Letter from me to the Adver:

The debate over the future of the Royal Mail shows how resistant the Labour government is to new ideas when they are most needed.

Privatisation, in part or whole, is the old ideology which the banks have shown results in a false economy and a failed economy.
After all, private money and private management were intended to carry the risk of any enterprise, leaving public finance as an 'off-balance-sheet' device, unrecorded as actual public debt.
Following the collapse of the banking bubble, it is public money (tax-payers' money) which has to take on the risk and rescue the banking industry.
There are alternative and better ways if reforming Royal Mail to make it secure and accountable, and one of these is some form of mutualisation involving trust status and profit sharing for employees.
Let the co-operative ethos prevail with customers becoming shareholders in their local post office.
A return to mutualisation is one part of the Green New Deal, which calls for 'green energy, green transport, green agriculture and green waste management'.
This means a use of renewable and sustainable systems to rebuild the economy, providing real value and more jobs. That is the way we should go.

Getting to Zero

Getting to Zero is the name of the play broadcast on 12th March, on Radio 4. It was a drama documentary with a panel of 3 experts - George Monbiot, Paul Allen and Peter Harper - who set an average (fictional) family the task of eliminating their carbon footprint in 3 weeks. I haven't had a chance to listen yet, but it sounds interesting.
The link is: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00j16kt for anyone that wishes to hear it too.

Letter from me to the Adver:

It shouldn't be a surprise that sea-levels are rising faster than expected. The observable pattern with scientific reports is that they continually reveal that climate change is more serious than we thought previously.

What is astonishing, on the other hand, is that all three big political parties in the UK fail to adopt the right targets, fail to pursue the full package of policies necessary to meet even their inadequate targets, and continue to pursue some policies that go in exactly the wrong direction. This is another observable pattern.

There is still only one political party that has always had the right targets and the full range of policies needed to meet those targets in an economically viable and socially just manner. It’s a simple fact: if you want the right action taken on the climate crisis, you're going to have to elect more Greens.

And the next opportunity is of course the European election on 4 June. The EU has a huge role to play on the world stage, and the need for more Green MEPs has never been greater.

Standards for energy efficiency

I just signed an urgent petition to European decision-makers urging them to adopt ambitious standards for energy efficiency in major electrical appliances like TVs, fridges and boilers.

This is important: strong rules will reduce the EU's contribution to climate change by driving manufacturers to produce a new-wave of efficient and clean products, while setting a strong benchmark for other producers around the world to follow.

The petition will be delivered to decision makers by global online advocacy group Avaaz.org in a joint event with Friends of the Earth Europe and Natuur en Milieu, on March 12th. I thought you might like to join me in taking this critical action, please click on the link or read the email below to learn more and to join our call:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/refrigerator_revolution/98.php

Lethbridge School Committee Meeting

I have just returned from my second Staffing and Finance committee meeting. I've joined this now as finance is a key area of knowledge for me so I can, hopefully, be of use! We looked through some new polices and heard about some of the great courses our staff have been on recently. we are lucky to have such devoted staff!

Green Party Meeting: Monday 30 March 2009

Next meeting: Monday 30 March 2009 from 8pm at Central Community Centre, Emlyn Square.

Refreshments and parking available. If you need a lift, please contact me and I will try my best to arrange this.

This will be a quick but important meeting with major decisions to make so please do come along if you can.

Agenda:

Agenda Item:	Duration (minutes)	Time (Finish)
1) Welcome, refreshments	2	08:02
1) Ricky Knight's Visit Feedback	5	08:07
2) By-elections Feedback	2	08:09
3) Leaflets for Parks	2	08:11
4) Regular Stall at Cavendish Square	2	08:13
5) Financial Issues (major, report to follow)	15	08:28
6) Priorities for Swindon Green Party for 2009:	20	08:48
Campaigns/Local Manifesto, Recruitment, Events (major, report to follow)
7) Facebook/Website	5	08:53
8) AOB	5	08:58

Solar pannels

There is a planning application to allow solar panels to a house near Wroughton. Post comments if you wish here, click through the acceptance options, use application ref s/09/0169 and you can submit comments. The options are for posting objections, but you can put general comments and support the proposal, if you wish.

This is what I put:

I am very much in favour of the installation of Solar Panels as:
1) Solar energy is inexhaustible and has generally benign environmental impacts
2) Solar collectors could eliminate the need for energy transportation and distribution networks, thereby reducing waste.
3) Small-scale solar energy devices can be mass produced with great savings to the consumer
4) Certain solar technologies are suitable for use in small units and many are considered potentially less complex and hazardous than other energy supply technologies now in us

“Quantitative Easing” (printing money)

On the 5th March, with its rate-cutting ammunition all but exhausted, the Bank of England pressed the button on a much more drastic policy, “quantitative easing” (printing money) in an effort to kick-start the economy.

In Japan the government sent money created in this way to citizens, who are likely to spend it and stimulate the economy directly. In UK the government buys the worthless assets of bankrupt financial institutions. Since UK plc is not in its entirety worth even a fraction of the debts that were incurred during the decade of asset bingeing this is a policy of despair that cannot work and will do nothing to help us avoid the looming Depression.

The Green Party has had a policy of Citizens' Income for about 30 years. As in Japan, this would be an ideal way to put more money into the economy, especially since the poorest would benefit most and are the most likely to spend rather than saving.

Money created by the public should be invested for the public good. What we are continuing to witness in our economy this week, on the other hand, is a massive transfer of wealth to those who least deserve it.

Letter from me in Adver:

BRITAIN is falling far behind in launching a Green New Deal, despite Government promises to "lead the world". The most comprehensive study yet of "green stimuli", A Climate for Recovery published by the HSBC Bank, puts Britain near the bottom. China, for example, has devoted well over a hundred times as much money to recession-beating environmental measures, despite being castigated for failing to tackle its pollution.

Britain has, so far, devoted only $2.1bn to a green stimulus, less than a third of France's $7.2bn and less than a sixth of Germany's $13.8bn. China's spending, at $221.3bn, is more than 110 times that of the UK. In addition, only 6 per cent of Britain's stimulus packages is devoted to green measures such as energy efficiency, renewable sources and public transport. This is less than a third of the proportion given as a "benchmark" by the London School of Economics' Grantham Institute. It contrasts with 13 per cent in Germany, 21 per cent in France, 38 per cent in China and 81 per cent in South Korea.

The Green Party believes that politicians should stick to their policies and pledges. I urge your readers to vote for Green Candidate, Ricky Knight, in June's European Parliamentary elections.

JENNIFER MILES

Chairwoman, Swindon Green Party

Green Drinks

Went to Green Drinks tonight, the next will be 7th April (see: www.swindongreens.org.uk for details)

Letter from me to the Adver:

So Peter Mandelson has made his intentions clear. At a time when unemployment is sky rocketing he would like to put tens of thousands of postal workers' jobs at risk with a madcap scheme to part privatise the Royal Mail.

It's hardly surprising the Royal Mail is struggling to make money, and it's got little to do with the internet as any online shopper will vouch for. No wonder - when the Mail's chief competitor, the Dutch private monopoly TNT, has already been gifted the most profitable parts of Royal Mail's business. And no wonder - when for years, successive Tory and Labour governments have been creaming off profits and starving this still vital public service of investment to modernise its systems, pay decent wages to its hard working staff, or properly restructure.
Perhaps the Business Secretary would like to explain just how the current management team, which his government brought in, has run down what was one of the best postal services in the world. A cynic might say a deliberate ploy to pave the way for privatisation. We now have fewer post offices, Sunday service cut, and almost 15 years of idiotic schemes for "improvements."