Greening Newcastle Welcome to issue 5 of the Newsletter of Newcastle Green Party Sustainable Cities public meeting Robin Harper, Green Party member of the for Lothian will address a public meeting at 7.30 p.m.. Thurs- day 25th November in the meeting room, Newcastle Arts Centre on Westgate Road, on the theme of “Greening the City”. Given the various battles over future development plans in the city at sites like the General Hospital & the whole south-east quadrant of the city centre, this is an excellent time to debate more sustainable options for the future. Robin has been standing for the Greens at local, national & European elections since 1986. He was elected as Lothians first Green Member of the Scottish Parliament, indeed Britain’s Cuts Campaigning first Green parliamentarian in 1999. During the course of his teaching career, he taught in Aberdeen, , Fife, Kenya, Tyne and Wear Midlothian and . Robin was elected Rector of Edin- burgh University in 2001-2003 & Rector of the University of Coalition of Resistance: Aberdeen from 2005-2008. During his 11 years as MSP, Robin has been involved in many planning meeting Cross Party Groups, including co-convenorship roles on the CPG Children & Young People, Renewable Energy and Energy Wednesday 17th November, Efficiency, & Architecture and the Built Environment. In 2008, 7 p.m., Gateshead Civic Centre Robin received an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Incorpora- tion of Architects & was elected President of the Royal Scottish (2 mins from Gateshead Metro and Interchange). Society of Arts in the same year.

This planning meeting is open to all supporters of Coalition of Resistance who want to be involved in anti-cuts events and activities. If you haven’t been along before, please get along to this meeting and feel free to circulate - the Campaign welcome new faces!

Greening Cities with Robin Harper, MSP Above is a picture of Vauban, near Freiburg in SW. Germany. 7.30 – 9.00 p.m., Solar housing can be seen in a new development built as “a sus- tainable model district” on the site of a former French military Thursday, 25 November 2010 base. It is the first housing community world wide in which all Newcastle Arts Centre,Westgate Road the homes produce a positive energy balance. The solar energy Conference room, first floor to the right: surplus is then sold back into the city’s grid for a profit on every access from courtyard, upstairs via blue doors home. Some 70% of residents do not own a car. — please be early The Greens and the Cuts The Green Party condemns the cuts as destructive and unnec- essary. What is necessary is fairer taxes and a real Green New Deal. The cuts will throw at least a million people out of work and create even wider social division. They will not work either. They are in fact a reckless gamble. As Keynes predicted and as was proved in the 1930s, a government really can spend to save the economy when in a recession. The present state of the Irish economy should be a warning to all. We need a Green New Deal to support our economy to make sure we come out of the recession, not to go back to the casino capitalism of the last three decades, but instead move towards a sustainable economy. A Green New Deal would invest in a massive labour-intensive UK wide energy-saving programme and a rapid shift to renewa- Above: a number of Green Party members took part in a protest out- bles, create affordable housing and expand public transport. It side Vodaphone early in November. Details of the company’s efforts would create a million jobs - real, skilled jobs. to avoid tax – and the complicity of the Treasury – have been chroni- To find the money for this we would raise taxes on the best off cled by Private Eye magazine (see http://www.private-eye.co.uk/sec- in society and on the profits of the corporate giants. It would tions.php?section_link=in_the_back&issue=1273). However it is just include a ‘Robin Hood’ Tax on the banks. We would also vigor- the tip of the iceberg. of systemtic evasion & avoidance. ously address tax evasion and avoidance – be it Vodafone or most of the cabinet! There are, of course, some cuts we would make – stop Trident, bring home the troops from Afghanistan, H2Oil stop the subsidies to the oil and nuclear industries, and to the arms trade, for example. People and Planet have organised a free showing of H2Oil, a sear- The cuts to our public services are ideologically driven. The ing look at the unfolding disaster of the Athabasca tar sands Conservatives are using the situation to drive home a funda- oil exploitation in Canada, one of the greatest environmental mental restructuring of society, reducing collective provision in catastrophe in human history (pictured below). favour of private profit. 20:00-22:00 The Green Party and Finance for the Future have produced Monday, 22nd November, a briefing focusing on tax justice:Cuts: “ the callous con Salsa Café on Westgate Road, Newcastle. trick”. It is available @ http://www.financeforthefuture.com/ TaxBriefing.pdf

The snapshot below from the report gives a flavour of what might be done. The figures are in billions. The actual Report provides supporting references.

The picture below shows another disaster: ‘mountaintop removal’ coal mining in Appalachia, something that President Obama has done little to halt. It demonstrates the falsity of all the hot air about ‘clean coal’. Limitless World? t is tempting to blame the weak performance of the Green Party on the vagaries of the first-past-the-post electoral sys- Item. We might also see ourselves as the innocent victims of tactical voting. However, many people didn’t vote Green be- cause… they are simply afraid to vote Green. They not only know little about party policies, but are very anxious about the present situation (and indeed, many do want to be more green) and don’t think there is a way out - so suppress it. And many sections of the media disparage any attempt to publicise the lim- its to growth. Indeed in some quarters, there is a very virulent in science and technology to solve all of humanity’s present opposition to everything for which we stand. problems. His refusal to recognise any real limits to growth was Channel 4, for example, has broadcast a series of ‘documen- extremely apparent, and in the end, despite being pressed by taries’ which explicitly and aggressively attacked the broad green a question from local Transition Initiative activist Steve Emsley, movement. Journals like The Economist and thinks tanks such as followed by Porritt, Ben-Ami pointedly refused to provide a the Institute for Economic Affairs sing from a similar song sheet. number for a limit on CO2 parts per million to prevent further It is one that sees the world as some sort of Aladdin’s cave, full climate change danger. This kind of reckless and irresponsible of treasure waiting to be unlocked by the appliance of human argument can be dismissed as at best naive, and at worst, perni- science and the creation of ever more powerful technologies. cious. They will fix every little problem, be it resource scarcities, pov- his was scientific optimism and blind believe in ‘progress’ erty, or even limits to how long we can live. Economic growth, in a very dark form, even to the extent of celebrating human they say, is the key to peace, prosperity and happiness for one “dominance” over nature as a great virtue and achievement, and all. Threats like climate change are either denied or treated regardless of the actual consequences. There was a limited as something that will be overcome by human ingenuity. discussion, endorsed by Porritt, of the ideas of environmental This worldview could be tasted at the recent ‘Great Debate’ economist Herman Daly, i.e.. his critique of conventional “false on Economic Growth when ‘boomster’ Daniel Ben-Ami debat- economics” and the need for a paradigmatic revolution that ed with the Green Party’s Jonathan Porritt in front of a packed incorporates a full accounting of the environment, and thus a audience. Such encounters matter. Critical to Green Party pros- radical redefinition of ‘economics’ itself and of ‘growth’ as well. pects is the battle of ideas. Large sections of the public agree Porritt expressed his optimism and great excitement over the with Ben-Ami’s line of thinking, albeit more at the level of broad potential for renewable energy technology, and especially solar sentiments than deeply reasoned arguments. So we must argue power, to bring about a radical progressive change in our entire our case at every level and at every opportunity. energy infrastructure. He also ended by invoking his sense of a Fortunately Porritt was on excellent form. He consistently need for and the meaningfulness of an underlying philosophical invoked and supported many aspects of central GP policies and and spiritual change in our culture, which offers further hope philosophy in his remarks. He denounced neo-liberal ideology for humanity’s future. and identified it as a source of the present crisis. He further ar- gued that any return to “business as usual” was not a viable way forward, given the magnitude of the climate change crisis,.. He Two to stressed the fact that we do not actually know how much time we have left to act to prevent runaway global warming above read the 2 degree Centigrade threshold agreed at the Copenhagen summit last December. The debate really hinged on the contrast between qualita- tive and mere quantitative growth. Both sides of the debate seemed to endorse the idea that it is only by innovation and transformation that a viable way forward for humanity can now be achieved. However, there was far less agreement on the po- litical and social aspects of such a necessary and radical trans- formation, with very little detailed discussion of the obstacles to these goals. Porritt did, however, mention the work of Noam Chomsky and his concept of a “manufacture of consent”, in other words, the collusion between controllers of media and the political and economic elite In the end, the debate was hampered by the extremism of Clive Hamilton’s Growth Fetish the pro-growth advocate, his simplistic and factually unsubstan- &, right, Ecology & the Politics of tiated ‘magical thinking’ and his uncritical faith and confidence Scarcity by William Ophuls. Cornucopianism comes in many political colours

“Ahead lies a time more full of opportunity for people to live out their dreams than any in human history… [The economy] is stronger, our streets safer, our environment is cleaner, the world is more secure…a majority of the human beings living on this globe live under democracies where the people rule… our best days are still ahead.” President Bill Clinton

“There are no limits to growth and human progress when men and women are free to follow their dreams” President Ronald Reagan

“I know — I am absolutely positive — that anything a man (sic) can imagine, he can accomplish.” Scott Carpenter, American astronaut

“If there is such a thing as the golden age, it is in the future, not the past. Society has improved in almost every way for 2,000 years & it is reasonable to expect the improvement to continue.” Roy Hattersley, ex Labour deputy leader Like most cornucopians, Daniel Ben-Ami foolishly extrapolates “In 2176, people will be numerous, rich & in control of the forces past progress into the future, ignoring all negative side-effects of of nature.” past changes as well as foreseeable future barriers. Herman Kahn, ‘futurist’ Ideas Matter “Knowledge & invention, boldness of thought & enterprise, con- quests of genius & improvements of social organisation have be- The last AGM of Newcastle Green Party decided to have reg- come international growths: & no kind of progress—intellectual, ular political discussion at its monthly meetings. They will give industrial or social—can be kept within potential boundaries us a chance to improve both of our understanding and hone Peter Kropotkin, Russian anarchist our skills of persuasion with non-supporters. Hopefully good argument makes for good meetings too! “Things Can Only Get Better”, ‘New Labour’ campaign song, • Nuclear power: not the answer? 1997 General Election • Wind energy = green power? “The world can, in effect, get along without natural resources.” William Nordhaus, Nobel Prize economist • Regeneration through Culture? (Quayside etc.)

“We’re facing 25 years of prosperity, freedom and a better environ- • Back the Bid? Should it be game on for ment for the whole world. You got a problem with that?” big sports developments? Wired magazine, 1997 • On your bike! How to reduce car use? “The progress of science “is just as limitless & at least as rapid as that of population…We are forever secure from the fear of • Can socialism and ecology mix? overpopulation.” Friedrich Engels • Recession: bankers’ greed or deeper cause?

“I assert that in a state of equality the natural increase of popula- • Do numbers count? (Population & sustainability) tion would constantly tend to make individual richer than poorer.” Henry George, Progress & Poverty, 1879 • Can music, film & other arts communicate green ideas?

“Continued vigorous economic growth provides us with the means • Science is the Future? (local Science City project) to enrich life itself & to enhance our planet as a place hospitable to man.” • Geo-engineering: from the frying pan to the fire? Richard Nixon • Biofuel: fuelling planetary destruction? “The supply of natural resources [is] really infinite!” Julian Simon, economist, 1981 Other suggestions to Laurence Ellacott please. Want to lighten your load on the planet & save money at the same time?

EcoTeams brings people together and shows them how to make smarter, greener choices that reduce their environmental im- pact and household bills. How EcoTeams works When you get an EcoTeam together, you’ll meet regularly with your group, perhaps at a local community centre, the pub, or each others’ homes. Together you’ll look at how you can take action to reduce your carbon footprint and live a healthier, greener life. Because you’re supporting each other, you’ll be able to do more. EcoTeams suggests actions you can take on rubbish and shopping, energy, water and travel. They’ll show you which ones make the most difference – you might be surprised. Most importantly, you’ll get to measure your progress so you know what can be achieved with just a few simple changes. EcoTeam-Up days This autumn, Global Action Plan is running EcoTeam-Up days across the UK in partnership with Team Green Britain. If you want to be greener at home, and not just go it alone, come and join us. The Newcastle Team Up Day is 6 p.m. – 8.30 p.m. Wednesday 24th November 2010. Note: If you want to take part, you’ll need to make sure you’ve joined Team Green Britain. Whether you’re a keen greenie or just starting out, EcoTeams helps you focus on the positive changes you can make in your home and your life.. Newcastle Green Party: next branch meeting 19.00 Wednesday, December 1st, British Legion, West Jesmond (just down from West Jesmond metro station, east side)

The main item for discussion will be the attitude of Greens towards the government spending deficit and the ConLib cutbacks. There will also be a review of the role of the Newsletter.

The Green Leaves Plus book group has gone into hibernation for the winter season but hopefully will blossom again when the nights grow lighter. In the meantime, if there are any books or indeed articles posted on the Internet you’d like to recommend, to fellow Green Party members please get in touch. Newsletter news Branch officers Most material in this Newsletter is about Green Party activities or the response of the Party to current issues in the city and, to Current officers and their contact details are listed below. If you a lesser extent, the region. Green World and Green Activist do the know of any opportunities that the local Party might take up or same at a national level. Usually there is one big feature in this want to raise any other matters, get in touch with Laurence or publication plus several snippets of news and other information. one of the other officers. However, there is always scope for other kinds of material. To reduce the number of emails in circulation, please use this One thing that the Green Party tends to ignore is mass cul- newsletter to draw attention to any papers you want to put ture and the kind of things which people beyond green circles forward for discussion. Just send your name, email address and tend to read, watch and listen to, be it prime time TV, Hollywood the title of the topic and we’ll try to give it due publicity. movies or the tabloids. The same goes for activities like football matches, holiday-making and that modern mass obsession, end- Laurence Ellacott, Branch co-ordinator less bouts of ‘retail therapy.’ So the Newsletter would welcome [email protected] contributions on such topics, providing they have a local angle Andrew Gray, Election Agent and, of course, bring a green perspective to the matter. contact via Laurence above The same goes for work which, after all, is where most peo- John Pearson, Treasurer ple spend a hell of a lot of their time, often with no great enthu- [email protected] siasm. An article looking at a particular workplace or company Tony Waterston, Literature and Publicity. in the locality would further help to relate our big vision to the [email protected] everyday world of the here and now. It might, for example, look Sandy Irvine, Newsletter editor and Policy Response at goods and services currently delivered, contrasting the way [email protected] things are done now and how they might be done in a sustain- able society. Last but not least there is always room for book and other reviews, though again it is a local flavour that is most wanted. PS: Thanks to Barry Gills for material for the report on the debate between Daniel Ben-Ami and Jonathan Porritt. Please pass Greening Newcastle to any person or organisation you like, and they can in turn pass it on themselves, provided it is transmitted at all times in its entirety as a PDF file and unchanged. Anyone may quote from it, provided this is in context and Newcastle Green Party is acknowledged as the source. This is the fifth issue of a regular publication. Please send material for the next Newsletter directly to Sandy Irvine, a.s.a.p. (Tel: 0191 2844367 or email [email protected])