Great Collaboration aims to help councils, community groups & individuals find examples of best practice in climate action & nature recovery
Help thousands of local councils turn their climate and environment ambitions into action.
Across the UK, communities are finding imaginative ways to cut carbon emissions, restore nature and strengthen local resilience. But too often, the knowledge gained by one community never reaches another.
The Great Collaboration is changing that.
We collect successful ideas, share practical experience and connect councils and communities so that nobody needs to reinvent the wheel.
We have already built a free Knowledgebase, established workshops and weekly online sessions, developed practical toolkits and helped communities learn from one another.
Now we need your help to take the next step.
We are raising £40,000 to employ our first two professional staff members, strengthening our Knowledgebase and communications so that more communities can find the practical help they need.
Every contribution will help good ideas travel further — and turn into action sooner.
The Great Collaboration is all about gathering and sharing good practice in reducing carbon emissions, adapting to change, and nature recovery to support biodiversity. We connect communities and councils, helping them to help each other.
All over the UK, there are nearly 12,000 parish, town and community councils, (District Councils in Northern Ireland), the majority of whom are working on climate, environment and community projects to help the planet as well as improve their local lives. Many of these projects are similar. To maximise use of time, skills, energy and resources, and to find great ideas and amplify them, we seek out stories of success, provide a home for that knowledge, and connect the storytellers with others. All in all, there are more than 100,000 volunteers running and working for these councils, with vast variation in skillsets, time, resources and experience - but brimming with enthusiasm. We aim to nurture this enthusiasm, to channel it into the most effective solutions, and to demonstrate all the advantages of communities working together.
We have:
There is a huge amount of information on the Internet about Climate Change, and what to do about it – everything from the global level down to countries and national governments, thence down to local levels. Sorting out the wheat from the chaff, and then applicability to your own interest, is complicated, time-consuming, and requires fore-knowledge.
In the UK, the lowest tier of formal government in England is parish and town councils; in Scotland, Wales, community councils, and in Northern Ireland, it is community councils.
It is not easy to find information specific to this tier of government, yet there 10,000 parish councils in England, all wondering, planning, or actually undertaking projects for climate and environmental improvements. Many parish clerks are overworked, and have no time available to look for the help that they need to start these projects running smoothly – not even to find examples of others who have already achieved their aims, and from whom lessons can be learnt.
There are endless examples of what to do – and what not to do – and major enrichment and support available, if only one could find them quickly and easily. And the proliferation of ideas and experiences is uplifting and reassuring – there is a huge amount of talent and skills out there, just waiting to be tapped.
The Great Collaboration – a non-profit company – has been set up specifically to help parish, town, and community councils, and community organisations, take advantage of all the knowledge out there. In the longer term, we aim to support an environment network in every county.
So far, all this work has been done by volunteers. Our success to date has resulted in more work than can be handled by volunteers alone, and it is time to start employing some professionals. This campaign is to enable the first two, one to focus on the Knowledgebase, the other on our website and communications
Funding method
Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 8th January 2027 at 12:14pm