9/11 conspiracy?

World power is not a neat pyramid structure with
aliens, Jews or a cabal of men with a secret handshake at the top.
It makes more sense to see a range of competing power blocks,
alliances and cartels in a shifting, perpetual power play - with
governments, nationalist and business interests doing what they've
always done, battling for control of land, resources, workforces
and populations. There is one conspiracy that doesn't lurk in
smoky rooms behind closed doors - it's called global capitalism.

Schnews it is so good! Do subscribe. This is on 9/11 conspiracy, absolutely essential.

TRUTH-ACHE - On the fifth anniversary, SchNEWS gingerly dips a toe
into the murky waters of the great 9-11 debate...

It's the big fight over 'the truth'. In the blue corner we have
the US government's official version of 9-11 events and in all the
other corners we have proponents of various 'conspiracy' theories.
But in these days of governments caught telling outright lies
about WMDs etc, and a massive groundswell of cynicism about any
official pronouncement - just what is a conspiracy theory? What
happens when 'common sense' is hijacked and the fringe goes
mainstream? And does it matter anyway?

The self-proclaimed 9-11 truth movement, in many ways a genuine
grassroots movement (or cult?), is growing and its ideas are
gradually filtering into the mainstream. No anti-war event is
complete now without a new 9-11 conspiracy DVD and flyers to some
new talk / book launch - and our inbox often overflows with new
'revelations'. Every possible, and some quite impossible angles
are covered - from the relatively mainstream question marks
hanging over the US administration's possible advance knowledge of
the plot, to off-planet assertions about holograms, missiles and
alien DNA. This kind of thing will always delight the 'Elvis faked
the moon landings with a black helicopter' Internet crowd, but
with polls showing that a third of Americans and nearly half of
New Yorkers believing US officials either knew about the attacks
or were actively involved, this represents a major uprising of
disbelief. This has forced the US govt into producing a series of
rebuttals, asserting their 'truth' and challenging the
accusations.

The two main strands of theorising could be summed up as "they
knew in advance" and "the whole thing was faked". At the more
plausible end we have the idea that the Neo-Cons had anticipated
or were complicit in the events of 9-11. In any case, the event
enabled them to put into practice an agenda for global domination
hatched years before. It is all laid out in the year 2000 paper,
'Rebuilding America's Defenses' published by the Project for a New
American Century, a think-tank whose members included Cheney,
Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz (See SchNEWS 387). It talked about the fact
that a "catastrophic and catalyzing event - a new Pearl Harbor"
would be needed to transform the public's attitude to war.
Certainly there were no flies on the Cheney-Bush axis when it came
to taking advantage of 9-11's propaganda value, and even now Bush
routinely invokes it as an emblem of America's need to be
militarily aggressive.

At the other end of the reality spectrum, are those that are sure
that all the buildings were pre-primed with explosives, that all
the Jews who worked there were given advanced warning, that the
planes never existed and were in fact holograms disguising
missiles etc etc. The trouble with all these theories is that they
require mind-boggling numbers of people to have been 'in on it'.
It seems unlikely that the clique responsible for the disaster in
Iraq could have organised something so slickly. And why would they
need to go to the trouble? Two planes striking the towers would
have been more than enough to serve as the big catalytic terrorist
event... And if you were orchestrating the whole thing, why bother
faking it with missiles or holograms anyway? Just use real
planes... much simpler.

Perhaps this is why too much speculation on these points
eventually leads inevitably to a paranoiac world view, a secret
cabal who must control everything from behind the scenes - only
they could pull the wool over everone's eyes in such an
all-encompassing way.

SHAYLER TRASH

The 'truths' arrived at by some of these theories are so way out
there, we began to wonder if they'd been spread deliberately to
sow confusion, making it easier for the authorities to discredit
the whole 9-11 debate by association. Conspiracy on conspiracy -
where does it end?

There's no doubt that big questions about the role of the US
government remain unanswered (for example, relationships with
Saudi elites), but it seems they're in danger of being drowned out
by the clamour of outright lunacy.

Poster-boy of the UK branch of the 9-11 Truth movement is former
MI5 agent David Shayler. An acknowledged 'insider', he must have
seemed a great asset to the fraternity. But at the Big Green
Gathering this year, SchNEWS were confronted with the spectacle of
a man who appeared to have swallowed and regurgitated the entire
works of David "blame the lizards" Icke. No stone was left turned,
no subject demystified as Dave told us how aliens have been
negotiating with our government and 500 abductees are the only
people who've got any real idea about all this 9-11 stuff. That
includes 7/7 and 11/7 (date of Mumbai bombings by the way) - all
evidence of an underground plot by a 'shadow Zionist secret
government'. Amongst other interesting points conjured forth were
that the Royal family is descended from multi-dimensional Annunaki
lizards (and 'flaws' in evolutionary theory prove it!) Riveting
though this stuff is, it is, unfortunately, a load of bollocks.

On the other hand, the documented existence of a shadow world of
CIA mounted black-ops and coups makes the idea that 9-11 was a
'false flag' operation seem within the realms of possibility.
American intelligence has a long and bloody history of covert
operations, instigating coups and funding opposition against those
that challenge their authority. Coups such as the one on the less
well remembered September 11th - 1973, when the CIA helped
overthrow the democratically elected leader of Chile, Salvador
Allende, and usher in a brutal military dictatorship. Doubts over
9-11, the cornerstone of the US's ideological crusade, make it
easier to appreciate that it's just all in a days work for the US
to fund and arm people like Saddam and the anti-Soviet forces in
Afghanistan, which gave rise to Al-Qaeda.

The fact that these theories are catching on so widely is partly
due to the huge growth of scepticism about the role of governments
in the entire War on TerrorT. In this country we already know that
our government plotted the war on Iraq well in advance, lied about
Iraq's WMDs and engaged in a systematic propaganda campaign to
support the invasion. We know that our government, in alliance
with the US, is engaged in secret renditions, torture and
aggressive war. Public awareness of the true nature of power has
probably never been higher - and the fact that so many are willing
to believe that the US government may have slaughtered its own
citizens shows how the ideological ground is shifting. It's not,
in the end, the truth of the allegations but the effect they're
having that's important.

The 9-11 truth movement clearly sees the anti-war crowd as fertile
recruiting ground (maybe we should return the compliment). They
argue that proving 9-11 a hoax should be the main focus of any
faction opposing the Neo-Con-men. But in reality, whether or not
they orchestrated 9-11 (let alone it actually be proven), we
should be concentrating on the broader US-led capitalist agendas,
and their catastrophic consequences. 9-11 was a symptom rather
than a cause of a 'big picture' which doesn't need science fiction
to explain it. World power is not a neat pyramid structure with
aliens, Jews or a cabal of men with a secret handshake at the top.
It makes more sense to see a range of competing power blocks,
alliances and cartels in a shifting, perpetual power play - with
governments, nationalist and business interests doing what they've
always done, battling for control of land, resources, workforces
and populations. There is one conspiracy that doesn't lurk in
smoky rooms behind closed doors - it's called global capitalism.

JUMP IN AT THE DEEP END...

** www.911truth.org ** www.911research.com **
www.whatreallyhappened.com/inside.html ** ** www.letsroll911.org
** ** Watch the movie made by an amateur on no budget:
www.loosechange911.com ** For the British perspective see -
www.nineeleven.co.uk and
www.whatreallyhappened.com/london_exercise_video.html **

-------------------------------------------------------

Blair goes

So Blair is to announce his time table for leaving today, so British politics is going to change, even if personalities mean little, they mean something.

The new Prime Minister is likely to continue with more of the same:

Interviewed by Newsweek Mr Brown noted,
Speaking of the relationship with the United States …
Incredibly strong. It’s based on the shared values of both countries, our support for liberty and for opportunity, our support for a world order that is based on these values, and our support for an economic order that is based on free trade as well as on strong and successful markets.


The Green Party motors on with MEPs, etc doing positive stuff but the danger is that the Party ignores the wider political context. The aim is clear, an ecologically sustainable, social just and grassroots democratic society. The path to this objective is less clear and will always be difficult...to get to sanity demands challenging vested interests and deep seated values. Getting there is not simply about electing a green government and legislating for change.

Social change is subtle and governments at best can nudge thinks forward, the big changes are around economics and culture. As well as the really, really big questions of strategy, the Party needs to think about how its slogans, tactics, recruitment drives, election targetting work within the bear pit of British politics as it stands.

The Party has gained lots of members and activist from the Labour Party, so the current civil war could if it gives political space to anything on the left within labour be damaging to the Greens. Thes worst case scenario is a Gordon Brown electoral rebound, i.e Blair goes Brown wins smoothly, Brown is perceived to be more radical and the Labour party moves up in terms of poll ratings. The sting in the tail is that Brown is in many way a more enthusiastic neo-liberal than Blair and would stay in Iraq, maintain pretty uncritical Atlanticism (see above)....so far from green policies would continue but may be Labour activists would stay with labour.


Brown is keen on free markets, the work ethic and a society which serves the economy, the idea of the economy being used as a tool is utterly alien to him, we serve the machine. He is a neo-liberal just like his present rival, will he go on holiday with Cliff Richards, though?


'the work ethic has been restored in Britain. I think there is a learning ethic that has been re-established in Britain and the people. I can see right across the social groupings in our country, people wanting to go to college and university and get qualifications. And I see enterprise, something we’ve learnt from America, far stronger in Britain than it used to be a few years ago.

The agenda for the future is about educational reform and investment, it is about building stronger modernized public services that are more in tune and accountable to the people they serve. It’s also about building in Britain some of the strongest world-class industries and services. In financial services and capital markets, we’re already showing that we can lead the way.

The Conservatives under Cameron are playing the green card and even bringing in social justice, critiques of globalisation...worrying for those of us green radicals who hear a centre right party leader talking our language. The Conservatives seem at the top level to be pushing fair trade, recycling, tight anti-CO2 policies, sceptical on nuclear power.

I can't see many Green voters shifting to the Conservatives and it is far better to have the right at least pretending to be light green rather than Bushites.

There are some health warnings, the Goldsmith lite green conservatism does have a very nasty right wing side, the Conservatives are very pro-nuclear weapons including replacing Trident and are neo-cons who support the war. The party is playing .the anti-Corporate card but is run by corporate interests. Anti-globalisation is combined with demands for freer markets. Very confusing very interesting.

Greens need to flag up the economic reality that the planet cannot continue with ever increasing economic growth, that markets are destructive and flagging up the nuclear and neo-con dangers of Cameron.

Could Labour meltdown in Scotland lead to a SNP,SSP, Green coalition...potentially very very interesting, although I guess Tommy has reduced the chances of the SSP growing?

At Westminster is possible that a weak coalition government could introduce proportional representation for Westminister. A referendum is more likely, so Greens should be campaigning for PR to put the arguments so that such a referendum could be won. The Party would need to be fighting hard at the General election, promoting strong candidates, building up membership and electoral organisation so it could win seats with PR. The Party also needs to debate how it would use its first Green MPs to push forward change, the MEPs provide a good model but could MPs continue their pragmatic radicalism?

LUCAS PLAN TO BAN EU SEAL FUR IMPORTS WINS MAJORITY SUPPORT

One of my regular posts flagging up the good work by elected Greens in Britain, all these people had to work very hard to get elected in the first place. If you do care about seals, global warming, peace, please join the party and get involved.



MEPs VOTE TO HALT SEAL SLAUGHTER

LUCAS PLAN TO BAN EU SEAL FUR IMPORTS WINS MAJORITY SUPPORT

The European Parliament has adopted a proposal by South-East England’s Green
Party Euro-MP Caroline Lucas designed to halt the annual slaughter of
hundreds of thousands of seals in Canada and Russia.

Lucas, who is also a Vice-President of the RSPCA, which awarded her its
‘Michael Kay Award’ earlier this year to mark an ‘outstanding contribution
to European animal welfare’, co-sponsored a Written Declaration, along with
four other parliamentary colleagues, calling for a ban on the import or sale
of any products from hooded or harp seals.

Written Declarations are the European Parliament’s equivalent of an Early
Day Motion in the UK House of Commons. They rarely receive the support of
sufficient MEPs to become the parliament’s official policy – but with 373
signatures lodged the call for a seal fur import ban has done so two weeks
ahead of its parliamentary deadline.

Dr Lucas, also the Green Party’s Principal Speaker, said: “This is fantastic
news, which brings us a significant step closer to ending the cruel and
entirely unnecessary slaughter of hundreds of thousands of seals in Canada
and Russia every year.

“I am delighted that a majority of MEPs from all political groups and EU
member nations have agreed that this barbaric practice must be ended – and
the onus is now on the European Commission to act immediately, as MEPs have
demanded, before next year’s hunt.”

The declaration, which will be formally adopted later today (Wednesday,
September 6th) calls for the European Commission to immediately ban the
trade in seal body parts and products – a ban already adopted in Belgium,
Italy, Luxembourg, Croatia and the US, and under consideration by the
Council of Europe.

Dr Lucas initially proposed the ban after it emerged that more than a
million wild harp and hooded seals have been slaughtered in Canada in just
the last three years – and over a hundred thousand seal pups have suffered a
similar fate in Russia.

She said: “More than 20 years after the EU banned the import of fur products
from the very youngest seal pups, hundreds of thousands of seals pups
annually – most just a few weeks old – are clubbed on the ice floes or shot
from moving boats as they attempt to flee. Many are skinned alive.

“And every year there is public outrage when pictures of the hunt are
broadcast around the world – but the most ‘telegenic’ pictures are taken
near the end of the annual hunt, and the outrage comes too late for another
generation of seals.”

Dr Lucas added: “Banning the import of all seal fur is the only guaranteed
way of saving thousands of animals’ lives and showing the EU takes animal
welfare and protection issues seriously.”

ENDS

Note to Editors: To read the Written Declaration in full seewww.carolinelucasmep.org.uk

Letter from New York

Howie on the streets for the Nader campaign



Interesting to get this from Howie Hawkins who is running for a New York Senate seat against Hiliary Clinton (pro-Iraq war would be presidential candidate). Howie is a long term and active ecosocialist, we are going to build up a loose network of global ecosocialist over the next couple of months.

He was very involved with Bookchin's Left Green Network.

As you can see Britain brims with pluralistic democratic promise in contrast to the US, you need 10,000s of signature just to get on the ballot paper for many elections.

It is a virtual two party dictatorship.

Howie's book Independent Politics is worth a read if you are interested about how America can move from being a corporate state, the problem is bigger than the slogans we hear of 'Bush and Blair, no, no, no!'


Hi Derek,

My campaign is taking every moment. After Nov. 7, I will get you a list of US Greens to contact about the international contact list.


We turned in 30,000 ballot petiton signatures, double the 15,000 minimum, and although leaders of the Working Families Party (a satellite of the Democrats) examined out petition, they didn't challenge. It would have been a waste of their time. We are on the ballot, which is not easy in New York.

Clinton won't debate Tasini or me. We both debated an empty chair for Clinton at a peace movement forum in New York City last weekend. She's getting criticized for refusing to debate in the newspaper editorials, but she figure's that is better than getting taken apart in a televised debate on the war, health care, etc.

I've asked for Tasini's support after the primary next Tuesday. We'll see if he's ready to burn his bridges to the Democrats. If he's not, a lot of his campaign workers are. They are disgusted at how the Democratic machine denied his campaign access to local committee meetings and the state convention.

-- Howie

Homophobic terror: The Talibanisation of Iraq

Do read and act on this important post from Peter Tatchell.

From those of us keen to promote progressive Islam, watch out for the Sufi Muslim council, they seem to be a neo-con front.

Homophobic terror: The Talibanisation of Iraq

Peter Tatchell reveals the targeted execution of gay Iraqis by
Islamist death squads

Tribune - London, UK - 1 September 2006

Parts of Iraq, including some Baghdad neighbourhoods, are now under
the de facto control of Taliban-style fundamentalist militias. They
enforce a savage interpretation of Sharia law, summarily executing
people for ‘crimes’ like listening to western pop music, wearing
shorts or jeans, drinking alcohol, selling videos, working in a
barber’s shop, homosexuality, dancing, having a Sunni name, adultery
and, in the case of women, not being veiled or walking in the street
unaccompanied by a male relative.

Iraq is sliding fast towards theocracy and is likely to end up similar
to Iran. The power and influence of fundamentalist militias is growing
rapidly. Two militias are doing most of the killing. They are the
armed wings of major parties in the Blair-backed Iraqi government.
Madhi is the militia of Muqtada al-Sadr, and Badr is the militia of
the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), which is
the leading political force in Baghdad’s ruling coalition. Both
militias want to establish an Iranian-style religious dictatorship.

Despite this goal of clerical fascism, the Socialist Workers Party and
the Stop The War Coalition support Muqtada al-Sadr. They invited his
representative to speak at the anti-war rally in London on 18 March.
Not to be outdone, the July issue of the left-wing monthly Red Pepper
gave over a whole page to white-washing al-Sadr’s crimes against
humanity.

The terrorisation of gay Iraqis by these Islamist death squads is
symptomatic of the fate that will befall all Iraqis if the
fundamentalists continue to gain influence.

Under Saddam Hussein discrete homosexuality was usually tolerated.
Since his overthrow, the violent persecution of gay people is
commonplace. It is actively encouraged by Iraq’s leading cleric, the
British and US-backed Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. He issued a
fatwa ordering the execution of gay Iraqis. His followers in the
Islamist militias are now systematically targeting lesbian, gay,
bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people, as indicated by the following
reports received from my clandestine gay activist contacts inside
Iraq:

Wissam Auda was a member of Iraq’s Olympic tennis team. His dream was
to play at Wimbledon this year. He had been receiving death threats
from religious fanatics on account of his homosexuality. On 25 May,
his vehicle was ambushed by fundamentalist militias in the al-Saidiya
district of Baghdad. Wissam, together with his coach Hussein Ahmed
Rashid and team mate Nasser Ali Hatem, were all summarily executed in
the street. Their crime? Wearing shorts. An Iraqi National Guard
checkpoint was about 100m from the site of the ambush, but the
soldiers did nothing, according to eye-witnesses.

The father of 23 year old Baghdad arts student, Karzan, has been told
by militias that his son has been sentenced to death for being gay. If
his father refuses to hand over Karzan for execution, the militia has
threatened to kill the family one by one. This has already happened to
Bashar, 34, an actor. Because his parents refuse to reveal his hiding
place, the Badr militia murdered two of his family members in
retribution.

Nyaz is a 28-year old dentist who lives in Baghdad. She is terrified
that her lesbian relationship will be discovered, and that both she
and her partner will be killed. They have stopped seeing each other.
It is too dangerous. To make matters worse, Nyaz is being forced by
the fundamentalist Mahdi militia to marry an older, senior Mullah with
close ties the Mahdi leader, Muqtada al-Sadr. If she does not agree to
the marriage, or tries to run away, Nyaz and her family will be
targeted for ‘honour killing’ by Sadr’s men.

Gay Iraqis cannot seek the protection of the police. Iraq’s security
forces have been infiltrated by fundamentalists, especially the Badr
militia. They have huge influence in the Interior Ministry and the
police, and can kill at will and with impunity.

Fourteen year old Ahmed Khalil was accused of corrupting the community
because he had sex with men. According to his Baghdad neighbour, in
April four men in police uniforms arrived at Ahmed’s house in a
four-wheel-drive police pick-up truck. They wore the distinctive face
masks of the Badr militia. The neighbour saw the police drag Ahmed out
of the house and shoot him at point-blank range, pumping two bullets
into his head and several more bullets into the rest of his body.

In the chaos and lawlessness of post-war Iraq, hundreds of young boys
are being blackmailed into the sex industry. The sex ring operators
lure the boys into having gay sex, photograph them and then threaten
to publish their photos unless they work as male prostitutes. If their
gayness was publicly revealed, the boys would be executed by the
Islamist militias. They are trapped.

Wathiq, aged 29, a gay architect, was kidnapped in Baghdad in March.
Soon afterwards, the Badr militia sent his parents death threats,
accusing them of allowing their son to lead a gay life and demanding a
£11,000 ransom. The parents paid the money, thinking it would save
Wathiq’s life. But he was found dead a few days later, with his body
mutilated and his head cut off.

The UK gay rights group OutRage! is working to support our counterpart
organisation in Baghdad, Iraqi LGBT. Despite the great danger
involved, Iraqi LGBT has established a clandestine network of gay
activists inside Iraq’s major cities, including Baghdad, Najaf,
Karbala, Hilla and Basra. These courageous activists are helping gay
people on the run from fundamentalist death squads; hiding them in
safe houses in Baghdad, and helping them escape to Syria and Lebanon.
The world ignores the fate of LGBT Iraqis at its peril. Their fate
today is the fate of all Iraqis tomorrow.

* Iraqi LGBT is appealing for funds to help the work of their members
in Iraq. They don’t yet have a bank account. The UK gay rights group
OutRage! is helping them. Cheques should be made payable to
“OutRage!”, with a cover note marked “For Iraqi LGBT”, and sent to
OutRage!, PO Box 17816, London SW14 8WT.

More info on Iraqi LGBT: http://iraqilgbtuk.blogspot.com/

Ends

Green lifestyle: Lets look at Derek's rubbish

Lifestyle can be curse, a way of taking individual action as a substitute for institutional change.

it can be a form of puritanism and guilt tripping.

In rural areas with no public transport, individuals may have to use cars.

this is why green politics is essential....public transport can be invested in, cycle paths built, local schools and hospitals and other services defended.

Green politics is about putting the structures in place so people can live in a green way....greens and environmentalists achieve nothing when they ignore politics and politics is about the power to change structures.

having said this I quite enjoy a green lifestyle....lets look at my rubbish issues.

All the glass goes to the nearby bottle bank

Paper, plastics and cans, etc are collected in a green box scheme.

Vacumn cleaner dust, waste food, peelings, cigar stubs, corks....just about everything goes in the compost.

The secret to rodent free compost seems to be to have a worm bin which speeds the process up plus a compost bin.

I have a wormery but I would say just buy a 100 worms (they can be delivered in the post) and stick them in a column of car tyres (ever garage has tyres it needs you to take away), you may lose the liquid out of the bottom but this is far cheaper!

Buy worms here or if you have a neighbour with a worm bin, borrow a few so they can multiply!

Two bins mean food waste is diluted and does not build up.

A fair amount of cardboard and scrap paper is good for the worms.

I stick the occassional spade or two of soil in both bins.

Buying less in the first place is a help as well.

If you produce lots of food waste it can be put in a cone...

Green Party Sheffield councillors argue that diy substitutes for cones can be made for just £20, here is their step by step guide


The green economics is to use free stuff to create a self sustaining system, so you do less work and have less need to earn cash.

Capitalist markets need us to throw away more, consume more, work harder and wreck the planet in the process, the conventional free market economy...it's organised insanity.

‘Housing We Can Afford’

Greenspeak is an excellent green politics forum monthly in Brighton, went and spoke to them with Miriam Kennet of the Green Economics Institute in June. Very stimulating and fun.

More local green parties and green groups should be doing this to raise the level of our thinking.


‘Housing We Can Afford’
Tuesday 12th September 2006

7.15 for 7.30pm start £Free - Donations welcome.
>> Please note venue change for one month only <<
At The Enigma, 12 Ship St, Brighton


Speakers:
Bill Randall - Green Party City Councillor for Brighton & Hove and housing campaigner
David Rodgers - Chief Executive of Cooperative Development Society


This month, with the cost of owning a home beyond the reach of most, with rent often eating half our wages, we ask: is there any way out of this mess?

We hear about pressures on interest rates and buoyancy in the housing market, next to reports on alarming levels of personal and mortgage debt. We rarely hear anyone talking about a way forward.

How do we secure housing we can afford, for us and for our children?

Co-organiser Martin Grimshaw said “Housing is as big as climate change in it’s impact on our lives. Our sky high rent and mortgages, together with rising council tax and utility bills, affects everything from the quality of our lives to the price of toothpaste or haircuts, to the rate of bankruptcies, evictions and repossessions, which are rising alarmingly.”

Greenspeak is a series of free talks and debates, organised in association with the Brighton & Hove Green Party, tackling the ethical topics of the day and delivered by experts in the field.

Meanwhile Greenspeak is back at Terraces Bar & Grill, Marine Parade for Tue 10th October to consider: ‘Madness In A Nuclear World – Britain’s Illegal Weapons of Mass Destruction’, with Keith Taylor, Co-Principal Spokesperson for the Green Party and Brighton & Hove representative to the UN International Association of Peace Messenger Cities (IAPMC) + speakers tbc

Café Scientifique returns on Tue 17th Oct @ Terraces Bar & Grill – ‘Send In The Idiots’ with Kamran Nazeer, who was diagnosed as autistic when he was a child. He recounts his own experiences and challenges orthodox views of the condition and what it means to be autistic. See www.cafescientifique.org for future events.


See you there?

Kat & Martin
PS National Green Party Conference comes to Hove Town Hall 21-24 September. Open to the public with panel & fringe sessions with prominent speakers and films: info at www.greenparty.org.uk/nextconference

If you don’t want to receive any more of these flyers, sorry - please just reply with 'remove me from your list'


If you want to know more:

1. Greenspeak is a monthly Brighton event, searching for solutions to the big topical issues, organised in association with Brighton & Hove Green Party. Sociable and non-smoking with drinks available. For more information see www.greenspeak-brighton.org.uk and www.brightonandhovegreenparty.org.uk
2. Bankruptcy, eviction, debt:

There have been numerous articles in the press over recent months. For example see Times Online article 4 August 06 : http://business.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,16849-2299242,00.html, In2Perspective articles 4/8/06 http://www.in2perspective.com/nr/2006/08/uk-bankruptcies-hit-record-high.jsp and 12/7/06 http://www.in2perspective.com/nr/2006/07/unemployment-soars-to-six-year-high.jsp – personal insolvencies in the Courts have risen almost 70% nationally compared to the same period in 2005 and Individual Voluntary Arrangements (IVAs) for people unable to pay their debts has risen over 150% over the previous year, personal debt is over £1 trillion, repossessions are more than 20% up over the previous year. Business insolvency is following a similar pattern.


Meanwhile, unemployment continues to rise and is now at a 6 year high, with an 11% rise over the previous year.

Unofficial confirmation has been gained from Brighton County Court, where bankruptcy has risen dramatically over the last year or so. It was noted anecdotally that the number of younger people becoming insolvent has been striking.

3. See Greenleaf article by Bill Randall, Summer 2006: ‘City Housing Crisis – Greens Work To Find Solutions’ http://www.brightonandhovegreenparty.org.uk/publications/greenleaf/gl28.pdf
Highlights proposals to hand over Patcham Court Farm to a not-for-profit Community Land Trust, to build more sustainable affordable housing.

4. For more on the work of the Cooperative Development Society, see: http://www.cds.coop

5. Related topics:
To learn more about Community Land Trusts, see: http://www.communitylandtrust.salford.ac.uk
To learn more about the campaign for a ‘4th option’ in the transfer of council held housing stock, see http://www.defendcouncilhousing.org.uk Brighton & Hove, like all other authorities, is being compelled by the government to hand over it’s stock. The public consultation is going on currently.

6. For Green Party policy on housing see http://policy.greenparty.org.uk/mfss/housing.html

Greenspeak Contacts:
Martin Grimshaw 01273 329 573 / 07891 571739
Kat Neeser 07958 964810
email: martin@greenspeak-brighton.org.uk