Category: Eastern England

East­ern Eng­land

EARTH FIRST! WINTER MOOT: 5th — 7th Feb 2010, County Durham — exact location released, & other info (incl. for cyclists)

EARTH FIRST! WINTER MOOT
6pm Fri 5th — Sun 7th Feb 2010
North-east Eng­land

“A week­end of net­work­ing, reflec­tion, strate­gic dis­cus­sions & cam­paign plan­ning for any­one involved in eco­log­i­cal direct action who believes in non-hier­ar­chi­cal organ­i­sa­tion and direct­ly con­fronting the forces respon­si­ble for the destruc­tion of the Earth and its inhab­i­tants”

EF! earth fist logoEARTH FIRST! WINTER MOOT
6pm Fri 5th — Sun 7th Feb 2010
North-east Eng­land

“A week­end of net­work­ing, reflec­tion, strate­gic dis­cus­sions & cam­paign plan­ning for any­one involved in eco­log­i­cal direct action who believes in non-hier­ar­chi­cal organ­i­sa­tion and direct­ly con­fronting the forces respon­si­ble for the destruc­tion of the Earth and its inhab­i­tants”

Venue:
The Win­ter Moot will be tak­ing place at the Dip­ton Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre, Front Street (A692), Dip­ton, Stan­ley, Coun­ty Durham, DH9 9DR. Fur­ther infor­ma­tion on get­ting there can be found via the How to get there link (now includ­ing cycling direc­tions).

New poster to down­load
New fly­er to down­load

Details of EF! Win­ter Moot announced:

The Earth First! Win­ter moot is an oppor­tu­ni­ty for peo­ple who feel affil­i­a­tion with the ideas behind Earth First! to net­work, dis­cuss and reflect on the UK eco­log­i­cal direct action move­ment and to plan for the future. Earth First! is about direct action to halt the destruc­tion of the Earth. We believe we can make a real dif­fer­ence by doing it our­selves rather than rely­ing on lead­ers, gov­ern­ments or indus­try.

This years Earth First! Win­ter Moot will be tak­ing place in Co. Durham on the week­end of 6/7th Feb­ru­ary. As well as eval­u­a­tions and updates from a num­ber of eco­log­i­cal cam­paigns from around the coun­try, this year we will have a themed event — The Cri­sis: eval­u­a­tion, analy­sis and pos­si­ble respons­es. We will be explor­ing the inter­ac­tions between the var­i­ous eco­log­i­cal, finan­cial and resource crises, exam­in­ing our own con­cep­tions and expe­ri­ences of cri­sis, then tying it alto­geth­er to find a way for­ward using non-hier­ar­chi­cal approach­es.

We will also be host­ing a dis­cus­sion on how Earth First and the Camp for Cli­mate Action inter­sect, to deal with quite a num­ber of issues that emerged at the EF! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing, includ­ing issues of gen­er­a­tional under­stand­ing, anar­chism vs. lib­er­al­ism, are we seper­ate net­works, and how can we go for­ward togeth­er in the future. This debate will be tak­ing from 6.15–7.30pm on the Sat­ur­day evening of the Moot, and is open to all.

Every­one wel­come

If your cam­paign (local or nation­al) is inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pat­ing in the feed­back please get in touch.

The venue will be acces­si­ble, and par­ent-friend­ly. Veg­an food pro­vid­ed. Sug­gest­ed dona­tion for the week­end is £20. The venue will be announced one week before­hand so keep an eye on the web­site for details; how­ev­er, for those who want to pur­chase advance tick­ets, the near­est sta­tion will be New­cas­tle-upon-Tyne.

For more infor­ma­tion vis­it http://earthfirst.org.uk/ & http://www.earthfirstgathering.org.uk/2010moot/front.html
Tel: 0777 114 2131

1. It is in doors with com­mu­nal sleep­ing areas (no camp­ing — we’re not that mad 🙂 )

2. The actu­al venue will be announced a week before hand, so please check the web­site then, or email us.

For enquiries, offers of facil­i­ta­tion & help, ideas for work­shops and TO LET US KNOW YOU ARE COMING! email : wintermoot@earthfirst.org.uk

More about the Moot
The EF! Win­ter Moot is an oppor­tu­ni­ty for peo­ple who feel affil­i­a­tion with the ideas behind Earth First! to net­work, dis­cuss and reflect on the UK eco­log­i­cal direct action move­ment and to plan for the future.

Fol­low­ing a pop­u­lar dis­cus­sion at 2009’s EF! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing 2010’s Moot also aims to hold dis­cus­sions on the theme of “ready­ing our­selves for unpre­dictabil­i­ty and insta­bil­i­ty in the UK and glob­al­ly”. The cur­rent & impend­ing crises of eco­nom­ics, ecol­o­gy, ener­gy & soci­ety fun­da­men­tal­ly alter the ter­rain of strug­gle; this in turn impacts both the prac­tice and pos­si­bil­i­ties for a rad­i­cal eco­log­i­cal move­ment.

2010’s Win­ter Moot is to be held in Coun­ty Durham, an area with a large num­ber of open­cast coal mines, both active and at the appli­ca­tion stage. The week­end will include oppor­tu­ni­ties to meet with activists involved local­ly in cam­paigns against these.

Cost includ­ing veg­an food & crash-pad accom­mo­da­tion £20-£30 (depend­ing what you can afford-but please don’t blag-even the organ­is­ers will pay).

If you have par­tic­u­lar accom­mo­da­tion, access or dietary needs or are bring­ing chil­dren it would help us to know as soon as pos­si­ble so we can plan suit­able facil­i­ties; who­ev­er you are please do try & drop us an email at least a week in advance so we can gauge how many to cater for.

www.earthfirst.org.uk

Hot off the press and packed with Direct Action — the new Earth First! Action Update is out!

Rebel­lion, a spark in search of a pow­der keg — the new Action Update is out, the quar­ter­ly round-up of eco­log­i­cal direct action from the UK and beyond.

What’s in this issue?

EF! gathering '07 logo (rabbit/fence)Rebel­lion, a spark in search of a pow­der keg — the new Action Update is out, the quar­ter­ly round-up of eco­log­i­cal direct action from the UK and beyond.

What’s in this issue?
Old King Coal meets his Match, but the Nuclear Empire Strikes Back! Read tales of flotil­las, bish­op-bash­ing, block­ades and occu­pa­tions as the Rebel Alliance takes on the Empire. The rebels have also been hang­ing around in nets and on plat­forms, occu­py­ing and lock­ing-on at coal ter­mi­nals, and pas­sion­ate­ly attack­ing pow­er sta­tion fences around the world, try­ing to shut ’em down. Main­shill protest camp con­tin­ues to pro-active­ly resist open-cast min­ing — they climb, occu­py, and by night, anony­mous pix­ies sab­o­tage. Who knows when they sleep — with a strong alliance with local vil­lagers, they wel­come YOU to come and play any­time, with a gath­er­ing at the end of Octo­ber.

Want more? Radio-tow­ers top­pled, dams and trucks seized, naked oil streaks and green smears in defence of the wild, a shit dumped with shit…resistance to peat min­ing, genet­ic engi­neer­ing, log­ging and Shell in Ire­land, and for Ves­tas wind tur­bine fac­to­ry and work­ers on the Isle of Wight.

Still not enough? Stop­ping Tesco, cli­mate cam­paign­ing suc­cess­es, run­way inva­sions, more eco­tage, and the EF! Win­ter Moot, plus con­tacts and upcom­ing dates.

To down­load your copy go to this web­site:

http://www.earthfirst.org.uk/efau/actionupdate_oct09.pdf

If you want paper copies to dis­trib­ute, con­tact us at: actionupdate@earthfirst.org.uk or pick up a bunch from our stall at the Anar­chist Book­fair in Lon­don. To print your own, down­load from http://www.earthfirst.org.uk/efau/actionupdate_oct09print.pdf

Want­ed: We are very skint! Please send us some dosh to help us pay for the print­ing.
Cheques can be made out to Earth First! Action Update, and post­ed to The Base­ment, 78a Pen­ny St, Lan­cast­er LA1 1XN

Love and Rage
Your Action Update col­lec­tive

*Hit the Production of Climate Chaos — get involved* — 13th December call for actions

The cli­mate cat­a­stro­phe has not hap­pened by ran­dom chance and the melt­ing glac­i­er is not its place. Our eco­nom­ic sys­tem, the way it pro­duces goods, and the way they are trans­port­ed and final­ly con­sumed is the root of cli­mate change.

The cli­mate cat­a­stro­phe has not hap­pened by ran­dom chance and the melt­ing glac­i­er is not its place. Our eco­nom­ic sys­tem, the way it pro­duces goods, and the way they are trans­port­ed and final­ly con­sumed is the root of cli­mate change.

We do not believe that this COP will solve the cli­mate cri­sis. The del­e­gates, NGOs and com­pa­ny rep­re­sen­ta­tives are stuck in an ide­ol­o­gy of nev­er end­ing eco­nom­ic growth and uni­ver­sal mar­ket solu­tions to all human-made prob­lems, such as eco­log­i­cal destruc­tion. Social jus­tice issues are con­se­quent­ly ignored.

On Decem­ber 13th we call for action on this eco­nom­ic sys­tem. We encour­age affin­i­ty groups to take action on tar­gets in Copen­hagen, and abroad. In the Morn­ing of Decem­ber 13th we will also shut down the har­bour of Copen­hagen through a mass action block­ade. The har­bour is a key sym­bol of the glob­al free-mar­ket econ­o­my. Here becomes vis­i­ble what is usu­al­ly hid­den: eco­log­i­cal dete­ri­o­ra­tion, eco­nom­ic and social exploita­tion, and utter injus­tice.

Since the dawn of colo­nial­ism the glob­al ship­ping indus­try has been char­ac­ter­ized by vio­lence. What was once gold pil­laged from the Incas is these days prof­it based on cheap resources and cheap labour — usu­al­ly trans­port­ed by ships. Today, con­tain­er ship­ping is one of the foun­da­tions of cap­i­tal­ism. There are hard­ly any reg­u­la­tions: fuel is not taxed, emis­sions are not sub­ject to con­trol and bor­ders are seem­ing­ly non-exis­tent for con­tain­er ships. At the same time, the nev­er end­ing need for more cheap goods is almost lim­it­less. The ‘free’ glob­al flow of goods con­tin­ues to grow — with ben­e­fits for only the few.

But where­as these flows of goods can enter the EU/ rich world freely, humans can­not. As soon as peo­ple do not have the right pass­port or enough mon­ey when enter­ing rich coun­tries, they are put in pris­ons, deport­ed and deprived of the most basic human rights. And the mil­i­tari­sa­tion of the seas is not just hap­pen­ing around the EU bor­ders. It is also used to pro­tect inter­na­tion­al ship­ping, like in Soma­lia where inter­na­tion­al fish­ing fleets have robbed Soma­li fish­er­men of the fun­da­men­tal ele­ments of their exis­tence.

Final­ly, inter­na­tion­al ship­ping is more than just a method of trans­port for the glob­al econ­o­my. It is in itself a pri­ma­ry cause of cli­mate change. Approx­i­mate­ly 5% of Glob­al Green­house Emis­sions are pro­duced by the ship­ping indus­try. Con­tain­er ship fuel is basi­cal­ly tox­ic waste left over from petrol pro­duc­tion, con­tain­ing high amounts of sul­phur and mer­cury. And like inter­na­tion­al flights, nobody is respon­si­ble for ship­ping indus­try emis­sions under the Kyoto Pro­to­col.

Cli­mate jus­tice and real social change will not come from above. Effec­tive change has to come from every­one — affect­ed, respon­si­ble, and observ­er. True change has to be orga­nized and real­ized by peo­ple all over the world — all peo­ple on the streets and in the fields. We say no to the pow­er of gov­ern­ments, com­pa­nies and so-called non-gov­ern­ment organ­i­sa­tions which are only inter­est­ed in main­tain­ing their pow­er, influ­ence and flows of cap­i­tal.

We will try to stop this mad­ness for a day. Fight­ing for cli­mate jus­tice means chang­ing our eco­nom­ic sys­tem and this needs to hap­pen here in the rich glob­al north, which reaps the most ben­e­fits from the dis­as­ter. For the free flow of peo­ple and ideas, instead of flows of goods to ben­e­fit the few.

Con­tact htp@riseup.net to get involved with plan­ning the action, or come to one of our next meet­ings: Berlin Octo­ber 3–4 & Copen­hagen Octo­ber 18.

SHAC’s Operation Liberation — Open Letter to the Cops!

- VIDEO OF POLICE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgV8p1KavSk

An open let­ter to all police offi­cers involved in the polic­ing of SHAC’s Oper­a­tion Lib­er­a­tion protest on 26th Sep­tem­ber 2009.

Dear Police,

- VIDEO OF POLICE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgV8p1KavSk

An open let­ter to all police offi­cers involved in the polic­ing of SHAC’s Oper­a­tion Lib­er­a­tion protest on 26th Sep­tem­ber 2009.

Dear Police,

Yes­ter­day pro­test­ers from around the coun­try came togeth­er to take part in Oper­a­tion Lib­er­a­tion a protest orga­nized by SHAC as part of a cam­paign to close down High­gate Farm who breed rab­bits and fer­rets for ani­mal test­ing.

The police on the day did not let the pro­test­ers go down to the farm and the protest was a sta­t­ic demo away from both the farm and the vil­lage. You used an unmanned drone to observe the demo as well as lines of cops and police vans all around us. While it has been argued in the past that drones would be used to lim­it police num­bers the num­ber of police was huge. You drew a line on the path and would­n’t let any­one past it. One offi­cer even move peo­ple back who’s shoes were slight­ly over the line anoth­er push some­one back with­out even ask­ing the pro­test­er to move!

The police seem intent on pro­vok­ing anoth­er New­church by pre­vent­ing effec­tive peace­ful protest and build­ing up anger by antag­o­nis­ing the nation­al ani­mal rights move­ment. If you want to show peo­ple that keep­ing to coop­er­a­tive protest is a good idea, putting them at the end of a lane away from their tar­get and being total­ly inflex­i­ble isn’t a great way of going about it!

I know there are some police try­ing to avoid anoth­er New­church. How­ev­er it seems you have been manip­u­lat­ed by a par­tic­u­lar­ly extreme ele­ment in your ranks that needs to pro­voke the move­ment to keep its fund­ing. NETCU and sim­i­lar units seem to be in a very bad way in terms of resources and in this reces­sion they need to manip­u­late you to keep the funds flow­ing away from your local polic­ing pri­or­i­ties and to line the pock­ets of there cosy lit­tle num­ber. They don’t want to see the move­ment coop­er­at­ing with you because that will make them unnec­es­sary.

Many of you may already be angry that mon­ey has in the past been wast­ed on such units. Do you real­ly want funds to be tak­en from you and used to sent a car of two or more spe­cial­ist offi­cers from far­away to a small peace­ful protest that could eas­i­ly be dealt with by your beat bob­by (or PCSO) in two min­utes flat?

You have prob­a­bly been told that the ani­mal rights move­ment has been frozen by the SHAC tri­als, this is not the case. The move­ment is get­ting up, shak­ing itself down and decid­ing it’s direc­tion. Where are you going to push it towards?

See you on the streets,

An activist.
—————-
This does not nec­es­sar­i­ly rep­re­sent the views of every­one at Ani­mal Rights Cam­bridge. Ani­mal Rights Cam­bridge has no lead­ers.

Ani­mal Rights Cam­bridge
http://animalrightscambridge.webs.com/

DSEi Arms Fair Exhibitor and SHAC Protests in Cambridge

On the 8th of Sep­tem­ber 2009 pro­test­ers head­ed to two Cam­bridge tar­gets named in the map of DSEi arms fair exhibitors and the Cam­bridge office of BDO who have giv­en a mas­sive loan to the most exposed ani­mal test­ing lab in the world Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences (HLS).

On the 8th of Sep­tem­ber 2009 pro­test­ers head­ed to two Cam­bridge tar­gets named in the map of DSEi arms fair exhibitors and the Cam­bridge office of BDO who have giv­en a mas­sive loan to the most exposed ani­mal test­ing lab in the world Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences (HLS).

The arms trade leads to the death of humans and non-human ani­mals alike and the pro­test­ers want to show there cross move­ment sol­i­dar­i­ty with all move­ments fight­ing for a just and kind world. HLS test sweet­en­er, GMOs and pes­ti­cides on ani­mals and has a his­to­ry of ani­mal wel­fare vio­la­tions and fal­si­fy­ing data.

Watch the protests here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPeHU8TBKNo

The small group of pro­test­ers head­ed to…

DESi Exhibitor: Mott Mac­Don­ald
Deme­ter House, Sta­tion Road Cam­bridge CB1 2RS

Arriv­ing at recep­tion pro­test­ers told the lady at the desk why they where there and asked to speak to the man­ag­er. But the man­ag­er did­n’t want to talk.

Pro­test­ers decid­ed to hold a protest in the recep­tion area and unfurled a ban­ner which the recep­tion­ist prompt­ly fold­ed over with pro­test­ers prompt­ly re-open­ing it again! After a bit a staff mem­ber decid­ed to drag the pro­test­ers out. He began drag­ging a pro­test­er across the floor rip­ping the pro­test­ers t‑shirt. The staff mem­ber then stop to grabbed a female pro­test­er push­ing her out the door. The remain­ing cam­paign­ers held on to each oth­er stay­ing in the office as the staff mem­ber tried to pull them across the floor.

The man­ag­er of the Cam­bridge office came down because of all the com­mo­tion and told the staff mem­ber to stop. The pro­test­ers sat down with him and have a long dis­cus­sion with him about the arms trade. He apol­o­gised to us for the staff mem­ber who attacked us and admit­ted he would­n’t have spoke to us apart from because of what hap­pened. He said he would be fill­ing in paper­work to inform the com­pa­ny about the protest.

HLS (ani­mal lab) Finance: BDO Stoy Hay­ward — Cam­bridge
Claren­don House Claren­don Road Cam­bridge CB2 8FH

Pro­test­ers went to the doors of the office block BDO is locat­ed in and pushed the buzzer and told the com­pa­ny who they were. An assis­tant popped down and spoke to them and said he did­n’t know any­thing about it and said he did­n’t agree with the cru­el­ty they described to him. He went back up to his office, but the pro­test­ers did­n’t real­ly feel there issue had been addressed so they went up as well.

A secu­ri­ty guard stopped them and pro­test­ers explained they just want­ed to speak to the peo­ple in the office. He did­n’t let them go up but did let them wait in the recep­tion area while the com­pa­ny phoned head office. One cop turned up and the secu­ri­ty guard said the pro­test­ers had been peace­ful and went to check about BDO who now said it was noth­ing to do with the Cam­bridge office but they did­n’t know about the rest of the com­pa­ny! Pro­test­ers explained that was­n’t good enough and went out­side to voice our oppo­si­tion on the mega­phone.

BDO’s Cam­bridge office now know about the issue and now have a chance to act and tell their boss­es to with­draw the mas­sive loan that is help­ing keep HLS afloat.

DESi Exhibitor: Atkins
5 Well­brook Court Gir­ton Road Cam­bridge CB3 0NA

Cam­paign­ers head­ed to the office of Akins to let them know they object to their com­pa­ny’s involve­ment in the arms trade. The site man­ag­er came and spoke to them and the pro­test­ers told him why they were there. His atti­tude did­n’t seem great, but he lis­tened. Pro­test­ers unfurled their ban­ner and staff rang the police.

They explained to the man­ag­er that they want­ed him to con­tact Head Office to let them know about their objec­tions he refused at first, even refer­ring to the pro­test­ers as ter­ror­ists at one point when they said tres­pass was a civ­il mat­ter, but even­tu­al­ly phoned his head office.

The police arrived and told the man­ag­er to tell pro­test­ers to leave so they left. The police asked for pro­test­ers details but were denied them.

Ani­mal Rights Cam­bridge
— Home­page: http://animalrightscambridge.webs.com/

GM Round-Up: Ready? Global sabotage the answer

Despite the Euro­pean Food Safe­ty Author­i­ty and of course Mon­san­to declar­ing MON 810 maize to be safe, Ger­many and France in Spring of this year banned the cul­ti­va­tion of this genet­i­cal­ly mod­i­fied crop. It was the only GM crop per­mit­ted in Ger­many. There are very active oppo­si­tion move­ments in both coun­tries — rip­ping up GM crops both at night and by day, occu­py­ing fields were it was due to be plant­ed and oth­er wide-scale protests.

GM apple trees snappedDespite the Euro­pean Food Safe­ty Author­i­ty and of course Mon­san­to declar­ing MON 810 maize to be safe, Ger­many and France in Spring of this year banned the cul­ti­va­tion of this genet­i­cal­ly mod­i­fied crop. It was the only GM crop per­mit­ted in Ger­many. There are very active oppo­si­tion move­ments in both coun­tries — rip­ping up GM crops both at night and by day, occu­py­ing fields were it was due to be plant­ed and oth­er wide-scale protests.

In June in Ger­many, two hun­dred and sev­en­ty apple trees on a tri­al site owned by the Insti­tute for Breed­ing Research on Hor­ti­cul­tur­al and Fruit Crops of the Julius Kühn Insti­tute (JKI) in Dres­den-Pill­nitz were destroyed by unknown intrud­ers. Most of the trees were genet­i­cal­ly mod­i­fied plants being grown in tubs in a spe­cial safe­ty tent under field-like con­di­tions. It is the first time that pro­test­ers have destroyed plants that were not being grown in the field.

Accord­ing to a press release by the JKI, the tent fab­ric was cut open and all of the trees, which were about sev­en years old, were either snapped by hand or cut with prun­ing shears above the graft. The insti­tute esti­mates the cost of the dam­age to be around EUR 700 000. Around ten years of research work has been destroyed.

Mean­while, in Spain 80,000 hectares of GM maize are grown, most­ly in Zaragoza and Cat­alo­nia. Thou­sands of peo­ple took to the streets this Spring to protest against Spain being the GM dust­bin of Europe.

The UK gov­ern­ment con­tin­ues to spout recy­cled (from 10 years ago) indus­try non­sense claims about feed­ing the world, solv­ing cli­mate change and gen­er­al­ly sav­ing human­i­ty. Scot­tish and Welsh politi­cians remain opposed to GM how­ev­er.

In the UK BASF — who have been try­ing to grow GM pota­toes over the last cou­ple of years — did­n’t both­er this year. There have been crit­i­cal reports over their antibi­ot­ic-mark­er GM pota­toes, and the com­pa­ny is prepar­ing itself for a hos­tile takeover bid. More info: deci­sion not to plant this year | takeover threat

How­ev­er, there are claims that a tri­al was grown in secret, and a Welsh GM indus­try-fund­ed farmer con­tin­ues to try to pro­voke through claim­ing to grow GM.

In April in Poland, anti-GM cam­paign­ers from GMO-Free Poland went on hunger strike for 3 weeks, wring­ing a minor con­ces­sion out of the gov­ern­ment.

Protest in India against GM corn led to a large num­ber of arrests, with 35 arrest­ed in oth­er protests there against GM rice.

And on 19th August 2009 in Ice­land, genet­i­cal­ly-mod­i­fied bar­ley, which was being grown for exper­i­men­tal pur­pos­es in Gun­narsholt, south Ice­land, by start-up com­pa­ny ORF Lif­taekni, was dam­aged by a group of activists in the ear­ly hours of Wednes­day. There will be no har­vest this fall. The CEO said: “For a small com­pa­ny like ours, which is strug­gling in the dif­fi­cult inno­va­tion envi­ron­ment, this is a seri­ous mat­ter.” The group of activists, which calls itself Ill­gre­si (Weed), sent an anony­mous email to the media, claim­ing respon­si­bil­i­ty for the sab­o­tage.

EF! summer gathering — exact location, travel info & updated workshop programme announced; coal-blighted communities visit

Earth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing, 18th-24th August 2009, Cum­bria

Nev­er has halt­ing the destruc­tion of our plan­et been so impor­tant… Learn how to make them stop!

The gath­er­ing this year will be held at Seath­waite in the beau­ti­ful Bor­row­dale. The site is right in the heart of the Lake Dis­trict and sur­round­ed by moun­tains, streams and tarns. The near­est train sta­tion is Pen­rith. More detailed direc­tions, pub­lic trans­port, walks & cycle rides to the site

Work­shop pro­gramme in a vari­ety of for­mats

EF!-rabbit-in-canoeEarth First! Sum­mer Gath­er­ing, 18th-24th August 2009, Cum­bria

Nev­er has halt­ing the destruc­tion of our plan­et been so impor­tant… Learn how to make them stop!

The gath­er­ing this year will be held at Seath­waite in the beau­ti­ful Bor­row­dale. The site is right in the heart of the Lake Dis­trict and sur­round­ed by moun­tains, streams and tarns. The near­est train sta­tion is Pen­rith. More detailed direc­tions, pub­lic trans­port, walks & cycle rides to the site

Work­shop pro­gramme in a vari­ety of for­mats

WHO
Earth First! is a net­work of peo­ple and cam­paigns who fight eco­log­i­cal destruc­tion and the forces dri­ving it. We believe in doing it our­selves rather than rely­ing on gov­ern­ments or indus­try. Direct action is at the heart of what we do, whether we’re stand­ing in front of a bull­doz­er, shut­ting down an open­cast mine or rip­ping up a field of GM crops.

Join us for 5 days of work­shops, net­work­ing and plan­ning actions at a low impact eco-liv­ing camp organ­ised non-hier­ar­chi­cal­ly

WHAT
Plan­ning actions and cam­paigns, meet­ing and shar­ing skills with oth­ers who care. Over 80 train­ing work­shops plus games and evening fun:
• Learn skills for direct action. Tree Climb­ing, Ori­en­teer­ing, Secu­ri­ty for activists, Legal brief­ing, Escap­ing pub­lic order sit­u­a­tions, street medics – first aid, self defence, Boat blockad­ing using kayaks, radio pro­ce­dures and rock abseil­ing.
• Net­work your cam­paign against eco­log­i­cal destruc­tion. open­cast min­ing, genet­ic engi­neer­ing, agro­fu­els, dam-build­ing, hunt-sab­bing, cli­mate actions, oil pipeline resis­tance, road stop­ping, anti-whal­ing, squat­ting, rain­for­est pro­tec­tion.
• Learn about ecol­o­gy, eco­cen­tric ethics and alter­na­tives to the cor­po­rate world of exploita­tion.
• Prac­ti­cal skills for eco­log­i­cal restora­tion and sus­tain­able liv­ing, field trips and hands-on work.

YOU
We are all crew! This is your gath­er­ing come pre­pared to help run the camp and con­tribute to the pro­gramme. Con­tact us in advance with ideas for work­shops, help with organ­is­ing the gath­er­ing, come ear­ly to help set­up the site or stay on for a cou­ple of days for take­down.
If you can help get in touch!

BRING
Bring tent and sleep­ing bag. You can either cook food for your­self or for £4 per day chip in with col­lec­tive cook­ing of deli­cious veg­an organ­ic food. There’ll be qui­et sleep­ing areas, toi­lets and run­ning water, a children’s space and spaces for work­shops and info stalls.
Veg­gies will pro­vide veg­an cake and snacks. Chil­dren and young adults wel­come with sub­si­dized meals.

Arrive Tues pm. Work­shops from Wed am until Sun pm.

Loads of cam­paigns are tak­ing to the water in defence of the plan­et, like at Ross­port where Shell are try­ing to lay onshore pipelines and the Great Rebel Raft Regat­ta at last sum­mers cli­mate camp. This sum­mer’s EF! gath­er­ing will be build­ing on these tac­tics with train­ing in water based actions.

An excur­sion to vis­it com­mu­ni­ties in the North East threat­ened by an expan­sion of coal min­ing on Mon­day 24th August. Vis­it beau­ti­ful val­leys and strong spir­it­ed com­mu­ni­ties and make links for ongo­ing resis­tance.

We aim to make the site as acces­si­ble as we can please con­tact us in advance if you have spe­cial needs, ques­tions or con­cerns.

WHERE
The site is near in the Lake Dis­trict, Cum­bria. The near­est train sta­tion is Pen­rith and there is a bus ser­vice to the site, there are car and liv­ing vehi­cle spaces out­side the camp.

Dogs: We are for­tu­nate this year to be able to accom­mo­date well behaved own­ers with dogs on leads but think about whether your dog will feel com­fort­able in work­shops. Please call before­hand so we know num­bers.

Cost: £20 — £30 accord­ing to what you can afford. We are not for prof­it all extra cash goes to help fund next year. Under 14’s free.

For more info con­tact us at :
summergathering@earthfirst.org.uk
www.earthfirstgathering.org.uk

Latest EF! Action Update bursts forth

Car tyres deflate in the night, dig­gers halt­ed in their tracks, build­ings and MPs cov­ered in slime…airports plagued by crazy golf, pic­nics, city gents and hostage-taking…eco-villages and oth­er autonomous spaces sprout, as oth­ers are under threat…tree-sits, banks evict­ed, fake phone-masts and whal­ing ships sunk.…it must be time for anoth­er Earth First! Action Update, bring­ing you a con­cen­trat­ed quar­ter­ly blast of inspi­ra­tion and con­tacts to get out there and take direct action against the bas­tards threat­en­ing this plan­et and its inhab­i­tants.

News from the front-lines — per­ma­nent protest camps old and new, and tem­po­rary gath­er­ings in a field near you, all the dates and info you need for a sum­mer of blis­ter­ing action and tor­ren­tial out­pour­ings!

Suc­cess­es here, across the pond and round the very oth­er side of the world.

People stop logging trucksCar tyres deflate in the night, dig­gers halt­ed in their tracks, build­ings and MPs cov­ered in slime…airports plagued by crazy golf, pic­nics, city gents and hostage-taking…eco-villages and oth­er autonomous spaces sprout, as oth­ers are under threat…tree-sits, banks evict­ed, fake phone-masts and whal­ing ships sunk.…it must be time for anoth­er Earth First! Action Update, bring­ing you a con­cen­trat­ed quar­ter­ly blast of inspi­ra­tion and con­tacts to get out there and take direct action against the bas­tards threat­en­ing this plan­et and its inhab­i­tants.

News from the front-lines — per­ma­nent protest camps old and new, and tem­po­rary gath­er­ings in a field near you, all the dates and info you need for a sum­mer of blis­ter­ing action and tor­ren­tial out­pour­ings!

Suc­cess­es here, across the pond and round the very oth­er side of the world.

A report back from the Coal Car­a­van, plus info about the com­mu­ni­ties along its route.

Court news — what hap­pened after pro­test­ers planned to shut a coal-fired pow­er plant, and climbed atop a train, plus handy Secu­ri­ty Tips for Going on Actions.

Leav­ing it All in the Ground — news of glob­al fights against the min­ing of gold, cop­per, baux­ite and alu­mini­um — blockad­ing, torch­ing and night-time pix­ieing.

A View from the Trees — a sto­ry from our eco-cen­tric cousins. And indige­nous Peru­vians fight on against the whole­sale onslaught on our world.

And a round-up of your favourite pub­lic order sit­u­a­tions — G20, SmashE­DO and Athen­ian rub­bish dumps!

Read, down­load and print it here, sub­scribe so you get it direct to your door, or look out for it at a cli­mate camp near you.

If you want to be list­ed or get a bunch of them to dis­trib­ute, please get in touch.

Share your inspi­ra­tional news at EF! Action Reports, and it’ll find it’s way into your very own print­ed EF!AU, in good old black and white print.

Local Writer Stops Council Hedge Cutting

This small, local action was car­ried out on the spur of the moment, but worked and prob­a­bly saved the lives of hun­dreds of nest­ing birds and oth­er inhab­i­tants of the hedgerow ecol­o­gy. Just goes to show that any­one can do it if they care enough — you don’t always need chains and tubes.

———-

This small, local action was car­ried out on the spur of the moment, but worked and prob­a­bly saved the lives of hun­dreds of nest­ing birds and oth­er inhab­i­tants of the hedgerow ecol­o­gy. Just goes to show that any­one can do it if they care enough — you don’t always need chains and tubes.

———-

NATURE-LOVING Kei­th Far­nish stood in front of trac­tors to stop them get­ting to birds nest­ing in hedges.

And Keith’s defi­ance has man­aged to halt a coun­cil hedge-cut­ting project in his local park.

Kei­th, 38, sprung into action when he spot­ted coun­cil con­trac­tors lop­ping two foot off the top of hedgerows, as he walked home through Sweyne Park, Rayleigh.

It stopped work­ers in their tracks, and Rochford Dis­trict Coun­cil has now decid­ed to call off the whole project until the end of the nest­ing sea­son.

Writer and dad-of-two Kei­th, who lives in near­by Eastcheap, is delight­ed.

He said: “That’s bril­liant news.Obviously, the coun­cil needs to review its pol­i­cy so it won’t hap­pen again.

“It’s so impor­tant the coun­cil takes into accounts pat­terns of nature.

“It was about three miles of hedgerow they would have mas­sa­cred and it would have destroyed nest­ing birds. Sweyne Park is the only green lung that Rayleigh has.”

Kei­th said the hedges are used by spar­rows, black­birds and robins, and about 20 metres had been cut down by the time he arrived after drop­ping off his chil­dren at school.

He said: “It’s just pure chance I hap­pened to be there and saw them. I said to the con­trac­tors that I will just stand in front of your machin­ery until you go.

“These guys seemed OK though I got their goat a bit. The man­ag­er told me they will just have to pack up and go some­where else.

“It’s the first time I’ve ever stood in front of machin­ery. It’s just some­thing I had to do.

“I felt empow­ered because it was the right thing to do. I didn’t feel threat­ened at all.”

(from http://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/local_news/rayleigh/4431250.Keith_makes_a_stand_to_protect_bird_nests/)Hedge Protester

New Social Centre/Ecovillage To Be Occupied In Suffolk/Essex Area

Want to get involved?

This week­end we will be occu­py­ing a prop­er­ty in the Suffolk/Essex area in order to start an ecov­il­lage. It’s got many acres of land attached, and var­i­ous groups will hope­ful­ly be com­ing to give work­shops on cli­mate change, shar­ing var­i­ous skills and activism.

Want to get involved?

This week­end we will be occu­py­ing a prop­er­ty in the Suffolk/Essex area in order to start an ecov­il­lage. It’s got many acres of land attached, and var­i­ous groups will hope­ful­ly be com­ing to give work­shops on cli­mate change, shar­ing var­i­ous skills and activism.

If you want to get involved in the occu­pa­tion, would like to come and live there, get in any of the activ­i­ties, or have some­thing you would like to teach, please email cocklehorsecrab@googlemail.com