshops and the completed film will premiere on YouTube on Monday 27 November. It showcases the action being taken by young changemakers, and their vision for the future of our world.
We are thrilled to be able to join with some of the filmmakers and participants in hosting a screening at the Foxlowe Arts Centre at 7:00pm on Wednesday 29 November. It will be introduced by our panel of participants (Alana Wheat, Ed Daly and Xander Wood), who will share their stories on the project, and followed by a Q&A session, possibly also including the producer, Ben Sandbrook.
So, watch the trailer, make a note of the date and look out for our publicity on Facebook and elsewhere. If you can share and like the posts, so much the better.
Rishi Sunak may have gambled on using opposition to Net Zero as a vote winner but inside Moorlands House a consensus still exists on the need to act decisively to decarbonise key sectors such as housing.
The Moorlands ranks very low on energy efficiency by national and regional standards: just 25.6% of houses have an EPC rating of C or above, compared to 41% for England and 36% for the West Midlands. The Moorlands also ranks badly on fuel poverty: 16% of households fall into this category compared to 13.2% for England and Wales.
The resources available to district councils in this area are painfully thin – instead of the long-term funding needed for such a multi-faceted project, authorities are forced to rely on irregular grants. These are small compared to the size of the task, the windows for obtaining and delivering the funding are tight, and the money is often hedged about with difficult restrictions.
SMDC has two new pots of money to deploy in this area. One is HUG 2 (the Home Upgrade Grant Phase 2 – not our green arts festival). This £1.5m fund runs until March 2025 and will be used to offer energy improvements to houses that are not connected to the gas grid. These measures include heat pumps, insulation and other measures.
The scheme is run through Staffordshire Warmer Homes – a route which has worked well on some schemes, less so on others. MCA have long argued that SMDC should be more pro-active in ensuring that energy efficiency schemes are fully taken up.
This is one of the subjects that the re-formed SMDC Climate Working Group is focussing on. In the previous round of working groups – in which MCA took part – members were largely left to themselves, and the results were patchy. Even those that produced definitive outcomes were ignored.
Read more: Spotlight Autumn 2023 - Making Moorlands Houses Warmer
Earlier this month, four MCA members took our stall, by bus, to the Stoke-on-Trent Sustainability Summit, organised by Stoke Central MP, Jo Gideon. It was themed around ‘three pillars of sustainability’ focussing on the ‘importance of environmental action, economic vision, and social responsibility to restore a healthy planet, economy, and society’.
It was good to hear so many excellent speakers, some of whom we already know and value, and also to see these important issues being integrated in the discussions – not that we agreed with everything that was said, although mostly we did. We were particularly interested in the discussion about the need for clarity on policy to allow workers in the new Green industries to be trained up rapidly.
As with all these events, the conversations outside the main hall were equally important. It was good to see old friends and colleagues but also to make new contacts and look at future opportunities to collaborate.
Our mascot, Baldrik the Beaver, came with us and was very happy to renew his acquaintance with Friends of the Earth, meet others working in wildlife restoration and get to know Jo Gideon, who did such a fantastic job both organising and chairing the summit.
- Staffordshire Climate Expo and Sustainability Conference
- Well, We Only Went and Won It!
- Spotlight Summer 2023 - Fiddling the Figures while the Earth’s in Flames?
- Mark Cocker Talk – One Midsummer’s Day
- Take a Punt on Us!
- A Bloom of Bees at HuG
- Carbon Literacy Training Opportunity
- Peak Cluster
- Spotlight Spring 2023 - A Clear Warning that We Need to Act Now
- Rare Woodlouse Makes a Comeback in the Moorlands
- A Big Green HuG
- Spotlight Midwinter 2023 - Changing Gear at SMDC