London as a city globally is famous for its entrepreneurship, style, dynamism and diversity. The Greatest London Authority or GLA is an important body for administration enacted in 2000 through a referendum in Greater London. The body has an administrative Mayor directly nominated by 25 members, having a staff of approximately 700 individuals in addition, to their inspection powers.

The regulatory bodies within the city get most of their powers from the GLA acts namely the 1999 and 2007 acts (Greater London Authority, 2006). These administrative privileges extend to several sectors that include the policing, transport, economic development policing and the emergency and fire planning aspects of the great city.

For efficiency within the GLA, four active bodies were created to offer the above-mentioned areas support. These sectors include the London transport sector, London fire and emergency planning authority, London development agency and the London metropolitan police authority. The government, aside from the cash, attained through tax, funds this body in terms of resources.

Duties of the Mayor and GLA

As initially stated Internationally, London is considered as a great city, therefore, for the wellbeing of its people to be observed, GLA under the directives of the Mayor was given various roles, which could guarantee the smooth running of things within the city.

In a broader perspective, the GLA has a central administrative role for the whole city. More accurately, its main function is the coordination of the city’s administrative body. In addition, similar local powers that are given to the thirty-two London council’s boroughs and the City of London Corporation are found within the administrative body (Greater London Authority, 2007).

The mayor has powers and is tasked with the responsibility of devising strategic plans that affect all areas of the greater city. To be more exact, the Mayor has about five main roles. He prepares and presents the budget to the Assembly for discussion; he also settles the London strategic directives by formulating policies and strategies for the whole city. He also represents the city both internationally and locally. He is still responsible for making appointments to organs that he governs. Lastly, he controls the actions during implementation and planning with other GLA related group (Dow, 2009).

Recently enacted environmental strategies

London, according to the Mayor aims to be seen as one of the best cities both abroad and locally mainly in terms of improving the environment. He plans to achieve this objective by effectively controlling pollution, mitigating impact of climate change, implementing strategies that foresee less consumption of resources and creating an economy that embraces low carbon emission (Andrew, Duncan, Jessica & James, 2008)

To achieve this, the Mayor has proposed various strategies or policies to handle the above-environmental challenges. Enacting policies that mitigate the greenhouse emissions within the greater city mostly make up the first aspects of the plan. In a 2009 survey done by Dow, an approximate 75 percent of the global energy is used within cities and in addition, an estimate 80.5 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions globally happen within these cities. In the UK, London alone contributes to up to 79.9 percent, which accounts for about 44 million tonnes of Carbon Dioxide. Key factors that are predicted to skyrocket this figure include the population increase and the economic growth over the coming years.

Therefore, emission of the Carbon Dioxide reduction is a top priority for the city’s management team. Within the city of London, Carbon Dioxide emission by 2025 is predicted to have reduced by an approximate 65 percent. This is achievable mainly through improving energy efficiency, increase of supply efficiency and renewable energy resources development (Greater London Authority, 2010).

The London climate change strategy is the second initiative (Greater London Authority, 2010). This initiative centralizes among three areas: what and who are currently at risk within the city. How the climate alterations will influence the risks of flood, drought and heat wave and lastly the action explanations that are relevant to manage the problem and those responsible for it. Scientists claim that England would be experiencing drier, hotter summers as well as winters that are wetter. London is thus, expected to experience floods, as well as droughts in the near future.

In this effect, policies have been enacted mainly as a precaution measure to handle the problem. The Drain London Forum, for example, is tasked with the role of recognizing areas at risk as well as initiatives of handling such issues. Many scholars agree that this is a visionary plan, and it will help the city with the strategies implementation in case of need because environmental conditions are changing fast. These climatic effects, in fact, are already being felt in some parts of the world; therefore, in this regard London in the near future is expected to experience floods and droughts. To this effect, the city’s management teams have implemented policies as mitigation measures for the problems.

In relation to the environment, the Mayor passed the waste recycling policy, according to the 2008 study by Andrew, Duncan, Jessica and James, these plans yearly are expected to save about 90 pounds for the city, mainly through the recently enacted waste reduction measures. Study points out that, in London an approximate fifty-five tonnes of waste are produced daily and annually an estimated twenty tones.

The city has two main ways of reducing its waste that is through the municipal waste management, policy implementation and the business waste strategy (Greater London Authority, 2010). Towards this, objective foundations are already established. For example, policies in the London plan have ascertained that the waste reduction within the city is achieved under the stipulated durations. Some of the goals described within the plan include view of London’s waste management as attainable, promotion initiatives aimed at waste management, which would lead to attaining the possible environmental benefits in terms of determining new compositing and repressing objectives. Through such programs, it is believed that London will be better for its citizens by reducing the cost of managing waste and waste reduction within the country.

The mayor of London also has environmental plans that touch on the city’s air quality. He tries to make the city clean as well as incorporates green cleaning within the place. The bold initiatives mainly center on ensuring air pollution is of quality within the city environs. Some of these initiatives affect policies that influence transport sectors, which significantly share of air pollution within the city. These will include funds investments to guarantee the success of the strategies. One such policy aimed at enhancing air quality is the London fleet bus cleaning to confirm the Euro Iv emission standards for NOx and PM10 (Dow, 2009).

Lastly, GLA has ranked water conservation as one of its main priorities in developing a suitable habitat for the city dwellers. In a speech, the Mayor once stated that in relation to water the creation of an environment, that meets the levels of protection and perseverance is a right for its citizens. In addition, he stated that this is achievable if the city water resources are protected. However, he agrees that, mainly due to increased population and the climatic effects attaining this initiative can be challenging for the city.

From this perspective, the first plan mainly focuses on the citizen’s use of water. Supply management according to the mayor is attainable through efficient water use, reducing water loss, development of water resources that least affect climate and use of reclaimed water. The second policy centralizes on encouraging the citizens to learn on how to store water efficiently for future use. Water disposal is at the core of the third mayoral policy. Wastewater according to the (2006) GLA guidelines should be disposed of on a combined or foul sewer respectively. Water usage within the city; have significantly been affected by the three policies. People have lately learnt on the relevance of water preservation, mainly thanks to the GLA based initiatives.

Review of the gap between different aspects of the policy

Noticeably the impacts of the recently enacted policies by the mayor are yet to be noticed. In an overview, there seems to be a distance between public policy, policy as well as general practices among the public. For a start for these initiatives to be fully initiated, there is a need for many resources. For example, to achieve carbon dioxide reduction by 60 percent by 2025, an approximate 60 million pounds in needed for the proposed policies implementation. The GLA believes the government will help by offering some form of financial aid, which will allow this administrative body to attain its initial objectives (Greater London Authority, 2009). It is not certain however that the central government will provide the extra help to progress the plan. This has been one of the key factors on why some of the strategies are yet to be started. Lack of enough public awareness on the environment is yet another reason that inhibits the policies. The body, therefore, has a lot to do if it aims to achieve the overall positive goals as stipulated. Through the awareness, the public will, inevitably be taught to be responsible for their actions in relation to their surrounding. As such, the lawmakers will have full backing of the public in conducting their work.

Technologically London is without a doubt one of the most advanced, however, in terms of implementing these policies a lot is still needed, and it will need a good amount f money pumped in to attain or rather achieve the required technology. For example, according to the mayor, electric vehicles will be made to mitigate emission of carbon dioxide; in addition, all new and already constructed homes within the city should be made to be water and energy efficient. Enough study should, therefore, be done to establish how effectively to implement the said policies based on the current available technology to reduce or mitigate costs that technology will incur.

Lastly, it is evident that in the recent years the living standards of the citizens within the city has improved, and it is expected to continue like that. However, it should be pointed out that there are still discrepancies in many sectors of life that influence particular aspects of the citizen’s lives and there is a probability that the situation would continue.

Opinions concerning priorities and a particular policy

As far as the mayor’s city priorities are, concerned different people have given divergent versions. For example, some people concur that the actions are useful but other things should be prioritized as compared to implementation of some policies related to the environment. For example, of late, creations of more jobs have to be prioritized as the standards of living increase. It is believed that for the well-being and a better future for the people of the city, its development should go concurrently with the environments preservation. Environmental developments, therefore, should stress as compared to initiatives in other areas. For example, most people agree that environmental policies development should be prioritized in comparison to initiatives in other areas. For example, many people agree that air pollution is evidently one of the main environmental issues in the city. The strategies, therefore, has been taken by the mayor and his team to address this issue, it will have a major effect in the lives of the City residents.

The Mayor and GLA effectiveness on the environment issues

Despite the challenges and failures the Mayor and the GLA have experienced, it can be said that these body has been sufficient in its main objective of addressing key issues associated to the environment. For example, some of the strategies initially proposed are already implemented. For example, the London Sustainable Development Commission is already doing the making of London as an international point of reference by the year 2020. Even though the initiative to prevent the high pollution of vehicles within the city was extended in less than two years in 2010, some of the initiatives that will enable carbon emission reduction are already in effect.

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