Care farms

Posted on September 9, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, August 2, 2011

Before breakfast, three young people head down to the woods, struggling a little with the heavy bag of sow nuts. “Just scatter them in different piles,” says staff member Jane Brinson, helping them through an electric fence. “If you put them in one place, the smaller pigs won’t be able to get anything.”

The pigs, which are enormous, surge towards us, and their new feeders step backwards. “I’m not doing that,” says 15-year-old Daniel firmly. Sofia, however, who at 14 is a good head shorter than her fellow pupil, hefts up the bag and moves forward, methodically pouring out a dozen small piles of nuts under the trees as the pigs scrabble around behind her. “She’s a natural,” says Brinson admiringly. Sofia does not look up, but a sweet little smile flickers across her serious young face.

The young people are part of a group of pupils from St George’s school in west London who have come to stay at Jamie’s Farm in Wiltshire. Most of them have never been to the countryside before. For five days, they will get up early, feed the animals, return to the farm to eat a huge breakfast, and then head off to do chores which, this being a farm, are dependent on the season. In late July, they are pulling up coriander that is going to seed from the vegetable beds, feeding calves with farmer Jamie Feilden and helping with the harvest.

But this is not just a gang of young people on a school trip. Jamie’s Farm is one of a growing number of care farms across the UK aiming to provide a farm-based therapeutic intervention. The pupils have been chosen by their teachers because they feel they could benefit from what the farm has to offer. Sofia is a young carer in need of respite, Georgia, 14, is extremely quiet, and Sarah, 13, is “full of attitude”. Many of the group of 10 are well known in the school’s learning support unit, and at least one, Hasan, 14, has recently been temporarily excluded from school.

Closer bonds

Between helping out on the farm, the young people will also take part in group sessions with the farm psychotherapist who teaches them useful tools for calming down, or for dealing with difficult situations. They can do “horse-whispering” sessions with her, which are one-to-one talking sessions using one of the farm horses as a tool. Phones and sweets are banned, as part of the focus on creating a calm, supportive atmosphere and reducing over-stimulation. The teachers too are encouraged to form closer bonds with their charges and to observe the attentive way that the farm’s staff interact with the young people, and the tools that they use to get the behaviour they want.

And the young people seem to be thriving. Aaron, 12, who has had attendence issues, says of the horse whispering: “I feel as though she [the horse] is calm and I’m calm and she’s focusing on me. I had to work out how to speak really calmly to make her do what I wanted.”

Hasan says: “I expected to be really annoyed and bored, but as soon as we arrived it was fantastic. There’s so much space here. You can find your own space, you can express yourself.” He says he is regretful now about the exclusion. “It was fair enough really. My school is really cool, they really care about us … It’s funny being here, you feel much calmer. There’s time to think.”

Like some of his peers, he has a complicated home life. Here on the farm it is clear that he is a lovely, larky boy, but one in need of support and respite.

“They get a chance to be kids again here,” says Feilden, during a brief break between feeding the calves and repairing the tractor in the farmyard.

Feilden, who grew up on a farm, trained as a teacher and taught in south London, found himself thinking more and more of the farm. “I even brought some sheep to school. Increasingly, I wanted to give [the young people] a chance to have the experiences – the family, the farm, jumping around on the hay bales – the things that I had growing up, and I started to think about setting this up,” he explains.

The psychotherapist at the farm is his mother, Tish Feilden, who has 35 years’ experience of working with children and young people. “She was behind it straight away and part of the leadership team as soon as we began to think about it.”

In 2006, Feilden, with a couple of other teachers, raised money from grants and a loan from ethical bank, Triodos Bank – which has its headquarters in the Netherlands where the concept of care farms is well established – and started to take children to his family farm in Wiltshire. In 2010, they found Hill House Farm, nearby in Chippenham, and began to adapt it to become Jamie’s Farm. The emphasis, they decided, would be on the care aspect, rather than the farming itself, and their income comes from the schools that send children there. Since 2006, they estimate that about 700 children have attended and the farm’s annual turnover is now around £400,000.

This particular trip cost St George’s £6,000. The money was raised by the teachers using various fundraising methods including a sponsored run.

Follow-up visits

“It may seem like an expensive option,” says Feilden, but, he argues, the results justify the cost. As well as a visit to Jamie’s Farm, a follow-up includes at least two visits from farm staff to the school the following year. Its data indicates that eight out of 10 children who stay at the farm show a persistent improvement in behaviour. “Schools rebook,” Feilden says. “Headteachers ring up and tell me they’re rebooking because they’re no longer seeing those children in front of them. That’s what we want to hear.”

The term “care farm” began to be used in the UK a decade ago, after the foot and mouth crisis forced farms to diversify. Some started providing respite or care for vulnerable people in their communities. Now there are more than 80 care farms. Care Farm UK has just been set up in response to demand for a central information hub. Ian Egginton-Metters, a founder of the organisation, says: “There is evidence that ‘green care’ works. Mind [the mental health charity] distributes lottery funding for its ecotherapy projects, which are focused around taking people out of institutions and putting them in the natural environment.”

But even the most fervent proponents of care farming concede that it can sound “fluffy”. There seems to be a wide divergence of opinion on why it works, ranging from those who believe that the farm and the contact with plants and animals itself has a therapeutic aspect, to others, such as David Chantler, head of West Mercia probation trust, who believe that it is all to do with taking people away from their problems.

“If you’re working on a farm you are not jacking up at home, or shoplifting in town,” says Chantler, who since 2006 has been sending ex-offenders – about eight at a time – to spend five days a week for a period of several months to three care farms in the Midlands.

Ex-offenders are removed from temptation, at a cost of about £50 a day. But, argues Chantler, it is a cheaper and more effective option than prison. “You’re being given a chance to work in a community and empower yourself and strengthen your identity … all the things that prison takes away from you.”

Chantler admits that local reoffending figures do not really show the impact, but says: “I can introduce you to several police who will tell you about the people we all know who have turned themselves around thanks to this.”

Willowdene, in Shropshire, which Chantler describes as “the best” care farm, offers one-to-one therapy to drug addicts alongside NVQs in forestry, welding or animal management. It claims that in 2010, 92% of the students who completed the programme were still drug-free and holding down a job a year later. Matt Home, Willowdene’s head, says: “Working the land isn’t enough alone, you need the therapy too. But there’s something about coming, as most of these lads do, from very chaotic environments to this place that is therapeutic. You have to take responsibility here, you have to work hard, you are a valuable member of the community. If you don’t water the plants or feed the animals, they’ll die.”

Back at St George’s, the teachers report tears from several children on the bus home from Jamie’s Farm. After just a week, have the changes stuck? “It’s too early to tell, really,” says art teacher Rebekah Spalding. “But all week teachers have been stopping me in the corridor, talking about the difference they notice in the children. Georgia stood up and gave a talk to her class about Jamie’s Farm; she’s putting her hand up in class and participating for the first time ever. Sofia is much more outspoken too, it’s done a lot for her confidence. It will have less effect for some of them, but even so, I think they’ll remember it for ever.”

Spalding also saw Hasan last week, although his exclusion lasts until September, and says she noticed a significant improvement in his attitude.

“And Sarah has already asked if she can go back as one of the mentors in the group next year,” says Spalding. The school will be going back then? “Oh yes, there’s no doubt about that.”

• Pupils’ names have been changed.

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The Fabian manifesto

Posted on September 9, 2011 by bibi

Just reread the Fabian manifesto. Am not sure whether to laugh or cry; some things do not seem to have changed in the last 100 or so years.

A MANIFESTO

THE FABIANS are associated for spreading the following opinions held by them and discussing their practical consequences.

That under existing circumstances wealth cannot be enjoyed without dishonour or foregone without misery.

That it is the duty of each member of the State to provide for his or her wants by his or her own Labour.

That a life interest in the Land and Capital of the nation is the birthright of every individual born within its confines and that access to this birthright should not depend upon the will of any private person other than the person seeking it.

That the most striking result of our present system of farming out the national Land and Capital to private persons has been the division of Society into hostile classes, with large appetites and no dinners at one extreme and large dinners and no appetites at the other.

That the practice of entrusting the Land of the nation to private persons in the hope that they will make the best of it has been discredited by the consistency with which they have made the worst of it; and that Nationalisation of the Land in some form is a public duty.

That the pretensions of Capitalism to encourage Invention and to distribute its benefits in the fairest way attainable, have been discredited by the experience of the nineteenth century.

That, under the existing system of leaving the National Industry to organise itself Competition has the effect of rendering adulteration, dishonest dealing and inhumanity compulsory.

That since Competition amongst producers admittedly secures to the public the most satisfactory products, the State should compete with all its might in every department of production.

That such restraints upon Free Competition as the penalties for infringing the Postal monopoly, and the withdrawal of workhouse and prison labour from the markets, should be abolished.

That no branch of Industry should be carried on at a profit by the central administration.

That the Public Revenue should be levied by a direct Tax; and that the central administration should have no legal power to hold back for the replenishment of the Public Treasury any portion of the proceeds of Industries administered by them.

That the State should compete with private individuals—especially with parents—in providing happy homes for children, so that every child may have a refuge from the tyranny or neglect of its natural custodians.

That Men no longer need special political privileges to protect them against Women, and that the sexes should henceforth enjoy equal political rights.

That no individual should enjoy any Privilege in consideration of services rendered to the State by his or her parents or other relations.

That the State should secure a liberal education and an equal share in the National Industry to each of its units.

That the established Government has no more right to call itself the State than the smoke of London has to call itself the weather.

That we had rather face a Civil War than such another century of suffering as the present one has been.

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Tim DeChristopher found guilty

Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, March 4 2011

An environmental activist was on Thursday found guilty on two felony charges after he disrupted a government auction of land for oil and gas exploration. Tim DeChristopher’s sentence will be decided on 23 June but is unlikely to face the full potential 10-year sentence, the prosecutor said.

Outside the courthouse, DeChristopher told press and supporters: “We know now that I will have to go to prison. If we are to achieve our vision, many more will have to join me.” Asked by one reporter whether he would do it again, he replied to cheers from the crowd: “I wouldn’t change a thing. It had the initial impact I hoped for, where attention was drawn to the auction and the auction was reversed but all this [support] is more than I could ever have asked for.”

The prosecutor, the US attorney for Utah, Carlie Christensen, said it was extremely pleased with the jury’s verdict. “DeChristopher had several reasonable and lawful alternatives to disrupting this auction.” She will now begin to prepare the pre-sentence report, but said she will not seek the maximum penalty.

DeChristopher, 29, had been charged with making a false statement, and violating the Federal Onshore Oil and Gas Leasing Reform Act. On 19 December 2008, he went into an oil and gas auction in Utah – the last before the end of George Bush’s term in office – where 130,000 acres of land near pristine areas of Utah such as Nine Mile Canyon and Dinosaur National Monument were due to be sold off. DeChristopher signed up as Bidder 70 and bid on a number of parcels, driving up prices and buying $1.7m of land before being taken into custody.

The conduct of the case, which began on Monday, has attracted controversy, with Judge Dee Benson criticised by some people for his decision to bar DeChristopher from using the ‘necessity defence’. This meant not only that DeChristopher was unable to argue that he acted in order to prevent greater harm to the environment, but also meant that all discussion of the political context for DeChristopher’s actions was barred.

“When he took the stand yesterday that opened it up a little in terms of being able to talk about his state of mind,” said law professor Rebecca Hall, who has been working with the defence team. “But from the start the judge has taken an incredibly narrow interpretation of the law. The government would have liked this case to go away, but as it has gone to court he had to be made an example of.”

The case has also attracted national attention in the US, and is being credited with reinvigorating the climate change movement. “It’s re-energised and given a new direction to the movement,” says Ash Anderson, whose organisation Peaceful Uprising has been running solidarity actions for DeChristopher throughout the trial. “It’s been inspiring.”

One Salt Lake man has already been so inspired that he lost his job. Ryan Pleune, a school bus driver, was taking 50 children home from a theatre performance of A Tale of Two Cities, and diverted the bus to show them the rallies outside the courtroom. “It started to occur to me that there is this kind of democracy in action going on in our city. It is national news,” Pleune told a local newspaper. “Why not share that with the kids rather than let them just read it in their text books and think it is in the past?”

Bill McKibben, the founder of the 350.org climate movement, told the Guardian: “If the federal government thinks this will deter protest of its policies, they are mistaken. There will be many more Tims; in fact we will be spurred to match his solitary bravery with bravery on a larger scale.”

Rainforest Action Network’s executive director, Rebecca Tarbotton, said: “If the government or the oil and gas industry think that today’s verdict has intimidated or silenced people of conscience, they can think again. We are emboldened and inspired by Tim’s actions and commitment to protect our health and our climate and we will follow in his lead”. Support for DeChristopher was also expressed by Phil Radford, the head of Greenpeace USA, and by the Sierra Club.

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Row over RBS sponsorship of “Climate Week”

Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, March 3 2011

Climate Week is coming. If that means nothing to you, how do you fancy a “supercharged national occasion that offers an annual renewal of our ambition and confidence to combat climate change”?

Still not clear? Well, the plan, Climate Week founder Kevin Steele tells me, is “all about pointing people to real low-carbon actions that are already happening. We want to showcase all those local projects – such as a headteacher making his school low-carbon – in order to inspire and enthuse.” Steele had been organising social enterprises for several years before he decided it was time to “paint a positive picture of low-carbon living. We urgently need dramatic action on climate change and we need to bring this issue into the mainstream.”

Over the course of the week (March 21-27), he hopes thousands of events will take place across the country, and that many thousands of individuals will sign up for the currently unspecified Climate Challenge (50,000 have registered already). He hopes that:

“The power of these real, practical examples – the small improvements and the big innovations – will then inspire millions more people. We want to highlight both the inspirational stuff and the incremental stuff. We want to create a sense of a national occasion, so that people feel as if they are part of a collective movement.”

The week has already been backed by a dizzying roster of supporters, which includes David Cameron, Nick Clegg, Kofi Annan and Al Gore, as well as hundreds of organisations both national and local, public and private sector.

But a section of the environmental movement that is concerned about the event’s sponsors are mounting a counter-campaign which includes spoof entries for the awards and an anti-Climate Week Facebook group. Their objections centre around two areas. The first is that by focusing on “small, positive actions” you take the spotlight off the large-scale changes that really need to happen.

The second and far more contentious issue is that Climate Week is sponsored by the Royal Bank of Scotland, the company cited by groups like Platform, People and Planet, the UK Tar Sands Network and the World Development Movement as one of the worst environmental offenders in the UK. In 2009, several groups tried to take legal action over RBS investments, and last summer the bank was the Climate Camp target for the year.

“This isn’t at all about criticising or attacking Climate Week itself,” says Kevin Smith of Platform. “I think it’s really important that there are initiatives that encourage people to take action on climate change.” For Platform the problem is in seeing RBS gain “an environmental credibility that it doesn’t deserve when it hasn’t made any substantial changes at all to the way that it finances oil, coal and gas companies”. He points to RBS’s heavy financial involvement in the Canadian tar sands, and also to their financing of oil company Perenco, who are involved in a controversial project in Peru that endangers several uncontacted tribes.

And other groups echo Smith’s concerns. The influential and long-established Centre for Alternative Technology were invited to participate in Climate Week but refused. Their spokesperson said: “We measure possible interactions with companies via a corporate engagement policy, and working with RBS would breach it.”

Meanwhile, Jess Worth at the UK Tar Sands Network said: “I think Climate Week have been incredibly naive to take on a sponsor with such a bad climate reputation. What does it say about their commitment to – or even understanding of – the cause they have been set up to further?”

Steele responds that this is “a big tent campaign. Climate Week is all about showcasing solutions, we’re trying to create a national occasion which everyone can seize, and in order to do that we need to include the major areas of our economy like banking and commerce. We are focused on the best things that people do.”

He adds that:

“Looking specifically at RBS, the total portion of RBS loans which goes to the oil and gas industry makes up just 2.1% of their lending. And they have stated publicly that this percentage has been declining for the past three years. In fact their biggest single category of project finance is now wind technology.”

But Tim Gee, one of the “Superglue Three” who was recently convicted for a breach of the peace after he and two other activists glued themselves to the doors of an RBS branch in Edinburgh, believes that this is not good enough. The three have nominated themselves for one of the Climate Week awards, but have been told that they cannot compete in the Climate Hero category, which is decided by open vote. Steele counters that this is because the nominees in the Climate Hero category are decided by panel and will be international figures such as Rajendra Pachauri or Al Gore.

Gee says: “Actually what we need is to challenge the institutions causing climate change. But instead, Climate Week is offering itself as an advertising hoarding for them, and freezing out those taking the steps that will be necessary to stop climate change.”

Hmm. Who’ll put money on his chances of winning that award?

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Climate camp disbanded

Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, March 2 2011

After five years of camps, composting toilets, vegan curry and run-ins with the police, Climate Camp is calling it a day.

There will be no camp for the climate activists this year and the loose-knit organisation will be disbanded in 2011. The decision follows a five-day meeting to reach a consensus.

In a statement, activists for the climate movement said the camp was being disbanded to leave room to “launch new radical experiments to tackle the intertwined ecological, social and economic crises we face.”

The immediate reaction has been a mixture of excitement about the future and nostalgia for an organisation that, most agree, changed the way the UK talked about climate change.

Most camp graduates believe this was the right moment to call it a day. “There was a feeling that Climate Camp was committed to a certain kind of action, the annual camp, which is really a huge commitment in terms of energy and resources,” said Kevin Smith, a key figure in the climate movement, who was at the Dorset meeting. “People from Climate Camp are now involved and helping to organise so many of the different movements around, I think people felt they wanted to be freed up to get on with new things.”

He, like many others, is excited by the wave of political energy and engagement that he sees in the UK. “This isn’t about people giving up on climate change. But most people feel that they want to focus more broadly now.”

The Camp for Climate Action, to give it its full title, first came into being in 2006, after activists at the 2005 G8 conference in Stirling in Scotland mooted the idea. One activist remembers: “We built a camp up in Scotland, and had about 4,000-5,000 people there, and after we pulled that off, we realised that actually, now we had the infrastructure to try something like this. We had marquees, mobile kitchens, and the ability to organise, and this really seemed to be the moment.”

Leo Murray was at the very first camp outside Drax coal-fired power station in 2006. “I remember just feeling so relieved that here were hundreds of other people who felt the same way that I did. Even though in the end we didn’t shut down Drax, we left on a real high, because now we had a model.”

The following year Climate Camp announced that it was going to target Heathrow airport. With the help of lawyer Timothy Lawson-Cruttenden, airport owners BAA announced they would be seeking an injunction against a huge number of potential protesters. The subsequent case drew enormous publicity and, as Murray puts it, “was an absolute PR gift to the camp.” In the event only three people were subjected to the injunction, the camp went ahead, and dominated the news for nearly a fortnight.

Subsequent camps, at Kingsnorth the following summer and then in Bishopsgate during the G20 protests in April 2009, were deemed equally newsworthy. “The media interest Climate Camp generated moved the subject of climate change right up the agenda in people’s mind, and got people to really discuss the issues,” said the Climate Camp poet Danny Chivers. “Before Heathrow, for example, I think people vaguely knew that flying had implications, but hadn’t fully made the connection.”

A number of Climate Camps set up in Australia, France, Canada and other countries are testament to its impact on an international as well as national level. Caroline Lucas MP said of its legacy: “Climate Camp has played a hugely significant role in raising awareness of the need for action on climate change – and through imaginative and inspirational non-violent direct action, has succeeded in scaling up the pressure on the government and industry to adjust to the realities of a changing planet.”

One-time Labour leadership candidate John McDonnell MP told the Guardian: “I joined the Climate Camp when it came to my area to protest against the Heathrow third runway and I learnt more about climate change in the week of climate camp activities than from all the debates in parliament. The Climate Camp at Heathrow transformed our campaign against the runway from a local issue to an internationally renowned campaign, making a pivotal contribution in defeating the third runway.”

The policing of the camps also became a national controversy. Critics of the camps complained that they were costing taxpayers millions, with the cost of the Kingsnorth operation alone estimated to be nearly £6m. Concerns about heavy-handedness and police undercover operations also became national issues.

But increasingly the “campers” have become involved in new movements, such as the student occupations, the forest sell-off campaign, Palestinian solidarity groups, and the national anti-cuts movement. Frances Wright, from the camp’s legal team, said of the school walkouts last year: “The girl who organised the walkout at my daughter’s school had been to Climate Camp that summer. People who have been to camp know how to organise, they have the skills set, and now I think you can see the impact all over the country.”

Activist Mel Evans is looking forward to what happens next: “Climate Camp was always about more than just climate change, it’s also about the political and economic context for climate change, and people from Climate Camp are now addressing those issues through UK Uncut and dozens of other campaigns. It may not be called Climate Camp any more, but the methods and the values will carry on.”

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Tim DeChristopher on trial for monkeywrenching oil auction

Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, February 28 2011

The trial has begun of a US activist accused of sabotaging an oil and gas land auction by bidding $1.7m (£1.05m) for land parcels that he could not pay for. Tim DeChristopher, whose case has attracted support from high-profile environmentalists including actor Daryl Hannah and environmentalist Bill McKibben, faces up to 10 years’ jail if found guilty.

At an auction in Utah on 19 December, 2008 – the last before the end of George Bush’s term in office, and seen as a gift for the oil and gas industry – 130,000 acres of land near pristine areas of Utah such as Nine Mile Canyon and Dinosaur National Monument were due to be sold off.

DeChristopher, then a 27-year-old economics student at Utah, walked into the auction and signed up as Bidder 70. He proceeded to bid on a number of parcels, driving up prices and buying $1.7m of land for himself. The auctioneers called a five-minute break, and DeChristopher was taken into custody. He has since been charged with two felonies; making a false statement, and violating the Federal Onshore Oil and Gas Leasing Reform Act. The auction was suspended, and the lots later withdrawn by Barack Obama’s interior secretary, Ken Salazar.

The case has attracted support from leading US environmentalists. Last year McKibben, Nasa scientist James Hansen, and Naomi Klein co-authored a letter calling for support for Bidder 70, as DeChristopher has become known. A film is being made about the case and will be released shortly after the verdict. A group called Peaceful Uprising have been organising rallies in his support.

In pre-trial hearings, DeChristopher has been forbidden to use the “necessity defence” which was used in the famous Kingsnorth Six trial in the UK, when a jury acquitted activists of causing criminal damage to a coal-power station chimney. The decision means that DeChristopher will not be permitted to argue that he was acting in order to prevent greater environmental damage.

The defence team also sought to argue that the case is politically motivated, by demonstrating that in other cases where bidders have failed to pay, they have not been prosecuted. DeChristopher claims that at least 25 other cases have not been prosecuted. This argument was also blocked by Judge Dee Benson.

DeChristopher, referred to by both opponents and supporters as a “monkey wrencher” – a tribute to the 1975 Edward Abbey novel The Monkey Wrench Gang in which the protagonist appoints himself protector of the remaining desert regions of the American south-west and becomes a pioneer in the art of “eco-tage” – told the Guardian: “I was very nervous when I went in to the auction but when I won my first parcel I felt totally calm and peaceful. It felt like the first time my actions had really been in line with my sentiment. Up to that point I knew that climate change was a really huge issue, and yet in response to that I was riding my bike and writing letters to Congress.”

The trial is scheduled to finish on Thursday.

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Progress with green housing

Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, February 24 2011

The UK’s largest ever off-grid housing development will have a traffic light system prompting residents to keep their energy use low, say developers awaiting planning permission.

PortzED is the 67-apartment development dreamed up by Bill Dunster – the architect famous for the BedZed eco-development in Sutton – and it is designed to be entirely self-powered.

The six apartment buildings, to be built at the mouth of Shoreham port near Brighton, will be linked by wind turbines, and their southern face will be tiled in solar thermal and photovoltaics panels.

Batteries will be charged during the day in order to keep the lights on at night, and the apartments themselves will be heavily insulated in order to keep power use as low as possible.

But resident behaviour will also play a key role, says the developer, Colin Brace of Bohogreen, who has worked on previous low-carbon projects. “We can’t tell people that you only have so much power, and no more. But there are studies showing that if you give people renewable energy they think, oh good, it’s free, and their energy use actually goes up. So an important aspect of the project will be to educate people about their energy use.

“The apartments will be designed to encourage communal living as much as possible,” says Brace, “rather than having everyone in their own rooms using their own sources of power.” There will also be LED lights on the wind turbines which light up red, amber and green to show which block is using power most heavily, in order to foster “a healthy sense of competition between residents to keep their power use low”.

“The most important thing is that residents have a sense of ownership,” he adds. “There will be resident panels, and if there’s something like a football match coming up, the idea is that they will be able to talk through how to handle the attendant surge in power demand.”

Rachel Shiamh, who built her own off-grid house in Wales last year, and who is organising an off-grid conference this summer, argues that being off-grid makes her more aware of her power use. “When the sun comes out I think ‘oh brilliant, I can use the hoover.’ It’s made me far more aware of the elements. And I think it’s really important that this isn’t just seen as some hippy and low-budget thing; this kind of development is so important for getting off-grid into the mainstream.”

The apartments in Portzed will be up to 22% more expensive than an “on-grid” development, due to the extra costs of installing high-spec insulation and renewables. At current market rates, that could add £20-24,000 to the final price of a two-bedroom flat. The developers believe however that there is a high demand for this kind of home due to their rarity. The financing for the project is already in place and the project is expected to be financial viable.

The final decision over whether the housing project will be off-grid, or remain online, will be made at a later date, depending on the feedback from potential buyers. “I’m not absolutely sure that the market is ready for it yet,” says Brace. “But that [off-grid] would certainly be the ideal.”

The development is generally seen as a rare bit of good news from the housing industry, which has flatlined since the recession, and is still struggling to reach agreement with the government over the target for zero-carbon homes. In 2006, Labour announced a world-leading target to make all new housing zero carbon by 2016; when the housing minister, Grant Shapps, came into office last year he confirmed that the target would remain in place, and announced that they would have nailed the definition by the end of the summer. Nearly a year later, however, a final definition has still not been announced.

“We are now two-thirds of the way to having a working definition for ‘zero carbon’,” said John Alker, policy director at the Green Building Council. The government’s Zero Carbon Hub believes that, as of last week, agreement has been more or less reached on the standards for the fabric and the energy use of new residential buildings.

But the third part of the definition is the tricky ‘allowable solutions’, section. If builders cannot make a building entirely zero-carbon they are permitted to try off-site solutions, such as investing in a community energy scheme. Opponents of the allowable solutions argue that it should be possible to achieve zero-carbon fully onsite. But the building industry say that in some sites this is just not practicable.

“There just isn’t enough sun or wind on some sites,” says Alker, who points out that the position of Portzed – right on our south coast with lots of wind and sunshine – gives it an advantage that other sites just don’t have.

“There are only a very few zero-carbon homes in the UK at the moment, so it’s wonderful to see something like Portzed come along,” he said. “It’s this kind of exemplar which gets us all excited about it again.”

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Police use CS spray on protesters

Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, February 2 2011

When UK Uncut protesters were sprayed with CS spray on Sunday they were shocked and angry. Up to that point, the protest had been largely marked by good humour and calm – one protester had even tweeted about how nice the police were being. There had been no threat of violence which is what, according to police guidelines, must justify the use of what is sometimes referred to as a “non-lethal weapon”.

But when a protester was arrested the mood apparently changed. According to police, some protesters tried to reach the arrestee. In the ensuing scuffles one officer sprayed several protesters with CS spray, hitting at least three of them in the face (and spraying himself too, according to footage on Newsnight).

Now, this may have been a step-it-up change in police policy, as signalled last week by Sir Hugh Orde. This is worrying, if so; repressive policing makes the police look bad while energising and inflaming protesters, as we saw with Climate Camp.

But it’s also possible, from the accounts of witnesses, that a single copper overreacted. That would confirm the worst fears of police-watchers, who have cautioned against giving “less-lethal weapons” to a huge and varied group of officers. Give them tasers, they have argued, and innocent people will be shocked. Give them CS spray, and the wrong people will be sprayed.

CS sprays were approved by Michael Howard for use by our police forces in 1996 as part of the ongoing search for politically acceptable alternatives to guns. A whole load of other options were being looked at as well – other sprays, water cannons, extendable batons – but CS spray looked like a good option, being debilitating but with effects that wore off, in most cases anyway, in a few minutes.

Police said they would only use CS spray in very specific situations, and that their use would be controlled by strict guidelines. “Originally they were only to be used as an absolute last resort in cases of serious violence,” says sociologist Dr Brian Rappert, who has researched the use of CS spray by police in the UK.

Guidelines emphasise that using the spray “may have a profound impact on crowd dynamics with obvious implications for public safety and public order”. Though it’s hard to come by concrete figures for current use – the Home Office do not keep figures centrally; instead, the use of CS spray is monitored by individual forces – Rappert reported in his book on the subject that “repeated, albeit anecdotal, reports have been made of the sprays being targeted against non-threatening individuals” rather than for officer or public protection.

Police have just paid out several thousand pounds to a Liverpool man with mental health issues who was sprayed in the face – a judge concluded that police had used “unreasonable force”. It’s a similar story with the use of Tasers, which has steadily increased. Last year, then home secretary Chris Huhne said “a full inquiry into their use must be conducted before they are rolled out any further,” after police Tasered a man in a diabetic coma.

Police are human, some are young. If the use of CS spray at the UK Uncut protest was a policy decision – the Metropolitan police is reviewing the circumstances of its use – it would imply a perfectly organised chain of command which has every officer behaving exactly as the chief wishes. The truth, I suspect, is far more messy.

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Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, January 31 2011

Trade talks between Europe and Canada could leave the door open to companies suing states for losses incurred by efforts to fight climate change, campaigners claimed today.

The warning, backed by an MEP and a law expert, came as 10 protesters unsuccessfully attempted to talk to Alberta’s energy minister, Ron Liepert, this morning during a visit to London for a meeting with Lord Howell, the UK minister for the Commonwealth.

Liepert is visiting the UK and Belgium to promote tar sands in the Canadian province of Alberta as a “leading source of secure energy”. The protesters tried unsuccessfully to gain access to the Canadian high commission on Grosvenor Square.

Concern is focused on the Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement (Ceta), a trade deal which Canada and the EU have been negotiating for the last two years and which they hope to finally sign in 2012. Campaigners say Ceta could affect governments’ rights to regulate themselves and could also open the door for tar sands oil to be imported into Europe.

The agreement, which is in draft form, includes a clause allowing corporations to sue states for compensation if they feel their earnings have been unfairly compromised. Campaigners fear the agreement would give investors leverage against proposed changes to the EU fuel quality directive, which MEPs are reviewing to decide if it should discriminate against carbon-intensive fuel, such as tar sands oil.

“The proposed trade agreement between Canada and the EU will have a substantial impact on efforts to address the local, regional and global impacts of oil sands developments,” was the conclusion drawn by lawyer Steven Shrybman, who studied the draft agreement on behalf of tar sands campaigners in Canada.

“If Ceta fails to significantly improve on the norms for such trade agreements, it will only add to the serious impediments that now exist under Nafta [North American Free Trade Agreement] and WTO [World Trade Organisation] agreements to establishing effective measures to combat climate change.”

The clause, known as an investor-state dispute settlement mechanism, is increasingly common in the proliferating bilateral trade agreements around the world that have followed the collapse of the WTO’s Doha round. Examples include:

• Tobacco company Philip Morris forced Uruguay to back down on tobacco legislation last year.

• In 2008, Dow Chemicals took legal action against the Canadian state of Quebec after a ban on “cosmetic” lawn pesticides.

• In a landmark case last year, which some observers fear may have granted private companies unprecedented water rights, the Canadian government settled a case brought by paper giants AbitibiBowater for $130m.

A spokeswoman for the UK Tar Sands Network, which organised today’s protest, said: “Liepert is using the fact that the EU and Canada are currently negotiating to argue that any attempts to discriminate against tar sands oil due to its high carbon intensity is an unfair trade barrier.

“Tar sands oil is significantly more carbon-intensive than conventional fuels. Boosting the tar sands industry will directly contribute to increasing climate change and Europe has every right to ban imports of tar sands on these grounds.”

Liberal Democrat MEP Catherine Bearder said: “There is a real concern that, if the final agreement includes an investor-to-state dispute mechanism, it could be used by corporations to prevent government actions to limit the tar sands and possibly even to stop government policy limiting the enormous use of water by the corporations in the tar sands.”

However, Professor Lorand Bartels at Cambridge University’s law faculty, who has seen the draft agreement, points out that it does include environmental exceptions which mean the “Canadians and the EU would retain the right to regulate for public policy reasons”.

He believes anxieties about the agreement may be overblown, but agrees there are grounds for wider concern over the rapidly multiplying number of investor-state disputes as 57% of these cases have happened in the last five years.

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Interesting power struggles in Europe. No really…

Posted on March 28, 2011 by bibi

The Guardian, January 24 2011

Protesters blockaded the main entrance of New Scotland Yard in London this morning in a demonstration against undercover police officers having sex with members of groups they infiltrate.

The protest followed claims that undercover officers routinely adopted a tactic of “promiscuity” with the blessing of senior commanders.

Anna Jones, who was among 35 protesters at the headquarters of the Metropolitan police, said: “These women were not able to give informed sexual consent.”

Another demonstrator, Leila Deen, asked a young male staff member: “Did you know your agents were using sex with women like us to get information?

“It is a clear abuse of public office.”

The protesters carried pictures of the undercover police officers identified in reports along with placards with slogans such as: “Keep your truncheon in your trousers”.

They demanded that other undercover officers should be identified.

“We want a fully independent judged inquiry into the way undercover policing is being conducted in this country,” said Kate Blagojevic.

The activists used Indymedia and Facebook to organise the blockade, which started at 8am, “because lots of us have still got to get to work”, said Blagojevic.

Police deny that sex between undercover officers and protest group members was officially sanctioned.

Protesters were furious at comments by a former undercover officer, reported in the Observer yesterday, that “everybody knew it was a very promiscuous lifestyle … You cannot not be promiscuous in this group, otherwise you’ll stand out straightaway”.

“It’s so ridiculous,” said Emily Armistead. “Just for the record I’ve been in the same relationship for six years, I don’t have nits and my kitchen is clean.”

Isabella Sankey, the policy director at civil rights group Liberty, said: “Police officers all over this country should feel thoroughly ashamed that the sacred oath to uphold the law has been so perverted in this scandal.

“We hope the service will understand the importance of investigation, accountability and redress so that vital public confidence can be rebuilt.”

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