Category: South East England

South East Eng­land

Thrupp Lake (Radley Oxfordshire) update

There were once nine lakes…

Local peo­ple have joined forces with ecol­o­gists and envi­ron­men­tal activists in a pledge to save Thrupp Lake (at Radley, near Oxford), fol­low­ing a deci­sion by Npow­er boss­es to dump 500,000 tonnes of fly-ash on to the site.

There were once nine lakes…

Local peo­ple have joined forces with ecol­o­gists and envi­ron­men­tal activists in a pledge to save Thrupp Lake (at Radley, near Oxford), fol­low­ing a deci­sion by Npow­er boss­es to dump 500,000 tonnes of fly-ash on to the site.

Thrupp lake is a nature reserve as des­ig­nat­ed by Oxford­shire Coun­ty Coun­cil, with many rare plants, insects and ani­mals includ­ing water voles and otters.

The plan is to cut down over 1,000 trees so that Npow­er can drain then fill the lake with 500,000 tonnes of tox­ic waste ash from the near­by Did­cot Pow­er Sta­tion. The waste ash is pul­verised fly-ash which can be recy­cled and used in var­i­ous build­ing prod­ucts such as cement and breeze blocks. Past study found traces of many nas­ties includ­ing Polo­ni­um 210!

Npow­er have already destroyed sev­en oth­er lakes in the imme­di­ate area. The locals have been try­ing to save the lakes for many years using all legal means and have failed. Their lat­est chal­lenge is to get the lake des­ig­nat­ed to vil­lage green sta­tus, which would save the lake. How­ev­er, Npow­er have said they will begin work BEFORE this appli­ca­tion will even be heard in court! The locals have wel­comed us with open arms to fight this along­side them.

As part of this, our group occu­pied an emp­ty prop­er­ty on the shore of the lake on Decem­ber 28th with a view to pro­tect the lake and using all non-vio­lent means to resist evic­tion (Lock-on’s and bar­ri­cades etc), whilst also open­ing the build­ing up (com­pul­sary pur­chased by Npow­er) as a field cen­ter for the study of the local ecol­o­gy.

Recent News: Npow­er took us to Coun­ty Court on 10th Jan­u­ary to gain a repos­ses­sion order to evict us, how­ev­er, they did not expect us to have such a great legal team behind us. The order for repos­ses­sion was thrown out as the papers were ille­gal­ly served to us by Npow­er! Local press
head­line was “Squatters win first roundâ€?. We are in court again Weds. 24th Jan. at the Coun­ty Court in Oxford. We have a bar­ris­ter work­ing on the case and are putting up a stiff legal defense.

At present: We are work­ing on defend­ing the build­ing and record­ing and pho­tograph­ing the local ecol­o­gy (we need proof that cer­tain species inhab­it the area as part of the defense). We are still in LEGAL pos­ses­sion of the build­ing and we have mas­sive local sup­port. The house is mas­sive and the lake is absolute­ly beau­ti­ful.

HOW YOU CAN HELP : Vis­it us! Remem­ber we are in legal pos­ses­sion and you are allowed to stay. Stay with us to defend the build­ing if we get evict­ed, or come to do some ecol­o­gy work. Bring your friends! (You may even see the Radley Lake Pen­guin!). Bring us things we need off our ‘Wish
List’. Come and sup­port us in court on the 24th – bring ban­ners etc.

Catch the train to Radley sta­tion (one stop from Oxford), and it is about a fif­teen minute walk to the site. For direc­tions ring the site mobile.
SITE MOBILE NUMBER IS: 07772 0553 384

For more infor­ma­tion see www.saveradleylakes.org.uk or check out our progress on UK Indy­media or Indy­media Oxford.

Watch the video (video/x‑msvideo 34MB)

WISH LIST
Food, Fur­ni­ture, Blan­kets, Duvets, Sleep­ing Bags, Water­proofs, Lad­ders,
Buck­ets, Kitchen knives and cut­lery, plates etc., Rope and Polyprop, Nuts,
bolts, Nails, Screws, Wire mesh, Tools, Span­ners, wrench­es, Sock­et sets,
Bot­tled Water (1 ltr), Ban­ners, Paint, Shov­el, Tim­ber for build­ing, Cable
ties, Climb­ing Carib­i­neers for lock-on’s, Chains, 45 gal­lon oil drums,
Fake ani­mal Fur (Yes thats right),Cash, YOU!

LATE NIGHT VISITS FOR NOVARTIS, ASTELLAS EMPLOYEES

received anony­mous­ly:

“Sat­ur­day the 13th Jan­u­ary was unlucky for some. The ALF were out in the dead of night vis­it­ing the homes of those who prof­it from ani­mal abuse at HLS.

Astel­las PA Mar­garet McQuil­lan, 22 Trig­gs Close, Wok­ing, Sur­rey GU22

received anony­mous­ly:

“Sat­ur­day the 13th Jan­u­ary was unlucky for some. The ALF were out in the dead of night vis­it­ing the homes of those who prof­it from ani­mal abuse at HLS.

Astel­las PA Mar­garet McQuil­lan, 22 Trig­gs Close, Wok­ing, Sur­rey GU22
0EJ Tel: 01483 760 058
had all the garages near her spray paint­ed with “num­ber 22 is ani­mal killer”, alf slo­gans and her front door had a pot of red paint thrown all over it.

Novar­tis direc­tor Kevin White, 3 Pip­son Close, Yate­ley, Hants GU46 6JL
had 2 big brick walls sprayed with “num­ber 3 is ani­mal killer” and an alf slo­gan.

Novar­tis employ­ee Christo­pher Gol­un­s­ki, Carthena Dri­ve, Fleet, Hants GU52 7SF Tel: 01252 624 601
had the tyres of the 2 cars on his dri­ve slashed and paint strip­per poured all over them.

Sec­re­tary of Novar­tis UK Pen­sion Trustees Ltd Richard Far­rar of 23 The Bram­bles, Crowthorne, Berks RG45 6EF
had all the tyres of his peo­ple car­ri­er slashed and the vehi­cle cov­ered with paint strip­per.

Novar­tis you are a pri­or­i­ty tar­get for the Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Front world­wide. Stop deal­ing with HLS or we will force you to stop by any and all means nec­es­sary. Get ready. The ALF is com­ing after you.

ALF”

Activist Mediation Network Launched!!!!!

Want to learn medi­a­tion skills?
Inter­est­ed in help­ing sup­port activist groups engage with inter­nal dis­agree­ments and con­flict, to make them more effec­tive?
Want to tack­le con­flicts in your per­son­al life that inter­fere with your activism?

Want to learn medi­a­tion skills?
Inter­est­ed in help­ing sup­port activist groups engage with inter­nal dis­agree­ments and con­flict, to make them more effec­tive?
Want to tack­le con­flicts in your per­son­al life that inter­fere with your activism?

Our launch events will be train­ing days:

North­ern Launch -
Leeds on 10th March 2007, from 11am — 5pm

South­ern Launch
— Lon­don on 17 March 2007, from 11am — 5pm.

The aims of these days are:

To train peo­ple in con­flict res­o­lu­tion skills that they can use in their own lives and activist work
For peo­ple inter­est­ed in vol­un­teer­ing with us to receive train­ing and to meet with us to dis­cuss tak­ing it fur­ther.

If you have a spe­cif­ic con­flict or sit­u­a­tion that you would like to dis­cuss with us, then please get in con­tact and we’ll see if we can help.

Activist Medi­a­tion to the res­cue! (not real­ly!)

Details of the train­ing days:

Book­ing essen­tial: Please email activist­medi­a­tion [at] aktivix [dot] org
Cost: We are ask­ing for a £10 dona­tion to fund expens­es and help set up a trav­el fund to help with our medi­a­tion work. If mon­ey would pre­vent you from attend­ing, then get in touch.
Creche: We are not pro­vid­ing creche facil­i­ties, but if child­care issues are pre­vent­ing you attend­ing, please get in touch and we’ll try and sort some­thing out.
Access: Both venues are wheel­chair acces­si­ble, and have acces­si­ble toi­lets. For oth­er access needs, please con­tact us.
Lunch: Not pro­vid­ed. Please bring your own.
Trans­port and Accom­mo­da­tion: Get in touch if you have any issues or can offer a lift.

For fur­ther infor­ma­tion have a look at our web­site www.activistmediation.org.uk
or tele­phone us on 0845 223 5254, and get in touch.

Back­ground

For the last few years we have both been involved in main­stream medi­a­tion, and using these skills at var­i­ous activist camps and sit­u­a­tions (Cli­mate Camp, Earth First!, Rad­i­cal Routes, Tri­dent Ploughshares). We have also been asked to work with oth­er activist groups to help them resolve inter­nal con­flicts. There is obvi­ous­ly a need for this work to be done on an ongo­ing basis, and so we have decid­ed to set up an activist medi­a­tion net­work. The aim is not for us to solve con­flicts, but to skill share and offer impar­tial medi­a­tors in order to help groups and indi­vid­u­als resolve their own con­flicts.

Save Radley Lakes Occupation update

12.01.2007

Activists are occu­py­ing and intend to defend a squat­ted lake­side prop­er­ty in order to pre­vent the infill­ing of Radley Lakes with tox­ic ash from the burn­ing of coal at the near­by npow­er owned Did­cot pow­er sta­tion.

Radley Lakes - toxic ash infill12.01.2007

Activists are occu­py­ing and intend to defend a squat­ted lake­side prop­er­ty in order to pre­vent the infill­ing of Radley Lakes with tox­ic ash from the burn­ing of coal at the near­by npow­er owned Did­cot pow­er sta­tion.

The occu­pants intend­ed to use the prop­er­ty as envi­ron­men­tal field cen­tre with the sup­port of the local com­mu­ni­ty, where there is mas­sive local oppo­si­tion to the destruc­tion of the last two remain­ing lakes at Radley.

The lakes are unusu­al in their clar­i­ty and the area con­tains local and nation­al rare and threat­ened species, with 115 species of birds record­ed and over1000 trees sur­round­ing the lake which will be felled. How­ev­er this has been ignored by pow­er com­pa­ny RWE npow­er, and has been rail-road­ed through by Oxford­shire Coun­ty Coun­cil.

Npow­er took the group to court last Wednes­day but failed to get them evict­ed, but will they try again this Wednes­day 17th and are like­ly to be suc­cess­ful.

But unde­terred the group are lock­ing on and dig­ging in prepa­ra­tion to defend the field cen­tre and pre­vent the destruc­tion of the lakes.

How­ev­er they are bad­ly in need of peo­ple and equip­ment to help with the defence. If you can sup­port the group or donate equip­ment such as wood, ply board, plas­tic sheet­ing, elec­tri­cal tools, build­ing sand, bal­last, shov­els, spades, chain, locks car­bines, poly-prop rope, cable ties, nuts, bolts screws, nails, con­tact adhe­sive, fake fur? and oh yea food con­tact the site on 07772055384, loca­tion OX14 3NG, a 15 minute walk from Radley Sta­tion.
 http://www.saveradleylakes.org.uk/index.htm

Next Aldermaston Blockade Monday 15th January

**Block the Builders return to Britain’s nuclear bomb fac­to­ry as Tri­dent
» debate heats up**
>
> NEXT BLOCKADE MONDAY 15TH JANUARY. FOR DETAILS OF BLOCKADE AND ARRANGEMENTS
> PLEASE VISIT http://www.blockthebuilders.org.uk/Blockades.php

**Block the Builders return to Britain’s nuclear bomb fac­to­ry as Tri­dent
» debate heats up**
>
> NEXT BLOCKADE MONDAY 15TH JANUARY. FOR DETAILS OF BLOCKADE AND ARRANGEMENTS
> PLEASE VISIT http://www.blockthebuilders.org.uk/Blockades.php
>
» ———————-
»
» In Decem­ber 2006 the gov­ern­ment pub­lished a White Paper in which it
» con­firmed its inten­tion to replace the Tri­dent sub­ma­rine fleet and
» out­lined pro­pos­als for replac­ing the cur­rent Tri­dent D5 mis­siles. The
» par­lia­men­tary debate on these aspects of Tri­dent replace­ment is expect­ed
» to take place in March.
»
» How­ev­er, the White Paper deferred the issue of what nuclear war­head the
» mis­siles would car­ry. Tony Blair’s intro­duc­to­ry text stat­ed that a
» deci­sion on war­head replace­ment could be tak­en in the next par­lia­ment.
»
» ———————-
» BUILDING FOR THE FUTURE BOMB
» ———————-
»
» Mean­while, mas­sive work to upgrade AWE Alder­mas­ton con­tin­ues with­out
» pause. A recent indus­try report sug­gest­ed that con­struc­tion firms are
» expect­ing £12bn to be spent on the nuclear war­head fac­to­ry over the next
» 12 years [2]. A curi­ous sit­u­a­tion if no deci­sion has been made on a future
» war­head.
»
» Block the Builders will con­tin­ue their reg­u­lar month­ly obstruc­tion of
» con­struc­tion traf­fic enter­ing the base. A spokesper­son said “We con­tin­ue
» to call for a halt to build­ing work at AWE. This mas­sive devel­op­ment
» project com­plete­ly under­mines any faith in the so-called ‘debate’.”
»
» ———————-
» WIDESPREAD CONDEMNATION
» ———————-
» Since the pub­li­ca­tion of the gov­ern­men­t’s White Paper there has been
» wide­spread oppo­si­tion, to both the replace­ment pro­pos­als and the process
» of deci­sion-mak­ing. Con­cerns have been expressed by a very broad range of
» indi­vid­u­als and organ­i­sa­tions; par­lia­men­tar­i­ans from all sides of the
» House have ques­tioned the gov­ern­ment, and faith lead­ers, trade union­ists
» and the anti-nuclear move­ment have con­demned both the pol­i­cy impli­ca­tions
» and the finan­cial cost.
»
» ———————-
» LOCAL NEWS
» ———————-
» Local media may be inter­est­ed to note that, despite pre­vi­ous­ly being
» gift­ed mon­ey by AWE just days before a 2005 plan­ning meet­ing [3], the
» local parish coun­cil is object­ing to one of the base’s cur­rent plan­ning
» appli­ca­tions and a spe­cial plan­ning meet­ing will be held on 22 Jan­u­ary in
» New­bury [4]
»
» ———————-
» ABOUT BLOCK THE BUILDERS
» ———————-
» Formed in 2004, Block the Builders is a non­vi­o­lent direct action group
» which has
» been tak­ing prac­ti­cal action to slow con­struc­tion work AWE Alder­mas­ton and
» at
» the sites of com­pa­nies with con­struc­tion con­tracts with AWE.
» This has tak­en the form of a month­ly, pub­licly-announced block­ade of AWE
» Alder­mas­ton, com­bined with unan­nounced actions at AWE and con­trac­tor
» sites, and
» events in con­junc­tion with oth­er groups such as the recent Greenpeace/BtB
» mass
» weapons inspec­tion (27/11/06). The Decem­ber 2006 block­ade saw roads around
» the site closed for two hours and sev­en peo­ple arrest­ed.
»
» For reports of pre­vi­ous block­ades, see http://www.aldermaston.net/news
»
» ———————-
» NOTES
» ———————-
» [1] White Paper: http://tinyurl.com/ye878z
» [2] Indus­try report:
» http://www.costain.com/externaldocs/finance/Nuclear.pdf
» page 17 (pre­vi­ous pages are very good for explain­ing the gen­er­al nuclear
» sec­tor con­tracts, whose bid­ding etc) but page 17 says “AWE Frame­work
» agree­ment £4m in 2006. Fore­cast £8m in 2007. Posi­tioned for con­tract­ing on
» AWE’s invest­ment pro­gramme £12bn over next 12 years”
» [3] Min­utes of the Parish Coun­cil meet­ing held on 8th Novem­ber 2005
» No mem­bers of the pub­lic were present.
» 94 Parish Plan progress report · The Parish Plan was tabled. It was agreed
» that
» Clerk will write to Ken Ray con­grat­u­lat­ing him and the steer­ing group on
» the
» excel­lent work they have car­ried out. A dona­tion of £1500 had been
» received
» from AWE and it was agreed that the Clerk would write express­ing the
» thanks of
» the Parish Coun­cil. [orig­i­nal at:
» http://www.aldermaston.co.uk/2005/dec05/pc_minutes11.05.doc]
» [4] Spe­cial meet­ing of the East­ern Area Plan­ning Com­mit­tee. The only item
» for deter­mi­na­tion will be 06/2326/comind (AWE office accom­mo­da­tion
» appli­ca­tion).
» This will start at 6.30pm and be held in the Coun­cil Cham­ber, Mar­ket
» Street, New­bury.
»
» Block the Builders: http://www.blockthebuilders.org.uk
»

CHICKEN FARM RAIDED, 22 CHICKS FREED

Click here for pic­tures from the res­cue.
View video here: http://www.sarconline.co.uk/tv

anony­mous com­mu­nique:

“0100hrs, 03/11/2006, Fovant Down, Wilt­shire.

Click here for pic­tures from the res­cue.
View video here: http://www.sarconline.co.uk/tv

anony­mous com­mu­nique:

“0100hrs, 03/11/2006, Fovant Down, Wilt­shire.
Tar­get: Lloy­d’s Ani­mal Feeds Ltd — Live­stock Divi­sion.

Look­out in place, tools at the ready, we began. Large bolt-cut­ters were used to chop through the tight secu­ri­ty: one small pad­lock hold­ing the door closed.

We shone our torch­es into the dark­ness and could­nt believe our eyes. Rows upon rows of bat­tery cages, crammed full with thou­sands of Broil­er chicks. They were being kept ille­gal­ly in the tiny cages and grown to become “food” for the glut­to­nous, blood-thirsty meat indus­try.

With­in min­utes we were done. We left hun­dreds of thou­sands of inno­cent lives behind that night, des­ig­nat­ing them to a life of hell and a death that is beyond words. But with us we took 22 friends who are now liv­ing the life they were meant to live: free from exploita­tion and suf­fer­ing in a sys­tem equat­ed to con­cen­tra­tion camps.

For all those left behind, we urge you to act. Ani­mals need YOU, and they need you NOW. They wait inside locked build­ings across the world.. it is up to YOU whether you reach for your bolt-cut­ters and break them out. Noth­ing stands in your way, except your­self.

Ded­i­cat­ed to cur­rent pris­on­ers Don Cur­ray and Joseph Har­ris, and deceased ani­mal lib­er­a­tionist Bar­ry Horne, who passed away five years ago on Novem­ber 5th. The fight goes on in your spir­it.

Until the last fac­to­ry farm is brought to the ground, until the final slaugh­ter­house is made ille­gal, until every lab shuts its doors, until all ani­mals are free from the shack­les self­ish bas­tards place upon them… A.L.F.”

Didcot power station trashing lakes — house squatted

Hi all a group of us opposed to the destruc­tion of Radley Lakes by infill­ing them with pul­verised fly ash (PFA) from N pow­ers coal burn­ing Did­cot pow­er sta­tion, have squat­ted a large house on the edge of Thrupp Lake and are now in legal pos­ses­sion. Our inten­tion was to use the house and its ground as a field cen­ter for locals and vis­i­tors, how­ev­er N pow­ers lawyers have been busy and they are in court on wed 10th of Jan to get this over­turned and us evict­ed. We intend to resist this and need peo­ple to turn up who are pre­pared to help defend our stake in the lakes future, so if you get down there for the 10th or short­ly after please do so, for updates call me on 07762733332.

Radley LakesHi all a group of us opposed to the destruc­tion of Radley Lakes by infill­ing them with pul­verised fly ash (PFA) from N pow­ers coal burn­ing Did­cot pow­er sta­tion, have squat­ted a large house on the edge of Thrupp Lake and are now in legal pos­ses­sion. Our inten­tion was to use the house and its ground as a field cen­ter for locals and vis­i­tors, how­ev­er N pow­ers lawyers have been busy and they are in court on wed 10th of Jan to get this over­turned and us evict­ed. We intend to resist this and need peo­ple to turn up who are pre­pared to help defend our stake in the lakes future, so if you get down there for the 10th or short­ly after please do so, for updates call me on 07762733332.

We also need the fol­low­ing:
Ladders/steps
gas heaters,
blan­kets, duvets, sleep­ing bags,
fur­ni­ture,
fluro jack­ets, cook­ing and eat­ing uten­sils,
Net­ting (army/climbing type),
lock on equip­ment,
weld­ing equip­ment,
tarps,
food and gen­er­al stuff.

Fail­ing this sign peti­tion at
http://www.saveradleylakes.org.uk/documents/SaveRadleyLakesPetition.htm or
vis­it the web­site at
http://www.saveradleylakes.org.uk/

or send us a let­ter or dona­tion to

RLLF,
San­dles,
Thrupp Lane,
Radley (Low­er),
Oxford­shire,
OX14 3NG.

CHICKEN FARM CLOSED BY ALF

report­ed by activists in the UK:

“John Park­ers Poul­try in Hamp­shire has final­ly closed after a sus­tained cam­paign of direct action. The actions tak­en includ­ed:

08/03/06 — 50 hens lib­er­at­ed
04/10/03 — 1024 hens lib­er­at­ed.

report­ed by activists in the UK:

“John Park­ers Poul­try in Hamp­shire has final­ly closed after a sus­tained cam­paign of direct action. The actions tak­en includ­ed:

08/03/06 — 50 hens lib­er­at­ed
04/10/03 — 1024 hens lib­er­at­ed.
19/06/03 — Chick­en units sab­o­taged, con­vey­or belts, cages, lights,
feed­ing appa­ra­tus etc… also 100 hens lib­er­at­ed.

These are just the report­ed actions, rumor has it there were sev­er­al
more…”

PLANE STUPID Newsletter #6

PLANE STUPID Newslet­ter #6

“This is a deeply trau­ma­tized com­mu­ni­ty which has been lied to for years and years

Plane Stupid logo 2PLANE STUPID Newslet­ter #6

“This is a deeply trau­ma­tized com­mu­ni­ty which has been lied to for years and years
by the avi­a­tion indus­try and one polit­i­cal par­ty after anoth­er. There is a litany of
bro­ken promis­es. I won­der just how you might feel if you had endured all this for
years! I am so angry I am almost incan­des­cent with rage at the immoral­i­ty of it
all.” — A res­i­dent of Har­mondsworth, near Heathrow

~ VICTORY FOR STOP STANSTED CAMPAIGN! ~

After a sus­tained and long run­ning cam­paign by the com­mu­ni­ty near Stanst­ed, the
Uttles­ford Dis­trict Coun­cil have blocked the pro­posed plans for expan­sion of the
exist­ing run­way. BAA how­ev­er is refus­ing to accept the demo­c­ra­t­ic rul­ing and is
tak­ing it to a pub­lic enquiry. A cam­paign fund has been launched to fight the
enquiry. www.stopstanstedexpansion.com

~ OCCUPATION AGAINST BRISTOL EXPANSION ~

On the 4th Decem­ber, activists from South West Cli­mate Action occu­pied North
Som­er­set Envi­ron­ment and Plan­ning Offices to protest against plans for expan­sion of
Bris­tol air­port. Pho­tos and report at www.indymedia.org.uk

~EASYJET SHUT IN DAY OF ACTION AGAINST SHORT HAUL FLIGHTS! ~

On Novem­ber 6th, activists from around the coun­try came togeth­er to take
action against short haul flights. Plane Stu­pid activists shut down the Lon­don HQ of
Easy­Group, the own­ers of low-cost car­ri­er Easy­jet, and Lon­don Ris­ing Tide vis­it­ed
the Civ­il Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty, pre­sent­ing them with a giant cheque for their £9.2
bil­lion annu­al sub­sidy.

In Cam­bridge, Man­ches­ter, Read­ing and Lon­don, there were protests out­side
trav­el agents, while Leeds Brad­ford air­port was plas­tered with anti-avi­a­tion
stick­ers. Robin Hood air­port received a vis­it from Robin and his Mer­ry Men,
dou­bly-angry because the air­port has been oppos­ing local wind farm appli­ca­tions.
Activists in Man­ches­ter dropped a ban­ner, and in Southend a trav­el agents was shut
when a pro­tes­tor locked her­self to the front door.

30 trav­el agents across the UK had their front doors chained shut
by activists who left signs on the win­dows read­ing, “Closed for a total
rethink. See www.planestupid.com”

A mem­ber of staff at Flight Cen­tre said, “Plane Stu­pid are caus­ing may­hem here
today, every­one is get­ting all aer­at­ed and vexed.” We’ll give them “aer­at­ed and
vexed!” What about the 182 mil­lion peo­ple to die in Africa this cen­tu­ry alone
because of cli­mate change, or the res­i­dents of ‘hacked off’ Har­mondsworth?

The day of action came as new research from HACAN Clearskies shows that 100,000
flights from Heathrow each year are to short haul des­ti­na­tions that are eas­i­ly
reach­able by the more sus­tain­able train alter­na­tive.

Reports and pho­tos at www.indymedia.org.uk

~ COURT REJECTS ASBOS FOR NEMA 25 ~

Lough­bor­ough Mag­is­trates Court reject­ed calls from the Crown Pros­e­cu­tion Ser­vice to
slap ASBOs on the 24 Plane Stu­pid activists who they described as “high­ly orga­nized
extrem­ists” that were arrest­ed in con­nec­tion with the shut down of Not­ting­ham East
Mid­lands short haul air­port in Sep­tem­ber.

In an appar­ent move aimed to avoid hav­ing the case heard by a jury, the charge of
pub­lic nui­sance was dropped, as was the charge relat­ing to an alleged breach of the
avi­a­tion and secu­ri­ty act.

Cam­paign­er for Plane Stu­pid, Ellen Rick­ford, said, “The same day that we learn the
gov­ern­ment is push­ing ahead with its air­port expan­sion pro­pos­als, they try to use
ASBOs to stamp out peace­ful protest. Well, it seems their plans were as doomed as
the avi­a­tion indus­try.”

17 activists got one year con­di­tion­al dis­charges (the min­i­mum sen­tence avail­able)
and each was charged £70 in costs. The 5 charged with crim­i­nal dam­age in addi­tion to
aggra­vat­ed tres­pass were giv­en vary­ing lev­els of com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice. One per­son was
referred to Crown Court due to unre­solved legal issues and anoth­er had his case
adjourned until Jan­u­ary 31st. One oth­er activist was unable to attend court due to
ill­ness.

Help us pay our fines! Donate via: www.planestupid.com

~ TOP 100 GREEN CAMPAIGNERS OF ALL TIME ~

Vet­er­an green cam­paign­er and staunch sup­port­er of Plane Stu­pid, John Stew­art, has
been named by the Envi­ron­ment Agency as the 82nd most influ­en­tial green activist of
all time! Just one posi­tion behind Mahat­ma Gand­hi, Plane Stu­pid is mighty glad he’s
on our side and proud that he’s often been our spokesman!

~ MARKETING GURU PREDICTS END OF SHORT HAUL AIR TRAVEL ~

In a cov­er-sto­ry fea­ture of Mar­ket­ing Week­ly Mag­a­zine, trig­gered by our nation­al day
of action, a PR guru is quot­ed as say­ing that he thinks short haul bud­get air trav­el
will go the same way that coal did in the 80s because, “they are unnec­es­sary,
out­dat­ed and there­fore fac­ing decline.” Too right!

~ AVIATION INDUSTRY PUBLISH “TEN REASONS TO KEEP FLYING” ~

Respond­ing to Plane Stu­pid­’s “10 rea­sons to ground the Plane” — the avi­a­tion
indus­try’s PR peo­ple at www.cheapflights.co.uk have come up with, “10 rea­sons to
keep fly­ing!” This comes after the Stern report sin­gled out avi­a­tion as one of the
most sig­nif­i­cant caus­es of cli­mate change.

~ ‘ETHICAL MAN’ JOINS PLANE STUPID ON LONDON CLIMATE MARCH ~

Around fifty Plane Stu­pid-ers marched togeth­er with Air­port­Watch cam­paign­ers and
Stanst­ed res­i­dents on the Cam­paign against Cli­mate Change (CaCC) march to Trafal­gar
Square on Novem­ber 4th. There was an 8ft long wood­en plane on storks, big ban­ners
and tons of peti­tion­ing. March­ing with Plane Stu­pid was News­night’s ‘eth­i­cal man’
and Seize the Day’s Theo and Shan­non. Pho­tos avail­able soon on the web­site…

In the mean­time, see www.indymedia.org.uk

~ POLITICS ROUND-UP ~

Gor­don Brown snubbed sci­en­tists and cam­paign­ers calls for tough new green tax­es and
instead opt­ed in his pre-bud­get report for the pathet­ic polit­i­cal ges­ture of
increas­ing air pas­sen­ger duty by £5. This news came less than a week after a report
from BA boss, Rod Edding­ton, who was hired by Gor­don Brown and paid by us the
tax­pay­er, to (shock) sug­gest air­port expan­sion was a good thing. So we now know that
indus­try boss­es sup­port their own plans. Fan­cy that!

~ DO YOU WANT US TO SPEAK IN YOUR AREA? ~

Plane Stu­pid speak­ers have appeared at the Lib Dem Region­al Con­fer­ence along with
Shad­ow Envi­ron­ment Min­is­ter, Chris Huhne; at the LSE along­side Stop Cli­mate Chaos
direc­tor, Ashok Sin­ha; at stu­dent union venues includ­ing in Lon­don and Sus­sex; and
at local Green­peace and FoE meet­ings across the UK. If you want us to come and talk
in your area, get in touch. info@planestupid.com

————————————————————-EVENTS
———————————-

CAMP FOR CLIMATE ACTION MEETINGS

Fol­low­ing the suc­cess­ful cli­mate camp at Drax, plans are afoot for the next camp
which will be at a dif­fer­ent location.get involved with putting plans into action.

www.climatecamp.org.uk

PLANE STUPID BENEFIT GIG/FILM SHOWING

On Fri­day 26th Jan­u­ary, Brix­ton Jamm presents The Alabama3. Tick­ets avail­able soon
via www.planestupid.com

——————————————————— RESOURCES
——————————

~ PLANE STUPID: A year in review ~

On Novem­ber 29th, Plane Stu­pid had its first anniver­sary. For a reflec­tion on the
incred­i­ble momen­tum we’ve built up over the last year, with video footage and pho­tos
for down­load, see www.planestupid.com

~ PLANE STUPID Blog ~

Plane Stu­pid has estab­lished a blog at www.myspace.com/planestupid. Its first blog
entry includes, “The arm­chair envi­ron­men­tal­ist’s guide to off­sets… or ‘How to save
the world for 38p!’)”

~ LEGAL RESOURCE FOR ACTIVISTS~

Expe­ri­enced cam­paign­ers are offer­ing free advice and train­ing to grass­roots groups
includ­ing legal skills and more. www.seedsforchange.org.uk

~ THE SHEILA McK­ECH­NIE AWARDS ~

The Sheila McK­ech­nie Awards pro­vide cam­paign devel­op­ment pack­ages to grass­roots
cam­paign­ers. Up for grabs is a ‘Trans­port Award’.anyone want­i­ng to apply should see:
www.sheilamckechnie.org.uk