BWI at the Visible London Workshop and City Tour

Cities must play a radical and central role in achieving climate justice and ensuring that their Just Transition process will not leave workers and marginalised communities behind. The majority of the population in every country live in cities; hence city governments have a primary role in ensuring that no sector in society will be on the sharp end of climate impacts and that their efforts to address climate change will not increase historic and current socioeconomic inequalities.

To such ends, members of C40 Cities – a global network of mayors driving the future of city climate action aspire to combine local economic development and urban regeneration through green infrastructure in the Built Environment, while funding green jobs, closing the skills gap, and supporting workers in the shift from high-carbon industries. These are the ideals behind a three-day workshop and city tour organised by the Mayor of London and C40 Cities. 

The Building and Woodworkers’ International (BWI), represented by Paola Cammilli, BWI Global Director for Campaigns & Global Director for Climate Justice, Migration and Sports, Dorothy Guerrero, BWI Global Climate Justice Programme Coordinator, and Stephen Craig, National Development Officer of Unite the Union UK, attended the “Visible London Workshop and City Tour”. The gathering focused on equitable climate action through inclusive workforce growth, circular construction, and home retrofit projects to support a fair and inclusive transition.

The event brought together city officials from London (Greater London Authorities - GLA), Madrid, Warsaw, Oslo and Barcelona; industry leaders on clean construction, energy and buildings; business innovators; trade unions and NGOs who shared their initiatives, experiences and expertise. In the three-day workshop, participants discussed climate action, workforce development, and affordable housing, with social and economic viability in mind. The presentations from the five cities were interspersed with interactive roundtables, dialogues and tours of innovative projects. The different departments of the five cities also discussed their governance models, scaling circular construction, socially responsible procurement, and how they embed equity into their climate action.

The site visits included an array of initiatives from GLA partners:

• Earl’s Court Construction Skills Training Centre where workers learn green construction
• London Design Museum’s Stone Demonstration prototype of a more sustainable building material and practices
• Tipping Point East GLA Circular Construction Hub for secondary material in the Royal Docks
• REinsTate community-led social enterprise hub in a retrofit historic building
• Carpenters Estate run by Newham Council and Populo Living doing circular material reuse and social housing retrofit

The workshops provided rich exchanges and information on how procurement could promote good jobs, ethical employment and improve the environment. The strategies employed vary, reflecting the cities’ respective circumstances, contradictions and priorities. All the cities are delivering carbon emission reductions and at the same time, addressing the challenge of the housing crisis prevalent in European cities. There are significant differences in the level of subsidies the city governments are extending.