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NALC celebrates Tree Charter Day with The Woodland Trust
The National Association of Local Councils (NALC) celebrated Tree Charter Day on 28 November, as part of National Tree Week.
Tree Charter Day is the annual celebration of the Tree Charter, which is a set of ten principles that outlines our relationship with trees and green spaces. The theme of this year's Tree Charter Day was tied to The Woodland Trust's campaign, The Big Climate Fightback which demonstrates the importance of trees as a way to combat carbon pollution. As a response to this, lots of councils organised tree planting events in their local communities with trees donated by The Woodland Trust.
Yet, as the coronavirus limits how community groups can meet, the Tree Charter also organised an online festival, Tree Charter Day 2020, as a celebration of woods and trees and the efforts that each community group has made over the past year. Head of policy and communications, Justin Griggs, spoke at the free festival and discussed how local (parish and town) councils can make a change in their communities by implanting the principles of the charter. Justin also highlighted that community heroes could get involved in their local council in the upcoming May 2021 local elections.
Cllr Sue Baxter, chairman of NALC, said: “It has been a pleasure working with The Woodland Trust over the past three years as it has highlighted the need to protect local green spaces which have become even more vital throughout 2020. The work of our councils in implementing green strategies, prove that they can protect our most local spaces".
In 2019, our members planted over 8,700 trees for Tree Charter Day and, we are hopeful that we will have beaten that record this year! NALC has partnered with The Woodland Trust to encourage local councils to protect and establish green spaces with our communities.