Sustainability and local government are a natural fit

The role of local government has been well beyond the perception of simply ‘rates, roads and rubbish’ for some time, but new legislation heralds another evolution in the lowest tier of government in Western Australia. The Local Government Amendment Act 2023 brought some big changes to local governments in Western Australia, particularly in how local governments need to plan. The new legislation says that councils must now think about economic, social, and environmental sustainability in their future planning. This marks a shift towards more detailed and integrated planning and reporting to incorporate holistic sustainability.

While we wait for the new regulations detailing how local governments might go about implementing these changes, ReGen investigated what was driving the current sustainability reporting landscape and what this change might mean for WA councils.

Whilst researching, it was clear there was significant concern from WA local governments, especially smaller or more regional jurisdictions, which saw sustainability reporting as an added onerous burden that they didn’t have capacity for. But the task might not be as overwhelming as it first appeared, and we argue that it’s already being done.

Local governments are in a unique position. Their entire ‘business’ is managing negative impacts and promoting positive impacts on their communities, a connection that corporations often struggle to grasp – let alone impact as effectively as local governments already are. It’s not then a surprise that sustainability should be second nature to local governments in WA, where the natural environment, unique cultures and communities are so prominent in its day-to-day operations.

Despite this, sustainability is still not quite as integrated into local government planning and reporting as it maybe should be, and we wanted to figure out why.

The sustainability performance of WA local governments varied from developing to reporting, with most councils approaching sustainability as just another facet of the environmental management of the council, rather than a holistic or strategic tool. As a result, a significant majority of the councils that developed a sustainability plan or strategy kept them siloed in the environmental team. Whilst any development of sustainability initiatives is positive, when sustainability strategies are isolated in this way, it can limit the perceived importance of improving sustainability performance internally. As a result, siloed sustainability strategies often fall short in delivering positive and impactful outcomes for both the council and the community.

Despite these challenges, some councils demonstrated clear enthusiasm for improving sustainability performance, jumping into climate change initiatives and emissions reporting ahead of any regulatory compulsion to do so.

Then there are advanced councils who seemingly understand the holistic and strategic application of sustainability, following national jurisdictions to guide their integration of sustainability strategy into core strategic documents in the absence of state-based regulations.

So why was there such a disparity? It’s not unusual for there to be varied understanding of sustainability ideologies, but the annual reports and Strategic Community Plans (SCPs) of the Integrated Planning and Reporting (IPR) framework had extensive and pin-pointed information that demonstrated the council’s sustainable performance on environmental, social, economic and governance topics, based on their community’s input. It just wasn’t labelled as ‘sustainability’ (except in the more mature jurisdictions), which was causing a greater headache than it needed to.

Our research into the frameworks driving the planning and reporting of WA local governments found that the application of the IPR Framework used by WA councils actually had several key similarities to global sustainability frameworks:

• Extensive community consultation to determine the most important key areas for strategy;
• Benchmarking and annual reporting; and
• Pillars/categories of SCPs often revolving around environmental, social, economic or governance topics.

This means that WA councils are already somewhat weaving sustainability into their operations in various ways, from financial planning and managing their workforce through to the development of the core strategic document that guides their council’s operations.

For example, under the old Local Government Act 1995 and the Local Government (Administration) Regulations 1996, councils had to plan for their districts’ futures with direct and robust input from their community. This meant creating a SCP that laid out the community’s vision and priorities for the future. Councils then turned this vision into actionable plans, including the Corporate Business Plan and other key documents.

The IPR Framework shines because it emphasises community engagement, much like double materiality assessments in corporate sustainability. Every four years, councils must conduct extensive consultations to develop the SCP, with reviews every two years. This ensures that the community’s voice is heard and that the plans are truly in tune with local needs and hopes. Interestingly, the common themes that emerged from the community engagement to develop the SCP usually included environmental, social, economic and governance pillars. Strangely familiar, no?

Without realising it, councils are already being driven by their communities to focus on core pillars that build strategic sustainability, even if a sustainability strategy isn’t resulting from it.

That said, the IPR Framework doesn’t yet require councils to integrate sustainability explicitly. Many councils currently only provide general updates on their sustainability efforts or focus on specific projects without detailed metrics to demonstrate their performance on each topic consistently. Others still early in developing their sustainability efforts often kept performance internal with little public visibility.

So, there are still some gaps to fill to make sure councils fully understand and adopt a holistic approach to sustainability. Without clear guidance, councils might continue to use a variety of methods and metrics to measure their performance, continuing to silo the perceived sustainability initiatives, making it impossible to feasibly compare the performance from council to council.

Throughout ReGen’s review, we determined the WA local government sector was still in the early stages of its journey to holistic sustainability reporting, but there was a strong foundation in place. With a little more guidance and better understanding of the true application of holistic sustainability, WA councils are ready to pave the way for a brighter future—one where sustainable futures for people and the planet remain the priority.

ReGen Strategic materiality assessments are delivered through our sustainability & ESG practice.  Talk to us today about how we can deliver a bespoke materiality assessment that sets your organisation’s sustainability strategy and ESG reporting up for success.

This article was also published on the ReGen Strategic website.