Making decisions for people, without people

There are people making decisions for people without people

That was how one participant described the challenge during the Lived Experience Access-to-nature workshop run by NPC in April 2026. The conversation was about green spaces, but it quickly became about much more than parks. People spoke about places that exist for everyone, but do not feel welcoming, safe or designed with everyone in mind. Lack of seating, inaccessible paths, inefficient transport, safety concerns, and a sense of exclusion from decision-making all shaped whether people felt able to use – and belong in – their local green spaces.

The same theme emerged in a different form during a workshop with community activists in June 2026, who described locals with ideas, energy, and deep knowledge of their area, but with limited routes to the people with the power to act. They talked about councils that feel slow or risk-averse, consultations that disappear into silence, and small groups who love and care for their local area but are stretched thin by funding, governance and volunteer capacity. One clear message came through: communities often know what is needed, but that knowledge and voice do not always reach decision-makers.

This matters because environmental change will not affect everyone equally. Access to safe, welcoming green spaces, the quality of local environments, public services, climate pressures and nature loss all connect with wider inequalities. Communities already facing social and economic pressures are often those with the least influence over the decisions that shape the places where they live.

Alongside the four Lived Experience workshops and policy sessions with professionals to understand some of the barriers and opportunities for the environmental and social justice sectors to work together and in collaboration with communities, Green Alliance supported the programme by helping explore how these issues connect; how campaigners, community power, funders, charities, and decision-making interact. In short, the work has helped show that these are not separate problems to solve one by one. They are linked, and the response needs to be joined up too.

A session with charity leaders in July 2026 picked up the same challenge from a different angle. Leaders discussed the need to start with people’s lives rather than policy agendas, and to move beyond listening towards genuine participation and shared influence. The question now is not whether environmental and social justice organisations should work together, but how they do that in ways that shift power, build trust and respond to people’s everyday realities.

Join us on Thursday, 17th September for an online event, where we’ll explore answers to some of the questions raised through the Everyone’s Environment project, and look at where there may be opportunities for future action and collaboration.

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Everyone’s Environment Leaders is an NPC-led project in partnership with Green Alliance and ACEVO, bringing together lived experience, community, environmental, social justice and funding perspectives to understand how environmental change can be more connected to people’s everyday realities. The work has explored where community insight is lost, what gets in the way of collaboration, and what practical action could help shift power, build trust and support more joined-up responses across civil society.