GreenPartyNews The newsletter for
Green Party supporters
#greensurge Membership overtakes UKIP and the LibDems!
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Jan/Feb 2015
SEE THE NEW CAMPAIGNS & EVENTS PAGE – JOIN IN WITH THE ACTION!
MEDIA ATTACKS ON THE GREENS – DON’T BELIEVE ANY OF IT!
GREEN PARTY MEMBERSHIP TRIPLES IN ONE YEAR TO OVER 50,000!
CONTENTS
Please click on the red titles to connect to that page.
REGULAR 3 Hot News/Editorial
Amazing surge in membership continues!
4 Message from Natalie Bennett
Natalie advises on how to combat negative media coverage of the Green Party.
Watch the Leaders’ Debate on TV - Broadcasters have published new plans for TV election debates which now include the Greens and leaders of six other UK political parties.
5 Campaigns & Events
New section! Up and coming demos and events plus social media sites where you can make an impact.
6 Caroline Lucas MP Caroline debates in the Houses of Parliament on Trident and the fracking industry
8 Green Party MEPs News from Jean lambert, Keith Taylor and Molly Scott Cato on their work in the European Parliament.
14 Green pioneers Donella Meadows – best known as lead author of the Limits to Growth, the work stimulated the formation of the Green Party.
15 Who’s Who in the Green Party
TALKING POINT 10 Green means ecology
Richard Lawson on the fundamentals of Green politics
f NATIONAL WEBSITE www.greenparty.org.uk MEMBERS WEBSITE
FEATURES
https://my.greenparty.org.uk/
11 Veganism – the green diet
Green Party News
The green case for veganism.
13 Citizens Basic Income
Clive Lord adds his perspective to this Green Party policy.
Send your comments, contributions, ideas and enquiries to: internalcommunications@greenparty.org.uk Editor: Peter Barnett Design: cherry.lifework@gmail.com
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HotNews! 50,000 The #greensurge continues with current Green Party membership figures up from under 15,00 in Jan 14 to over 50,000 members at January 2015. This means the Green Party has overtaken UKIP and the LibDems!
15,000 January 2014 to January 2015 EDITORIAL by NATALIE BENNETT, LEADER WITH less than 100 days to go to the General Election, the Green Party of England and Wales (GPEW) are stepping up the case for an end to austerity. The Green Party is experiencing an unprecedented membership surge and is polling at its highest levels ahead of a General Election for decades. GPEW membership passed 50,000 this week and combined UK Green parties membership is fast approaching 60,000. Natalie Bennett, Green Party Leader, said: “Today is a day of opportunity. It marks the start of a countdown to one of the most competitive and unpredictable elections
in living memory – an election when the British public have a chance to vote for genuine political change. “The hold of the traditional political parties on Westminster is breaking up and so is the belief that we have to stick with an economic and political system that has concentrated wealth and power in the hands of a privileged few whilst the rest of us are left to suffer at the hands of the austerity agenda. “We don’t believe politics has to be 3
like this – and if the Greek elections have taught us anything it is that when enough people come together to demand change, change can be delivered. “We urge everyone to make sure they are registered to vote and that they are ready on 7 May to have their say. The politics of the future doesn’t have to look like the politics of the past. Let’s get ready to change politics and build a fairer, more sustainable society that works for all.”
MESSAGE FROM NATALIE BENNETT “The Green Surge will inevitably mean more scrutiny of our policies and an increase in negative media coverage. This is to be expected and is something we should all prepare for.” Combatting bad press One of the things that makes us different is the fact that our policies are democratically decided by our members in a process that culminates in party conferences that take place twice a year. We are 100% transparent about what our policies are and they are published on our policy website This transparency does leave us open to attack from journalists who can trawl through our website and give their own spin to the policy statements published there. A recent Telegraph article is a good example of how the Green Party’s fine sentiments can be twisted into a sensationalist headline. As the Leader of the Green Party it is my job to promote and defend our membermade policies as best I can. For the avoidance of any doubt the Green Party is wholly opposed to violence. ISIS (or Islamic State) is a violent and horrific organisation – anyone involved in it should be dealt with through the criminal justice system. Anyone who is involved in violence – be it the violent act itself, the planning of violent acts, or the financing of violent acts – is a criminal and should be dealt with through the criminal justice system.
Being a member of the Green Party means signing up to a commitment to peace and non-violence, as reflected by our commitment to the abolition of Trident nuclear weapons and our opposition to the Iraq and Afghan wars. People should be free to believe in whatever they want to – but supporting organisations that use violence against members of the public to advance their cause is a criminal act and should be treated as such. The other major issue that has excited sections of the media is the Citizen’s’ Income (or Universal Basic Income). This is a long-standing Green Party policy and is about recasting the social security system so that it is fit for the twenty-first century. Universal Basic Income is about providing economic security for everyone, removing the benefits trap, making work pay, and ensuring a reasonable work/life balance so that people get to spend more time on the things that matter most. We will include a fully-costed proposal in our General Election manifesto but until that point we will not be releasing costings. The BBC and others are bandying figures around but these are not Green Party figures and should not be taken as such. 4
We will not win every battle with the media but that should not stop us from being bold, courageous and ambitious in setting out our vision for a Green society.
Don’t believe what you read in the papers! It is NOT Green Party policy: To put the Queen in a council house - a malicious lie derived from taking an obviously playful remark to be a factual policy statement. It is NOT Green Party policy: To remove all immigration controls and an have open door policy in 20 years time - a wilful distortion of taking the bottom end of a vague estimate - in fact our policy is to remove immigration controls at an unspecified time in the future when the pressures to migrate have been mitigated on a more equal and peaceful planet.
MUST READ: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/ian-middleton/green-partypolicy_b_6551676.html?utm_hp_ref=ukpolitics&ir=UK+Politics
CAMPAIGNS & EVENTS
Join in ...
TIME TO ACT CLIMATE
GREEN PARTY CAMPAIGNS campaigns@greenparty.org.uk Twitter @gpewcampaigns Facebook: /gpewcampaigns
MARCH
March 7, London. See www. campaigncc.org/TimetoAct
Young voters need to register!
HELP FUND A CAMPAIGN! if you would like to donate money or resources please visit www.greenparty.org.uk
Robert Lindsay Actually, everyone needs to ensure they are registered to vote, but it’s particularly an issue with students who are not at their parents’ address. You can register online in just five minutes (you need your National Insurance number) here https://www.gov.uk/ register-to-vote Students can register both at their home and their university address and can vote in local elections at both places, though they can only vote once for the national election. The Green Party membership lists for Newcastle were checked
f HELP SPREAD THE GREEN MESSAGE ON SOCIAL MEDIA!
THE FRACK STOPS HERE! County Hall, Preston, Lancashire PR1 8RL. 28 Jan at 9.00am and 29 Jan at 5.00pm. See https:// www.facebook.com/events/15 24388561165172/?ref=3&ref_ newsfeed_story_type=regular
Please help us reach as many people as possible on Twitter by following this account and retweeting. Please ‘Like’ our Facebook and add photos and details of your campaigning activities. SUPPORT THE GREEN PARTY FOR A BETTER FUTURE FACEBOOK https://www.facebook.com/ groups/421623437897519/
RAILWAYS FOR PEOPLE, NOT PROFIT The Green Party wants public transport back in public hands. The railways should exist to provide a good service to commuters and travellers, not a honey pot for big business. In 1993, the Tories sold off the railways to a number of private firms such as Virgin, Arriva and Stagecoach.
Over 20 years later, the public subsidy to private rail companies is three times what it was in the days of British Rail.
• The Tories claimed they would provide better and cheaper services than state-owned British Rail had.
Investment has been low and Britain has some of the highest rail fares in Europe while private companies take out huge profits, costing customers and taxpayers alike.
• They claimed British Rail wasted taxpayers’ money. • They claimed they would invest in a rail system Britain would be proud of.
Greens say we can do better than this!
BACK IN PUBLIC HANDS
Carbon cuts not climate chaos
Green Party MP Caroline Lucas is proposing a Bill for renationalisation of the railways.
Nationalise the railways join.green
party.org.uk
ACTION FOR RAIL Promoted by and on behalf of the Green Party, 56-64 Leonard Street, Development House, London, EC2A 4LT. Printed by a supporter from http://www.greenparty.org.uk/. Designed by www.lifework.biz Photo: iStockphoto
Combat Climate Change
join.greenparty.org.uk
Promoted by Howard Thorp on behalf of the Green Party, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London, EC2A 4LT. Printed on 100% recycled paper by Acanthus Press Ltd, Unit 21, Ryelands Farm, Bagley Road, Wellington TA21 9PZ. Photo: iStockphoto©SteveStone. Designed by www.lifework.biz
Poster12V1print.indd 3
17/03/2014 09:59
We need activists to distribute our new Railways for People not Profit flyers (out soon) at as many stations as possible. 27 February – Railways Bill comes up in the House of Commons for its second reading and a vote - it needs to pass if it’s to go forward to the Committee stage. 5
against the electoral register after Christmas, and 21% of our own members were not on the electoral register – 44% of those in the Young Greens category. It’s vital we not only get our own members to register to vote, but encourage other residents to do so, especially the younger folk, so that those very healthy Green polls like here http://www.theguardian. com/politics/2014/dec /27/ young-voters-shun-ukip-farageclegg-lib-dems-general-election translate into votes in May. The unregistered members have, of course, all had an email, but for non-members we’ll all have to do a lot more door-knocking, especially of shared houses.
CAROLINE LUCAS MP Over the next 30 years, the UK’s set to shell out a staggering £100 billion on renewing our Trident nuclear defence system. So alongside the SNP and Plaid Cymru, I was pleased yesterday to co-sponsor an Opposition debate on why that shouldn’t happen. Disappointingly, for the second time in a little over a week, Labour (with a few honourable exceptions) sided with the Conservatives, and opposed us. Their auto-justification is that Trident keeps us safe. Yet that position isn’t even supported by many defence experts themselves. The former head of the British Armed Forces has described our nuclear weapons as ‘completely useless’ and ‘virtually irrelevant’. In 2007, Cold War defence and foreign policy leaders Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, Sam Nunn and William Perry, argued in the Wall Street Journal that reliance on nuclear weapons for deterrence was ‘becoming increasingly hazardous and decreasingly effective’. Yet Ministers persist in claiming that nuclear weapons are vital for our security. But when I asked the Secretary of State whether he agreed that the logic of his
Caroline protesting at Faslane against Trident when she was a Green MEP.
People must come before Trident “When the impact of spending £100 billion is so huge, I’d argue it’s inconsistent to be pro Trident and pro a better education system, pro ending the housing crisis or pro our NHS. Trident is a political vanity project, irrelevant for our real security needs.” argument should mean he supported all nations in the world seeking to acquire nuclear weapons to protect their security too, he was unable to answer me. The world has moved light years since the Cold War. Terror has changed its form. Today, nuclear weapons simply divert massive resources from real security threats. The Government has itself stated that the main security threats we face today are terrorism and cyber-attacks. The MoD thinks coastal flooding, climate-driven migration and rising food prices due to drought and water stress will pose a far greater security risk than anything a nuclear weapon might help us with. On that, I agree with them. The best deterrent is to redouble our efforts to work with other nations to address global threats like fossil-fuel-induced climate disruption, transnational trafficking in weapons, people and drugs, and the poverty and desperation which fuel conflicts, hunger and violence around the world. 6
Trident is a political vanity project, irrelevant for our real security needs.And what a vanity project it is, at a cool £100 billion. It would, of course, be illegal for us to actually use it. Which means the Government is unlawfully squandering billions on a warhead that it cannot ever justify using under international law. Which, some might (and do) suggest, lacks a certain common sense. It’s even more outrageous when the austerity axe is hacking away at housing, health, education, public sector jobs and social security. From 2010-11 to 2015-16 core central government funding to local authorities is being slashed by 40 per cent and, with it, essential public services. Think what we could do with £100 billion over 30 years. Last year, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) published People not Trident, which considered just that. Investing that money wisely, it found,
could create 2 million jobs, compared to 7,000 as a result of Trident. It could build us hundreds of thousands of new homes. In Brighton, sky-high rents mean nurses and health workers are having to move away. We currently have 18,000 people on the waiting list for housing. The Government should be increasing the direct capital grant to Local Authorities so they can invest in a mass programme of sustainable council housing. When the impact of spending £100 billion is so huge, I’d argue it’s inconsistent to be pro Trident and pro ending the housing crisis. In Brighton, as in many parts of the country, our A&E faces crisis, while nurses are being denied even a miserly 1% wage increase. But the £100 billion earmarked for Trident could fully fund all A&E services in hospitals for 40 years. It could cover the cost of building 180 new state of the art hospitals. It could employ 150,000 new nurses for the next three decades. When the impact of spending £100 billion is so huge, I’d argue it’s inconsistent to be pro Trident and pro our NHS. This Government has cut the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA), lifted the cap on tuition fees and forced schools to enter into partnerships with private companies. £100 billion could pay the tuition fees of over 4 million students. It could reinstate EMA for 60 years, enabling students to afford books, transport and college materials. It could build as many as 30,000 primary schools – or refurbish thousands more. Instead of nuclear warheads we could – and should – be investing in our children’s future. When the impact of spending £100 billion is so huge, I’d argue it’s inconsistent to be pro Trident and pro a better education system. People must come before Trident.
CAROLINE’S Statement in response to Infrastructure Bill debate, 26 January, 2015
Government determined to force fracking at any cost “Today’s debate was farcical – so little time was given that we weren’t even able to bring the trespass amendment to vote. That amendment sought to prevent fracking companies being awarded sweeping new powers to frack beneath your home without your consent – a move opposed by 99% of respondents to the Government’s own consultation. It was backed in a petition by 360,000 people. When it came to a freeze on fracking, Labour abstained. Instead they served up their own superficial tweaks, lacking in detail and riddled with loopholes. Additional provisions, accepted by Government, to rule out fracking in the South
Downs, other protected areas and groundwater protection zones, are welcome and a sign that public pressure is forcing politicians to listen. The strength of public feeling on this issue is palpable – and I think it’s intensified still further in the face of the astonishing lack of transparency, lack of accountability and lack of regard for the views of voters. People won’t be silenced on this.” She added: “In the run up to the crucial Paris climate talks later this year, the pressure to ditch plans for fracking and instead invest in clean home-grown renewable energy will continue to grow.”
Caroline is a member of the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC), Co-Chair of the All-Party Fuel Poverty and Energy Efficiency Group, and Parliamentary Champion of the Energy Bill Revolution campaign. Caroline wrote on today’s EAC report and the Infrastructure Bill debate for the Huffington Post – you can find the piece here
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GREEN PARTY MEPS
Jean Lambert – London, Keith Taylor – South East and Molly Scott Cato – South West
Apple - biggest profits ever made by a company
Green MEPs Jean Lambert, Keith Taylor and Molly Scott Cato say beware TTIP – the USA/EU trade agreement which can sue governments and abolish workers’ rights.
Syriza victory in Greek Election
26 January – Green Party MEPs Keith Taylor and Molly Scott Cato issued a joint statement after Syriza won the General Election in Greece. The Greek Ecologist Green Party, part of the European Green Party, took part in a joint election campaign with Syriza, which now sees them join a left coalition government in Greece. In a joint statement issued this morning by Keith Taylor Green MEP for South East England and Molly Scott Cato Green MEP for South West England, they said: “The result of the Greek elections has shown that the people of Greece have taken a strong stand against the politics of austerity. Greens share the view of the new government that austerity is a failed model which has piled misery on the poorest while making the wealthiest even richer. This result shows that challenging business 8
Molly Scott Cato MEP says “While people go hungry and austerity politics stalks the world, corporations like Apple literally have more money than they know what to do with. We need politicians to address the issue of tax avoidance and to challenge the power of these vast corporations.” Apple’s record profits – iPhone 6 sales net £120bn with 74.5m iPhones sold in three months pre-Christmas 2014 Allegations over ‘minimising’ tax in the U.S. Along with giants such as Amazon, Google and eBay. Apple and other multi-national companies are accused of using complex schemes to minimise their tax bills. Apple amass a cash pile larger than the total market value of Disney, Pepsi or Amazon.
as usual politics can win the support of the people. In the UK we are witnessing a Green Surge, in no small part due to our anti-austerity agenda, and we hope the Greek election result marks the beginnings of ordinary people standing up to a discredited economic model and failing Governments across Europe.” For more information or to request an interview please contact: Joe Ryle (Press Officer for Keith Taylor MEP) keithpress@greenmeps.org.uk Andrew Bell (Media Officer to Molly Scott Cato MEP) media@mollymep.org.uk See more at: http://www.keithtaylormep. org.uk/2015/01/26/uk-green-mepsrelease-statement-after-syriza-win-greekelection/#sthash.Yi0L3OCt.dpuf
GREEN PARTY MEPS
European Parliament GMO vote will mean ‘more GMOs not less’ 13 January – MEPs in the European Parliament voted for a final time today in favour of allowing member states to legally ban or restrict Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) in their territories. The result of the vote was 480 in favour and 159 against. 58 abstained. However, by giving member states more power to ‘opt-out’ on GMOs many campaigners and politicians fear this will actually make it easier for pro-GM Governments to ‘opt-in’ and therefore enable more GMOs. An email sent by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs in December 2014 said that as a result of this new legislation ‘we now expect to see GM Maize 1507 get its final authorisation in the near future, and new applications should be approved much more quickly than has been the case until now’. Keith Taylor Green MEP for South East England who voted against the new proposals today said: “This agreement is not all it seems. While giving EU countries new powers to ban GMOs – I believe what this will mean in reality for the UK is more GMOs not fewer. This is because our pro-GM Government are now able to give the go-ahead to more authorisations.
I remain convinced that GMOs cause contamination of crops, are bad for our health and that small scale sustainable agriculture is the answer to solving future food shortages”. See more at: http://www.keithtaylormep. org.uk/2015/01/13/european-parliamentgmo-vote-will-mean-more-gmos-notless/#sthash.9ay8qaLm.dpuf
End to ivory trading 26/01/2015 – Wildlife is in crisis. The numbers of elephants lost to poaching is climbing ever higher. Clearly, urgent and immediate action is needed to stop the slaughter of elephants for their ivory. It is currently estimated that 100 elephants are being slaughtered by poachers every single day. Attending a peaceful demonstration outside the Chinese embassy on Saturday, 24 January, Jean Lambert, Green MEP for London, said: ‘It is a shocking, cruel and unnecessary trade. The Chinese Government can make a big difference in ending this cruelty, but there’s a need to engage with those who work with ivory and also buyers in order to change attitudes and quell demand.’ As the world’s leading consumer of ivory, the role of China in ensuring the survival 9
of African elephants cannot be underestimated. China can improve its global reputation by putting an end to its engagement in the ivory trade. See more at: http://www.jeanlambertmep. org.uk/2015/01/26/demonstrationchinese-embassy-stop-elephantdecline/#sthash.iUTIYBk7.dpuf
Guantánamo demo Jean attended a demonstration outside the U.S Embassy this month – it’s 13 years since Guantánamo bay opened, now 148 prisoners remain held arbitrarily, almost wholly without charge or trial. Giving a short speech, Jean’s key points were: • We need to remember all victims of terrorism, including those in Nigeria, Pakistan and many other countries. • The European Parliament will continue to pursue the truth about what our national Governments have done – need to apply consistent, not double standards. • We hope that David Cameron’s trip to the USA this week will see Shaker Aamer return to his family in London. The London Guantánamo Campaign has been campaigning since 2006 for the return of all British residents, the release of all prisoners, and of course the closure of this prison. Follow @ShutGuantanamo
TALKING POINT
Green means ecology by Richard Lawson The Ecology Party changed its name to Green Party back in 1985 not because we moved away from the ideal of political ecology but because you could see people’s eyes glaze over when they heard the ‘-ology’ bit. The philosophical basis of our party is still firmly rooted in ecological thinking, that is, in a world view that sees humankind in its natural setting, a delicate web of life stretched thinly across this beautiful, blue and white planet that is our home. In basing our thinking on our dependence on the natural world, we stand apart from the ancient left-right, socialist-individualist dilemmas of the old politics, who see ‘Man’, whether viewed as a social entity or as an individual entity, as a god-like self-existent being. Having said that, it is true that humans are a social animal like dolphins and wolves, rather than solitary animals such
as bears. This means that individualism, the dominant political philosophy of our age that gives rise to free market capitalism, neo-conservatism, neo-liberalism and all the other self-oriented drivers of our age, is simply wrong from a scientific point of view. This is not to say that Greens do not wish to maximise the liberty of the individual, so long as that liberty does not limit the liberty of others. Human are social animals. Does that mean therefore that we are a socialist party? That depends on what is meant by socialism. There are a vast array of socialist parties on the market, all 100% convinced that they are the one and only true socialist party, all convinced that all other parties (including us) are fakes and traitors to the socialist cause. In this way, socialist parties behave exactly like religious sects who base their existence on the correct interpretation of an absolute Truth. Torah, Bible, Koran, Das Kapital – these are all texts that are believed
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by their adherents to be absolutely true, and all generate schism as different authorities make different interpretations. Learned eco-socialists may protest that Marx mentioned the environment more than once. But christian greens may point to a few places in the Bible also where it is mentioned that it is not right to kill trees and poison wells. It is fine to be a green christian or a green socialist or a green anything else, so long as we remember that what binds us together is our common interest in the ecosphere that sustains our life. So the Green Party has no sacred text. A few may try to put Policies for a Sustainable Society into that position, but any reading of it shows that it has more internal self contradictions than the Bible. It is very much a text written by fallible people struggling to understand something much bigger than words. Nature itself, and our best way of interacting with it and each other, is our Book. Left and right are absolute opposites, in their own terms. But society and individual, the state and the market, all exist within a larger matrix – the matrix of a dynamic living reality, the biosphere. Ecological thinking is a big tent, one with no single top-hatted and be-whipped ringmaster, no absolute text, just a living milieu all around us that is being trashed by foolish and short-sighted economic policies. In relating to this all-encompassing ecosphere, and in focusing our minds on changing a destructive economy into constructive economic and political actions that serve the interests of all living beings, we Greens can heal the conflict ridden politics of our age.
FEATURE “Meat eaters in developed countries will have to eat a lot less meat, cutting consumption by 50%, to avoid the worst consequences of future climate change.”
Veganism: The Green diet by Marcus Dredge, Lincoln Green Party Social commentators over at Freakonomics asked why many in the environmentalist movement obsess over the evils of coal, yet neglect the huge issues caused through our use of animals. The article is entitled Agnostic Carnvivores and Global Warming: Why Enviros go after Coal and not Cows and it certainly makes a fair assertion: “Forget ending dirty coal or natural gas pipelines. As the WPF report shows veganism offers the single most effective path to reducing global climate change.” Switching animal products makes little difference, nor does being a locavore: “The evidence is powerful. Eating a vegan diet is seven times more effective at reducing emissions than eating a local meat-based diet. A global vegan diet would reduce dietary emissions by 87 percent, compared to a token 8 percent for ‘sustainable meat and dairy.’ In light of the fact that the overall environmental impact of livestock is greater than that of burning coal, natural gas, and crude oil...” Freakonomics conclude: “I’d suggest McKibben, 350.org, and the environmental movement as a whole trade up their carnivorous agnosticism for a fire and brimstone dose of vegan fundamentalism.” Animal farming has been proven to produce higher levels of greenhouse gases
Make this yummy Vegan Pesto Pasta! 1 lb. pasta 2 garlic cloves 2 cups packed fresh basil leaves 1/2 cup pine nuts 1/4 cup olive oil 1/4 cup hot water Salt, to taste
than any other sector of industry. Cows especially, as ruminants farmed for their meat and dairy, produce a lot of methane, as much as 51%, as shown by a study from The World Watch Institute on behalf of The World Bank. Non-ruminants such as chickens still consume vast quantities of grain. Often it takes eight to twelve kilos of plant protein to produce one kilo of animal protein. 60% of global grain production goes to farmed 11
Cook the pasta according to the package directions. Combine the garlic, basil leaves, and pine nuts in a blender and process on low speed. With the blender running, slowly add the olive oil, followed by the hot water. Add salt to taste and continue processing until the pesto is smooth and creamy. Drain the pasta and toss in the pesto sauce. Makes 4 to 6 servings From The Compassionate Cook
Diagram: Domestication as a driver in species extinction animals. With 925 million humans lacking enough food, needlessly breeding non-human animals then feeding them this way seems a criminally selfish act of negligence. The grain is often produced in ecologically sensitive areas such as the cleared Amazon Rainforest, where 80% of the soya produced is used to fatten up farmed animals. Around the world 85% of the total clearance is done in order to make space for cattle ranching. Meanwhile with 884 million people lacking access to clean water it takes 2400 gallons to produce one pound of meat. That’s a total of 235 trillion gallons of clean water annually just to produce meat alone. Truly a food stuff of the self-appointed ‘global elite’. Topsoil is being destroyed, previously fertile land is increasingly made barren and native plant species are becoming extinct, as are wild animal species, pushed out of existence as this monolithic global animal farm spreads. Currently nearly one third of the earth’s surface is covered by farm animals. It’s not just the big environmental groups who are afraid to rock the boat and offend
their vastly omnivorous membership base. Former vice-president of the USA, Al Gore, is much vaunted for his impressive An Inconvenient Truth lecture and admirable missionary zeal in educating the public on the threat of climate change, yet he failed to make one reference to livestock impacts during his entire film. In fact the only cows that feature in the documentary are those used to positively make reference to the Gore family business of cattle ranching. The companion book did make clear the significance of animal product reduction and Al has since stated that: “It’s absolutely correct that the growing meat intensity of diets around the world is one of the issues connected to this global crisis – not only because of the CO2 involved, but also because of the water consumed in the process.” In March of 2014 Gore confirmed he was now vegan, stating that: “Over a year ago I changed my diet to a vegan diet, really just to experiment to see what it was like. And I felt better, so I continued with it. Now for many people that choice is connected to environmental ethics and health issues and all that stuff, but I just wanted to try it to see what it was like. In a visceral way, I felt better, so I’ve continued with it and I’m likely to continue it for the rest of my life.” Buoyed by Al Gore’s veganism, prominent UK environmentalist and journalist, George Monbiot, finally came down in favour of the position. This decision was based largely on his findings while researching the book Feral, which focused on rewilding. He rescinded his previous opinions that animal agriculture could be done sustainably and that there are better uses of the Lake District’s hills (one example being reafforestation) than allowing them to become ‘sheepwrecked’ by the destructive, non-native grazers farmed by humans 12
In 2006 the United Nations specialist Food and Agriculture Organization presented the report Livestock’s Long Shadow, with the study’s authors concluding that more intensified factory farming would be required to meet demand, a suggestion that fails to consider both the interests of the other animals who are being used, or whether animal farming need take place at all. Sadly with an ever-growing human population, and animal products occupying a place as a food of status and social climbing, the amount of animals farmed continues to rise. This is despite the evident truths regarding dietary impacts and the scientific consensus regarding anthropogenic climate change. Paul MacCready notes that when agriculture began, humans, their livestock and pets accounted for less than 0.1 percent of the total. Today he estimates this group accounts for 98 percent of the earth’s total vertebrate biomass, leaving only 2 percent for the wild portion. Prominent film director and environmentalist, James Cameron, announced his veganism as an ethical imperative: “It’s not a requirement to eat animals, we just choose to do it, so it becomes a moral choice and one that is having a huge impact on the planet, using up resources and destroying the biosphere.” A plant-based diet just happens to be one of the healthiest ways of eating yet we continue to unnecessarily inflict suffering on other animals and threaten the very sustainability of this one planet all species depend upon. Ecological concerns are a good reason to go vegan; it’s easily done and if you need any assistance do drop a line to: http://veganoutreachuk.blogspot.co.uk/ search/label/activism
FEATURE
For more information visit www.clivelord.wordpress.com
Citizens’ Basic Income (CBI) by Clive Lord The Citizens’ (Basic) Income (CBI), a regular sum of money given to everybody instead of means tested benefits to a few poor people was discussed in the last Green Activist. The idea has also appeared in the Guardian with a multitude of comments. Not quite mainstream yet, but a good start. I have been pleading for the Citizens’ or Basic Income to be a leading Green Party policy for over 40 years, and it is salutary for me to be reminded of the huge misunderstandings. The Green Activist article covered most of the bases well. Two points are worth elaborating. The CBI must cover housing costs. But Housing Benefit is huge, due to distortions caused by short sighted solutions, so the tax on the better off would frighten them too much. At this (election) stage, Green Party policy will be a generous Job Seekers Allowance equivalent to everybody, paid for by abolishing the tax free personal allowance. This will be tax neutral, to get people used to the principle. The Green Activist article is concerned that the CBI might enable bosses to pay lower wages. Let me explain why this won’t happen generally, but why I approve of it where it does.
3 The CBI can be the basis for a reconciliation between ‘left’ and ‘right’, or workers and bosses. No one will have to work, but they will be better off if they do, and employers will have to make it worth their while. But on the other hand a struggling entrepreneur can offer lower wages where he would otherwise go out of business, and employ nobody. The main thing which needs stressing now – and in the election campaign – is that the CBI ends the poverty trap. This is where major misunderstandings persist. Iain Duncan Smith has hoodwinked the entire Labour party with his demonising scroungers mantra. He was quite right to identify MEANS TESTING as a problem. Withdrawal of benefits operates as a tax which is massive in proportion to low incomes, but negligible to everyone else. Everybody who doesn’t receive means tested benefits pays this disguised, but very real tax.
For me there are THREE reasons for a CBI. 1 It is redistributive, reducing inequality, and it is FAIR in a way the present system is not. It will allow millions of ordinary individuals to contemplate a recession without fear. 2 The Green Party was founded in response to the ‘Limits to Growth’ MIT study (1972) which warned that indiscriminate economic growth would risk wrecking the planet
Means testing is seriously wrong, and must be got rid of. Duncan Smith’s way is workfare (working for benefits only) benefit sanctions, the bedroom tax, the 1% benefits cap and Work Capability Assessments. In other words, 19th century ideological nastiness. The only other way is to give everybody basic subsistence, and take it from those who don’t need it through the tax system. All this is given, chapter and verse in a very surprising source: Dynamic Benefits: towards Welfare that works. Search for the Centre for Social Justice – an Duncan Smith Think Tank – click ‘Publications’ and go to September 2009. The second part is specious rubbish. It introduces the Universal Credit. But the first part cannot be bettered as the unintentional case for the CBI, with a series of graphs showing the withdrawal of means tested benefits as though they were taxes. Look at page 88, and (from memory) page 162. One of our worst enemies has given us the ammunition to destroy him.
Marginal Tax rate (the amount you lose from each extra £ earned)
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GREEN PIONEERS Who was Donella Meadows? By David Flint Donella Meadows (1941 to 2001) was an award-winning environmental scientist and writer. She is best known as lead author of the Limits to Growth, 1972, a study which predicted global collapse unless urgent action was taken to restrain growth. This work stimulated the formation of the Green Party (which was then called People) in 1973. Donella Meadows (nee Hagar) was born in Illinois. She earned a BA in Chemistry and a PhD in biophysics from Harvard then became a research fellow at MIT. There she was part of Jay Forrester’s team, applying systems thinking to a variety of complex problems, and was lead author of The Limits to Growth.
DIAGRAM OF THE LIMITS TO THROUGHPUT FROM THE CONSERVER SOCIETY BY MARY IVER (1979)
She taught at Dartmouth College from 1972 to 2001 and for 16 years wrote a weekly newspaper column – ‘The Global Citizen’ – applying systems thinking to world events. She received a number of awards for her work including a Pew Scholarship, a MacArthur ‘genius’ Fellowship, the Walter C. Paine Science Education Award and, posthumously, the John H. Chafee Excellence in Environmental Affairs Award. In her later years she lived in an organic farm-based community in Vermont. Meadows died at 59 of bacterial meningitis. Meadows’ most important book was undoubtedly the Limits to Growth. The book reported attempts by Meadows and her co-workers to understand the global economic /industrial/ environmental system using the methods of systems dynamics. The authors built a computer model, World3, which showed the relationships between population, industrialization, pollution, food 14
production and resources. They then ran the model repeatedly using a variety of assumptions about both the actual numbers and the relationships between them. The major finding was that the most likely result if we continued with ‘business as usual’ was a collapse of the whole system sometime in the 21st century. The immediate cause of the collapse might, depending on the assumptions, be the exhaustion of key resources or an excess of pollution. The result would be a major decline in world population and production; a true catastrophe. The authors showed that this could be avoided by determined and timely action. The work was attacked by many people but often for not doing things it did not claim to do – making specific predictions. Meadows’ work remains controversial though attitudes seem to owe more to prior assumptions than to analysis. In general, scientists accept its general message whilst economists reject it. The same arguments can be seen in relation to climate change which is, arguably, a special case of Meadows’ argument. For more information see: Kolankiewicz, Leon, 2001: Donella Meadows - A Tribute. Social Contract Press. Volume 11, Number 4 (2001). http://www. thesocialcontract.com/artman2/publish/ tsc1104/article_985.shtml The Donella Meadows Institute: http:// www.donellameadows.org/systemsthinking-resources/ Meadows, Donella, Randers, Jorgen and Meadows, Dennis, 2004: Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update.
WHO’S WHO IN THE GREEN PARTY HOUSE OF COMMONS
LEADERS
Caroline Lucas
Natalie Bennett
MP for Brighton Pavilion House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA clucasmedia@parliament.uk Twitter: @CarolineLucas Facebook: /caroline/page www.carolinelucas.com Cath Miller – Chief of Staff Jenny Williams – Press Officer
Leader leader@greenparty.org.uk www.nataliebennett.co.uk Twitter: @natalieben Facebook: /GreenNatalieBennett
HOUSE OF LORDS Shahrah Ali
EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT
Jean Lambert MEP for London jeanlambert@greenmeps.org.uk www.jeanlambertmep.org.uk Twitter: @GreenJeanMEP Facebook: /GreenJeanMEP UK OFFICE Danny Bates – constituency co-coordinator and researcher jeanlambert@greenmeps.org.uk Claire Norman – PR and media officer media@jeanlambertmep.org.uk BRUSSELS OFFICE Rachel Sheppard – Parliamentary Assistant to Jean Lambert jean.lambert@ep.europa.eu
Deputy Leader decouvrez@yahoo.com
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb jenny.jones@london.gov.uk Twitter: @greenjennyjones http://t.co/BA70H5w5MY http://t.co/6Isc6vT6Zl
Amelia Womack Deputy Leader amelia.womack@hotmail.com
Keith Taylor MEP for South East England www.keithtaylormep.org.uk Twitter: @GreenKeithMEP Facebook: /KeithTaylorMEP
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UK OFFICE Krysia Williams – Constituency Coordinator and Researcher keithtaylor@greenmeps.org.uk Joe Ryle – Press Officer keithpress@greenmeps.org.uk REGIONAL STAFF Eloise Shavelar – Hampshire & Isle of Wight eloiseshavelar@greenmeps.org.uk Anne Weinhold – Surrey and Sussex anne@greenmeps.org.uk BRUSSELS OFFICE Jo Sprackett – Parliamentary Assistant keith.taylor@europarl.europa.eu
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Molly Scott Cato MEP for the South West & Gibraltar http://mollymep.org.uk/ Molly.ScottCato@europarl.europa.eu Twitter: @MollyMEP Facebook: /molly.scottcato?fref=ts For all enquiries regarding Molly’s work in the European Parliament. Grace Murray – Parliamentary Assistant, molly.scottcato-office@ europarl.europa.eu For issues relating to the South west constituency or to invite Molly to attend an event. office@mollymep.org.uk For all enquiries relating to press and media Andrew Bell – Media Officer media@mollymep.org.uk