NATURAL DISASTERS

Cascadia Subduction Zone, One of Earth’s Top Hazards, Comes Into Sharper Focus

Kevin Krajick

June 8, 2024

Off the coasts of southern British Columbia, Washington, Oregon and northern California lies a 600 mile-long strip where the Pacific Ocean floor is slowly diving eastward under North America. This area, called the Cascadia Subduction Zone, hosts a megathrust fault, a place where tectonic plates move against each other in a highly dangerous way. The plates can periodically lock up and build stress over wide areas―eventually to be released when they finally lurch against each other. The result: the world’s greatest earthquakes, shaking both seabed and land, and generating tsunamis 100 feet high or more. Such a fault off Japan caused the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster. Similar zones exist off Alaska, Chile and New Zealand, among other places. At Cascadia, big quakes are believed to come roughly every 500 years, give or take a couple hundred. The last occurred in 1700.

Scientists have long been working to understand the Cascadia Subduction Zone’s subterranean structures and mechanics, in order to delineate places most susceptible to quakes, how big they might be and what warning signs they might produce. There is no such thing as predicting an earthquake; rather, scientists try to forecast probabilities of multiple scenarios, hoping to help authorities design building codes and warning systems to minimize the damage when something happens.

A newly published study promises to greatly advance this effort. A research vessel towing an array of the latest geophysical instruments along almost the entire zone has produced the first comprehensive survey of the many complex structures beneath the seafloor. These include the geometry of the down-going ocean plate and overlying sediments, and the makeup of the overriding North American plate. The study was just published in the journal Science Advances.

A schematic cross section of the Cascadia Subduction Zone shows the ocean floor plate (light grey) moving under the North American continental plate, along with other features. (Courtesy USGS)

“The models currently in use by public agencies were based on a limited set of old, low-quality 1980s-era data,” said Suzanne Carbotte, a marine geophysicist at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, which is part of the Columbia Climate School. “The megathrust has a much more complex geometry than previously assumed. The study provides a new framework for earthquake and tsunami hazard assessment.”

With funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation, the data was gathered during a 41-day cruise in 2021 by Lamont’s research vessel, the Marcus G. Langseth. Researchers aboard the ship penetrated the seafloor with powerful sound pulses and read the echoes, which were then converted into images, somewhat similar to how physicians create interior scans of the human body.

One key finding: the megathrust fault zone is not just one continuous structure, but is divided into at least four segments, each potentially somewhat insulated against movements of the others. Scientists have long debated whether past events, including the 1700 quake, ruptured the entire zone or just part of it—a key question, because the longer the rupture, the bigger the quake.

Sub-seafloor map of the Cascadia Subduction Zone, showing depth of the fault between the eastward-moving Juan de Fuca place and the North American plate. Yellow/orange indicates shallow depths; green, deeper; blues/purples deepest. Diagonal black lines approximate divisions between different segments of the zone. Wavy red line to right indicates the seaward edge of rigid continental rocks that apparently cause the zone to break into these segments. (Modified from Carbotte et al., Science Advances, 2024)

The data show that the segments are divided by buried features including big faults, where opposing sides slide against each other perpendicular to the shore. This might help buffer against movement on one segment translating to the next. “We can’t say that this definitely means only single segments will rupture, or that definitely the whole thing will go at once,” said Harold Tobin, a geophysicist at the University of Washington and coauthor of the study. “But this does upgrade evidence that there are segmented ruptures.”

The imagery also suggests the causes of the segmentation: the rigid edge of the overriding North American continental plate is composed of many different kinds of rocks, formed at different times over many tens of millions of years, with some being denser than others. This variety in the continental rocks causes the incoming, more pliable oceanic plate to bend and twist to accommodate differences in overlying pressure. In some places, segments go down at relatively steep angles, in others at shallow ones.

The researchers zeroed in on one segment in particular, which runs from southern Vancouver Island alongside Washington state, more or less ending at the Oregon border. The subterranean topography of other segments is relatively rough, with oceanic features like faults and subducted seamounts rubbing up against the upper plate—features that might erode the upper plate and limit how far any quake may propagate within the segment, thus limiting the quake’s size. In contrast, the Vancouver-Washington segment is quite smooth. This means that it may be more likely to rupture along its entire length at once, making it potentially the most dangerous section.

Also in this segment, the seafloor is subducting under the continental crust at a shallow angle relative to the other segments. In the other segments, most of the earthquake-prone interface between the plates lies offshore, but here the study found the shallow subduction angle means it probably extends directly under Washington’s Olympic Peninsula. This might magnify any shaking on land. “It requires a lot more study, but for places like Tacoma and Seattle, it could mean the difference between alarming and catastrophic,” said Tobin.

With funding from the U.S. Geological Survey, a consortium of state and federal agencies and academic institutions has already been poring over the data since it became available to sort through the implications.

As for tsunami hazard, that is “still a work in progress,” said Kelin Wang, a research scientist at the Geological Survey of Canada who was not involved in the study. Wang’s group is using the data to model features of the seafloor off Vancouver Island that might generate tsunamis. (In general, a tsunami occurs when the deep seafloor moves up or down during a quake, sending a wave to the surface that concentrates its energy and gathers height as it reaches shallower coastal waters.) Wang said his results will go to another group that models tsunamis themselves, and after that to another group that analyzes the hazards on land.

Practical assessments that could affect building codes or other aspects of preparedness may be published as early as next year, say the researchers. “There’s a whole lot more complexity here than was previously inferred,” said Carbotte.

New Report Refutes 33 False Claims About Solar, Wind and Electric Vehicles

Jacob Elkin and Matthew Eisenson

June 11, 2024

Achieving the United States’ ambitious emissions reduction goals depends in large part on the rapid adoption of wind and solar energy and the electrification of consumer vehicles. However, misinformation and coordinated disinformation about renewable energy is widespread and threatens to undermine public support for the transition. In a new report, the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, an affiliate of the Columbia Climate School, identifies and examines 33 of the most pervasive false claims about solar energy, wind energy and electric vehicles, with the aim of promoting a more informed discussion.

Photo: Kenueone / Pixabay https://pixabay.com/photos/electricity-sun-wind-1330214/

Many of these false claims center on three categories of impacts commonly attributed to renewable energy development: impacts to the environment, impacts to human health, and impacts to the economy. For example, our report examines the common misconceptions that electric vehicles have a net harmful effect on climate change (they do not); that electromagnetic radiation from wind turbines poses a threat to human health (it does not); and that solar energy development negatively impacts U.S. jobs (it does not). Some of the misconceptions examined in the report, such as the notion that whale deaths stem from noise related to wind farm surveys, are entirely unsubstantiated. Others have some factual basis but are commonly repeated without necessary context: for instance, the notion that solar panels produce significant waste, without the context that fossil fuel energy generates far more.

To identify the most common false claims regarding wind, solar and electric vehicles, the authors of the Sabin Center’s new report first reviewed social-media groups and websites created to oppose renewable energy projects or policies, as well as existing coverage about misinformation. The authors then developed transparent, fact-based responses to these false claims, relying to the greatest extent possible on peer-reviewed academic literature and government publications. The authors designed the report so that members of the public can cultivate balanced and informed opinions on frequently-contested topics related to renewable energy and electric vehicle deployment.

The Sabin Center’s report should be read in conjunction with other fact checks and studies refuting false claims about renewable energy and electric vehicles, such as those published by EPA, RMI, USA Today, Carbon Brief, the Center for American Progress, the Annenberg Public Policy Center’s website FactCheck.org, the Brown Climate and Development Lab and Heated.

Read the full report here.

This press release was originally published by the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, an affiliate of the Columbia Climate School.

Here Comes the Sun—and the Extreme Heat

Olga Rukovets

June 20, 2024

News from the Columbia Climate School

Extreme heat. Credit: Drought.gov

We’re only on the precipice of summer, but already a major heat wave has swept much of the Midwest and Northeast, raising serious alarms in the United States and placing more than 94 million people under heat alert in recent days.

After an unprecedented 2023, which was the planet’s warmest year on record, it’s becoming increasingly clear that treacherously hot temperatures are something we’ll need to contend with for the foreseeable future—and they will only intensify as the effects of climate change persist.

Heat is already one of the highest weather-related killers in the United States, leading to more than a thousand fatalities per year, according to the CDC. However, extreme heat has not received the same classification—and therefore resources—as other disasters like tornadoes and floods. On Monday, dozens of health care, environmental and labor groups united to file a petition asking the Federal Emergency Management Agency to recognize extreme heat as a major disaster, which would grant vital funding and frameworks for responding to this phenomenon.

Heat waves are especially dangerous to populations who are already vulnerable—the elderly, children and newborns, individuals with chronic illness, as well as outdoor workers and those who can’t afford air conditioning. Related and potentially fatal illnesses can include heat exhaustion or heat stroke, but the higher temperatures can also exacerbate underlying or existing health conditions such as heart attacks, strokes or other cardiovascular diseases. The worse air quality and pollution brought about by extreme weather can likewise have an impact on individuals with respiratory conditions.

Historically underserved and lower-income communities have also suffered greater consequences from heat waves, with evidence showing that communities of color and lower-income areas are disproportionately exposed to heat islands, or urbanized centers that have much higher temperatures than their surrounding greener areas. According to the newly released 2024 New York City Heat-Related Mortality Report, which analyzed the effect of heat on the lives of New Yorkers, 350 heat-related deaths occur in the city every year (around 340 caused by underlying conditions that were exacerbated by heat, and approximately seven directly from heat stress), with numbers growing over the past decade and Black New Yorkers more likely to die from heat stress.

To address these critical issues, on July 10–12, Columbia Climate School will host an Extreme Heat Workshop, titled “Emerging Risks From Concurrent, Compounding and Record-Breaking Extreme Heat Across Sectors.” By bringing together multidisciplinary researchers and practitioners, the workshop aims to evaluate and progress the current understanding of heat extremes; pinpoint community needs; and create interdisciplinary infrastructure for assessing these risks on a variety of sectors, including public health, energy and agriculture, with an underlying focus on climate justice throughout these discussions.

As the summer continues, we’ll keep providing coverage of how warming temperatures are affecting our planet. For now, try to stay cool and read some of State of the Planet’s previous articles on heat waves below:

• Columbia Energy Exchange Podcast: What to Make of Extreme Weather Predictions: Why are extreme weather events worsening? How is climate change contributing to this development? And what measures are being taken to adapt to this new reality? 
• Putting This Summer’s Record Global Heat Into Context: A roundup of articles aimed at explaining the record-breaking heat last summer and why it occurred.
• How Can We Make Heat Waves Less Deadly? What makes heat waves so dangerous? Why do we underestimate their dangers, and what can we do about it?
• Greener Ways to Keep Cool During a Heat Wave: The world is warming and our air conditioners are making it worse. Here are some less energy-intensive ways to survive the rising heat.
• Exposure to Deadly Urban Heat Worldwide Has Tripled in Recent Decades, Says Study: A detailed analysis of temperatures and population trends in 13,115 cities shows where specific numbers of people are most affected.
• Study Maps Urban Heat Islands With Focus on Environmental Justice: In summer 2021, researchers collaborated with citizen scientists to map the heat in parts of upper Manhattan and the Bronx at the street level for the first time.
• Potentially Fatal Combinations of Humidity and Heat Are Emerging Across the Globe: A study identified thousands of incidents of previously rare or unprecedented extreme heat/humidity combinations in parts of Asia, Africa, Australia, South America and North America.

More people becoming dissatisfied with the function of democracy, survey finds

It's not just a U.S. problem — more people across the world are becoming disenchanted with their government.

GOVERNMENTS ARE PARLIAMENTS 

NOT DEMOCRACY

DEMOCRACY IS SOCIALISM



Photo by: Evan Vucci/AP
Peru's President Dina Ercilia Boluarte Zegarra shakes hands with President Joe Biden at the leaders retreat at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperative summit.

By: Scripps News Staff
Posted Jun 20, 2024

The proportion of people dissatisfied with democracy is growing in the U.S. and internationally, a new survey from Pew Research says.

According to the new survey, 31% of Americans said they were satisfied with the way democracy is working in the U.S., compared to 68% who said they were dissatisfied. In 2021, 41% of Americans said they were satisfied with the function of U.S. democracy.

In a survey that included citizens from 31 democracies throughout the world, just four had a higher proportion of satisfied respondents. Peru has the population most dissatisfied with its democracy, with 89% upset with how the government is functioning. According to The Associated Press, Peru President Dina Boluarte has been under investigation for allegedly acquiring an undisclosed collection of luxury watches since working for the government.

Greece is the nation next-most dissatisfied with its democracy. Like many Western nations, Greece has struggled with the cost of living, prompting Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis to make changes within his cabinet to focus on the economy.

Colombia and South Africa also had a high proportion of citizens dissatisfied with their democracy.

Several nations saw large drops in support for their respective democracies. The United Kingdom saw its democratic satisfaction go from 60% in 2021 to 39% in 2024. South Korea saw a drop from 53% satisfaction to 36%. Canada went from 66% to 52%.


Of the 31 nations surveyed, 54% said they were dissatisfied with their government's democracy, compared to 45% who were satisfied.

Singapore, India and Sweden reported having the highest satisfaction with their nations' democracies.

DIRECT DEMOCRACY IS @

Economists reveal the costs of sanctions

by Gunnar Bartsch, Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

What effect do economic sanctions have on the countries affected, such as Russia or Iran? What impact do they have on the sanctioning states? And is there possibly an ideal coalition of sanction partners? Economists from Würzburg, Kiel, Berlin and Bielefeld have analyzed these questions. They have now published their findings in Economic Policy.

Economic sanctions can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they usually reduce gross domestic product and thus prosperity in the affected countries, as intended. On the other hand, however, they can also have a severe impact on the economies of the sanctioning countries. However, a skillful selection of the countries involved in the sanctions measures could significantly mitigate these undesirable negative consequences.

These are the key findings of a new study that has now been published in the journal Economic Policy. Economists Sonali Chowdhry (DIW Berlin), Julian Hinz (Bielefeld University & IfW Kiel), Katrin Kamm (IfW Kiel) and Joschka Wanner (University of Würzburg & IfW Kiel) are responsible for the study. The study focuses on the sanctions against Iran in 2012 in response to its nuclear program and against Russia following the violent annexation of Crimea in 2014.

Analyzing prices, prosperity and trade flows

"In our analyses, we focused on the economic effects of sanctions, for example on prices and prosperity in the target country, as well as on trade flows," says Joschka Wanner, Junior Professor of Quantitative International and Environmental Economics at Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (JMU), describing the approach. As a first step, the team analyzed the extent to which these parameters have changed as a result of the sanctions.

In fact, the calculations for Iran show a real decline in gross domestic product of 1.9% as a result of the sanctions. For Russia, the figure is 1.44%—based on the sanctions from 2014. The sanctions following the attack on Ukraine do not yet play a role in this study. "1.4 or 1.9% may not sound like much. However, from an economic perspective, this is a full-blown recession," says Wanner.

Maximum sanction potential not reached

The group compared these real developments with the maximum potential of the sanctions under various conditions—either by including more countries in the sanctions or by extending them to all goods. "According to our calculations, in the case of Iran, the current coalition achieves around 39% of what would be possible in terms of a decline in gross domestic product—compared to the case in which all countries participate in the sanctions," explains Wanner. For Russia, this figure is just under 58%.

These figures are partly even more drastic if the current scenario is compared with the case in which the sanctions apply to all goods, i.e. there are no more exceptions. In this case, the current coalition only achieves 47% of the possible decline in GDP for Iran. And 16% for Russia.

High costs for some stakeholders

When sanctions are imposed, it is not only the sanctioned countries that suffer—the study also shows this. However, there are major differences. "While larger economies such as the U.S., Japan and Germany get off relatively lightly, smaller countries such as Malta, Estonia and Latvia suffer relatively drastic consequences," explains Wanner. This should come as no surprise: if a small country like Latvia restricts trade with its large neighbor Russia, this will inevitably have a greater impact than in the U.S. or Canada.

As a consequence, this means that small countries pay a high price in this case, while the effects of their participation in the sanctions are only reflected in a small loss of welfare for Russia. The study also shows how things could be better. "Instead of the small countries, other states would have to join the coalition. Then the sanctions would have much greater consequences," explains Wanner.

In the case of sanctions against Russia, the economists have calculated that the participation of China, Vietnam, Belarus, Turkey and South Korea in particular would drastically increase the potential for sanctions. This would rise from 58% under the current coalition to 71%—simply by China joining the sanctions coalition.

Transfer payments for particularly affected countries

Of course, it is unlikely that China will join a coalition of Western states against Russia. So what could the coalition do to ensure that as many countries as possible side with it without suffering disproportionately large economic damage? "Financial transfers" is the research team's answer.

"Our results show that 591 million US dollars would have to be mobilized in connection with the sanctions against Iran and 4.8 billion US dollars in the case of Russia so that the members could compensate for their welfare losses due to the respective sanctions," the study states.

The largest contributor to this "compensation fund" would be the U.S., whose combined transfers for both sanctions packages would amount to around 4.4 billion US dollars. They would be followed by the UK (770 million US dollars) and Canada (553 million US dollars).

More information: Sonali Chowdhry et al, Brothers in arms: the value of coalitions in sanctions regimes, Economic Policy (2024). DOI: 10.1093/epolic/eiae019

Provided by Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg Researchers build quantitative model with the aim of imposing cost-efficient trade sanctions

A TikTok revolution?

BYRasna Warah

June 20,2024

AFRICA IS A NATION

Kenyan youth are leading popular protests against regressive tax reforms that will worsen the country’s worsening cost of living crisis.

A protesters throws back a teargas canister at police officers during a protest over proposed tax hikes in a finance bill that is due to be tabled in parliament in Nairobi, Kenya, Thursday, June 20, 2024. (AP Photo/ Andrew Kasuku)

The following article is a part of our series of reposts from The Elephant. It is curated by regional editor Wangui Kimari.

Something truly remarkable happened in Nairobi on June 18. For the first time since Kenya’s independence, a people-driven movement, ignited largely by Gen Z (those born after 1997, also known as the fully “digitally native” generation because they were born during the internet age) took to the streets in droves to protest against the Finance Bill 2024 that will introduce punitive taxes that will, among other negative impacts, significantly raise the cost of living and the cost of doing business in Kenya. If passed, it will also allow the state to raid citizens’ personal data, including bank details and mobile money accounts, thereby overturning existing digital privacy laws. The people gathered on the streets of Nairobi were not the usual hoi polloi who usually attended rallies; they were young people, including professionals, from all classes.

This spontaneous, organic movement was significant in three important ways. One, it was leaderless; there were no politicians or political leaders leading the pack, nor was it associated with any political party. Two, it was driven largely by social media; the call to protest was communicated mainly via social media platforms like X and TikTok. Third, civil society organizations that in the last couple of decades have been the traditional torchbearers of matters related to good governance and accountability were largely absent or invisible during the protests. In this regard, the movement is very much akin to the Occupy Wall Street movement that took hold during Barack Obama’s presidency in the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis, the “Arab Spring” in North Africa, protests that resulted in the ouster of Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir in 2019, and to the rapidly growing climate change movement currently being championed by young activists like Greta Thunberg, among others.

The June 18 protests demonstrated that it is possible for Kenyans to rally around a cause without being chaperoned or persuaded by any political leader or politician. This is in sharp contrast to the early and mid-1990s when political leaders, such as Martin Shikuku, Kenneth Matiba, and James Orengo could mobilize thousands of people to large pro-democracy rallies at Kamukunji grounds and other places, demanding the end to Daniel arap Moi’s dictatorial regime. For their efforts, some of these leaders were incarcerated, and it took another decade for Moi to be ousted. The resounding victory of Mwai Kibaki in the 2002 general election saw many of these leaders join the government or become elected leaders. Then, there was no one left to speak for “the people,” except civil society and non-governmental organizations (CSOs and NGOs). During the Kibaki era, NGOs and CSOs also took on the role of educating the public about their rights and responsibilities when it was no longer dangerous to do so.

However, the 2007/8 post-election violence, which led to the death of hundreds of people and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of others, made it clear that the relationship between the state and its citizens had altered irreversibly and that the concept of “nationhood” was still a mirage in Kenya. This disputed election was a turning point in Kenya. Ordinary Kenyans became skeptical of the ability of the state to protect them and to uphold their rights. This resulted in louder demands, spearheaded by Raila Odinga, among others, for changing the constitution to give citizens more rights.

On their part, NGOs and CSOs experienced a severe crisis of confidence as many viewed the post-election violence as a symptom of their failure to reduce ethnic tensions and polarization. After more than a decade of work in the areas of democratization, human rights, and civic education, they were forced to ask themselves this difficult question: Was the Kenyan electoral crisis a result of their inability to bring about genuine transformation in the country? After all, Kenya had experienced flawed elections in the past but had never witnessed death, destruction, and displacement on the scale of 2007/8. Had Kenyans reached a stage where they were willing to take up arms to fight for what they perceived to be their rights or had the political class become more Machiavellian in creating ethnic divisions in the country and entrenching a culture of violence and impunity?

The violence and mass displacement brought to the fore issues that had not been dealt with adequately by both the state and NGOs, such as grievances related to land, inequality, and the rule of law. NGOs dealing with good governance worried about democratic backsliding and the deepening of polarization along ethnic lines. (It is interesting to note that the recommendations of the Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation Commission that was established to address these grievances were never implemented by Uhuru Kenyatta when he took office in 2013.)

The Kenyan public was also beginning to question whether CSOs and NGOs were, in fact, part of the problem afflicting Kenya’s politics; some civil society and non-governmental organizations were viewed as being partisan or aligned to certain political parties or donor countries. Because most of these NGOs and CSOs were heavily dependent on mostly Western donors and donor agencies, which came with their own biases and agendas, few could assert their independence regarding the kinds of projects and programs they wanted to run. They succumbed to what constitutional lawyer Wachira Maina refers to as the “language of the donors.”

Many NGOs and CSOs thus became “professionalized,” carrying out projects that appealed to certain donor organizations and quite often oblivious to the needs of what Kenyans refer to as people “kwa ground.” The “real” civil society—members of trade unions, cooperatives, farmers’ associations, and the like—were ignored in discourses to do with politics and the economy. (William Ruto cynically exploited this disconnect by appealing to the so-called hustlers—people who survive in the informal economy through precarious jobs and sheer resilience in the face of lack of employment opportunities in the formal sector—in the last general election.) However, as has become apparent, these hustlers will be most affected if the Finance Bill becomes law because the Bill is aimed primarily at taxing the informal sector, which comprises the majority of the Kenyan workforce.

It was expected that the promulgation of a new constitution in 2010 would lessen the burden on NGOs and CSOs to ensure that people’s rights are respected and that the establishment of independent state-funded commissions and oversight bodies would protect citizens from the vagaries and excesses of the state. However, the powers of these commissions were significantly eroded by both President Uhuru Kenyatta and President William Ruto. Anti-corruption and police oversight bodies, for instance, have largely failed to bring people to book or to make leaders and the police more accountable. Extrajudicial killings by the police continue unabated. More significantly, these presidents’ disrespect for court orders (most recently the one on the newly introduced Housing Levy and the decision to send Kenyan police to Haiti, which the courts deemed “unconstitutional”) has signified that an independent judiciary is also under serious threat.

The “defanging” of state institutions not only poses a threat to citizens but also to the many NGOs and CSOs that had become accustomed to carrying out their work with little interference from the state during the Kibaki era. There is a palpable fear among them that their operations might come to a halt if they are too vocal, especially under the current president, who is already displaying dictatorial tendencies. (This was clear during the June 18 protests—dubbed Occupy Parliament—when several peaceful protesters were arrested by police for simply carrying out their constitutional right to protest.)

What recent governments—including the so-called digital presidency of UhuRuto in 2013—have underestimated is the power of social media to bring about social, economic, and political transformation. Former President Uhuru believed that an army of propagandists and bloggers he recruited in the State House could shield him from the people’s wrath, but this clearly did not happen, including in his own backyard in Central Kenya, which voted overwhelmingly for Ruto (whom he did not support in the 2022 election). Similarly, President Ruto believes that his communication team will help ensure his neoliberal, regressive agenda is not questioned, whether citizens like it or not. This has clearly not happened.

Ruto also believes that by cozying up to Western leaders (whom he vilified during his campaign to become deputy president before the 2013 election because he perceived them as supporting his indictment, along with Uhuru, at the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity committed during the 2007/2008 crisis) he will be protected from scrutiny or criticism from Western nations and financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which most Kenyans believe is the main architect of the draconian Finance Bill 2024.

But even Ruto had to account for the millions of shillings he wasted in traveling in a luxurious private jet to the United States for a recent state visit, even as he implored Kenyans to “tighten their belts” and prepare for tough austerity measures in the face of rising national debt. (The US embassy in Nairobi denied that the US had paid for the trip after Ruto suggested that it was paid for by the US government.) His belated explanation that the jet was a “gift” from friends also raised a lot of questions about Kenya’s foreign policy. What “quid pro quo” arrangements were made with this foreign “friend” and did this put Kenya’s national interests at risk? These questions may not have arisen if Kenyans on social and mainstream media had not demanded answers. Similarly, it is likely that any future domestic or foreign policy issues will come under closer scrutiny under a “woke” generation that has little patience with politicians who speak from both sides of their mouths.

As anti-corruption crusader and founder of The Elephant, John Githongo, explained to me during a recent interview published in Debunk magazine, “current democracies are not delivering public goods at anything near the pace that our very young population expect. There is a profound skepticism with power and suspicion of the West, in particular, among this African demographic we are witnessing.” This youthful demographic has also been quick to realize that Kenyan politicians cannot be trusted—they can easily switch alliances and political parties for their own selfish individual interests and don’t seem to have any ideology, except amassing as much as wealth as quickly as possible and living large. Their appetite for debt has not abated since the presidency of Uhuru, which went on an unprecedented borrowing spree, including from the Chinese; recent estimates indicate that under Ruto, Kenya’s debt burden is set to rise even further to 80 percent of GDP as he continues borrowing from international and domestic markets to fund his bloated budget and repay the debts. Even opposition leader Raila Odinga, who called for protests recently against the rising cost of living (which resulted in several deaths at the hands of police), has gone silent after President Ruto supported his bid to become the African Union Commission’s chairman.

Kenyan youth are also deeply aware of the fact that the decisions made by the current crop of old-school politicians, many of whom have been accused of corruption and other crimes, will deeply affect their future, and they are determined not to let that happen. Remember, this is also the generation whose parents suffered under the IMF/World Bank-induced Structural Adjustments Programmes (SAPs) of the ’80s and ’90s (now reincarnated in the Finance Bill 2024) when the state withdrew from providing essential services, such as health and education, a gap partially filled by NGOs and church organizations. SAPs resulted in what is often referred to as the “lost development decade” in Africa and created a stressed and deeply impoverished generation with reduced access to basic services that make countries grow and prosper. Poverty and inequality levels rose as people struggled to meet their basic needs. (President Ruto is planning to dismantle the existing national health insurance system and replace it with a more expensive and complicated system that will make it harder for families and young people, including children, to access healthcare. Public university education fees are also set to rise.)

Enter Gen Z. This tech-savvy generation has shown us that Kenyans do not need mediators in the form of politicians or civil society organizations to speak on their behalf. They have demonstrated their ability to organize on a massive scale. (After Nairobi, protests were planned in Mombasa, Eldoret, Kilifi, Laikipia, Nakuru, Kisumu, Meru, and Kericho, which means that the movement could soon become truly national—it has gone viral!) They are the true patriots who will lead a people’s revolution that will bring about the change Kenyans desperately need.


About the Author

Rasna Warah is a Kenyan writer and journalist. In a previous incarnation, she was an editor at the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat). She has published two books on Somalia: War Crimes (2014) and Mogadishu Then and Now (2012).

 

Only 1 in 3 people enjoy talking about politics—researchers say the reasons are more social than political

 I DO, I DO

by Linda Schädler, Universität Mannheim

Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

One of the cornerstones of liberal democracies is the political debate on how to shape society. However, discussions about politics often lead to frustration or result in a long-term strain on social relationships.

"Our results suggest that citizens are aware of the potential social consequences of political discussions, as only 30% of all respondents generally like to talk about politics," explains political scientist Manuel Neumann, who worked on the study at the chair of Professor Dr. Rüdiger Schmitt-Beck.

"Only 10% of all respondents have very positive attitudes towards political discussions when differences in opinion are to be expected or when discussing politics with acquaintances." The results are based on surveys of 1,600 eligible voters from the city of Mannheim in the run-up to the 2017 federal election.

Personality has a greater influence than political views

The results show that citizens with a high level of interest in politics, in particular, enjoy political discussions. By contrast, affiliations to a political party and strong ideological positioning have no influence. Personality traits proved to be much more significant.

Four factors play a role here: Generally, citizens with a low need for social affiliation, high social trust, high self-rated communication skills and a positive attitude towards conflict enjoy political discussions more. From this, the researchers conclude that the social dimension plays a more important role than the political dimension in explaining attitudes towards political conversations.

"Political discussions are first and foremost social situations in which interpersonal contacts need to be cultivated," says Manuel Neumann. "When it comes to the question of whether we like to have political conversations or not, how we treat each other plays a greater role than our political views."

More information: The "MZES Focus" series is published at irregular intervals. The latest issue is available under majournals.bib.uni-mannheim.de/mzes-fokus/index.

Provided by Universität MannheimResearch suggests darker side of being politically confident

UK

At Cammell Laird

Cammell Laird protest, Birkenhead, 1984

LONG READ

LONDON REVIEW OF BOOKS
Tabitha Lasley

Vol. 46 No. 12 · 20 June 2024
DIARY

‘Imagine a roll of barbed wire, but this big.’ Billy Albertina spreads his arms out, gesturing to a brick building near the entrance to the Cammell Laird shipyard in Birkenhead. In the summer of 1984, Albertina and his colleagues occupied a half-built gas rig and a Type 42 destroyer, HMS Edinburgh, in protest at proposals to make almost a thousand workers at the yard redundant. Some of the men stayed on the rig for fourteen weeks. They were cajoled, harassed, threatened with bailiffs, and served with writs for trespass. Eventually, the police unspooled thick coils of barbed wire and wound them round the legs of the rig, creating an impassable barrier. The men were forced out by thirst. When the occupation ended, all 37 were tried for contempt of court, for failing to accede to a judge’s order to leave the rig. They were sent to prison for thirty days, lost their redundancy pay-outs and were blacklisted. They are the largest group in Britain to be jailed for union action. There have been several attempts to get their convictions quashed and their redundancy payments reinstated. None has been successful.

The occupation is largely forgotten, while the miners’ strike, which began a couple of months earlier, has acquired near mythic status. By every metric, the miners’ strike was the bigger dispute. It involved more men, lasted much longer and induced state intervention so vicious that certain scenes are embedded in the national consciousness: the Battle of Orgreave, where thousands of police, led by mounted officers, repeatedly charged picketers, took place in June 1984, a few days before the action at Cammell Laird began. The miners’ strike also took up most of Fleet Street’s attention. Albertina, shop steward for the staging department at Cammell Laird, kept track of the coverage. ‘At the start of the strike,’ he told me, ‘we stressed to the men, on no account would any of them commit violence or damage. We’d witnessed some of the miners commit damage. The newspapers ran amok on them. We didn’t want the newspapers being able to run amok on us.’

He failed to heed his own advice. After Albertina and the others got out of prison, they went back to the picket line. Every morning, the strikebreakers would troop past them into the yard, accompanied by a police escort. One man marched at the front, blowing a bugle. Albertina grew increasingly exercised about this, and one day lunged at the man. He was charged with breach of the peace.

These days, Cammell Laird is quiet and looks a bit down at heel, but it used to be one of the most important shipyards in Britain; the Mauretania and two aircraft carriers called Ark Royal were built here. In the 1940s, it employed twenty thousand people. On the day I went there with Albertina, Liverpool, a mile away across the Mersey, was obscured by a navy vessel, dwarfing the sheds on the dock. It was the same gunmetal grey as the sky. The only spot of colour was a tiny orange rescue craft, tucked at the ship’s side. I took a photo and was shooed away by a security guard. He couldn’t stop me taking pictures, since I was outside the yard, but I gave up anyway. I couldn’t get a decent shot of the ship – it was too big.

The biggest employers in Birkenhead now are call centres, which offer insecure, poorly paid jobs, no substitute for the skilled trades they replaced. They are predominantly staffed by women, who supposedly stick to the rules and are perceived to be better than men at the emotional labour that is part of a customer-facing role. The male-coded skill set that Albertina and his colleagues possessed – strength, hand-to-eye co-ordination, physical courage – has become less valuable.

Albertina is the eldest of seven children. He grew up on Scotland Road, not far from Liverpool’s docks, and tends to attribute everything about his personality to his place of birth. In the Scotland Road of his childhood, the population was Catholic. They were very poor. Families had a lot of children, and since the city was sectarian, the men could only get casual work – most of Liverpool’s businesses were Protestant-owned. They had no glasses and drank out of jam jars. They had no blankets and slept under army greatcoats. When the priests came to collect tithes, they demanded silver coins. The people were credulous. They saw ghosts and believed in elves. ‘Stop it,’ I say to Albertina. ‘That can’t be true.’ He insists: one night, a woman claimed she saw some elves on the green. The next night, someone backed her up. On the third night, Albertina’s mother made him walk down with her to take a look, but the crowds were so big, they couldn’t get close.

Albertina used to run a boxing club with his brother Jimmy. ‘One thing I’ve learned. Anyone who’s a boxer and aggressive; it’s in them. I’ve seen fathers say to their lads: “Go on, go and fight him!” You’ll never make a placid lad fight. It’s a waste of time. And it’s wrong.’ His scrappiness came in handy at school. The priests were ‘brutal’: they’d ask boys if they’d been to mass, then test them on the colour of the vestments. If a boy got the answer wrong, he’d be beaten. Albertina renounced his faith at fourteen. He started throwing the priests out when they came round asking for money. His mother remained devout, but his father, a cleaner at Cammell Laird, was almost as lapsed as his son. ‘You’ll find most union men and prominent left-wingers were all people who gave the Catholic faith up. First you question the Catholic faith. Once you do that, you question everything else.’

An alarm trills on his phone. He suffers from trigeminal neuralgia, and the alarm is to remind him to take his pills. It goes off periodically throughout our meetings. It’s easy to forget that Albertina is 77. He boxed for many years, and has the neat, nimble carriage of a much younger man. And his recollections seem sharp. But when his phone goes off I remember: these men are old. Of the 37 who took part in the occupation, fourteen are dead. For the remaining 23, time is running out.

I first met Albertina at the office of Mick Whitley, Labour MP for Birkenhead until the general election was called. The neighbouring seat of Wirral South is being abolished and its MP, Alison McGovern, beat Whitley in the selection contest for the Birkenhead seat. She’s on the right of the party; he’s a member of the Campaign Group. For much of his career, Whitley was a union organiser at the Vauxhall plant in Ellesmere Port. His brother Chris, now dead, was one of the 37. In 2021, he tabled an Early Day Motion calling for an inquiry into the case, and the release of the relevant cabinet papers. He arranged for me to interview Albertina and Eddie Marnell, a former shipwright at Cammell Laird who was a member of the occupation committee and became a GMB official.

Whitley describes Birkenhead as a ‘left-behind town’. According to the 2021 census, 72 per cent of its households were deprived in at least one measure. Crime rates are 56 per cent above the national average. Life expectancy is low: 72 for men, seven years below the national average. Drug use is prevalent: mostly heroin and ketamine. There is a shortage of good housing stock; more than 70 per cent of the inquiries Whitley’s office handles are related to housing.

I ask him what the town was like in the 1970s, when the trade unions were at the height of their powers. ‘Birkenhead and Liverpool were thriving. You had Tate and Lyle. Fords. Massey Ferguson. The docks were doing great. Vauxhall Motors were permanently in the dole office in Birkenhead and Ellesmere Port, recruiting. People weren’t millionaires, but they had enough money. They knew if they lost a job Friday, they could start somewhere else on the Monday.’

He grew up on the Woodchurch estate. Part of the postwar Labour government’s push to build a million homes, Woodchurch was a model development. Unlike modern estates, which tend to be tacked onto existing conurbations, it was self-sufficient. It had schools, shops, pubs and a large church. ‘It was fantastic,’ Whitley says. ‘Well-made houses, big gardens, plenty of open spaces, football pitches. The buses from Cammell Laird to the docks used to flood the estate.’

Forty years on, the estate has a reputation for guns and gang violence. In 2022 a feud between organised crime groups based on the Woodchurch estate and the neighbouring Ford estate culminated in the shooting of Elle Edwards on Christmas Eve. Edwards, a 26-year-old beautician, wasn’t the intended target. She just happened to be sitting outside a pub near two men in the Ford OCG, Kieran Salkeld and Jake Duffy, when Connor Chapman opened fire on them. Chapman was using a Skorpion submachine gun, a military-grade weapon capable of discharging fifteen rounds in less than a second. Salkeld and Duffy were seriously injured; Edwards died. Chapman, who was arrested two weeks later, was jailed for life with a minimum term of 48 years. Edwards’s youth and good looks – and the fact that she died on Christmas Eve – meant there was a lot of media interest in the case, so the police moved fast to make an arrest. But not every murder is treated this way. A few weeks earlier, another local woman, 53-year-old Jackie Rutter, was shot on her doorstep. The shooters were looking for her son. The two incidents are apparently related, but Rutter’s killers haven’t been caught.

Like many career criminals, Chapman started off shoplifting. There was once an alternative route for troubled youths, prone to bouts of petty criminality and risk-taking behaviour. They could have joined the stagers, where a degree of recklessness was seen as an asset. I had to ask what stagers did, since I’ve never seen a ship being built. First the keel is laid. Then segments of the ship are assembled, transported to the slipway and welded together. As the superstructure goes up, stagers construct scaffolding around it, so other workers can gain access. ‘It was a very, very dangerous job,’ Albertina says. ‘We used to put a plank down, 70 foot high, then run across [that] plank carrying another plank. No harnesses, we’d just run across. You had to have bottle. A lot of the Scotland Road lads went over and did the job. And there were a lot of Birkenhead lads, who’d come from similar areas. Some of them were a bit wild. [They’d] been to court for thieving and stuff like that. A lot of them got married, settled down. Then the redundancies came. And it was sad to see. The lads who’d been up to skulduggery in the early days went back to it because they’d lost their jobs.’

Stagers would recommend new recruits, usually men they’d grown up with. Everyone was connected, one way or another. Three of Albertina’s brothers – Jimmy, Francis and John – joined the occupation, along with their uncle, Eddie. ‘It was like no other department in Cammell Laird’s,’ Albertina says. ‘Because it was all younger lads. And it was full of comedians. It was a joy to go into work. You’d rather go into work than stay off.’

‘I started at the age of sixteen,’ Marnell says. I had a great apprenticeship. I started off on £3 3/3 a week – unbelievable. Only just paid the bus fare and the boat. That was if your mother gave you money, after you’d handed the wages over.’ At 21, he finished his apprenticeship and his pay went up to around £25 a week: enough to buy a house, get married, start a family.

But British shipbuilding was in decline. The industry had been nationalised in 1977 and the Conservatives were itching to reprivatise it. In 1983, Margaret Thatcher won her second general election by a landslide and returned to power with a mission to destroy the trade unions. The Tories had been working out how to do this for a while. In 1977, a think-tank paper, the Ridley Plan, which was a response to the Heath government’s defeat in the 1974 miners’ strike, suggested picking off coal first: building up stocks, training police in riot tactics, then provoking a strike. Shipbuilding was another early target. In 1982, British Shipbuilders employed 62,000 workers. By 1987, that number had fallen to five thousand. In October 1983, Cammell Laird employed 3300 people; down from 5500 in 1977. The yard had just two orders on its books – the Type 42 and the rig – and so in May 1984 another thousand job cuts were announced.

The stagers wanted to strike. Albertina had already secured them several significant victories; under his leadership, they had been reclassified as semi-skilled workers, which got them a pay bump. And he’d battled off the most recent round of redundancies. They were used to winning. But Albertina wasn’t universally popular. When he applied to be secretary of the boilermakers’ department, the boilermakers demanded his name be taken off the list. Though they were all part of the same union, the boilermakers objected to the idea of a stager representing them. Some started spitting at him as he walked across the yard. The snobbery displayed by skilled workers towards semi-skilled and unskilled labourers was once so common there was a name for it: craft consciousness. ‘A lot of the craftsmen in Laird’s resented what [Billy] and his partners achieved, the wage rises, the ability to get to the same status as them. It galled them,’ Marnell says.

When the story of a strike is told, factional splits are often occluded. But faultlines – friction between various groups, discord over levels of skill and grades of pay – grow wider as a strike goes on and money gets tight. At Cammell Laird, there was also a generational divide. The older workers wanted to take redundancy. The stagers didn’t. As Albertina says, they were a young department. They didn’t want to spend the next thirty years on the dole. Management claimed they were pitching for new business, but many suspected the yard was earmarked for closure.

A strike was called on 28 June. When management threatened to tug the two incomplete vessels to France and finish the work there, a group of men decided to occupy them. They worked in shifts, taking turns to collect food parcels and water. They told the bosses they would stay put until the redundancies were withdrawn, and set up camp in the rig’s accommodation block, making bunks out of scaffolding poles and mattresses. ‘I enjoyed the atmosphere,’ Albertina says. ‘My brother and Mick’s brother were brilliant comedians. They were always taking the piss, telling jokes.’ But Marnell remembers it rather differently: ‘It was worse than being in prison. You had no heating for a start. No lights. No conversation with your family. That was all taken away from you.’

The men were told to leave. They were warned they’d be prosecuted for trespassing and lose their redundancy payments, since continued action would be interpreted as resignation. The management brought in bailiffs to evict them. Jimmy Albertina said that if they tried to storm the rig, they’d have to answer to the boxers at his club. The summer wore on, and the stalemate continued. Thatcher condemned the sit-in, calling it ‘a great tragedy’. Albertina was a frequent presence on the local news, glowering under his thick cap of hair. Didn’t he think this action was hurting the yard, he was asked again and again. What sort of message did it send to potential customers? Albertina didn’t think any new orders were coming, and believed there would be further closures. ‘If they break us,’ he said. ‘They’ll break the other yards.’ Asked about the threat of prison, he sounded resigned: ‘It’s no worse than facing a lifetime on the dole.’

In August, a few men sneaked away and went back to work. Albertina says they’re still called scabs when they’re seen on the Scotland Road. Their children and grandchildren were called scabs at school. The stain of strikebreaking is indelible. In September, the men were told to end their occupation by the high court. Cammell Laird claimed they had already been sacked and so the sit-in amounted to trespass. The men ignored this too. So the police were sent in. Marnell remembers looking down from the platform, eighty feet up, and seeing the ground swarming with officers. ‘Police patrolling every area of the yard. Police patrolling the outside of the yard. We thought: “What the hell’s this? Is it a war?” Which is what it turned out to be, virtually.’

The police marched up to the bottom of the rig and shouted up to the men. Increasingly militarised and emboldened by their new powers, they were spoiling for a fight. ‘They said: “Some of ours may get hurt. But so may some of yours.” Their exact words.’ They went for the men on the Type 42 first. It was more accessible and harder to defend. A few days after those men had been jailed, the police came back to deal with the rig. They pulled gloves on and unfurled barbed wire, wrapping it round the legs of the rig. The men, who had been climbing down to get water from standpipes in the yard, were now trapped. Albertina remembers that their lips began to swell, as they got dehydrated. ‘They were out here,’ he says, holding his hand an inch from his mouth. ‘You couldn’t make a cup of tea, couldn’t get washed, couldn’t have a drink. The worst part was, as you were speaking, you found it hard to talk. I’m an outdoor person, I’ve done survival [and] what amazed me was how quick it happened. Within two days. On the third day, we had to come off the vessel. We couldn’t carry on without water.’

The men were locked up for the night, then taken to Walton prison. There was no mention in the press or on the TV news that the police had managed to remove the strikers only by depriving them of water. The occupation was framed as an act of childish self-sabotage. Journalists kept calling them ‘defiant’; Frank Field, then MP for Birkenhead, dismissed them as ‘hotheads’. Justice Lawton, who sentenced them to prison, said the occupation was ‘about as bad a bit of behaviour as I have come across in fifty years’.

The government was determined to extract an apology from the men. The attorney general, Michael Havers, was sent to Walton to persuade them. Havers went from cell to cell, trying to talk to each man separately, promising early release. He then addressed them in the prison chapel. All they had to do was say sorry. If they did, they could leave that day. ‘Everyone said: “We’re not saying sorry. We’re fighting for our jobs. No way,”’ Albertina recalls. ‘Not one man gave in. He was a bit embarrassed. He got all flustered and went: “Is there anything I can do for you, then?” Our Jimmy stood up and said: “Can you send in three blow-up dolls and a bottle of disinfectant?” His face!’ He and Marnell rock back on their chairs, giggling.

Albertina has a few stories like this, but Walton was a horrible place, an overcrowded Victorian Class A prison infested with vermin. Prisoners had to swill out every morning. The men were paired up and kept in their cells 23 hours a day. ‘There were lads in there pining for home,’ Albertina says. ‘They were cracking up. Screaming. They just couldn’t take it.’ One day, he was summoned to the warden’s office. His wife had been receiving threatening phone calls. Someone had pushed matches through their door, and notes saying they were going to burn the house down. The notes mentioned his Italian heritage (he’s actually Russian-Polish). He assumed it was the National Front, responding to a full-page profile in the Liverpool Echo, which described him as a ‘card-carrying communist’.

While he was in prison, his mother died. ‘We got woken up at two o’clock in the morning. They said: “Right, get dressed.” We got taken to Walton Hospital in our prison uniform. We stood round my mother and she died. A week later they said to me: “We’ll let you out to the funeral so long as you come back for five o’clock.” So I said: “Of course we’ll be back for five o’ clock.”’ The funeral was disrupted by photographers waiting outside his mother’s house. ‘I said: “Get rid of those effin cameras. This is private.” Next thing, the local priest said: “Billy, can I have a word?” I said: “Certainly.” He said: “I’m from the Catholic Herald. Now, you know your mother was a good Catholic? Do you mind if we take a photograph?” I said: “Certainly, for the Catholic Herald.” Next day. Where’s the picture? In the Echo. The priest had sold it!’

The men got a week off for good behaviour, and were released after three weeks. They went back to the picket line, and stayed there until their union pulled its funding for the strike. It was, they said, unwinnable. The 37 were blacklisted. They couldn’t even get casual employment on the docks. Albertina had to swap his well-paid job for lonely, low-status work as a bouncer. Twenty years later, he was still barred by some firms. Marnell got a job with the council in Liverpool, rehousing homeless people. The yard was privatised in 1986, sold to Vickers, and then, in 1993, closed down. It reopened under new management, but with its old name, in 2008. Despite repeated requests, the company refused to answer any questions for this piece. It is one of only two remaining shipbuilders in the area, one of the few left in the UK, and it still gets some work. Last year it won a contract to build a new Mersey ferry. According to Whitley’s office, it has 650 employees and 150 apprentices – a quarter of its workforce in 1983.

One thing that Albertina emphasised was the importance of having good back-up at home. The wives of the 37 banded together and began to organise, with Mary Mooney as their leader. She and her husband, Mick, live in an ex-council house on the eastern edge of Liverpool, a few minutes’ walk from Kingsheath Avenue. This is where nine-year-old Olivia Pratt-Korbel was shot and killed in August 2022 by a drug dealer, Thomas Cashman, who forced his way into her home in pursuit of a rival. The day before, Ashley Dale, who was 28, had been shot at her home two miles away. She was dead because her boyfriend hadn’t been there: he owed money to her killers. It was a bad year for women and girls on Merseyside: they were treated repeatedly as collateral damage, dying when they got between men and their targets.

It can sometimes feel as if drugs have this part of Merseyside in a chokehold, like the only people making real money are the criminal gangs who deal in them. The word ‘graft’ has a double meaning here, both hard toil and a drug-selling syndicate. Robert Hesketh, a criminologist at Liverpool John Moores University, says the line between legal and illegal work is becoming blurred. Connor Chapman, at his trial, said about a Mercedes A Class he’d stolen: ‘Most people weren’t using that car to do crimes in. It was used by people selling drugs.’ His counsel had to remind him that selling drugs was a crime. According to Hesketh’s 2019 paper ‘Grafting: “The Boyz” Just Doing Business?’, gangs supply the excitement, sense of purpose and cohesive identity that a job like staging would once have provided, and even mimic the structure of a department in a shipyard or factory. Gangs are hierarchical, with foot soldiers ‘serving their time’ – effectively completing an apprenticeship – before moving up the pecking order.

In the days after Pratt-Korbel’s death, the area was besieged by reporters. But the morning I visited Mary and Mick Mooney at home, the streets were very quiet. They had only just bought their house from the council when the strike began. ‘I actually regret buying the house,’ Mary says. ‘You were offered a discount then. Afterwards, people were scared, because they had a mortgage. It was a way of stopping you from striking. I wish we’d just kept [the tenancy]. Especially with the housing situation now.’

Mooney also grew up on Scotland Road. She is from a Catholic family, the middle child of five. They lived in one attic room for six years. There was a hole in the ceiling above her parents’ bed with a plastic bag pinned over it. One day, the plaster collapsed on her father. Her mother used to sit in the council offices for hours on end, petitioning to be rehoused. Eventually, the local paper ran an article about her. Only then did they get a house. ‘Are you like her?’ I asked. She smiles and nods: ‘I think so. Yeah.’ She shows me a picture of them together, marching behind a banner that reads: jobs not jail. Locally, the strike had broad support. There was talk of making the 37 freemen of Liverpool. The Labour council, whose deputy leader was Derek Hatton, a flashy member of Militant who was expelled from the Labour Party in 1986, gave the wives travel passes to get to Walton. Teachers told Mooney’s children their dad had done nothing wrong. Mooney mentions this in an interview recorded outside the prison at the time. She claims to be a ‘nervous wreck’, but in the clip she seems composed and frank. Asked how much her children understand, she replies: ‘They’re not ashamed in any way. They understand that much. That their dad’s not a criminal.’ Afterwards, she kept being asked to speak at events. ‘I was always nervous. Especially when I was asked to talk at the town hall. It was absolutely packed. I can honestly say that I was shaking. But I managed to do it.’

Mick’s version of events is different from Albertina’s. He has no funny stories about prison. ‘The wing we were on, believe it or not, was called the Unemployed Wing. It was a joke on the screws’ behalf.’ Afterwards, he got a job as a street cleaner. But the company was privatised and he was made redundant. Since then, he has only had agency work. He would like to see their names cleared, but he’s pessimistic: ‘I can’t see that after all this time they’ll give 37 working-class men the justice and compensation they deserve.’

The Mooneys believe Thatcher left her mark on Liverpool even as it rejected her. Their children haven’t been able to buy their own homes. Their younger daughter is living with them; the elder two are renting privately. They think the city has changed in a less tangible way. ‘Everyone has become very materialistic,’ Mary says. ‘I believe that was a generation she made.’ ‘They worked it great,’ Mick says. ‘I hate to say it, but they worked it great. You ended up being one of them, more or less. Because you were a property owner.’

I ask Albertina if he agrees with Mick Mooney that the campaign was unlikely to succeed. ‘I do,’ he says. ‘But I do see a glimmer of hope, more so than I have in the past. I got asked to go to a meeting a couple of months ago. Fifteen Labour MPs promised us that if the Labour Party got in, the first thing they were going to do was bring it up and fight for justice.’ Such promises have been made before. In 2006, Tony Blair was pictured holding a sign saying ‘Justice for Cammell Laird’. In 2008, the men had a meeting with Gordon Brown. About ten years ago there was talk of a film, but the money ran out. In 2014, the European Parliament called for the government to issue a formal apology. But the Tories paid no attention. The men now find themselves in a similar position to the authorities all those years ago – trying to wring an apology out of people who don’t think they’ve done anything wrong.

The most promising current lead was found by a third-year law student, Clare Lash-Williams, the daughter of a trade unionist called Barry Williams, who was a GMB official at the time of the occupation. After he objected to a local gangster sending scabs across the picket line, a man walked into his office and set about him with a hammer. Lash-Williams asked Marnell to give her all the documents he had. She trawled through them, compiling a timeline. And she noticed something strange. Cammell Laird wrote to the men, dating their dismissal to 6 September (I have seen this letter), but the company’s statement of claim to the court on 5 September said the men had been dismissed two weeks earlier, on 23 August. It was on this basis that they were understood to be trespassing at the yard: they were no longer employed there. Except they were. When Cammell Laird applied for this order, it was lying, which is contempt of court – the same charge levelled at the men.

Lash-Williams wrote her university dissertation on the subject. She is cautiously optimistic; Albertina was friends with her father, and says she’ll be ‘dogged to the end’. But he knows, better than most, that plaintiffs can spend decades chipping away at the official version of events only to come away with nothing, because the people in power can’t be made to care. The Shrewsbury 24 – building workers who went on strike in 1972 and were charged with offences including affray and conspiracy to intimidate, several of them given jail sentences – campaigned for 47 years before their convictions were finally overturned.

My last meeting with Albertina was at the McDonald’s on Rock Retail Park, opposite Cammell Laird. Everything is huge here, as in the shipyard itself. The retail units are like monuments to the pile ’em high scheme within: Matalan, Home Bargain, B&M. As we left, I asked Albertina if it would make a difference that Whitley has been replaced by McGovern. Albertina nodded, his gaze sliding back towards the docks. ‘It makes a big difference. Mick Whitley is for the working class. We could have trusted Mick to push it. I was wanting to meet her, see where she stood. But I don’t hold out much hope.’ He looked around. ‘There’s a way out of here. A road that leads round the back. I think.’ I watched him go. He doesn’t cross roads like an old man. He strides out in front of the traffic, assuming it will stop.