Worthing Councillors Approve 'Motion For The Ocean'

Worthing Borough Council plans to create a forum of environmental regulators for the ocean after approving a Motion for the Ocean.

The council’s cabinet unanimously approved the signing of the Motion for the Ocean Declaration at its meeting on Tuesday, February 6, signing the council to seven pledges aimed at improving marine recovery in Worthing and aiding the existing Sussex Bay programme.

One pledge of the council’s motion is to write to the government and ask for a commitment to net ocean recovery by 2030, the creation of a Minister for Coastal Communities, and a national Ocean Recovery Strategy.

Worthing Borough Council is the 22nd local authority in England and Wales to sign up to the declaration, with other authorities having also written to the government in support of the same measures.

The council has also committed to establishing an ocean regulators forum, with support from the Marine Management Organisation, Natural England, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), and Sussex Inshore Fisheries and Conservation Authority (IFCA).

The council claims this will be the first forum of its kind in the UK, saying it will aim to improve ‘terrestrial and marine’ planning in the area.

Previously, members questioned the need for the motion given the work already underway by the Sussex Bay programme.

The Sussex Bay programme was created by the joint Adur and Worthing Council in 2021 after a consultation with residents, to aid recovery of Adur and Worthing coastlines, rivers and lakes.

It also aimed to restore the historic 172 square kilometre kelp forest that used to stretch from Selsey Bill to Shoreham, and was largely destroyed in 1987 by a storm – with the council leasing the seabed from The Crown Estate to help investment in the restoration.

Most pledges in the approved motion now largely centre around the programme instead the council exclusively, making Sussex Bay mostly responsible for five of the seven pledges.

According to a report detailing the pledges to the cabinet, this will likely include developing an Ocean Literacy program for schools, a ‘seascape recovery strategy’, finding areas for habitat restoration, and a Sussex Bay website set to launch in early 2024.

The council’s Motion for the Ocean was put forward initially by Claire Hunt (Green, Goring) and the Cabinet Member for Climate Emergency Sophie Cox (Lab, Castle) to full council in December, 2023.

Mrs Hunt said it was ‘good’ to see a set of ‘united demands’ from multiple authorities putting pressure on the national government to give more support for marine recovery, saying it could be embedded at ‘every level’ of the council going forward.

The council’s Motion for the Ocean, like other authorities, was informed by Ocean Conservation Trust’s model motion on its website.

The original motion was written by marine social scientist and former Plymouth City Councillor Dr Pamel Buchan, marine conservation specialist Emily Cunningham, and Head of Ocean Advocacy and Engagement at the Ocean Conservation Trust, Nicola Bridge.