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| Newsletter | August 2002 |
In the 19th Century, John Constable immortalised the landscape of England in his painting The Haywain, showing a ramshackle horse and cart crossing a brook. Alas, the appropriate image for the countryside that this government is creating would not be a hay cart but a churning concrete mixer. ... Forget the bulldog being the symbol of England, it is now the bulldozer. ... Green fields are gobbled up. Passenger jets scream over the little open country that is left. -- Clive Aslet, Editor of Country Life
It is time we joined them. -- John Pilger
Last month in the US, in an open letter to their compatriots and the world, almost 100 of America's most distinguished names in art, literature and education wrote:
Let it not be said that people in the United States did nothing when their government declared a war without limit and instituted stark new measures of repression. We believe that questioning, criticism and dissent must be valued and protected. Such rights are always contested and must be fought for. We, too, watched with shock the horrific events of September 11. But the mourning had barely begun when our leaders launched a spirit of revenge. The government now openly prepares to wage war on Iraq - a country that has no connection with September 11.
We say this to the world. Too many times in history people have waited until it was too late to resist. We draw on the inspiration of those who fought slavery and all those other great causes of freedom that began with dissent. We call on all like-minded people around the world to join us.
Doing nothing is not an option. As a first step we need to do all we possibly can to make the most of existing capacity. But on any view that is not enough. -- Alistair Darling, Transport Secretary
A third main runway at Heathrow would have such severe and widespread impacts on the environment as to be totally unacceptable. -- Roy Vandermeer, T5 inquiry inspector
The most respectable of residents are talking about direct action. Swampy is alive and well and living in Richmond. -- John Stewart, Hacan
I am appalled. Totally appalled. Three runways - it is the work of madmen. I cannot understand how they can so little feeling for the environment and how they can kowtow so much to the interests and desires of big business. -- Norman Mead, chairman of Great Hallingbury Parish Council, near Stansted
We are facing the loss of the heritage of this part of the country. We are facing everything. More noise. More pollution and increased risk of accidents. But it is only a proposal and people will fight tooth and nail against it. -- Norman Mead, chairman of Great Hallingbury Parish Council, near Stansted
If the large public subsidies currently handed to the aviation sector were spent elsewhere in the economy they would create as many, if not more jobs and employment and with less pollution and environmental damage. -- FoE
This is proof positive that the lumbering monster that is the aviation industry is well and truly out of control. -- Paul de Zylva, FoE
Six regional papers have been published, a White Paper in the spring. Stansted would be bigger than Heathrow and at least six new runways would be built around Britain under government plans to cope with a huge surge in the number of air passengers over the next 30 years. The vast expansion would allow Britain's airports to handle up to 500 million passengers a year, but would mean the destruction of hundreds of homes, ancient monuments and listed buildings and the development of vast tracts of green belt.
Another runway at Heathrow, tearing up the commitments given over T5, a cap on numbers and no new runway. The extra runway at Heathrow would result in 500 extra flights a day over London, with a new flight path stretching from north Chiswick to Kensington. The airport would handle 116 million passengers a year by 2030, compared with 64 million in 2000. The new runway would handle an extra 175,000 movements. The 2,000-yard runway between Harmondsworth and Sipson would require the destruction of 260 homes, St Mary's Church, the Harmondsworth tithe barn, a scheduled ancient monument, and eight other listed buildings. It would also mean development on 570 acres of green belt.
Three new runways at Stansted, tripling the number of passengers. An expanded airport bigger than Heathrow. By 2030 Stansted could be handling more passengers than Heathrow, up from 13 million today to 122 million. The expansion of Stansted would result in as many as 200 homes being lost as well as the destruction of 3,000 acres of agricultural land, two ancient monuments, Waltham Manor and The Grange, and possibly Takeley Priory, the destruction of half of Elsenham Wood and up to 65 listed buildings.
A new airport somewhere between Rugby and Coventry, just east of Wolston, which would mean demolishing two villages and damaging a nature reserve on the river Avon. An airport bigger than Heathrow.
Extra runways for Birmingham and East Midlands. A second terminal for Manchester.
The disused airbase at Alconbury, near Huntingdon, to be turned into an airport the size of Luton for budget airlines.
A new airport at Cliffe in north Kent on the Thames Estuary, two new runways in less than ten years time, eventually five new runways handling 58 million passengers, to be built on wetlands of international importance. The site is a protected sanctuary for rare wading birds, and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds is already planning litigation in the British and European Courts. A spokesman for the society said that it was 'hard to think of a worse site'. The north Kent marshes were the setting for Charles Dickens' Great Expectations and it was here that Dickens grew up.
A new airport north of Bristol, whilst Cardiff is recommended for an 'aerospace park', whatever that means. Better airport provision in Wales, ie internal flights to overcome poor road and rail links between the north and south of the principality.
Runway extensions at regional airports in the north of England.
A new runway at Glasgow or Edinburgh.
The legal agreement at Gatwick which stops any development for at least 17 years has so far kept it off the list.
The government is now talking of a tripling of passenger numbers. The old discredited 'predict and provide'. In the 1960s and 70s, 'predict and provide' on growing car traffic was used to steamroller through a motorway programme. By the 1990s predict and provide was discredited. Now it has been wheeled out again to justify more airport capacity, on the fallacious argument that air travel will grow indefinitely. We are committed to meeting Kyoto greenhouse gas reduction targets. Air travel is the fastest growing source of greenhouse gasses. Whilst motorists are balking at paying nearly 65p a litre in tax, supposedly to reduce car use and pollution, airlines pay no tax on the aviation fuels, nor do they pay VAT. It would be more rational to first increase the cost of aviation fuel by taxing it, in concert with the rest of the EU, to see what the demand for air travel might be when air travellers have to pay a price which reflects the damage being caused to the ozone layer and global warming. Alistair Darling has already prejudiced the so-called 'consultation' with his crass comments. The industry false argument of 'have to compete with Europe' is now being pushed by the government.
By 2015, up to 35,000 people would be exposed to nitrogen dioxide pollution exceeding EU limits. An extra 107,000 people would face 57 decibels of aircraft noise, the level officially deemed to be of 'significant community annoyance'. More than £120 million would be wiped off house values around Heathrow.
The use of 57 decibels as the starting point for measuring disturbance, used to define a low impact noise footprint, is misleading - people experience 'noise nuisance' at lower levels. WHO uses 50 decibels as the limit. By using the higher limit, all those affected by aircraft noise caused by an expanded airport would not be considered.
The Institute for Public Policy Research has said that the economic benefits of air travel have been exaggerated. The South East paper states that inward tourism is worth £13 billion to Britain but fails to acknowledge that Britons spend far more than that overseas, with a net deficit of £10 billion. This deficit would increase with extra runways.
News of the massive expansion came as the National Audit Office, the official spending watchdog, warned that a slump in air travel since 11 September could mean that the part-privatised air traffic control service might have to be bailed out again by taxpayers. The audit office said that further loans may be needed to prevent National Air Traffic Services (Nats) from being placed into administration. The audit office has launched a scathing attack on the handling of the part-privatisation in March last year, saying the ministry should have heeded warnings from both Nats and the Civil Aviation Authority about the effects of a calamity, which in the event turned out to be the effect of the 11 September terrorist attacks. [BVEJ newsletters passim]
The announcement by Alistair Darling of massive airport expansion was made during the middle of the Farnborough Airshow. Was it intended as a morale boost to a flagging aviation industry?
The environment, what environment?
AEF has launched Airport Watch.
In Mexico, hundreds of irate farmers armed with machetes and petrol bombs and holding 10 hostages are protesting against plans to build a new international airport outside of Mexico City. Why do the farmers feel so strongly about the new airport? Because it just so happens that its scheduled location is smack in the middle of their land. In return for the hostages, protesters are demanding that they be allowed to keep their land. Sounds reasonable enough, but the pro-business government of Mexican President Vicente Fox has ruled out any changes to its plans to build the £1.3 billion airport.
From 26 August to 4 September the world's leaders will be meeting in Johannesburg for the World Summit on Sustainable Develoment (WSSD), to agree a strategy for curing the world's environmental and social ills, building on the landmark successes of the Rio Earth Summit ten years ago. Or so the publicity would have us believe. In fact, fears are growing that the summit will be seized as an opportunity to further push the corporate-led globalisation agenda, with genuine environmental and social concerns being sidelined as governments push their own vested interests - and those of the rash of corporations and corporate lobby groups attending the summit. -- Corporate Watch
So what hope is there for Johannesburg? The summit itself looks like being at best a publicity extravaganza, strong on fine words and heart warming images of sustainability 'success stories' and weak on commitment; and at worst a corporate free-for-all resulting in ever more co-option of democratic institutions by big business, commodification of the world's resources and privileging of trade over human rights and sustainability. The only source of hope looks like coming from outside, from the Civil Society Indaba in Johannesburg itself and from alternative forums and street protests around the world. -- Corporate Watch
Business Action for Sustainable Development (BASD) is the distasteful lovechild spawned from an unholy union between the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC - the world's premier business lobby group) and the benign sounding, but very dangerous, World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD - otherwise known as Greenwash International). The initiative was launched in April 2001, with the expressed intention of 'rallying the collective forces of world business in the lead up to next year's Earth Summit.' It is aptly headed by Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, retired chairman of those arch-deacons of global greenwash Shell. -- Corporate Watch
The mainstream environmentalists and the pretend environmentalists are getting very excited at the thought of the Earth Summit in South Africa later this month (Rio+10). Why?
At the last Earth Summit in Rio ten years ago Big Business woke up to its implications in the closing stages and sabotage was the word. This time they have ensured they are well prepared in advance and they will dominate the precedings.
LA21, sustainable development, was one of the things to emerge from Rio. Its implementation in Rushmoor is all too typical in England, some local authorities are better, others are much worse. It does not influence development within the borough, as we see with the pro-developer planning department, its main public window is the Aldershot Green Day, in past years sponsored by BAE Systems and McDonald's (at last year's event opponents of Farnborough Airport were barred for fear of upsetting Big Business). LA21 has fared better in the Third World.
Two other important developments to emerge from Rio were the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) and the Climate Change Convention (CCC), both of which have been sabotaged by Big Business.
In preparation for Rio+10, Big Business has formed BASD (Business Action for Sustainable Development aka BASDards). BASDards have been formed by the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) and World Business Council on Sustainable Development (WBCSD). BASDards is chaired by Mark Moody-Stuart, recently retired chairman of Shell. BASDards mission aim is to 'ensure maximum participation from the world business community' at Rio+10.
ICC represents 7,000 corporations. ICC has been active in scuppering both the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) and the Climate Change Convention (CCC). It is also active in blocking the Basel Convention on the export of hazardous waste.
WBCSD has been more subtle in its approach but a look at its membership we see corporations with a known track record in promoting sustainable development - Cargill, Dow Chemicals, Monsatan, Nestle, RTZ, Shell, Unilever - we think not.
The Earth Summit is looking increasingly less like a gathering of environmentalists and more like a meeting of WTO or G8 - protesters will be barred from exclusion zones - Seattle and Genoa revisited.
Far from encouraging grassroots civil society participation, streets will be barricaded to prevent grubby protesters from approachng the select conference area, 'spontaneous gatherings' are banned on pain of arrest for all concerned and participants in any permitted demonstrations will be required to register. 50m Rand is being spent on improving the city's tourist potential, including road-widening (the road to the conference venue is being widened to a three-lane highway), encouraging delegates to make good use of the city's shopping opportunities, including the luxury shopping centre adjacent to the main conference venue which is set in the city's richest quarter.
Meanwhile, in the struggle to fund the conference which is set to cost 500m Rand (about £35m), the lure of easy money from big business has been eagerly snapped up. Mining group Anglo-American, South African Airways and SA electricity firm Eskom (currently under fire for massively increasing electricity prices and cutting off many poor customers, prior to privatisation) have each coughed up 5m Rand in exchange for branding at the conference, while Hewlett-Packard has had Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, Mohammed Valli Moosa, falling over himself to praise them for sponsoring information technology services apparently worth US$4 million.
Keen to avoid accusations of unfair influence over the UN, the BASD decided not to fund the conference directly, despite requests from the South African government. Instead it has chosen to fund so called 'legacy projects' elsewhere in Johannesburg, South Africa and other parts of Africa, to form a 'lasting memorial to the summit.' According to BASD the list of legacy projects still remains to be finalised. However, they define these projects as 'grassroots sustainable development projects in the most needy communities in Africa.' An almost flawless piece of greenwash, but for the fact that the list of projects proposed at the BASD conference in Paris last October included several nuclear energy projects as well the highly controversial West African gas pipeline. Designed to transport Chevron's Nigerian gas reserves to neighbouring countries, if implemented this project would have disastrous consequences - including leaving a legacy of 50,000 displaced families.
Civil society in SA is split over the summit - the original civil society coalition has broken up into the radical Civil Society Indaba, consisting mainly of rural peoples groups and small NGOs; and the mainstream Civil Society Forum, led by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (CoSATU), the SA Council of Churches and larger NGOs. The Forum is organising the official international civil society sector gathering at the summit. Indaba holds that the Civil Society Forum is excessively dominated by the government and business interests; Indaba itself is taking up a radical position and has announced that it will not take part in the WSSD. Instead, according to Eddie Cottle, they will pursue 'a politically independent process that will result in a Global Indaba Forum' parallel to the main summit; they hope to produce 'a people's declaration of all the world's social movements, together with a commonly defined plan of action'.
Outside South Africa, NGO and environmental and social justice campaigners' responses to the summit have been mixed. While large development and environment NGOs are still engaged in the process, it seems that some perceive it as flawed, perhaps terminally, and remain involved largely because they do not want to further undermine the UN. If the summit goes as badly as some observers predict, the possibility of a partial civil society walkout looks high. FoE International is pushing a campaign for binding regulation of TNCs, but this issue is currently in danger of slipping off the official Johannesburg agenda completely as a result of opposition or apathy by most Northern nations (with the notable exception of Norway).
FoEI are one of the few NGOs to have access to the inner exclusion zone. This opportunity is being thrown away with the building of a large robot-like figure blaring out sounds nominated by anyone who cares to send a prepaid card to FoE (itself an appalling waste of resources and a lost campaigning opportunity).
Meanwhile, campaigners concerned about the encroachment of corporate control have published The Girona Declaration, setting out how corporations, through lobbying, greenwash, bluewash (UN endorsement for adherence to voluntary codes) and distortion of issues, have co-opted the environmental and social agenda to their own ends; and calling for democratic control of the global economy. It has so far been signed by over 80 campaign groups, NGOs and other progressive organisations around the world.
At last month's Aldershot Fun Day the organisers were proudly wearing their Rio+10 t-shirts, but apart from a timid expose of corporate criminals E$$o on the BVFoE stand there was nothing exposing the corporate sham being promoted as Rio+10.
A Global Day of Action against a corporate UN has been called for on 31 August 2002 - contact earthsummit02@yahoo.co.uk or ASEED Europe for details of events.
Note: Rio+10 is being held in Johannesburg that the end of this summer, 26 August to 4 September 2002.
Business Action for Sustainable Development (BASD), Corporate Watch Newsletter No 5, Sept-Oct 2001
Resistance is Fertile, Corporate Watch Newsletter No 8, April-May 2002
UN - sustainability, Corporate Watch Newsletter No 9, June-July 2002
BASDards at the World Summit on Sustainable Development, Corporate Watch Newsletter No 9, June-July 2002
We simply replaced two letters in Esso's logo with the internationally recognised symbol for the US dollar. We find it ironic that the richest corporation in the world can't recognise the dollar sign and confuses it with a Nazi symbol. -- Stephen Tindale, Greenpeace UK director
This is just ridiculous. Esso knows it can't win a debate about climate change, and it won't discuss the content of the website. Instead Esso is trying to gag us with legal threats. We will fight this in court. -- Gerd Leipold, Executive Director of Greenpeace
This court case is just another attempt by by Esso to use its money to continue its dirty business unhindered. -- Stephanie Tunmore, Greenpeace climate campaigner
In the meantime, Greenpeace agrees that the public's repulsion with the Esso brand should not be based on a logo. It should be based on the facts of ExxonMobil's record of endangering our future. -- Greenpeace Netherlands
It's no fun, not comfortable, to be under continuous nagging from activist groups. -- Rene Dahan, ExxonMobil, senior vice-president
Oil giant E$$o, the world's richest corporation and premier league polluters, are suing Greenpeace to stop the French StopE$$o campaigners using their logo. The StopE$$o campaign is a world-wide alliance united against Esso's dirty fuels, tricks, money and lies. E$$o has a history of throwing money around to buy researchers to deny the existence of global warming. They also bought themselves a president by donating more cash to the Republicans than anyone else.
The company says the replacement of the middle two letters of Esso with dollar signs makes it resemble the Gothic-scripted symbol of the SS and this is confusing to the public. Urh! To us the symbolism is one of GREED. Is there a guilty conscience at work here? Were E$$o, like many US corporations, eg IBM and Coca-Cola, willing to work with the Nazis? Coke used the brand name Fanta to carry on business as usual, IBM boss Watson rode in with the US troops to check his Germany factories were OK.
ExxonMobil is worried about the reputation of its brand, and is attempting to sue Greenpeace to protect it.
It's not worried about the fact that it has tried to convince the public that global warming isn't happening. It's not worried about getting criticism because it has sabotaged international climate agreements. Nor has it expressed concern that it has chosen to prioritise selling more oil over scientific warnings of famine, floods, and disease for future generations.
It's worried that Greenpeace is taking the piss out of its logo.
It thinks that Greenpeace is deliberately trying to create 'a repulsion, which turns away customers from the ESSO brand' by swapping two letters in its brand with dollar signs. It is even suggesting that Greenpeace is attempting to draw a connection between the world's biggest climate criminal and 'the infamous SS.' Maybe veterans of the SS should be suing ExxonMobil for linking them with a criminal corporation.
In a suit filed with the French courts over Greenpeace's use of the Esso logo, the corporation is demanding a penalty of 80 thousand euros for reputational damage and 80 thousand euros a day per logo should Greenpeace fail to comply. It also demands removal of all use of the term 'StopEsso'.
StopEsso, a coalition of groups including Greenpeace, is campaigning around the world to stop ExxonMobil from sabotaging international action to address climate change, such as the Kyoto Protocol.
The French website over which ExxonMobil wants to sue, is one of several StopEsso sites globally.
E$$o (or ExxonMobil in America) pressured Bush into backing out of the Kyoto agreement on global warming and were caught out this April when secret memos to the White House were leaked. One asked Bush Jr to get rid of top UN climate scientist Dr Watson and replace him with someone 'less biased' (BVEJ newsletter 0025 June 2002). Under Watson the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had concluded that 'most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities' and predicted that average global temperatures will rise between 3 degrees C and 10 degrees C by the end of the century.
Bush did just as his oily friends told him and led the charge to get Watson out. He has now been thrown out of his job and is not even allowed a position on the panel. Bush's top climate negotiator now refuses to take stock of climate change until 2012.
Maybe E$$o need a little history lesson. In 1997 BP sought punitive damages from Greenpeace with the intention of putting them out of business. All Greenpeace assets were frozen and Greenpeace were barred from talking. Across Europe people rode to the aid of Greenpeace. Service stations in Germany were shut down. BP was forced to back down. Then again, maybe E$$o has never heard of the McLibel case.
Greenpeace has a couple of cute e-cards you can send out to alert your friends, also a standard letter which you are free to modify to tell the E$$oles what you think of them.
We are now calling for a worldwide boycott of E$$on. We wish to see E$$on shut down worldwide.
Stop Press: Greenpeace have lost the first round. In an interim ruling pending a full hearing, the French court has found no link with the SS, but perversely barred Greenpeace from using the dollars signs, but Greenpeace may still use the logo StopEsso. The punitive damages demanded have been reduced to 5,000 euro per day. Everyone is now at risk from E$$o, as are campaigners such as AdBusters who parody well known brands. We must strike back.
Exxon is the climate baddie (BVEJ newsletters passim), was responsible for removal of the guy in charge of the scientific panel on climate change (BVEJ newsletter #0025 June 2002), is attempting crude intimidation of Greenpeace and now stands accused of killing whales.
Held over until next month.
This pipeline would militarise a corridor running from the Caspian to the Mediterranean. This could threaten the fragile cease fire in the Kurdish region through which the pipeline will pass. -- Kerim Yildiz, Kurdish Human Rights Project
But before we get too hung up on Exxon, let's not forget the other oil majors.
A consortium of oil companies led by BP has big plans to build a 1,777km long oil pipeline from Baku in Azerbaijan, to Ceyhan, Turkey via Georgia, so that Caspian Sea oil can be exported to the US. BP, the world's third largest oil company, are begging the World Bank and other national export credit departments to provide them with credit for this environmentally disastrous scheme.
Campaigners against the pipeline are pressing these institutions to refuse credit, apart from the obvious pollution the oil will cause when burned, they believe the pipeline may well exacerbate tension in a region recovering from conflict, and will provide no benefit to local people. The pipeline passes through several Kurdish regions in Turkey.
This year CAAT attended the BP AGM for the first time. They did so over concern of BP involvement with paramilitaries in Colombia. Also at the AGM were Colombia Solidarity Campaign, Free Tibet Campaign and environmental campaigners.
Hundreds of angry Nigerian women have pulled off something we here in the West can only dream of - they've managed to shut down a huge multinational oil company's operations for nearly two weeks, armed with nothing but their bare hands. -- SchNEWS
Last month, a band of women from the Ugborodo and Arutan tribes in southern Nigeria pirated a ChevronTexaco staff ferry to sneak into the company's Escravos pipeline terminal. The unarmed women occupied the terminal, stopping exports and trapping about 700 workers, including Americans, Britons, Canadians and Nigerians, inside. The women demanded that ChevronTexaco hire more local workers, and provide water, electricity, schools and clinics for their villages, some of which are less than 100 yards from the terminal. The women were angered that previous company promises to transform the villages surrounding the facility into modern towns have not been realised.
In the best traditions of Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, several hundred Nigerian women took a nonviolent stand for their country. Ranging in age from 25 to 90 -- some with infants strapped to their backs -- the women held a successful sit-in at a ChevronTexaco Escravos facility in Nigeria's oil-rich delta.
Without firing a shot or injuring a soul, the women shut down an operation that produces a half million barrels of oil a day. In the end, they accomplished what their men could not, and what their government should have done long ago. The women ended their 10-day occupation in exchange for jobs for their sons and help building clinics, schools and farms.
Two weeks later women from the Ijaw tribe occupied four ChevronTexaco oil facilities in the same area as the Escravos oil terminal, cutting a flow of 100,000 barrels of crude per day, while trade unionists held a protest rally in the state capital.
In Nigeria, occupations and protests of this sort are common. Tribal communities that see the black gold flowing away from their area to enrich others regularly storm facilities to demand investments, jobs and compensation for pollution. In the past, native men have kidnapped, but rarely harmed, oil workers. Government police and oil-company security didn't hesitate to use force to quell such attempts by male protesters.
Conflict between oil firms and Nigerian locals attracted international attention in the mid-1990s, when violent protests by the small Ogoni tribe forced the Shell company to abandon wells on their land. The late dictator General Sani Abacha responded in 1995 by hanging nine Ogoni leaders, including writer and environmental activist Ken Saro Wiwa, and drew global outrage. Abacha and his family asset stripped the country, much of it laundered through London.
Although Nigeria's current government is elected, it too uses harsh methods to protect the oil facilities while collecting millions from Shell, Exxon and ChevronTexaco. Although delta oil brings in more than 80% of Nigeria's hard currency, the region's 7 million residents are among the poorest in the nation.
Every day, the locals live in squalor in the shadows of plants that look like paradise. They watch black gold flow from their backyards to enrich others, while they have no access to the fruits of those profits, but suffer the pollution. By one village, dumped cyanide contaminated oil has been leaking.
The women do not seek handouts; rather they rightly want to share in their nation's oil wealth through self-sufficiency. The oil companies and the corrupt Nigerian government should invest more in education, health, employment and infrastructure.
Two rusting rustbuckets slipped out from Japan hours before a court injunction by Greenpeace was to be served in London. The Japanese only learnt of the potential structural problems when it was too late from news bulletins. BNFL have refused to release information on the structural state of the ships.
HMS Nottingham, a state-of-the-art British destroyer, believed to be an unofficial escort for the nuclear rustbuckets, ran aground in rough seas off the coast of Australia, the same rough seas through which the nuclear cargoes will pass.
Micronesia has already been devastated by the rough seas, seas through which the radioactive cargo will pass.
The British and Japanese governments have failed to carry out an environmental impact assessment (as required under international law).
Over 1 million Irish citizens have protested to the British government over radioactive discharges from Windscale into the Irish Sea. The MOX shipments will pass through the Irish Sea on the final leg to Sellafield.
Stop Press: A flotilla of ships attempted to blockade the Tasman Sea. The hazardous cargo slipped through under the cover of darkness.
[BVEJ newsletter #0026 July 2002]
It is 10 months since 11 September, and still the great charade plays on. Having appropriated our shocked response to that momentous day, the rulers of the world have since ground our language into a paean of cliches and lies about the 'war on terrorism' - when the most enduring menace, and source of terror, is them. -- John Pilger
Where US leads, client state Israel follows.
US ignores international treaties and UN resolutions, Israel ignores international treaties and UN resolutions.
US declares war on terrorism and uses it to attack innocent civilians. Israel declares war on terrorism and uses it to attack innocent civilians.
US bombs a wedding party and kills over 40 innocent civilians including men, women and children. Israel bombs the house of a Hamas military leader and kills dozens of civilians including men, women and children.
US storm-troopers attack Afghan villages taking away the men. Israel storm-troopers attack Palestinian villages taking away the men.
Afghans on the ground are now finding little difference to Afghanistan under a Russian puppet, to Afghanistan under an American puppet.
What Israel fears most is not Hamas but moderate Palestinians. This has been true ever since Israel occupied Palestine. Whenever talks are under way Israel launches a particular atrocious attack knowing what the retaliation will be.
William Blum, Rogue State, Zed Books, 2001
Noam Chomsky, Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel & the Palestinians, Pluto Press, 1999
Noam Chomsky, Rogue States, Pluto Press, 2000
Noam Chomsky, 9-11, Seven Stories Press, 2001
John Pilger, The New Rulers of the World, Verso, 2002
We're appalled by this cocktail of risky pesticides in the very foods which should be a healthy choice such as strawberries, lettuce and celery. It's particularly shocking that some of these pesticides are above recognised safety levels for toddlers. New regulations in July will make any of these residues illegal in processed babyfood. Today's results show that this approach needs to be extended to fresh fruit and vegetables too. -- Sandra Bell, FoE Pesticides Campaigner
The latest Government survey of pesticide residue results reveal that a cocktail of pesticides above legal and safety limits has been found in a range of fruit and vegetables.
Some of the key findings of the report are:
UK grown non-organic strawberries contained dicofol at illegal levels. Dicofol is not approved for use on strawberries in the UK. Dicofol is similar to DDT and is a suspected hormone disrupter. The three organic strawberry samples were free of residues.
Organophosphate (OP) pesticides were found above legal limits in, grapes, starfruit, nectarines and peaches. In peaches and nectarines the OP methamidophos exceeded safety levels for adults and toddlers, the PRC admitted that 'safety levels have been significantly eroded'.
All 'soft citrus' fruit contained residues including imazalil at levels which the PRC described as 'an unacceptable risk for all consumer groups' but went on to say that most of the residue was assumed to be in the peel.
Potatoes were found to contain aldicarb above safety levels. Aldicarb is a carbamate insecticide which works on the nervous system, it is highly toxic and is classified by the World Health Organisation as 'extremely hazardous'.
Iprodione, a suspected hormone disrupter, was found above legal limits in UK celery although it is not approved for use on celery here. Most grapefruits (83%) and lemons (93%) tested contained pesticide residues.
Lindane was found in mushrooms. This pesticide is banned in the EU and there are fear that exposure to this pesticide may be linked to breast cancer.
One sample of tomatoes from Spain contained residues of 6 different pesticides, none of the 5 organic samples of tomatoes contained residues. 97% of the fresh salmon samples contained residues. DDT was found in fresh and canned salmon (due to contamination of food or the environment).
Pesticides were also found in bread but milk was found to be free of residues.
The Pesticides Residues Committee states that none of the samples present safety concerns for consumers but only looks at exposure levels in individual foods, not the overall cocktail of pesticides that people are being exposed to. Recently Dr Brown, the chair of the Committee admitted that there was 'cause for concern' about the threat to young children being exposed to pesticide residues in food. He said was he 'particularly worried' about the potential risks where food was contaminated by several similar chemicals, such as different forms of heavily restricted organophosphate pesticide, which could combine to create a 'cocktail effect'. [Independent on Sunday 9 June 2002]
In recognition of the additional vulnerability of babies and young children to pesticide residues new regulations were be introduced on 1 July this year which effectively prohibits residues in baby food by setting the allowable level at the limit of detection. But no such protection is extended to toddlers eating fresh fruit and vegetables.
Although more of the pesticides exceeding legal limits were found in imported produce, nine UK samples contained illegal levels of residues (above the Maximum Residue Level) and nine other UK samples were found to contain pesticides which are not approved for use in the UK. The Government has a policy to minimise pesticide use. These results suggest it is not doing enough to implement it.
We want the Government to ban the most risky pesticides including those organophosphates and hormone disrupters with most evidence of harm to human health, extend the new regulations prohibiting residues in baby food to fresh produce, introduce a levy on pesticide products to wean farmers off pesticides and use the money raised to fund research into non-chemical means of control and provide independent advice to farmers about reducing pesticide use.
Note on 'safe' levels and legal limits:
The Acute Reference Dose (ARfD) is the 'safe' level for short term exposure and the Acceptable Daily Intake (ADI) is the 'safe' level for long term exposure. The MRL is the legal limit and indicates over-use of pesticides but is not regarded as a safe level. We regard no level of pesticide contamination as 'safe'.
McChina were finally out of the clear at the end of May when McDonald's failed to exercise their leave to appeal.
McDonald's have faced strong opposition to build a McVomit in a public park in Voronezh in southern Russia. In March over 200 people blockaded the park for five days until cleared out by the police. When protesters dogged the pro-McVomit mayor wearing Stop McDonald's t-shirts he had the local police arrest them for wearing inappropriate attire. Letters of protest to the mayor are welcome: Voronezh City Administrators, Mayor Kovalev, Lenin Square 1, Voronezh 394000, Russia.
According to food writer Delia Smith, McDonald's is a good place to eat! Could a cookery book sponsored by McVomit be on the way?
Million dollar law suits are now being launched in the US against the fast food industry for serving junk food. McDonald's has already made one out-of-court settlement and others are in the pipeline.
That there are, today, still 815 million hungry people in the world is truly a crime. That the proposals we made nearly six years ago are now even further from being achieved is [even more] shameful. - Sr D Felipe Perez Roque, Cuban Foreign Minister
It is our Global Shame that nearly a quarter of the population goes to bed hungry in a world that has never before produced so much food. The sad reflection on the formal summit is that governments will do little to eradicate hunger and corporations will continue to be allowed to extend their control over who gets to eat. And there is little profit in providing for the poor. -- Patrick Mulvany, ITDG
Another summit, another exclusion zone for civil society, as the world's leaders, in this case noticeably absent, met behind barricades to carve up the world.
In 1996 world leaders met at the World Food Summit to talk about how they might be able to reduce world hunger, a time when there were 800 million starving people. They made commitments to halve world hunger by 2015. Nearly 6 years later, the follow on summit took place in Rome.
This year's summit was never going to get off to a good start, with the number of starving people in the world pretty much the same as at the time of the last Summit, and a massive famine looming in southern Africa. But rather than take the bull by the horns and do something for the poor, the leaders of the world's richest countries decided to stay at home and count their weapons. Only two managed to attend, and one of them Silvio Berlusconi, the Summit's host, even managed to wrap it up early so he could watch the football.
This is in sharp contrast to the NATO-Russia Summit, also in Rome, five and a half weeks earlier, where 20 world leaders met and agreed effectively to sustain the $800 billion a year global arms industry without a mention of the needs of the poor. In fact as Patrick Mulvany from Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG) points out 'Apart from Berlusconi and Jose Maria Aznar, the Spanish Premier, the only common link between the two Summits was the military operation of 16,000 police, carabinieri and soldiers put in place to contain the politicians and exclude the people. Many people from Civil Society were unable to enter the exclusion zone of half a kilometre around the building, which kept away the 30,000 person March for Food Sovereignty: land and dignity. [The Food Summit] became a military zone. And this emphasised the sense of oppression in the summit.'
Nothing really new, remember the G8 summit in Genoa last year?
In the absence of world leaders the summit was gobbled up by corporations, who made sure they didn't leave it empty handed. The final declaration was extremely bad news for the poor with a US imposed acceptance of genetically modified (GM) crops as a solution to world hunger, and an abandonment of any reference to the precautionary principle when it comes to GM food. The declaration also deleted any reference to a legally binding code of conduct on the right to food (the right to produce and consume food), and watered down the call to ratify the International Seed Treaty (ITPGFRA - see SchNEWS 329), which should stop the patenting of crops, to something that countries 'should consider'.
So if you're starving from now on it seems that it's going to be the same but worse, with little hope for anything but GM food landing on your plate in the future. Food aid spiked with GM maize will now be dumped on the ravaged countries of southern Africa by Uncle Sam. This will cleverly pollute all the crops in the region, making any sustainable GM-free option a dead duck - so much for the World Summit on Sustainable Development being held in Johannesburg in August/September.
But nothing is ever new under the sun. In the 1970s a similar summit was held under the auspices of the FAO and addressed by such well-meaning luminaries as Henry Kissinger, hands dripping with the blood of Indo-china. Then, as now, the starving were to be fed, then as now, there was sufficient food to feed the world's starving poor. Then, as now, technology and global corporations were to provide the solution, the only difference was that then it was the green revolution now it is genetic engineering. Then as now the solutions were the problem.
But all is not doom and gloom.
Six hundred people took part in the Civil Society Forum for Food Sovereignty, also in Rome, at the same time as the official Food Summit This Forum was attended by many that were excluded from the main Summit: farmers, fisherfolk, pastoralists, indigenous peoples, environmentalists, women's organizations, trade unions, and NGOs. They came up with their own Action Agenda that totally rejected the declaration made at the formal summit. Instead they called for a radical change in approach to address the real cause of hunger - international trade rules. Their agenda calls for the removal of food and agriculture from the control of the World Trade Organisation, an end to dumping of cheap food in poor countries, the total rejection of GMOs and patents on life, and investment in more sustainable locally controlled small-scale agri-ecology (sustainable agriculture).
Part of their press release read: 'The 1996 Plan of Action has not failed because of a lack of political will and resources, but rather it has failed because it supports policies that lead to hunger, policies that support economic liberalisation for the South and cultural homogeneity, which are backed by military force if the first wave of prescriptive actions fail. Only fundamentally different policies, which are based on the dignity and livelihoods of communities can end hunger. We affirm our belief that this is possible and urgently needed.'
The fact that anybody is hungry in the world today is a scandal: there is no scarcity of food overall. In fact we've never grown so much food; and food has rarely been so cheap. But as trade liberalisation has increased there's been increasing levels of hunger amongst growing mounds of plenty, now spiked with GMOs. The bottom line has become that if you want to eat then you've got to pay, and that goes just as much for those in Europe and the USA as in poorer countries. Unless the situation changes by 2015 it's predicted 122 million people will have died needlessly of hunger.
Susan George, How the other half dies, Pelican
Frances Moore Lappe, Food First
John Madeley, Hungry for Trade, Zed Books, 2002
John Madeley, Food for All, Zed Books, 2002
Martin Khor, Rethinking Globalization, Zed Books
David Ransom, The No-Nonsense Guide to Fair Trade, NI/Verso, 2001
Wayne Ellwood, The No-Nonsense Guide to Globalization, NI/Verso, 2001
Emma Bircham & John Charlton (eds), Anti-Capitalism, Bookmarks, 2002
Last month, London's very ritzy Carlton Tower Hotel hosted a conference on 'Monetising carbon credits in emerging economies' which, when you scrape off the jargon, means 'Making money out of climate change and exploiting some of the world's poorest people into the bargain'.
At 10 am Monday morning 8th July, a small group of environmental activists from London Rising Tide interrupted a hush hush conference for powerful corporate carbon traders, (including the World Bank and Vivendi) at a top Knightsbridge hotel. The conference had been arranged by Environmental Finance, the publication which informs the corporate sector on how to dodge global pollution control laws by buying 'carbon dioxide emission credits' from less industrialised countries, who have not yet used their quotas. This mechanism was created by the sham Kyoto Protocol, in 1997, under pressure from big business lobbyists in the US, who also managed to secure a world wide emission reduction target of only 5% instead of the 60% that is needed for real affect.
Up to 100 delegates had paid around £1000 for tickets for the exclusive conference, but the group managed to walk easily past door staff into the first floor meeting. Once inside, they showered delegates with detailed leaflets, posing the question 'What about our future?' and asking them to own up that they were only really in it for the money, despite the pious 'We're saving the world' line they take when not talking to each other. This was despite being shouted down by the speaker, who seemed to think that climate chaos and the need for 60% cuts in emissions was 'boring'!
After the Tiders had been led out with the assistance of hotel security, one delegate from Environmental Finance (EF) came out to talk to the group. Trying to defend the conference and show that he too was concerned about the environment, he stated that he had talked with 'the green movement', which in his mind consists of Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace and WWF, none of whom has taken issue with carbon trading. 'How can you talk to a movement?' he was asked, to which he had no cogent reply. In actuality, EF's magazine is very aware of opposition from green groups in Europe and the US, carrying regular reports on this. Journalists for the magazine attempt to undermine any non-market based approach to environmental protection, being entirely focused on enabling business to carry on as usual.
London Rising Tide disrupt carbon trading conference by Rising Toad of London 10:22am Wed Jul 10 '02 (Modified on 10:59am Thu Jul 11 '02) UK Indymedia
THE LARGEST RESOURCE GRAB IN HISTORY: You can't trade in something unless you own it. When governments and companies "trade" in carbon, they establish de facto property rights over the atmosphere. At no point have these property rights been discussed - their ownership is established by stealth with every carbon trade.
THE CARBON TRADE WILL STRENGTHEN EXISTING INEQUALITIES: Shares in the new carbon market will be allocated on the basis of who is already the largest polluter and who is fastest to exploit the market. The new "carbocrats" will therefore be the global oil, chemical and car corporations and the richest nations, the very groups that created the problem of climate change in the first place. What's more, the richest nations and corporations will be able to further increase their global share of emissions by outbidding poorer interests for carbon credits.
SO-CALLED SOLUTIONS POSE A DIRECT THREAT TO VULNERABLE PEOPLES: Development projects such as nuclear energy, large dams and other large-scale, hi-tech projects - as well as tree planting - have come to be known as Joint Implementation and Clean Development Mechanisms in the Kyoto Protocol and are tradable. But they assert foreign ownership of local resources, consolidate the power of undemocratic elites, oust people from their land and undermine local self sufficient economies and low-carbon cultures.
CLIMATE CHANGE REFUGEES: climate change effects such as droughts or flooding, are turning millions into refugees.
ECOLOGICAL DEBT TO 'SOUTH' NOT ADDRESSED: Repayment of the ecological debt of the north to the south, which is caused by the extraction, use and destruction of southern resources such as fossil fuels, minerals, forests, marine and genetic resources, is not acknowledged. Neither is the fact that while a small number of highly industrialised countries have caused the damage, all countries suffer the consequences of climate change.
MANY OF THE SOURCES OF CARBON CREDITS ARE SCAMS
TREE PLANTING IS NOT A SOLUTION TO CLIMATE CHANGE: Carbon absorbed by forests is only removed from the carbon cycle for as long as the tree is standing and alive. Industrial forestry will not 'breathe in' carbon.
CARBON TRADING ALLOWS COMPANIES TO PROFIT FROM MEASURES THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN INTRODUCED ANYWAY: Because we cannot know the future, we cannot be certain that a project selling carbon credits has really reduced its emissions further than would have occurred without this intervention. Competition and technical innovation, for example, ensure that industry consistently reduces its energy costs. For example, British Airways, an early supporter of the new UK emissions trading system, is claiming financial credits from the government for the cut in emissions caused by the collapse of its business after September 11th last year, (actually it was in trouble long before S11, and simply used it as a convenient hook on which to hang extensive job cuts).
"HOT AIR" TRADING IS AN ACCOUNTING FRAUD: Russia's economic collapse since 1990 has reduced its emissions by 30%. Russia is intending to sell this incidental windfall (often called "hot air") as international carbon credits - potentially swamping the market. If countries subsidise their emissions with these Russian credits, the final global emissions will end up being the same as they would have been without a carbon market or a Kyoto protocol.
HUGE INCENTIVES FOR CHEATING: There are strong incentives for cheating and creating bogus credits that do not represent any real reduction in emissions. The seller gets the cash without having to change anything and the buyer gets cheap credits. And what's to stop you transferring polluting activities to areas that are not accounted?
THE CARBON MARKET CANNOT BE MONITORED OR CONTROLLED: The temptation for all parties to cheat means that every transaction must be scrutinised and every sale certified. Yet there is no global institution or accounting system that can manage the complexity of this market.
THE LEGAL FRAMEWORK WILL NEVER BE STRONG ENOUGH: International legal frameworks are usually very weak. Countries that want to use carbon credits to subsidise their emissions are already arguing for penalties so small they will fail to discourage cheating. The door is open for any country desperate for foreign currency to endorse doctored carbon credits.
NO REAL MODEL EXISTS FOR CARBON TRADING: CO2 is not SO2: The main model for carbon trading is Sulphur Dioxide (SO2) emissions trading under the US 1990 Clean Air Act. Yet this programme was small (a few 100 companies), easy to monitor (one pollutant from one source-power generation), had permanent targets and, above all, was conducted within one country with strong enforcement mechanisms. CO2 is not CFC: The only international emissions trading has been in CFC's under the Montreal Protocol. Once again, the programme was small (only 17 producer companies), easy to monitor (one pollutant from one industrial process) and within a strong legal framework.
CARBON CREDITS FROM DIFFERENT SOURCES ARE NOT EQUIVALENT: The market assumes that carbon credits from different sources will be fully interchangeable. However, carbon sequestered in sinks is an entirely different product from the carbon "saved" by a technical innovation, which is different again from the carbon "saved" by a social or lifestyle change.
Governments want to be assured of a cheap way to buy off their failure to meet Kyoto targets that will keep the public and corporations content.
Brokers, accountants, and financial institutions are extremely excited at the thought of the size of their cut in a new $2.3 trillion speculative market.
Corporations and other major polluters want "flexible" governments who don't punish them for their emissions and hand over public money to pay for any emissions they are forced to make.
Oil companies support carbon trading as a way to avoid making any cuts in oil production.
Academics and financial consultants see rich pickings from becoming "experts" in the new market.
Educate the public on the urgency of climate change and the need for dramatic solutions.
Set a schedule for cutting global fossil fuel consumption by 60%, and 90% within ten years.
Recognise the moral (and political) imperative for fairness and social justice by allocating targets to every country on the basis of equal per capita emissions.
Reduce the supply of fossil fuels with an international ban on all new oil, gas and coal development. As a first step, cut the $200 billion per year global subsidies for coal and oil power. Carbon trading is not concerned with the supply of fossil fuels, which is why oil companies support it. As a result, government subsidies are increasing, reducing the price of energy and swamping any attempts at reducing demand.
Invest heavily in renewable energy to replace all fossil fuel supplies. Right now funding renewables is a far more expensive way to reduce carbon emissions than credits from bogus "hot air", tree planting, or outright fraud. These cheap carbon credits will dictate the market price.
Involve all people in the achievement of climate justice - particularly those most affected in the 'global south'.
The Case against Carbon Trading by Mickey Mullarkey 10:59am Thu Jul 11 '02 UK Indymedia
[BVEJ newsletter #0014 July 2001]
Since Labour came to power they have introduced draconian surveillance laws on e-mail, the recent anti-terrorism legislation, new proposals to extend data-sharing between government departments and the 'Snooper's Charter', abandoned two weeks ago. A worrying trend is emerging. -- Karen Bartlett, Charter 88
ID cards are back on the agenda - or as the government would like us to call them 'Entitlement Cards', which must mean the government and police are entitled to find out everything about you whenever they like. -- SchNEWS
On your new hi-tech card will be your fingerprints, digital photo, name, address and an ID number. To make sure people are who they claim to be, the cards will probably incorporate a chip containing the 'biometric data' - a fingerprint, retina or hand scan of the holder.
Nothing else would be on the card, or so we are told, but the capacity will be there.
It would be compulsory to have a card, but not compulsory to carry a card, nor would it be compulsory to produce the card. Compulsion at a later date?
In which case why do we need the cards?
Neo-Labour says the cards are needed in the fight against crime, terrorism, illegal immigration and dog fouling. Privacy International on the other hand reckon they will actually make some of these things worse. For the past 12 years the Big Brother busting watchdog has studied the world-wide implications of ID cards and concluded that they have no effect on the reduction of crime or fraud, and instead introduce additional problems of discrimination, criminal false identity and administrative chaos!
Their survey also found claims of abuse in virtually every country with the question of who is targeted for ID checks left largely to the discretion of the police. And what happens if your card is lost or stolen? In nearly all countries with ID cards this causes immense problems with services and benefits being denied. So with all these problems and costs estimated to be up to £3 billion why the hell does the government want to carry on with this IDiocy?
Privacy International believes that the proposal has little to do with the government's stated objectives of reducing crime but part of a broader objective outlined in the Cabinet Office report 'Privacy & Data Sharing'. As Mark Littlewood from Liberty points out 'Any form of ID card scheme would require a national database storing vast amounts of sensitive information on every one of us. You would have to be supremely uncynical or incredibly naive to believe that the database will only be deployed in catching the guilty.'
The cards could be used to store vast amounts of data on us, but this would no longer be necessary. The card would carry a unique number. This would be the key to unlock all other databases, which is what we believe is the real purpose of the cards.
The cost of introduction of the cards is likely to run into tens of billions of pounds, money that could be spent on better policing.
That the cards will be hi-tech, doesn't prevent their forgery, it simply establishes a new opportunity for entrepreneurs in the Far East.
A report by the NACRO has found that CCTV only has a limited effect in cutting crime, and that other measures such as better street lighting, could be up to four times more effective. A Home Office evaluation of 24 CCTV schemes across the country showed that in four cases crime rates had risen significantly and in seven there was no effect at all. Yet this didn't stop Lord Falconer (he of the Dome), the Home Office minister contradicting his own department's evidence and say 'What the research indicates is that in every area there is a statistical reduction in crime.'
In Guildford, the problem of drunken yobs running rampage in the town centre and on the railway station has arisen since the installation of CCTV.
Whilst we were all congratulating ourselves on stopping wholesale monitoring by the state (BVEJ newsletter #0026 July 2002), the government slipped in yet another monitoring measure. Without any parliamentary debate or scrutiny, the Secretary of State for Health has granted himself the power to access our medical records whenever he deems it to be 'in the public interest.'
Rushmoor, along with other local authorities, has direct on-line access to DSS records.
11th September is not only being used to justify ever draconian legislation, it and 'terrorism' is being used to cut off any debate on these issues.
11th September is International Day Against Video Surveillance.
There are many ways you can confuse the watchers, throw them off scent or make their lives far more difficult. None of this is foolproof, much may be out of date, so please check with the latest newssites and techno-experts.
Mobile phones are not linked to an address. Mobile calls can be monitored, cell phones located to a cell. Go into a phone shop and pay cash for a phone. Possible in Virgin shops, also off-the-shelve in supermarkets and places like WHSmith. Pay for use with cash for top-up cards. It is also possible to buy sim cards for Virgin and O2.
Calls can be re-routed. Try the PO phone card (from Post Offices) or use Just-Dial (0870 7940 870). And saves money!
Text messages can be sent from the net via O2 or Lycos thus are received from your phone but do not originate from your phone.
Use anonymous e-mail. Open an account with HotMail (loads of junk mail) or JungleMate. Too many accounts now ask for a geographical address (make one up, address of a big store works if you get the postcode right). Operate account from net cafes. Move around, always use cash.
Try HushMail.
Use Anonymizer for accessing web pages. Do so from net cafes.
Use Bigfoot as e-mail address. Junglemate lets you specify the outgoing (ie return address). Can also do this if using POP3 e-mail software.
Us one time accounts for setting things up, then change address or discard if no longer needed.
PGP can be used for encryption. Headers are a give away (ie alert monitoring software that encryption is in use). Software is available for stripping out headers, even for turning random text (ie encrypted) into pseudo-poetry.
Route e-mails through several anonymous e-mailers. Important to use more than one. Some can also use encryption for each leg.
Screw the monitoring software. Activate keywords: IRA, 9-11, bomb, terrorists, anarchist, protest .....
Laser pens, illegal in UK, widely available in Tenerife and Cyprus, can be used to knock out CCTV (that's why they were banned, not because some poor sods might have been blinded).
None is foolproof. All add extra layers, more work.
Legality? Don't try it at home children!
Over ten thousand of you arrived at a nature reserve and birdlife sanctuary - at the height of the wading birds nesting season. For three days, you terrorised the local inhabitants, and destroyed the nests and the fledglings. -- local resident, near Steart Beach, Bridgewater Bay
It is our fucking right to party where we like. We've been doing it since the dawn of time. Music, drugs, dancing ... So fucking what if the locals got disturbed for a weekend? Selfish cunts want to keep the area all for themselves. They get year round peace and quiet, with georgeous countryside to look at, I get Heathrow fucking Airport - where's my peace and quiet??? -- Sleeze, Steart Beach raver
The site wasn't the one chosen, confusion abounded, a few rigs took to the previously used beach, then everybody else followed. It's not on to use somewhere like that, but if you're not aware of its sensitivity, and the police are chasing down convoys, then it's not surprising someone made a snap decision to take the site. What we need is places to party safely and responsibly. Dancing shouldn't be an outlaw activity. -- Guilfin
Several thousand people in a field, dancing to underground music from sound systems to live bands, taking whatever drugs they want as the party continues 24 hours a day, and making new connections outside capitalism's reign of terror. -- raver at alternative Glastonbury at Smeatharpe
Clubs are apparently becoming a little too tame for clubbers, they prefer the freedom of a rave in the countryside - freedom that is to trash someone else's property, freedom to have a free party and freedom to indulge in a cocktail of drugs.
Clubbers and ravers believe they have a right to party where ever they like and fuck everyone else. A right to trash the countryside, the same right exercised by Monsatan, the same right exercised by farmers ripping out hedgerows, the same right exercised by TAG/MoD trashing the heathland to the west of Farnborough Airport. A right to disturb the peace and quiet of the countryside with unwanted noise, the same right exercised by TAG Aviation, BAA, BA, GO, Ryanair, easyJet.
Like effluent overflowing from a rusting pipeline, clubbers and ravers flowed out of the clubs and washed up on Steart Beach during Jubilee Weekend for a free festival. To have arrived at this secluded spot in Bridgewater Bay near Hinckley Point nuclear power station would have required local knowledge (thus inexcusable). The pathetic excuse was that the waste of urban society was being hounded from pillar to post by the local police and they had to go somewhere to exercise their God given right to party, especially when it's free. [SchNEWS 359 & 363]
The result of this effluent washing up on Steart Beach was that a nature reserve was trashed, a bird sanctuary was destroyed at the height of the nesting season for waders, fires were lit, needles left in fields with young lambs. Locals were left to clean up the mess and count the cost.
Post-Glastonbury, an alternative Glastonbury free festival was held at Smeatharpe, a former airbase some twenty miles from Glastonbury. The neighbouring farmer had no problem with the party as long as people showed him the basic respect of not using the fences for firewood (it was lambing season at the time) or trashing his crops. Not so tricky really, but that, unfortunately, is what happened, as well as kids burning a car left behind 10 years ago and sending a smoke signal of filth over the surrounding countryside. [SchNEWS 363]
No one would dispute organising a free party with a modicum of structure is not easy, there are too many legal hurdles to surmount, as has been seen with the failed Welsh Green Gathering (SchNEWS 354), but as the Ambient Picnic in Guildford has shown, it can be done. But, if trashing the countryside is the result of a free rave, then local communities will quite rightly erect even bigger hurdles.
If there is nowhere suitable, the answer is not to trash somewhere unsuitable, the answer is to call the event off. With legitimate protest there is every ground to criticise police action, when sensitive areas get trashed, ordinary people and local communities left to clean up the mess and pick up the bill, then the police are more than justified in going in hard. One person's enjoyment can never be justified if it is at the expense of someone else.
In maintaining links with the party goers and giving their countryside trashing events promotion and publicity in their Party and Protest Guide, SchNEWS has lost a great deal of credibility.
If the ravers and clubbers must exercise their God given right to dance, then choose a suitable venue, an ASDA car park, a GM farm-scale field trial. Or why not the heathland to the west of Farnborough Airport? TAG/MoD have already done a good job of trashing it, it is difficult to see that further harm could result, and it would probably force closure of the airport, so at least some good would result.
Behind the scenes people have been working hard to forge links between small farmers and environmentalists and anti-globalisation campaigners, to show the farmers that we are all on the same side, fighting a common enemy. It only takes a few morons pulling stunts like these to destroy months, if not years, of hard work and hard won trust.
Plans for a second nuclear reactor at Hinkley Point rumble on despite a recent survey conducted by concerned parents which found rates of cancer in the area were four times the national average. stophinkley@aol.com
Stop Press: Mid-July 2002, 250,000 party goers descended on Brighton for a free Fat Boy Slim party (heavily promoted by the morons' favourite station BBC Radio 1) and did an excellent job of trashing town and beach. SchNEWS saw it differently when it was their own back yard being trashed. [SchNEWS 365]
Let's trash the countryside by Party Trashers 11:22am Tue Jul 16 '02 (Modified on 11:28pm Wed Jul 17 '02) UK Indymedia
Beach Bummers Boozy Bottleneck, SchNEWS 365, Friday 19 July 2002
The Commonwealth Games are being held in Manchester at huge costs to the local community.
Direct action magazine Loombreaker reports 'the Commonwealth Games are being used to launch a new Corporate Manchester - a posh apartment playground for coke-sniffing yuppies, ... The cost of the games are astronomical - the stadium alone accounts for a cool £120 million - but you won't hear too much about £80m of public money the council has committed to paying - So if you're wondering why there are cutbacks in schools and housing, or where your local swimming pools and other public amenities have all gone when your council rents and tax are rising, there's not much need to look any further really.'
Blitz promises to be 'a kick-ass anti-corporate extravaganza' to coincide with the Commonwealth Games being held in Manchester.
Organised by NATO (Northern Arts Tactical Offensive) the festival covers a week of shows, actions and events kicking off on Sat 20th July 2002 with an open air music event, and the opening of two exhibitions. One is AgiTATE being held in a spanking new shopping mall who failed in their bid to ban it once they realised what was happening! Throughout the week there will be film and multimedia events organised by Beyond TV. The week will end with a skate attack and critical mass plus political street theatre on Saturday 27th. NATO has also produced a spoof guide to the city to guide tourists to their events.
During that week there will also be a GM trashing nearby, Manchester People's open seminar for the Anti Commonwealth Games Coalition and lots of anti sweatshop actions.
Stop Press: As the games opened the mainstream press was awe-struck, no mention of what had been done to the facilities of the people of Manchester, the price they had paid for the dubious honour of hosting the games. [BVEJ newsletters passim]
Farnborough is to become the Teterboro of London. -- Roger McMullin, chief executive TAG Aviation Group
To deepest Hampshire for the Farnborough 'Air Show', a delightful euphemism for one of the world's leading arms fairs. -- Gadfly, Financial Mail on Sunday
An expose on Farnborough Airport in the June-July 2002 issue of Corporate Watch newsletter. Copies from (50p each payable in postage stamps):
Corporate Watch 16b Cherwell Street OXFORD OX4 1BG
EasyJet are wanting to move to Farnborough Airport?
As last summer, local residents are being disturbed by noise day and night from the airport. As last summer, the Rotten Borough of Rushmoor is turning a blind eye. As last summer, the profits of TAG come before the tranquillity of the neighbourhood.
The government has finally published its PSZ policy. The underlying criteria 'is that there should be no increase in the number of people living, working or congregating in Public Safety Zones [ie the area where there is a risk of injury or death from an air crash] and that, over time, the number should be reduced'. Or more specifically: 'There should be a general presumption against new or replacement development, or change of use within existing buildings, within the Public Safety Zones. In particular, no new or replacement dwellinghouses, mobile homes, caravan sites or other residential buildings be permitted.' [DfT Circular 1/2002, 10 July 2002]
Rushmoor has granted permission for a development in the grounds of Knellwood House (that will destroy the woodland) which may lie within the PSZ and certainly lies on the edge of the PSZ where such development would normally not be permitted unless there are strong mitigating circumstances. The planners showed the same cavalier attitude to public safety as they did towards the people of South Farnborough when granting permission for Farnborough Airport.
Planning agenda (10 July 2002): Societal risk is a material consideration but in this instance it is not considered that this precludes development on the application site. [Knellwood House ref 02/00154/FUL]
Previous council policy (21 March 2001): Safety from aviation risk is a material planning consideration ... On planning applications within the 1 in 100,000 contour and developments nearby where there may be societal risk ... This information will then be one of the material considerations to be weighed in the decision making process. The Council may decide that safety grounds warrant refusal or that other grounds are more significant and override the safety issue ... The fact that a particular site lies within an area where the risk is greater than 1 in 100,000 per annum will not at this stage bring with it an automatic presumption for refusal. However, the principles behind the intention to designate a PSZ should be followed. Therefore, for the time being, any development that results in the number of people living, working or congregating in areas subject to a greater than 1 in 100,000 risk per annum should be strictly controlled. Only certain types of low density, non-residential development should be allowed, along with extensions to "granny" annexes etc, unless other material circumstances outweigh the potential exposure to risk.
Mid-July 2002 the trashed heathland to the west of the airport is starting to recover - swathes of heath grassland, some heather, coppiced trees starting to regrow. Recovery is better than it was late August last year, but then the area was trashed again late summer and again this spring. The area that has not recovered, apart from a few weed species on disturbed soil, is the area where the soil has been scraped bare in long broad strips with the scraped soil in narrow parallel piles. The bare sterile subsoil is still bare.
During the Farnborough Airshow, timed to coincide with the government's proposals of massive airport expansion across the country (see elsewhere in this newsletter), TAG announced they were seeking massive expansion of Farnborough. Roger McMullin, chief executive TAG Aviation Group, told a press conference that 'Farnborough is to become the Teterboro of London.' Teterboro, based in New Jersey and serving New York, is a 24-hour round-the-clock operation, the world's biggest business airport. Once again Caroline Lucas MEP has been vindicated, not that anyone other than dumb councillors thought TAG intended anything other than expansion with their multi-million expenditure at Farnborough, now running at 50% over budget. McMullin claims he has the full backing of the local community for expansion, apart from a vocal minority who caused problems for TAG during the planning stage. McMullin thanked MoD and BAE Systems for their help during the planning process which was vital in keeping the project on-time.
Around 70 corporate and VIP aircraft were handled by TAG on the first day of the airshow, some business had to be turned away. TAG used the airshow to gain more clients, mainly business and Middle East. According to McMullin: 'Some of the Middle East aircraft could be based here for six months of the year.' Current revenues for TAG are a three-way split between landing fees, fuel and property revenues, these will be enhanced in the future by hanger fees and income from charter and management services.
22-28 July 2002, Farnborough Airshow. For Airshow week, and the week before, horrendous noise and danger. Aircraft were coming in to land all over the place and lower even than TAG. Contrary to the nonsense in the Farnborough News, it was not good for business, post-Sept 11th the emphasis was on consolidation, traffic to the airshow was light and local taxi drivers reported it as the slackest airshow they had known.
A clear indication the Cold War is over, BAE Systems were offering upgrades for Russian military helicopters. Well almost, the Russians, without naming names, accused BAE Systems of compromising safety endangering lives with shoddy work. A sign of the times was QinetiQ (bloody stupid name) sharing a pavilion with Rosonboronexport (exporters of Russian military hardware).
SBAC claim the airshow brings $24 million into the local economy! What of the carbon deficit - logistics, flying, visitors? What of the waste - a temporary town built for one week then ripped apart? What of the costs to local businesses - loss of trade, noise, delays and congestion?
Farnborough International 2004, 19-25 July 2004. Opposition to the airshow, or as the airshow commentator correctly put it trade fair (ie selling weapons to nasty foreigners, has always been to the defence side. With global warming increasingly attributable to aviation, we could see as many deaths from the civil side. Looking ahead there should be well organised opposition to all aspects to the air show - opposition this year, even to the arms fair, was noticeable by its absence - arms campaigners, airport campaigners, global warming etc. The aviation industry should be seen as much a pariah industry as the arms industry is and the oil industry is becoming.
It could be you! On the first public day of the Farnborough Airshow a Russian Sukhoi SU-27 fighter aircraft of the Ukraine air force crashed at an airshow in the Ukraine, near the Polish border, killing over 80 people and injuring several hundred, the world's worst airshow disaster. SU-27s were not at this year's Farnborough Airshow. At the previous Airshow, the SU-27 pilots were disciplined for their dangerous display. The following day a Russian Ilushyn airliner on its way to St Petersburg crashed on takeoff at Moscow's International Airport, 16 people were killed.
Keith Parkins, Air show, arms fair or corporate gateway to Europe?, Corporate Watch newsletter, Issue 9, June-July 2002
Stephen Lloyd, Security tight as airshow takes off with Prince Andrew, Farnborough Mail, 23 July 2002
Farnborough Future: 'London's Teterboro', Aviation's Week ShowNews, Wednesday 24 July 2002 {Farnborough International 2002}
Show gives local economy $24m shot in arm, Flight Daily News, Issue 3, Wednesday 24 July 2002 {Farnborough International 2002}
Mark Hannant, TAG Farnborough a good model for development, Flight Daily News, Issue 3, Wednesday 24 July 2002 {Farnborough International 2002}
Farnborough's future in safe hands, says TAG, Farnborough News, 26 July 2002 {Farnborough Airshow Special Edition}
For reasons only known to themselves, HACAN are making a pigs ear of raising the money to fight the case.
The last ruling had massive publicity. Just raising from those affected would be more than sufficient to bring in the necessary funds. Lobby hard local authorities to stump up the cash. Alternatively find someone who is unemployed or on Income Support as the litigant, who will then get legal aid.
All very simple, all very obvious, so why is HACAN making such a piss of it?
Stop Press: The government's announcement of a third runway at Heathrow (we are going to consultation but we have decided anyway) should bring the money flooding in, more than we know what to do with, but it depends upon how it is handled, and past experience to date does not bode well.
[BVEJ newsletters passim]
The Ambient Picnic in Guildford was an improvement on last year but still not back to its heyday of three years ago. What was particularly disappointing was the almost complete lack of information stalls, which after all is the whole point of the day.
Aldershot Fun Day, was, well Aldershot. The focus was Rio+10 but nothing on the Earth Summit at Johannesburg, especially the corporate takeover of the summit (see elsewhere in this newsletter). FoE now produce some excellent corporate briefings and position papers but none were available on the BVFoE stall (they probably don't even know about them), just some dated material on corporate criminals Exxon. An ex-councillor was manning a LA21/fair trade stall. We don't know what she was on but she was under the illusion that councillors influence planning decisions on behalf of the local community and that Roland Dibbs is a hard working councillor on behalf of the people of Knellwood!
Yet another tale in the workings of the Rotten Borough of Rushmoor ...
Last month the planning committee rubber-stamped the pro-developer planning officials' recommendation to destroy the wood in the grounds of Knellwood House, Farnborough, to enable Hilder the Builder to make a packet constructing a mini-estate of 9 houses and a block of 17 flats. The plans are cosmetically different to those originally submitted. [Knellwood House ref 02/00154/FUL, planning committee 10 July 2002]
Two days before the planning committee met, local residents were invited to comment on changed plans! When challenged the planners said this was 'normal practice'. The plans were changed several times following the original submission. One resident who complained re lack of consultation was told that 'There was never any reason or obligation to seek further views from you because you had already made your views on the application very clear.'
A report on the trees and an ecological survey were carried out. These were carried out on behalf of and paid for by Hilder the Builder. The committee were led to believe these were independent reports carried out by or on behalf of the council. The ecological survey was not in the file and there was no reference to any such survey being carried out!
The ecological survey looks for and finds no protected species. It fails to adequately address the value of the habitat - semi-natural woodland which borders onto open woodland and grassland in the adjacent park. The loss of the woodland is deemed okay as there is woodland in the Blackwater Valley, and there are habitats on the airfield and to the west of the airfield. Various mitigation measures are proposed.
The loss of one habitat, in this case a semi-natural urban woodland, is not offset by the presence of habitat elsewhere, which could and has been damaged or destroyed. The airfield is primarily heath grassland, which has been reduced for hard-standing and terminal buildings, there is some woodland on site, which has been reduced in size for the TAG control tower. The area to the west of the airfield has been trashed by TAG/MoD, including parts of the Basingstoke Canal by Eelmoor Flash. The mitigation measures, eg bat boxes, are fine for improving suburban gardens but in no way mitigate the loss of a valuable woodland habitat. Fragmentation and area reduction of any habitat has a lose far more severe than a simple linear relationship of the area lost would predict.
This loss of habitat fails to take into account past and ongoing loss of habitat within Farnborough, eg loss of the open pine woodland on the corner of Church Road East and Canterbury Road.
English Nature have not raised any objections in terms of rare species loss, they were not consulted on habitat loss. No site survey by English Nature, they relied upon reports commissioned by Hilder the Builder.
An existing problem of traffic and access to houses along Canterbury Road was not drawn to the attention of the committee.
Societal risk was casually dismissed. The development is either on the edge of or within the PSZ (defined by the 1:100,000 risk contour). Any development within the PSZ is prohibited, outside on the edge as within, ie strong presumption against, unless overriding reasons can be demonstrated for the development. Making a few millions for Hilder the Builder is not an overriding reason. The PSZ has to be drawn for 2015, there is a strong probability the development will lie within the PSZ, thus not permitted.
It goes without saying that the concerns raised by local residents were not elaborated before the committee or written into the agenda.
[BVEJ newsletter #0023 April 2002]
On 4 July, the front page of the Daily Mirror was as powerful as any I have known, a tabloid at its best. George W Bush was flanked by a row of Stars and Stripes, chin up, eyes misted. "Mourn on the Fourth of July," said the banner headline. Above him were the words: "George W Bush's policy of bomb first and find out later has killed double the number of civilians who died on 11 September. The USA is now the world's leading rogue state." -- John Pilger
To commemorate the 4th of July, American Independence Day, The Mirror had a front page picture of George W Bush looking suitably doleful before the American flag. The wording may have been less to Bush's liking, describing the US as 'the world's leading rogue state' with a 'policy of bomb first and find out later'. Inside a two-page article by John Pilger. The following day, Tom Shrager, a fund manager with the American investment company, Tweedy Browne, phoned Philip Graf, the chief executive of Trinity Mirror, to complain about the front page and the accompanying article. He reportedly 'did not threaten' to sell his company's 4% share of Trinity Mirror and 'began by stating that he respected the concept of freedom of the press'.
A local rag in Staines was expected to carry a report on water pollution at Heathrow. It did not appear. Our reliable insider sources inform us that the editor was leant on from above (it was more than his job's worth to publish) and the pressure ultimately came from BAA.
Farnborough News has received several stories about the problems with TAG and Farnborough Airport. Stories that never appear in print. Correspondents have given up writing to the News as they know their letters will be spiked. The News is degenerating into little more than a TAG PR comic. News, what news, but what the hell, we have a new Lifestyle feature on Tuesdays.
The trashing of the town appears to be going ahead.
The park outside the sports centre is being dug up and concreted over for a skateboard park.
Building work on one side of The Mead and on the old Post Office site is going ahead. Aldershot councillor David Clifford claims it is wanted by the retailers. That he has not spoken to retailers, presumably because he knows he will get a mouthful of abuse, may excuse his ignorance. The building work is not welcome. Retailers are being moved around like pawns on a chess board. No compensation is being offered to those who are being FORCED to move, nor to the rest who are suffering loss of trade. Clifford also claims the work is welcome by town centre residents. Again he has not spoken to any. The residents will suffer while the building work takes place then again those who are adjacent to the site will suffer from overshadowing and loss of privacy. They will also suffer from the greasy smells from the junk food outlets planned for this end of town.
Will people really wish to buy the squalid shoe-box homes planned for the old Post Office site - situated above and nearby junk food outlets, disturbed by ASDA lorry deliveries?
Will shoppers enjoy going through the 10 foot alley between the old Post Office and the Pizza Hut or mind the loss of public open space?
The Mead will also lose open space.
The residential tenant above the Wimpey is being forced out of her home. KPI are refusing to release Wimpey from their lease and let them have a new letting unless they kick out the tenant from the shop above. Contrast this with the action of KPI to attempt to obtain the lease for the flats above Lloyds TSB.
[BVEJ newsletters passim]
This month's BVEJ Cretin of the Month award goes to councillor Roland Dibbs, holder of the Rushmoor Cabinet environment portfolio, for failing to understand that levying a charge on householders for the collection and disposal of heavy items of rubbish will lead to increased dumping of rubbish.
Rebecca Chard, Bulky waste plans spark controversy, Farnborough Mail, Tuesday 23 July 2002
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