GERMANY
Greta Thunberg dragged from coal mine protest by police

'We can’t accept that RWE, a fossil fuel company, can do deals with the government and threaten countless lives across the world,' says Greta Thunberg - David Young/Bild

Jorg Luyken
Mon, 16 January 2023

Greta Thunberg has criticised Germany’s Green Party for allying with a fossil fuel company, after police carried her and other climate protesters away from a village that is due to make way for an expanding coal mine.

Speaking at the edge of the protests in the village of Lützerath in the Rhine region, Ms Thunberg accused the Greens of hypocrisy, saying: "They took part in the demonstrations to save Lützerath and then sacrificed Lützerath.”

Ms Thunberg told broadcaster ARD: “We can’t accept that RWE, a fossil fuel company, can do deals with the government and threaten countless lives across the world.”

The environmental campaigner, 20, travelled to Germany last week to join protesters who had occupied the deserted village, which is situated at the edge of a huge open cast mine owned by energy firm RWE and due to be expanded.

Greta Thunberg says the German Greens have 'sacrificed Lüzerath'

- Federico Gambarini/dpa via AP

On Sunday, police carried Thunberg away after she refused to leave a sit-in at the edge of the mine.

German police spent much of last week clearing hundreds of protesters from the village, but two activists who had shut themselves inside an improvised tunnel were still holding out on Monday morning.

Robert Habeck, Germany’s energy minister, announced the deal with RWE last autumn, describing it as a “milestone” for climate protection.

RWE agreed to waive its right to dig up coal under five further villages in the surrounding countryside and to stop all coal mining in the Rhine region in 2030, eight years earlier than planned.

Under the deal, RWE agreed to keep two large coal-fired plants running for an extra 15 months to temper the effects of Russia cutting gas supplies to Germany.

Greta Thunberg is taken away by officers after joining the coal mine protest in Germany

 - David Young/Bild

This week, Mr Habeck accused protesters of picking “the wrong symbol” in Lützerath, claiming that the village stood for the end of coal mining in the region.

But climate activists have seethed at the fact that the environmentalist party has prioritised securing energy supplies over what they say see as the more critical fight against climate change.

Protesters point to studies that suggest Germany will overshoot its climate obligations under the Paris protocols if it continues to mine the coal found in the Rhine region.

Barbados ambassador calls on UK government and monarchy to apologise for slavery

Nadine White
Mon, 16 January 2023 

The Emancipation Statue, known by locals as Bussa, located at St Barnabas roundabout outside of Bridgetown in Barbados (Johnny Green/PA)

A Barbados ambassador has called for the British government and royal family to apologise for slavery and pay reparations following the Church of England’s admission of its involvement in past atrocities.

David Comissiong, Barbados’ ambassador to the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), addressed the church’s “groundbreaking” developments in disclosing its involvement in the mass enslavement of African people, as the Caribbean nation continues to push for reparatory justice.

Barbados was the birthplace of the British slave society and was most ruthlessly colonised between 1636–1876; Mr Comissiong is the deputy chairperson of the country’s National Task Force on Reparations.

The Church of England’s investment fund’s “shameful” historic links to transatlantic slavery were laid bare in a full report on Tuesday, prompting it to announce £100 million of funding for a programme of investment, research and engagement to try to “address past wrongs”.

In the 18th century, the church “invested significant amounts” of its funds in the South Sea Company, a firm founded in 1711 to refinance England’s national debt which was awarded the monopoly on Britain’s trade of enslaved people to the Spanish Americas.

Other entities that invested in it include the British royal family, government, the Bank of England, scientific pioneers such as Sir Isaac Newton, and members of the ruling class of European nationalities including King Philip V of Spain.

“The reality is that the Church of England has confirmed that investment or other participation in the crime against humanity that the transatlantic slave trade was is more than enough to establish an obligation to apologise and to implement and finance – in consultation with representatives of the affected communities – a concrete programme of reparations,” Mr Comissiong said on Sunday.

“The eyes of all right-thinking people, all over the world, will now be on the British government, the British royal family, the Bank of England and other institutions of the British establishment, and the governments of Spain and other relevant European countries.

“How will each of them respond to the moral imperative that now confronts them? The world will be watching."

David Comissiong, deputy chairperson of Barbados’ National Task Force on Reparations (Supplied)

The Church Commissioners for England announced the funding commitment on Tuesday. However, as it emerged that the institution is sitting on £10 billion, derived from the Anne’s Bounty, a predecessor fund of the church which had direct links with transatlantic chattel slavery, some critics have dismissed its £100 million as inadequate. On the other hand, some members of the church have slammed the funding package altogether.

Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, chairman of the Church Commissioners, called the report’s interim findings “a source of shame” in June 2022 and reiterated his apology last week, saying “it is now time to take action to address our shameful past”.

The £100 million funding, to be delivered over the next nine years, will establish an impact investment fund to “invest for a better and fairer future for all, particularly for communities affected by historic slavery”, the church said.

"The involvement and culpability of the Anglican Church and the other relevant institutions actually go way beyond investing in slave-trading companies like the South Sea Company,” Mr Commisiong told The Independent.

“What the Anglican Church has established is that - at a minimum- investing in a slave-trading company like the South Sea Company requires the guilty entity to genuinely apologise and to be prepared to help repair some of the damage that was done, and that still persists in the lives of African descendants today.

“These are all crucial, historic, ground-breaking developments in their own right, but of equal, if not greater, significance is the invaluable light that they shed on other extremely important related aspects of our reparations campaign.”

The South Sea Company transported 34,000 enslaved African people “in crowded, unsanitary, unsafe and inhumane conditions” during its 30 years of operation, the report estimates.

Shareholders with over £10,000 worth of stock in the company included the Earl of Halifax, Charles Montagu, the founder of the Bank of England. That amounts to over £1.5 million in today’s money.

“There can be no doubt that the eighteenth and nineteenth-century slave trade was an unacceptable part of British history. As an institution, the Bank of England was never itself directly involved in the slave trade, but is aware of some inexcusable connections involving former governors and directors and has apologised for them,” a Bank of England spokesperson told The Independent.

“The bank appointed a researcher to undertake extensive research into this aspect of its history. Much of that research is presented in an exhibition in the Bank’s Museum which is free and open to the public.”

Weeks ago, it emerged that Barbados is pursuing reparations from Richard Drax, a sitting member of parliament and the UK owner of the largest former slave estate on the island. The nation became a republic, removing the British monarch as its head of state, in November 2021.

While the palace declined to comment, the UK government has been approached for a response to Mr Commisiong’s remarks.

Capitalism and Slavery

https://glc.yale.edu › pdf › capatlism_and_slavery

PDF

Capitalism. &. Slavery. <I. Eric Williams. NORTH C ... slaves in other colonies, the Georgian planters found them- selves in the position, as Whitefield ...

This Is Australia: First Nations dancers remake Childish Gambino’s This Is America

Sian Cain
Mon, 16 January 2023 a



When Childish Gambino’s song This s America was first released in 2018, its elaborately choreographed and racially loaded film clip inspired a storm of speculation as people tried to decode what likely became the most talked-about music video of all time. Which of the dance moves were based on Jim Crow caricatures? Is the shooting of the gospel choir a rejection of spiritual upliftment? Is the last shot a reference to Get Out? And just what did the galloping horse mean?

Then remakes began to stream in from around the world. This Is Iraq, This Is Sierra Leone, This Is Nigeria, This Is Barbados, This Is Malaysia: all tackling racial injustice, human rights abuses, political hypocrisy and greed through dance and song.

Now Marrugeku, Australia’s leading First Nations dance company, has put together This Is Australia: a searing indictment of the country’s treatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, refugees and migrants.

Like Childish Gambino’s video, Marrugeku’s take is packed with references familiar to Australians with one eye on the news – a man with a spit hood over his head, an overly-familiar white reporter, refugees holding signs, heavily armed police. The song, lead by Noongar rapper Beni Bjah, opens: “We just want a barbie / Crack a can or two / Put upon your thongs / Aussie day is due / Oh, lest we forget / The footy’s on tonight / Can’t you just get over it / You know she’ll be right.”

“It’s is a different process to writing an original song, to having a blank canvas,” Bjah says. “But having Childish Gambino’s version to go off actually helped – This Is America had already inspired me so much, all these ideas just popped in my head. We could have probably written three or four songs.”

Marrugeku’s co-artistic directors Dalisa Pigram and Rachael Swain had the idea years ago, while brainstorming a work that would tackle First Nations incarceration rates and Australia’s treatment of refugees. That work would become Marrugeku’s latest show, Jurrungu Ngan-ga (Straight Talk), which heads to Adelaide Festival in March.

At the time, then prime minister Scott Morrison was announcing a $7m plan for a “re-enactment” of James Cook’s journey on the HMS Endeavour that would circumnavigate Australia, despite the fact that Cook never did that. (It was later scrapped due to the pandemic.) When Black Lives Matter protests began a few months later after the murder of George Floyd in the US, suddenly Australia was engaged in a national debate around toppling statues celebrating figures such as Cook.

“We were thinking, how do we respond to all of this?” says Pigram. “And this was it. [Marrugeku] worked on the choreography, while Beni crafted up those amazing lyrics that hit hard in the heart.”

Glover’s opening dance, as a twitching caricature, inspired Pigram to think of an Australian equivalent. “We were trying to think of the kind of stereotypical dance that people imagine Aboriginal people doing – the kangaroo, and shaking shoulders,” she says. “[Dancer] Luke Currie-Richardson is doing it with style, but it is kind of cheeky.”

Halfway through, the song is interrupted by a wailing cry, sung by Marrugeku’s Emmanuel James Brown, over a shot of a triumphant Cook figure standing on a boat. This is a grieving response to the valourisation of Australia’s colonisers – a reminder of the pain they left behind, Pigram says: “We talk about melting statues down, when these statues are melting people down.”

The project sat in stasis during the pandemic, until stars aligned: Marrugeku was touring Jurrungu Ngan-ga around the Kimberley just as the Western Australia border re-opened and all the company’s dancers were in the same space for the first time in a long time.

Marrugeku and Bjah reunited on a sweltering day at Fitzroy Crossing, on Bunuba country, to record the video. Childish Gambino’s clip features several long, meticulously choreographed takes, and Marrugeku filmed roughly seven takes of every shot. “Multiple takes for anything a couple of minutes long is a lot work,” Bjah says. “But the dancers were so on point, they brought me up to their level. I felt the pressure because I didn’t want to make them keep running through it on a hot day.”

While Marrugeku’s shows like Jurrungu Ngan-ga earn rave reviews from those with the opportunity to see them, Pigram and Bjah hope people around the world who can’t will watch This Is Australia, and better understand the unique challenges facing Australia’s First Nations peoples, migrants and refugees.

“When we make a show for a theatre, we’re making the show that some people can never access – people who are incarcerated, on prison islands, in detention centres,” Pigram says. “So this is how we get to them, and to people all across the world.”

“Australia has a fear of the unknown,” Bjah says. “What we don’t understand, we want to lock up or send home. And we’re the most multicultural country in the world.”

Petition to strip royal loopholes from Scottish laws becomes Holyrood's most popular

Steph Brawn
Mon, 16 January 2023

A PETITION demanding the Scottish Government abolish royal exceptions and adaptations to legislation has become the most popular on Holyrood's website.

The petition launched by Our Republic has amassed over 6000 signatures in just over a week – nearly twice as many as any other submitted in the past year.

It calls for all details of instances where the monarchy has lobbied for changes in Scottish law to be made public, for them to be reversed, and for any future communications between the monarchy and government to be “fully transparent” to prevent any such alterations to Scottish laws being implemented in the future.

Our Republic convenor Tristan Gray said it is important for people to realise the monarchy are not simply “neutral figureheads”.

READ MORE: BBC Scotland radio host calls Nicola Sturgeon 'our leader'

He said: "We wanted to draw attention to the secretive ways in which the royal family have been interfering with our laws to their own benefit.

“While many people think of the royals as simply neutral figureheads and tourist attractions, the reality is that, behind the scenes, they are anything but.

"News stories this week, from the clear strategy of anonymous briefing to shape media reporting to revelations Charles yet again interfered with environmental regulations in 2019, show how much of an immediate concern these ongoing royal manipulations should be.

“The first step towards changing this is to lift the shroud of secrecy."

READ MORE: An SNP shift to the left could boost independence campaign

A constitutional mechanism called Crown Consent sees the monarch given an opportunity to look over prospective laws that could affect his or her property and public powers. It is not the same as Royal Assent, which is given to bills to make them acts of Parliament.

Gray added: “We're calling on the Scottish Government to ensure all future communication between the Crown and the Government are public and transparent, publish all past correspondence, abolish past exemptions implemented on the monarchy's behalf, and work to prevent such alterations to our laws in the future."

The popularity of the petition has come amid a rocky time for the royals after the publication of Prince Harry's autobiography Spare, which made claims about how the family has sought to shape media reporting and "plant" stories.

The National: Prince Harry's autobiography Spare included revelations about how the family can shape media reporting

Prince Harry's autobiography Spare included revelations about how the family can shape media reporting (Image: Archant)

Reports said that the late Queen was given advance sight of Holyrood bills – allowing her to secretly lobby for changes – on at least 67 occasions. These included bills dealing with property taxation, protections from tenants, and planning laws.

It emerged at the weekend the UK Government asked King Charles for permission to pass its post-Brexit Environment Act because laws requiring landowners to enhance conservation could affect his business interests.

In letters sent in October 2019, then environment minister Rebecca Pow informed Charles: “This bill contains measures on conservation covenants which affect the interests of the crown, the Duchy of Lancaster and the Duchy of Cornwall.

READ MORE: UK's richest one per cent has more wealth than bottom 70 per cent

“Part 7 (conservation covenants) of the bill applies to crown land as it applies to any other land.”

Letters then show that the prince’s private secretary, Clive Alderton, gave his consent for the law.

Gray said that he feels republicanism is growing in Scotland and now is the right time to talk about the future of the monarchy.

He said: "We have members from parties across the political spectrum and republicanism is growing in Scotland. A recent poll showed that only 45% of Scots still support the monarchy.

“We think the time is right to have a proper conversation about the future of the royal family in Scotland, and the vital importance of the concept that all of us should be equal under the law."

The petition can be signed here and will continue to collect signatures until February 2. It will then be considered by the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee.

EU/UK
Energy bills will remain higher for years, warns boss of major gas producer


August Graham, PA Business Reporter
Mon, 16 January 2023

Societies need to stop thinking of energy as something abundant, the boss of one of Europe’s biggest gas companies has said as he warned that bills will remain higher for years.

Equinor chief executive Anders Opedal said that a lot of energy has been wasted as countries got used to cheap oil and gas.

But after Russia escalated its war with Ukraine, the European energy market has lost its biggest supplier of gas, a vital fuel for much of the economy.

“I think we need to treat energy as something that is not abundant. It actually has a value. I think we’ve had a lot of cheap energy in the past and we’ve probably wasted some of it,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“So, to make sure that we are making the right investments everyone wants to use as little energy as possible.”

The current energy crisis has seen bills for the average household protected by the price cap, rise from around £1,300 to £2,500 today, including government support.

Without the support from the Government, the average annual household energy bill would have been £4,279 in the last three months of 2022.

Mr Opedal said prices will likely remain higher for years to come, although they will start to fall from the more extreme level as the market adapts.

Norway’s Equinor is one of the biggest producers of gas in the world, and supplies much of Europe’s energy needs.

“We will see more and more normal prices in a couple of years’ time,” Mr Opedal said.

Energy bills will remain high for years to come, a major gas producer has warned 

(Danny Lawson/PA)

He added: “We see a rewiring of the whole energy system in Europe in particular after the gas from Russia was taken away. We need massive amounts of more renewables.

“We need to do the industry in a totally different way, requiring hydrogen and so on.

“This will require a lot of investment and these investments need to be paid. So I would assume that energy bills will maybe be slightly higher than in the past, but not as volatile and high as they are today.”

Brazil makes official bid for Amazonian city to host UN climate conference in 2025

Euronews
Mon, 16 January 2023 

Brazil makes official bid for Amazonian city to host UN climate conference in 2025


Brazil has officially launched a bid for the northeastern city of Belem to host the COP30 international climate summit in 2025.

The UN climate talks are held annually with the last event, COP27, taking place in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt in November. COP28 will be held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates later this year with oil company boss Sultan Al Jaber recently named as president of the talks.

The venue for COP29 hasn't vet been confirmed but Australia is currently the main candidate.

On Wednesday (11 January) President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said that he was fulfilling a promise he made last year by proposing a Belem to host the climate conference.

Lula, who in November attended COP27 in Egypt as president-elect pledging to recommit the rainforest nation to tackling the climate crisis, said he would name a city in the Amazon to host the 2025 UN climate talks.

A candidate to host the 'biggest climate event on the planet'

Belem is the capital of the Amazonian state of Para and one of the largest cities in the region by population. It is second only to Manaus, which hosted games of the 2014 World Cup.

Lula said in a video on Twitter that Brazil's foreign relations ministry had formalised Belem as a candidate to host COP30.

"In Egypt I made the pledge that Brazil could host COP30, and I am happy to know that our (foreign relations) minister Mauro Vieira has formalized Belem's bid," Lula said in the video alongside Para Governor Helder Barbalho.

"I hope that we are going to make a beautiful COP."

Governor Barbalho called COP the "biggest climate event on the planet" and said that Belem will open its doors to debate the Amazon, discuss climate change and find solutions.

Lula has been promising to tackle deforestation in the Amazon, which hit a 15-year-high under former President Jair Bolsonaro. He recently named Marina Silva, who oversaw a significant drop in deforestation during his first stint as president in the 2000s, as his environment minister.

Companies will soon have to prove that they really are taking climate action, under draft EU law

Charlotte Elton
Mon, 16 January 2023


A draft European Union law will require companies to back up green claims with evidence.

The proposal will clamp down on companies promoting their products as "climate neutral" or "containing recycled materials" if such labels are not substantiated.

The draft document - seen by Reuters - aims to fight misleading environmental advertisements.


"By fighting greenwashing, the proposal will ensure a level playing field for businesses when marketing their greenness," said the draft, which could still change before it is published.

The attempt to stamp out greenwashing comes after a European Commission assessment of 150 claims about products' environmental characteristics in 2020 found that more than half - 53 per cent - provided "vague, misleading or unfounded information".

Davos: 1 in 10 travelled by private jet to meeting designed to tackle climate change

What is greenwashing and why is it a problem?

How does the EU plan on fighting greenwashing?

As awareness about the climate crisis grows, increasing numbers of businesses are co-opting the language of sustainability.

The draft legal proposal would fact-check these claims by imposing reporting requirements on different companies.

EU countries would have to ensure environmental claims are proven against a science-based methodology, such as a "product environmental footprint" framework that tracks environmental impacts across 16 categories including the air and climate change.

Large fossil fuel polluters are often accused of greenwashing when they promote their sustainability credentials. - Canva

Under the proposal, companies that claim their product has a positive environmental impact must also disclose if this causes an negative impact in another area.

Claims based on promises of future environmental performance must be backed up by milestones the company will achieve by specific dates.

Companies whose claims rely on buying carbon credits to offset their own environmental impact would have to disclose this.

EU countries would need to establish a system to verify companies' claims, and impose penalties for non-compliance.

Oil firms pour millions into ‘greenwashing’ Google adverts, study claims


Community conflict and vague predictions: The five biggest reasons carbon offsetting schemes fail

The draft document said the move would help consumers identify which products are truly eco-friendly and give proper credit to firms whose products have real environmental benefits.

The draft rules would cover all products and services sold in the EU, unless they are covered by comparable EU rules. "Green" investment products are already regulated the EU's taxonomy, a controversial labelling system facing legal challenges from the Austrian government and campaigners for allowing gas and nuclear energy to be labelled as green.

Why an absence of A-listers at Davos is not just deep trouble for the World Economic Forum, but for globalisation too

Mon, 16 January 2023 


Davos, the World Economic Forum (WEF) and its founder, Klaus Schwab, have become more famous than ever before in the past couple of years - albeit not for the reasons they might have wanted.

As COVID-19 spread and the world battled the pandemic, Mr Schwab and the WEF, not to mention regular delegates such as Bill Gates, became the subject of a suite of outlandish conspiracy tales, most of which came back to the premise that they were hell-bent on world domination.

Leaving aside the lurid detail of these stories, they seem to have missed the most important point of all, far from becoming more powerful than ever before, Davos is failing.

Before we go any further it's worth pointing out that pinning down what Davos "is" is surprisingly tricky.

At its core, it is a four-day-long meeting of businesspeople, politicians, academics, campaigners and, yes, celebrities, up the mountain in a Swiss ski resort.

There are speeches from world leaders, forums where people talk about the big issues of the day, from poverty to climate change to inequality and countless meetings and parties outside the official World Economic Forum cordons.

Bankers come here to meet potential clients and do deals in hotel suites, politicians have quiet bilateral meetings with their peers and with businesspeople.

Read more:
What is Davos and what happens at the World Economic Forum meeting?

But there are two overarching reasons why Davos matters. The first is: convening power.

It stands and falls on whether it can persuade enough influential people to come here, so that the other influential people can rub shoulders with them.

The second is something deeper: most of the delegates here benefit from a world where capital and trade move freely from one part of the world to another. This place is not the explanation for the globalisation of the past few decades, but it has certainly thrived in that world.

And on both of these fronts, things are not looking good for Davos.

There are plenty of A-list delegates coming to the forum this year, from German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to US climate envoy John Kerry, not to mention the business mainstays like JP Morgan chief executive Jamie Dimon and, of course, Bill Gates.

But the guestlist this time around looks considerably less heavyweight than usual.

There is no US president, no UK prime minister and even Emmanuel Macron is giving the meeting the cold shoulder - little wonder given these nations, and so many others, are battling a cost of living crisis back home.

The end of globalisation itself?

But more important still is the fact that the very world Davos thrived in is disintegrating.

There is a war in mainland Europe. Indeed, some have described the conflict in Ukraine as simply the earliest movements in a world war.

Relations between China and the West are at a new low point. Countries around the globe are re-engineering their supply chains, and the era of untrammelled globalisation seems to be ending.

Davos has been written off many times before (possibly including by yours truly) yet it has managed each time to defy such prognostications.

A lot of people thought Donald Trump's election would spell disaster for the forum, yet he attended it more than once, and was here at the last winter meeting back in early 2020.

Yet there are two other reasons, on top of the two above, why Davos is facing its biggest threat yet.

Click to subscribe to The Ian King Business Podcast

COVID's blow to face-to-face events

The first is the pandemic that erupted shortly after that last winter meeting, which has undoubtedly dealt a blow to face-to-face events such as these.

Davos may be leagues bigger and more influential than most corporate jamborees, but at its core that's ultimately what this event is, and thanks to Zoom and remote working the corporate jamboree sector is trapped in a deep recession of its own.

The other issue comes back to something Klaus Schwab, the forum's founder, has often talked about before: the stakeholder economy.

This idea, his brainchild from decades ago, is that businesses do not exist in isolation: they are at a nexus of various different groups, from shareholders to customers to employees and, for that matter, the state and society in which they operate.

The idea was that by engaging more sensibly with each of these parties the stakeholders could all get along. The Forum's official motto is "Committed to Improving the State of the World" but it might have done better to borrow the old BT slogan: "It's good to talk".

Yet in the face of the cost of living crisis, these lines of communication seem to have frayed, or possibly snapped altogether.

There has been more industrial action in recent months than at any time in recent decades.

Dialogue seems to be failing.

On pretty much every front, then, Davos seems to be in deep trouble.

Far from gaining power in the past few years, it is under greater threat than ever before.

There will be fanfare aplenty from this Swiss town in the coming days: Ukraine, the state of globalisation, climate change - all of these issues will be discussed here by A-list panels.

But quietly, almost indiscernibly, this place is becoming less important as the world around it changes.

Economic, social and cultural rights must be enshrined in UK law



Mon, 16 January 2023

Photograph: Gian Ehrenzeller/EPA

This week UK government representatives will meet world and business leaders at Davos to talk a big game on inequality. Yet at the same time, a new report from more than 70 civil society organisations across England and Wales has found that our basic human rights at home are in crisis.

Over the last six months, the UK human rights organisation Just Fair has been accepting evidence from organisations on the front line of the cost-of-living crisis for a report to the United Nations on rights in the UK. The evidence is damning, and points to a government falling short in many areas and for too many people.

Soaring levels of poverty, a health service in crisis, a social security system no longer fit for purpose, poor work conditions, restrictions on the right to strike, discrimination at work and school, and in healthcare and housing, are all human rights issues under international law. Our essential rights to food, housing, social security, work, health and education are not being respected, protected or fulfilled.


The successive shockwaves of austerity, Covid-19 and the cost of living crisis have left us with deepening levels of inequality, with the government’s actions consistently worsening rather than improving the situation. Far from protecting our essential rights, the government is failing people across the board.

What is the solution? Greater human rights protections. More than 45 years after the UK signed an international treaty agreeing to uphold economic, social and cultural rights, they’re still not part of domestic law, meaning the government can break its obligations without consequence. It’s time for us to stand up for these rights, and for them to be incorporated into domestic law.

Jess McQuail
Director, Just Fair

UK
New Tory law would see protests shut down before they even HAPPEN

Adam Robertson
Mon, 16 January 2023 

The UK Government is seeking new powers to clamp down on protests (Image: PA)

THE UK Government is set to announce a range of new proposals to clamp down on protests, broadening the range of situations in which police can take action to prevent disruption.

Major protests in recent years have focused on a range of issues, including environmental issues.

In November, for example, Just Stop Oil protesters blocked the M25 with supporters climbing onto overhead gantries.

The law would only apply south of the Border although many Scots often travel to take part in demonstrations.

READ MORE: Tories bid to repeat FOI tribunal battle over secret Union polling

The Government passed legislation in 2022 in a bid to allow police to have more power to stop disturbance but is planning to go further with a new set of laws known as the Public Order Bill.

The bill was published last year and is currently in the final stages of debate in parliament.

Criticism has come from civil rights groups who believe it is anti-democratic and gives the police too much power.

The UK Government wants to amend the Public Order Bill before it becomes law in order to broaden the legal definition of “serious disruption”, give police more flexibility and provide legal clarity on when the new powers could be used.

Sunak said in a statement on Sunday: “The right to protest is a fundamental principle of our democracy, but this is not absolute.

“We cannot have protests conducted by a small minority disrupting the lives of the ordinary public.

“It’s not acceptable and we’re going to bring it to an end.”

The Government says that the new laws, if passed, would mean police are able to shut down disruptive protests pre-emptively.

The bill already includes the creation of a criminal offence for anyone who seeks to lock themselves onto objects or buildings, and allows courts to restrict the freedoms of some protesters to prevent them causing serious disruption.

It builds on the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, passed in April 2022, which sparked several large “kill the bill” protests.

New Law Gives Police Powers To Treat Protests Like 'Terrorism' – Shami Chakrabarti


Sophia Sleigh
Mon, 16 January 2023

Shami Chakrabarti [R] and a climate protest in London [L].

Shami Chakrabarti today warned that a bill designed to crack down on eco-protesters means all peaceful dissent could be treated as “effectively terrorism”.

The Labour peer said the “draconian” Public Order Bill essentially gives the police a “blank cheque” in how they deal with protesters.

Under the new bill, police could be allowed to intervene before protests become highly disruptive, the government has confirmed.

An amendment to the bill, due to be introduced on Monday, will aim to give police greater clarity about when they can intervene to stop demonstrators blocking roads or slow marching.

Police guard activists sitting with their hands glued to the road and holding Insulate Britain banners in Parliament Square.

Police guard activists sitting with their hands glued to the road and holding Insulate Britain banners in Parliament Square.

Baroness Chakrabarti, a former shadow attorney general and ex-director of civil rights group Liberty, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “This is a very draconian bill, it is a blank cheque of police powers at a time when there are considerable concerns about public trust in the police.

“The police already have adequate powers to arrest people and move them on when they are obstructing the highway.

“This, I fear, is treating all peaceful dissent as effectively terrorism and this bill looks very similar to anti-terror legislation we’ve seen in the past.

“This degree of pre-emption will basically shut down what isn’t even causing disruption at all because their definition will set such a low bar.”

The bill is aimed at curbing the guerrilla tactics used by groups like Insulate Britain and Extinction Rebellion.

The proposals, backed by Rishi Sunak, come after police chiefs claimed there is uncertainty over what can be currently classed as “serious disruption” under existing law.

Police officers attempt to stop an activist as they put up a banner reading

Police officers attempt to stop an activist as they put up a banner reading "Just Stop Oil" atop an electronic traffic sign along M25.

According to Downing Street, under the proposed changes, police would not need to wait for disruption to take place and could shut demonstrations down before they escalate.

Human rights group Liberty said the plan amounted to an attack on the right to protest.

Director Martha Spurrier said: “These new proposals should be seen for what they are: a desperate attempt to shut down any route for ordinary people to make their voices heard.

“Allowing the police to shut down protests before any disruption has taken place simply on the off-chance that it might sets a dangerous precedent, not to mention making the job of officers policing protests much more complex.”

No.10 said police would not need to treat a series of protests by the same group as standalone incidents, but would be able to consider their total impact.

Officers would also be able to take into consideration long-running campaigns designed to cause repeat disruption over a period of days or weeks.

Sunak said: “The right to protest is a fundamental principle of our democracy, but this is not absolute.

Climate activists from Extinction Rebellion drop a huge banner reading 'April 21st Unite To Survive' from Westminster Bridge on 11 January 2023.

Climate activists from Extinction Rebellion drop a huge banner reading 'April 21st Unite To Survive' from Westminster Bridge on 11 January 2023.

“A balance must be struck between the rights of individuals and the rights of the hard-working majority to go about their day-to-day business.”

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley also backed the proposals, adding: “The lack of clarity in the legislation and the increasing complexity of the case law is making this more difficult and more contested.”

The Public Order Bill is considered a successor to the controversial Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act passed last year, which was criticised for introducing curbs on the right to protest.

The Bill is currently undergoing line-by-line scrutiny in the House of Lords, which will be tasked with debating the amendment.

New measures to silence climate activists? They’ll only spur us on

Indigo Rumbelow

THE GUARDIAN
Mon, 16 January 2023 



On a day when swans were seen swimming through Worcester town centre after the latest flooding, the government has announced new measures to silence those of us pushing for more climate action.

The latest restriction on your freedoms involve the police in England and Wales having the power to shut down protests before disruption begins. The proposals will be part of an amendment to the public order bill, which already includes new stop and search powers and creates an offence of “locking on” to things.

So far the government has gone out of its way to characterise nonviolent civil resistance and peaceful protest as dangerous and criminal. But we are teachers, nurses, students, parents and grandparents. We act out of care, love and compassion. Now the government is going even further. Alongside the proposed restrictions on workers’ rights to strike, this is a sinister and authoritarian move from cowardly leaders who would prefer to lock us up than grant us all the right to live.

The supporters of Just Stop Oil are many different things but what they have in common is a deep concern for the future of humanity and a firm commitment to the principles of nonviolent civil resistance.

Resistance is necessary because politics is broken. Our democracy is dead on its feet. All avenues for legitimate protest are being closed, one by one. The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act has effectively banned noisy protests. The public order bill bans “slow marching”. How are we to express our dissent? With new electoral laws on the requirement of voter ID discriminating against young people, how can those who will face the brunt of climate breakdown have a voice?

The police already have adequate powers to arrest people for obstructing the highway. Blocking roads is already illegal. The proposed powers will give them carte blanche whenever a political demonstration is happening nearby. Standing holding your D-lock about to lock up your bicycle, while being young or black? We know where that might end.

Related: Police to get new powers to shut down protests before disruption begins

The recent reports about how the US oil company Exxon “privately ‘predicted global warming correctly and skilfully’ only to then spend decades publicly rubbishing such science” shows how, for decades, the cards have been stacked against those of us on humanity’s side. How can we expect justice and honesty from a government that is continuing to offer new oil licences?

We can’t expect reason or sanity either. These new legal powers will simply speed up the slow collapse of the justice system. Fair Trials reports that the number of people being held in prison on remand in England and Wales is at its highest for more than 50 years, with 1,800 people being held without trial for at least a year. As I write, 10 Just Stop Oil supporters remain on remand.

Just Stop Oil is not a fashionable cause or a protest movement. Our supporters are doing what the suffragettes did and what the civil rights movements did. It’s what everyone does when the inalienable right to life and a livelihood are violated: they engage in direct action. It is an act of self-respect, an act of solidarity, an act of necessity.

It matters little what changes legislators make to the laws on peaceful protest or how strongly the police enforce those laws. Just Stop Oil supporters understand that this is irrelevant when set against the future that runaway climate breakdown entails.

The government can arrest, fine or incarcerate ordinary people for making their voices heard, or it can take meaningful steps to protect the people of this country by stopping the development of new sources of oil and gas, insulating people’s homes and defending the NHS.

This latest clampdown is not going to deter us: if anything, it’ll have the opposite effect. We call on everyone to step up and do whatever is nonviolently possible to resist new fossil fuel exploitation in the UK – and the government’s slide into authoritarianism.

Indigo Rumbelow is a supporter of Just Stop Oil and co-founder of Insulate Britain

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