Kindred Spirits #NationalPoetryDay

Last one for #NationalPoetryDay

Dear David & George,

Dear David & George,

I am deeply concerned that our country and my grandchild's future is in large part... in your hands! Although I am no scientist, I am certain that if you permit fracking, it will bring harm to the health and the well-being of people in the UK. I don't expect you to pay any attention to me at all (that would just smack of democracy) so I present the following for your careful consideration as it comes from the Royal Society of Chemistry's recently published “Fracking” – volume 39 (see page 15) in the book series “Issues in Environmental Science and Technology” - and surely, this is worthy? To quote:

[..a number of environmental problems, including contamination of water supplies, air pollution, creating minor earthquakes and contributing to climate change, have been identified and have led to the banning of commercial fracking in several countries (including Germany and France) and even within the US (most notably in New York state). ]

and then there's this:

[..the US experience on energy costs is unlikely to be relevant to the UK where world rather than internal market pricing would apply. ]

and this:

[Failure of the well containment casings, perhaps due to earth movement or incorrect installation, could allow leakage of toxic fluid into underground aquifers.]

and this:

[Large quantities of water are needed for fracking and most of the (contaminated) water returns to the surface as ‘flowback’. This imposes requirements for a plentiful water supply and for storage, treatment and disposal facilities at the site. These requirements all carry cost implications as well as environmental risk.]

and this chapter overview:

[Unconventional, Unburnable and Unwanted: why going all out for shale gas is the wrong direction for the UK’s energy policy.]

Sure there are mitigating words in there about strictly enforced regulations (bit difficult with all those cuts to regulators?) as noted here:
[UK Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, which is responsible for funding the main environmental regulator for fracking, the EA, has already absorbed large budget cuts, and passed many of them on to the EA. It is very worrying that the government is now considering the impacts of a further, massive, 40% cut from this budget.]

...and the need for independent checks (bit challenging when you look into the definition of 'independent') covered here:

[The well examiner is an independent competent person separate from the immediate line management of the well operations he is examining. The well examiner can be an employee of the operating company or a contractor (the latter is usually the case for UK onshore wells).]

...but if you take the time - you will find the reasons to say no to fracking. 

Another report out this week that you can trust the credentials of (certainly more than this Nana), the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health research published online in the journal Epidemiology says things like this:

[The growth in the fracking industry has gotten way out ahead of our ability to assess what the environmental and, just as importantly, public health impacts are.]

and this:

[Expectant mothers who live near active natural gas wells operated by the fracking industry in Pennsylvania are at an increased risk of giving birth prematurely and for having high-risk pregnancies..]

and this:

[Study leader Brian S. Schwartz, MD, a professor in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences at the Bloomberg School: “More than 8,000 unconventional gas wells have been drilled in Pennsylvania alone and we’re allowing this while knowing almost nothing about what it can do to health. Our research adds evidence to the very few studies that have been done in showing adverse health outcomes associated with the fracking industry.”]

and this:

[The researchers found that living in the most active quartile of drilling and production activity was associated with a 40 percent increase in the likelihood of a woman giving birth before 37 weeks of gestation (considered pre-term) and a 30 percent increase in the chance that an obstetrician had labeled their pregnancy “high-risk"]

and this:

[The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that preterm-related causes of death together accounted for 35 percent of all infant deaths in 2010, more than any other single cause. Being born prematurely is also a leading cause of long-term neurological disabilities in children.]

Enough yet? How much more information do you need? Is there any amount that would actually succeed? 

There are bans and moratoriums all over the world - put in place by those in office in New York, Scotland, Quebec, France, Bulgaria, Tasmania etc that heard and saw research that caused concern; WHY haven't you heard and seen this? If you have - then what bit did they understand, that you didn't?

I believe you to be more than incompetent; you are behaving in a criminally negligent way and putting the entire population at risk with the decisions you are making. It's not just fracking either, it's all the other decisions you are making (on behalf of the people of this country?) that are reckless, criminal and verging on insane.

Our 'democratic government' is in serious trouble and that means we are too. You need help, you need to seek wise council urgently and you need to stop, now. This can't go on any longer; each day another harsh ruling, another cruel cut, another waste of our money, another selling-off of OUR publicly owned (that's us) properties/services etc. Our parents and theirs, worked, paid taxes and created these publicly owned properties/services - they are not yours to sell.

You never ask us what we want. Your Manifestos only give hints and leave plenty of 'wriggle room' to allow all sorts of abuses of our understanding and interpretation. You falsely claim (and you know it) that the ticking of a box every 5 years, means you have the right to take power and wield it any way you can get away with. Only 24 percent of the eligible UK population voted for you!

You are NOT the 'chosen' - you are the fossilised relics of an antiquated system no longer fit for the times we live in. It is ONLY that the shape of our 'system' of government puts the power in the hands of those 'holding office' - that stops us being able to get you out. Stops us being able to create a system that would notice the huge evolutions in society that are screaming for change.

Heritage is education and fascination - not a way to be perpetuated for time immemorial. A man in tights knocking at the door with his rod looks just plain crazy to most of us. Similarly... people in horse-hair wigs, speaking in ways that seem designed to keep the majority, uninformed of the law... when we need clarity most of all.

Then there's pigs and paedophilia - we really need to get all this stuff out in the open. Maybe the pig is a tale but it is not inconceivable, which is very worrying; we are aware that public school can be very damaging and may involve some bizarre and bullying practices that can then lead to damaged adults who do not adjust to what most perceive as normality. The article offers insightful glimpses into Boarding School Syndrome like this:

[..these institutions, full of emotionally needy and incompetently supervised children, have provided havens and hunting grounds for sexual criminals since their beginning. Hence the extraordinary wave of allegations about historic child abuse in institutions.]

and this:

[..the side-effects of this abrupt intervention in a six- or eight-year-old’s development could be savage. Symptoms that a therapist in boarding school syndrome addresses are problems with anger, depression, anxiety, failure to sustain relationships, fear of abandonment, substance abuse and so forth.]

Very worryingly, you and others who may be damaged too - are in charge of all the important stuff. I do not trust your clarity of thought, wisdom, sincerity or good intent because I believe you need help. This article adds more:

[David Cameron was only seven when he was sent away to board at Heatherdown preparatory school in Berkshire. Like so many of the men who hold leadership roles in Britain, he learned to adapt his young character to survive both the loss of his family and the demands of boarding school culture. The psychological impact of these formative experiences on Cameron and other boys who grow up to occupy positions of great power and responsibility cannot be overstated. It leaves them ill-prepared for relationships in the adult world and the nation with a cadre of leaders who perpetuate a culture of elitism, bullying and misogyny affecting the whole of society.]

I stood outside your conference in Manchester this week, I met those of the tiniest minority that chose you - and I have never been more certain that you are isolated, out of touch and cocooned in a fantasy world, that does not exist beyond your peripheral vision. I also met you George in Tatton, for long enough to feel your discomfort, your obvious sense of being completely out of place and your inability to look people in the eye and chat naturally.

You are though in charge and I have no idea how to change that. 2020 is way too far off to let you have control that long - goodness knows what a mess we'll be in buy then. So how do we do it?

Lots of us have genuine questions in need of answers: How do we remove our current government when it is clearly dangerous? What legal recourse do we have? How does this work? The MUST surely be a way that doesn't involve a bloody revolution? How then do we initiate some sort of 'holding pattern' whilst we throw some amazing minds at designing a system that is fit for a world that is not about ritual, tradition, bullying and abuse - but a world full of technological potential, creativity, ingenuity and possibility?

I look forward to your reply.

Tina Louise Rothery
Nana

Dark, Light, Butterflies & Knights #NationalPoetryDay

Thank you LUSH...

The opportunity to say thank you to the hard-working and very generous people who work with LUSH... at their conference in Bournemouth September 2015. The kindness of this organisation has helped to transport activists, print important information for sharing and helped to amplify the message of the anti-fracking movement in particular:

Tomorrow ...we remember:

TOMORROW... we remember just where it is that our actions should be directed:

- to the system that says fracking is a risk worth taking here in the UK
- to the system that says it's ok to bail out banks but not ok to bail out people
- to the system that says it's ok for trade agreements like TTIP to be signed without consideration of the effects on WE the people
- to the system that spends our taxes on weapons as a priority - rather than ensuring adequate funding for our sick, our poor, our old and our struggling
- to the system that says it's ok to use those weapons on people in countries you and I don't have a problem with
- to the system that accepts the death of a child as 'collaterral damage'
- to the system that reacts to and creates divisions, shortage and threat rather than the unity, hope, positivity, renewable, regenerating energy of us

...along this activist journey there are personal and individual challenges and issues - but none is so great as the challenge of wrestling back our power from the hands of those in office who abuse it.

It is less about the party than the SYSTEM that allows (encourages?) the politics of the UK to represent industry BEFORE the people. We fight our causes - fracking, war, debt, NHS, austerity, education, homelessness etc. but these are in reality the SYMPTOMS of a DISEASE at the core of our DEMOCRACY.

See you tomorrow heart emoticon

Gathering The Bloc - for march at Conservative Conference Manchester
Take Back Manchester - Protest The Tory Party Conference
Stop TTIP Mcr bloc @ the Tory Party Conference Demonstration
Green Bloc at the Tory Party Conference Protest
No to Austerity, Yes to Workers Rights - National rally and march at Conservative Party Conference
...and so many more x

Unpredictable cells...

This activism thing is far from easy; often frustrating, deeply intrusive, hugely time-consuming, life-changing and although it brings us to a place of self-empowerment and a life of genuine purpose - it can drain and exhaust, frustrate and infuriate. The anti-fracking movement in particular is one that because it affects air and water - affects EVERYONE... and so the people standing up to it, come from every walk of life. We find each other unusual sometimes, question motives and tactics, think to ourselves: "I would NEVER do an action that way." etc.

For every activist action that I have disliked and not agreed with personally - I have likely done one that makes someone else feel this way. BUT so long as we are all chipping away at the edges of the target (the fracking industry and the government that gives it permission) it is good - because we are not one mass that can be attacked by industry/government - we are many little cells of unpredictable behaviour coming at it from all sides, using a huge variety of tactics. This works - we are not yet fracking in the UK! Four years ago the industry expected to be underway - now all they have is test drills and a lot of expense to go along with a very informed and growing amount of opposition smile emoticon

We are succeeding - every day that there is a frack-free UK, is down to what each of us is doing ...in our own ways. Be it sharing online, marching in demos, holding protection camps, fighting legal challenges, researching the credibility of documents, exposing corrupt politicians, bothering Francis Egan, giving evidence, holding public meetings, waving banners at roadsides, making videos, livestreaming events, fundraising for fines, risking arrest, slowing trucks, doing media interviews, engaging in debates... talking to the neighbours - it ALL helps and it ALL works in its crazy, disorganised, un-collaborated yet rather beautiful way.

I discovered early on in this, that telling other activists how to do their activism is not helpful - the best is for each to act in their own way... we then find ourselves in good company when our ways match. I feel blessed to have Nanas and Protectors as my closest companions on the journey.

The movement is vast and when bits of it upset me - I look wider... spent time yesterday loving the actions of Australian and Pennsylvanian activists and felt soothed and reassured that what we see in our immediate view - is NOT the full picture. Much love and respect to all who aim at the target with good intent.

War on Fracking

Quote before action:

When we see dictators inflicting dangerous industry or chemical attacks on their own people, we are in uproar and our government acts. When democracy is abused by governments acting in the interests of industry and influential individuals whilst ignoring the will of the people, again our government acts. Yet here in the UK, OUR government is seeking to use dangerous practices, chemicals and waste dumping that will put residents at risk for generations to come. Yet here in the UK, OUR government is indicating that it will seek  to overturn a decision made here in Lancashire by Councillors representing the people of Lancashire because it took too long and they don't like the outcome. What democracy? What safeguards? What voice the people?
 
And so it is with the deepest sadness and regret that we find ourselves, we residents, mothers. grandmothers and children of Lancashire... here today to confront what can only be described as a dictatorship. In a true democracy we would have been heard the first time and not be about to be dragged into legal wrangles that we cannot afford to win, with opponents so powerful they dwarf us and silence our voices. today we roar in an uncommon declaration of war on fracking... because if we don't take steps to protect ourselves, our government certainly won't.

Yesterday's anti-fracking action involving Vivienne Westwood, a bus-load of Nanas and a tank at David Cameron's house - all in under 2 mins! Thanks to Cheryl Atkinson for photography - words to tune under video) x

NEW WORDS to 'Dad's Army' theme-tune ...

NAN'S ARMY
(Chorus)
Who do you think you are kidding Mr Cameron,
if you think we're on the run
We are the Nanas that will stop your fracking game.
We are the Nanas that will make you think again.
Cause who do you think you are kidding Mr Cameron
If you think old England's done

The Nanas have come to your town to tell you fracking's done
We're going home this evening for a cuppa and a bun
So watch out Mr Cameron you have met your match in us
If you think you can frack us
We're afraid you've missed the bus

Chorus
Cause who do you think you are kidding Mr Cameron
If you think we're on the run
We are the Nanas who will stop your fracking game
We are the Nanas who will make you think again
Cause who do you think you are kidding Mr Cameron
If you think old England's done