That 'C' word doesn't get much of an airing by MP's in the UK
Just one part of a Caroline Lucas's great speech from the weekend is copied below:

I spoke earlier about our analysis and our values.

Why those two words in particular? Because they sum up what we have to offer.

We see things differently.

I think we see them more clearly, because we don’t have any vested interests to get in the way.

We don’t come to an issue like criminal justice and ask – what will the editor of the Daily Mail think about this?

We don’t look at nuclear power and say – the most important thing here is what our pals in the nuclear industry want.

We don’t look at banking regulation and tax reform and say – how do we keep our friends in the city happy?

And it’s because we’re free of all those vested interests – all the corporate lobbying, all the kick-backs and secret donations and the rest of it – that we can see things clearly and speak the truth.

–

For years, we have spoken of the dangers our country faces from within.

How globalisation and unrestrained capitalism have been eating away at the fabric of our society.

How big corporations and cynical marketing have left people feeling manipulated and exploited.

How consumerism excludes those who don’t have money and enslaves those who do.

How, in a society where individuals are defined as consumers not as citizens, those who cannot afford to consume effectively become non-citizens .

And we’ve spelt out how this greed-based economy was built on sand.

On the myth of cheap resources and on exploitation.

Alienation. The undermining of community spirit.

These are the practical effects of decisions by government.

Starving local authorities of the means to provide alternatives for young people.

We pointed out how crime was a symptom of this malaise.

How unless you got to the roots of these issues, then building more prisons or putting more police on the streets would at best buy you some short-term relief – but at the expense of a worse problem in the future.

–

Well, now it is the future.

We’ve seen scenes on our streets that might have come from a dystopian sci-fi film.

A kind of collective madness in which trouble-makers and gang members are mixed up with ordinary people acting out of character.

Such behavior must be condemned.

But while some politicians have spoken at length about a sickness in society, perhaps the riots have shown most clearly a sickness with politics itself.

It fell to David Cameron to deliver this response – but it is one that might have come from Tony Blair or Gordon Brown, or Ed Miliband.

The first instinct of the typical politician is to shed responsibility and try to pin the blame elsewhere.

So we have attacks on the police not only from gangs on the streets, but from the Home Secretary and Prime Minister.

The truth is, the police faced an unprecedented situation and though there are lessons to be learned, recriminations are a distraction.

The second instinct is tough talk.

Talk of calling in the Army. Of water cannon and baton rounds.

Heavy sentencing, cutting benefits, making people homeless.

All panicky and unnecessary responses made against the advice of the experts.

The third is to use rhetoric to cover up inaction. So we have Cameron’s inane sound-bite about a security fightback being followed by a social fightback.

How wrong can he be? It’s not about society fighting back against alien invaders.

The people who took part in the riots are from our society.

They are our neighbours and our work colleagues. We sit next to them on the bus and visit the same shops.

Casting them into outer darkness is exactly what you would expect from a ruling cabal who will not accept that the divisions in society are largely of their making.

And where are they to go, these enemies of our society, when the fight-back has been won?

Prison? Internment camps?

I fear Cameron already has the answer in his mind – though he will not speak it clearly.

It’s the idea of ghettoes, where the undeserving poor can be kept and contained through heavy policing, CCTV surveillance, and the use of benefits as a stick to intimidate, without the need to use the courts, with their inconvenient interest in evidence and justice.

That is Cameron’s vision.

Read Full Speech here

This has been being shared back and forth on facebook, as status updates for a few days now. I have just been made aware of the source; Credit to Bradford Uncut. Of course 'cost' here is referring to the financial realm and does not acknowledge extra-economic costs which are considerable. It does offer remarkable perspective and useful soundbites for anti-capitalists and campaigners for social justice, whatever your flavour.

This is a brilliantly 'ecosocialist' approach to reducing 'anti-social' behavior.  We know if we 'grow our own' or support local agriculture we are significantly reducing our carbon footprint, as foods do not need to be transported long distances, we also can control directly the level to which our food is influenced by chemicals. In addition growing your own is a step toward creating cracks in capitalism as it is essentially a form of boycott; a move away from Monsanto and the like, and the corporate-media-political complex. And you know what, it feels good too, I have been growing my own for one year, and today ate Carrots, Courgettes, Runner Beans, Potato in a cheese sauce, the first meal I have had when my own produce dominated the plate, and I enjoyed it more than any meal I can remember, sure it was nice but knowing that food intimately from seed to plate enhanced the satisfaction, more than I could have imagined! But what has this got to do with anti-social behaviour? The concept is well-established; engaging community, cooperation and sharing around food production; (Community is something they used to have in the olden days for anyone my age or younger)  But cutting anti-social behaviour? Anti-social behaviour is often associated with young people (I refer to the London riots, Nick Clegg teenage arson attempt; apparently not charged, David Cameron, Boris Johnson and Bullingdon boys smashing windows on a friday night lash-up). But when I was 15 if you asked me to come down tut allotment and do some gardening I would probably have stubbed out my spliff in your eye and laughed at your ridiculous proposal. It would seem however that community agriculture has form, and staggeringly so, in a Manchester neighbourhood, anti-social behaviour has fallen by over 50% the reason according to police and community members is unanimous it is the local allotment. And you know what when I was 15 if you had told me that by getting involved in community agriculture I would be entering in to an anti-capitalist, grass-roots social movement and if you had taught me about the Zapastistas the landless farmers movements in Latin America, Hugo Blanco and the commons you would have got my attention, and I might even have shared my spliff with you instead.

In short in light of the riots the very real expression of the frustration, the hopelessness, the anger and the massive disengagement from community I would seriously urge the greens to explore this as a genuine policy response to recent events (maybe leave out the bits about spliffs and so on, I was only joking have never seen one before) It is realistic, practical and achievable. By no means a 'magic-bullet' to all of societies ills it is however not unreasonable to propose that with increased community engagement around food production that improved nutrition, increased school performance and over-all well-being could also be expected. 


In contrast the Conservatives would prefer to continue creating these problems and then appearing really stern when it all kicks off kind of like smoking when you've got already got lung cancer and offering aspirin for treatment. The greatest obscenity offered by our government in this age of austerity when interest in allotments has seen a boom unprecedented since the post-war years is the move announced by Ed Pickles to end the >100yr old law that dictates local authorities should provide land for local people to grow their own. What will cash strapped councils be forced to do with this allotment land? Unless we fight it I imagine we will see a lot more Tesco-Express and the like in their place and we will be increasingly forced toward civil disobedience. If you are young person what else are you likely to do anyway? go to the youth club? in my hometown  27 youth clubs have closed in the last year, access to all those community leaders was lost, was it really a surprise that in the summer holidays things kicked off?


Here is the article and video clip I have referred to:

In 2009, the early days of Landshare, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall visited a community allotment for local residents in Leigh, Greater Manchester, as part of a River Cottage programme. Two years on, the allotments are thriving, and local police are amazed to find that anti-social behaviour has fallen by over 50% in the area.

The community allotment is a joint venture between the Leigh Neighbourhood Policing Team and Wigan Council, and was spearheaded by two very determined ladies – Doreen and Marg. It was set up to encourage young people to take an interest in growing their own fruit and veg. Visiting the site, Hugh said:

“I am absolutely certain that it will make a real difference to the lives of dozens of kids. You can’t ask for more than that”.

He was right. Residents are able to take on individual allotment plots at the site, and the site is well used by young people. But local police are astounded by the massive drop in the amount of anti-social behaviour on the estate since the allotments were established, and believe that the allotments have had a significant impact on that fall in social problems. 

Local police who helped set up the allotments have reported an incredible fall in the amount of anti-social behaviour in the last two years since,  the allotments were established, and Police Community Support Officer Wendy Walters said, “In the past year there has been a staggering 51% reduction in Anti-Social behaviour on the estate”.

Locals agree that the allotments have had a positive effect on reducing anti-social behaviour. One of the local residents commented, “Over the past two years the estate has seen a great improvement in Anti-Social behaviour since the allotment started, I’m sure that this has had an effect giving children somewhere to go and something to do”.

Growing your own food is well known to have a positive effect on health, and recent research by the Food for Life Partnership also found that growing and eating healthy food in schools also improved the behaviour and performance of school pupils. The massive reduction in anti-social behaviour seen at Leigh Allotments is further evidence of the personal and social benefits of growing and eating healthy, fresh food with our families and local communities.

Thanks to Ian Cropton for the link.

Well every now and then a British politician says something about politics that I appreciate. I'm not accustomed to 'talking up' many of our MP's but credit where credit is due; perhaps if there were more like John McDonnell, Jeremy Corbyn and Caroline Lucas it would be easier to engage to a greater extent with politics as we know it, nonetheless after the baron wasteland of any sensible debate from any parliamentarians; John McDonnell's speech here is a breath of fresh of air, it really is:

Lib democrats infamous pre-electoral porky 'No more broken promises' has been regularly and appropriately mocked since the Con-Dem coalition came to power. However it would appear grains of truth can be found in Nick Clegg's pre-election work-up. Take this video for example when Nick Clegg expresses his view that if conservatives were to win then riots would be a serious risk. We are now on night three of the most notable scenes of civic unrest for a decade and it's spreading around London and is now crossing the country; flaring up in Birmingham. 

Court of appeal judges have quashed the convictions of 20 climate change protestors. The protestors were convicted of conspiracy to break into Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station in December last year, but those convictions have been
overturned after judges ruled that undercover police officer Mark Kennedy
was "involved in activities which went much further than the authorisation
he was given, and appeared to show him as an enthusiastic supporter of the
proposed occupation of the power station and, arguably, an agent
provocateur."

Green Party spokesperson Penny Kemp said: 

"These people were not terrorists, but were involved in peaceful direct action to bring about urgent political change where governments are failing to act. Infiltration of a peaceful group was a grossly disproportionate exercise and wasted an enormous amount of public money. Not only that, but Kennedy's actions continue to affect those whose trust he manipulated and abused. Those at Climate Camp and the Big Green Gathering were unfairly targeted for taking responsibility for our planet and for future generations." 

Caroline Lucas leader of the England & Wales Green party has entered the debate on human population. I should point out that I have not read the source document or transcription (if there is one) and the quotes come from a recent Guardian article about the Beckhams 4th child. 

I agree completely with this quote:

 "The lesson to be learned from China is surely that efforts to curb population growth in a way that restricts individual liberty are dangerous and come at huge human cost," and. "Policies that focus on increasing access to birth control for all who want it, reducing poverty and inequality, improving food security and tackling environmental degradation are where we should be focusing our attention.

Framing the issue around population is in my view wrongheaded:

 "We need to have a far greater public debate about population, whether it focuses on improving family planning or reducing global inequality – and looking again at how we address the strain on our natural resources. The absence of an open and honest discussion about this issue means most people don't give much thought to the scale of global population growth in recent years. In 1930, just one or two generations ago, the world's population stood at around two billion. Today it is around seven billion, and by 2050 it is projected to rise by a third to 9 billion.

"We live as if we have three planets instead of just one. It is interesting that public figures, environmental groups and NGOs in general have tended to steer away from population to the extent that it's become a taboo issue. The horrific consequences of China's one-child policy and of other draconian efforts to regulate procreation have, for many, rendered discussion of the subject completely unpalatable. Yet as long as an issue remains a taboo subject where no one talks about it, then there's very little chance of finding the solutions we need."

Calling it a taboo is motivational propoganda, this has seeped in to the language via supporters of the 'optimum population trust'.  Besides, people have been talking about it for a long time, Marx and Malthus had notable squabbles on the subject.

It is wrongheaded because the problem of availabilty of resources for all and of a sustainable and just future for all is a result of capitalist profligacy, expansion and disparity of distribution. This is the lens that needs to be looked through not that of human population. I agree however that if the human population were to grow indefinately and forever that humans would eventually have to find a different  planet to occupy. This is not a fear we need have and therfore a fear we need not exacerbate by jumping upon a bandwagon that will inevitably veer dangerously toward the far right of the political spectrum.  Human population has settled and is declining in many countries. Often neglected by populationists is the fact that there are third world countries traditionally associated with large families where this is also the case. The examples here are not nessasarily headed by an increased availability of birth control or of a rebalancing of financial inequality and education. Rather a grassroots social and cultural reorientation with no government intervention, not 'top-down'; the emancipation of women. 

I should probably add a myriad of links to justify my reasoning, but alas this is an occasional organ and this is a large topic.

As the only green MP Caroline Lucas has limited influence and with the sway she has, I think she is doing a brilliant job. A public debate would likely be weighted towards the populationists; they are organised and have attracted celebrity endorsements. Jeremy Irons for example recently joined-up. I cannot recall how many properties he owns but atleast one of them is a castle. Perhaps he is concerned about sharing. What would a public debate entail anyway, certainly nothing that smells of anything approaching democratic; we just had the first referendum for 20 years in the UK and were given options that nobody wanted or asked for.  It was a time-consuming and expensive distraction, expensive because in the first instance referendums cost and secondly because the condems could slide some austerity under the carpet whilst we and the media scratch our heads and try and work out which of two options we don't actually want we want the most. But I digress!

In this country the populationists would introduce systems that would discriminate against those that have more than two children. Any of you a 3rd child or have one? Bastard CO2 emitting resource users.  Along with a couple of 'good uns' in the Labour camp Caroline Lucas is becoming a strong voice for the left on many issues and is winning the respect of the trade unions. On balance, I think it is a very complex subject, and I have concerns about the wider implications of raising it's profile.   Time is thin. I think there are other issues Caroline Lucas should concentrate her efforts on and that the uneasy  and ill-matched marriage of resource depletion with population is one we could do without and in my view should head for an early divorce. 

Britain's biggest array of solar panels is now operational in Howberry Oxfordshire. The 3,000-panel array generates up to 682 MWh a year and will save 350 tonnes of CO2 per year.  Though the biggest in Britain it is significantly smaller than those in Spain or Italy which are  up to 10 times bigger. It is the UKs first large ground system to feed into the national grid and will initially benefit from the tariff scheme paying a premium for supplying clean electricity.

The manufacturer has similar projects due online next month, but these could be the UK's last big solar farms for some time. In February, the Con-Dem government announced a review of feed-in tariffs for anyone generating more than 50kW of power and cut the rates payable for large ground-mounted solar installations by more than 70%. Derry Newman representing the manufacturer  comments:

"This means that virtually all investors have withdrawn from financing such developments," and "There were probably many hundreds lined up for development across the country. they're pretty much all cancelled now. This type of installation will be a relative rarity for a few years."


Source Article: UK's biggest solar energy farm connects to national grid | Environment | The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jun/27/uk-solar-energy-national-grid

PR Dave Cameron pledged that this would be "the greenest government ever".The recommendations of  the statutory body set up to advise the government on global warming policy (committee on climate change C.C.C.) were accepted in full by the previous government.  The target was to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 60% by 2030, compared with 1990 levels. But now this is under review. They will cut everything going but may now be set to prove there is an exception when it comes to carbon emissions.
 
Jonathon Porritt has examined the credentials of the "greenest government ever" covering 77 green policies and reports little or no progress in more than three-quarters of them, describing the governments environmental assertions  as "vanishingly remote", and judged that many policies had already been "delayed, watered down or abandoned". The crucial decision will be taken at a meeting on Monday. In response an emergency demonstration has been set up by the campaign against climate change:

Next week: Monday 16th  
8.00 am at Lib Dem HQ, at 4 Cowley Street, Westminster
8.45 am  Move on to Downing Street
Click here for more information