We propose, not oppose

Robin was not just a colleague, he was a mentor, a collaborator, my political champion and a dear friend.

Robin would never claim anything for himself, but there are few people who have had such a profound impact on environmental thinking in London and far beyond. 

I met him in 1995, when I was chair of the London Planning Advisory Committee.  Robin had just come back from Canada from working on community economic development projects with the progressive Ontario government.  London needed an alternative waste strategy and Robin had a vision of “zero waste”  - and recruited wonderful people like Keith Collins and Kathy Killinger to make it happen.

The vision was: everything that is designed and created can be reused, repaired, recycled.  Robin involved me in his unique way of approaching a problem. He worked systemically.  Everything was reframed – and then reframed again from another perspective.  For him, refuse collectors became recyclers, waste a valuable resource, and citizens sorting their own rubbish were part of the production line. This is productive democracy and Robin was passionate about it. 

Everything had to be tested on the ground. There were no dry reports, only action research. And the results were spectacular!  As a result John Gummer, then secretary of state for the environment, who really ‘got’ Robin’s vision, gave us £12m to kick-start household recycling, jobs and industries across London. Robin and his team went on to work across the country and recycling rates exploded. 

It’s only now that Robin’s vision is beginning to be fully realised.  The New London Plan promotes the Circular Economy, and Robin has a lot to do with that.

In 2000 with Ken Livingstone at the helm of London once again, there were new opportunities to innovate.  Robin and I worked together on the Mayor’s climate change agency to cut carbon and to pioneer new green technologies. Robin believed in a distributed, decentralised approach to everything. His concept was of a network of distributed local generation, a network of citizens and communities producing their own power, not reliant on the grid and making London more resilient.  This was productive democracy at work.

Robin astounded us with his practical action on greening London’s homes, an idea cross-fertilized from Canada, with Phil Jessup, who was seconded to us by the Mayor of Toronto.

Robin was just as abundant in his personal life.  Work, family and friendships were intertwined.  There were many wonderful gatherings, filled with food, friends, ideas and his beloved family. 

We suffered many slings and arrows together, but Robin always battled with a smile – totally disarming.  At many different spheres of government, he always spoke truth to power -“straight as an arrow, clear as a bell”.

He was happy to work with and speak to anyone at any level.  Every conversation with him on the phone was a gift. He would always tell you about the latest person he’d met or the latest idea he’d had, before he would meticulously go on to help us solve the latest problem. 

In his last great conversation with me in his study, he said something that I now realise had underpinned his whole being. “We propose, not oppose.”

How much we miss those proposals, his endless generosity of spirit and clarity of intellect.

Robin always began with a poem, and so I will end with one: 

I may, I might, I must

If you will tell me why the fen
appears impassable, I then
will tell you why I think that I
can get across it if I try. 

- Marianne Moore

Robin emboldened us to try. 

I owe him a great debt.  And so does London.