Historic Failure

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Led by Donkeys: A historic failure

Jeremy Corbyn: A warning to Truss and Hunt: people see the chaos and unfairness – and they won’t accept it

In my 39 years in parliament, I cannot remember a fiscal plan so reckless, arrogant and out-of-touch. More than one in five people – and one in three children – are in poverty in the UK. A quarter of a million people in England are homeless. This October, millions of people will struggle to heat their homes or feed their children. But will nobody think of the bankers?

It doesn’t matter which remnants of neoliberal economics this government tries to rescue from the rubble. Nor does it matter how many chancellors they use to try to resuscitate them. The Tories will never be able to fix the economy until they reckon with the fact that they’ve spent the past 12 years destroying it.

By preparing for another wave of austeritythe new chancellor is not just in denial about the scale and severity of the cost-of-living crisis. He is in denial about the very economic policy that engendered it. The last round of cuts to public services – which has been linked to 330,000 excess deaths by a recent report – did not just plunge millions into poverty. It stole resources from the poorest people in society and transferred them to the richest: as child poverty was heading towards its highest levels since 2007, Britain’s billionaires more than doubled their wealth. Far from rectifying this act of social robbery, the government is intent on helping the 1% steal even more.

As the Tories plunge themselves into electoral oblivion, those in opposition have a precious opportunity: to redistribute wealth, ownership and economic power. To end insecurity, exploitation, poverty and homelessness. To build a society grounded in compassion, creativity and care.

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Thank you climate activists

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Thanks to climate activist. Thank you Morgan and Marcus of Just Stop Oil.

Queen: We are the Champions for climate activists

Tory MPs and even Essex Police have taken to call climate activists selfish just recently. It’s totally ridiculous – how on Earth can they be selfish while risking prosecution and imprisonment? Those making these accusations are on the side of those destroying the climate for private profit. It’s them that are selfish of course, these assoles have no fekking idea.

Continue ReadingThank you climate activists

Just Stop Oil shut Dartford’s QE2 bridge

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It appears that this news is censored by UK government, it is reported by very few news outlets in UK.

Two Just Stop Oil  supporters have climbed to the top of the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge forcing police to close the bridge to demand that the government halts all new oil and gas licences and consents.

At approximately 5 am two climbers ascended the two 84m masts on the North side of the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge forcing the police to stop traffic from entering the bridge. It is expected that the bridge will remain shut for at least 24 hours.

Morgan Trowland, 39, a bridge design engineer from London, said

“As a professional civil engineer, each year as I renew my registration, I commit to acting within our code of ethics, which requires me to safeguard human life and welfare and the environment. Our government has enacted suicidal laws to accelerate oil production: killing human life and destroying our environment. I can’t challenge this madness in my desk job, designing bridges, so I’m taking direct action, occupying the QE2 bridge until the government stops all new oil.”

Marcus, 33, a teacher from London said:

“Too many people in this country simply don’t know the scale and intensity of climate breakdown as the scientists describe it. The authorities are criminally failing to get this grim science communicated. During Covid the science was conveyed on a daily basis. Why isn’t the most existential threat that humanity has ever faced on the news every day? 

“Our political system is betraying the people of this country. More fossil fuel licenses means global genocide. Only direct action will now help to reach the social tipping point we so urgently need.” 

Today’s actions follow over two weeks of continuous disruption by supporters of Just Stop Oil in which they have experienced over 450 arrests. On Sunday, there were 14 arrests of Just Stop Oil supporters, who blocked Park Lane and sprayed an Aston Martin dealership with orange paint.  Since the campaign began on April 1st, Just Stop Oil supporters have been arrested over 1,700 times, with 5 currently in prison. 

Continue ReadingJust Stop Oil shut Dartford’s QE2 bridge

just Stop Oil respond to Home Secretary Suella Braverman’s threats

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UK Home Secreatry Suella Braverman is proceedng with the Public Order Bill introduced by the previous Home Secretary Pritty [23/10/22 Priti, apologies] Patel. It includes a new amendment so that secretaries of state can apply for an injunction  ‘in the “public interest” where protests are causing or threatening “serious disruption or a serious adverse impact on public safety”.’ It appears that the government has accepted Labour Parly leader Keir Starmer’s suggestion. The Labour Party has since attempted to position itself as pro-green e.g. with the slogan “fairer, greener future” at it’s 2022 conference.

I’m struck than many of Just Stop Oil’s activists are so young. These are the people that destroying the planet are really going to affect. It could literally be a death sentence for them, wtf are they going to see? We already have serious weather events on a regular basis at 1.1/1.2C increase in global temperature. We’ve seen devestating temperatures, flooding and fires. Despite such devestating effects, Liz Truss’s bonkers UK government is accelerating climate destruction.

It is unfortunate that protests are disruptive but these protestors are certainly not selfish as claimed by Braverman. They’re not the government supporting and indistinguishable from those destroying the planet for profit. I can fully sympathise that climate activists have no choice other than to protest disruptively.

Continue Readingjust Stop Oil respond to Home Secretary Suella Braverman’s threats

Just Stop Oil London protests continue, Extinction Rebellion make a weekend of it

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Van Gogh Sunflowers yesterday. It’ll clean up.

New Scotland Yard sign yesterday. It’ll clean up.

edit: New Scotland Yard is the London Metropolitan Police’s main police station and near the Houses of Parliament.

‘It was terrifying’: Stop Oil activists on the new battle against fossil fuel

Just Stop Oil, XR’s latest successor movement, has vowed to block central London roads every day this October. Friday was their 14th consecutive day, and they stepped up tactics once again, with two young women throwing paint over Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers painting in the National Gallery, a polarising action that left many aghast. Another action involved spraying the revolving sign at New Scotland Yard, the Metropolitan police headquarters.

Their demand is simple: that the government agree to a moratorium on all new oil and gas projects, in line with a recommendation by the International Energy Agency.

With the government having announced a new round of licensing only last week, their prospects of success seem bleak, but activists remained committed. “The burning of fossil fuels is killing people right now,” Kat, a children’s mental health nurse said as she sat blocking St George’s Circus.

“It’s fuelling the cost of living crisis, and it’s driving temperatures higher and higher. So I will not stand by and watch this government commit crimes against humanity by continuing to invest in the fossil fuel industry. That is morally wrong.

“So I’m sitting here peacefully and non-violently in the road, and our demand is: no new oil and gas.”

Extinction Rebellion burn energy bills in Downing Street protest

Climate activists Extinction Rebellion burned energy bills outside Downing Street on Friday as Liz Truss sacked her chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, and replaced him with Jeremy Hunt.

“We’re here to apply for the job of Chancellor,” the group tweeted, as streams of their supporters marched through the streets. “We need action on the climate and cost of living crisis now.”

“The anti-growth coalition have arrived at Downing Street,” the climate activists said, adopting Ms Truss’ description of Extinction Rebellion among others during her speech at the Conservative party conference in Birmingham this month.

Extinction Rebellion is holding a weekend of resistance in London from Friday until Sunday in an attempt to grow numbers and build momentum towards 100 thousands people on the streets in spring next year.

Continue ReadingJust Stop Oil London protests continue, Extinction Rebellion make a weekend of it

Tories slammed for imposing windfall tax on renewable energy but not fossil fuel giants

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/government-accused-of-double-standard-for-imposing-windfall-tax-on-renewable-energy%20but%20not%20fossil%20fuel%20giants

Greenpeace UK policy director Dr Doug Parr said: “Was it just a dream or did we all hear the Prime Minister say, just weeks ago, she was against a windfall tax?

“Now she’s going to impose a de facto one after all but only on electricity generators, not a proper one on oil and gas firms.

“This glaring double standard makes no sense. It’s almost as if Liz Truss’s belief in the free market only applied to big polluters.

“Of course, it’s right that industries profiting from the energy crisis should give up lots of their extra cash to help people struggling with their bills, but then why is the government refusing to properly tax fossil fuel giants?”

Continue ReadingTories slammed for imposing windfall tax on renewable energy but not fossil fuel giants

George Monbiot: I’m part of the ‘anti-growth coalition’ Liz Truss loves to hate – and I’m proud of it

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https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/oct/12/liz-truss-anti-growth-coalition-class-power

,,,

For many years, a small band of us “voices of decline” and “enemies of enterprise” who “don’t understand aspiration” have been trying to point out that increments in gross domestic product do not equate to increments in happiness. We have argued that no one wins the human race. We have sought to explain that what mainstream economists call progress is what ecologists call planetary ruin. We’ve contended that infinite growth on a finite planet is a recipe for catastrophe. I hope Liz Truss is right to claim that so many people now accept our arguments.

Even if this coalition is not yet as broad as she suggests, she seems determined to widen it. Her plans to rip down planning controls, to cut public services, deregulate business, crush protests, unleash exploitation and destroy economic security, all in the name of boosting the rate of economic growth, could scarcely be better calculated to reveal the difference between GDP and prosperity.

Is our prosperity enhanced by increasing the volume of sewage in our rivers and on our beaches? No. It may boost the profits of the water companies and the remuneration of their directors, very little of which – unlike the effluent they release – will trickle down into our lives. Will a new roadbuilding programme enhance our lives? Not if, as new roads always do, it pushes congestion to the next bottleneck, while increasing noise, pollution and the destruction of landscapes. Will we be happier if the regulations protecting workers and consumers are stripped away? No. We will find that our health, wealth and wellbeing decline, even as the companies exploiting us become richer. Our lives do not grow in these circumstances. They are shrunk by poverty, pollution, poor health and exploitation.

dizzy: As a blogger, I should only quote small excerpts of copyrighted works and as a rule of thumb I tend to go for 3 paragraphs of newspaper articles. I recommend the rest of Monbiot’s article.

Continue ReadingGeorge Monbiot: I’m part of the ‘anti-growth coalition’ Liz Truss loves to hate – and I’m proud of it