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Victory at Leith Hill! Divest Fracking! Resisting sites of speculation
Blog post -
Oct 12, 2018
This piece was written before the news of the draconian jail sentences passed on those opposing fracking in Preston, Lancashire … but that bitter ruling does not destroy the reality that shortly before that decision we celebrated a Victory! The News of an Amazing Victory! We wrote of it as follows … The permission to...
Update: The Bus, its seizure and our story
Blog post -
May 14, 2018
Here is the latest on the campaign to pressurise Nigeria Customs release the Living Memorial to Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni 9 known as the Bus. Customs seized the Bus in 2015 and has refused to release it despite the huge efforts and directives described below. The guest blog is written by Celestine AkpoBari, National Coordinator for Ogoni Solidarity...
The Invisible Machine – a gas pipeline in the Caucasus and a handshake in No10
Blog post -
May 1, 2018
On the evening of Thursday 26th April 2018, it was warm and sunny in London. President Ilham Aliyev strode down Downing Street and was met by Prime Minister Theresa May with smile and a handshake. They posed for the cameras on the red carpet outside No 10 and then retired inside. A short formal chat...
Aliyev re-elected as President for another 7 years – the chain of oil autocracy that binds Azerbaijan
Blog post -
Apr 18, 2018
On 18th April Ilham Aliyev will be inaugurated for the fourth time as President of Azerbaijan. His re-election comes as no surprise. It is so predictable that it barely counted as ‘news’ and consequently got next to no coverage in the international media. Originally the election was scheduled for 17th October, but at nine weeks...
Spring in the Thames Valley – The extraordinary resistance of the more than human
Blog post -
Apr 9, 2018
Even in the dark the Blackbird sings. The bubbling song fills the night outside our bedroom window. You sleep silently, the bedclothes rising and falling, as the notes of the bird flow over you. Hours later, the grey light of dawn has come and with it the calls of Song Thrush and House Sparrow....
Win! Mayor of London and More Councils Back Divestment
Blog post -
Mar 29, 2018
Yesterday, the Mayor of London joined the divestment movement. Sadiq Khan announced plans to divest the London Pension Fund from fossil fuels, calling on other London boroughs to do the same. We are seeing a wave of divestment pledges across the capital. Lambeth and Islington Labour have announced divestment commitments in their manifestos. With some local...
Home is a Hostile Lover – ending the UK Government’s racist deportations regime
Blog post -
Mar 22, 2018
‘Home is a hostile lover’ a poem by Selina Nwulu is read from the concrete steps of Chelmsford Crown Court. London’s former young poet laureate, gives a powerful indictment of the UK’s ‘hostile environment’. Hundreds listen in the chill morning outside Chelmsford Crown Court to stand in solidarity with fifteen people who begin trial this week...
The slow dismantling the house of oil – The Gulbenkian Foundation divests
Blog post -
Mar 18, 2018
Quite unexpected comes remarkable news! Lucy Neal, a long-term part of the Platform family, e-mails out of the blue, forwarding an article from the Algarve Daily News, published on 1st February in southern Portugal. The headline reads: ‘Gulbenkian Foundation gets out of the oil business’ That truly is unexpected. Lucy had not foreseen this coming...
Avebury and the infrastructure of community
Blog post -
Jan 15, 2018
Over the Winter Break I walked at Avebury in Wiltshire with Nick Robins, a long term Platformer, who’s worked on several projects and was a Trustee. We had the chance to reflect on time and community. The soft whale back curve of the Ridgeway rose to the left, its skyline punctuated by barrows ringed with...
‘How you would have loved these times’ – A conversation with Doreen Massey
Blog post -
Dec 10, 2017
The days tip towards the darkness of Winter. The world of the North comes into our lives. The year stops and takes a breath. It pushes me to reflect on the months past. It makes me think of you Doreen and how you would have loved these times. You’d have been everywhere. In your element, plugged...
Councils: Fuelling the Fire
Publication -
Nov 9, 2017
Councils: Fuelling the Fire reveals that UK councils invest £16.1 billion of their workers’ pensions into companies that extract coal, oil and gas, fueling dangerous climate change. Download the report The report uncovers: Councils invest £16.1 billion of pensions into fossil fuel companies out of a total of £289.9 billion, new data reveals No significant...
Revealed: UK council pensions are banking £16.1 billion on climate disaster
Blog post -
Nov 9, 2017
Today we’re releasing new data analysis showing that UK councils invest £16.1 billion in fossil fuel corporations through their workers’ pensions. These investments are bankrolling the companies most responsible for climate change, like Shell and BP. The councils with the biggest investments in fossil fuels – Manchester, Galloway & Dumfries, Hammersmith & Fulham, and Torfaen...
