Coastal erosion campaigners mark decade
By Ed Foss (Eastern Daily Press, 08 April 2009)
A campaign body which has attained international importance on the issues of climate change and coastal erosion, or a tiny community group representing the interests of a few hundred people in the Norfolk clifftop village of Happisburgh?
On the 10th birthday of the Coastal Concern Action Group, Ed Foss explains why it is both.
---------------------------------------------
The clifftop village of Happisburgh is not alone in its plight.
Yet it has become an international icon in the worldwide battle against the impact of a changing climate, its name being mentioned by media organisations, government institut-ions and academic bodies across the globe. Australia, America, Japan, South Korea, Holland, Germany, Canada and France are just some of the countries that name has reached.
Linked inextricably with the mention of Happisburgh is the Coastal Concern Action Group, a body born of local need in 1999 because it was recognised that the village's problems with erosion needed focus.
The group's name consciously omitted the word "Happisburgh" because of the limitations that would place on its scope. Ten years on, that apparently simple decision has proved so important.
Often assisted by the striking aerial photographs of Norfolk pilot Mike Page, the group has entered many arenas, mostly in the guise of co-ordinator Malcolm Kerby but also via several key backroom members, such as website manager Jim Whiteside.
It has conducted school visits, held beach and clifftop tours, called many public meetings, met five ministers and Environment Agency bigwigs, built relationships with all levels of local authorities, engaged the media both locally and internationally, travelled to various corners of the country to meet coastal communities in similar positions, talked to European politicians and given presentations at academic conferences.
Also, it has raised the profile of the phrase "social justice", whether in the form of cash compensation for those who lose their homes to unmanaged erosion or in other guises, and has demanded coastal management policies for the sake of the shoreline and its communities rather than for the sake of not spending money.
Latterly - perhaps most signif-icantly - the group has found its way into the corridors of government power, contributing to low-profile but high-ranking think tank sessions that one day might influence the coastal management policies of which it has for so long been critical.
Away from the institutions of government, the work on the ground has in the main been appreciated both inside and outside Norfolk.
At Selsey, West Sussex, hundreds of homes would have been lost or put at high risk of being lost, with no compensation, unless the community had fought Environment Agency proposals dating back three years.
That fight, which continues today, was assisted by the Coastal Concern Action Group in the form of a visit by Mr Kerby and regular contact over the years. Roland O'Brien, one of the key campaigners at Selsey, said: "After Malcolm spoke to us we realised that, actually, yes, we could do something about this. And we did. He has been a fantastic help, a genu-ine, approachable bloke who has brought ideas, contacts, an under-standing of the problems and a mess-age that this is happening all around the country, not just in Selsey."
There are similar stories of assis-tance at Jurys Gap in East Sussex and Seasalter in Kent, while schools across Norfolk and much further afield are also grateful for field
trip support and school visits.
Sometimes it is a punishing schedule - an unpaid voluntary one at that. But for Mr Kerby the effort has been worthwhile,
"We have been heaving and shoving for 10 years, called a spade a spade, and made life uncomfortable for a series of government ministers.
"We have moved from being the oiks out on the coast, with a minute voice, no knowledge, no power and no nothing, to gaining a reach which has gone beyond anything we ever hoped for or even dared dream about.
"We are now at the heart of the matter, operating within the central government machine, and I find that quite extraordinary.
"The website sees a quarter of a million pages read some months, from all over the world.
"We have turned the pipsqueak of Happisburgh into a bass booming voice and they have had to listen.
"I think the most satisfying things are getting all levels of the system working together rather than against each other and also the work we do in schools, with universities and with young people who, after all, are the important ones in all of this - the ones who will have to manage the coast into the future.
"It's about community, passion and justice. This is something which matters."
And long may the group continue its good works.
- A meeting to mark the group's 10th anniversary will be held at the village's St Mary's Church on May 1 at 7.30pm. Everyone is welcome and refreshments will be provided.