Paul King from the UK Green Building Council speech

Paul King’s speech at the Building Sustainability Awards

Nov 19th, 2008

Paul King chief executive of the UK Green Building, gave a brief speech at last night’s Building Sustainability Awards. Here it is:

A question on many people’s lips, including journalists from the trade press, recently has been, ‘will sustainability be the next casualty of the credit crunch?’

Life is very tough out there at the moment, and I don’t underestimate the scale of the challenge some people are facing, with some very real threats in the short to medium term. But I wanted to share with you some feedback from a recent poll of UK-GBC members, covered in The Guardian today, at a recent event looking at our response to the financial crisis.
27% said that sustainability has maintained its place on their company’s agenda. But remarkably more than 55% said that it had assumed even greater importance and had become an even bigger area of focus over the last 6 months.
Why is that? Well, I think there is now overwhelming acceptance of the imperative to respond to the threat of climate change. This, combined with growing concerns over rising fuel prices, and fear regarding future energy security, means that a consensus has emerged right across the political spectrum here in the UK - and indeed across the Atlantic in the recent presidential elections - that our economic recovery must be a low carbon one. We are presented with an unprecedented opportunity to rethink traditional ideas of ‘growth’. We need a green new deal.
Perhaps it follows then, that 95% of the people we polled said that they either agree or strongly agree with the proposition that government must stick to ambitious sustainability targets, maintain the direction of travel, and provide consistency and certainty for the industry in the months and years ahead.
Tonight is all about recognising those individuals and organisations which have already seen the opportunities in staying ahead of the curve of government policy and regulation. A relatively small number of you will step up here to collect your shiny prize tonight. But I think it’s worth recognising that all of you, and indeed all of the other nominees for these awards, are likely to be among the winners where it really matters - in an increasingly competitive marketplace in the years to come.