Recommendations

Cross-cutting: make the plan real

• Fund and appoint an adaptation lead now — accept the draft's own recommendation of a dedicated Climate Change Adaptation Project Manager (part-time or shared with a neighbouring council is fine), with a named post, start date and budget. Council.
• Establish the Multi-Agency Climate Adaptation Steering Group within six months of adoption, with named leads, and publish annual progress reports against KPIs (flood costs, heat-related hospital admissions, action status). The draft proposes all of this; the final plan should commit to dates. Council + NHS, emergency services, Anglian Water, utilities.
• Put adaptation in the budget. The 2026/27 budget and MTFS mention climate nowhere; the final plan should come with a council funding line and a schedule of external bids (flood and coastal resilience programmes, Warm Homes funds, Combined Authority co-funding). Council — and residents can ask councillors why the MTFS is silent.
• Publish the adoption timetable now — which committee will see consultation results, when, and how responses will be reported. Council.

Protect People

• Cooling plan, not just heatwave warnings: designate public cooling spaces in every ward before summer 2027, using the council's existing network — libraries, community hubs and the ~20 Crisis & Resilience Fund partner venues, plus day centres such as the Garden House (already open seven days). The national Green Party has called for exactly this: "a free, accessible cool space in every local area". Council + community partners.
• Reach the people who won't see a tweet: checks on socially isolated older residents (the draft's own suggestion), cooling information via care providers, sheltered housing and the foodbank network, not just social media. Council, NHS/ICB, voluntary sector.
• Heatwave provision for rough sleepers: extend the existing Severe Weather Emergency Provision — already triggered by heat warnings — into a standing summer cooling offer. Council + Light Project and partners.
• Schools and children: the draft notes climate anxiety in young people; ask for the consultation's school-visit idea to become a standing programme. Council + schools.

Homes and buildings

• Use the licensing levers already in hand: make flood-resilience and overheating expectations part of selective licensing (2024–29) and the new citywide additional HMO licensing scheme — the cheapest way to improve the worst private rented homes, and a Green-policy theme (a renters' right to demand efficiency improvements nationally). Council housing standards team.
• Retrofit partnership for social housing: work with Cross Keys Homes (~13,000 homes) and the Medesham Homes joint venture on a heat-and-flood retrofit programme for existing stock, drawing on Warm Homes funding and PECT's existing advice services. Council + Cross Keys + PECT.
• Future-proof all new homes: use planning powers now (not waiting for the postponed Local Plan) to expect passive cooling, shading and water efficiency above Part O minimums, and reflect the adaptation plan's evidence in every major application. Council planning.
• Council estate as exemplar: rainwater harvesting and greywater recycling in council buildings (the draft's own D-measure), plus heat-resilient schools and care homes. Council.

Flooding and water

• Put the catchment first: commit to the Nene Rivers Trust / Nene Valley Catchment Partnership approach and feed the city's evidence into the EA's Nene Water Management Strategy — the draft already points this way; the final plan should make it a named workstream with dates. Council + EA + catchment partners.
• Property-level resilience grants: pilot small grants for flood doors/raised electrics in the mapped hotspots (Welland, Dogsthorpe North, Eastfield/Gladstone, Eastgate/Fengate fringe) before the next flood, rather than only after one. Council + Environment Agency partnership funding.
• Hold Anglian Water to account in writing: the plan should state the specific outcomes it expects over AMP8 — leakage reduction, storm-overflow cuts on the Nene (Oundle Road spilled 48 times in 2024), Ruthamford North supply resilience — and report progress annually alongside its own KPIs. Council convening + Ofwat/EA enforcement; residents can name this ask in the survey.
• Support SuDS now: while Schedule 3 remains uncommenced nationally, use planning conditions to require sustainable drainage with maintenance plans on every suitable development. Council planning + developers.
• Demand management with teeth: water efficiency standards at the tighter end for new homes (the draft Local Plan floated 110 litres/person/day) and a visible retrofit-and-rainwater-harvesting offer for existing homes. Council + Anglian Water.

Nature, food and the Fens

• Tree canopy where it cools most: set a canopy target for low-canopy, high-deprivation wards (city centre, Millfield, Eastfield, Fengate, Hampton, Bretton) and deliver through the existing Forest for Peterborough / mini-forest programme with PECT. Council + PECT.
• Deliver the draft's nature measures: riparian shade along the Nene, habitat corridors and "pollinator pockets" — all already scored in the draft; they need owners and dates. Council + Nene Rivers Trust + Nene Park Trust + Wildlife Trust.
• Food security as adaptation: expand allotment and community food-growing capacity (The Green Backyard, Project Abundance, the Flourish-led Peterborough Food Partnership) — the draft's own top-scoring drought measure — and connect it to the city's cost-of-living support. Council + community food sector.
• The Fens deserve a chapter, not a mention: peat, soils and pumped drainage shape the city's flood and drought risk and half of England's Grade 1 farmland; ask for a named Fens workstream with the IDBs, farmers and the Fens CCRA evidence behind it, including support for regenerative soil and water-retention practice. Council + DEFRA, EA, Internal Drainage Boards, NFU/FWAG.

Consultation and engagement

• Open non-digital routes before 19 October: paper surveys in libraries and community hubs, a telephone option, and drop-in sessions in the wards the plan itself flags as most exposed — mirroring what the council did for its own budget consultation. Council.
• Add equality monitoring (or run targeted sessions with older, disabled and minority-community groups) so the final plan can show who was heard. Council.
• Publish what happens next: results report, committee date, and the adoption timetable — before the consultation closes, so respondents know their time was spent honestly. Council.

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