Shopping vouchers for recycling

They just don't get it do they? The idea that Zac Goldsmith would teach them to be green was bonkers from the outset but this piece in the Indy just shows that they have no insight into green thinking at all.

Giving households vouchers to spend in shops as a reward for recycling lots is simply wrong with a capital R. We need to reduce waste primarily and only recycle what we can't avoid or reuse. Recycling is way down the 4 Rs of waste management.

Getting people to buy more will just increase consumption. Get people to buy less, but buy more wisely and buy items of better quality is the answer.

More on climate change

Lets hope that the recent climate news puts some vigour into Copenhagan, unless there is an agreement to seriously reduce man-made CO2 emissions there, the planet will do it for us.

This news piece on the BBC talks about the water loss from West Antartica and Greenland being 405 billion tonnes per year currently. That seems like quite a lot of water. Now they have found the the East Antartica ice sheet, which was thought to be stable, is losing 57 billion tonnes a year.

Cockermouth has suffered a once in a thousand year event and in Australia they have a once in 100 year wild fires. Al Jazeera reports that over half the world will suffer political instability as a result of climate change:

"International Alert believe that unless there is a change in approach, 3.9 billion people in 102 countries around the world - more than half the world's population - are at an increased risk of political instability as a result of the knock on consequences of climate change, with 2.7 billion facing a high risk of violent conflict."

Action is needed now. Lets take to the streets and demand it. If you haven't marched beford, start with the Wave on 5th December.

Tony Benn in Maidstone

Tony Benn was in Maidstone on Wednesday talking about his new book and answering questions from the audience. I managed to get a ticket - just, the theatre was packed - and it was an absolute pleasure to listen to someone with such clarity of views.

It is such a shame that Labour has headed off in such a different direction to Tony Benn's. The mushy middle ground is now fought by Labs, Libs and Tories with so little to choose between them.

I asked him about whether candidates should refuse to share a platform with fascists or whether we should defeat them in debate. His view was clear that we should enter and win the debate.

A great evening.

Flicking through wikipedia I found this quote from him: "There is no moral difference between a Stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. They both kill innocent people for political reasons." 

Leadership, NASA, Cockermouth and Copenhagan

Each month NASA produce an index of world average temperature. They show what the average has been in relation to seasonally adjusted baseline (1951 to 1980). It clearly shows the rises in temperature over the past 130 years and how hot the last decade has been.

The level of variation month by month is relatively wide and skeptics use this by falsely interpretating this, however anyone with a brain can see the general trend. Worryingly, what is quite clear is that after the predicted relatively cool 2008, things are getting hotter again. Four of the last five months are all the second hottest on record (which while it sounds a little complex is a bit like a racing driver coming second in four out of five races which could easily put him/her in a commanding lead). Even a year isn't long enough to demonstrate a trend in climate terms so the recent months could be a blip, however they are in line with the general pattern.

I doubt today's footage of Cockermouth will be directly linked to climate change, but it should serve as a minor warning of events to come. Unless Copenhagan sucessfull agrees a international plan to rapidly reduce carbon emissions we will hit the doomsday scenario of 6 degrees.

Of course the UK must show leadership in carbon cuts, but none of the three main parties have the policies or will to secure our collective future. They should be ashamed of themselves.

Maidstone's Sainsburys has lost it

Maidstone Sainsburys has lost it. It re-opened today after a refit and after kicking Starbucks out. (Sad to see Starbucks go, not because I like the company, but becasue I know quite a lot of the staff in that branch and they have been solidly supporting the Fairtrade campaign in Maidstone for the past 4 years.)

Walking into the new look store, you are greeted by the obligatory tobacco counter, but this has be repositioned to be far more prominent and the word tobacco above the counter is in yer face. They seem to have expanded the number of junk food isles - I counted 6 all next to each other. Once you have finally got past them, in the far corner is a single isle with cooking ingredients. On the wall by the tills they proudly proclaim: "We've Dumped The Junk". No you bloody well haven't!

Last year they got rid of the pedestrian entrance by the bus station / main part of the town. This has made it harder to use the shop without a car and I'm sure they will have seen a fall in sales to older people.


Fortunately a Co-op is opening in town. It is much smaller and doesn't yet have enough for us but let's hope it gets better.

KIG case starts to crumble

On Tuesday I spoke at the public inquiry into the Kent International Gateway (KIG). I challenged AXA / KIG over their heroic ecomonic assumptions that claim that KIG would be good for Bearsted, Maidstone and the country. Obviously, their case was complete rubbish and the one question they fired back at me seemed to justify my argument. 

I gather that the Joint Parishes Group dropped a bombshell this week at the inquiry, showing that the KIG application misquoted guidance from the Institute of Light Engineers. If correct guidance is applied the site could not operate 24/7. Well done JPG people!!!

Stop KIG are continuing with their excellent campaign and it was good to meet key people on Tuesday. It was also great to see a strong presence from CPRE / Protect Kent.

We the elite...

This excellent document from Democratic Audit is a brilliant satire on the appalling state of our nation, the supreme lack of democracy and the determination by the state to ensure that the elite remain in power.

A few snippets:

10.1. The electoral system for the primary chamber, the House of Commons, shall confine the choice of governing party at general elections to one or other of two main parties and shall usually confer upon that party a disproportionately large majority in the House of Commons in order to swell its power. For the  convenience of the two main parties, general elections shall  generally be won or lost by the votes of fewer than 200,000 electors in less than 100 seats.

11.6. The system shall be known informally as ‘first past the post’ to reflect popular interest in horse racing. Its merits are as follows: it
a) enables the two established parties to dominate the House of Commons and to take turns in governing the country;
b) returns one or the other dominant party with an exaggerated majority in the House at general elections, so that it can rule on its own with the minimum of parliamentary fuss and opposition;
c) protects the political careers of up to 550 MPs who sit in ‘safe seats’

13.5. The right to freedom from torture and inhumane treatment is recognised, subject to the rendition of terrorist suspects or sympathisers to nations that may torture them with the complicity as necessary of the British intelligence services.