Category: Squatting / Free Spaces / Protest Sites

May 23rd, 2011
After eight months of occu­pa­tion and strug­gle, Coal Action Scot­land has decid­ed to bring an end to the Hap­pen­don Wood Action Camp. The camp was tak­en in Sep­tem­ber last year to resist Scot­tish Coal’s plans to open-cast the wood­land, and to act as a base in South Lanark­shire to take direct action and work with affect­ed com­mu­ni­ties in the ongo­ing strug­gle against the coal indus­try. Hav­ing felt that those goals were met as much as they were going to be, and with Scot­tish Coal’s appli­ca­tion being sub­mit­ted for a new 4 mil­lion ton open cast at Glen­tag­gart East, we have decid­ed to change our focus. We are in no way aban­don­ing South Lanark­shire, or the strug­gle against Scot­tish Coal, and will con­tin­ue to be active in the area in new and excit­ing ways.

Sur­round­ed by three active open cast coal sites, and mul­ti­ple scars being “restored”, the res­i­dents of THWAC placed them­selves along­side the peo­ple of the Dou­glas Val­ley, right in the bel­ly of the beast. Mak­ing the threat of new coal exploita­tion and the con­stant noise and dis­rup­tion a part of every­day life for our­selves is one way in which we felt we could show sol­i­dar­i­ty. We were able to build on links forged dur­ing Main­shill, and met many more peo­ple cam­paign­ing and work­ing to halt Scot­tish Coal’s march across the Dou­glas Val­ley.

Dur­ing our time at Hap­pen­don Wood we tried to impact as lit­tle as pos­si­ble on the envi­ron­ment we were stay­ing in. This includ­ed using solar pan­els to charge the bat­ter­ies to pow­er the lap­tops and the lights in the com­mu­nal and office, donat­ing our shit to a local hous­ing coop who will com­post it and use it to grow food in their orchards, grey water sys­tems to fil­ter our waste water and using paths to reduce the soil ero­sion. Great effort was tak­en to return the small area of wood­land we inhab­it­ed to its orig­i­nal state as we left, and we left the land bet­ter than how we found it. More than Scot­tish Coal can say.

The camp became a use­ful hub in the com­mu­ni­ty for shar­ing infor­ma­tion and ideas. Pub­lic meet­ings were organ­ised and links between the many com­mu­ni­ties were forged. Dur­ing our time at Hap­pen­don Scot­tish Coal launched their “For­ward Strat­e­gy.” Their land grab of the Dou­glas Val­ley involved three new open cast coal sites, with plans to remove a total of 5.4 mil­lion tonnes of coal, fly­ing in the face of local oppo­si­tion and glob­al opin­ion on cli­mate change. This cat­a­lyst ignit­ed a local cam­paign with oppo­si­tion reach­ing from Gle­spin to Les­ma­hagow and a series of pub­lic meet­ings, kick start­ed by peo­ple from THWAC. Peo­ple from all over the Dou­glas Val­ley have con­tin­ued their gen­eros­i­ty with food, water, build­ing mate­ri­als and lock-on cement. We would like to say a mas­sive thank you to the all the peo­ple who came down and pro­vid­ed vital prac­ti­cal and moral sup­port in a win­ter cold enough to rival last year’s at Main­shill.

Dur­ing the occu­pa­tion of Hap­pen­don Wood, Coal Action Scot­land con­tin­ued cam­paign­ing against coal expan­sion in Scot­land. The Health Study Group and Com­mu­ni­ty Ecol­o­gy Group car­ried out vital research into the neg­a­tive effects of the coal indus­try. Eco­log­i­cal stud­ies have been car­ried out at prospec­tive coal sites in the Dou­glas Val­ley, dis­cov­er­ing pro­tect­ed species which were some­how over­looked by Scot­tish Coal’s paid for eco­log­i­cal sur­veys. More and more research has been con­duct­ed show­ing the links between coal extrac­tion and res­pi­ra­to­ry dis­eases, regard­less of Scot­tish Coal or South Lanark­shire Council’s refusal to lis­ten. CAS also con­tin­ued to sup­port the cam­paign in Mid­loth­i­an against an open cast by Scot­tish Coal near the vil­lage of Cous­land, and we thank the local cam­paign­ers for their sup­port in return. The com­mu­ni­ty man­aged to defeat the pro­pos­al at the plan­ning stage.

A Smooth Newt found dur­ing tat down.

As the name sug­gests, THWAC was start­ed as a base for direct action. Dur­ing the eight months affin­i­ty groups from across the UK, and fur­ther afield, came and car­ried out a wide vari­ety of direct action and protests at open casts in the area and tar­gets fur­ther afield. This includ­ed: mine gates locked shut at night three times, dig­ger div­ing at Main­shill twice, Main­shill offices were attacked with paint, Raven­struther coal rail head was block­ad­ed twice, South Lanark­shire Council’s offices had ban­ners hung from the roof and stink bombs let off inside the com­mit­tee room, Scot­tish Coal con­trac­tors RPS and Weber Shand­wick had their offices glued shut and slo­gans paint­ed on their walls, and accord­ing to anony­mous reports post­ed online there were six sab­o­tage actions with over thir­ty three vehi­cles inca­pac­i­tat­ed. These add to the already impres­sive list of actions tak­en against the coal indus­try since Coal Action Scot­land formed. Through this cam­paign of sus­tained direct action we have cost Scot­tish Coal a con­sid­er­able amount.

Over the next few months we will be set­ting our sites on Scot­tish Coal’s plot to tear up Glen­tag­gart East in the Dou­glas Val­ley. We are join­ing with local cam­paign­ers in a call out for as many objec­tion let­ters to South Lanark­shire Coun­cil against this appli­ca­tion as pos­si­ble. More infor­ma­tion about this can be found on the STOP web­site. We will also con­tin­ue to use direct action to apply pres­sure on them to aban­don this open cast. If any­one wish­es to join in then Tar­get Brochures show­ing coal infra­struc­ture across Scot­land can also be found on our web­site. After the suc­cess of last year’s event we will be plan­ning anoth­er Out­door Skill Share from the 26th to the 29th of August, where we will run work­shops on the prac­ti­cal skills need­ed to hold a protest site. More infor­ma­tion can be found on the Out­door Skill Share web­site.

All that’s left is to say thank you to all our vis­i­tors and see you all next time.

The Hap­pen­don Wood Action Camp