HC and our environment

The Directors at Hunt & Coombs Solicitors take their responsibility for the environment very seriously and actively encourage all the staff and suppliers to limit their use of the world’s natural resources. They recognise that environmental issues form an integral part of their business and are committed to the continual improvement of the firm’s environmental performance in relation to its services and operations. To help achieve this we are working towards Investors in Environment accreditation and have developed our own travel plan. 

As an office based company based in Peterborough, with branch offices in Oundle and Huntingdon, the main environmental issues which concern us relate to the use and recycling of office consumables, (especially paper and stationary) the use of energy and water and the reduction of waste. 

We have over the past ten years taken specific decisions which have had a positive impact both on the environment and on the firm’s efficiency. These include: 

  • Installing a modern and efficient heating system 
  • Employing specialist contractors to advise on the environmental issues when extending our offices. Our air conditioning complies with the KYOTO agreement, we have energy efficient movement sensor lights, more efficient water heaters rather than kettles in the new area, together with a zoned heating system to minimise wasted energy. 
  • All offices and open plan areas have recycling bins and staff are encouraged to recycle everything they can and keep the non-recyclable waste to a minimum. 
  • As a legal practice, we have a considerable amount of confidential waste. All of this is collected and stored separately, shredded on site and then taken away to be recycled 
  • The paper used is in the main FSC certified paper sourced from sustainable forests. 
  • Increased used of email over recent years has greatly reduced the need for use of paper- certainly for internal communications and we hope to shortly be able to save emails from clients straight into their computer matter file to avoid the need for printing out 
  • Several teams within the practice have their printers set to print double sided automatically and this will be the practice across the firm. Staff are required to print all internal communications double sided and use paper save (4 sides to a piece) whenever this is possible. 
  • We re-use office stationary wherever possible- e.g ring binders and plastic wallets have been recycled repeatedly over recent years 
  • Old Office equipment is recycled whenever possible. Furniture is renovated where possible and items such as computers and printer cartridges are given to charities or schools 
  • Cans and bottles are collected and recycled 
  • We now have a travel plan. We provide a bike shed for staff to leave their bikes and encourage them to car share and walk to work where possible. We also encourage staff to walk to court appointments and in recent years arrange training courses in house whenever possible, rather than have staff travel e.g to London 
  • We involve staff in “green” days and activities to encourage them to get involved and make their own pledges to support environmental issues. Many staff have recently made a pledge to the “Live Healthy Live Green” Campaign launched in Peterborough in May 2011. We also have a designated email inbox for staff to send in suggestions and ideas to improve our Environment policy and travel plan and offer prizes for the best ones. 

Hunt & Coombs Solicitors are committed to seeking further improvements to increase efficiency in the use of energy and water and have now set targets to reduce our use of gas, electricity, water and paper. We will continue to involve staff and suppliers in our efforts and send regular requests to staff e.g reminding them to print double-sided, turn off lights, boil only the water required in kettles etc. We have an Environment policy which is made available to staff, clients and suppliers and a detailed working policy document which sets out the work we have done over recent years and our plans for the future. The policy is reviewed annually to incorporate new ideas and initiatives and to review our targets.