|
| Newsletter | October 2000 |
The seriousness of climate change means that all parts of the economy will have to do their bit to reduce greenhouse gases. At present the air industry gets away almost scot-free when it comes to contributing tax income to society. The result has been other more environmentally-sound forms of transport such as railways being at a serious disadvantage. -- Caroline Lucas
Aviation is growing at an unsustainable rate - that is the bottom line. It is a serious environmental threat, particular insofar as it exacerbates climate change, and not only is it a major problem, but we're actually subsidising it - thus making the situation very much worse. -- Caroline Lucas
As rapporteur to the European Parliament Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism, Green Euro-MP Caroline Lucas was asked to prepare a report on Sustainable Aviation. This was approved by her own committee by 49 votes with one abstention.
It is widely recognised that the current high level of growth in aviation is unsustainable. Unlike other transport sectors the aviation sector is heavily subsidised, the level of lost tax revenue alone running at £200 per household in the UK. As Caroline Lucas has stated the fly-anywhere-at-any-cost culture is no longer acceptable. One of the worst examples has to be Farnborough where a Boeing Business Jet (size of Boeing 737) carries a handful of passengers.
The driving force for the report was the recognition that greenhouse gas emissions from the aviation sector would outweigh gains made elsewhere, air quality, noise, health impacts, congested skies and safety implications.
The report calls for:
Following two days of discussion, and despite intense lobbying by the aviation industry, the European Parliament approved the report.
Following adoption of the report Caroline Lucas stated:
We also want to put the UK's airports on notice that expansion plans should be put on hold until they have fully assessed the significance of this decision. Many airports, including Heathrow, Stansted and Biggin Hill have plans to build new runways or terminals in the expectation of growing passenger numbers. The responsible line being taken by the European Parliament today shows those plans could be premature.
Last year Rushmoor were forced to admit that the Farnborough Main Road (A325) was one of the worst polluted roads in Southern England, a few months ago they appeared to have changed their mind, claiming that air quality on the road was not a problem. Eventually the truth will out, Rushmoor have been forced to admit that they are unable to meet government targets on air quality within the borough. [BVEJ newsletter #0003 August 2000]
Rushmoor have failed to achieve targets in four areas: carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and particulates. Hot spots are the M3 corridor and junctions 4 and 4a. Potential hot spots include Farnborough Airfield, the Aldershot military power station and Drum Laundry in Ash Vale. Last year BVFoE identified Drum Laundry as a source of dioxins. There is no safe level of dioxins.
Rushmoor have recently granted planning approval for airfield expansion, they did so knowing that the site would be a pollution hot spot. Though of course officials did not advise councillors of this fact. We have the irony of VIPs flying into a so-called luxury airport that is the local pollution black spot.
The ongoing Doncaster corruption investigation saw the court appearance of twelve people variously charged with corruptly influencing planning decisions in return for financial gain, seeking to influence, receiving payments, aiding and abetting corruption, and fake accounting. The twelve include a former planning chairman (alleged to have received a farm as a gift), a former deputy council leader (alleged to have received payments), and the current Tory leader.
Hart have suspended two planning officials for alleged incompetence.
Rushmoor Borough Solicitor Michael Lawther told councillors at the TAG special planning meeting that if TAG were not given 80 tonnes they would walk away and the planning application would collapse. This was greeted by cheers from the public gallery, and complaints of blackmail and a gun being put to our heads by councillors. The following morning on BBC Southern Counties Radio, planning official Daryl Phillips claimed no strong-arm tactics had been used by officials on councillors, that a 80 tonnes was merely a preference in the TAG business plan, and they would go with 50 tonnes if nothing else was on offer. Officials from Chief Executive Andrew Lloyd downwards then fell over backwards to claim there had been a misunderstanding. A view echoed by Councillor Ferrier, but not agreed by members of the public who were present. The report presented to councillors was a one-sided uncritical regurgitation of TAG's flawed arguments. Prior to the meeting Rushmoor tried to dirty the name of BVFoE by claiming a well presented illustration of the facts in a circulated leaflet was emotive and said councillors were in the pocket of TAG. The implication being that objectors who were alerted by the BVFoE leaflet and put pen to paper to lodge a formal objection were misguided and should be disregarded. Two days before the TAG driven Local Plan was approved by Council, planning official Richard Short commissioned a report to promote TAG's desire for 80 tonnes and override the 50 tonne limit.
For more details of the TAG special planning meeting, the dirty tricks and the public response see: BVEJ newsletter #0004 September 2000, Farnborough Mail Tuesday 29 August 2000, Farnborough Mail Tuesday 5 September 2000, letters Farnborough News 8 September 2000.
After finally waking up to the fact that no money is coming their way and that Rushmoor are happy to see them wither away and die, Farnborough College of Technology are now firmly on the side of the objectors. Hard lobbying is going on behind the scenes. The destruction of trees in the college grounds beneath the flight path will not be allowed to go ahead.
Somewhat late in the day, a residents association has been formed to fight airfield expansion. It was launched at a packed meeting held at FCoT. Geoff Marks spent a little over an hour leading the meeting through a presentation that showed the shoddy treatment that had been metered out by Rushmoor and the level of maladministration. The meeting ended with an action plan as to where the association was heading and what everyone present could do to help. Most urgent was for everyone to write to John Prescott to call for a Public Inquiry on the TAG application. The association is open to anyone who agrees with the association's aims of opposing airfield expansion.
The Heritage Lottery Fund has awarded a grant in excess of £1 million for heathland management in Surrey. Meanwhile across the border in Hampshire TAG are to be allowed to go ahead and destroy heathland to the western end of the runway and species rich heath grassland on the airfield site.
Were TAG to be restricted to 50 tonne aircraft there would be no requirement to lop off the top of the hills. Were the hills to be lopped to give lower clearance, TAG would then be coming in too low over the road that runs parallel to the Basingstoke Canal. There would be insufficient clearance for a high-sided vehicle or a double-decker bus. To carry out the work TAG and MOD would be in breach of the proposed Thames Basin Heath SPA (a Euro designation) and in direct conflict with Brussels.
John Prescott has refused to call-in the TAG planning application, ie he has refused to heed the people of Farnborough and grant a public inquiry. Prescott took his decision before the deadline of 26 September 2000, meaning he did not have the opportunity to look at all the material placed before him. Even Andrew Lloyd, Rushmoor Chief Executive, expressed his surprise at the speed of the decision. Prescott would have taken his decision based upon a one-sided presentation from Rushmoor.
The level of disfranchisement and the one-sided response can be seen from the following comments:
Obviously we are pleased to have confirmation that the Secretary of State does not intend to intervene and has validated the council's decision to grant planning consent. -- Andrew Lloyd, Rushmoor Chief Executive
This application is good news for Farnborough ... -- Councillor Alan Ferrier, chaired the planning meeting that granted TAG approval
At the western end of the runway, MoD are to go ahead with massive environmental damage on behalf of TAG. This involves far more than the hills which was what everyone had been led to believe by TAG's environmental impact assessment. MoD have confirmed that they will clear 82 acres of trees. The work has the blessing of Hart, Crondall Parish Council and English Nature.
BVFoE who have done little since the beginning of the year, and even worse have sabotaged the work of others, have now given up any pretence of opposing the airfield.
Contrary to the defeatist message put out by BVFoE, the fight is not over yet. There is the possibility of judicial review, intervention by EU, intervention by the Ombudsman, intervention by Parliamentary Commissioner. TAG and Rushmoor should continue to be challenged at every opportunity. This generates delay and raises the costs for TAG. At the end of the day TAG are here for the money they make.
Of the options available, one way forward is direct action and to occupy the hills to the west of the runway. This will protect the environment and hold up the airport. Virtually all other options have now been exhausted. The democratic route has been tried and found to be flawed.
In Europe, every country, bar UK, local people have the right to object to a corrupt council's planing decision. In Britain, only developers are granted this automatic right. In 1994 Labour pledged that when they took office objectors would have an 'automatic right of appeal ... in cases where there has been a departure from the local plan'. We are still waiting Mr Prescott for you to honour your promise.
When it comes to planning applications, airport operators have a teensy-weensy problem telling the truth.
At the Terminal 5 Inquiry BAA said better organisation would result in fewer, but larger air movements, and this would accommodate a large increase in passengers. Rubbish said the opponents and predicted 63 million flights by 2000 (cf BAA forecast of 57 million). The inquiry has taken longer than expected, the expected figures for 2000, 63 million.
TAG have predicted no environmental damage, no risk to the locality, no increase in noise, expansion of airfield will reduce greenhouse gases, great economic benefit. Opponents know otherwise and have produced detailed evidence to support their claims.
Unlike other areas, Rushmoor supports the operators and has simply regurgitated everything TAG has fed them.
The planning system in Great Britain, which at first sight looks orderly, well balanced and fair, is thoroughly rigged. -- George Monbiot
Individual councillors with political ambitions ... discover quickly that the more wealthy and powerful allies they can enlist, the better they are likely to do. While local authorities can help make property developers a great deal of money, the developers, in turn, can render favours of various kinds, financial and political, to local authorities. -- George Monbiot
It is widely recognised that the planning process is flawed. On the one hand we have wealthy developers and corrupt councillors and councils in the pocket of developers (the DETR is little better), on the other hand impoverished local communities trying to fight unwelcome plans. Often all that is left for local people is a judicial review, but when we are talking of sums of £50,000 just for starters they stand little chance of rectifying injustices.
Before they were elected and before they were bought lock stock and barrel by big business the flawed planning process was widely recognised by New Labour. In Europe, in every country bar UK, local people have the right to object to a corrupt council's planing decision. In Britain, only developers are granted this automatic right. In 1994 Labour pledged that when they took office objectors would have an 'automatic right of appeal ... in cases where there has been a departure from the local plan'.
The manner in which Prescott has been so quick to dismiss the TAG application as not worthy of calling-in has shown how quickly these promises have been forgotten.
The response from DETR:
We have given careful consideration to the issues raised by the application and, on the information available, the conclusion has been reached that the proposal does not raise issues that would justify the Secretary of State's intervention. Rushmoor Borough Council has, therefore, been authorised to decide the application as it thinks fit.
DETR have gone on to say:
... planning applications are in general only called-in if planning issues of much more than local importance are involved, and if those issues need to be decided by the Secretary of State rather than at local level. Examples of cases where the Secretary of State might consider call-in appropriate are those which could have wide effects beyond their immediate locality; those which give rise to significant regional or national controversy; those which may conflict with national policy on important matters; and those where the interests of national security or a foreign government may be involved.
Exactly. The application has 'wide effects beyond their immediate locality', all the neighbouring boroughs are affected, all the neighbouring boroughs have said No. There has been significant controversy in the manner in which the application has been handled, the manner in which the Inspector's recommendations have been ignored, and that the planning authority has chosen to put the profits of a foreign transnational before the safety and other considerations of the local community - Rushmoor have shown themselves to be unfit as a planning authority. The proposals conflict with national policy on public safety zones, and fail to meet international treaty obligations on greenhouse gases.
By the DETR's own statement Prescott has cocked it up - grounds to ask Prescott to look again, grounds for a judicial review, grounds for referral to the Parliamentary Commissioner (has to go through a Parliamentarian, but it does not have to be the local MP).
Recommended reading on corruption in the planning process and how New Labour has been corrupted by big business, George Monbiot's excellent and recently published book Captive State (to be reviewed in a later newsletter).
We have spouted at length on the inability of UK farmers to produce sufficient organic produce, the failure of government to provide adequate funding for organic conversion, and how badly we compare with Europe (BVEJ newsletters passim). The Organic Food and Farming Targets Bill sets targets of 30% of agriculture to be organic by 2010, 20% of consumption to be organic by 2010.
Everyone agrees British agriculture is in crisis. This is an opportunity to do something positive. Has your MP signed up to support this excellent bill?
They are not getting value for money in my opinion and in the opinion of the Food Standards Agency if they think they are buying extra nutritional quality or extra safety because we don't have the evidence to support those claims at the moment. -- Sir John Krebs
When Krebs speaks out of his arse can we have any confidence in the recently formed Food Standards Agency of which Krebs is chairman?
Like Sandra Bell (FoE Real Food campaigner) we too are appalled by Kreb's crass comments.
'We are appalled that Sir John Krebs has launched this attack on organic food. Organic food avoids synthetic pesticides, the routine use of antibiotics and genetically modified ingredients. No-one knows what long term impact these may have on human health. If there is no problem with pesticides in conventionally grown food why does the Government advise people to wash and peel vegetables before giving them to children? The truth is that organic food is better for people and the environment. The Food Standards Agency should be promoting it, not rubbishing it.'
The modern day organic food movement has been around for about 50 years. Only in the last few years has it really started to take off with the UK now having to import around 70% of its requirements. Organic food has recently come under attack, one of the the most strident and ill-informed coming from Krebs.
One of the scare stories that circulated last year was that organic food was contaminated with a particularly nasty and sometimes fatal form of e-coli. Further examination showed the story was mischievous. Similar stories have been circulated, all with the same aim of damaging the public's confidence in organic food.
It is because organic food has broken out of its cranky niche market and is proving a threat to the petrochemical industry and manufacturers of heavy equipment that it is now coming under attack.
Organic food is characterised by sustainability, respect for farm animals and respect for the environment. Unlike petrochemical-based industrial farming organic farming does not pass its costs on to the rest of society, does not douse the produce in toxic carcinogens and mutagens, does not mine the soil, does not maltreat farm animals.
According to the government's own data published last year, 33% of fresh fruit and vegetables contained pesticide residues, 70% of conventionally grown carrots were found to contain pesticide residues including organophosphates. The use of organophosphates are currently under review due to concerns about their potential health effects.
Figures released last month show the situation to be getting worse. 43% of fresh fruit and vegetables were found to contain pesticides residues. Even more alarming was the fact that legal limits for pesticide residues were being exceeded.
Earlier in the year the Government announced new regulations limiting pesticide residues in baby food to 0.01mg/kg. These regulations do not come into effect until 2002.
Organic food is not doused in toxic biocides. The organic sector does not use antibiotics as growth promoters, and because of better standards of husbandry and healthier animals has less need to resort to medication. Organic beef and dairy framers did not feed their cattle chopped up diseased remains of animal carcasses and have not suffered from outbreaks of BSE. It is not organic farmers who are contaminating our drinking water. Organic farmers do not have slurry lagoons that have to be disposed of as waste. The organic sector will not permit the use of genetic mutations.
One of the myths that is often given wide currency, is that organic farms are not productive farms, that to go organic is to go backwards. In Cuba as a consequence of the illegal US blockade, there is now a large organic sector. The organic sector is no less productive than the industrialised sector that has yet to convert.
If you work within Murdoch's far flung empire then you have to watch what you say, especially if you criticise big business. Even being award winning journalists offers little protection.
Award winning journalists Steve Wilson and Jane Akre produced a TV documentary that exposed the dangers of Monsanto's rBGH milk hormone. Pressure was applied to WTVT (a Fox TV company) not to show the programme. Wilson and Akre were pressurised to water down the programme. This they refused and it eventually led to their sacking.
Monsanto did not like the unfavourable light in which rBGH was being shown (ie the truth being told), pressure was applied to Fox TV, which in turn was applied to the two journalists.
A Tampa Bay jury has awarded investigative journalist Jane Akre $450,000 damages. The jury heard how Jane Akre had refused to participate in 'the broadcast of false, distorted or slanted news'.
... financial markets are inherently unstable ... they have acted like a wrecking ball, knocking over one economy after another. The swings cannot be avoided altogether but they need to be brought under control. -- George Soros
The world is now ruled by a global financial casino staffed by faceless bankers and hedge-fund speculators who operate with a herd mentality in the shadowy world of global finance. -- David Korten
Early last year a remarkable thing happened in the Canadian parliament, they voted for the introduction of a Tobin Tax.
Every day trillions of dollars cascades around the world. $1.5 trillion, of which most is speculative currency flows, is traded everyday. The sums to finance trade and capital investment is minuscule in comparison. World trade is an annual $6 trillion.
These vast cash flows are bad for national economies as we saw a few years ago when money poured out of south-east Asia, Russia, Mexico and Brazil. These countries then suffer a double whammy when on bended knees they have to seek IMF intervention and the IMF fucks up the economy still further. The cash flows are destabilising leading to exchange rate instability (one of the few arguments for joining the euro, there are many against). Central Banks are powerless to intervene. The combined reserves of all the Central Banks amounts to half a day's speculation.
Currency traders speculate, ie bet, on small fluctuations in exchange rates, separated in space and time. Nobel Laureate James Tobin proposed a small tax, 0.25%, on international currency transactions, that would wipe out the profits of currency speculators, or as he put it 'throw some sand in the wheels'.
A reduction in speculative flows would reduce some of the instability in exchange rates, lessening the need to hedge against currency instability, and release capital for more productive use. Removal of exchange rate fluctuations would remove one of the arguments for joining the euro.
Levying the Tobin Tax would not be difficult as most of the exchange is handled by 100 banks, the top 10 control 52% of the market and are mostly American, German and British. Over half the speculation takes place in New York, London and Tokyo, seven centres control over 80% of the market. If there was a temptation to relocate to tax havens, flows into and out of the tax havens could be subjected to much higher levels of taxation. Apart from hitting offshore tax havens, this would also hit money launderers, and at the same time hit drug traffickers and arms dealers.
A Tobin tax would raise by conservative estimates an annual $150-300 billion. The UN estimates to wipe out the worst forms of poverty and environmental destruction requires an annual $225 billion.
Since the decision by the Canadian Parliament to vote for a Tobin Tax things have moved forward. The European Parliament is discussing a Tobin Tax and the UN during a session in Geneva (helped along by street demos) has agreed to undertake a study of the tax. The French are expected to promote a Tobin Tax during their presidency of the EU.
War on Want have produced a Tobin Tax campaign pack.
At DSEi (Defence Systems Equipment International) held last year at Surrey, Romtechnica (a Romanian arms company) were caught with illegal promotional material for anti-personnel landmines (BVEJ newsletter #0004 September 2000). The Crown Prosecution Service has yet to decide whether or not to prosecute. Whilst the CPS dilly-dallies, Romtechnica were in business at the Farnborough Airshow promoting their wares.
This year the Farnborough Airshow once again knocked up record sales and attendance figures. [BVEJ newsletter #0003 August 2000]
Guns and explosives were recently brought through Stansted which supposedly has security checks. How much easier will it be at Farnborough where there are no checks?
Small airfields like Farnborough with unscheduled no questions asked flights are well suited for drugs and arms shipments. Ex-MoD Manston, now laughingly called Kent International, handles the odd charter when it can get it, and freight. Manston has no permanent customs presence. Cargo manifests are faxed through to customs at Ramsgate.
Occidental Aviation Services (Belgian based, Liberian flag of convenience) has used Manston to ship weapons and other military material in its clapped out Boeing 707s. One Boeing 707 was stopped for inspection with visible corrosion. A cursory inspection showed the engines to out of hours, and an engineer refused to start the engines as their condition was so bad. A detailed inspection by CAA revealed 23 separate faults including defective engines, leaking brake fluid, ripped fuselage, severe corrosion, missing support struts in the cargo hold and lack of any maintenance records. Another 707 was in even worse state. Forged documents claimed airworthiness and authorisation to continue flying past due safety checks. The 707 crashed on take-off in Bulgaria on a rumoured gun running flight when two of the four engines failed. It had 32 faults awaiting repair. [BBC Radio 4 programme on arms dealers Sunday 10 September 2000]
Arms traffickers operate from the UK unlicensed, unregulated. In the US they are licensed and regulated. Moves within Western Europe to licence these traders in misery have been scuppered by the British. [BVEJ newsletter #0003 August 2000]
Two weeks after her report calling for controls on the unsustainable growth in aviation, Caroline Lucas MEP came down to Farnborough to discuss the airfield issue with a small group of airfield campaigners.
Caroline took on board all the issues that were raised - safety, air quality, noise and environmental damage. The hills that are to be damaged are within a proposed SPA. This is a European designation and if flouted strong enforcement action may come from Europe. There is no need to damage the hills if the weight limit adheres to the local plan limit of 50 tonnes.
Local people have been disenfranchised. The local council with the honourable exception of Patrick Kirby has failed to act on behalf the local community. The local MP Gerald Howarth is more interested in promoting TAG than acting on behalf of his constituents.
Caroline Lucas sits on a European Parliament aviation committee. She is the Green Party euro-MP for the South East. She is the only politician who has been prepared to act for the people of Farnborough. Something that should be remembered come the next election.
An NOP poll commissioned by Greenpeace shows a large majority (67%) of the British public are opposed to farm animals being fed on GM crops. A clear majority of people (55%) do not wish to eat animal products such as meat, eggs, milk and cheese from animals fed on GM crops and 90% of respondents want products from animals fed GM crops to be clearly labelled. The results of the survey are:
Do you think the use of GM crops for use in animal feed should continue, or not?
Yes 26% No 67% Don't know 8%
How happy would you be to eat meat or dairy products such as eggs, cheese and milk from animals that had been fed on GM crops?
Very happy 6% Happy 17% No preference 22% Would rather not 36% Very unhappy 19%
Do you think that eggs, meat, milk etc from animals fed on a diet containing GM crops should be labelled as such, or not?
Yes 90% No 9% Don't know 1%
[NOP telephone interviews with 1001 adults aged 15+ 1-3 September 2000]
The Food Standards Agency has called for the labelling of GM animal feed but the NOP poll demonstrates that this will not go far enough in meeting consumer concerns.
Tell the supermarkets what you think. [see BVEJ newsletter #0001 June 2000 for a list of supermarkets]
As we went to press we learnt that FoE had carried out a similar survey which showed that 63% said No to GMOs. We also learnt that Iceland would be eliminating GMOs from their animal feeds.
Ending the cycle of hatred:
If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary to only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them! But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart. -- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Fine upstanding citizens. -- William Hague
They had every right to be there. -- Bruce Kent
People can see no difference between the government and the opposition ... people have been disenfranchised. -- Tariq Ali
In France direct action is seen as part of the democratic process, in England it is seen as a heinous crime, at best an undemocratic process. All this changed when following the example set by the French, the English came out on the streets and blockaded oil refineries and terminals. Whilst we deplore their motive we applaud their action.
Direct action has a long and honourable tradition, the suffragettes, Gandhi salt march, freedom riders, civil rights marches, Vietnam. The powerful do not give way when presented with reasonable and rationale argument, they give way when faced with direct action. No democratic advances have ever been achieved without direct action.
The trashing of genetic crops has achieved what so-called democratic process and scientific argument has failed to achieve.
Far from being an import from an alien culture, direct action is a very English tradition - Twyford Down, Newbury Bypass, Manchester Airport. Every day of the week there is direct action taking place somewhere across the country. We rarely hear about it because it is deliberately kept out of the mainstream media in case it gives people ideas. To learn more about what is happening on the ground read the quarterly Peace News, the monthly Nonviolent Action, the monthly Earth First! Action Update or the weekly SchNEWS.
At national and local level we see parties and politicians bought by big business. When the ballot box fails, when the electorate is ignored, the people have no choice other than to take to the streets. To fail to do so is to fail to act on behalf of civil society, to fail in ones civic duty.
It is time to put the demo back into democracy.
It is clear that the protesters were incredibly effective. -- Chris Gibson-Smith, Chairman of BP
They took to the streets, the farmers, the truckers, the taxi drivers. What had been minor action by a handful of Welsh farmers following the example set by their French counterparts proved to be the fuse that set the whole country alight. Whilst we cannot agree with their aims we approve their methods. Democracy in the UK is dead and the people have to take power back from the corrupt politicians who use it to line their own pockets.
Whilst we cannot agree with the aims of the fuel blockaders, we can sympathise, though we would note that with an adjustment for inflation, to compare with the fuel crisis in the '70s, oil would have to be around $80 a barrel, not $30 dollars a barrel.
High fuel prices are clearly not meeting their intended aim of reducing fuel consumption, reducing journeys, encouraging regional and local economies, forcing modal transport shifts.
There has to be education. Motorists do not understand externalised costs, that they are not paying their way. The message of global warming, air pollution, the need to redouble our efforts has not yet got across. If motorists saw their taxes going to fund improvements in public transport they would be a lot more understanding than when it disappears into some vague exchequer pot never to be seen again.
The externalised cost of motoring is around £40 billion, the tax contribution is around £20 billion. When the positive feedback loops of global warming lock in and bite hard these costs will seem marginal and insignificant compared with the costs of rising sea levels, mass starvation, hordes of refugees attacking fortress Europe. What price then the cost of 2p/litre on fuel?
We consume goods and services, not miles. We are forced to travel by crass planning policies that separate us from where we want to be.
People are forced to travel vast distances to earn a few crumbs. Job Centres force people to take crap jobs many miles away from their homes. The net real disposable income is often less than before. The externalised cost outweigh the meagre cost of when they were unemployed: pollution, health, dysfunctional families, production of crap that no one wants let alone needs.
The blockade would not have happened if the government had invested the tax rises into better public transport and cycle ways. Nobody is going to stop using their car unless there are better provisions, and people understand that now. -- Chris Keene, Green Party
A handful of people manage to bring the country to halt. Tony Blair finds himself unable to utter the C word, though at the same time he was acquiring Emergency Powers. He puffed up his chest and decided to take on the fuel protesters. Blair badly miscalculated. He wasn't taking on a handful of protesters, he was taking on the whole country, and was forced into a humiliating climb down.
With no central organisation a handful of protesters managed to take on the government and win a people's victory. They discovered the power of networking. Networking at each protest location, networking across the country to liaise with other protest locations. These networks were constructed from scratch. These networks are now in place. We saw farmers, truckers, ordinary people all working together to a common aim.
These are tactics that small protest groups have learnt to good effect over the last few years, though none have managed to use it to this great effect. Lessons to the centralised, top heavy, over bureaucratic mainstream environmental groups who are incapable of fast response, incapable of cooperation with others who share their aims.
The government spoke of mob rule, thugs, law breaking, intimidation. There was no evidence of this. The media could find no evidence, the police could find no evidence. There was a few isolated incidents away from the blockades, and in the last few days militants jumped on the bandwagon. Possibly the same militant thugs who destroyed the May Day celebrations in London and the question has to be asked who are they acting for.
The protests were a model of non-violent peaceful direction action to achieve a democratic aim.
Blair talked of not being dictated to by a tiny minority. We see this every day, dictatorship by Tony and his cronies. Big business dictating how the country is run for their benefit. We have seen it in Farnborough where TAG speaks and a corrupt council jumps. Last year Monsanto were averaging several meetings a week with ministers to discuss their genetic mutations. When Ford puts a gun to the government's head and threatens plant closures, the government jumps and rushes over with a blank cheque book.
The protests took place during the TUC annual beanfeast. The capitalist lackeys who claim to represent the working man, and occasional woman, and sometimes even those with a black face, rushed to the cameras and microphones to pour their bile over the heads of the protesters.
The high fuel prices may have been the trigger but the protests were about far more than the cost of fuel. In the '70s and '80s massive strikes were often triggered on seemingly trivial issues like a few minutes on a tea break. The real issue was a chance to hit at management. The protests were aimed at smug Blair, but even more so at all politicians. They were putting across that this is a democracy and you had better start listening to the people.
A BBC poll showed the protesters to have 78% public support.
Unpopular taxes always fail. The Boston Tea Party, the Poll Tax Riots, the Fuel Tax Revolt. No one likes paying taxes, no one likes high prices. Taxes have to be seen to be fair.
Fuel pricing is inelastic. No matter how much we push up the price we fail to make a dent in consumption. We make the motorists squeal, but is that the real intention? Fuel tax was never intended to be a retributive tax. We have to make the motorist understand environmental issues, the true cost in air pollution, climate change and global warming. We have to provide decent public transport. We have to restructure society so that a car is not a necessity. We have to change social values so that cars are no longer a status symbol, or for inadequate males a penis substitute. In Stockholm people manage without cars, why not here? Unnecessary use of a car has to be seen as antisocial. We have to work at reaching a consensus where everyone understands that the present rate of fuel consumption is unsustainable, and everyone agrees that action, drastic action, has to take place if we are to avoid a global catastrophe.
Is the government listening? Sadly we have to say no. Far from setting up communication channels to talk to protesters, the first act of the government was to set up a crisis committee under Jack Boot Straw to ensure this never happens again. No doubt Straw is drooling over the opportunity to bring in ever more Draconian legislation.
There has been a complete lack of leadership from the government. Blair puffed up his chest, then with defeat staring him in the face became more conciliatory. Brown displayed even more arrogance than usual. Straw looked forward to the opportunity to remove more civil rights. Other ministers talked a load of garbage of thugs, law breaking, mob rule. No one came out and talked of global warming, the need to cut fossil fuel consumption. Brown talked of the need for general taxation and asked where was the money coming from, but in his arrogance was completely blind to the issue of unfair taxation.
The price to be paid by the 'leaders' of the direct action is that they are now being targeted by those custodians of democracy, Special Branch.
A conspiracy theory which we do not necessarily subscribe to but which we feel nevertheless deserves a wider airing is that put forward by Charles Secrett (FoE).
In most cases there was no physical barricades, nevertheless the oil companies chose not to cross the lines (cf Miners Strike). Pickets were able to use oil company car parks, oil company canteens. Why?
Coming up soon is a major international conference on climate change and global warming (International Climate Change Conference in The Hague, November 2000). The oil companies have been the most strident critics and have done everything possible to water down international agreements on reductions in fossil fuel consumption. The fuel crisis was the ideal opportunity to shift the blame onto the government and the focus of attention away from the oil companies.
Throughout the crisis no one from the oil companies could be found to make a comment. Once the fuel started moving the chairman of BP was prepared to comment, but he had very little to say, other than than to comment that the protest had proved to be very effective. He had no idea how a future crisis could be avoided.
No one side seems to come out very well from the fuel blockade.
The political opposition ran around like chickens with their heads cut off. On the one hand they wanted to give Blair a bloody nose, on the other hand it went against the grain to support direct action. In the end they came down on the side of the protesters when they saw that polls for the first time in a decade put the Tories neck and neck with New Labour. Not that many people can tell the difference. When the Tories were asked what they would do on fuel taxation they were remarkably silent.
The government were caught napping, they huffed and puffed and failed to blow the barricades down. They spoke of dark forces, taxes, but failed to mention the environment. Belatedly there was a recognition of the fragility of energy supply lines but their answer to bring in more legal big sticks failed to understand the underlying fragility of today's supply lines.
The environmentalist fared little better. They spoke of the short sighted greed of the protesters, referred to global warming, but singularly failed to recognise that the hiked fuel taxes was not achieving their intended objectives. Secretly they were embarrassed that they had never been able to mount this kind of direct action and they were supposed to be the radicals. If you are digging a hole in the wrong place the solution is not to redouble ones efforts to dig the hole deeper.
Commentators were caught on the hop. Straightforward reporting was not a problem, the action was too quick and new for the distortion of prejudice and vested interests to intervene. The analysis tended to be way off the mark. The UK may be a low tax economy, but that doesn't excuse unfair taxes. For one commentator in The Observer to comment Brown did well we can only assume he (or maybe she) lives in the same unreality as Brown.
It what can only be seen as the politics of the madhouse the government, and now G7, has called upon Opec to increase oil production. This is insane. We should be reducing not increasing the amount of oil we draw out of the ground.
When the Berlin Wall fell, the old Soviet system collapsed, the revolutionaries didn't use or need Kalashnikovs or Molotov cocktails, they used fax machines and photocopiers.
The Fuel Tax revolutionaries added mobile phones and the internet to their armoury.
The revolutionaries learnt from the battle in Seattle, only unlike Seattle where the protesters had spent months in planning and preparation, had web sites and e-mail discussion groups and mailing lists, the farmers, truckers and taxi drivers just hit the road. They also innovated and brought in new techniques, the rolling road block for example.
The most useful tools all of the revolutionaries had at their disposal were networks. Hierarchical structures are for the weak and impotent. Real revolutionaries use networks. Networks are adaptive, networks have fast response times. Networks have the potential to reach and activate large numbers.
Networks don't have to use high technology. Many of the farmers used word of mouth. The telephone was used, one farmer phoned a dozen mates, who in turn passed on to his mates. But often as not it was the local farmers market that proved just as effective.
We are part of a network. We take in information and disseminate to a wider audience. Through receipt of this newsletter you are part of the network, by pushing the newsletter out to your mates you are an active part of the network. If you don't already push the newsletter along, then we ask that you do, to at least two people and ideally a lot more. If you are not already a subscriber that is how you first received a copy. If you wish to subscribe please go to our web site and follow instructions.
Receipt of the BVEJ newsletters and all the other benefits that go with it are one of the few good things left in life that are still free.
Where big business ends and government begins is becoming increasingly difficult to detect these days, especially where the oil industry is concerned.
A whole legion of oil industry executives have either been seconded to government or serve on government advisory bodies. To limit space we will only highlight some of the more perverse.
Shell chairman Mark Moody-Stuart chairs the Renewable Energy Task Force. Former Shell chairman Chris Fay chairs the Advisory Committee on Business and the Environment. Shell company secretary Jyoti Munsiff is a member of the Sustainable Education Development Panel. BP Amoco managers are working on secondment in the DTI energy group.
Not surprising Blair threw a wobbly when he got no cooperation from the oil industry during the fuel blockades. After all what are friends for?
The Stone Age came to an end not for a lack of stones and the oil age will end, but not for a lack of oil. -- Sheikh Yamani
We do not have to use carbon-based fuels in our cars. Some cars now use LPG or CNG but these are hard to find at filling stations and can only be seen as interim fuels. The future lies with hydrogen fuel cells and hydrogen.
Both Ford and BP see hydrogen as the fuel of the future. Ford has under development a hydrogen-powered car. Code-named P2000, Ford's prototype hydrogen-powered car, upon which it has already invested $1 billion, is expected to be in production by 2004.
Lorry trains are under development based upon the small run-a-rounds that zip around the tracks for maintenance. These mini-freight-trains will go on trial in the spring. Each train will be 300 ft long (cf traditional freight train c 2,6000 ft). Mini freight trains can be coupled together to form longer trains. M&S will be one of the companies using the mini freight trains. Safeways already uses rail to transport chilled and frozen goods. In the last 10 years HGV traffic has increased by 38% and van traffic by 40%. Business as usual scenario will see continuing growth.
To offer the haulage industry cheaper fuel is not an acceptable option. This would encourage more freight onto the roads. We have to not only shift freight off roads back onto rail, we also have to remove the reason for moving freight around the country.
One positive outcome of the fuel blockade apart from the drop in road traffic was a substantial drop in air pollution in our cities. Pollution levels in some big cities dropped by as much as 2/3. The fuel crisis forced motorists to look to alternatives to the car. With an alarming increase in the level of young children suffering asthma and the threat of climate change the trick has to be to make these behavioural changes permanent. Fuel pricing clearly does not work. More radical alternatives must be tried. One such alternative has to be car free days. On the continent some cities enforce car free days when pollution levels become dangerously high.
To be usable public transport has to be cheap, clean, regular and reliable. Something we don't have in the UK. Germany has higher car ownership than UK, but better use of public transport. In Sheffield and Doncaster during a cheap fares policy, people left their cars at home and used the bus. Over the last 20 years the cost of motoring has stayed constant. The cost of using the bus has risen by 50%, of using the train 70%.
Tony Benn has put forward a very radical suggestion. That the Road Tax disc be used as a free bus, tube and train pass. This would serve the dual function of immobilising a car and getting the motorist onto public transport.
The one alternative that is not available is to sit back and do nothing.
The energy problem, according to conventional wisdom, is how to increase energy supplies ... to meet projected demands. The solution ... ever more remote and fragile places are to be ransacked, at ever greater risk and cost, for increasingly elusive fuels, which are then to be converted to premium forms - electricity and fluids - in ever more costly, complex centralized, and gigantic plants. -- Amory Lovins
Traditionally energy planners have seen energy like a currency, where one source can be exchanged freely for another. The 'Energy Crisis' does not stem from a lack of energy but from a failure to match forms of energy to the real requirements of the consumer. -- Amory Lovins
As we have seen a handful of protesters standing outside oil refineries can grind the country to a standstill. It doesn't have to be protesters, it could equally be striking refinery technicians or tanker delivery drivers, or looking further afield a dispute or crisis in the Middle East. This is not a situation unique to the oil industry, it applies equally to all energy sectors.
A brittle system is one that shatters with a sudden shock. A soft system is one that is resilient to sudden shocks.
Following the oil crisis of the '70s work was done on the development of alternatives, in some cases renewable energy sources. Within this search for a move away from ever greater dependency on the unstable Middle East, some work, primarily by Amory Lovins, was done on the development of soft energy paths.
A soft energy path is one where we have a diversity of energy sources, where there is loose coupling between the supply systems, where there is built in redundancy, where energy supply is appropriate to end user needs in scale and quality, where we make use of natural energy distribution systems.
Buildings can be designed to be passive solar collectors, where we loosen our dependence upon external supplies. Roofs can be solar collectors, though we recognise cost, that solar cell production is a dirty process and solar cells have a limited life span due to radiation damage. A local solar power generator can be a net contributor to the power grid. The grid is necessary to smooth out the peaks and troughs and to avoid the need for expensive, bulky and inefficient local storage. Wind turbines should be community projects to power a local community, not large remote wind farms with their consequential environmental damage.
Highly recommended reading:
Amory B Lovins, Soft Energy Paths, Penguin, 1977
Amory B Lovins & L Hunter Lovins, Brittle Power: Energy Strategy for National Security, Brick House, 1982
The Slyfield Waste Incinerator is one of three incinerators earmarked for Surrey. Surrey County Council has a contract for waste disposal with French Company SITA, which includes incineration of waste. SITA wish to build two incinerators at Redhill and Capel. Thames Waste Management (owned by Thames Water) wish to build a waste incinerator at Slyfield on the edge of Guildford.
An operational licence is required from the Environment Agency (environment and health). Surrey are the planning authority. Waste disposal and minerals are handled at the County level because they have regional implications.
Planning consultation has only taken place with people living within 600 metres of the plant. Visually intrusive (larger in size than the Palace of Westminster) the incinerator will be seen from a much wider area, the pollution will be spewed over a much wider area.
Surrey already seems to have accepted incineration as a foregone conclusion as it forms part of their waste management strategy, although a Waste Local Plan has yet to be agreed. All that appears open is the siting of incinerators and whether a couple of large ones or more smaller ones. Recycling is not being taken seriously, waste minimisation and resource conservation is not even on the agenda.
The Environment Agency are playing down the risks from dioxins, pointing out that dioxins from the plant will be less than local traffic.
The plant will consume 225,000 tonnes/year, taking in waste from Guildford and the surrounding area. This will generate heavy traffic flows, both into the plant with waste, and back out with highly toxic fly ash. The plant will generate 20 MW of electricity, with possibility of district heating in the future. Sewage may be consumed in the future.
Guildford recycles a miserly 7% of its waste. This is far below government and EU targets. Waste in Surrey is growing at 3% per annum.
The incinerator is close to green belt land. It is on a flood plain and in danger from freak floods. Whitmoor Common SSSI is in the deposit zone for pollutants.
The health risk has ben calculated assuming a healthy adult of average weight (70 kg, 11 stones). The weak, the old, the young, the frail, asthmatic suffers are all at greater risk. Nor do the health risks take into account the stress and psychological damage of living near to an incinerator.
The most toxic emissions are sub-micron particles. These are not filtered out. Although mass reduction takes place, the mass does not magically disappear nor get converted to energy. It goes up the chimney, dioxins, heavy metals. CO2 and NOx emissions are greenhouse gases. The atmosphere has been substituted for landfill. The contaminated fly ash goes to landfill.
Incinerators are a tax-subsidised gravy train. The UK is the only industrialised country contemplating an expansion of incinerators.
The deadlines for objections to the TWM Slyfield Incinerator are 13 October 2000 for Surrey County Council (late objections will be considered up to the planning meeting), end of October 2000 for Environment Agency.
Slyfield Incinerator Roger Hargreaves Environment Agency Head of Planning PO Box 143 Environment Department Camberley Surrey County Council Surrey GU16 5WA County Hall, Penrhyn Road Kingston Upon Thames Surrey KT1 2DY
Note: Surrey CC deadline has been extended to 22 December 2000.
Plans are available for viewing in Guildford BC, Woking BC and Guildford Library. A non-technical summary is available from Surrey CC, and is also on the web.
A Guildford councillor recently accused protesters of criminal irresponsible behaviour for covering the town in posters declaring a 10 mile cancer zone around the proposed incinerator. The criminals are the developers and the councillors in their pockets.
Opposition is being coordinated by the Guildford Anti-Incinerator Network. They have produced briefing material including a model letter of objection. The local FoE and Burpham Residents Association are actively opposing the Slyfield Incinerator. Opposition to the other two Surrey incinerators is being led by the recently resurrected Mole Valley FoE.
A more detailed version of this article can be found in a BVEJ briefing paper on the BVEJ web site.
A group of households in Dorking are regularly flooded with raw sewage. The sewers are the responsibility of Thames Water. To date Thames water has refused to carry out any remedial work to prevent the problem repeating. Thames Water are responsible for cleaning up the mess. It can be days before Thames Water take any action.
Thames Water recorded profits of £559 million.
With landfill no longer an option we have to look more seriously at recycling. We have to look more seriously at the problem of waste generation at source.
Kerbside separation and collection can easily achieve 80% recycling. Communities across the world are achieving recycling rates of 50-80%. What limits recycling is not the will of local people to participate, it is the failure of corrupt councils to implement viable recycling schemes. A community in Essex has been able to achieve over 90% public participation with no complaint of contamination from buyers.
In Yorkshire a community recycling project takes in a variety of plastic at one end, cuts and chops, processes, and out the other end comes extruded plastic board of about the density of hardwood suitable for a variety of uses. They are currently experimenting with a mix of plastic and rubber that has potential as a surface for canal paths and cycle tracks. The same group has many other recycling projects, one of which is chopping up and composting cardboard boxes, any boxes still fit for use are sold to a furniture removal company. Worms from the composting are sold to anglers and currently being used as input for a community fish breeding project.
In Devon a community project composts household waste. The compost is sold and used on a community small holding. The food grown is sold in a community shop and cafe. This reduces imports, fair traded goods are also sold. The cafe runs courses on vegetable growing, composting, use of recycled materials. The Devon project is one of more than 20 such schemes in Devon.
In a natural Gaian system, the output from one system is the input for the next, resources are used efficiently. The concept of waste and waste disposal does not exist.
Summer is now past. One of the images we have of warm hazy summer days is clouds of butterflies. When did you last see a butterfly?
20 years ago, maybe even 10 years ago, is was possible to go walking in the countryside and disturb clouds of butterflies. Not any more.
The UK has 58 species of butterflies, 55 are resident, 3 are migrants. To put these numbers in context, there are 17,000 species of butterflies worldwide.
Over the last 150 years we have lost 5 species of butterfly. Currently about half of the butterfly species are seriously threatened. Some species have seen a 90% decline.
In lowland Britain we have lost 97% of our species rich grasslands. TAG, with the connivance of Rushmoor, are determined that we lose some more when they pave over species rich grassland on the airfield site.
Organic farms are better for butterflies, in both numbers and range of species, than industrialised farms.
Ted Heath took us into the Common Market at any cost. The claimed economic advantages were a mirage for public consumption. Not our view but the truth revealed by recently released secret cabinet papers.
Tony and his cronies seem determined to repeat the mistakes of history. They seem to want to take us into the euro no matter what the cost. The euro has now sunk below the North Korean won!
If Denmark, then UK (if we are allowed) vote NO to the euro the whole federalisation project is likely to unravel and collapse. Robin 'what's ethics' Cook has been whinging that Brits have been raising money to back the NO campaign in Denmark. Dark mutterings about interfering in the internal affairs of an independent sovereign state: 'nothing more than a cynical attempt to exploit the [Danish] referendum to advance their own agenda.' Something Cook (or the EU) would never dream of doing, let alone contemplate the supply of arms to repressive regimes.
Local authorities are spending taxpayers money to prepare for the euro (even though we have yet to have the promised referendum). The EU spends £850 million a year of taxpayers money on EU propaganda. Like Canute trying to stop the tide coming in, the G7 group of countries have spent billions of dollars throwing good money after bad trying to prop up the euro. Money that could have gone to relieve third world debt.
According to a report in the Independent on Sunday (IoS 17 September 2000), the EU is working hard to destroy programmes on energy conservation and renewable energy sources.
The EU has put a stop to the funding of urban renewal projects.
The EU used the summer recess to rush through sweeping powers that severely restrict freedom of information in areas of security, military and foreign policy matters.
As we went to press we received the excellent news that the Danes had voted No to the euro - No 53%, Yes 47%. This was not only a vote against the euro, it was a No to greater European integration, and Yes to local democracy. The Danes demonstrated what is true across all of Europe, the politicians are out of touch with the people. The following day arrogant European leaders jostled with each other to show their contempt for the Danish people. Maybe they should heed their own people. In both France and Germany there is a majority of public opinion against the euro. In Germany 55% against, rising to 72% in East Germany. Pompous ass Leon Britain was wheeled out to claim European leaders were not out of touch with their people. The Head of the European Central Bank claimed the Danes were depriving themselves of the benefits of the euro, those living within the euro-zone have yet to discover what these 'benefits' are. [see Diary for conference/celebration of the Danish No to the euro]
We have known for a long time that people don't want to eat GM food; supermarkets won't sell GM food and the time has come to stop planting GM food. - Peter Melchett
We don't have immediate plans, but if the government don't do anything and the chemical companies don't stop planting these crops, we won't rule anything out. - Peter Melchett
As far as I can see this throws the door open for people to legitimately destroy GM crops that are about to go to pollen. -- Charles Secrett
Greenpeace protesters who trashed a crop of GM maize in Lyng July last year have been cleared of all criminal charges. The jury at Norwich Crown Court were unanimous in their verdict of Not Guilty.
Greenpeace trashed a crop of GM maize July last year. At their trial last April they were cleared of theft, but the jury were unable to reach a verdict on criminal damage. At their second trial last month the jury were unanimous in their verdict of Not Guilty. The jury accepted the argument of 'lawful excuse', that the protesters were acting to prevent widespread genetic contamination. Outside the court members of the jury joined supporters in offering their congratulations.
The result vindicates the jury system. Environment Minister Michael Meacher showed sour grapes when he spoke of GM food having widespread support and illegal protest not being acceptable. Maybe someone should explain to Meacher the meaning of a Not Guilty verdict. Once again Tony and his cronies have been shown to be out of touch and in the pocket of big business.
The trial once again exposes the farce of the so-called GM crop trials. These are not properly conducted scientific trial, these are deliberate and cynical attempts to contaminate the British countryside. Seventy-three sites were chosen for GM trials this year.
A government that acted for the people not big business would recognise the economic advantage the UK would have if it declared these Isles GM-free and went fully organic.
nvCJD, BSE, scrapie, and other 'brain-rotting' diseases are believed to be caused by prions.
Prions are self-replicating proteins. Of sufficiently small size they pass through all but the finest filters. Almost indestructible, normal sterilisation techniques do not destroy them. Invisible to the immune system as they are not detected as alien proteins.
BSE infected carcasses were buried at landfill sites where the prions could pass into the local ground water. When spinal cord and other potentially hazardous material was banned from the human food chain it was still being used for the manufacture of childhood vaccines.
A woman who died of nvCJD appears to have passed the disease to her daughter. Experiments with sheep have shown that BSE can be passed by blood transfusion. Blood from cows is still being used in animal feed.
The current rise in new cases of nvCJD coincides with the handing in of the report of the BSE Inquiry. The spectre of death once again haunts the land.
If you have paid oodles of money to bankroll the Olympics then you expect value for money. You expect everyone to stay on message.
If you have paid to have your sweatshop sportswear displayed everywhere then it will not do to see inappropriate brands. The wrong brands, ie those that have not bribed their way into the arena, are not allowed to appear anywhere near the stadium. Spectators wearing inappropriate attire, ie not on message, are to be denied admission.
High security surrounds the events. You will not be allowed in if you are bearing anything as offensive as a can of Pepsi.
We want to make the financiers' lives as difficult as possible in Prague and disrupt their meeting. -- Viktor Piorecky, Inpeg
We don't consider the IMF and World Bank to be legitimate institutions and they don't have the right to have meetings somewhere and decide about other people's lives. -- Viktor Piorecky, Inpeg
Dialogue is vital as we are all doomed to live on this planet. We cannot emigrate elsewhere. -- Vaclav Havel
Assembled in Prague, on the one side 18,000 bankers representing nothing other than self-interest and greed attending the annual beanfeast of the IMF/World Bank, on the other side 20,000 protesters representing the world's poor and the environment determined to grind the meeting to a halt.
Co-ordinated by Inpeg, Initiative Against Economic Globalisation, the protest in Prague was the big follow on to the WTO Prattle in Seattle of the previous Autumn. Earlier in the month there had been a warm up event at the WEF meeting in Melbourne. For those who could not make Prague events were taking place across the globe in more than 40 countries.
Protesters were stopped at the border and prevented from entering the country. In its first real test, Czechoslovakia reverted to a Stalinist state mentality.
On the Saturday, to coincide with a G7 meeting, 2,000 protesters, dressed in black and carrying white crosses to represent the 19,000 who die each day, marched on behalf of Jubilee 2000 to protest at the G7 failure to deliver their promise to cancel third world debt. [see BVEJ newsletter #0004 September 2000 for coverage of G8 meeting in Okinawa, Japan on third world debt relief]
On the first day of the IMF/World Bank meeting rioting broke out. Anarchists threw Molotov cocktails, street cobbles and virtually anything they could lay their hands on. The police retaliated with tear gas, stun grenades and water cannon.
The second day was quieter but the delegates decided to call it a day and the final day was cancelled.
Displaying his usual pig-headed arrogance Gordon Brown defended the World Bank and IMF and the process of globalisation. Spokesman for the World Bank and IMF said they would have to listen and engage in dialogue, though whether they will go as far as what is now wanted, abolition, is doubtful.
Prague has once again shown that since Seattle things will never be quite the same again.
As people have drifted home, reports have started to filter out of Prague of police brutality and lack of human rights - protester held for days without charge, denied access to lawyers, denied access to medical care and medication, denied food, water and sleep, sexual and physical abuse, protesters badly beaten. These and many other charges of human rights violations are now under investigation by Amnesty International.
Recommended tool kits for campaigners: the campaign pack produced by WDM, campaign pack produced by the Green Party, The Ecologist special report Globalising Poverty September 2000.
Recommended reading:
Kevin Danaher & Roger Burbach (eds), Globalize This!: The Battle Against the World Trade Organization and Corporate Rule, Common Courage Press, 2000
Jerry Mander & Edward Goldsmith (eds), The Case Against the Global Economy, Sierra Club Books, 1996
Colin Hines, Localisation: A Global Manifesto, Earthscan, 2000
BP Amoco has had a makeover. If the BP Amoco greenwash is to be believed they have moved out of oil.
The reality is that they are still big in oil. Worse still, drilling in fragile environments like the Arctic Circle has not stopped, dealing with repressive regimes as their investment in PetroChina has not stopped.
At the time both Catholic priests, brothers Daniel Berrigan a Jesuit and Philip Berrigan a Josephite, sprang to fame at the height of the Vietnam War when they publicly burnt draft cards. The two brothers have continued ever since to oppose the US war machine. At one time they headed the FBI's most wanted list.
Currently Philip Berrigan (#292-139, 30 months) and the Rev Steve Kelly SJ (#292-140, 27 months) are serving time at the Roxbury Correctional Institute (MD 21746, US) for disarming two A10 Warthog tankbusters.
Also serving time for disarming A10 Warthogs is Susan Crane (#916-999, 27 months, Maryland Correctional Institute for Women, MD 20794, US).
The unofficial biography of the Berrigans is well worth reading as they are an inspiration to us all. Also recommended is Daniel Berrigan's analysis and semi-autobiographical journey of the Book of Daniel.
Murray Polner & Jim O'Grady, Disarmed and Dangerous, Basic Books, 1997
Daniel Berrigan, Daniel: Under the Siege of the Divine, Plough Publishing House, 1998
We reported last month on alternative local currencies and the need to decouple local economies from global economies (BVEJ newsletter #0004 September 2000).
Time Banks are a new concept that trade in our most precious commodity - time. They store the time credits that people save by helping others or their community. So if one member spends an hour of their time helping another member they are then entitled to an hour of somebody else's time.
There are now 15 time banks across the country.
No barley in, No beer out is the slogan of a new campaign group that has been set up with the intention to bring the country (or at least the SchNEWS office) to it's knees. Angry boozers around the country this week vowed to Dump the Pub if the government doesn't reduce alcohol tax. Unlike those whinging drivers you've got to admit they've got a point. At least petrol taxes get spent on roads, how much of alcohol tax gets spent on pubs? With at least one rural pub calling time every day the campaign are calling for some of the £10 billion revenue from alcohol tax robbed from us each year to be spent on building new pubs, or refurbishing old ones. A spokesman for the campaign stated that 'we pay about 66% tax on the price of beer, so for every £10 you spend on a night out, you're giving the government nearly an extra £7 out of your own pocket!! For every three pints you buy for yourself, you buy two pints for Gordon Brown. Mr Brown buy your own!!!' Of course it would be impossible to dump the pub for good, so the campaign is running a weekly boycott on Mondays, which still sounds pretty drastic. [courtesy of SchNEWS]
The market last month was the last of the present series. There are no immediate plans for more markets.
It is hoped to hold a market before Christmas, and a regular monthly market next year, but there are no firm plans in place. Guildford has shown the same level of bloody incompetence and maladministration as is the norm for Rushmoor.
Local people had to push very hard to have the present series of markets, against strong opposition from the Council. The markets have proved to be a success, being welcomed by farmers, public, and surrounding shopkeepers. Guildford have not yet got around to deciding whether to hold any more or to make the market a permanent feature. This decision should have been made BEFORE the last market was held to enable publicity to be available on the market stalls.
The most successful Farmers Market in the area continues to be the monthly market held at Secretts Farm, Milford.
A leaked report on the Ilisu Dam by ex-World Bank staffer Dr Ayse Kudat for the Swiss Export Credit Agency shows that the Dam cannot meet international standards. This means that a key test set by Trade Secretary Stephen Byers for British Government support for the project has not been satisfied. If the UK government is pig-headed enough to continue with their support for the dam campaigners will use the report to mount a legal challenge.
The report, Ilisu Dam's Resettlement Action Plan: Achieving International Best Practice, shows that the Ilisu Dam has failed to meet international standards in a number of key areas:
Copies of the leaked Kudat report are available from FoE. A summary can be found at the Ilisu Dam campaign web site.
Skanska, a Swedish construction firm with a 24% stake in the project, has pulled out of the project to protect its environmental reputation.
The pull out by Skanska is a major blow to the scheme. It is difficult to see how it can continue. Balfour Beatty has a 31% stake in the project.
At the Labour Party Conference Tony Blair said it was time to listen. Tell him that it is time to listen on the Ilisu Dam.
Ilisu Dam Campaign produce excellent campaign material.
[see BVEJ newsletters passim, BVEJ urgent actions, BVEJ briefings for further information on Ilisu Dam and Balfour Beatty]
Tories have tabled hundreds of time wasting amendments in a crude attempt to scupper the Bill.
The damage that TAG, with the connivance of Rushmoor, intend to inflict on the local environment, are one of many examples that could be cited to show the weakness of current wildlife and habitat protection legislation.
Towards the end of the Second World War a promise was made on the right to roam. We are still waiting for that promise to be honoured.
Give me a child for the first seven years and I will ruin his diet for the rest of his life must be Ronald McDonald's wet dream.
Kids have a greater awareness of diets than they are often given credit for. The know what is good, what is bad, and understand the reasons if given the opportunity, will try new foods if given the chance.
In Croydon a Junior School has withdrawn crisps and other junk from sale and replaced with fruit. This has been met by a chorus of approval from the kids. Their teachers have noticed improvement in behaviour.
The Head has now taken control over catering. One of the first steps has been to introduce a Breakfast Club, where kids can have breakfast for 30p. The second major change has been to introduce a Meals Committee, on which sits the head, a teacher, the cook and two of the kids. They decide, within budget, what will be served at meal times.
The Croydon school is a marked improvement in the overall depressing picture of creeping privatisation where schools are seen as profit centres and opportunities to franchise junk food.
Nationally, children are suffering from malnutrition and rickets. The primary cause is junk food.
Can someone please take BVFoE by the scruff of the neck and give them a jolly good shake.
BVFoE have recently laid claim or credit for the following activities over the last year.
Opposing the Newbury Bypass.
Ugh! Maybe someone should tell them that the Newbury Bypass has been open for traffic for the last year.
Promoting renewable energy locally.
Really?
Opposing the airfield.
Yes, some excellent work was done last year, mainly the work of two people who worked very hard. We have seen nothing this year, even worse what little BVFoE did at the beginning of the year was counter-productive. All the work on the airfield has been done by a small network of local individuals who have been working very hard. Who have spent around £2,000 of their own money. Not backed by a national or any other organisation. Too busy working to go around blowing their own trumpet. It does little for the credibility of BVFoE to try to steal the credit for work done by others. Even worse when one BVFoE member makes snide comments of one of these hard working individuals that 'he is paddling his own canoe'.
Stopping GM food.
One member of BVFoE did work very hard, with little help from anyone else. She alone, does deserve praise.
But don't worry, BVFoE are working hard to protect the local environment. Their latest dumb antics was a childish demo against Boots! If BVFoE want to protest against a major retailer, then at least do it properly and protest against Wal-Mart (Asda), or protest against the retail chains that are exploiting Third World Labour, or protest against McDonald's on World Anti-McDonald's Day (see Diary). A properly run campaign is a lot more than one dumb demo. There has to be awareness raising, follow-ups, constant pressure, otherwise you are just pissing in the wind.
We need an effective local environmental campaigning group. BVFoE seem determined to make themselves a laughing stock and alienate all local support.
A community is not created by the imposition or diktat of external forces.
As reported last month, attempts are being made to create more grandiose schemes for North Camp (BVEJ newsletter #0004 September 2000). However well meaning the Civic Society may be it cannot create a community in North Camp. This has to come from within. Only then, when outside expertise may be needed, do outsiders have a role.
Civic Society has distributed a North Camp newsletter that is nothing but waffle. An appalling waste of paper.
The front page of the newsletter shows the Rushmoor Cafe as a local meeting place. This is news to anyone in North Camp. The picture shows the cafe closed for repairs which about sums up the statement.
A sense of community comes from a sense of place. Wendell Berry, farmer, poet, philosopher, captures this sense of place better than anyone. Communities have core values. Lewes, Delaware ascribed to the following core values:
The third core value obviously does not apply to North Camp, but it would not be too difficult to develop a substitute. From these core values we can then decide how we want our community to develop. We take stock of our assets.
North Camp is known for its specialist shops. Two worth mentioning are the junk shop next to the pub on the main road where if you delve into its depths you find it to be one of the best second hand book stores in the area and the Fleet Micro computer shop on the edge of the central area on Queens Road.
Specialist shops are fine and they bring people into the area, but what we also need are shops that serve the community in its basic needs. We have butchers and bakers, though no candlestick makers, but lack a medium size supermarket. The area is surrounded by high density housing on three sides and many small businesses. The ideal place for a supermarket would be on the old supermarket site. We suggest that it and the derelict building next door be demolished. This would give sufficient floor area for a viable supermarket on the ground floor, offices on the first floor, and residential accommodation on the second floor.
The proposed use of the old supermarket site for an auction house is not in the interest of North Camp. If nothing else it will generate a lot of traffic and cause congestion. It should be opposed.
North Camp has an excellent charity shop, though not serving local needs. What North Camp lacks are any form of community projects. A suggestion would be a community composting and recycling project. These are very successful in other communities, why not North Camp? The essential is that these projects have to come from within to serve local needs. They may need outside help to get them started. What is not wanted is the self-serving presence of local councillors.
Camp Road closed off midweek would be an ideal location for a monthly Farmers Market. North Camp offers easy access for the area and is a far superior location than either Aldershot or Farnborough, and being midway neither town gets its nose put out of joint.
Johann Christoph Arnold, Why Forgive?, Plough Publishing, 2000
Whoever opts for revenge should dig two graves. -- Chinese Proverb
Forgiveness is a door to peace and happiness. It is a small, narrow door, and cannot be entered without stooping. It is also hard to find. But no matter how long the search, it can be found.
Bitterness is more than a negative outlook on life. It is a destructive and self-destructive power. Like a dangerous mold or spore, it thrives in the dark recesses of the heart and feeds on every new thought of spite or hatred that comes our way.
In my experience, the strongest motivation for forgiveness is always the sense of having received forgiveness ourselves, or - if we do not have that - an awareness that, like everyone else in the human race, we are imperfect and have done things we need to be forgiven for.
When General Pinochet was under arrest there was some discussion within the peace and human rights movements. What are we looking for, are we seeking vengeance, if so does that make us any better?
When we get hurt, we suffer. If we let it smoulder we become bitter and learn to hate. The slight can be small, a minor tiff, it can be a betrayal by a friend who turns their back on us and leaves us to suffer, it can be torture or a brutal killing. The bitterness grows until it forms an impenetrable barrier. Like a cancer it eats into us, bitterness destroys our heart, hatred devours our soul. We have to learn how to forgive. Until we can forgive we will never have peace of mind.
Many Japanese prisoners of war, after 50 years, are still consumed with bitterness. It is easy to see why they hate, the torture, degrading and brutal treatment under the hands of the Japanese. It would be strange if they did not. But half a century later their lives are dominated by the hatred, the bitterness is consuming them, nightmares keep them awake at night. They have yet to find peace of mind. Some have made it to Japan and faced their tormenters and learnt to forgive, only then have they found peace of mind.
Why Forgive? looks at many tragic cases, where bitterness destroys people, how it can do far more damage than the original hurt. Johann Christoph Arnold shows how we can learn to forgive.
Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart is not the beginning of competition, it is the end of competition. Once it has driven out the competitors, it is free do whatever it wants with its prices. -- Al Norman
Consumers should ask themselves whether a six pence reduction in the price of baked beans is worth the environmental cost of of having to buy the car and travel even further to get to the tin shed to buy the tin can on the edge of a motorway. Is it really worth it? -- Tim Lang
From what we have seen from the States, we can see that Wal-Mart does affect the High Street. They are going to be quite detrimental to consumer choice at the end of the day. -- spokesman for Iceland
Wal-Mart's executives have demonstrated an often breathtaking contempt for laws and regulations. In the US, courts again and again have found the company to have lied, to have illegally falsified, destroyed and withheld documents, to have committed civil fraud, to have wilfully sold counterfeit goods, to have deliberately discriminated against disabled job applicants, to have illegally fired workers for interracial dating, to have discriminated against black and Mexican employees in other ways, to have allowed managers to sexually harass women workers - and to have fired women who have had the temerity to complain. -- Bob Ortega
Our priorities are that we want to dominate North America first, then South America, and then Asia and then Europe. -- David Glass, Wal-Mart CEO and President
When Wal-Mart acquired Asda last year there was massive media razzmatazz, Rip-Off Britain was about to come to an end, Tony Blair was rumoured to have offered Wal-Mart a deal on out-of-town sheds on the bypass.
Wal-Mart was founded in the US 40 years ago. It has grown to become the US's largest retailer, with stores on four continents. Wal-Mart intends to turn itself into the Coca-Cola of the retail world.
When Wal-Mart opened its first US-style shed in Bristol this summer, cars clogged the roads queuing to get into its 1000-space car park. The typical out-of-town superstore imposes an externalised cost of £25,000 a week on the local economy through pollution and congestion alone.
Wal-Mart uses its brutal economies of scale to drive down prices and to kill off all competition. In Iowa, ten years after the arrival of Wal-Mart 555 grocery stores, 298 hardware stores, 293 building suppliers, 161 variety stores, 151 women's clothing stores, 153 shoe shops, 116 drug stores, and 111 children's clothing stores died. In total 7326 businesses went bust. Typically for every job created by Wal-Mart (usually low paid part time) 1 1/2 jobs are destroyed elsewhere. In the US, a typical Wal-Mart adds 140 jobs and destroys 230 higher paying jobs elsewhere.
Jobs lost is less money circulating within the local economy. If local business are replaced by Wal-Marts more money is siphoned out of the local economy. In the US, one dollar spent in a locally-owned store has 4-5 times the economic spin-off than one dollar spent in a Wal-Mart.
Once Wal-Mart has killed of all the competition in a town, Wal-Mart will often abandon the town altogether forcing shoppers to travel to a regional Wal-Mart. In the US there are over 4,000 abandoned shopping malls, Alabama alone has 22 abandoned Wal-Marts.
Brainwashed staff sing the company song: 'Stack it deep, sell it cheap, watch it fly and hear those downtown merchants cry.'
Wal-Mart hates unions. In the US out of a 920,000 strong workforce, only 10 belong to a trade union. Workers are often sacked on the spot for joining a union. Wal-Mart has an open door policy for its employees, or 'associates' as they are known in Wal-Mart double-speak, open your mouth and you are out of the door.
Full time work at Wal-Mart is defined as more than 28 hours (it used to be 20 hours). For the first 90 days of employment, workers can be fired with no notice. Once the 90 days has passed there is no guarantee of permanent employment, hours of work, type of work can be changed at any time.
Brute force purchasing power is not the only way in which Wal-Mart cuts costs. It exploits cheap overseas labour. 'Made in USA' garments on sale in Wal-Mart have been found to come from a factory in Bangladesh employing 12-year old workers. The children were locked in at night until they had completed their production quotas. In Honduras women as young as 14 were found to be working 14-hour shifts with occasional 24-hour shifts, seven days a week. Wal-Mart imports from the world's sweatshops: Honduras, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, China and Bangladesh. Only this summer Wal-Mart imported 60 tonnes of garments from the pariah state of Burma.
Wal-Mart ran a 'Buy American' campaign. NBC charged that Wal-Mart imported 288 million pounds worth of goods from Hong Kong and China, 8,000 times more than it did before the start of the campaign. Wal-Mart imports more goods from China than any other American retailer.
Asda has signed up to Fair Trade, but it is difficult to see how long this will survive under the Wal-Mart culture.
It is not only in the Third World that Wal-Mart exploits child labour. Wal-Mart agreed to pay $205,650 for more than 1,400 violations of child labor laws in the biggest case of its kind ever investigated by the Maine Department of Labor. The 1,436 violations from January 1995 to June 1998 involved minors working too early or too late, too many hours a week or too many days in a row. Violations were found at all 20 Wal-Marts in Maine.
Wal-Mart operates an insurance scam. Workers are encouraged to join a free life insurance scheme. Wal-Marts insures the life of its workers. It borrows the money from the insurance company for the premium and for the interest on the loan. Wal-Mart offsets the costs against tax. On the death of a worker, even after the worker has left the employ of Wal-Mart, the payout goes to Wal-Mart as holder of the policy. Wal-Mart generates $30-80 million a year in tax savings alone from this Corporate Welfare scam.
Wal-Mart has a sorry record in the US for contempt of the law and a disregard for customer safety. There has been many cases of women being sexually assaulted, abducted and killed in Wal-Mart car parks.
Donna Meissner was kidnapped and raped in a Wal-Mart car park. Wal-Mart lied as to the extent of these incidents in its stores and car parks. Wal-Mart was fined $18 million for a 'pattern of false and misleading discovery answers.' The judge accused Wal-Mart of having a 'corporate policy' of undermining the discovery process. Alto Watson, lawyer for Donna Meissner, told the court that Wal-Mart had 'systematically engaged in a conspiracy ... to withhold evidence from victims who have been injured at their stores relating to a lack of security nationwide.'
Wal-Mart has its eyes on Boots. At first this does not appear to fit in with their normal retail strategy of cheap out-of-town retail space until it is realised that Boots own Halfords.
In Farnborough, Asda is in breach of its planning consent with deliveries during embargoed hours. The lax attitude Rushmoor takes to big business means Wal-Mart is able to flout these breaches with impunity. Since Asda went 24 hours, local residents are having their sleep disturbed by late night and early morning noise. Rushmoor have failed to take any enforcement action.
Wal-Mart have yet to flex their muscles in Farnborough. What the Arabs have not yet destroyed Wal-Mart could well finish off.
Recommended reading includes issues of The Ecologist August/September 1999, September 2000 and October 2000, Corporate Watch Autumn 1999. Also recommended: In Sam We Trust: The Untold Story of Sam Walton and How Wal-Mart is Devouring America by Bob Ortega, Slam-Dunking Wal-Mart by Al Norman (see books next month). Also BBC File on Four investigation of Wal-Mart (Radio 4, BBC, 27 July 1999).
@nti-copyright - information for education and action - copy and distribute