US Weapons At War 2008

This is an annual report, co-authored by William Hartung and Frida Berrigan, of the New America Foundation.

Hartung and Berrigan are calling on Barack Obama, and the next US Congress, to endorse/ratify treaties on landmines and cluster munititions, and to develop a new arms transfer policy that includes human rights and nonproliferation objectives.

Some choice facts:

- The United States accounts for 45% of all weapons transferred globally in 2007.

- During 2006 and 2007, the United States provided weapons and military training to over 174 states and territories, up from 123 states and territories in 2001.

- Of the 27 major conflicts under way during 2006/07, 20 involved one or more parties that had received arms and training from the United States.

£9 Million In City Council Cuts

Coventry City Council is considering £9 million in cuts in services.

They blame the rising energy/fuel prices for council buildings, the downturn in the housing market (a six-figure drop in revenue from planning application fees), and the need for 3% government efficiency savings.

- If we had shifted council buildings to having their own solar panels, and their own micro-CHP units, they would be "insulated" from energy price rises.

- I've sent an email to the council's head of "Finance and Legal" to see if their "corporate risk register," as of 1st Jan 2007, and as of 1st Jan 2008, had assessed the risk of a housing collapse. 5 times earnings, and 120% mortgages, were not going to go on forever.

- If central government can bail out corporate banks, why can't they give a "holiday" for a year to efficiency savings made by local government? Do you cut the fat when you're starving?

Global Corruption

I worked for a year at a think-tank, looking at military corruption and military-run business. As such, stories like this one leap out at me. Today is the UN's International Anti-Corruption Day. Corruption adds up. $1 trillion is estimated to be spent each year worldwide on bribes, by firms and ordinary individuals. Christian Aid has issued a report on what the UK could do.

This would include:

- full compliance with the OECD's Anti-Bribery Convention,
- full implementation of the UN Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC),
- more resources to investigate and prosecute domestic firms accused of bribery overseas,
- the return of the billions in stolen foreign assets held in British banks,
- the freezing of assets of people in the UK, including foreigners, who are under investigation for corruption.

What I'm Reading

- The Coventry Telegraph's latest Go Green supplement, 24 pages, in today's paper

- A market-led approach for "Next Generation Access" broadband may lead to 40% of the country being excluded -- "almost all of Scotland, most of Wales, much of Northern Ireland, large parts of south-west and north-east England, and rural areas throughout the length and breadth of England."

- Ann Pettifor, about the credit crisis myth: "The global economy is now sinking under a vast strain of debt, and the priority must be to deal with that debt. We are not faced with a savings crisis ... We are faced with a massive debt crisis."

Plane Stupid's Stansted Protest

On BBC Five Live's morning broadcast, they interviewed people who had "saved up for months for a girly day out to Bremen" ... when the average income of people using Stansted Airport is £48 340 per year (CAA; 2007). This was a peaceful direct action protest ... one morning of disruption to highlight the impact for decades of short-haul flights within Europe.

- The aviation industry creates a "tourism deficit" of £7 billion pounds each year ... this is the amount of money spent abroad by Britons flying out of the UK for leisure and holiday trips, compared with the spending by visitors to Britain

- Airlines receive over £9 billion in tax breaks each year because of tax-free fuel and VAT-free tickets and planes. That's the same as the tuition fees for 3 million students.

- In 2004, the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee said that the government foresees the need for another Heathrow-sized airport every 5 years. Does this sound sustainable ... on carbon emissions grounds, on noise pollution grounds?

Why does one industry get to expand and expand and expand, when the rest of us will have to drastically cut our carbon emissions?

Also see: BBC video of the arrests
Also read: Leo, from Plane Stupid, chatting with the Guardian
Also read: Jess Worth, New Internationalist
Also read: Paul Kingsnorth, commenting on an article on the Guardian's website (616pm, 8 Dec)
Also read: Johnny, from Plane Stupid - Scotland, in his comment in a Telegraph article (624pm, 8 Dec)

UK Youth Delegation In Poznan

You can follow a group blog of the UK Youth Delegation to the Poznan conference here.

One of the delegates, Casper ter Kuile, who is a student at the University of Warwick, gets interviewed here:



You can also see other videos from youth participants:

- Dian, from China
- Josh, from Canada
- Line, from Denmark

"Poznan Needs To Head Off The Collision"

Kevin Watkins, senior research fellow at Oxford University's global economic governance programme:

"Put starkly, Poznan must head off a collision between the energy systems that drive our economies, and the Earth's biosphere. Ambitious targets must be at the heart of any agreement. But we also need a new institutional architecture for cooperation between rich and poor countries ... Over the past few months, rich governments have moved financial mountains to protect the integrity of their banking systems. What price the ecological integrity of our planet, the wellbeing of future generations, and our commitments to the world's poor?"

Climate Change March On Saturday

The London event will start at Grosvenor Square at 12 noon. Beforehand, there will be a climate protest bike ride starting from Lincoln's Inn Fields at 10.30 am.

The march this year is part of a global day of action. You can read more about it here.

Speakers at Parliament at the end of the march will include Caroline Lucas (our party leader), Michael Meacher (ex-Environment Minister) and George Monbiot (Honorary President, Campaign against Climate Change).

The March on Parliament has four main themes:

1) No to a 3rd runway at Heathrow (the cabinet has postponed a decision on this until January 2009)
2) No new coal-fired power stations
3) No expansion of agro-fuels (which have a negative impact on climate and the world's food supply), and,
4) Yes to a renewable energy revolution and green jobs - a "Green new Deal"

Pilot Projects For Free School Meals

Green councillors in Brighton have won a vote to ask the Government for funding for a pilot scheme to provide all young people at the city's primary and secondary schools with free school meals. It would be a big help for low income families facing rising food prices.

Copenhagen - UN Climate Head At Poznan

A climate change conference is underway in Poznan to begin a year-long process for an agreement to succeed the Kyoto Protocol. 10,700 delegates – from 187 nations – are gathering in Poznan. Kyoto only lasts until 2012, and the hope is that an agreement will be reached at a 2nd conference, in December 2009, in Copenhagen. Within the EU, Poland (93% of its electricity comes from coal) and Italy are opposing an agreement with tough new emissions standards.

Yvo de Boer, the UN's top climate official wants the right path to be taken for the next 15 years:

"What concerns me most is that the financial crisis will lead to a second set of bad investment decisions ... I hope that the second financial crisis is not going to have its origins in bad energy loans. We must now focus on the opportunities for green growth that can put the global economy onto a stable and sustainable path."

Copenhagen - EU Emissions Permits

This was the same process that preceded Kyoto ... water down and water down the agreement, and then still claim for the subsequent decade that Kyoto was too stringent and harmful:

Oxfam says that in tomorrow’s [5th December] Environment Council meeting in Brussels, European decision-makers must resist industry scaremongering if the EU is to lead the way at global talks. If the EU buckles, it will fail to deliver on its own objectives of avoiding global warming above 2°C and send the wrong signals to the UN Climate Conference now underway in Poznan.

In general, business groups are strongly opposed to the auctioning of emissions permits, saying they should continue to get them for free. They argue that paying for carbon permits will lead to higher costs, a loss of competitiveness and ‘carbon leakage’ as firms facing global competition will shift their operations to other countries which will not face a carbon price. In particular, the iron and steel, cement, oil refining and chemical manufacturing sectors have been lobbying intensely for continued free allocation – and they seem increasingly confident of winning concessions.

Elise Ford, head of Oxfam’s Brussels office: “Poor countries need at least $50 billion a year to adapt to the negative impacts of climate change and much of it could be raised by earmarking the revenues of auctioning carbon permits. This would be one of the most decisive contributions that rich countries could make to engender good-will and progress at the Poznan talks."

The Plan

After a good 90-minute group leaflet tonight, we only have 1500 leaflets to go in our first ward-wide effort at Cheylesmore. After meeting our two other signatories, I'm off to cut a cheque to pay our printer tomorrow at Nationwide. Then, I'm down in London for the climate change march on Saturday.

Our next meeting will be on Thursday, 11th December, at 730pm, at the Cheylesmore Community Centre.

We'll have a guest speaker, Anne Harris, on supermarkets and obesity in Coventry.

We're going to try and have speaker meetings once a month at various venues in Cheylesmore, and then have socials (both canal walks and other get togethers) apart from this.

In the new year, 2009 seems like such a big number, January and February will be devoted to following up our leaflet with some door-to-door canvassing in Cheylesmore.

The Oslo Treaty On Cluster Bombs

Over 100 countries are signing an international treaty today to ban cluster bombs. Progress, slow but sure.

World AIDS Day - 1st December

I didn't want there to be a 20th anniversary of World Aids Day.

73 000 adults have HIV in the UK. 5000 more contract HIV each year, with Coventry having a higher rate than the rest of the West Midlands.

HIV prevention is straight-forward. If you're at risk of HIV transmission through drug use, there are a number of needle exchange projects near to Coventry. In straight or gay sex, men need to wear condoms. Women need more self-respect and confidence, so they can ask a male partner (whether for the night, or longer-term) to wear a condom. We need to value and protect ourselves.

If you need help and advice, you can phone THT Direct on 0845 1221 200 between 10am and 10pm on Monday to Friday, and from 12 noon to 6pm on Saturday and Sunday. Emails can be sent to info@tht.org.uk

Twitter Tweets

If you wish, you can get notification of new posts on this blog through Twitter. Each post is also a tweet.

Twitter played a key role in getting information out to loved ones, and even minute by minute reportage of what was happening, in Mumbai.