About SoCAN
Working together for a sustainable, thriving city
Who We Are
Southampton Climate Action Network (SoCAN) came into being in 2021; a kind of organic grouping that emerged from COP26 activities. In 2023, we managed to secure some funding. SoCAN brings together community groups and businesses across the city, and our Steering Group helps steer our direction.
Our Purpose
We are a coalition of community groups, organisations, businesses and individuals that promotes Southampton's work towards becoming an environmentally sustainable and regenerative city.
Embedding community development and co-production principles into all our work
The intention of working together as equals has always been our goal, and we have been using various techniques over the year to make sure we keep our members' interests at the heart of all we do.
Membership and democracy
People can join the Steering Group, sign up to the website or attend our events. SoCAN is a project of Southampton Collective, and anyone who agrees to a series of principles can join as a "Member" in order to have democratic voting rights. To see more information and join, please see the form on this page.
The network is a coalition of community groups, organisations, businesses and individuals that promotes Southampton's work towards becoming an environmentally sustainable and regenerative city.
If you support the above and would like to network and contribute to climate action and conversations, you can get involved in a variety of ways.
- Sign up to our monthly Mailchimp newsletter here
- Sign up to be a member of the Southampton Sustainability Directory and post events and activities on a shared calendar
- Come to one of our Climate gatherings or any of the other events on our Calendar
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Become part of the Steering Group who meet every couple of months. Send us an email at sotoncan@gmail.com
Our Team
SoCAN is run by a small team of Steering Group members. You can get in touch with us by emailing sotoncan@gmail.com.
Our Steering Group is comprised of local specialists including:
- Clare Diaper (Co-Chair) is a community connector and change maker with people and planet at the heart. Clare has many roles in different organisations in Southampton including The Southampton Collective CIC, October Books and Transition Southampton.
- Rebecca Kinge (Co-Chair) is a community development worker with a particular interest in health and sustainability. She is a founder-Director of The Southampton Collective CIC. She is interested in policy as well as project development, and represents SoCAN on the Southampton Climate Commission.
- Christelle Blunden is a GP, part-time coordinator for Southampton National Park City and environmental activist.
- Lyn Brayshaw is co-ordinator for Southampton Greenpeace, joint-coordinator of Southampton Friends of the Earth, as well as chair of Southampton Cycling Campaign. She helps at Repair Cafes, sings with Climate Choir, helps coordinate Kidical Mass Cycle Rides and Rhythms drumming, and more! She is also on the Southampton Climate Commission.
- Angela Cotton is co-chair of Transition Southampton as well as joint-coordinator of Southampton Friends of the Earth and Working Group lead with Southampton Cycling Campaign. She runs Southampton Repair Café, which currently operates on four sites across the city.
- Ruth Magennis is involved in community engagement and direct action campaigns in the city. She is passionate about engaging communities in grassroots projects that have positive impacts on our built and natural environment.
- Peter Ray is Managing Director of Business Architecture 365 who are an independent consultancy service specialising in Sustainable IT.
- Izzy Sargent is a community organiser and researcher. She is joint-coordinator of Southampton Friends of the Earth, helps coordinate Rhythms drumming, and more!
- Tammi Sinha is one of SoCAN’s newest Steering Group members. She is an academic and her work includes a focus on sustainability and knowledge exchange.
We are developing a more formal membership structure, but in the meantime, please note our Guiding Principles below
Our Guiding Principles
We ask our Members to agree to the below principles, in order to be part of SoCAN:
• Our overall goal is for Southampton to be an environmentally sustainable and regenerative city
• We take evidence-based action to tackle issues around climate change, biodiversity loss and associated challenges and encourage others to do the same
• We embed holistic approaches, such as Doughnut Economics, into all our work and encourage others to do the same
• We aim to be a mutually supportive place, where people can explore issues in a collaborative way, and act together
• We aim to be a broad and inclusive organisation, rooted in Southampton and reflect the city’s diverse communities
• We support and develop creative and just means for people to participate in issues associated with our goals and governance
• We appreciate that people can have a range of views. However, we will not support initiatives that ignore the climate and biodiversity challenges we face, or undermine the goal of reaching net-zero by 2050
• Our Steering Group, recruited from our Membership, ensures that we are focusing on priorities for work that could have the most impact