Local authorities face “Kafkaesque” barriers to achieving Net Zero goals, reveals a comprehensive new UK100 report. Powers in Place calls for a new Net Zero Local Powers Bill and Net Zero Delivery Framework. The report is released as UK100 joins Chris Skidmore MP’s Local Mission Zero Network and announces plans to work together to drive forward policy solutions to overcome the barriers to local Net Zero.

Looking back at the Green Day announcements, have Ministers made the best of this test? Have they taken the right path at this critical fork in the road?

On ’Green Day’ we hoped to see a plan for Net Zero delivery that understands, as the Government’s Independent Mission Zero report did, that local authorities are the key to achieving Net Zero in the UK. Our hopes, however, have been dashed on the ‘Boulevard of Broken Dreams.’ Today’s announcements fall far short of unlocking the ambition and ability within local government to go further and faster in delivering Net Zero.

Responding to the Spring Budget, UK100 welcomes the short-term energy bill relief but reiterates its call for a long-term solution, targeted at the most vulnerable.

UK100 writes to the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities with recommendations for the National Planning Policy Framework to address the climate and ecological emergency, seize the economic opportunities that the transition to Net Zero presents and build communities and infrastructure resilient to the worst impacts of climate change.

Since 2019 the majority of UK local authorities have declared a Climate Emergency, and 327 have produced a climate action plan of how they plan to reach Net Zero by their own target date (if they have one) of 2030, 2040 or 2050. These plans vary in length, design, topics covered and ambition. So how can you tell which council has a good climate action plan, a plan that the council is actually able to implement, and that the subsequent actions will mean that the council reaches Net Zero before 2050? Annie Pickering, Co-Director of Climate Emergency UK, writes for UK100's blog on climate action plans.

UK100's report argues that Birmingham, Camden, Hertfordshire, Leeds and Nottingham are leading the way on integrating climate and clean air policies but Ministers' "refusal to recognise the importance of joined-up policy making" is stalling wider progress.

UK100 Chief Executive, Polly Billington, was invited to be a part of the panel at the official launch of Rt Hon Chris Skidmore OBE MP's Mission Zero Net Zero Review at King's College London on Monday alongside the Climate Minister, Graham Stuart MP.

UK100 welcome's the Net Zero Review's call for a "net zero local big bang" and the recognition that local authorities are vital to delivering the most successful version of Net Zero in the UK.

This is an edited version of Polly's foreword from UK100's 2022 Annual Review.