I’d rather be a hobbit than an orc

Being at the Barton Moss Protection Camp is like being at sea. There are tides, surges, waves and ripples. Calm periods and storms. There’s always the risk of losing a friend overboard. On Monday I was one of those lost to sea, lost to the GMP.

GMP = Greater Manchester Police. It was actually a Tactical Aid Unit (TAU) officer who arrested me – I now know that the TAU have blue tucked-in trousers rather than the straight black slacks of the local police uniform, and they’re much meaner.

——*——

Solidarity Sunday is all calm waters. Several hundred people mass in a muddy carpark, some tumbling out of coaches after long journeys, from Sussex and Somerset and Scotland, to cheers from the earlier arrivals. Another, smaller, group meets at a local pub. We all walk towards the rally at the end of Barton Moss lane, in high spirits despite rain. The lack of police is notable. There’s no one here to facilitate our protest. At first we take over two lanes of the four-lane dual carriageway, the A57. Then we spill into three lanes. Then we realise there’s nothing to stop us blocking the road entirely – no cops, no road cones – and we stroll into the fourth lane. Some of the cars we’re holding up are filled with beaming people giving us thumbs up and honking their solidarity. Others, grim faced, rev and try to push through our ranks. I’ve never been on a march or procession where pedestrians take over a major road without any police presence. One woman is hit, but not seriously hurt, by a van.

At the rally there are welcomes to the protectors from far-off towns and camps. Messages from supporters in Greece, in Afghanistan. Then songs. Then we head along the lane to camp. Someone’s brought along a gigantic pan of spicy soup. An abundance of other food has been donated. This and the cardboard signs – “I am a local”, “I’m a local and I don’t want fracking” – give the lie to media attempts to divide local residents from those who’ve travelled to protect the Moss.

Most of the day trippers melt away home as afternoon turns to early dusk, but some of us stay on. There’s a party atmosphere around the campfire; drums compete with songs and for a few moments I’m dancing in the road. Later I join a meditation for global peace, in a red and yellow geodesic dome warmed by a smoky woodstove. As we shake ourselves and stretch after a half hour’s silence, a shout goes up and it’s the evening iGas shift change and protectors move into the road to slow the convoy of workers as they leave the fracking site. Now there are police.

There’s singing and chanting – “I’d rather be a hobbit than an orc” – and dancing in the narrow lane, in the flickering light of campfire flames. It’s pretty tribal. There’s us, the colourful rowdy tribe, and the iGas workers, stony and grey in their cars, cut off from us, thinking what? Resigned to the slow crawl down the lane? Angry? Regretting taking this job? Hating us? I’d like to ask them but the police are separating us from them. The police are asking us to move, and we’re moving, but haphazardly, not with the purposeful slow march of mornings. There’s more of us than there are of them, unusually. A woman, small, with long brown hair, is dancing near me. She dances towards the cars, and then away, back towards me. But she’s not moving fast enough and she’s grabbed by a policeman and then she’s being dragged and then – uproar. I can’t see what’s happening but there’s shouting and anguished sounds and then she’s in the back of a police van and the tribe is outraged. They hurt her, people are saying. The police smashed her face and she’s bleeding, they say.

There’s a calmness even in the eye of the storm, even as the joy and exuberance of the evening turns bitter. A woman suggests we move out of the road and let the workers past, and we do. Then we escort the police van up the lane and some people are yelling at the police and others are walking a silent vigil. I return to the geo dome and make a nest of sleeping bags in a nook beside a shrine to the camp’s recently destroyed trees and treehouse (destroyed at police behest, for reasons not quite clear). I keep all of my clothes on, including my hat. I’m sharing the space with four others – one sleeping on an old sofa, one on a camp-bed, one upright on a dining chair and one in a coffin (a real coffin).

In the morning there’s time for tea and biscuits munched as I walk up the lane to the junction with the A57. It’s a drier day and there are perhaps twenty of us waiting for the lorry convoy. All in good humour. The police arrive, and then the trucks. There’s a short stand-off; a local man attempts to establish with some kind of superior officer (red lapels) what exactly is construed as a “reasonable pace”. It seems we’re to be allowed to walk “at a reasonable pace” but no definition of reasonable is forthcoming. The local man demonstrates the pace at which he intends to walk and it looks to me as though Red-Lapels concurs that such a pace would be both reasonable and legal.

We’ve barely set off before there’s two arrests. It happens quickly, there’s a yell, a surge, a sudden wave of fear and anger and pushing and stumbling and then we’re calm and walking again – slowly, but at a reasonable pace – just two members of the tribe down. Our original police escort is joined by additional cops, and now – but not then – I understand that these are TAU. Tucked-in trousers, flat hats and tough-guy attitude. They push us, harry us, try to hurry us. We’re moving faster than last time I did this walk. I’m calmer than last time though, no longer surprised by the pushing and goading and unwelcome touching from the police. I’m answering them “I am still moving forwards… yes, I am still walking… please don’t push me… take your hands off my back… I can’t walk any faster there’s someone in front of me… you said – one of you said – we can walk at a reasonable pace and that’s what I’m doing…”. I’m asked by an officer to “walk through” the person in front of me. I laugh at the absurdity of this order. Then that thing happens when you know they’ve set their sights… and I’m grabbed from behind and neatly pulled backwards through the police line and I forget to yell or let anyone know that I’ve gone.

I’m accused, arrested, for walking too slowly. They call it “obstruction”. I don’t struggle and yet I’m handcuffed, then searched, locked in a tiny cell in a police van, driven to a police station, searched again. My photograph, fingerprints, palm prints, DNA are taken. I consent – if I don’t consent, they’ll take prints and mouth swab by force, I’m told. Too late I wonder whether I should’ve refused. If I’m found innocent, will these be destroyed? I ask the operative. He says I can apply to have the DNA destroyed, although hardly anyone does because most people don’t ask and aren’t informed that they have this right. He’s not sure about the prints. I’m still innocent (“until proven guilty”, right?) and yet everything from this stage on is a petty battle, from being allowed to keep my boots and coat to getting lunch and, more seriously, gaining access to the solicitor I’ve requested. I’m only allowed to keep the boots because they’ve run out of plimsolls in my size. Turns out they want the boots because the cleaners are getting sick of the mud we countryside protectors bring in. The cells are cold. It’s worth hanging on to as much clothing as you can, or asking for replacements if they take yours away. My cardigan is confiscated, in case I try to hang myself by its woolly cord. Likewise, bootlaces. They try to take my nose ring but at that I balk, and win.

My cell’s surprisingly large, and clean. It’s bigger, in fact, than many of the places I’ve lived in. That makes me smile. I’ve managed to keep my notebook, pen and book. With these, a copy of PACE (the Police and Criminal Evidence Act codes of practice) collected at the custody desk, and a thin mattress to use as a yoga mat, I know I can entertain myself for at least 24 hours. There’s a loo but no toilet roll. Water for washing but not for drinking. PACE tells me I can request a drink every two hours. Once I’ve got a cup I’ve also got a vessel for washing. This is fine.

Some people kick their cell doors and shout and scream, others sing. I feel as though I’m in a film. I read PACE. Later there’s an attempt to fob me off with a duty solicitor. I’ve got my bust card and I know not to acquiesce. Through a port-hole in my ceiling I watch the sky darken. Time passes quickly. I keep asking to talk to the solicitor I’ve requested. Eventually a cheerful woman in normal clothes, no uniform, lets me out of the cell and tells me I’m going home. I think, for a moment, that she means I’m being released without charge, but when I get to the front desk the custody sergeant who checked me in rustles my charge sheet and the cheerful woman reads it out.

“Aren’t I supposed to have talked to my solicitor before I get charged?”

Consternation.

Yes, I am. A number is called, a phone thrust across the desk. I speak to the solicitor in public, in the reception area of the police station. I know this isn’t right, this should be a private conversation. We try, the solicitor and I, to get me released on unconditional bail but the sergeant’s not having it. I’m given a map of the areas around Barton Moss where I’m not supposed to go. I refuse to accept the map, the conditions, the bail. I’m innocent, why should my freedom of movement be curtailed? I ask for my Custody Record. The sergeant says I have to apply for that. PACE says otherwise. I get my Record and it’s peppered with errors. I leave my bail map on the station floor.

I have no idea where I am, how I’m going to get back to camp, where my belongings are, whether I’ll be arrested again when I get there. I’m shown to the exit by the cheerful plain-clothes woman. I press a button, step outside into a cold dark rainy Manchester night, and I’m greeted with hugs, cheers, tea, soup, donuts. The Barton Moss Protectors are here on arrestee support duty. The warmth I’m enveloped in brings tears to my eyes. I don’t know most of these people but they’re family now and I don’t need to worry about where I’m going, how I’ll get there or what will happen to me when I do. Everything is taken care of and I’m safe.

The next day, back in the real world, messages of support from family and friends flood in. Both of my sisters – beautiful, kind, non-political women – say they back me absolutely: “Fracking is evil,” says one, and the other writes “My eyes are now wide open. Stand united and keep on fighting this worthy cause, and Thankyou from all of us who can’t be there to support you.”

News reaches my mum at work: “Everyone in the office very impressed with your arrest”, she reports.

Ordinary people don’t want pollution, poisoned water that we have no disposal plan for, chemical-laced earth, toxic gases seeping into homes, earthquakes and climate change. The UK public is not impressed by rhetoric from politicians who have only their own interests at heart, and no compunction about lying to the electorate they’re meant to serve. No one – except the corporate boss set to make a killing by killing our land – thinks that bribing councils is a just or wise move.

Are we really winning this fight against fracking, and swinging public opinion our way, because we “wear exciting clothes”, as Owen Paterson claimed today in the Telegraph? Or might it be because we’re right… and it’s really fracking obvious that we’re right?

Sunday Stroll in Salford (Barton Moss)

I thought we’d be lucky to get 50 people out to demonstrate about an environmental issue on a cold January day in Salford. About a thousand turn up. “They’re… normal people” I overhear someone mutter. Old, young, Salford families, Greens, union members, members of co-operatives, local residents, anti-fracking groups from other areas, environmentalists, grannies, kids, cyclists, musicians, health workers. A reasonable cross section of the 99%.

Plenty of creativity and humour has gone into the placards and banners we wave, as we walk a mile or so from the rendezvous point to Barton Moss. One lane of the A57 had been closed for us and we stream along it in festive mood, a procession more than a march, buoyed up by a strong sense of solidarity and community. Roughly 80% of passing cars beep in support of our Frack Off and Not for Shale messages – despite having been held up in a traffic jam on our account. One placard – “I’d rather be a hobbit than an orc” – rings very true for me. This and “Welcome to the desolate North… Now Frack Off!” are perfect rejoinders to nonsense peddled by pro-fracking politicians.

At a rally just up the lane from the Protectors’ Camp, we hear from members and supporters of the camp, including:

• Local union reps, who say that profiteering by a minority at the expense of the majority is what we’re fighting here at Barton Moss – it’s bigger than environmental issues and its bigger than Salford, and we all need to work together;
• A Campaign Against Climate Change speaker, pointing to the need to create climate-friendly jobs which will set up communities for a viable, sustainable future;
• Vanessa Vine of Balcombe – a Sussex village which faced down the frackers in 2013 – who reminds us of the global nature of this struggle, and the brutality being faced by protesters and protectors in Canada and Romania;
• Ewa Jasiewicz, of No Dash for Gas and Fuel Poverty Action, pointing out that investment in renewables now is the only way out of the fuel poverty trap of the moment, where the Big 6 energy companies are in a position to charge extortionate rates, filling their own pockets while risking the lives of the poor and turning a blind eye to climate change.

The crowds amble into Barton Moss Road as the rally comes to a close. Hundreds of us, strolling slowly on a Sunday afternoon along the lane where, on weekday mornings, police harrass and arrest protectors for walking at a similar pace ahead of the fracking trucks. There’s almost no visible policing today. Today, the police don’t feel the need to outnumber us 10:1 and shove us along the road “for our own safety”. Is it because they don’t want to show the ugly side of policing – the side which is about protecting corporate profits rather than people – to so many of their neighbours and peers, who are genuinely here to protect? If only a tenth this many people could turn up every day…

Past the camp we go, to the gates of the fracking site. There’s music, and dancing, and meetings between like-minded people. Someone’s cooked up a hearty soup and there’s a campfire to warm cold knees beside. This is what solidarity looks like. And we need more of this kind of thing!

A perfect summing-up from Carmen, of Occupy Manchester:

“Today one thousand people agreed that there is no social license for fracking – not locally or nationally or globally. We stand united for a frack-free planet [and for] investment in renewable energy, for all future generations and the planet Earth.”

Barton Moss Protection Camp, Barton Moss Road, Just off A57 next to Airport, Eccles M30 7RL

Barton Moss Protection Camp: Facebook 

Twitter: @BartonMoss

Frack Free Greater Manchester: website

Northern Gas Gala

Frack Off: website (great for background info)

Barton Moss

BARTON MOSS ANTI-FRACKING PROTECTORS’ CAMP & THE ORANGE BUS BLOCKADE

Salford in the early hours of a December day, trapped in a sliver of damp earth between motorway and access lane. Barton Moss Protectors’ Camp. Pre-dawn, chilly, dawdling, waiting for the fracking trucks to arrive, waiting to slow-walk up the lane – the only peaceful protest the law is prepared to allow us these days.

Waiting, reading signs on the noticeboard outside the camp’s info point. Few awake as yet.

A woman runs towards us. “The big orange bus is up there! They need support up there!” She points towards the fracking site entrance.

We jog up the road.

There is, indeed, a big orange bus. It’s huge, very orange, and parked across the site’s entrance. It’s covered in ‘Frack Off’ and ‘Not for Shale’ signs. Just where the wind turbine blade was dropped off a couple of days earlier. So many large and generous gifts for the frackers, IGas.

Someone has set up camp on the roof of the bus. Someone else is locked on underneath. At least three people are inside, also locked on. A sign on the door says “Do not open this door, I am locked on, you will break my leg”.

A surge of excitement and solidarity floods through us. We wave and grin, gesture, thumbs up.Over the next few hours more and more cops turn up, until they outnumber us about 3:1. Local journalists arrive. The Salford Star guy is one of us, warming himself by our brazier. I make it my job to forage for twigs, to keep the fire going. Our legal observer and welfare crew keep an eye on those locked on, passing them warm things and food, while the baseball-capped ‘Protestor Removal Unit’ cops suss out the situation.

With two friends I temporarily resist the police instruction to leave the vicinity of the bus. We question their need to create a “sterile area”, their constant claims of “we just want to keep everyone safe”. Yeah RIGHT. That’s why you shoved a disabled guy into a ditch, breaking his leg in the process, just a few days ago, right here. We hold up proceedings for a wee while, then move away, not feeling that now is the time to push it and get arrested.

Eventually the power tools come out. Locks are broken, windows are smashed, ladders are hoisted and the bus-bound protectors are removed. Three are arrested. The two who were outside the bus look cold, shaky and exhausted. We whoop, holler, cheer our heroes. A breakdown truck manouveures into position, ready to tow the big orange bus away. A big orange sacrifice, gifted by Brighton.

A shout goes up “Down the lane! The trucks are coming in!” We dash back to the camp, get into a huddle and begin the slow walk in front of the fracking trucks. Police form their own huddle behind us and goad us, push us, poke us in the kidneys, get their hands on us and try to steer us, harry us, patronise us and shout in our earholes. They threaten to arrest anyone who complains too vociferously. A few years ago I’d have been shocked but it’s the kind of behaviour I expect from cops now. The baby-blue liaison cops are still going around with fixed grins, plaintively trying to explain that they’re the good guys; they’re not getting much traction. We shout out the numbers of the pushiest and our legal observers earnestly write down our complaints, walking backwards, keeping an eye on us as we stumble up the lane. They make me feel safer than I would if they weren’t there.

There aren’t enough of us. Too soon we’re at the gate, and funnelled off to stand impotent on the verge. Truck after truck after truck goes by.  A crane, cabins, a catering unit. Someone says the rig is in now. Trucks from North Yorkshire, trucks from Lincolnshire. We glare at the drivers, screaming with our eyes – “get out of your cab and come join us, you’re people like us!”. They drive into the fracking site. I feel as though I’m watching evil at work. Saruman wrecking Isengard. Two women are weeping. An 82 year old comforts them. Tears prick my eyes too. How can people be doing this? Why aren’t more people with us, trying to stop it? This isn’t just Isengard. It isn’t a story.

This is our future. Join us.

northerngasgala.org.uk/
frack-off.org.uk/

Legal Challenge to UK’s ‘Nature Watchdog’

This is a Ban The Burn update.

Campaigners are asking the European Commission to investigate a potential misuse of European funding by Natural England (NE), the UK’s nature watchdog.

A representative of the Ban The Burn campaign, based in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, will travel to Brussels on 10 January to meet officials from the Commission’s Environmental Compliance Unit.

Legal reviews are being requested due to:

• Natural England’s decision to drop its prosecution of Walshaw Moor Estate (WME). In March this year, Natural England took WME to court because of 43 environmental infringements on its 4000 hectare grouse moor estate above Hebden Bridge. The case was dropped abruptly for reasons that have not been made public.

• The subsequent £2.5 million “Higher Level Stewardship” agreement between NE and WME. This amounts to £1,000 of public money every working day for the next 10 years, while allowing the continued burning of blanket bog – a European priority habitat. Activities which were previously considered prosecutable are now being subsidised by the tax-payer and European funding.

The legal basis for the campaigners’ challenge is that European funding for nature protection should not be used to subsidise activities likely to degrade an extremely sensitive and valuable habitat.

The EU Birds Directive and EU Habitats Directive are both designed to protect environments such as that at Walshaw Moor. Hebden Bridge was very badly hit by flooding in the summer of 2012 and the agreement between NE and WME fails to recognise the downstream effects of current management practices. In order to minimise flood risk in the town, the upland catchment needs to be managed so that large areas of degraded blanket bog are restored to a healthy state, with a good cover of sphagnum moss to act as a buffer slowing the run-off during heavy rainfall.

Local campaigner Dongria Kondh explained that “On Walshaw Moor, we have seen erosion from unconsented tracks, very extensive drainage and aggressive burning on blanket bog. The increased scale of this activity over the past few years may well have been a contributory factor to the severity of flooding in our town. Instead of being banned, these activities are now being subsidised.”

Dr. Aidan Foley BA, Msc., Phd, FGS, an environmental scientist who has helped the group to compile data for the complaint, added “Sphagnum is particularly vulnerable to fire, so continued burning is widely recognised as detrimental. Such damage to the structure of the soil will prevent this degraded moorland being restored to a healthy state.”

Although Ban The Burn is a locally based campaign, it is not just a local issue. Degraded peatlands turn from being carbon sinks to becoming carbon sources; according to the Commission of Inquiry on Peatlands, damaged UK peatlands currently release almost 3.7 million tonnes of CO₂ a year – more than all the households in Edinburgh, Cardiff and Leeds combined.

 

Please share this story widely.

For more information, contact bantheburn2012@gmail.com, or ring Dongria Kondh on 07847 815 926 (if there is no reply, leave a text message and you will  be called back).

A Press Release and photographs will be issued on 10 January following the meeting between Ban The Burn campaigner Dongria Kondh and Jean-François Brakeland, head of Environment Compliance for the European Commission.

Update on Walshaw Moor and Ban the Burn campaign

The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has submitted a formal complaint to the European Commission over the handling of Walshaw Moor, a grouse-shooting estate in the South Pennines, above the former mill town of  Hebden Bridge.

Renowned for being the ‘fourth funkiest town in the world‘ and the ‘lesbian capital of Britain‘, this summer Hebden Bridge was in the news again as it suffered from devastating floods.

Residents found a smoking gun… the Walshaw Moor Estate (WME) had been draining and burning the moors above the town, degrading the upland catchment and increasing the risk of flooding downstream.

Natural England (NE), the government’s environmental advisory body, had previously found 43 environmental breaches at WME and had initiated court proceedings. However, in 2011 the court case was abruptly dropped and instead of prosecuting, NE entered into an agreement which saw the Estate being awarded a large sum of money to continue managing the land.

Martin Harper of the RSPB said “Why they [NE] lost confidence is unclear, because they were mounting a robust defence only weeks before, supported by independent expert witnesses as well as the RSPB.”

The key issue is that the area being ‘managed’ by the Estate is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) and is protected by the highest European environmental designations. Peat-rich blanket bog, a globally rare and threatened habitat of delicate mosses, acts as a carbon sink when in good condition, as well as being linked to water quality and flood risk. The site is also home to scarce wading birds.

Following six months of investigation, RSPB believes Natural England has contravened European environmental protection legislation in its dealings with the Walshaw Moor Estate.

Mike Clarke, RSPB chief executive, said: “The decision to lodge this complaint has not been taken lightly, but this is a vitally important issue which centres on the Government’s statutory duty to protect our natural environment.

“Natural England – the Government’s wildlife watchdog – has dropped its prosecution without giving an adequate explanation and without securing restoration of this habitat. It has also entered into a management arrangement which we consider has fundamental flaws.  This combination of actions is probably unlawful and will do little, if anything, to realise the Coalition Government’s stated ambition to restore biodiversity.

“This is just one of several protected areas in our uplands, and this case may set an important precedent for how these sites are managed in the future.”
Hebden Bridge’s ‘Ban the Burn‘ group was delighted to hear that their local campaign is now being echoed at a European level.

I’ll keep updating as this case progresses.

Who’s messing with Hebden Bridge’s vital flood barrier? | New Internationalist

“Town that won’t stop flooding: Hebden Bridge cleans up for the third time in three weeks.”

That was a Daily Mail headline in July. It was a slight exaggeration. Most people who live in Hebden are pretty sure they were only flooded twice, but it was enough. Cars were submerged, the library was evacuated, the main road closed, businesses were wrecked, homes swamped, livelihoods devastated.

A story is emerging involving a millionaire landowner, a government minister, environmental breaches at a site of special scientific interest (SSSI), a mysteriously dropped court case, the profitability of shooting grouse, and the spending of taxpayers’ cash. The setting: the wuthering heights above Hebden Bridge, famed moors of the Brontës. The unlikely heroes of the piece are blanket bog and sphagnum moss.

On Sunday August 12th, flood-hit residents of Hebden Bridge and campaigners from across the country set out from the town centre on a protest walk to the Walshaw Moor grouse-shooting estate. Following the walk, the Ban the Burn! national campaign launch, timed to coincide with ‘The Glorious Twelfth’ (the opening of the grouse-shooting season), took place at Hebden Bridge Trades Club. Ban the Burn! campaigners are demanding a ban on the draining of peat-rich blanket bogs and the burning of moorland heather, activities carried out by landowners to maximise grouse-shooting potential.

The effects of draining and burning of blanket bogs, which are supposed to be protected under EU and UK conservation regulations, include: increased flood risk downstream; very significant carbon emissions; adverse impacts on water quality; and the destruction of rare and globally significant habitat. According to the Commission of Inquiry on Peatlands, damaged UK peatlands currently release almost 3.7 million tonnes of CO2 a year – more than all the households in Edinburgh, Cardiff and Leeds combined.

Walshaw Moor came to public attention when Natural England attempted to prosecute the landowner for 43 environmental breaches. The case was abruptly dropped and Natural England subsequently entered into an Environmental Stewardship agreement with the Estate, whereby £2.5 million of taxpayers’ money will be paid to it over the next ten years while “controlled” burning will still be allowed. Campaigners describe this as a scandal in a YouTube video.

According to a local resident, “Here in Hebden Bridge we know the real hardship of flooding – shops and businesses in our town are still shut, and many of us have suffered irreplaceable loss. We need to manage the upland catchment to promote healthy blanket bog, with sphagnum moss to act as a sponge during heavy rainfall. It seems grotesque that the taxpayer is paying for the exact opposite – £2.5 million is about five times as much as we have in the Calder Valley flood recovery fund!”

At the end of a “brilliant”, “eye-opening” and “exhausting” day, a walker explained via the live EnergyRoyd blog why he joined the Ban the Burn! campaign: “I think it’s a travesty that Walshaw Moor Estate has been given public money. They’ve got friends in Whitehall, and the Minister for Wildlife’s a grouse shooter – basically, a bunch of aristocrats are making life worse for hard-working folk in the valley by increasing the risk of flooding.” Parts of this claim are unsubstantiated, however suggestions regarding the influence of political and land-owning elites on environmental and countryside policies have been made by Dr Mark Avery (former Conservation Director of the RSPB), George Monbiot (in The Guardian) and Michael McCarthy (The Independent).

Dr Avery says in his blog ‘Standing up for Nature’: “The access of the Moorland Association to the [Wildlife] Minister is at a level that many statutory agencies who work for Defra might well envy, and is well beyond that of the average environmental NGO.” Edward Bromet, Chairman of the Moorland Association, which supports grouse shooting, sent Wildlife Minister Richard Benyon a private email in December 2011. The content of this email has since been made public under a Freedom of Information request. Bromet, referring to the court case brought by Natural England against Walshaw Moor Estate, wrote “What Natural England are doing is complete madness… Suggestions of readdressing the basis of existing agri-environment schemes… would make the management of moorland, most of which is privately funded, completely impossible.” How much influence such communications had on Natural England’s decision to drop the case is unknown.

When it comes to environmental degradation by a politically untouchable elite of large landowners, the Hebden Bridge story may be just the tip of an iceberg. Walshaw Moor is certainly not an isolated case – the Peatlands Inquiry found that only 11 percent of blanket bogs in English SSSIs are in favourable condition. Primary reasons cited for unfavourable (no change or declining) condition are overgrazing, inappropriate moor burning and drainage – the latter two being associated with grouse moors.

 

What do bankers have to do with oceans, ice sheets and orang utans?

Flooded with requests from members of the public, the media and my family to explain why I’m camping out on the chilly cobbles of St Paul’s, I stormed my own brain and came up with this:

I’m here because I believe in real democracy, social justice and environmental responsibility. I’m here because I passionately believe – no, I know – that we need to put planet and people before profit. I’m not here because I hate bankers, or hate cuts. It’s so much deeper, broader and more complex than that… and it’s got a lot to do with loving this earth we live on.

Environment and economics are inextricably linked. One doesn’t have to understand fractional reserve banking to understand this. The profit-driven economic system we have is not sustainable. By that I don’t just mean it’s not ‘green’, I mean that in a world of finite resources we literally cannot have perpetual growth. It won’t work . It cannot be sustained. Already the financial system in the Western world has begun to implode. We’ve knocked back the ‘good’ times – the greed times – and now we’re lurching about like drunkards trying to pretend we just need a cup of coffee and then we’ll be fine to drive.

I think it’s time the car keys were confiscated because it’s not just economies that we’re crashing, it’s the planet.

Economic and social injustice is what many of us are feeling most keenly at the moment but we can’t afford to ignore the looming dual impacts of climate change and resource scarcity. They’ll hit the most vulnerable first, especially those living in marginal lands – the deserts of Africa, the floodplains of Bangladesh – while the super-wealthy 1% will relocate to the least affected areas and insulate themselves in robust palaces. We can’t wait until our low-lying cities flood, until the glaciers melt and the gorillas are gone before we do something about it; if we do it’ll be too late, we’ll be trapped in a chain-reaction of crises way more severe than job losses and home repossessions.

So, in addition to railing at banks and corporations for stealing our money and corrupting the politicians who are supposed to represent us, we must remember that they are the ones destroying our land – again, for their own profits. Extracting oil from the tar sands of Canada, deep-water oil drilling in the Arctic, fracking for gas in Lancashire, slashing rainforests to grow cash-crops such as palm oil… these environmentally devastating practices need to be stopped.

A British environmental lawyer (Polly Higgins) has proposed to the UN that Heads of State and directors of corporations be required to take individual and personal responsibility for their actions and that ecocide, the environmental equivalent of genocide, becomes an International Crime Against Peace (alongside genocide itself, crimes against humanity, crimes of aggression and war crimes).

While this may give profit-hungry polluters pause for thought, I believe it’s not just the elites who need to re-evaluate; we all do. We need to stop being selfish. Selfishness is behind the unsustainable profit-driven economy, the destruction of environments, over-fishing, over-consumption, pollution and war. We need to look at what is really needed to have a decent quality of life. Let’s try to get those things – food, clean water, shelter, warmth, security, community, education, leisure, meaningful pursuits – for everyone on the planet… and get rid of everything else. Stop lusting, hoarding, competing. Demand that the bankers do their bit but be prepared to do our bit too. If everyone stopped being selfish we have the intelligence and resources to sort it out. For example, an IPCC Report (Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change) shows that with political will and investment we could meet 80% of the world’s energy needs with renewables by 2050.

That would go some way towards heading off environmental catastrophe; towards saving the oceans, the ice, the orang utans and the people. We might even find enough compassion in our hearts to invite the bankers onto the ark.