We would like you to submit a photo to us. If you are a Staffordshire Moorlands resident please take part!
This photo just needs to be a photo of you (your head and torso) holding a banner or with a t-shirt with a environmental slogan on it.
- If possible, please ensure your picture is of the ratio 3 (High) x 2 (Wide) but we can crop it if necessary if you leave space around you.
- If you are under the age of 18, please provide parent or guardian consent along with the photo.
- Optional - share your first name and the first part of your postcode to help make this a local issue!
Please send the photo to us via email:
Also, don't forget to sign up to our mailing list to come along to the teams!
The Challenge!
Great news if you're looking for project funding. We've just had the following from Severn Trent's Biodiversity Project Manager:
“We’re writing to let you know that our Boost for Biodiversity 2021 grant scheme will now be opening for applications on Monday 15th March and will close Friday 23rd April. We’re looking for projects between 0.5-30ha in size that will create or enhance habitats within the Severn Trent region.
Hello everyone! I’m Alana, the new Moorlands Climate Action Communications and Admin assistant. I am a recent geography graduate of Keele University. I have always lived in the Staffordshire Moorlands, where the local connections to nature have inspired me as an environmentalist.
During my time at Keele, I formed Keele Wildlife Society and have coordinated the Hedgehog Friendly Campus campaign at Keele. I assist Keele’s Sustainability as Senior Sustainability Intern with their projects and communications, as well as currently working towards a Masters in Geographical and Environmental Research, with a focus on climate change, conservation, community initiatives and youth engagement.
Read more: Introducing Alana Wheat - Our New Communications and Admin...
MCA have been working with SMDC for several months on the development of an Action Plan that will set down how Staffordshire Moorlands will become carbon neutral by 2030. We were pleased to see the council recognise the need to review the way that this work was to be carried out, and they recently agreed to set up a number of sub-groups that can work in parallel, very much as how MCA organises our different groups.
We have now been advised that these sub-groups will fit under these headings
Natural Environment - third Wednesday of each month (TBC) - this group has already met.
Travel & Transport - second Monday of each month at 7.00 pm. The first meeting will take place on 12 October.
Housing - first Tuesday of each month at 7.00 pm. The first meeting will take place on 6 October.
Industry & Agriculture - TBC
Energy - TBC
The Council - TBC
We have had a number of people already come forward, but we would like to ensure we have 4 MCA members on every topic, so there are vacancies for most of these sub groups.
These groups will meet every month for 1 hour, with the idea that every month you will talk through an idea and present it back to the overall sub-committee. They will then pass all the approved ideas up to the Council for further work to be done working up the details and incorporate them into the Action Plan.
Whilst we welcome this more pragmatic approach, MCA have raised their concerns that the original Climate Emergency declaration stated that the sub-committee (which includes MCA members) would produce the Action Plan, but it now appears to be the responsibility of the Portfolio Holder, Clllr Joe Porter. We are concerned about the lack of transparency and meetings being held ‘behind the scenes’, but we will give this process a try for a month or so while it beds in. Better to be ‘inside the tent, than outside’ to paraphrase the common expression.
So, let’s give it a shot, get involved, put forward our ideas and see if we can work with the councillors to create the Action Plan that we know we need for our contribution to the overall plan to save our World.
Email us at
Please note: You will have to be a MCA member to take part on these sub-groups.
Jenny, our Community Organiser for the past 12 months, left this month to start her PhD at Sheffield University. Her research into resilient decarbonisation will look at methods of responding to and preparing for climate change. Her work could contribute to the abandonment of significant fossil fuel use.
Jenny was essential to MCA right from the start. Her enthusiasm buoyed us, and her organisational skills drove us forward. Jenny worked incredibly hard over and above her contracted hours: she sorted out our calendars, meetings and reports; helped with courses, Slack training and with writing some of our funding bids. Jenny also collated our MCA response to SMDC and so, so much more. Throughout it all she has encouraged and supported us, whether as individuals, within our groups or MCA as a whole. As one of our members said, “She will be a hard act to follow”.
Given our inability to meet face to face, we contacted everyone on-line to tell them of Jenny’s departure. This August, Mike emailed all MCA members who were invited to contribute a leaving message to Jenny and return it via email. All messages received were collected and combined in a booklet for Jenny. Many of the messages speak of her hard work, her willingness to help, her encouragement and the vividness of her personality.
As a thank you for all she has done for MCA over the past year, we also received donations which were combined to give Jenny a National Gardens Gift card. Jenny was delighted with her gift and said ‘Thank you’ to everyone.
We will be sorry to see Jenny go but know we will stay in touch, particularly as she will be only three moors, two valleys and a gritstone edge away in Sheffield. We look forward to seeing the results of her research, which will continue her commitment to helping the planet – and her beloved Moorlands.
Moorlands Climate Action has broadly welcomed the renewed commitment of Staffordshire Moorlands District Council to addressing the pressing issue of climate change, despite what it sees as essentially a wasted twelve months until now.
“We have obviously been disappointed with progress, or lack of it, since SMDC declared a Climate Emergency over a year ago,” says Nigel Williams, chairperson at MCA. “We have made it clear where we felt the problems lay.”
But we are heartened that key councillors such as James Aberley and Nigel Yates are moving determinedly to put the right structures in place to ensure a more collegiate and accountable approach in the future.”
Putting the Sub-committee on a sounder footing should mean that decisions are made in a more energetic, transparent and evidence-based manner.”
Working groups will be set up in key areas such transport, energy and buildings with direct input from groups such as MCA and Staffordshire Wildlife Trust. Reports from these and the sub-Committee will then be sent to the SMDC Cabinet.
“Follow-up action can be monitored and scrutinised in the way that all local authority processes should be, and usually are,” said Nigel Williams.
MCA member Maggie Pollard added: “We welcome the fact that there will be a renewed emphasis on the central issue – the need to reduce carbon emissions in order to avoid a catastrophic rise in global temperatures. Measures such as reducing the use of single-use plastic drinks containers, while laudable in themselves, are a very small part of the central task.”
She said that the teenagers and twenty-somethings who are increasingly engaged in climate change issues have been put off in the past by endless talk and few tangible results: “They want action, not words.”