Eithinog and Brewery Fields victory (Bangor, Wales)

BREWERS TROOP

North Wales cam­paign­ers who have fought a four­teen year bat­tle to stop plans to devel­op a 50 acre coun­cil-owned wildlife haven and com­mu­ni­ty space on the edge of Ban­gor, Gwynedd are near­ing vic­to­ry.

BREWERS TROOP

North Wales cam­paign­ers who have fought a four­teen year bat­tle to stop plans to devel­op a 50 acre coun­cil-owned wildlife haven and com­mu­ni­ty space on the edge of Ban­gor, Gwynedd are near­ing vic­to­ry.

Rare fun­gi found recent­ly at Eithinog and Brew­ery Fields by a vet­er­an of two camps evict­ed vio­lent­ly by police in 1998 (See SchNEWS 172/173 & 178) have final­ly brought Gwynedd Coun­cil’s pro­posed hous­ing plans to a halt. This turn­about comes short­ly after their devel­op­ment had been giv­en the green light by the UDP Inquiry Inspec­tor last Novem­ber. Cam­paign­ers are now await­ing a for­mal announce­ment by the coun­cil, which would mean 83% of the orig­i­nal area being pre­served, hope­ful­ly to be man­aged as a Nature Reserve by a local com­mu­ni­ty trust.

The long cam­paign, con­duct­ed var­i­ous­ly by Gwynedd and Môn Earth First! in con­junc­tion with and oth­er groups and the local com­mu­ni­ty, has seen many twists and turns: direct action against the coun­cil and devel­op­ers, com­mu­ni­ty march­es, nature events, Ban­gor coun­cil­lors giv­ing evi­dence to under­mine res­i­dents’ town green appli­ca­tions, and use of vio­lence by North Wales police to break lock-ons and a bull­doz­er to evict a tun­nel. This cul­mi­nat­ed in a 1998 Gwynedd Coun­cil com­mit­ment to estab­lish a nature reserve being reversed in 2004 and the rein­state­ment of large-scale hous­ing plans.

How­ev­er, com­mu­ni­ty anger at this last coun­cil U‑turn per­suad­ed it to agree to con­duct an eco­log­i­cal appraisal of the site — which found that much of Eithinog & Brew­ery Fields crossed the grass­land fun­gi SSSI thresh­old. In con­se­quence, a large part of the pro­posed devel­op­ment was dropped in 2005, although sev­en acres of eco­log­i­cal­ly sen­si­tive grass­land rec­om­mend­ed for con­ser­va­tion were still ear­marked for hous­ing. The coun­cil’s own bio­di­ver­si­ty team acknowl­edged that its devel­op­ment would jeop­ar­dise the integri­ty of the whole site.

The Coun­try­side Coun­cil for Wales has now stepped in, and although some fur­ther devel­op­ment will hap­pen, it says it should be con­fined to five acres of degrad­ed land. All the open space used for gen­er­a­tions by the sur­round­ing com­mu­ni­ty is to be pre­served and the land pos­si­bly trans­ferred to a local trust, who — if this comes about — would man­age it in con­junc­tion with con­ser­va­tion bod­ies. A big SchNEWS thumbs up to the peo­ple con­cerned for their efforts in sav­ing Eithinog & Brew­ery Fields to be a com­mu­ni­ty asset for future gen­er­a­tions.

* For a cam­paign his­to­ry les­son, see -

http://www.eithinog.org.uk/history.html

Leeds street medic training, 28th-30th March

The UK Action Medics are run­ning a 2 1/2 day street medic train­ing in Leeds at the end of this month. This is a 20 hour course that will teach you the basics of gen­er­al First Aid, as well as skills to deal with med­ical sit­u­a­tions spe­cif­ic to direct action, such as deal­ing with chem­i­cal weapons and the police. The course will involve sce­nar­ios and hands-on prac­tice and, although we can­not offer you any offi­cial accred­i­ta­tion, the 2 1/2 day train­ing is the min­i­mum stan­dard for mem­ber­ship of the Action Medics, and will equip you for a wide range of sit­u­a­tions, from hypother­mia to baton wounds.

The UK Action Medics are run­ning a 2 1/2 day street medic train­ing in Leeds at the end of this month. This is a 20 hour course that will teach you the basics of gen­er­al First Aid, as well as skills to deal with med­ical sit­u­a­tions spe­cif­ic to direct action, such as deal­ing with chem­i­cal weapons and the police. The course will involve sce­nar­ios and hands-on prac­tice and, although we can­not offer you any offi­cial accred­i­ta­tion, the 2 1/2 day train­ing is the min­i­mum stan­dard for mem­ber­ship of the Action Medics, and will equip you for a wide range of sit­u­a­tions, from hypother­mia to baton wounds.

The train­ing will be on the 28th-30th of March, which is Fri­day to Sat­ur­day. There will be 3 or 4 hours on Fri­day evening and two full days on Sat­ur­day and Sun­day. Food will be pro­vid­ed, as well as accom­mo­da­tion if need­ed — we ask for a dona­tion of £30 to cov­er costs, although this will be less if we can find a venue for free.

The venue is as yet uncon­firmed, but the train­ing will take place in cen­tral Leeds, and we can give you direc­tions from the train/bus sta­tion. It is essen­tial to book a place so we know how many peo­ple are com­ing — please email iloveavocado@hotmail.com to do this, or with any ques­tions.

Also, we are plan­ning to organ­ise a 4 hour cer­ti­fied ‘Emer­gency Life Sup­port’ course on the Fri­day (28th March) after­noon. This will cov­er CPR as well as a bit of oth­er stuff, like how to con­trol bleed­ing and deal with an uncon­scious per­son. We don’t teach CPR in the 2 1/2 day course, although we cov­er every­thing else, but hav­ing cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is use­ful. We’d rec­om­mend that peo­ple com­ing on the 2 1/2 day course try to attend this too, but it isn’t manda­to­ry, and it is open to peo­ple who can’t com­mit to the week­end. As we will be bring­ing in an out­side train­er, please email if you want to come on this so we can work out if we have the num­bers.

www.actionmedics.org.uk

Wominspace now open!

6.03.2008
Womin only space is now open in North East Lon­don. The space is open for all womin to use. We will be hold­ing lots of dif­fer­ent work­shops and hav­ing cafe and bar. Come and vis­it us and get involved. All ref­er­ences to womin are trans friend­ly.

6.03.2008
Womin only space is now open in North East Lon­don. The space is open for all womin to use. We will be hold­ing lots of dif­fer­ent work­shops and hav­ing cafe and bar. Come and vis­it us and get involved. All ref­er­ences to womin are trans friend­ly.

Womin­space is an autonomous womin cre­at­ed, womin organ­ised space in north east lon­don. Womin­space aims to chal­lenge cap­i­tal­ism and patri­archy, by trans­form­ing an emp­ty build­ing and cre­at­ing space to share skills, learn, make friends, cre­ate dia­logue, find alter­na­tive ways of liv­ing, being and doing, and be an exam­ple of co-opper­a­tion, trans­for­ma­tion, respect and love.

After a busy week prepar­ing the space and fight­ing an attempt­ed ille­gal evic­tion, we have already had some excit­ing work­shops. We have lots more work­shops planned for the weeks to come includ­ing weld­ing, bike­ol­o­gy, fem­i­nist singing, veg­an cake- mak­ing, lan­guage exchange, herbal skill­share.….

We are look­ing for­ward to all the events in lon­don this week­end cel­e­brat­ing inter­na­tion­al womins day and would like to invite self defined womin who would like to use the space before and dur­ing the events to chill or to crash to come to the space.

There will be a veg­an cafe and kid­space this thurs­day from 3- 6 with an open meet­ing to fol­low at 7. The meet­ing is open to any womin who would like to be involved in the space in any way. On fri­day we have a bar and cin­e­ma from 7pm. The next weeks work­shops and events will be up on indy­media soon.

We are in court this Mon­day 10th at 3pm at Gee Street court, Shored­itch and would wel­come sup­port. If any­one has pic­tures of the attempt­ed ille­gal evic­tion please could they send them to marg_musella@yahoo.co.uk

This space belongs to all womin so please come and check it out this amaz­ing place and be a part of this amaz­ing jour­ney.

For more infor­ma­tion call 07939381562 or email womenorganise@yahoo.co.uk

Treesit last ditch attempt stop bushland destruction

2008–2‑29
A group of Con­cerned Inde­pen­dent Activists (CIA) have placed a plat­form occu­pied by an activist, high up a tuart tree in bush­land at Col­lege Grove in Bun­bury. It is hoped this will delay destruc­tion of this con­tentious for­est.

College Grove tree-sit2008–2‑29
A group of Con­cerned Inde­pen­dent Activists (CIA) have placed a plat­form occu­pied by an activist, high up a tuart tree in bush­land at Col­lege Grove in Bun­bury. It is hoped this will delay destruc­tion of this con­tentious for­est.

The bush, which forms part of a valu­able nature cor­ri­dor, is under threat of being bull­dozed by Land­corp for a hos­ing devel­op­ment. CIA spokesper­son Simon Peter­fly said “this is the last nature cor­ri­dor on the Swan Coastal Plain that con­nects the ocean to a riv­er”…
The plat­form is a last ditch attempt to save the bush, which includes a rare pop­u­la­tion of ring-tailed pos­sums. He said that Landcorp’s project was con­trary to all good sense and showed a total lack of moral stand­ing in the world of con­ser­va­tion.

“We want to expose Landcorp’s intent to destroy this vital sec­tion of the cor­ri­dor to all West­ern Aus­tralians”, he said. “This is more than just a piece of bush to be flat­tened. It con­tains the rare tuart tran­si­tion zone and pro­vides habi­tat to a pro­tect­ed species which relies upon the bush for its ongo­ing exis­tence”.

Mr Peter­fly said that the inde­pen­dent activists hoped that their remain­ing actions would help edu­cate peo­ple about the fragili­ty of the remain­ing bush­land at Col­lege Grove. “If peo­ple log onto Google Earth, they will see just how thin the nature cor­ri­dor has become… It is just so frag­ile and too valu­able to lose”.

Mr Peter­fly said that the plat­form would stay in place as long as pos­si­ble to focus people’s atten­tion on the plight of rem­nant bush­land on the Swan Coastal Plain.

CONTACT Simon Peter­fly — 0422 540756

South West Envi­ron­ment Cen­tre

Brixton Reclaim Your Food Collective, 2 Arrests.

Peo­ple tak­ing part in Brix­ton’s Reclaim Your Food week­ly action faced arrest on Sun­day (2nd March 2008 ) as they chal­lenged the legit­i­ma­cy of a Dis­per­sal Order issued by the Lam­beth branch of the Met­ro­pol­i­tan Police.

Reclaim your FoodPeo­ple tak­ing part in Brix­ton’s Reclaim Your Food week­ly action faced arrest on Sun­day (2nd March 2008 ) as they chal­lenged the legit­i­ma­cy of a Dis­per­sal Order issued by the Lam­beth branch of the Met­ro­pol­i­tan Police.

The week­ly veg­an open pic­nic has recent­ly faced grow­ing repres­sion from Police and con­sis­tent sup­port in the com­mu­ni­ty. Police (which con­sti­tut­ed a mix of PCs, CSOs and high­er-rank­ing offi­cers) were wait­ing for the col­lec­tive before they even arrived. They came equipped with a mobile sur­veil­lance van, 2 reg­u­lar Police vans and 2 Police cars. Dis­pro­por­tion­ate? Make up your own mind…

The first arrest came as a result of a refusal to com­ply with the Dis­per­sal Order placed upon the group, the sec­ond for attempt­ing to estab­lish the legal basis for such an arrest.

The Dis­per­sal Order, made pos­si­ble by the con­tro­ver­sial Anti-Social Behav­iour Act, was issued in response to an alleged Sec­tion 5 Pub­lic Order offence — defined as caus­ing harass­ment, dis­tress or alarm. How­ev­er, when ques­tioned, the Police failed to pro­vide ade­quate evi­dence to sug­gest that such an offence was tak­ing place. What fol­lowed was a series of con­vo­lut­ed and dubi­ous expla­na­tions as to why they had rea­son to believe an offence was being com­mit­ted:

1) By giv­ing out free food, a cli­mate was being cre­at­ed that enabled drug-deal­ing — which in itself could pro­mote harass­ment, dis­tress and/or alarm. Case Law con­tra­dicts the use of this Pub­lic Order law ‘by proxy’ (as it were) and it has pre­vi­ous­ly been ruled that if a Sec­tion 5 offence is being comit­ted, it is unlaw­ful to arrest any­one oth­er than the alleged per­pe­tra­tor of the offence.

2) “Local Busi­ness­es” — such as the near­by McDon­alds & KFC resta­raunts — were claim­ing that the actions of the col­lec­tive were inhibit­ing their abil­i­ty to make a prof­it. No law that explic­it­ly states the inter­ests of said busi­ness­es are to take prece­dent over the inter­ests of the oth­er par­ties involved was invoked. How­ev­er, it’s hard­ly a shock­ing rev­e­la­tion that prof­it comes before peo­ple.

3) The con­cen­tra­tion of Brix­ton’s drug users and deal­ers in Brix­ton Town Square, alleged­ly as a result of the Reclaim Your Food col­lec­tive’s project, was mak­ing the ‘prob­lem’ more dif­fi­cult to Police. This isn’t even wor­thy of a wit­ty retort.

Thank­ful­ly, the long arm of the law did not stretch to the Bicy­cle Repair Work­shop or those mak­ing Punc­ture Repair Kits and Wal­lets from recy­cled and sus­tain­able mate­ri­als. These were wel­come addi­tions to the Town Square, which was reclaimed as a ful­ly-func­tion­al pub­lic space for all…with room for a bit of a dance to the chilled reggae/dub soundsys­tem!

Despite all the Police intim­i­da­tion and gen­er­al­ly not fan­tas­tic weath­er, a good time was had by most peo­ple who turned up or hap­pened to be pass­ing by!

Sun­day’s events also demon­strate the pow­er of sol­i­dar­i­ty and engage­ment with the com­mu­ni­ty, after Police aban­doned ini­tial threats to arrest every­one present because they thought those involved had ‘learnt their les­son’ and would not be back the next week. This, of course, had noth­ing to do with the logis­ti­cal dif­fi­cul­ties that would’ve arisen from arrest­ing up to 50+ peo­ple with lim­it­ed resources — and hav­ing to jus­ti­fy that to the large­ly sup­port­ive mem­bers of the pub­lic present…honest, sarge! There were many peo­ple on hand to pho­to­graph and film the behav­iour of the Police and to record the iden­ti­ty num­bers of the offi­cers involved. The action was not only ful­ly com­plet­ed and large­ly unim­ped­ed by Police inter­ven­tion but also took to the streets after­wards, march­ing to Brix­ton Police Sta­tion and stand­ing in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the two arrestees. The Reclaim Your Food ban­ner was unfurled accross the Met­ro­pol­i­tan Police logo at the front of the sta­tion, gen­er­at­ing pub­lic inter­est and sup­port. Tea and Bis­cuits were also on offer, giv­ing the whole pro­ceed­ing an unchar­ac­ter­is­ti­cal­ly twee vibe!
Many Brix­ton res­i­dents approached the col­lec­tive, shar­ing their own expe­ri­ences of deal­ing with Police intim­i­da­tion and bru­tal­i­ty. Whilst this may appear incred­i­bly doom-and-gloom, the atmos­phere was more con­ducive to a sense of mutu­al sup­port and a desire to chal­lenge the state appa­ra­tus than of feel­ing down­trod­den or apa­thet­ic, which left many peo­ple feel­ing pos­i­tive about the pos­si­b­li­ty of resist­ing the ever-creep­ing Police state.

The col­lec­tives involved in Sun­day’s action are keen to wel­come any­one who is inter­est­ed in any aspect of the project to come along. The project will con­tin­ure to meet at Brix­ton Town Square

(by Cold­har­bour Lane, oppo­site the Ritzy Cin­e­ma) from around 2/3pm every Sun­day. The town square is well on it’s way to being a free pub­lic space, for any­one to use. This does not fig­ure in the plans of the Police and Local Gov­ern­ment, who are intent on see­ing through gen­tri­fi­ca­tion of the area. Let’s show them whose streets they real­ly are!

Video and Report: http://indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/03/392723.html
Pre­vi­ous Encoun­ters: http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/02/391653.html?c=on#c189534

International Anti Nuclear Festival

Invi­ta­tion to join Inter­na­tion­al Anti Nuclear Fes­ti­val –
– FINLAND — Mid­sum­mer — June 2008 -

Due to the increas­ing nuclear threat devel­op­ing in Fin­land and indeed glob­al­ly, a coali­tion has formed to pro­mote dis­cus­sion, net­work­ing, edu­ca­tion, skill devel­op­ment, and action for inter­na­tion­al civ­il soci­ety to oppose and resist nuclear pow­er devel­op­ments.

Invi­ta­tion to join Inter­na­tion­al Anti Nuclear Fes­ti­val –
– FINLAND — Mid­sum­mer — June 2008 -

Due to the increas­ing nuclear threat devel­op­ing in Fin­land and indeed glob­al­ly, a coali­tion has formed to pro­mote dis­cus­sion, net­work­ing, edu­ca­tion, skill devel­op­ment, and action for inter­na­tion­al civ­il soci­ety to oppose and resist nuclear pow­er devel­op­ments.

We are in the ini­tial stages of plan­ning the first Finnish Inter­na­tion­al Anti Nuclear Fes­ti­val, to be held dur­ing Mid­sum­mer (mid to late June) 2008, in the vicin­i­ty of Olk­ilu­o­to, con­struc­tion site of the world’s largest nuclear reac­tor.

Fin­land is cur­rent­ly set­ting a pres­i­dent for Europe and the world. After years of denial and inac­tion on cli­mate change, gov­ern­ments and indus­try are now pro­mot­ing nuclear pow­er as the solu­tion to ‘clean’ ener­gy pro­duc­tion and the reduc­tion of green­house gas emis­sions. We believe civ­il soci­ety must also set a pres­i­dent by oppos­ing the con­struc­tion of this pro­to­type reac­tor, thus send a mes­sage to pol­i­cy mak­ers that we will not allow our world and our future to be con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed by a dan­ger­ous
radioac­tive lega­cy.

Our objec­tives are numer­ous. We wish to bring peo­ple togeth­er to speak, learn and act about prob­lems asso­ci­at­ed with the nuclear pow­er process — from min­ing on indige­nous peo­ple’s lands, to ore pro­cess­ing and its use in reac­tors, to waste dis­pos­al and mil­i­tary appli­ca­tions. We seek to learn of oth­er peo­ple’s strug­gles, vic­to­ries and set­backs.

We also seek to devel­op a coor­di­nat­ed inter­na­tion­al strat­e­gy. Increase skills; in civ­il democ­ra­cy / con­sen­sus deci­sion mak­ing, research, media, fundrais­ing, sus­tain­able liv­ing, non-vio­lent com­mu­ni­ca­tion, action and civ­il dis­obe­di­ence. We hope to involve our­selves in the deci­sions which affect our lives and those of future gen­er­a­tions, from con­sumer choice to cli­mate change, Cher­nobyl to Hiroshi­ma.

Most of all, we want to invite you to a fes­ti­val to cel­e­brate the beau­ti­ful pos­si­bil­i­ties of life, to dance, sing and share…and to make it very, very dif­fi­cult for them to keep build­ing nuclear death machines. We would hope that any­body pos­si­bly affect­ed by the grow­ing nuclear threat would feel inspired to par­tic­i­pate, indeed help organ­ise this fes­ti­val.

We are invit­ing speak­ers, train­ers, logis­ti­cal and mon­e­tary sup­port, musi­cians, medics, clowns and oth­ers.

More infor­ma­tion at www.olkiluoto.info and www.nuclearmadness.info

if you would like to get involved, have ideas or want to be updat­ed, e‑mail camp@olkiluoto.info or jsun@rbgi.net

Lancaster ‘First’ Carnival Of Culture 2008

“The Car­ni­val of Cul­ture is a cel­e­bra­tion of all that’s good and dis­tinc­tive about Lan­cast­er and a protest against the cor­po­rate takeover of our city by Cen­tros Miller and oth­er devel­op­ers, against the wish­es of the com­mu­ni­ty.

Carnival of Culture“The Car­ni­val of Cul­ture is a cel­e­bra­tion of all that’s good and dis­tinc­tive about Lan­cast­er and a protest against the cor­po­rate takeover of our city by Cen­tros Miller and oth­er devel­op­ers, against the wish­es of the com­mu­ni­ty.
From Cen­tros Miller, the North­ern Link road and out-of-town super­mar­ket plans at Lawson’s bridge, Lan­cast­er is sub­ject to a bar­rage of pro­posed devel­op­ments designed to ben­e­fit large com­pa­nies, yet threat­en the fab­ric and live­li­ness of our com­mu­ni­ties. We are tired of the lack of any say for the res­i­dents of the city as to the direc­tion that the plan­ners are tak­ing us.

The Car­ni­val is about giv­ing Cen­tros, the Coun­cil and any oth­er devel­op­ers a taste of the strength of our com­mu­ni­ties and of our oppo­si­tion. It’s also about mak­ing links and cre­at­ing lots of excit­ing and fun events!”

Tak­en fron web­site.…

Sat­ur­day 1st of March saw Lan­cast­er’s Car­ni­val of Cul­ture come off with­out a hitch. Dur­ing the day, between 250–350 peo­ple joinedin a fan­tas­ti­cal­ly colour­ful, cre­ative and vibrant street pro­ces­sion that snaked around the town through the after­noon, stop­ping in spots that are due to be blight­ed by car-parks, big box retail shop­ping and so forth, as well as the town square with it’s Trump­ton-style Vic­to­ria stat­ue, the City hall and the plan­ners’ offices. We were treat­ed to per­for­mances by a com­mu­ni­ty steel band, Bata­la sam­ba (lead­ing the pro­ces­sion for much of the day), Sis­taSlap wom­en’s african drum­ming group, an impromp­tu klezmer group, a skate­board­ing 10-foot Punch pup­pet, an alien on stilts etc etc etc.

The pro­ces­sion also took up the City’s one-way sys­tem in between events, with a bike sound-sys­tem pro­vid­ing the bassy beats. Stew­ards for the car­ni­val on bikes blocked side streets and on foot, hand­ed lol­lipops to car dri­vers caught up in the block­age. The police, it has to be said, facil­i­tat­ed the whole thing in a low-key man­ner, except for the unnec­es­sary pres­ence of 3 under­cov­er cops and evi­dence gath­er­ing team. Why don’t they just use our web­site for pic­tures!? 😉

The protest/procession was organ­ised over sev­er­al months at open, pub­lic meet­ings run by con­sen­sus, and at ‘infra­struc­ture group’ meet­ings (also open), with tasks divid­ed into work­ing groups for e.g. music, per­for­mance, carnivalism…The event itself was pro­ced­ed by a street per­for­mance where cor­po­rate ‘grey men’ pulled the mag­got of con­sumerism through sat­ur­day shop­pers, suck­ing the souls from ‘unsus­pect­ing’ ‘ran­dom’ Lan­cas­tri­an shop­pers, who were offered emp­ty shiney bags and emerged with zom­bie-mask blank faces.

It is impos­si­ble to con­vey the ‘vibran­cy’ and ‘diver­si­ty’ (we want­ed to reclaim these cor­po­rate-pro­pa­gan­da words from the devel­op­ers) of the day, it’s best to vis­it the web­site at www.carnivalofculture.org.uk. We have sent a loud and colour­ful, well-organ­ised and diverse, unam­bigu­ous ‘NO’ to the cor­po­rate take-over of our city, and a mul­ti-faceted ‘YES’ to the alter­na­tives of non-com­mer­cial com­mu­ni­ty and cre­ativ­i­ty.

car­ni­val­of­cul­ture at google­mail dot com
http://www.carnivalofculture.org.uk

Fossil Fools Day — 1 Month to Go!

Whether you’ve been plot­ting for months or have just been inspired, there’s plen­ty of time left to plan your action. Read on for loads of resources and sup­port…

FFD frontWhether you’ve been plot­ting for months or have just been inspired, there’s plen­ty of time left to plan your action. Read on for loads of resources and sup­port…

With one month to go until April 1st, actions are being plot­ted up and down the coun­try and around the world, rang­ing from street the­atre and town cen­tre demon­stra­tions to high pro­file direct actions tar­get­ing indus­try oper­a­tions and head­quar­ters. Net­works from Earth First! to Peo­ple and Plan­et have got on board in help­ing to spread the word. Nation­al press have been in touch and are plan­ning to cov­er the day. Peo­ple are email­ing from around the coun­try ask­ing for more info on plan­ning their prank, and look­ing for local actions to get involved in.

We are in the mid­dle of an unstop­pable rise of cre­ative, rad­i­cal, nec­es­sary direct action against cli­mate change… be part of it, on Fos­sil Fools Day and beyond.

Whether you’ve been plot­ting for months or have just been inspired, there’s plen­ty of time left to plan your action. Read on for loads of resources and sup­port… and what­ev­er you do, make sure to call or email us on the day so we can add your action to our end-of-day round up, and show the world what grass­roots action against the fos­sil fuel indus­try can achieve.

Hap­py Fos­sil Fools Day every­one!

CONTACTS
www.risingtide.org.uk/fossilfoolsday
info@risingtide.org.uk
0796 191 7535

RESOURCES AND SUPPORT

Resources avail­able at www.risingtide.org.uk/fossilfoolsday (get in touch if you’d like any­thing mailed to you in hard copy):
‑actions book­let with 15 ideas for action against the fos­sil fuel indus­try, includ­ing plan­ning tips, tar­get loca­tions, exam­ples of suc­cess­ful actions and more
‑posters, leaflets and graph­ics to make your own mate­ri­als
‑com­ing soon: a gener­ic leaflet you can adapt to hand out on the day and a Q&A sheet for answer­ing media ques­tions

Want to find an action to get involved in?
If you’re look­ing to get involved where you live, get in touch and we may be able to link you up with some­thing in your local area… or give you advice on get­ting your own action off the ground… or put you in touch with a local group for future actions!

Pub­lic­i­ty
If you’re plan­ning a pub­licly announced action, let us know ASAP and we can help spread the word.

Media
We’ll be send­ing out a nation­al press release and may be able to direct jour­nal­ists to you on the day if you wish, so any info you can let us know in advance will be real­ly help­ful – and/or a phone num­ber to con­tact you on the day if that’s pos­si­ble. And call or email us as soon as your action’s hap­pened so we can include it in the end-of-day actions round-up, which we’ll be press releas­ing as well. Get in touch if you’d like help writ­ing and/or send­ing your own press release — there’s a great guide here:
http://www.networkforclimateaction.org.uk/toolkit/press_and_media/guides_for_using_the_mainstream_media/short_guide_to_the_media.pdf

And if your action’s all sort­ed and you just can’t get enough of FFD… Help spread the word!
• Send an email or let­ter to every­one who might be inter­est­ed, or who sup­ports your group, let­ting them know about Fos­sil Fools Day and where to find out more.
• Post a Fos­sil Fools Day link or event descrip­tion on your web­site, or to any oth­er lists, blogs or web­sites you can think of.
• Dis­trib­ute Fos­sil Fools Day leaflets and put up posters wher­ev­er you can — mailed to your local groups, in your com­mu­ni­ty cen­tre, office, pubs, book­shops, cafes, library, wher­ev­er you can think of. Just let us know how many you need and we’ll send them out to you!

And one last time… the call-out:

FOSSIL FOOLS DAY, April 1st 2008
Pull a prank that packs a punch.

Roll up, roll up! The cli­mate cir­cus is in town. Cli­mate change threat­ens our very sur­vival, but the fools at the head of the fos­sil fuel empire con­tin­ue to plun­der the earth, with gov­ern­ments the will­ing court jesters at their side.

They would have us believe that we can escape cli­mate change with tech­no-fix­es, mar­ket mech­a­nisms and off­set schemes – all tech­no­crat­ic acro­bat­ics that dis­tract us from the truth: the only real solu­tion to cli­mate change is to keep fos­sil fuels in the ground.

For over a cen­tu­ry the fos­sil fuel indus­try has been fool­ing with our lives. From extrac­tion to com­bus­tion they have poi­soned our air, pol­lut­ed our water and ruined our cli­mate. On April 1st, 2008, we’re going to turn the tables and show them who the real fools are.

Find a local fos­sil fool – the coal-min­ing clown, the off­set con­tor­tion­ist, the avi­a­tor trip­ping on the high wire, the super­mar­ket food mile freak show, the oily strong man, or any oth­er fool that deserves your atten­tion – and take direct action to end the fos­sil fuel empire.

On Fos­sil Fools Day, bring the spir­it of car­ni­val and mis­chief to the fight for cli­mate jus­tice.

PS. Don’t for­get, Fos­sil Fools Day kicks off a sea­son of action…
3 MONTHS, 3 DAYS OF ACTION
April 1st: Fos­sil Fuels
May 1st: False Cap­i­tal­ist Solu­tions
June 3rd: Food and Cli­mate Change
www.networkforclimateaction.org.uk
www.daysofclimateaction.org.uk

and…
August 4–11: Camp for Cli­mate Action 2008
www.climatecamp.org.uk

CLIMATE ACTION NEWS SHEET 77, MARCH 2008

CONTENTS:
———————————————-
UPCOMING ACTIONS AND EVENTS:
———————————————-
1) FOSSIL FOOLS DAY — INTERNATIONAL, 1.4.08
2) MAYDAY! MAYDAY! INVASION OF THE CLIMATE SNATCHERS – INT’L, 1.5.08

CONTENTS:
———————————————-
UPCOMING ACTIONS AND EVENTS:
———————————————-
1) FOSSIL FOOLS DAY — INTERNATIONAL, 1.4.08
2) MAYDAY! MAYDAY! INVASION OF THE CLIMATE SNATCHERS – INT’L, 1.5.08
3) CLIMATE ACTION WITH A BITE! — INTERNATIONAL, 3.6.08
4) “PEOPLE ARE STILL THE SAME” — BRECON, 8.3.08
5) PADDY’S DAY OF ACTION AGAINST SHELL — IRELAND AND BEYOND, 17.3.08
6) BIKES NOT BOMBS TOUR — LONDON TO ALDERMASTON, 22–24.3.08
7) TERMINAL 5 FLASHMOB — HEATHROW, 27.3.08
8) CLIMATE BILL PUBLIC MEETING — LONDON, 22.4.08
9) COIN WORKSHOPS — NATIONAL, MARCH-APRIL 2008
10) NATIONAL CLIMATE FORUM — LONDON, 14–15.6.08
11) EARTH ACTIVIST TRAINING — GLOUCESTERSHIRE, 12–26.7.08
12) ENVIRONMENT CAMPAIGNER AWARD – 2008
13) LILI COURSES IN APRIL — BUCKS/LONDON/SHEFFIELD

———————————————-
RECENT HAPPENINGS:
———————————————-
1) CLIMATE EMERGENCY AT HEATHROW, THEN WESTMINSTER — 25.2.08 / 27.2.08
2) RATCLIFFE ACTION VERDICT — NOTTINGHAM, 25.2.08
3) BP AMERICA, EXXON MOBIL AND CO. IN THE DOCK — ALASKA, 27.2.08
4) HANDS OFF IRAQI OIL! ACTIONS — UK AND NETHERLANDS, 23.2.08
5) EARTH FIRST! BLOCKADES POWER PLANT CONSTRUCTION — FLORIDA, 18.2.08
6) RTNA/EARTHFIRST! PIPELINE ACTION — PORTLAND, U.S. 23.1.08
7) SABOTAGE AT GLENSANDA — YORKSHIRE, FEBRUARY 2008
8) PLANKTOS DUMPING SCHEME DEFEATED BY ANTI-WHALERS — MADEIRA, 14.2.08
9) COMMUNITY HALTS SHELL — IRELAND, 12.2.08
10) CRITICAL MASS HERO CLEARED — BRISTOL, 7.2.08
11) KLIMAX SURGE ON! — SWEDEN, JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2008
12) TARA CAMPAIGN UPDATE — FEBRUARY 2008
13) 15 ACTIONS TO TOPPLE THE FOSSIL FUEL EMPIRE — FEBRUARY 2008
14) RISING TIDE POP-ED RESOURCE PACK — FEBRUARY 2008
15) “RISING TO THE CLIMATE CHALLENGE” BOOKLET — FEBRUARY 2008
16) “BURNING CAPITAL” — FEBRUARY 2008
17) SPIRIT OF FREEDOM — FEBRUARY 2008
18) CLIMATE CHANGE SOLUTIONS CENTRE — FEBRUARY UPDATE 2008
19) “THE AGE OF STUPID” — FEBRUARY 2008
20) AIRPORT WATCH BULLETIN — FEBRUARY 2008
21) CAUSE CLIMATE CHANGE — WEBSITE 2008

———————————————-
UPCOMING ACTIONS AND EVENTS:
———————————————-
1) FOSSIL FOOLS DAY — INTERNATIONAL, 1.4.08
Roll up, roll up…the cir­cus is com­ing to town, and it’s going to be big!
For over a cen­tu­ry the fos­sil fuel indus­try has been fool­ing with our lives. From extrac­tion to com­bus­tion they have poi­soned our air, pol­lut­ed
our water and ruined our cli­mate. On April 1st, we’re going to turn the
tables and show them who the real fools are. Ris­ing Tide’s call has been
backed by Net­work for Cli­mate Action, Glob­al Exchange and Rain­for­est
Action Net­work. There are actions planned across the coun­try and around
the world — let us know what you get up to! (Or tell us in advance if you
can and we’ll help spread the word, get media atten­tion, etc.) Con­tact
local groups or just do it your­self. Show the fos­sil fool clowns what you
think of their freak­show — It’s time to Pull a Prank that Packs a Punch!
Resources and ideas are avail­able from;
http://risingtide.org.uk/fossilfoolsday/resources
http://www.networkforclimateaction.org.uk/
Also see; http://www.fossilfoolsday.org/
and; http://risingtide.org.uk/node/241
Con­tact no: 07961 917 535

2) MAYDAY! MAYDAY! INVASION OF THE CLIMATE SNATCHERS — INTERNATIONAL, 1.5.08
From bio­fu­els to nuclear pow­er, car­bon-trad­ing to hydro­gen fuel cells,
dump­ing urine in the ocean to car­bon cap­ture — every­where cor­po­ra­tions are
seek­ing the elu­sive elixir which allows them to con­tin­ue with busi­ness as
usu­al. All these tech­nolo­gies are a dis­trac­tion from the real solu­tions -
a mas­sive reduc­tion in our con­sump­tion and far-reach­ing social change. On
May 1st, Inter­na­tion­al Work­ers Day, we will chal­lenge these false
solu­tions to cli­mate chaos.
http://networkforclimateaction.org.uk

3) CLIMATE ACTION WITH A BITE! — INTERNATIONAL, 3.6.08
Cli­mate action starts on your din­ner plate, in the super­mar­ket, at the
food pro­cess­ing and dis­tri­b­u­tion cen­tres, on the farm, in your allot­ment
or your back yard. The foods we eat are respon­si­ble for about a third of
our green­house emis­sions. It’s time for us to switch to plant-based,
organ­ic, sea­son­al and local­ly pro­duced food. Whether you’re into local
food, per­ma­cul­ture, ani­mal rights, allot­ments, human­i­tar­i­an issues, food
pol­i­tics or trans­port cam­paign­ing, make the links and take action to
high­light the role of the food indus­try in cli­mate chaos.
http://networkforclimateaction.org.uk

4) “PEOPLE ARE STILL THE SAME” — BRECON, 8.3.08
A one-day event show­cas­ing art­works cre­at­ed in response to inter­views,
dia­logues and doc­u­men­ta­tion of the con­struc­tion of the South Wales gas
pipeline.
From 3pm till dusk: Cur­rent State Dystopia — a video pro­jec­tion in the
tun­nel under­neath the A40 road and: Books — a sound and slide instal­la­tion
in Din­gle Wood. 6pm: Going Home — pro­jec­tion and music in Pen­pont Church.
RSVP morag@cooptel.net or tele­phone 01874 636269 www.penpont.com

5) PADDY’S DAY OF ACTION AGAINST SHELL — IRELAND AND BEYOND, 17.3.08
This year´s St Paddy´s day, 17th March, has been called as an
Inter­na­tion­al day of action against shell, in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the peo­ple
of Ross­port. Peo­ple from all over Ire­land are set to join forces and show
their unit­ed strength by going all the way to Lon­don to demon­strate on
Shell´s front door step.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/20124
http://gluaiseacht.nologic.org/wordpress

6) BIKES NOT BOMBS TOUR — LONDON TO ALDERMASTON, 22–24.3.08
Bikes not bombs are plan­ning a bicy­col­o­gy bike tour from Lon­don to
Alder­mas­ton Atom­ic Weapons Estab­lish­ment to mark the 50th anniver­sary of
the Alder­mas­ton Peace March. The ride is expect­ed to take 3 days
(22nd-24th March). More than 5000 peo­ple are expect­ed to attend the
“Sur­round The Base” event at Alder­mas­ton on the 24th. If you are
inter­est­ed please email; info@bikesnotbombs.org.uk
Also see www.cnduk.org/aldermaston

7) TERMINAL 5 FLASHMOB — HEATHROW, 27.3.08
Be at T5 Inter­na­tion­al Arrivals at 11am to put on (or strip to reveal)
your bright­ly coloured “Stop Air­port Expan­sion” t‑shirt: a vis­i­ble
pres­ence of pub­lic oppo­si­tion to the mad­ness of air­port expan­sion. Wan­der
round for a bit, have a cof­fee, leave when you like. Wear­ing a t‑shirt is
not (yet) a crime!
Order your free T‑shirt today: stopairportexpansion@gmail.com or 0845 458
2564.
The Government/BAA see the open­ing day of Ter­mi­nal Five (the biggest
ter­mi­nal ever built in the UK, and the sub­ject of the longest Pub­lic
Inquiry in British his­to­ry) as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to put the case for fur­ther
air­port expan­sion. Join the flash mob to high­light the real prob­lems that
air­port expan­sion caus­es: cli­mate change, noise, air pol­lu­tion and
com­mu­ni­ty destruc­tion.
http://www.t5flashmob.com/

8) CLIMATE BILL PUBLIC MEETING — LONDON, 22.4.08
Friends Meet­ing House, Euston, Lon­don, 7.30pm. A chance to attend a pub­lic
meet­ing with Hilary Benn MP (Envi­ron­ment Sec­re­tary) and Peter Ainsworth
(Shad­ow Envi­ron­ment Sec­re­tary) and join the calls for a strong cli­mate
change law.
More info: howard.whitehead@foe.co.uk

9) COIN WORKSHOPS — NATIONAL, MARCH-APRIL 2008
(a) Cli­mate Change Con­densed will be hap­pen­ing in Chel­tenham on the 6th
March.
(b) Cli­mate Action Groups match­mak­er evening, Tue 11th March 4:30 -
7:30pm, The Envi­ron­ment Coun­cil, Lon­don. Any­one who has attend­ed any of
the COIN/TEC series of train­ings can attend this for free.
© Do you work for the NHS? COIN is offer­ing a tai­lored Cli­mate Change
Speak­er Train­ing in Lon­don on March 14th. See;
www.healthandsustainability.net
(d) Com­mu­ni­cat­ing Cli­mate Change, a one-day work­shop, in part­ner­ship with
Vale
Roy­al Bor­ough Coun­cil on Fri­day, April 11th.
Fur­ther train­ings com­ing soon in Birm­ing­ham, Man­ches­ter and Scot­land.
Would you like COIN to run train­ings in your local area? — give Mim a call
on 01865 727911 or email mim@coinet.org.uk
See the COIN web­site for details on all the above; www.coinet.org.uk

10) NATIONAL CLIMATE FORUM — LONDON, 14–15.6.08
This event offers a wide range of work­shops and sem­i­nars all deal­ing with
dif­fer­ent aspects of the cli­mate change cri­sis, prob­a­ble solu­tions and
future devel­op­ments in nation­al and inter­na­tion­al cli­mate poli­cies. Venue;
South Cam­den Com­mu­ni­ty School, Lon­don. Fol­low the link below to look at
the pro­gram and speak­ers from last year cli­mate con­fer­ence.
http://www.campaigncc.org/conference.shtml

11) EARTH ACTIVIST TRAINING — GLOUCESTERSHIRE, 12–26.7.08
A per­ma­cul­ture design course and more for activists! Learn the skills to
trans­form a piece of land, a com­mu­ni­ty, and our polit­i­cal and eco­nom­ic
sys­tems.
COSTS: (Includ­ing tuition, two weeks accom­mo­da­tion and all meals) £150 -
£500 slid­ing scale accord­ing to income. If you are inter­est­ed in tak­ing
part in the course, down­load an appli­ca­tion form from:
http://www.earthactivisttraining.org/
Or write to: Earth Activist Train­ing, c/o 59 Chelsea Park, Bris­tol, BS5 6AH.

12) ENVIRONMENT CAMPAIGNER AWARD
The Envi­ron­ment Awards (organ­ised by the Sheila McK­ech­nie Foun­da­tion) are
an oppor­tu­ni­ty for grass­roots cam­paign­ers to receive a bespoke pro­gramme
of sup­port and skills devel­op­ment designed to help them take their
cam­paign to the next lev­el. See www.sheilamckechnie.org.uk for details of
how to apply.

13) LILI COURSES IN APRIL — BUCKS/LONDON/SHEFFIELD
Low-Impact Liv­ing Ini­tia­tive: (01296) 714184 www.lowimpact.org

———————————————-
RECENT HAPPENINGS:
———————————————-
1) CLIMATE EMERGENCY AT HEATHROW, AND THEN WESTMINSTER — 25.2.08 / 27.2.08
On the 27th, cam­paign­ers opposed to Heathrow expan­sion scaled the roof of
the Hous­es of Par­lia­ment and hung protest ban­ners from the build­ing. The
pro­test­ers also made paper aero­planes out of con­fi­den­tial White­hall
doc­u­ments and flew them into the MPs’ car park below! The doc­u­ments –
obtained under the Free­dom of Infor­ma­tion Act — prove that air­port
oper­a­tor BAA wrote parts of the con­sul­ta­tion doc­u­ment and that the
gov­ern­ment has already decid­ed to build a 3rd run­way and 6th ter­mi­nal at
the world’s biggest inter­na­tion­al air­port.
http://www.planestupid.com/?q=content/plane-stupid-scales-parliament
Two days ear­li­er Green­peace cam­paign­ers had climbed on to one of
Heathrow’s short-haul flights and cov­ered the tail­fin of the plane with a
huge protest ban­ner that read “CLIMATE EMERGENCY – NO 3rd RUNWAY”.
http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/blog/climate/climate-campaigners-bring-peaceful-protest-to-heathrow-20080225
Also on the 25th, the Heathrow end-of-con­sul­ta­tion ral­ly at West­min­ster
was a packed-out suc­cess, with thou­sands of res­i­dents, politi­cians and
envi­ron­men­tal cam­paign­ers pledg­ing to resist plans to extend Heathrow -
http://www.airportwatch.org.uk/
The dis­tri­b­u­tion of 50,000 leaflets and the actions of anar­chist art troop
Weird Load helped make the ral­ly such a suc­cess:
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/20050

2) RATCLIFFE ACTION VERDICT — NOTTINGHAM, 25.2.08
Fol­low­ing their attempts to halt oper­a­tions and thus dimin­ish CO2
emis­sions at the Rat­cliffe-on-Soar pow­er sta­tion last April, 10 activists
were recent­ly back in court. Unfor­tu­nate­ly the defen­dants’ defence of
envi­ron­men­tal neces­si­ty was reject­ed and they were found guilty. The judge
had ear­li­er said that he wished to com­pli­ment all the defen­dants on the
pre­sen­ta­tion of their case.
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/02/392323.html

3) BP AMERICA, EXXON MOBIL AND CO. IN THE DOCK — ALASKA, 27.2.08
Mean­while, in Alas­ka, lawyers for the native coastal vil­lage of Kivali­na
have filed a suit argu­ing that 5 oil com­pa­nies, 14 elec­tric util­i­ties and
the coun­try’s largest coal com­pa­ny were respon­si­ble for the relo­ca­tion of
vil­lagers because of flood­ing caused by the chang­ing Arc­tic cli­mate.
“There has been a long cam­paign by pow­er, coal and oil com­pa­nies to
mis­lead the pub­lic about the sci­ence of glob­al warm­ing,” the suit says.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/27/us/27alaska.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=Flooded+Village+Files+Suit%2C+Citing+Corporate+Link+to+Climate+Change+&st=nyt&oref=slogin

4) HANDS OFF IRAQI OIL! ACTIONS — UK AND NETHERLANDS, 23.2.08
In sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Iraqi peo­ples’ strug­gle against the plun­der of
their oil reserves, there were actions in Birm­ing­ham, Lon­don, Liv­er­pool,
Wrex­ham, Coven­try and Ams­ter­dam.
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/02/392315.html

5) EARTH FIRST! BLOCKADES POWER PLANT CONSTRUCTION — FLORIDA, 18.2.08
Dozens of con­cerned com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers from Palm Beach Coun­ty and across
the States put their bod­ies on the line to halt con­struc­tion of a mas­sive
gas-fired pow­er plant. A dozen activists locked them­selves togeth­er
through met­al pipes as 200 sup­port­ers ral­lied around them. The block­ade
stopped work on the con­struc­tion site for six hours before a total of 27
peo­ple were arrest­ed.
http://www.risingtidenorthamerica.org/wordpress/2008/02/19/blockade-shuts-down-south-florida-power-plant-construction-27-arrested/
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/20038

6) RTNA/EARTHFIRST! PIPELINE ACTION — PORTLAND, U.S. 23.1.08
The above block­ade fol­lowed anoth­er com­bined action where Cas­ca­dia Ris­ing
Tide joined forces with Stump­town Earth First! to hold an action and ral­ly
at the Port­land office of NW Nat­ur­al in protest at their involve­ment in
Liq­ue­fied Nat­ur­al Gas pipelines, which threat­en to clear-cut strips of
for­est through­out Ore­gon for new fos­sil fuel infra­struc­ture. Activists
piled trees around the office entrance and hung a large ban­ner which read
— “There’s noth­ing Green about Clear-cuts, No new pipelines”.
http://www.risingtidenorthamerica.org/wordpress/2008/01/23/cascadia-rt-organizes-anti-lng-action-at-nw-natural/

7) SABOTAGE AT GLENSANDA — YORKSHIRE, FEBRUARY 2008
An aggre­gates pro­cess­ing plant on the edge of the York­shire Dales Nation­al
Park has been sab­o­taged. 20% of the stone extract­ed will go to major road
net­work con­struc­tion across Europe. The plant in York­shire was entered and
vehi­cles, includ­ing all bull­doz­ers, had holes drilled in vital parts of
their engines and their tires. Both con­trol rooms were bro­ken into and all
com­put­ers and instru­ment pan­els were smashed. Keys to all build­ings and
machin­ery were removed from the site. The mes­sage “Stop Glen­san­da” was
left.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/20043

8) PLANKTOS DUMPING SCHEME DEFEATED BY ANTI-WHALERS — MADEIRA, 14.2.08
Plank­tos, the Cal­i­for­nia com­pa­ny try­ing to turn a prof­it by fer­til­iz­ing
the ocean with iron dust, has pulled the plug on planned field tests. On
the com­pa­ny’s web-site, a sim­ple notice blamed the shut­down on a “high­ly
effec­tive dis­in­for­ma­tion cam­paign waged by anti-off­set cru­saders.” In
Novem­ber 2007, the anti-whal­ing ship Sea Shep­herd con­front­ed the Plank­tos
ves­sel and forced it to move onto Madeira. And there it stayed until its
recall last month.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/19989

9) COMMUNITY HALTS SHELL — IRELAND, 12.2.08
The Erris com­mu­ni­ty con­tin­ues to pro­tect the land — sur­vey work was
stopped and trucks were blocked. Local peo­ple pre­vent­ed Shell from ille­gal
work for 4 hours until Gar­dai forced through work­ers, injur­ing pro­test­ers.
http://www.corribsos.com/index.php?id=1686
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/19977

10) CRITICAL MASS HERO CLEARED — BRISTOL, 7.2.08
In May last year, some­one stood in the road and tried to stop a car that
had hit a Crit­i­cal Mass cyclist, from dri­ving away. For that he was
arrest­ed for obstruct­ing the high­way, thrown to the floor by his neck
whilst hand­cuffed, and then — sur­prise sur­prise — also arrest­ed for
assault­ing a police offi­cer.
After 9 months of ner­vous wait­ing, he was final­ly cleared of all charges,
as Bris­tol Mag­is­trates Court accept­ed a sub­mis­sion that the police
evi­dence was at best ‘severe­ly flawed’ and at worst, fab­ri­cat­ed, and the
tri­al was stopped.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/19971

11) KLIMAX SURGE ON! — SWEDEN, JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2008
Groups of activists con­nect­ed to Kli­max, Sweden’s direct action move­ment
against the root caus­es of cli­mate change, struck repeat­ed­ly last month.
At Malmö Air­port, sev­en activists were appre­hend­ed when try­ing to break
into the run­way, some of them dressed as polar bears. Some 30 activists
put up a block­ade in the mid­dle of the high­way run­ning through Umeå, the
largest city in north­ern Swe­den.
A sim­i­lar num­ber staged a protest out­side the office of Swedish Meat, a
major meat cor­po­ra­tion, to high­light the severe effects the indus­try is
hav­ing on our cli­mate. Anoth­er 50 activists marched into the traf­fic on
one of the major streets in inner city Stock­holm, seiz­ing it for 15
min­utes. The action was direct­ed against a planned mega-high­way, to be
built in the west­ern parts of the cap­i­tal.
http://klimatet.org/2008/02/17/action-report/
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/20019
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/20035

12) TARA CAMPAIGN UPDATE — FEBRUARY 2008
Lock-ons and dig­ger-div­ing, plus protest camp con­tact.
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/19996
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/20126

13) 15 ACTIONS TO TOPPLE THE FOSSIL FUEL EMPIRE — FEBRUARY 2008
Ris­ing Tide’s newest resource, on why and how to take direct action
against the fos­sil fuel indus­try… includ­ing plan­ning tips, tar­get
loca­tions, exam­ples of suc­cess­ful actions and more. Email us for a hard
copy or down­load it here:
http://risingtide.org.uk/resources/other

14) RISING TIDE POP-ED RESOURCE PACK — FEBRUARY 2008
A pop­u­lar edu­ca­tion resource packed with tools to help you run engag­ing,
inter­ac­tive work­shops on all aspects of cli­mate change for a wide range of
peo­ple. Down­load it here: http://risingtide.org.uk/resources/other

15) “RISING TO THE CLIMATE CHALLENGE” BOOKLET — FEBRUARY 2008
Cli­mate change myth-bust­ing book­let designed to help peo­ple cut through
the fog of con­fu­sion and mixed mes­sages about cli­mate change and to be a
use­ful resource for com­mu­ni­ty groups and indi­vid­u­als all over Scot­land.
Down­load from the web­site at www.sead.org.uk

16) “BURNING CAPITAL” — FEBRUARY 2008
This com­pelling series of short films explores the role of Britain’s
largest cor­po­ra­tion in the grow­ing cli­mate cri­sis. Burn­ing Cap­i­tal is a
video voy­age through the murky world of oil giant BP, who kind­ly deliv­ered
1.3 bil­lion tonnes of car­bon diox­ide to the atmos­phere last year.
Watch the films now at; http://www.platformlondon.org/burning

17) SPIRIT OF FREEDOM — FEBRUARY 2008
Earth Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­ers Sup­port Net­work newslet­ter. They’re in there
for us out here — Please write!
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/19960

18) CLIMATE CHANGE SOLUTIONS CENTRE — FEBRUARY UPDATE 2008
A group of envi­ron­men­tal and com­mu­ni­ty-based organ­i­sa­tions in the South
West have made a bid to found an inde­pen­dent, inter-dis­ci­pli­nary ‘Cli­mate
Change Solu­tions Cen­tre’, on the site of an ex-agri­cul­tur­al col­lege
cur­rent­ly owned by Ply­mouth Uni­ver­si­ty. For more details, and infor­ma­tion
on how to sup­port the plans, please see; www.climatechangecentre.co.uk

19) “THE AGE OF STUPID” — FEBRUARY 2008
A cli­mate change doc­u­men­tary for the big screen from Fran­ny Arm­strong
(McLi­bel) and John Battsek (One Day In Sep­tem­ber). Mix­ing doc­u­men­tary
footage, dra­ma and cut­ting-edge ani­ma­tion, and star­ring Pete Postleth­waite
as an old man liv­ing in the dev­as­tat­ed world of 2055. As he watch­es
‘archive’ footage from 2007, he asks him­self: Why did­n’t we stop cli­mate
change when we had the chance? http://www.ageofstupid.net

20) AIRPORT WATCH BULLETIN — FEBRUARY 2008
For infor­ma­tion about the cam­paigns against sui­ci­dal expan­sion at
Heathrow, Bris­tol, Lon­don City, Lydd, Carlisle, Newquay and oth­er air­ports
see; www.airportwatch.org.uk

21) ‘CAUSES CLIMATE CHANGE’ WEBSITE
Sub­ver­tis­ing ideas and resources.
http://www.causesclimatechange.blogspot.com/

———-

Please send any­thing you’d like includ­ed in this news sheet to:
newssheet@risingtide.org.uk

To view pre­vi­ous edi­tions of the Ris­ing Tide News Sheet, vis­it the News
Sheet Archive at http://risingtide.org.uk/newssheet

This News Sheet was brought to you by Ris­ing Tide, a grass­roots net­work
of groups and indi­vid­u­als com­mit­ted to tak­ing action and build­ing a
move­ment against cli­mate change.

For more infor­ma­tion…
email: info@risingtide.org.uk
Phone: +44 (0)845 458 8923 / +44 (0)7708 794665
Address: 62 Fieldgate St, Lon­don, E1 1ES
Web site: http://risingtide.org.uk

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Mass Action: Refuse to Pay on trains to London, 20 April

A mass cli­mate action is tak­ing place on Sun­day 20th April in Lon­don. Peo­ple will board trains into cen­tral Lon­don, refus­ing to pay the high prices. There will be a con­ver­gence in the cen­tral Lon­don ter­mi­nals at around 1pm. The action aims to high­light how the cur­rent pub­lic trans­port prices are unaf­ford­able and must be rad­i­cal­ly low­ered if we are to get peo­ple out of their car­bon inten­sive cars.

A mass cli­mate action is tak­ing place on Sun­day 20th April in Lon­don. Peo­ple will board trains into cen­tral Lon­don, refus­ing to pay the high prices. There will be a con­ver­gence in the cen­tral Lon­don ter­mi­nals at around 1pm. The action aims to high­light how the cur­rent pub­lic trans­port prices are unaf­ford­able and must be rad­i­cal­ly low­ered if we are to get peo­ple out of their car­bon inten­sive cars.

All are invit­ed to take part in a mass action against soar­ing pub­lic trans­port prices on Sun­day 20th April. We encour­age peo­ple from all walks of life to board trains into the cen­tral Lon­don ter­mi­nals, refus­ing to pay the fare. Peo­ple will con­verge togeth­er at the ter­mi­nals at around 1pm. The action is high­light­ing the fact that pub­lic trans­port must become dras­ti­cal­ly cheap­er and afford­able if it is to become a viable alter­na­tive to the dom­i­nant car­bon heavy motor­ing. It will be a chance to col­lec­tive­ly rise up and declare that we are not going to accept how much it costs to trav­el by sus­tain­able means, and a warn­ing to both the gov­ern­ment and pri­vate train com­pa­nies that these actions will con­tin­ue until pub­lic trans­port prices are brought down mas­sive­ly.

The action is being organ­ised by The Stu­dent Cli­mate Project, because choos­ing whether or not to own a car is a deci­sion many stu­dents are faced with. Many will opt to own a car sim­ply because an afford­able and acces­si­ble alter­na­tive is not avail­able. This action gives stu­dents an empow­er­ing oppor­tu­ni­ty to con­tribute to chang­ing the fun­da­men­tals of our car­bon inten­sive infra­struc­ture and econ­o­my, rather than mere­ly feel­ing guilty about their own per­son­al emis­sions. But, of course, you don’t need to be a stu­dent to take part in the action!

Since 1980 motor­ing has increased by an alarm­ing 87%, and con­tin­ues to grow despite the ongo­ing threat of cli­mate change. This might have some­thing to do with the fact that, in this time peri­od, pub­lic trans­port costs for the user have risen by 40% in real terms, where­as motor­ing costs have decreased by 14%. [1]

If any­one is in any doubt about the emis­sion reduc­tions pub­lic trans­port can bring, then you need look no fur­ther than the Depart­ment for Transport’s own cal­cu­la­tions. In a par­lia­men­tary answer in July 2004, the Depart­ment stat­ed that tak­ing the train from Lon­don to Man­ches­ter would mean just 14% the car­bon emis­sions of tak­ing the car for the indi­vid­ual pas­sen­ger. [2]

Cli­mate Change needs to be tack­led today. We need 90% cuts in UK emis­sions before 2030 if we are to avoid going beyond tip­ping point where the cli­mate sys­tem will spi­ral out of our con­trol com­plete­ly. As well as rapid­ly doing away with car­bon inten­sive means of trans­port, we must also ensure the sus­tain­able alter­na­tives become avail­able for all.

There­fore, let’s come togeth­er on this action and bring about pos­i­tive change: putting pub­lic trans­port first!

More infor­ma­tion will fol­low very short­ly at www.studentclimateproject.org.uk and you can also email process@studentclimateproject.org.uk for info and resources for the action.

Ref­er­ences

[1] http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/statistics/datatablespublications/trends/current/section1rvc.pd
[2] http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmhansrd/vo040708/text/40708w05.htm

networking@studentclimateproject.org.uk
http://www.studentclimateproject.org.uk