CLIMATE CHANGE

Creating the new normal

George Thorley looks at our nations’ challenges as they start to look beyond the pandemic. He argues for the strengthening of the role of local government as a key component of the new normal.

Remember the early weeks of the first lockdown last year, when we faced a future clouded with uncertainty underpinned by a genuine fear of what the future might bring? Can you recall the emerging discussions on the need to rethink our individual and collective ways of living? Of a commitment that if we ever got through this terrible pandemic, things would never be the same again. The conclusion was: ‘Things would have to change – there would be a new normal.'

With the enormous comfort of more than 60% of the UK's adult population now inoculated against COVID-19, and prospects of an autumn booster, is there any evidence that these early hopes of positive change having manifested themselves?

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