Plymouth community group shortlisted for national award
Plymouth community group have been announced as one of 30 finalists in line to receive a national award in recognition of its work in making the local area a better place to live.
Environment Plymouth have been shortlisted in the ‘Best Community Group Contribution to Environmental Sustainability’ category in the Groundwork Community Awards and will learn whether they have won at a national awards ceremony hosted by the charity in the Houses of Parliament in London next month.
Groundwork, a national charity who works across the UK to support communities to change places and change lives, launched its awards in 2017 to honour small community groups making a big difference to everyone’s quality of life and to celebrate and reward groups who often get little recognition and support.
Environment Plymouth (EP) are a strategic community network and coordinate a network of 80 local groups and 300 individual members in Plymouth representing ‘green and sustainability’ issues. Over the past 12 months EP has been led by a Steering Group of five dedicated and tenacious volunteers who, working with the network’s co-ordinator, organise monthly meetings on various topics including air quality, Fairtrade, plastics and trees and green spaces.
Thanks to their work, Plymouth’s Waterfront achieved Surfers Against Sewage ‘Plastic Free Community Status’ in June 2018 – the first city in the UK to achieve this. The project was inspired by a network meeting held by Environment Plymouth in December 2017 on marine plastic; which happened to be day after the last in the series of Blue Planet II. By January, they had secured funding from South West Water to take a plastic free coastline initiative forward and they had contacted Surfers against Sewage to register to use their Plastic Free framework, a challenge that required extensive work in the local community.
EP have worked tirelessly, contacting businesses, organisations and individuals on a campaign that has since recruited nearly 80 Business Pioneers and over 60 Community Ambassadors. Members of both groups have all committed to removing three plastic items of single use plastic from everyday use and identify an action to reduce plastic use in the future, leading to Plymouth’s achievement of securing ‘Plastic Free Status’ for the Waterfront in just 5 months.
Penny Tarrant from Environment Plymouth said: “We hit the ground running with this campaign but have been humbled by the sheer breadth of support we’ve received from Plymouth’s community. As an Ocean City we are only too aware of the threat waste plastic poses to the marine environment so we are delighted to be able to do our bit towards a solution.”
Graham Duxbury, Groundwork’s national CEO, said: “I’d like to congratulate Environment Plymouth and all of the other finalists at our awards. Having judged some of the entries makes you realise how many extraordinary everyday heroes we have in our communities.
“Their achievements are seldom noticed beyond the neighbourhood or the people directly benefiting. We thought it was time to change that and to celebrate the power of community action.”
The Best Community Group Contribution to Environmental Sustainability category is sponsored by Peel Land & Property Group.
Joanne Holden, Sustainability Manager at Peel Land and Property said: “Peel Land and Property is passionate about creating sustainable environments where people and businesses can flourish and it fills us with a great sense of pride to see such a high quality range of projects from across the UK applying for Groundwork’s Environmental Sustainability Award.
“We congratulate each and every applicant and hope their stories will inspire other groups to help their communities become more sustainable for the benefit of local people and the environment.”
The Groundwork Community Awards are sponsored by B&Q, Buzzacott, Firmdale Hotels, Givewith, GVA, John Lewis Partnership, M&S, the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government, Peel Land & Property and Tesco.
