We are having a fundraiser quiz/social as part of Fairtrade fortnight.

Thursday 25th February 7.15 for 7.30 pm
at RISC (conference hall) 35-39 London Street, Reading, RG1 4PS.

Part of Reading Fair Trade fortnight

We’ll have teams of five, and you can either come in a team or join a team on the night. Bring your friends, relations and work colleagues.

In the interval sit back and be entertained by local musicians and our special guests, folk duo Louisa Davies-Foley and Pete Churchill from Birmingham.

Prizes, raffle, stalls.

Entry costs £5 waged, £2.50 unwaged. Please book in advance – we need an idea of numbers.

Help the local Greens stand three candidates in the General Election.

Support the campaign to get Rob White elected in Park Ward.

To book places and for further information please contact Rob on: bobby.blanc@gmail.com

An orchestrated campaign is being waged against climate change science to undermine public acceptance of man-made global warming it was claimed.

The attack against scientists supportive of the idea of climate change has grown in ferocity and become more personal since the leak of thousands of documents on the subject from the University of East Anglia (UEA) on the eve of the Copenhagen climate summit last December.

Anti-climate change think-tanks such as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation in the US and the International Policy Network in the UK have received grants totalling hundreds of thousands of pounds from the multinational energy company ExxonMobil. Both organisations have funded international seminars pulling together climate change deniers from across the globe.

Critics have broadcast material from the leaked UEA emails to undermine climate change predictions and to highlight errors in claims that the Himalayan glaciers could disappear by 2035.

Climate deniers broadcast stories last week casting doubts on scientific data predicting dramatic loss of the Amazon rainforest. All three stories, picked up by mainstream media, questioned the credibility of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the way it does its work.

The controversies have shaken the IPCC, whose chairman, Dr Rajendra Pachauri, was subjected to a series of personal attacks on his reputation and lifestyle last week. A poll this weekend confirmed that public confidence in the climate change consensus has been shaken: one in four Britons – 25 per cent – now say they do not believe in global warming; previously this figure stood at 15 per cent.

Professor Bob Watson, the chief scientific adviser of Defra and former chairman of the IPCC, said yesterday that the backlash is the result of a campaign: "It does appear that there's a concerted effort by a number of sceptics to undermine the credibility of the evidence behind human-induced climate change."

A complicated web of relationships revolves around a number of right-wing think-tanks around the world that dispute the threats of climate change. ExxonMobil is a key player behind the scenes, having donated hundreds of thousands of dollars in the past few years to climate change sceptics. The Atlas Foundation, created by the late Sir Anthony Fisher (founder of the Institute of Economic Affairs), received more than $100,000 in 2008 from ExxonMobil.

Atlas co-sponsored a meeting of the world's leading climate sceptics in New York last March. Called "Global Warming: Was It Ever Really a Crisis?", it was organised by the Heartland Institute – a group that described the event as "the world's largest-ever gathering of global warming sceptics". The organisation is another right-wing think-tank to have benefited from funding given by ExxonMobil in recent years.

A large British contingent was present at the event, with speakers including Dr Benny Peiser, from Lord Lawson's climate sceptic think-tank, the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF); the botanist David Bellamy; Julian Morris and Kendra Okonski from the London-based International Policy Network; the weather forecaster Piers Corbyn; Christopher Monckton, a former policy adviser to Margaret Thatcher; and Professor David Henderson, a member of GWPF's advisory council.

Bob Ward from the London School of Economics, said: "A lot of the climate sceptic arguments are being made by people with demonstrable right-wing ideology which is based on opposition to any environmental regulation of the market, and they are clearly being given money that allows them to disseminate their views more widely than would be the case if they didn't have oil company funding."

I have been looking at James Delingpole at the Telegraph, his denialist views seem comic but some are taking him seriously. He says he 'is right about everything' and refers to those who think climate change is serious as 'warmists'. He talks about 'Al Gore’s AGW gravy train' as though climate scientists are a highly paid conspiracy. He thinks wind turbines destroy the landscape!
His attacks on IPCC Chair Pachauri get more personal.

The headline "Lib policy would 'boost' emissions" grabbs attention, but its not about the UK. Its about an election battle in Australia that is featuring climate change as an important issue.

The current Prime Minister of Australia is Kevin Rudd (centre-left Australia Labor Party (ALP)). In opposition, Rudd called climate change "the greatest moral, economic and social challenge of our time" and called for a cut to greenhouse gas emissions by 60% before 2050. On 3 December 2007, as his first official act after being sworn in, Rudd signed the Kyoto Protocol. On 15 December 2008, Rudd released a White Paper on reducing Australia's greenhouse gas emissions. The White Paper includes a plan to introduce an emissions trading scheme in 2010 that is known as the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme and gave a target range for Australia's greenhouse gas emissions in 2020 of between 5% and 15% less than 2000 levels. Last year Rudd announced that the Government will delay implementing an emissions trading scheme until 2011. This all sounds horribly familiar.

In opposition is Tony Abbott, federal leader of the centre-right Liberal Party of Australia.
At an October 2009 meeting in the Victorian town of Beaufort, Abbott told the audience that the concept of climate change was "absolute crap". When questioned about that statement, he said he had used "a bit of hyperbole" at that meeting rather than it being his "considered position". After his election as Liberal leader, Mr Abbott promised to have a strong and effective climate change policy - but not one that would damage Australian export industries, putting the country at a competitive disadvantage with its competitors.''It's quite likely that increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has some effect on climate, but debate rages among scientists over its extent and relative impact, given all the other factors at work.''


The Liberal Party is usually in a coalition with the smaller National Party.

The Australian Greens won 8 per cent of the 2007 vote. Australian Greens Leader Bob Brown says that, after the Copenhagen collapse, next year's federal election will be a referendum on global warming.

"The 2010 poll is shaping up as a vote for or against Australia taking a lead in fixing global warming below 1.5 degrees. That means a 2020 target of reducing the nation's greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent over 1990 levels and, in doing so, taking action for the rest of this threatened world to follow," Senator Brown said. "Kevin Rudd's target range of 5-25 percent needs lifting to responsibly meet the need. Tony Abbott's got no effective target - so he is taxing everyone's patience. Where is his plan to tackle the polluters?"

Australia's emissions would increase by 13 per cent by 2020 - not fall by the promised 5 per cent - under Tony Abbott's Emissions Reduction Fund, say Rudds government.

Here are some more pictures from the demo last week.

Romans Return To SilchesterThe Iron Age and Roman settlement of Calleva Atrebatum lies in the north of Hampshire in the parish of Silchester, roughly midway between the modern towns of Basingstoke and Reading.







Romans At Newbury Council

Join the Nuclear Information Service on Facebook, Twitter
Map of AWE here AWE peace camp block the builders

Trident Ploughshares on twitter
Theres an excellent letter in the local paper also

Preparations are being made for the big blockade at AWE 15th Feb


I've just heard activist Dan Viesnik free after 4 days in jail for non-payment of fine from AWE Aldermaston nuclear weapons protest!

You can also see a video here


Anti-nuclear protestors dressed as Romans visit council offices to object to proposed development at AWE

A Group of 'Romans' visited the West Berkshire Council offices bearing ‘gifts’ of radio-active waste. The Romans were, infact, members of the Nuclear Information Service (NIS), a pressure group, who are protesting against the latest development at the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE). Dressed in Roman gear and carrying black bins, with radioactive labels on them, they stood outside the office bringing attention to their cause.

Peter Burt, director of the NIS, said the group decided to dress up like the Romans because they left a rich history, in Britain, that people could be proud of - unlike the “poisoned” environment people of today would leave future generations.
He added: “Thousands of visitors enjoy travelling to the Roman amphitheatre and ruins at Silchester every year. “But how would it be, if instead of leaving us these fascinating historical sites, they left behind their toxic radioactive waste and a poisoned environment for us to inherit? “That is exactly what we are planning to do with the waste that will be created by AWE's Project Pegasus. Because, we have devised no method of disposing of this waste in a way which is safe and poses no risks to the environment.

“Our historical view of the Romans would be very different if they had been irresponsible enough to have left us with the expense and danger of managing their unwanted radioactive wastes, yet that is exactly what we are planning to do for the generations who follow us.”

Project Pegasus is a multi-million pound development proposed by AWE which will provide long-term capability for the storage and handling of enriched uranium, a naturally occurring heavy metal enriched for use in nuclear weapons, at the Aldermaston site.

More than 900 objections have been received and a decision about the development is due to be made by members of the eastern area planning committee in the coming weeks. A recent survey of 550 residents carried out by local environmental groups, including the NIS, showed that 60 per cent believed the development should not go ahead. Ninety per-cent said they would like information about the environmental and safety impacts of the development to be made public before permission to build the facility is given.

Mr Burt added: “Common sense says that information about the hazards faced by public should be published before a development of this nature is given the go-ahead, and, quite reasonably, a large majority of people feel that we should be told more about the risks we will face.
“West Berkshire Council should pay careful attention to the results of this survey, and should not grant planning permission until adequate information about safety and risks is provided by AWE.”

This is the speech I read out to the press:
Ave!!

Salvete omnes – greetings everybody.

We are Roman envoys from the nearby city of Calleva Atrebatum – or Silchester as you know it. Silchester has changed a great deal since our times – can you imagine what it was like two thousand years ago with far fewer people living locally, surrounded by forests, and with the civic buildings still intact?

We come bringing gifts to your generation from our generation. Unfortunately they are gifts you may not want. Here are all our most dangerous and unpleasant wastes, which we have been unable to dispose of ourselves. Looking after them safely will be an expensive and dangerous affair for you, I am afraid.

Do you not wish to accept these wastes? Do you think worse of us Romans for leaving you with this legacy? Yet we are doing nothing that you are not doing yourselves. The Atomic Weapons Establishment that you have built at Aldermaston near Silchester produces radioactive waste which is far more dangerous than anything we have left for you. Unlike our wastes, your wastes will remain toxic for hundreds of thousands of years. And the new factory that you are building at Aldermaston, named Pegasus after the flying horse from the stories of Greece, will create even more of this waste for the peoples who follow you to look after.

So to your civic leaders, we say think carefully about those who will follow you and do not repeat the mistakes of the past.

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
We come to bury our waste, not to praise it.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones.
Vale!


If you want to stop AWE there is a peaceful protest and blockade planned for the 15th February.

www.blockthebuilders.org.uk
CND
Come and join us on 15th February at the non-violent blockade of Aldermaston, organised by Trident Ploughshares. To maximise its impact this will start at 7am, continuing for as long as possible. You can sit, lie down, lock-on or simply provide support for those blockading. We need as many people as possible to stop the work at Aldermaston and tell the government loud and clear: No Trident Replacement. See here for full details on training, accommodation and transport.

After the news coverage on Wednesday of Martin Salter insulting the pope, the Catholics have responded.

Fr Bruce Barnes, parish priest at Christ the King Catholic Church in Whitley, said: "This is rather a cheap slur and it's very unfortunate when this sort of invective is used.
"If you criticise the Pope, you in effect criticise the whole Catholic Church.
"I'm sorry if Martin Salter finds us offensive - he should perhaps remember all the good work the Church has done in his constituency."

FR Ray Blake at StMaryMagdalen describes his words as a 'little piece of effluent that has has just floated down the Thames from the pen of Martin Salter, Member of Parliament for Reading West.'

Martin Salter MP hoped to minimise the damage, pretended it was all a joke. He said:
"I am genuinely sorry if people took my comments the wrong way, and I do assure people that my future blog posts will also poke fun at all political parties including my own, and probably poke fun at other religions and belief systems as well. This is a light-hearted way of getting some serious points of view across."


More than 140 people commented on Mr Salter's article, most of them deeply unhappy with its contents, including one who labelled it "anti-Catholic hate speech". Others speculate about the reaction if he said something similar about an Imam?

Incidentally the only Pope to hail from England was called Pope Adrian IV.

chronicle
reading107fm
indiatimes
usatoday

The most senior Foreign Office lawyer at the time of the invasion of Iraq said that he had considered the Iraq war to be illegal because it had not been authorised by the United Nations. Sir Michael Wood said
"I considered that the use of force against Iraq in March 2003 was contrary to international law. He also made plain that he consistently over two years advised both Blair and Straw direct that the war would be illegal.

In potentially explosive testimony to the otherwise rather tame Iraq Inquiry, Sir Michael Wood also told how Jack Straw, then Foreign Secretary, had told the Americans he was "entirely comfortable" to be making the case for military action a year before the invasion eventually took place. That runs counter to Mr Straw's own evidence to the inquiry last week, when he insisted that he had only "very reluctantly" supported the war.

His deputy, Elizabeth Wilmshurst said "In my opinion, that use of force had not been authorised by the Security Council, and had no legal basis in international law." Ms Wilmshurst became the only British civil servant to quit over the war when she resigned days before the first attacks on Iraq, telling her superiors that an invasion without UN sanction would be a "crime of aggression".

Craig Murray quotes Tony Blair "You would be hard pressed to find anyone who in September 2002 doubted that Saddam had WMD". Craig argues that it wouldn't have been that hard. "If he had asked members of the Near East and North Africa Department of the FCO, the Middle East experts in the FCO's Research Analysts, or in the Defence Intelligence Service, he would have found absolutely no shortage of people who doubted it, whatever position No 10 was forcing on their institutions."

He goes on to say "One of the many failures of this Inquiry has been a failure to ask individual witnesses before it whether they personally had believed in the existence of any significant Iraqi WMD programme. I know for certain that would have drawn some extremely enlightening answers from among the FCO and probably MOD participants."

Craig goes on to make an interesting point about the "government spends a very great deal of public money on employing a whole cadre of the best public international lawyers in the world, but takes its legal advice on matters of war and peace from a shifty barrister mate of Tony Blair." He lists some publications from Sir Michael, and contrasts this with Lord Goldsmith who has no 'internationally accepted publications on international law'. 'The decision whether to go to war is a political question. But the legal advice should come from the most qualified source, not the source most likely to agree with the Prime Minister.'

That Blairs Cabinet are now saying they were not informed of the opinion of Sir Michael, just given a summary of Lord Goldsmith, says plenty about Labours methods.

Craig Murray was British Ambassador to Uzbekistan from August 2002 to October 2004. He found Western support for the dictatorial Karimov regime in Uzbekistan unconscionable and spoke out about what was happening, particularly torture and human rights abuses. Murray was subsequently removed from his ambassadorial post on October 14, 2004.

Martin Salter MP for Reading West said "There is no prospect of my ever blogging. What little I have seen of the blogsphere, it seems to me to be the last refuge for tragic insomniacs who lack social skills.”

So welcome to the world of blogging Martin. You can see read it here

His first few blogs were distinguished only in uniting his readers who comment against him. Then yesterday he decided to attack the Pope. He said the Pope was a 'hypocrite', a 'bloke in a dress', and that 'I find the hypocrisy of the Pope reprehensible'.

Only an MP that has already decided to stand down would think it clever to do this, the millions Catholics in this country should rise up against him.

Even before this latest outrage, Martin has been well known as a hypocrite who is quick to insult others. I have a few examples:
climate change
Calling Polish people thieves
gurkhas
Hunting
censorship
name changes
He also campaigned to save Post Offices & then voted to close them.
And of course Iraq where he pretended to be a rebel but failed to vote.
I sum it up here where I state why I joined the Green Party in order to oppose him.

He had his own expenses scandal; in October 2007 Martin broke parliamentary rules, though he now claims that the complaint against him was rejected. This is a matter of public record, and I will not be silenced by him, despite his attempts at bullying; he threatened to sue me if I mention it. See here
or here


Some other websites/blogs on this; Saint Mary Magdalen , South Wales Argus, Berkshire Humanists

Update
Reading Chronicle'MP Martin Salter came under fire today'
Reading Post'
Was
Its fine to disagree with the Pope, but not to insult him, indeed its not ok to insult anyone.
Greens including Peter Tatchell back a petition 'Protest the Pope' here

With the local elections just three months away the LibDem candidate for Park Ward Alex Kirke has appeared on the radar just in time. No doubt as happened in 2008 there will now be a forest's worth of LibDem propaganda claiming to be best placed to win the ward even though their vote has fallen in Park at the last three local elections resulting in them finishing fourth last time.

There has been lots of hot air from Labour and Tories on the new city status bid. I was going to pen something myself on this subject -- I have yet to be convinced of the merits of such a scheme -- but I saw a letter from a local activist Colin Lee in the local paper, which I thought summed up the arguments nicely:

Dear Sirs,

When will Reading Borough Council get real? Each year, I see the Centre for Cities Report misrepresented and incorrectly applied to the Local Authority by some media, Reading UK CIC, Councillors and the Chief Executive. The report indicates that the region as a whole could be well placed for the future. However the ‘Reading’ and the ‘city’ researched are the urban areas of Reading, Wokingham and Bracknell Forest – see www.centreforcities.org/outlook10 (click on the link for “Primary Urban Areas”). Reading LA and City are not synonymous.

The recession has brought some very tough choices and what is least needed is spin, hype and over-egging. Business and particularly those people and companies who want to invest in the town require accurate data, sound economic markers and not sound-bytes and more of the mirages on which RBC policy is built.

So what are the dimensions that this town is performing well in? Does anyone know? Do we have the economic models necessary for sound planning? No. The town does not even have a cohesive master plan for the future as CABE has stated.

If lead councillors Jo Lovelock and Andrew Cumpsty want to take us forward as a city then surely we need to include at least Wokingham and Bracknell Forest and go back to a kind of Berkshire County Council again? However, I fear City status for Reading is about ego not practicalities and realities. For some Councillors it has everything to do with pie-in-the-sky aspirations – a utopian Dubai-on-Thames where 30 storey towers abound without examination of the consequences to the town, our local economy and its people.

Surely our Councillors can see that the town is a town and that their function is to serve the people, not delusions of grandeur? It would stop wastage of taxpayers’ monies too.


Yours faithfully


Colin Lee

I caught a bit of How to Look Good Naked last night. Gok has a campaign for more disabled models. You can sign his petition here.

This reminded me of one of Mark Thomas' policy ideas, models should be chosen at random from the electoral register just like jurors.

It really took some doing, but the local Labour Party are so bad that they are causing a stir. Their ex MP Jane Griffiths has been following the storey for some time. Basically a council document listed sites for potential development, nothing was yet decided, but the danger was there. Park Ward Green Candidate Rob White found the document, got a petition from local residents and highlighted the danger. Now the Labour Party could simply have said we agree, we don't want 315 homes built on a playing field, lets remove this site from the list. But no, thanks to their candidate ex-Cllr Richard McKenzie, they decided to pretend that the site was never on the list, though it was on the website! Richard writes a blog with no comments allowed,
here. So I am responding to him here. Jane has written a commentary for this, which I have copied below.


a straw man
Rob White and the Green Party, campaigning for Park ward as they consistently and energetically do, have been highlighting the development plans for the Alfred Sutton playing fields, as well they might, and they have succeeded in bringing out into the open the secret and corrupt ways of the leadership of the Reading Labour Group. Basher McKenzie, who wonders aloud on his website why people keep trying to run him over, (probably because one violent thug the less keeps the population safer, eh Basher?), thinks he will gain some electoral advantage in Park ward (though putting on your side bar "Where is Park Ward?" is not the best idea Basher) by rubbishing the Greens instead of campaigning positively on practical policies. With this in view he "publishes" a letter from Cllr Tony Page, as follows: ( a little light fisking is irresistible here)

Reply to Mr White from Cllr Page Janes Comments Italic
I thank Mr White for his petition but very much regret the mischief-making and scaremongering agenda oh no you've rumbled us we were trying to keep that secret that lay behind this petition. There is no threat whatsoever to the playing fields. we have always been at war with EurasiaThe Site Allocations Document is now known as the Sites and Detailed Policies Document, so now we've changed its name that's all right then and the draft document is to be discussed at this meeting. which we had to be dragged kicking and screaming into doing The Thames Valley University playing fields are not included in the Sites and Detailed Policies Document, and there is therefore no need to remove them. oh yes they are, read the document and see below The existing built form of the TVU site, along with the areas used for parking, are included as an allocation primarily for education. Should it not be required for education then the policy does allow for residential see? and there are no plans to build any more schools in that area, but it is clear, and explicitly stated on page 94 of the latest document we hoped you wouldn't read that far that this would not include the adjacent playing fields.The whole Crescent Road campus, including the playing fields, was included as a candidate site in an earlier consultation version of the Site Allocations Document in 2008 we had it down to build on all along, you bastards, you spotted it, as it had been nominated for development by the University a big boy did it and ran away – not the Council. so who gives planning permission then? The Council consulted on all of the approximately 100 sites that had been nominated for development, as it is required to do. and the Greens have been responding, which we have decided to call "scaremongering"The document explicitly stated on several occasions that the Council did not necessarily endorse any sites. The playing fields are among a number of sites consulted on in 2008 that are not included in the current draft document. no - now we have been rumbled we are simply going to hem it in with car parking and prevent public access until in due course there is residential development on the site and the by-then-disused playing fields are covered with condoms and needles and sold off to another developer.

RADIATION RISKS AT LOW DOSES:
New studies on the impacts of low-level radiation

Dr Ian Fairlie
(Independent consultant on radiation and health)
All welcome - Admission free
Organised by Nuclear Awareness Group (NAG)
Information: 0118 327 7489 / www.nuclearawarenessgroup.org.uk


7.00 pm Thursday 11 February
RISC Centre
35-39 London Street, Reading




Yesterday AWE protestor Dan Viesnik got 14 days imprisonment.
'I was in the public gallery of Court 4 at Highbury Corner magistrates courts this afternoon (1/2/2010) with about twenty other supporters of Dan Viesnik. Dan is a peace activist and active supporter of Brent Green Party.'
I was with Dan as we walked from AWE to London with footprints for peace in Aug 2007.

The facts of the case are much as reported already on http://greenleftblog.blogspot.com/ and http://wembleymatters.blogspot.com/. Dan had refused to pay a total of £515 in fines and costs imposed after his arrest for a sit down protest in the entrance to Aldermaston Atomic Weapons Establishment.

As his letter to the court (quoted on http://greenleftblog.blogspot.com/), shows Dan has decided to continue his protest against the grotesque distortions of justice caused by the British Government’s committment to Weapons of Mass Destruction. Dan continued his argument in the statement that he read out to the court which protested against the resources spent on nukes in a world where chronic poverty continued. Dan ended his statement with a quote from Thoreau affirming that an individual acting according to his/her own conscience should be a better guide to conduct than the letter of law. In this instance I agree with Dan and Thoreau.

Advised by the Clerk of the Court, the Bench decided that Dan’s explicit refusal to pay his fine or even acknowledge that he had committed a crime by giving details of his means, meant that they had no option but to imprison Dan. The fact that they gave him 14 days rather than 28 which they could have done, may indicate sympathy or may indicate a wish to minimize the prison population, but in any event, I am sure that Dan has the best wishes and support of many Green Party members and others. I hope that we will be able to find a way to let him know this.


I echo the words of http://wembleymatters.blogspot.com/2010/02/wembley-peace-activist-sentenced-to-14.html 'I express my admiration for Dan's principled action and his courage at a time when there is so little of either in evidence from our politicians. It is incredible that on Friday the Chilcott Inquiry failed to make Tony Blair answer for waging an illegal war, which killed thousands of innocent civilians, on a pretext of non-existent Weapons of Mass Destruction; and on Monday a peace activist was jailed for not paying a fine incurred when he demonstrated against our own Weapons of Mass Destruction.'

I went to the sustainable schools event yesterday at Norcot Early Years Centre in my capacity as the sustainability link governor for Alfred Sutton school. It was a really interesting few hours, where we had various presentations from council officers and other people involved in sustainability work locally. There was also a room filled with stalls to find out more from officers, Thames Water, local businesses, local schools etc.

One thing that I would really like to plug from the meeting is the Sustainable Schools section of the Reading Borough Council website which has material on each of the eight doorways to sustainability.

Another thing is Eco-Schools, of which we already have 20 in Reading, most bronze level, but two silver. It would be good to work with other schools in east Reading as a sustainability hub. I understand that St John's, Newtown, Redlands and Alfred Sutton have all signed up to the council's Energy and Carbon Service Level Agreement, which is a first step.

The government is expected to confirm tomorrow that emissions of greenhouse gases fell by a 2% in 2008 compared to the previous year. Ministers pretend the figures are evidence that the UK is on the right track to meeting its targets; to cut emissions by over a third by 2020 compared to 1990 levels.

But energy experts said that the small decline was a result of the recession and record energy prices, rather than government policy. In 2008 petrol prices and utility bills soared, prompting motorists and households to be more frugal.

Chris Goodall, energy and environment author, said: "What drove 2008 emissions lower were high energy prices and by the end of the year a decline in economic activity, rather than any structural changes. Although government policies are beginning to work they won't be enough to meet 2020 targets on their own. It seems that, unfortunately, high energy prices are a more important part of reducing energy demand and emissions."

In 2007, according to government estimates, the UK emitted 636.6m tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent. The government issued provisional figures last year indicating that 2008 emissions stood at 623.8m tonnes carbon dioxide equivalent, 2% down on 2007.

The emissions cuts, only the fourth in the last 50 years, provide countries with a unique chance to switch to less carbon-intensive energy sources, said the IEA's chief economist, Fatih Birol.
"Average growth in emissions has been 3% a year but we estimate this year that emissions will fall 3%. Because of the financial crisis, many industries have the chance to move away from unsustainable power." he said.

Read all about Caroline’s recent work in her role as an MEP here.

I got this from the Nuclear Awareness Group about their next meeting:

"The next NAG meeting will take place on Thursday 11th February with a special guest speaker, Ian Fairlie, an independent consultant on radiation and health. Following the theme of NAG's previous meeting with John Harrison of the Health Promotion Agency we will be considering the impacts of low level radiation doses on public health.

The meeting will take place from 7 pm on Thursday 11th February at the RISC Centre, 35-39 London Street, Reading. All are welcome."

A detailed and startling analysis of how unequal Britain has become offers a snapshot of an increasingly divided nation where the richest 10% of the population are more than 100 times as wealthy as the poorest 10% of society.

The man largely responsible for the traversty, Gordon Brown, described the paper, as "sobering", saying: "The report illustrates starkly that despite a levelling-off of inequality in the last decade we still have much further to go." We has a long way to go, he doesn't. He probably only has a few weeks left in power, but the opposition is little better.

The report, An Anatomy of Economic Inequality in the UK, scrutinises the degree to which the country has become more unequal over the past 30 years. Much of it will make uncomfortable reading for the Labour government, although the paper indicates that considerable responsibility lies with the Tories, who presided over the dramatic divisions of the 1980s and early 1990s.

Britain had reached the highest level of income inequality since soon after the second world war. Tthe top 10% of the population stands at £853,000 and more – over 100 times higher than the wealth of the poorest 10%, which is £8,800 or below (a sum including cars and other possessions).

When the highest-paid workers, such as bankers and chief executives, are put into the equation, the division in wealth is even more stark, with individuals in the top 1% of the population each possessing total household wealth of £2.6m or more.

Commissioned by Harriet Harman, minister for women and equality, the report was led by Prof John Hills, of the London School of Economics. The report is more ambitious in scope than any other state-of-the-nation wealth assessment project ever undertaken.

It concludes that the government has failed to plug the gulf that existed between the poorest and richest in society in the 1980s. "Over the most recent decade, earnings inequality has narrowed a little and income inequality has stabilised on some measures, but the large inequality growth of the 1980s has not been reversed," it states.

Hills said: "These are very challenging issues for any government because the problems are so deep-seated." "But we hope that by doing this work, policy makers have now got information they never had before, to try and get at the roots of some of those problems."

The significance of where you live is another theme. The panel says the government is a "very long way" from fulfilling its vision, set out in 2001, that "within 10 to 20 years no one should be seriously disadvantaged by where they live". The paper notes "profound and startling differences" between areas. Median hourly wages in the most deprived 10th of areas are 40% lower than in the least deprived.

The government have utterly failed to address the issue, bankers are still getting their huge disproportionate bonuses where in many cases they should be sacked or charged with negligence.
PFI/PPP rake in billions straight out of government coffers facilitated by Gordon Brown, future generations will be paying for his mistakes.

How can a Labour Government be proud that till recently the wealthiest pay tax at a lower rate than their office cleaners? Multi-millionaire chiefs of private equity firms to pay as little as 10 per cent tax on their earnings.

Nicholas Ferguson, chairman of SVG Capital, said "Any commonsense person would say that a highly-paid private equity executive paying less tax than a cleaning lady or other low-paid workers can't be right". "I have not heard anyone give a clear explanation of why it is justified."

Paul Kenny, general secretary of the GMB union, added: "Top private equity chiefs are freely admitting that the current tax regime allows them to pay less tax than the minimum wage worker. This is an important and significant breaking of the ranks."

'Fair is worth fighting for' is what the Green Party say. That the richest should pay more tax than the poorest seems so obvious that it shouldn't even need saying. But it needs to be said, or the cronies of those in power continue with the way things have been.

Today Blair will be giving evidence to the Chilcott enquiry into the illegal invasion of Iraq. To date no weapons of mass destruction have been found and it is by no means clear-cut whether the lives of the Iraqi people have been improved.

It was the buildup to this illegal war that got me interested in what was going on in the world, and other issues such as trade justice and climate change which ultimately ended up with me getting involved with the Green Party -- I was impressed by their principled stand against the war -- in Reading and local politics.

How will Blair there today? I suspect badly... And then we will have Brown in front of the enquiry before the May elections -- assuming he doesn't call an early general election.

Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp survivors have been among those marking the 65th anniversary of its liberation at UK Holocaust Memorial Day events. Many attended a national commemoration at London's Guildhall, with other survivors of genocide and politicians.

Among the survivors at the Guildhall was Lilly Ebert, 79, from Golders Green, north London, who was taken to Auschwitz with her family in 1944. She remembers her time in the largest Nazi concentration camp "so vividly, it could have happened yesterday" and remains traumatised by the experience. "The most important thing is to be alive," she told the BBC. "It's important to be tolerant with each other. It makes no difference what religion you are or the colour of your skin."

More than a million people were murdered by the Nazis at Auschwitz. The great majority were Jews but they also included non-Jewish Poles, Roma Gypsies and Soviet prisoners of war. The camp was liberated by the Soviet Red Army on 27 January 1945.

Holocaust Memorial Day is marked with the intention of remembering and honouring the victims and survivors of the Holocaust and those from subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and the ongoing atrocities in Darfur.

Th BBC quotes the Archbishop of Canterbury, David Cameron, Labour Lord Janner of Braunstone, at the event in London. Oddly not the Chief Rabbi though.

In Reading an Anne Frank Exhibition at Broad Street Mall. The Holocaust display will run from 9.30am to 5pm on Monday, January 25, to Friday, January 29. (0118) 951 0279

Stonewall Chief Executive Ben Summerskill discusses the persecution of Gay men and Lesbians under the Nazi regime and why Holocaust Memorial Day is an important day in the equalities calendar in the UK.


They even have a bloggers pack, I think I am the first blogger to notice it though. I don't find it easy to write about this subject, too many members of my family were killed. My grandparents were lucky to have left Lithuania by then; all those that remained, died.


Holocaust Memorial Day website
Legacy of hope
Martin Salter may have been there too.
Cllr Ennis was at a civic centre event. He says 'it is the pursuit of power, influence, resources and particularly money that acts as a pretext for genocide and war.'
Holocaust Memorial Day Exhibition in Wokingham