The Corporate Takeover of Britain Introduction Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher became close friends. Both were involved in deregulation and both opened the way to corporate influence. “Poison Spring: The Secret History of the US EPA1 documents, in devastating detail, the corruption and misuse of science and public trust that has turned the (US) EPA from a watchdog into a “polluters’ protection agency.” In its half-century of existence, the agency has repeatedly reinforced the chemical-industrial complex by endorsing deadly chemicals, often against the continued advice of its own scientists. It has botched field investigations, turned a blind eye to toxic disasters, and unblinkingly swallowed the self-serving claims of industry. “Rarely has our government allowed and encouraged the actions of the chemical industry so openly as it did during Reagan’s tenure in Office. He opened the door wide to corporate influence throughout the government, and especially at the Environmental Protection Agency, which began a precipitous functional decline. Reagan gave corporations the reins of power at the agency and they immediately began tearing the EPA apart.” Margaret Thatcher also opened the door to corporate influence. In particular she cut funding to Universities in order for them to make up the difference by commissioned research. Prof Jeremy Ramsden, writing in Nanotechnology Perceptions in 2012 lamented the loss of distinction between University Research and Commissioned Research (either from industry or from Government Departments).2 “This renunciation of unimpeachable scientific integrity could not have come at a worse time for humanity. Our technical capabilities for manipulating nature have reached unprecedented heights.” This is an investigation of significant events between 1998 (when Bill Clinton told Tony Blair that Monsanto would object if a British scientist found something damaging about GMO crops, so Arpad Pusztai had to be sacrificed) and 2016 when EFSA, the European Commission and the British Government are preparing to approve GM Crops, despite warnings from 60 million US citizens. What made the Editor of The Lancet Richard Horton change? In 1998, Dr Richard Horton stood up against the industry and the Royal Society in a courageous manner and refused their request to withdraw Dr Pusztai’s paper. It was duly published in 1999.3 Yet in 2015, he collaborated with the Rockefeller Foundation (that funded Nazi eugenics experiments during the war 4) in order to publish in The Lancet: Safeguarding human health in the Anthropocene epoch: Report of the Rockefeller Foundation–Lancet Commission on planetary health.5 1 http://www.independentsciencenews.org/health/poison-spring-the-secret-history-of- pollution-and-the-epa/ 2 Ramsden, J.J. The independence of university research. Nanotechnology Perceptions 8 (2012) 87-90. 3 http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(98)05860-7/fulltext 4 http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/article/Eugenics-and-the-Nazis-the-California-2549771.php 5 http://www.thelancet.com/commissions/planetary-health 1 The Rockefeller Foundation funded the initial research on genetically modified organisms in the early 1940s and founded the science of molecular biology, a highly reductionist programme aimed at “understanding” life. 6 The RF’s 100th Anniversary Agriculture website says:7 “Since the 1970s, the techniques pioneered by the RF have been criticized for their environmental impact, for their relationship with big agribusiness, and for failing to eliminate hunger completely.” The RF also founded the ‘Green Revolution’. “As one analyst put it, in effect, the Green Revolution was merely a chemical revolution. At no point could developing nations pay for the huge amounts of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.” This is illustrated by the many suicides amongst Punjabi farmers the early 2000s.8 The Punjab was the first to embrace the Green Revolution in 1984. They were also first to realise that they had been trapped in a monoculture that requires chemicals and large amounts of water in a period of climate change and unprecedented drought. There is an increasing incidence of cancers in the cotton belt.9 The Rockefeller Foundation gives financial support to the global spread of GMO technology; and to research on the bio-fortification of crops, the introduction of nutrients into crops by genetic engineering techniques for the supposed benefit of third world countries. I don’t know whether Richard Horton actually read the paper…but there was no mention of pesticides anywhere in the 56-page, 23-author document. Why has The Guardian/Observer changed? In 2002, Alan Rusbridger and Ronan Bennett wrote a 2-part drama for the BBC: Fields of Gold about genetically-modified (GM) crops. They were astonished at the reactions from the Royal Society and those with vested interests. Bennett wrote in The Observer: 10 “…Fields of Gold, a two-part drama about genetically-modified crops, has become the centre of an ugly little conspiracy by those with a vested interest in discrediting it and personal grudges to settle. Last week The Times and Daily Telegraph ran prominent news stories in which a number of senior scientists, who appear not to have seen Fields of Gold, attacked the drama, which will be shown on BBC1 on 8 and 9 June. According to Lord May, president of the Royal Society, it is an: 'error-strewn piece of propaganda'. The Times headlined its piece: 'BBC drama peddles ludicrous lies on GM'; the Telegraph's story was billed: 'Adviser accuses BBC of being anti-GM in "ridiculous" thriller'. Since the Telegraph accuses us of 'dramatically modified truth' and the Times accuses us of 'lies', it seems odd that they are not being open about the origin of the story. Nowhere did they mention it had been brought to them by a lobbying organisation, Science Media Centre. The Science Media Centre (SMC) was set up recently and, according to its website, has 'a brief to renew public trust in science'. Its funders include Dupont, Merlin Biosciences, Pfizer, PowderJect and Smith & Nephew - all biotech or pharmaceutical companies with a direct interest in the promotion of the technologies the drama explores. 6 http://www.globalresearch.ca/doomsday-seed-vault-in-the-arctic-2/23503 7 http://rockefeller100.org/exhibits/show/agriculture 8 http://livingheritage.org/green-revolution.htm 9 http://sustainablepulse.com/2015/04/09/monsanto-knew-of-glyphosate-cancer-link-35- years-ago/#.V8XjiBSFDzI 10 https://www.theguardian.com/science/2002/jun/02/gm.comment 2 Though SMC seems keen to become a sort of Mandelsonian rapid rebuttal unit, it has yet to learn the subtler arts of black propaganda. When 'Fiona' from the centre was touting the story around last week, she finished her email with a last inducement: There will no doubt be others keen to have a pop at BBC/Guardian in one go.” (Bennett noted that ‘Fiona from the centre’ sent it to Guardian’s sister paper, The Observer, which is prescient. In 2014 the Editor-in-Chief of The Observer John Mulholland wrote an editorial saying that Britain needed GM to feed the world!) The impartiality of the BBC in 2002 Bennett went on to say: “Fields of Gold started life almost three years ago when Alan and I met Jane Tranter, the BBC's drama commissioner, to discuss a possible serial about genetic modification. Alan had been running a series of articles on Monsanto and other GM corporations, assessing the impact of the technology on farming, the environment and the developing world. We were all familiar with footage of environmental activists trashing GM trial sites and mounting public concern about the contamination of ordinary crops by their genetically-modified near neighbours. More pertinent is the over-excited way in which a certain section of the scientific community has responded. In orchestrating their unpleasant campaign to denigrate the programme-makers, they are confirming the suspicions of those who have legitimate concerns about how and why the new technologies are being developed. Campaigners on GM are used to the smear tactics described by George Monbiot last week in The Guardian when he revealed how GM giant Monsanto used fake email addresses to lobby on its behalf and attack opponents.” Alan Rusbridger, Bennett’s co-writer, wrote a piece about it: Fields of Ire.11 “What would happen if something went seriously wrong with a GM crop trial? We have in this country a prime minister (Tony Blair, who closed down Arpad Pusztai’s Department in the Rowett Institute and tossed him on the scrap heap 12) who dismisses sceptics about the new technologies as Luddites and a science minister with an extensive personal and financial interest (held in trust) in biotechnology. The big biotech and pharmaceutical companies are notoriously rich and powerful and, say their critics, increasingly sophisticated in discrediting those who threaten their vested interests. It explains why Monsanto secured early copies of the drama and why people at the highest levels of government are known to be anxious about the fall out. And it explains why the Science Media Centre, extensively backed by the biotech and pharmaceutical industries, mimicked some of the clumsiest spin techniques of New Labour in trying to discredit it in advance.” The Government closure of wildlife organisations in Britain The Birth of Defra 11 https://www.theguardian.com/media/2002/jun/07/bbc.medicalscience 12 http://www.psrast.org/pusztblair.htm 3 In 2001, under Tony Blair’s government, the Department of the Environment was merged with the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries to become ‘Defra’ the Department of the Environment, Farming and Rural Affairs, with obvious conflicting interests. Tony Blair’s speech to the Royal Society on Science13 In May 2002 Blair gave a wide-ranging speech to the Royal Society. “In GM crops, I can find no serious evidence of health risks.