Sandra Finley

2012-06-14 U of S VP Finance, Richard Florizone, seconded to World Bank Group, Star Phoenix. PPP’s.

 Corporatocracy or Democracy or Administrative State or WHAT?, Nuclear, Take back the University  No Responses »
Jun 142012
 

(PPP’s = Public Private Partnerships)

Richard Florizone was Vice-President of Finance at the University of Saskatchewan during a period of unprecedented over-spending.

2012-05-07 Letter to U of S, Board of Governors.  Who is responsible for Debt situation?

EXCERPT:  The finances, roughly:

  • $95 million debt
  • Borrowing capacity maxed out
  • A $10 million shortfall in the current operating budget, upgraded to $12 million
  • $15.5 million deficit for 2012-13
  • a potential shortfall of $20 million to $40 million annually by 2016.  Upgraded two weeks later to $44.5 million.
  • $600 million needed for repair and maintenance of the existing buildings
  • No money to finish the interior of some of the new buildings

Prior to looking at how Florizone is rewarded, also consider this excerpt from the posting  2009-10-10 Corporations at the Universities. Selling Out. Richard Florizone and UDP. Nuclear at the University.

Excerpt from item #4:

I observed the loss of integrity again, repeatedly, through the Uranium Partnership Development (UDP or “NUKE”) Panel struck by the Government of Saskatchewan and chaired by Richard Florizone, Vice-President of Finance of the University of Saskatchewan.

More than 2,000 citizens heard the lie from Florizone that the acid rain problem in Canada has been solved.

The public meetings were about nuclear reactors.  Why was Florizone even mentioning acid rain?

Understand the relationship between the tar sands (acid rain production) and “small” nuclear reactors which are to be developed under the “Uranium Development Partnership”.  (Actually, the “small” reactors have already been developed in the U.S., in Japan and elsewhere.  Whatever is done in Saskatchewan will build on that. The University is a vehicle through which to get the “small” reactors up and running.)

Huge amounts of electricity are needed for the large electrical diodes that will heat the far underground to get the tar to the point where it will flow.  It is projected to take more than 3 years of 24-hour heating just to get the first tar on the Saskatchewan side of the border flowing.

Imagine the vast quantities of electricity (heat) needed by the tar sands producers.

The increase in acid rain from tar sands processing continues , and will continue, unabated.  Since it was first identified that some areas  of northern Saskatchewan (downwind) are already past critical load limits (CCME Report, 2005) there has only been EXPANSION of the tar sands.  The Government is sitting on the updates on how bad the acid rain problem now is.

It is very convenient for the industry to have the Vice-President of the University tell us all that the acid rain problem in Canada is no longer a problem because we are so smart we fixed it.  It’s about the use of lies (propaganda)to remove obstacles. to tar sands expansion.

Further, Florizone led the public to believe that we were being consulted about the whole uranium/nuclear question, including whether or not there would be a nuclear studies centre of excellence at the U of S.

While he was doing that, he had to know that the Canadian Centre of Nuclear Studies at the University was already  established.  In the “On Campus News”, July 17, 2009 the Vice-President of Research, Karen Chad was interviewed.  She said that the Centre has been in operation for more than a year.  (Link no longer valid http://www.usask.ca/communications/ocn/09-july-17/2.php.)  The decision had been made and implemented.

The mandate of the Canadian Centre of Nuclear Studies at the U of S includes research into “power production” and radioactive waste disposal (“safe storage” as she calls it).

Call a spade a spade.  Richard Florizone is not the kind of role model acceptable at the University.  We pay his salary so that our children have a centre of learning, where people search for truth.  They should not be taught that lies and deception are just part of the way we do business.

– – – – – –

A brief bio of Florizone is at  2011-04  The University:  Are We Living in a Brave New Academy?   The Conditioning Centre. See  item 10.  NOTICE OF MEETING CONTAINS BIOGRAPHY OF FLORIZONE

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Richard Florizone rewarded?

The StarPhoenix June 14, 2012

University of Saskatchewan vice-president Richard Florizone will be seconded to World Bank Group’s International Finance Corp. for six months, beginning July 1.

The agreement was signed between IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, and the university.

“Creating this unprecedented partnership with this leading global institution advances our growing prominence as a globally engaged university and enhances our capacity in public policy areas – finding new ways to finance infrastructure development – areas of critical importance to both Saskatchewan and developing countries,” university president Peter MacKinnon said in a news release Wednesday.

Florizone, the VP of finance and resources at the university, will act as a senior adviser to IFC Advisory Services in Public-Private Partnerships in Washington, D.C.

The prestigious secondment is the first undertaken by the World Bank Group with a Canadian university.

The World Bank Group is an international organization of 188 member nations that fights poverty by offering developmental assistance to middle-income and low-income countries.

Florizone’s work will focus on a study of past public-private partnership transactions, as well as providing support for several IFC projects in developing countries.

“With a growing need for infrastructure construction and renewal around the world, effective ways of financing these critical public works is increasingly important,” Florizone said.

© Copyright (c) The StarPhoenix

2012-06-06 and 07 Elections Canada says in a court document it has reasonable grounds to believe offences were committed by Dean Del Mastro, who serves as Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s parliamentary secretary, and by his campaign’s official agent

 Robocalls & Vote moving, Election Fraud  No Responses »
Jun 142012
 
Two articles,  June 6 and June 7.  Scroll down to the second one:

1.  June 7

Conservative MP Dean Del Mastro came under fire during  Question Period Thursday after Postmedia News and the Ottawa Citizen reported  that he is being investigated for allegedly exceeding both his spending limit  and contribution limit in relation to a $21,000 personal cheque he used to pay  for services from Holinshed Research Group..

Records from a court case appear to contradict Conservative MP Dean Del  Mastro’s claim that he paid a research company only a small amount during the  2008 election, muddying the waters as he resists calls to step down during an  Elections Canada investigation for alleged campaign spending violations.

On Wednesday, Postmedia News and the Ottawa Citizen reported that Del Mastro  is being investigated for allegedly exceeding both his spending limit and  contribution limit in relation to a $21,000 personal cheque he used to pay for  services from Holinshed Research Group.

The revelation led NDP and Liberal critics Thursday to request Del Mastro  step aside as the prime minister’s parliamentary secretary until the  investigation is resolved, but Del Mastro brushed aside the demands, stating  that he serves “with integrity and conviction.”

In a CBC TV appearance Wednesday night, Del Mastro said his audited campaign  expenses — which showed a payment of only $1,575 to Holinshed — were accurate  and complete, and said the rest of the money was for other work.

“They undertook a small amount of work during the campaign, during the actual  campaign writ,” he said. “That’s reflected in that campaign expenditure. They  did also undertake some work at various times for my association. They would be  on separate statements.”

But documents filed as part of a small-claims lawsuit launched by Holinshed  appear to show that Del Mastro’s campaign manager, John McNutt, hired Holinshed  for election work on Sept. 14, 2008, a week after the campaign began.

According to one of those documents, a quote on Holinshed letterhead, the  company was to perform 630 hours of voter-identification calls and  get-out-the-vote calls on election day and on advance poll days for $21,000.

The small claims court file also contains a cheque from Del Mastro’s personal  account for the same amount dated Aug. 18, 2008, and an invoice for the  completed work.

In a statement of defence filed by Del Mastro’s lawyer in the legal dispute  between Holinshed and the Peterborough MP, the lawyer writes that Holinshed “had  done work for the Peterborough Conservative election campaign for the general  election.”

After the election, when Del Mastro’s official agent filed the campaign’s  return, it included a payment to Holinshed of $1,575 and one mysterious line  item worth $75,238.39. In the supplier name it said only  “Advertising/Brochures/Signs.”

Elections Canada’s auditors seem to have demanded more detail, because when  the audited return was posted online, the single line item was gone and 100  smaller line items were added, including a $10,000 payment to Holinshed, under  the header “amounts not included in election expenses.”

The expense statement showed the campaign spent $91,770.80, just $795.99  under the limit.

The Peterborough Conservative association’s annual return for 2008 shows  $9,548.32 for polling, although the supplier isn’t listed.

In a court order filed in the Ottawa courthouse, Elections Canada says it  suspects that Del Mastro violated the Elections Act in two ways, by exceeding  the amount he is allowed to spend on his own campaign, and by exceeding the  spending limit for the riding.

His campaign’s official agent, Richard McCarthy, is suspected of improperly  accepting the $21,000 alleged personal donation from Del Mastro, failing to  include all the expenses in documents filed with Elections Canada and knowingly  filing a false claim.

Under the Elections Act, each charge is punishable by a fine of up to $5,000  and up to five years in prison.

Del Mastro and McCarthy have both asserted that all such charges are  groundless, and the statements filed were accurate and complete.

In October 2009, after their business relationship had eroded into acrimony,  Holinshed wrote to McCarthy, asserting that the campaign’s return did not  include all of the work the firm did during the campaign.

“Holinshed charged $20,000 plus GST to your campaign,” wrote company  president Frank Hall. He included copies of the contract and invoice, and asked  that the campaign rectify the “reporting error.”

In the small claims court documents, Holinshed says the firm became aware of  Del Mastro’s financial report when another Conservative candidate for whom the  firm worked asked why Del Mastro paid so little for election work.

In question period on Wednesday, MPs for the Liberals and the New Democrats  called on Del Mastro to step down as parliamentary secretary to Prime Minister  Stephen Harper, in which he has acted as the government’s main defender in the  “robocalls” affair.

After question period, Liberal leader Bob Rae said Del Mastro will not be an  effective spokesman on Elections Canada issues since he’s under investigation by  that body.

“It’s not up to us to find him guilty or not guilty,” he said. “It’s up to us  to decide is this now going to be a credible spokesman for the government when  it comes to issues dealing with ethics and dealing with Elections Canada.”

NDP MP Charlie Angus also said Del Mastro should step aside.

“While an investigation is under way, where Mr. Del Mastro is compromised in  his ability to defend the government and also in his ability to attack Elections  Canada, if that’s the government’s position, then he should step aside.”

In an email Thursday, Del Mastro declined to clear up questions about the  cheque.

“I have never been contacted by Elections Canada on the matter and stand by  the accuracy of my financial records,” he wrote.

Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre told CBC TV Thursday that Del Mastro will  not be stepping down.

“He’s not stepping aside,” he said. “There’s no evidence of any wrongdoing  here.”

In an interview on CTV TV Thursday, Del Mastro said he would come forward  soon with documents showing that everything in his campaign was on the  up-and-up.

Postmedia News and Ottawa Citizen

smaher  AT  postmedia.com

gmcgregor  AT  ottawacitizen.com

© Copyright  (c) Postmedia News
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2.  June 6

The MP leading the Conservative government’s defence in the robocalls scandal  is himself under investigation by Elections Canada for alleged election-law  violations related to voter-contact calls made by his campaign in 2008.

Elections Canada says in a court document it has  reasonable grounds to believe offences were committed by Dean Del Mastro, who  serves as Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s parliamentary secretary, and by his  campaign’s official agent.

The MP leading the Conservative government’s defence in the robocalls scandal  is himself under investigation by Elections Canada for alleged election-law  violations related to voter-contact calls made by his campaign in 2008.
Elections Canada says in a court document that it has reasonable grounds to  believe offences were committed by Dean Del Mastro, who serves as Prime Minister  Stephen Harper’s parliamentary secretary, and by his campaign’s official  agent.
In a surprise television appearance Wednesday evening, Del Mastro emotionally  denied any wrongdoing. None of the allegations have been proven in court.
The allegations of Elections Act violations are listed in the court order  compelling Frank Hall, owner of Holinshed Research Group, to produce emails,  invoices and other documents related to work he did for Del Mastro.
An invoice submitted in a small-claims court dispute brought by Holinshed  against Del Mastro purports to show that Holinshed performed voter  identification work as well as get-out-the-vote calls on election day for Del  Mastro’s 2008 campaign. The company, once based in Ottawa, now no longer appears  operational.
The production order, issued in response to an investigator’s sworn  statement, says Del Mastro is suspected of incurring costs that breached his  campaign’s spending limit by more than $17,000.
He is also suspected of paying $21,000 for election expenses with a cheque  drawn on his personal bank account – which, if proven to be a personal  contribution, would dramatically exceed the $2,100 contribution limit for  candidates.
Those violations are each punishable by a fine of $5,000 or imprisonment for  as long as five years.
The production order also names Del Mastro’s official agent Richard McCarthy,  who was responsible for ensuring expense reports filed with Elections Canada  were accurate. He is suspected of improperly accepting the $21,000 alleged  personal donation from Del Mastro, failing to include all the expenses in  documents filed with Elections Canada and knowingly filing a false claim.
No charges against Del Mastro or McCarthy have been laid and none of the  allegations cited in the production order have been proven in court. The court  order was obtained by Thomas Ritchie, an investigator retained on contract by  Elections Canada last year.
Del Mastro said in a telephone interview Wednesday that he was not aware of  the investigation.
“I have no knowledge of what you’re talking about,” he said.
Later, when Postmedia reporter Stephen Maher was discussing the story on the  CBC television show Power and Politics, Del Mastro made an unscheduled  appearance to defend himself. He complained that Elections Canada has not  informed him about the investigation, which was putting him in the  spotlight.
“The reason why I’m here is things like this eat you up inside,” he said.  “I’ve got a family back in Peterborough. I’ve got a lot of friends there. I’ve  got a family in business. And it has my name on the sign.”
Del Mastro said he was in the process of reviewing records and couldn’t say  what exactly the $21,000 cheque paid for.
“They (Holinshed) undertook a small amount of work during the campaign,” he  said.
“That’s reflected in the campaign expenditure (report). They did also  undertake some work at various times for the association. Those would be on  separate statements.”
Neither the Del Mastro campaign-expense disclosures nor the annual report for  the Conservative electoral district show a payment of $21,000 to Holinshed.
Reached by the Ottawa Citizen at his home in Peterborough on Wednesday,  McCarthy said he was not under investigation, to his knowledge.
“I don’t know anything about this,” he said. “I don’t know what you’re  talking about.”
He recalled some dealings with Holinshed but said they had nothing to do with  the election.
“There was an inappropriate disbursement made to him for something that  didn’t have anything to do with the election period and then he paid it back,”  he said.
“I don’t want to talk to you about this. There is no issue.” He then hung  up.
For the past three months, Del Mastro has been the Conservative party’s  spokesman on Elections Canada’s investigation of misleading calls in the 2011  election. He answers most questions about the issue in the House of Commons and  has represented the party on TV panel discussions about robocalls.
There is no sign the Prime Minister’s Office knew Del Mastro was under  investigation until asked for comment by Postmedia News on Wednesday.
The office has yet to respond to the request.
The production order issued March 29 gave Hall until the end of May to hand  over his correspondence with Del Mastro or his campaign, the scripts used for  the voter contact calls, company payroll records and bank statements and related  invoices.
Ritchie appears to be working from some documents that were also introduced  in a small-claims lawsuit filed by Holinshed against Del Mastro in 2010 over  other work the company says it did for him after the election.
In the small-claims lawsuit the company sued Del Mastro, alleging it had not  been paid for providing a voter-tracking system called GeoVote – work it says  the MP requested Holinshed perform after the campaign.
None of the allegations in this case has been proven either.
Hall mentioned in court documents that Del Mastro had also hired the company  at the beginning of the election campaign to do $21,000 worth of voter ID and  get-out-the-vote work and had been happy with the work. That election work  allegedly included 630 hours of telephone calling and live calls on election  day, an invoice submitted in the court file purports to show. Del Mastro won the  election by a wide margin.
Holinshed was paid, Hall said in the court file, with two cheques from the  Peterborough riding association, one for $10,000 and another for $11,000. The  cheque for $11,000 was cancelled, and Hall says he received a $21,000 personal  cheque drawn on a joint account Del Mastro held with his wife – an overpayment  of $10,000 that Hall says he refunded.
The small claims court file includes a copy of a cheque, dated Aug. 18, 2008  – about three weeks before the election. The court file also includes a  Holinshed invoice for $21,000 sent to the Del Mastro campaign on Sept. 14, 2008.  It appears to have been signed by campaign manager John McNutt.
After the election, Hall claimed, Del Mastro asked him to do $1,500 of  additional work using some of the election data and to backdate the invoice to  the election period.
Hall later checked Elections Canada filings and found that the Del Mastro  campaign had declared only the $1,500 payment for the extra Holinshed work – a  payment Hall said he never received – and not the $21,000 of work he performed  during the election.
The filings show Del Mastro’s campaign was just $796 below its spending limit  of $92,567. Any substantial additional expenses that count toward the spending  limit would have breached the cap, in violation of the Election Act.
A letter in the court file shows Hall wrote to Del Mastro’s official agent,  McCarthy, to alert him to a “possible mistake” in the Elections Canada filings.  McCarthy wrote back to say the first cheque for $10,000 was issued in error and  the other for $11,000 had a stop-payment placed on it. McCarthy explained that  he shouldn’t have paid for “annual expenses” from the campaign and instead  should have pro-rated the amount for the election period.
In court documents, Del Mastro denied Holinshed’s claims and said the company  completed no work for him that was satisfactory. He further alleged that any  invoices for the work were “erroneous, false and were prepared prior to any  services being completed.”
The small claims action appears to have gone dormant.
Hall could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Elections Canada has a track record of investigating MPs who try to secretly  use their own money to exceed election spending limits, although it doesn’t  typically impose tough sentences.
In 2008, former MP Wajid Khan – who was elected as a Liberal, then crossed  the floor to the Conservatives – pleaded guilty to exceeding election expenses  in the 2004 election in the Mississauga-Streetsville riding of Ontario, and was  fined $500. Khan ran unsuccessfully as a Conservative in 2008.
In the same year, Elections Canada entered into a “compliance agreement” with  Blair Wilson, who was elected in West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky  Country as a Liberal in 2006. In the agreement, Wilson acknowledged paying for  $9,000 in undeclared advertising expenses.
Wilson resigned from the Liberal caucus when allegations about election  irregularities were made public in 2007, and was refused readmittance in 2008.  He then joined the Green party, although Parliament was dissolved before he  could sit as the party’s first Green MP. He ran unsuccessfully for that party in  the 2008 election.

Read more: http://www.canada.com/news/Tory+robocalls+defender+under+investigation+election+violations/6740276/story.html#ixzz1xoIeIao6

© Copyright  (c) Postmedia News
Ottawa Citizen and Postmedia News

2004-06-11 Great Sand Hills (GSH) and Water: Be very clear on the dynamics.

 Corporatocracy or Democracy or Administrative State or WHAT?, Culture and Ethics, Energy, Sustainability, Water  No Responses »
Jun 142012
 

(The arguments and information remain valuable, in spite of the date.)

FROM:  Sandra Finley

(contact info)

June  11, 2004

TO: DEPT OF ENVIRONMENT

(1)       MINISTER  David Forbes,    Email: dforbes  AT  serm.gov.sk.ca

(2)      DEPUTY MINISTER   Lily Stonehouse,   Email:  lstonehouse  AT  serm.gov.sk.ca

CC:  MLA”s  Pat Atkinson and Peter Prebble

 

Dear David and Lily,

Re:  GREAT SAND HILLS

The Department of Environment, and therefore you two, have power of veto in the attempted re-zonings of lands in the Great Sand Hills.

What support do you require in order to exercise your veto?

 

I.    REGARDING WATER SUPPLY

Regarding water supply and your responsibility for the SASKATCHEWAN WATERSHED AUTHORITY  (SWA issues the permits to use water;  each new well uses water;  permits are required.)

Question:

(1)  What is the amount of water allocated for each new well and how is the amount that is withdrawn actually monitored? I pose the question because the graph for the monitoring well in the GSH from the Saskatchewan Research Council, data from 1965 to 2002 shows a dramatic decrease in the water table.  This is a very serious issue that should be resolved PRIOR to further water allocations.    The graph is at:   http://www.econet.sk.ca/pages/issues/gshhydrograph.html

The graph raises two further questions:

(2)  What is the reason for the decline in the water level?

(3)  If you don’t know the answer,  will you find out the answer before allowing more gas well development in the GSH?

In this regard I note that the National Water Research Institute (NWRI) of Canada has two locations, one of which is right here in Saskatchewan.  The NWRI employs 300 water scientists, which is most of the water scientists in Canada.  It is their job to conduct research and provide input to Provincial Governments so that we may have well-informed, effective water policies.  Which leads to another question:

(4)  Have you sought input from the NWRI regarding the water situation in the GSH?  If so, what input have they supplied?

 

II.    REGARDING SUPPORT IN CABINET AND THE PUBLIC

My understanding is that Peter Prebble and Pat Atkinson are likely supporters of the need to establish intractable protection for the existing Environmentally Sensitive #1 lands in the GSH.

So you, Minister and Deputy Minister of Environment,  are not alone.  If you choose to exercise your veto, there is support.  And there will be respect from a very large public.

You may recall a book that was popular about 3 years ago:  “Sex in the Snow” by Michael Adams,  President of Environics Research Group.  On page 193:

“The Canadian emphasis on egalitarian values goes beyond the equality of human beings – whatever their sex, age, race, ethnicity or sexual orientation – to the consideration of non-human species and the natural environment.  I expect this principle will be codified in the preamble the next time we amend the Canadian constitution.  Canada’s global village is a global garden.”

That there are so many people willing to fight for the protection of what remains of the natural environment is consistent with Michael Adams observations, which are based on years of research into the attitudes of Canadians.  The many communications the Government of Saskatchewan has received from citizens in support of protection for the GSH is further evidence.

You have all the support you require to bring an end to the “death by a thousand cuts” being experienced by the Great Sand Hills.

 

III. THE OIL AND GAS INDUSTRY

The oil and gas industry has access to all the ES2 lands in the GSH, but not to ES1 lands.

They seem not to be satisfied unless they will have it ALL, which, through re-zoning they will have.  That is not right.  There is a balance to be achieved.

The CANADIAN ASSOCIATION OF PETROLEUM PRODUCERS (CAPP)  is on record as saying there are natural areas that should be protected, from which oil and gas activity should be excluded.  The Petroleum industry participated in the task force 1994-98 that established the protected areas in the Great Sand Hills.   They AGREED that ES1 lands should be ES1.

What has happened since then?  Why now do companies like Anadarko want on ES1 lands?  …  Since the earlier agreements, there has been a large sell-off of Canadian oil and gas companies to American interests.  (Anadarko bought up Norcen, for example.)  So we have more demanding companies now.   What that means is that we have to be stronger, to stand up for our own interests.

(Contact in Calgary for CAPP:  Roger Shanaman 403 267 1104.)

The Petroleum Industry has applied in the past for drilling permits in the National Wildlife Areas (NWA)’s in the Great Sand Hills.  NWA’s are on Federally-held Crown lands.  The applications have been turned down because of the endangered species (in spite of the fact that the Dept would have liked the revenues).    The Federal Government has set a precedent, which you can follow.

 

IV.      SELLING US OUT

When the gas is gone, what will remain?  … rusted and twisted pipes.  For certain there will be no money in the bank. … The Sand Hills are sand.  When disturbed, sand blows.  Need I tell you about the power of the winds in Saskatchewan?  So there will be a desecrated landscape, a desert of blowing sand with no trace of the creatures and the beauty. (Remember that some of the wildlife is ALREADY endangered.)  The accessible gas reserves will have been depleted by our greed and lack of consideration for the future.

We will do this for what?

94% of our natural gas extraction goes to the United States.  Simultaneously there is every likelihood that Canadians will actually need this resource in the future.  . . .   Let me use analogy to put this in focus:

There are stories of native peoples who were bribed, duped or coerced by invaders to essentially give away portions of prime reserve lands in return for shiny baubles.   The deed would be done by a few “leaders” who profited themselves.  The invaders profited, too, of course.  The native peoples became impoverished without the resource of good and valuable land.

Think of the food supply that was exhausted so that animal pelts could be shipped in massive numbers to decorate the wealthy class in Europe.  It was not only the food supply, it was the source of clothing, warmth, protection, tools, etc..

Gone, sold-off, vanished.  Gone for the unsuspecting, for those who did not have information, the powerless, the weak.

We, local Canadians, are now the “native people”.

Some of “our leaders” are in the process of selling us out.    What is to be done in this case?   . . .  The response is to become leaders ourselves.  Stand up and speak out for, indeed DEMAND “what is right”, which is for the good of the community and its future.

WHO are the profiteers?

I have provided the documentation for Ron Clark, President of crown corporations SaskEnergy and Trans Gas Pipelines,  fraudulent press conference with Clayton Woitas, millionaire American and owner of Profico.  Dwayne Lingenfelter, former Deputy Premier now with Nexen Oil and Gas.  Doug Anguish, former Cabinet Minister now working for the pipeline companies.   Larry Kratt, former Dept of Environment employee now working for Nexen.  Nexen, number one client of Trans Gas.  Trans Gas builds a pipeline into the GSH.  … There are obviously more would-be profiteers in Government or what is happening would not be happening.

(Do you know what gets me, in addition to everything else?  The salt in the wound? . . . The sell-off is done at bargain basement prices.  Resource companies today in Saskatchewan receive “royalty holidays”!   The profiteers are indeed generous with what is not theirs to give away.   EXACTLY what happened to the resource base of the Native peoples in Canada . . sold off for a pittance.  History repeats itself.  Only this time WE are the doomed people, unless we see and will fight.)

 

V.   ENVIRONMENTAL SIGNIFICANCE

The environmental significance of the GSH is well recognized and documented through such vehicles as:

  • the International Biological Program.
  • Parks Canada (one of five Natural Sites of Canadian Significance in Saskatchewan)
  • the Provincial Parks System Plan in 1990 as a candidate Natural Environment Park
  • the province identified it in 1992 as a candidate Ecological Reserve
  • 9 quarter-section National Wildlife Areas (NWA’s) established by the Federal Govt
  • an Important Bird Area (IBA) (Bigstick Lake Plain) of “Global” significance.

At a public meeting in Saskatoon Dr. Howard Nixon, member of the Order of Canada, expressed his frustration:  more than a decade  ago he had participated in public meetings on this very issue of the Great Sand Hills.  The Government was supposed to have done cumulative environmental impact assessments as a consequence of the process.    Nothing has been done in all the intervening years.   The Government approves rezoning in complete ignorance of the consequences because there has been no effective cumulative assessment.  Just empty words about what “should be” or “will be” done.

 

VI.     SPECIES

The Great Sand Hills are home to a large number of plant and animal species, including over 20 species considered internationally to be rare, threatened or endangered. Some of these include: Sprague’s Pipit, Long Billed Curlew, Ferruginous Hawk, Burrowing Owl, Great Plains Toad, Lotus Milk Vetch, Prickly Milk Vetch, and Burr Sage.

Short-eared owl and Ord’s Kangaroo Rats are in the Sand Hills, and are rated “of  special concern“.

Antelope, sand hill cranes, partridges, prairie chicken, sharp-tailed grouse, whitetail deer, burrowing owls, and kangaroo rat all make the region their home. Dotted throughout the area are aspen, birch, and willow trees, as well as rose and chokecherry bushes and sagebrush.

VII.     PHILOSOPHICAL BASE

When making irreversible decisions,  it is important to know and to acknowledge the philosophical grounds upon which the decision is made.

  • “The real problems facing all living things on this planet are not economic or technical, they are philosophical.  The prevailing western philosophy at the end of the 20th century is swamping the whole world, resulting in the destruction of our natural heritage and our human heritage.” writes Robert Bateman.
  • J. Stan Rowe,  in “Saskatchewan’s Endangered Spaces”  writes of “Species Self-Centeredness” and a “faulty world-view that can be changed.”   “How curious that every right-thinking person condemns selfishness and egoism in the individual, and sometimes even in the ethnic group or nation, but never in the species as a whole.  We recognize and condemn imperialism as enslavement and exploitation directed at other people, but our entrepreneurial species directs the same imperialism against nature to the sound of loud applause. …”  “No wonder species are disappearing as if the end of the world were here.  Like mechanical cowbirds we are laying our industrial eggs in every possible niche and nest, crowding out and displacing all creatures that do not directly serve us.  On the playing field that we have levelled, moose cannot compete with bulldozers nor frogs with spraying machines.  In the words of Kenneth Boulding we have to be worried about this planet when there are more species of nuts and bolts than there are of birds.”

VIII. IN CONCLUSION

Mary Gilliland from Saskatoon said it as well as it can be stated:  “The Great Sand Hills are one of those places which deserve to exist simply because they are irreplaceable to a large number of other species, plant and animal, which depend on their ecosystem.  … We are intelligent, not only in how we choose to make change, but also in terms of knowing when to stop, regardless of the dollars which might come through more development.”

It is my request that through the power you have as Minister and Deputy Minister of Environment,  with support inside Cabinet, and wide support outside Cabinet, that you put an immediate end to the re-zoning of Environmentally Sensitive #1 lands, and that permanent irreversible protection be legislated for these areas.

Thank-you for your consideration.

 

Yours truly,  . . .

2012-06-11 CPPIB investment in Lockheed Martin increased by 14 times, 2010 to 2011.

 Corporatocracy or Democracy or Administrative State or WHAT?, Culture and Ethics, Lockheed Martin, War Economy (includes Cdn Census & Trials)  No Responses »
Jun 112012
 

The figures from Richard Sanders below on Canada Pension Plan Investments in Lockheed Martin are pretty staggering.  I believe he is a credible researcher.

Many people lobby the CPPIB (CPP Investment Board), I do not know that it is reported anywhere.  I used to lobby them on what they are investing in and the conflicts-of-interest on their board.  Haven’t done it for some time – it became more difficult to find info on their website and the efforts didn’t appear to bear fruit.

CPPIB hired a couple of people 7 or 8 years ago,  positions responsible for their “Socially responsible” investing.  I recently received an email:  “(Name) lost the job at cppib, soon after we started asking questions, a lot of questions. (Name) tried to be helpful.”

 

APPENDED:  postings from our network regarding the CPPIB.

 

From #11,  2012-04-23 From Tootsie Rolls to tobacco: What’s in your CPP fund?  CBC News,

a senior executive from the CPPIB (Don Raymond, formerly from Goldman Sachs – see bottom of this posting) said  “the fund has a strict “investment only” mandate and, by law, cannot take political or moral considerations into account when choosing investments”.

The statement contradicts CPPIB policy on “socially responsible investing”?

Last week I called the CPPIB (“socially responsible” section) to question re the increase in investment in Lockheed Martin.  I was told 2 or 3 times about the statement on the CPPIB website re socially-responsible investing; I haven’t looked at it yet (in the past I found it to be advertising or rhetoric or propaganda – not the real goods).

Between two of the postings, you will see (Don Raymond, the Senior VP responsible):

CPPIB went on “a buying spree”, (“$2-billion to $5-billion of debt”, March 2009), they then lost $24 billion in that same year, and paid the executives $7 million in bonuses. 

” . . . In 2009, during the global financial crisis, the fund, like many, took a big hit, plummeting 18.6 per cent and losing $24 billion.  This sparked a backlash from some critics who complained the top executives of the board received $7 million in bonuses despite the losses. …”     . . .  Nothing mentioned about the “buying spree” – –

“Don Raymond, senior vice-president of public market investments at CPPIB, said the fund would issue $2-billion to $5-billion of debt over the next year to provide “additional flexibility” . . .” 

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

From: Richard

Sent: June-08-12

Subject: Re: Need info – war industry funding of Canadian universities

 

Hi Sandra

In the past few days, the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) released its data regarding CPP investments for 2012. (This new data which reflects CPP holdings as of March 31, 2012, updates the previously available information for March 31, 2011.)

The CPPIB also recently released the times and places of its nine public meetings.  These June 11 mtgs are an hour-and-a-half-long opportunity (once every two years) for Canadians to make comments and ask questions about the CPP and its investment practices.  The Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade is rallying folks to attend these meetings in person or to pose questions online via a CPPIB webcast on Monday, June 11.   http://coat.ncf.ca/research/cppib-meetings.htm

The new data shows that the CPPIB almost doubled its investments in the world’s Top 100 war industries during Fiscal Year (FY) 2011.

Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin (LM) ranks as number one on the list of international war industries.

The CPP has long invested in LM. The CPP currently includes $78 million worth of shares in LM, up from $5 million in 2011.  That is a more than 14-fold increase.

In 2011, the CPP held 62 shares in LM.  Now, as of March 31, 2012, the CPP holds 872 shares in LM.  (INSERT: these numbers are likely in units of a thousand)

The CPP isn’t the only large Cdn pension fund investing in LM.  The CP and three other large funds (among the top six Cdn pension funds) own a total of $ 101,598,000 worth of shares in LM.  (The three other funds are OMERS, OTPP and PSPI.)

Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor for the F-35 warplane.

The CPP and the other five top Cdn pension funds are investing in many militar contractors that are building the F-35s.

See this COAT research to show the 2012 data:  http://coat.ncf.ca/research/Pensions-F35.htm 

The total value of the CPP’s stake in the top 100 international war industries (as ranked by “Defense News,” using 2011 company data on military revenues) went from $387 million in 2011 to $674 million in 2012.

The CPP Investment Board seems to have deliberately chosen to increase its investments in the world’s largest war industries.

During Fiscal Year 2011, it added 15 new companies to its portfolio from the Top 100 list.

So, instead of investing in only three of the world’s Top 10 war industries, as it did in 2011, the CPP increased that to 9 of the Top 10.

And, instead of owning shares in only 7 of the world’s Top 20 war industries, as it did in 2011, the CPP now holds shares in 18 of the Top 20.

Cheers

Richard Sanders

coordinator, COAT

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

APPENDED:    POSTINGS RE CPPIB & ETHICAL INVESTING

(Note:  click on the link and then scroll down past the top headings to read the article.)

1.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5709   2006-01-01   Norway’s Central Bank hires Doctor of Philosophy (Henrik Syse) re Implementation of moral behavior in investment decisions (money from offshore oil)   (Der Spiegel).

2.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5707   2006-06-06  Norway dumps Walmart stock because of its unethical behaviour.

3.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5712   2006-07-29  Wal-Mart pulls out of Germany at cost of $1bn U.S. (The Times of London)

4.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5715   2006-08-02  CPP investments – our money, our responsibility.  Canada Pension Plan Investment Board.

5.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5718   2006-08-02  Letter to Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Divestment needs to be part of the CPPIB socially responsible investing policy

6.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5785   2006-11-28  Water is the new oil, says CIBC.  I called CEO Brain Shaw.  You, too?.  CPPIB launched bid for British water utility.  P3’s.

7.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5705   2007-02-22  Norway withdraws support from World Bank Fund, Water privatization

8.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5777   2007-02-28  Weyerhaeuser, Letter to major pension plans. Grassy Narrows. CPPIB.

9.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=4897   2007-06-06  How to find out how much of your money (CPP) is invested where.  VIDEO: Help “Get the Shell Out” of the Sacred headwaters.

10.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5771   2007-12-13  Violent Evictions at El Estor, Guatemala.  Eviction Notice sent by a Canadian company, Skye Resources. Acadians. CPPIB.

11.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5767   2008-03-22  BASF Clearfield Wheat. CPPIB Board Director in conflict-of-interest.

12.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=2367   2008-05-26  Lockheed Martin Census: Are Canadians Contravening the Global Ban on Anti-Personnel Landmines? CPPIB

13.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=188    2008-12-08 Canada signs international treaty to ban cluster bombs. The treaty conditions and moral authority require us to dis-invest from Lockheed Martin, manufacturer of cluster munitions. CPPIB

14.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5848   2009-03-26  CPPIB going on a buying spree, Financial Post, Karen Mazurkewich

NOTE:  They went on a buying spree, (“$2-billion to $5-billion of debt”), they lost $24 billion in that same year, and paid the executives $7 million in bonuses.

The article, “CPPIB going on a buying spree”, was written in March 2009.

By the end of 2009, excerpt from 2012-04-23 From Tootsie Rolls to tobacco: What’s in your CPP fund? CBC News ” . . . In 2009, during the global financial crisis, the fund, like many, took a big hit, plummeting 18.6 per cent and losing $24 billion.  This sparked a backlash from some critics who complained the top executives of the board received $7 million in bonuses despite the losses. …”

15.   http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=258   2010-02-25  Understanding why we flounder, help from John Ralston Saul “On Equilibrium”

16.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5740   2012-04-23  From Tootsie Rolls to tobacco: What’s in your CPP fund?  (CPPIB)  CBC News

17.  http://sandrafinley.ca/?p=5746    2012-06-08  CPP Investment Board, Public Meetings   (June 11 in Regina)

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –

FROM THE CPPIB WEBSITE:   DONALD M. RAYMOND,  SENIOR VICE-PRESIDENT

Donald M. Raymond

Senior Vice-President and Chief Investment Strategist

Don is responsible for overall fund level investment strategy. He chairs the Investment Planning Committee, which approves all new investment programs and oversees all portfolio risks, including passive, active, credit and liquidity risk. Prior to this role, Don built and led the Public Market Investments department transition from external passive equity investing to the development of a wide variety of sophisticated internal active capabilities across all asset classes.

Prior to joining the CPPIB in 2001, Don worked for Goldman Sachs for seven years. He joined their Toronto office as a fixed-income strategist before moving to the Quantitative Strategies group in New York with responsibility for global equity and fixed-income portfolios. He began his investment career as a research analyst in the fixed-income derivatives department of Burns Fry, a predecessor of BMO Capital Markets.

Prior to developing an interest in finance, Don worked for Schlumberger in China and trained as a pilot in the Canadian military. He holds a PhD in engineering from Queen’s University and a CFA charter. Don is currently Chair of the International Centre for Pension Management at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management and a Trustee of Queen’s University.

2012-06-10 When NATO does this in Tampa, WE do this in our community.

 Corporatocracy or Democracy or Administrative State or WHAT?, Economy / Political Economy, Empowerment, Lockheed Martin, War Economy (includes Cdn Census & Trials), Solidarity with the Warriors  No Responses »
Jun 102012
 

I offer PROBLEM and REMEDY in this posting.

When NATO does this in Tampa  /  WE do this in our community.

I am sorry you may find it lengthy.   I feel I have to make a water-tight case.

ON “THE REMEDY” SIDE:

Do not fall for the propaganda that what is happening in Quebec is “violent” or just a bunch of spoiled children.  The documentation below shows it is neither.  And it is spreading.  There is video footage of similar mass protests (“casseroles” —  banging on pots and pans) in Toronto and Vancouver.  The movement is growing.

Remember Montebello (Item #13 below).  It is well documented that violence is sometimes a deliberate tactic of the police to discredit and discourage protest.

Rally all the support we can for the “casseroles” (banging of pots and pans, citizens taking to the streets).  Please take the time to understand the situation (“the problem”).

ON “THE PROBLEM” SIDE:

The factual documentation below shows that we are (democracy is) in a precarious situation.

– Jim (from the U.S.) writes:

“June 8, 2012 – Special Forces from 96 countries focused on ‘Building the Global SOF (Special Operations Forces) Partnership’ at a conference in Tampa, Florida.  The multinational cooperation of NATO SOF serves as  good example of (INSERT: proof of) such a global Special Forces network.”

The one thing that could be most effective globally would be true and enforceable INTERNATIONAL LAW & ORDER – but no one cares about this fact. None of this military bullshit (INSERT: NATO exercises in Tampa, Florida) would be needed if there were any real LAWS against corruption, fraud, mass murder (war – drone attacks), crimes against humanity and the like – this crap is a physical stopgap that only exists to keep all people prisoners of the (INSERT: I would say “corporate globalization”) one-world “government” that is in reality not a government at all – but is simply organized CRIMINALITY ON A GLOBAL SCALE. (INSERT: it is happening in many areas, privatization of water, utter destruction of the environment and graphically – the drone attacks, the President’s “kill list” – more below.)

BACK TO THE “REMEDY” SIDE:

1. (From Item #11 below, Vancouver “Casseroles” (street protest):

There is a beauty that emerges when we learn and inspire each other, just as Quebec has done for the rest of Canada. When we speak to each other instead of through governments or the mainstream media. Here in Vancouver, we discovered what it means to make music together in the streets, in the rain, and you can see it on our faces. It is magic.

2. (From Item #13 below, A talk given by Chris Hedges to the graduating class at Wilfrid Laurier University):

If the street protests in Quebec, the most important resistance movement in the industrialized world, spread to all of Canada and reach the United States, there remains the possibility of hope.

INSTRUCTION:  After clicking on links to my blog, scroll down past the top headings to the actual posting.

 

3. (From Slavoj Žižek, Interview, “Democracy Now”, with Amy Goodman and Julian Assange):

“.. . . this idea that there are out there quite ordinary guys, nothing special, but who all of a sudden, as if in a miracle, do something wonderful. That’s almost, I would say, our only hope today.”

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

To:   All of us and our neighbours

I propose:

PROBLEM:    WHEN NATO DOES THIS IN TAMPA
(see video, 6 minutes)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CvfJCzYtA3Y

(NOTE: the video is identified as “NATOchannel.tv”.)

 

REMEDY: WE DO THIS IN OUR COMMUNITIES: 

1.   Think about the “chilling” effect of the military, and the “normalizing” of their presence in communities.

Jim (Canadian) writes:

One has to have a sinking feeling watching all the public taking photos rather than protesting that foreign troops are on American soil:  NATO Special Op Forces Assault Tampa, Florida – YouTube

2.  Add a smithereen of history: The Nazis were a democratically-elected Government, as incomprehensible as that may seem. The people who COULD, did not stand up and say “NO” when they saw the threat, until it was too late to salvage democracy. And so there was a war.

3.  Understand the importance of the Rule of Law in a democracy.  Be clear – – Harper has blatant disregard for it.  One example:  It doesn’t matter what you think of the Canadian Wheat Board (CWB) – the issue is that Harper did exactly what the Law said he could not do.

4. If you want to know what’s coming down the pipes in Canada, look at what’s happening in the U.S. (and in Canada, already).

  • The NATO “Special Operations Force” in Tampa.

5.  Review the role of propaganda in the build-up of a militaristic state, be able to identify it.  The NATO video is propaganda.  Cleverly done, and subtle, normalizing what is UNacceptable. A “NATO TV channel” running this kind of propaganda, “conditioning” the populace – – not good news.

Only for the REAL keen people!:

6. Know the GOOD NEWS!  The military-industrial people might be building the propaganda, BUT! Sometimes the truth gets aired on mainstream media – NBC (who would have thought?) !!

6 minutes

Very important televised debate: Jeremy Scahill (“The Nation”) says Obama drone strikes constitute murder, and he says it on NBC.  The U.S. “kill list”.

7. Refresh our memory:

Last week a friend saw the Saskatoon Police Force’s “cougar” on the street.  That is the first I’ve heard to confirm that it was actually purchased and delivered.

8.  Make sure everyone knows that if Bill C-38 gets passed, American police (on top of the American military) will be allowed to operate in Canada with American laws.

9. Then watch this (new posting), if you need a reality check:

10.  Add “Kettling” to our vocabulary (new posting).

2012-06-10    Kettling, a tactic of police, now counter-used by crowds to “kettle” the police.

11.  Think:  Does lobbying the Government work in Canada?  If not, what will?

12.  Get comfortable with banging our pots and pans.  And if you aren’t, do not denigrate those who are.

I added the following 3 updates to  All over the World, people coming to life in the streets – – even in Canada! (in solidarity with Quebec)

Shot & edited by Ian MacKenzie, ianmack.com

Inspired by Jeremie Battaglia’s gorgeous Montreal film, Vancouver answers the Quebec student movement with a pots and pans revolt of our own. There is a beauty that emerges when we learn and inspire each other, just as Quebec has done for the rest of Canada. When we speak to each other instead of through governments or  the mainstream media. Here in Vancouver, we discovered what it means to make  music together in the streets, in the rain, and you can see it on our faces. It  is magic.

13.   DO NOT FORGET MONTEBELLO:

EXCERPT:

. . .  EVENT: SPP meetings in Montebello, Quebec.  Peaceful protest.

DATE: 2007

The only protesters who were masked were POLICE OFFICERS. They were trained and assigned the role of turning the protest violent.

It is all on video, along with the later statement by the head of Quebec Police (Surete) that yes, the “protesters” were actually police officers. . . .

14.  READ THIS, VERY IMPORTANT, NEW POSTING:  2012-06-03  If the street protests in Quebec, the most important resistance movement in the industrialized world, spread to all of Canada and reach the United States, there remains the possibility of hope. “Northern Light”, column by American Chris Hedges.

If the street protests in Quebec, the most important resistance movement in the industrialized world, spread to all of Canada and reach the United States, there remains the possibility of hope.

The preceding is similar to:

(From Slavoj Žižek, Interview, Democracy Now, with Amy Goodman and Julian Assange):

“ . . . this idea that there are out there quite ordinary guys, nothing special, but who all of a sudden, as if in a miracle, do something wonderful. That’s almost, I would say, our only hope today.”

15.  KNOW THIS  (the purpose of the preceding factual information):  What’s coming down the tubes is not pretty.  This is no time to be timid.  Talk with your friends, spread the word, support the pot-bangers.  Be a pot-banger.

The only power on Earth that can stop and reverse the taking down of democracy is ours.

= = = = = = = = =  ==  = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = ==

RELATED:

2008-02-14 Canada-U.S. Troop Exchange Agreement.  “Civil Assistance Plan”.  In context of privatization of prisons, military functions, access to information.

2012-06-03 If the street protests in Quebec, the most important resistance movement in the industrialized world, spread to all of Canada and reach the United States, there remains the possibility of hope. “Northern Light”, column by American Chris Hedges.

 Chris Hedges, Corporatocracy or Democracy or Administrative State or WHAT?  No Responses »
Jun 102012
 

(For other postings related to “Hedges”, please “search” this blog – the button is in the upper right corner.  After you hit the “enter”, scroll down past the headings.  There will be a computer-generated  list of summaries of articles re “Hedges”.  I am extremely thankful for his work.  )

Hedges thinks Quebec protest is big enough to infect Canada and move south to the USA!

EXCERPT:  If the street protests in Quebec, the most important resistance movement in the industrialized world, spread to all of Canada and reach the United States, there remains the possibility of hope.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –

I gave a talk last week at Canada’s Wilfrid  Laurier University to the Congress of the Humanities and Social  Sciences. Many in the audience had pinned small red squares of felt to their  clothing. The carre rouge, or red square, has become the Canadian symbol  of revolt. It comes from the French phrase carrement dans le rouge, or  “squarely in the red,” referring to those crushed by debt.

The streets of Montreal are clogged nightly with as many as 100,000 protesters banging pots and pans and demanding that the old  systems of power be replaced. The mass student strike in Quebec, the longest and  largest student protest in Canadian history, began over the announcement of  tuition hikes and has metamorphosed into what must swiftly build in the United  States—a broad popular uprising. The debt obligation of Canadian university  students, even with Quebec’s proposed 82 percent tuition hike over several  years, is dwarfed by the huge university fees and the $1 trillion of debt faced  by U.S. college students. The Canadian students have gathered widespread support  because they linked their tuition protests to Quebec’s call for higher fees for  health care, the firing of public sector employees, the closure of factories,  the corporate exploitation of natural resources, new restrictions on union  organizing, and an announced increase in the retirement age. Crowds in Montreal,  now counting 110 days of protests, chant “On ne lâche pas”—“We’re not  backing down.”

The Quebec government, which like the United  States’ security and surveillance state is deaf to the pleas for justice and  fearful of widespread unrest, has reacted by trying to stamp out the rebellion.  It has arrested hundreds of protesters. The government passed Law 78, which  makes demonstrations inside or near a college or university campus illegal and  outlaws spontaneous demonstrations in the province. It forces those who protest  to seek permission from the police and imposes fines of up to $125,000 for  organizations that defy the new regulations. This, as with the international  Occupy movement, has become a test of wills between a disaffected citizenry and  the corporate state. The fight in Quebec is our fight. Their enemy is our enemy.  And their victory is our victory.

This sustained resistance is far more effective  than a May Day strike. If Canadians can continue to boycott university  classrooms, continue to get crowds into the streets and continue to keep the  mainstream behind the movement, the government will become weak and isolated. It  is worth attempting in the United States. College graduates in Canada, the U.S.,  Spain, Greece, Ireland and Egypt, among other countries, cannot find jobs  commensurate with their education. They are crippled by debt. Solidarity means  joining forces with all those who are fighting to destroy global, corporate  capitalism. It is the same struggle. A blow outside our borders weakens the  corporate foe at home. And a boycott of our own would empower the boycott across  the border.

The din of citizens beating pots and pans  reverberates nightly in cities in Quebec. The protesters are part of what has  been nicknamed the army of the cacerolazo, or the casseroles. I heard the  same clanging of pots and pans when I covered the protests against Manuel  Noriega in Panama and the street protests against Augusto Pinochet in Chile.  Quebec Premier Jean Charest, who despite Law 78 has been unable to thwart the  street demonstrations, is the latest victim. I hope the next is Barack Obama or  Mitt Romney; they, and Charest, are puppets manipulated by corporate power.

The importance of the Occupy movement, and the reason I suspect its encampments were  so brutally dismantled by the Obama administration, is that the corporate state  understood and feared its potential to spark a popular rebellion. I do not think  the state has won. All the injustices and grievances that drove people into the  Occupy encampments and onto the streets have been ignored by the state and are  getting worse. And we will see eruptions of discontent in the weeks and months  ahead.

If these mass protests fail, opposition will  inevitably take a frightening turn. The longer we endure political paralysis,  the longer the formal mechanisms of power fail to respond, the more the  extremists on the left and the right—those who venerate violence and are  intolerant of ideological deviations—will be empowered. Under the steady  breakdown of globalization, the political environment has become a mound of  tinder waiting for a light.

The Golden Dawn party in Greece uses the Nazi  salute, has as its symbol a variation of the Nazi swastika and has proposed  setting up internment camps for foreigners who refuse to leave the country. It  took 21 seats, or 7 percent of the vote, in the May parliamentary elections.  France’s far-right National Front, led by Marine Le Pen, pulled 18 percent of  the vote in the first round of the presidential election. The right-wing Freedom Party in the Netherlands is the third largest in the parliament and brought down  the minority government. The Freedom Party in Austria is now the second most  popular in the country and holds 34 seats in the 183-seat lower house of the  parliament. The Progress Party in Norway is the largest element of the  opposition. The Danish People’s Party is Denmark’s third largest. And the Hungarian fascist party Jobbik, or the Movement for a Better Hungary, captured  17 percent of the vote in the last election. Jobbik is allied with uniformed  thugs known as the Hungarian Guard, which has set up patrols in the impoverished  countryside to “protect” Hungarians from Gypsies. And that intolerance is almost  matched by Israel’s ruling Kadima party, which spews ethnic chauvinism and  racism toward Arabs and has mounted a campaign against dissenters within the  Jewish state.

The left in times of turmoil always coughs up its  own version of the goons on the far right. Black Bloc anarchists within the  Occupy movement in the United States, although they remain marginal, replicate  the hyper-masculinity, lust for violence and quest for ideological purity of the  right while using the language of the left. And they, or a similar  configuration, will grow if the center disintegrates.

These radical groups, right and left, give to  their followers a sense of comradeship and empowerment that alleviates the  insecurity, helplessness and alienation that plague the disenfranchised.  Adherents surrender the anxiety of moral choice for the euphoria of collective  emotions. The individual’s conscience, a word that evolved from the Latin  con (with) and scientia (knowledge), is nullified by personal  sublimation into the collective of the crowd. Knowledge is banished for emotion.  I saw this in Yugoslavia. And this is what happened in Germany during the Weimar Republic. The Nazis, who knew whom they could trust, forbade recruitment from  the Social Democrats. They understood that the bourgeoisie liberals of that  political stripe lacked the desired ideological rigidity. But the Nazis embraced  recruits who defected from the Communist Party. Communists easily grasped the  simplistic, binary view of the world that split human relations into us and  them, the good and the evil, the friend and the enemy. They made good comrades.

“Comradeship always sets the cultural tone at the  lowest possible level, accessible to everyone,” Sebastian Haffner wrote in his book  “Defying Hitler,” which more and more looks like a primer on the disintegration  of the early 21st century. “It cannot tolerate discussion; in the chemical  solution of comradeship, discussion immediately takes on the color of whining  and grumbling. It becomes a mortal sin. Comradeship admits no thoughts, just  mass feelings of the most primitive sort—these, on the other hand, are  inescapable; to try and evade them is to put oneself beyond the pale.”

William Butler Yeats, although he saw his salvation in fascism, understood the deadly process of disintegration:

Turning
and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the
falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is
loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction,
while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Those of us who care about a civil society, and  who abhor violence, should begin to replicate what is happening in Quebec. There  is not much time left. The volcano is about to erupt. I know what it looks and  feels like. Yet there is a maddening futility in naming what is happening. The  noise and cant of the crowd, the seduction of ideologies of hate and violence,  the blindness of those who foolishly continue to place their faith in a dead  political process, the sea of propaganda that confuses and entertains, the  apathy of the good and the industry and dedication of the bad, conspire to drown  out reason and civility. Instinct replaces thought. Toughness replaces empathy.  “Authenticity” replaces rationality. And the dictates of individual conscience  are surrendered to the herd.

There still is time to act. There still are mass movements to join. If the street protests in Quebec, the most important  resistance movement in the industrialized world, spread to all of Canada and  reach the United States, there remains the possibility of hope.

2012-06-10 G-20 Summit, Toronto. And kettling, a tactic of police, now counter-used by crowds to “kettle” the police.

 Freedom of Speech. (Remove some wrong postings from category)  No Responses »
Jun 102012
 

Note re footnotes (links to supporting documents, at bottom):   April 2017 – I deactivated the invalid links.   They appear in italicized text with no underlining.)

 

See also:

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Canada has the distinction of providing the best video footage of an actual kettling event, from the G20 Summit in Toronto in 2010.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZbgz3eo4YI .

Uploaded by     whoisbobbyracket on Jun 29, 2010

Taken from an apartment overlooking Queen and Spadina – clearly shows that the crowd is mostly just curious onlookers and absolutely NO violent protestors or violent actions (even agressive actions) everyone was just dumbfounded and confused – trying to find a way out, which as you can see was NOT directed nor were they given directions. They were surrounded, and every single one of them was detained. For close to five hours outside. Video shows the first hour and a half (edited).  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_G20_Toronto_summit_protests

Sound cannons were not used during the weekend, but tear gas was used for the first time in the history of Toronto,[48] being deployed in a few locations by muzzle blasts. Rubber bullets and pepper spray were also used against many protesters.[49][50] At the end of the day, Toronto Police Service chief Bill Blair announced that 130 people had been arrested.[51] Several media personnel, including a Canadian reporter for The Guardian, a CTV producer, and two photographers for the National Post, were also arrested.[52][53][54]

Condemnations of the violence were made by Ontario premier Dalton McGuinty and Toronto Mayor David Miller.[55] In a press conference, Miller said, “All Torontonians should be outraged. They’re criminals who came to Toronto deliberately to break the law. They are not welcome in this city.”[34][48] Referring to damage caused by black bloc protesters downtown, he claimed that calling the attackers protesters was “not fair to the people who came to [legally] protest,”[34] and that they were in fact “criminals.”[34] In a statement, Dimitri Soudas, spokesperson for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, proclaimed, “Free speech is a principle of our democracy, but the thugs that prompted violence earlier today represent in no way, shape or form the Canadian way of life.”[56]

June 27: Police brutality protests

People boxed in by riot police at Queen and Spadina

Approximately 480 arrestees were taken to the Eastern Avenue temporary holding centre during the previous day’s protests; police initially gave numbers ranging from 32 to 130. While those with minor charges or dropped charges were released, those with serious charges were set to appear in a courthouse located on Finch Avenue and Weston Road in North York.[57][58]

After closed services throughout the night, the following morning saw the resumption of regular TTC and GO Transit services, while G20 leaders began formal discussions at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. Lockdowns at University Avenue hospitals and the Toronto Eaton Centre were also lifted.[59] Additional officers from the Ontario Provincial Police were deployed, doubling the total number of officers to 20,000.[60]

Four arrests were made during the twilight of June 27 after two security guards witnessed men emerging from a manhole on Queen Street West. The manholes were later welded shut.[61]

About 100 additional arrests were made during a morning raid by Toronto Police Service at the University of Toronto. Those arrested were said to be in possession of black clothing and “weapons of opportunity” such as bricks and sharpened stakes.[62]

During the mid-morning, protesters marched from Jimmie Simpson Park on Queen Street East to the front of the Eastern Avenue temporary detention centre, where a “jail solidarity” bike rally and sit-in consisting of about 150 people occurred during the afternoon, with demonstrators urging the release of those arrested the previous day.[63] Following several arrests during the rally, protesters began a sit-in interrupted by small muzzles of pepper spray and rubber bullets fired by police.[64][65] At least 224 arrests occurred by evening.[66]

Another large group assembled at the intersection of Queen Street West and Spadina Avenue, presumably to conduct a protest, but were immediately surrounded by heavily armed police forces. [67] Numerous bystanders and media personnel were also in the crowd. Several arrests were made, including several members of the media and another CTV cameraman who was briefly held and then released; police later claimed that they had found weapons at the scene, and that they suspected the presence of more black bloc protesters within the crowd. [66][68][69] The blockade caused traffic diversions and the stoppage of streetcar service along Spadina Avenue. After several hours of detainment in record-breaking heavy rain, police released the remainder of the crowd during the night. [citation needed]

Aftermath

Post-summit protests

A total of 1118 people were arrested in relation to the G20 summit protests, [4] the largest mass arrests in Canadian history,[70] while nearly 800 of them were released without charge. [71] The remaining 231 people remained with charges before the court while 58 of them have had their charges withdrawn or stayed. [72] Smaller-scale, non-violent protests took place the following day, June 28, during the afternoon and evening. Nearly 1000 protesters marched to Toronto City Hall and Queen’s Park to protest the treatment of arrested individuals at the Eastern Avenue holding centre and demanded the release of individuals still being detained, although police had earlier released several arrested on minor charges. [73] Large numbers of Toronto Police Service officers continued to patrol the demonstrations. [74] On June 29, a group of gay activists gathered outside a community centre where Toronto Police Service chief Bill Blair was scheduled to speak to demand his resignation for the treatment of women and homophobia within the detention centre. [75]

Criticism of policing

On December 7, 2010, Andre Marin, Ontario Ombudsman, issued a report called Caught in the Act, an investigation into the legality of the Ontario Public Works Protection Act, and, more specifically Regulation 233/10, in Marin’s words, “…known as the secret security regulation, a little known and widely misunderstood legal measure that was supposed to help the police keep the peace, but in my view wound up contributing to massive violations of civil rights.”  [76]

Police were allowed to arrest anyone within five metres of the fence who would neither leave nor identify himself.

A group of lawyers requested court injunctions against the Toronto Police Service from using newly purchased Long Range Acoustic Devices (LRAD), also known as sound cannons, during protests. [77] Sound cannons have been used in previous summit protests and have the ability to produce sound at ear-piercing volumes, potentially causing hearing impairment. The Ontario Superior Court of Justice later ruled that officers can use sound cannons, with a few restrictions. [78]

The Toronto Star reported that the Executive Council of Ontario had implemented a regulation under the provincial Public Works Protection Act on June 2 granting the ISU sweeping powers of arrest within a specific boundary during the summit;[79] the rule was said to designate the security fence as a public works and, as such, allow any police officer or guard to arrest any individual failing or refusing to provide identification within five metres of the security zone. The regulation was requested by Toronto Police Service chief Bill Blair and debate in the legislature was not required. Orders in Council such as this one are announced in the Ontario Gazette, but the next issue of that publication was to be published after the order expired on June 28, a week after the summit ended. The new law came to light after a York University graduate student, who claimed to have been simply “exploring” the security zone but who did not provide identification when confronted by police, was arrested on June 24 under the regulation.[80] He later vowed to file a lawsuit against the law once the summit ended.[81] The Cabinet later confirmed that the new laws were not “special powers” and that those who were believed to have been arrested under the Public Works and Protection Act were in fact arrested under the Criminal Code. [82] The police chief later admitted that, despite media coverage, no such five-metre rule ever existed in the law. [83]

Human rights investigations

Individuals arrested during the protests who claimed to be bystanders not taking part in protests condemned the treatment they received from police at the Eastern Avenue holding centre. [84] According to testimonials given to the Toronto Star and La Presse by a few arrestees, including university students, journalists, street medics, teachers, tourists, photographers, and a former mayoral candidate, “[individual] rights were violated” and “police brutality [was present].” The detention centre was described as “cold” with “barely any food or water” and “no place in the cages to even sit,” and “tantamount to torture.” Other allegations included harassment, lack of medical care, verbal abuse, and strip searches of females by male officers. [85][86] [87] At one point, a plainclothes officer reportedly told a detainee that the federal government had declared martial law.[88] Blair defended the conditions in the temporary detention centre, citing the fact that every room in the centre was under video surveillance, and that to the best of the officers’ abilities, occupants were read their rights. [89][90] However, a Toronto Star commentator editorialized that “some of the elements of classic authoritarian detention were there, albeit in embryonic forms.” [88]

Amnesty International called for an official investigation into the police tactics used during the protests. The organization alleged that police violated civil liberties and used police brutality. [91] The Canadian Civil Liberties Association decried the arrests and alleged that they occurred without “reasonable grounds to believe that everyone they detained had committed a crime.” [92]

Toronto Police Service held press conferences to speak out against inappropriate actions of protesters, including displaying items alleged to have been seized from protesters. However, when confronted, Chief Blair admitted that some of the items were unrelated to the G20 protests. [93]

Police officers were also reported to attack detained journalists, while forcing other journalists to leave the scene of the protests. [94]

Adam Nobody

Protestor Adam Nobody, 27, was arrested in Queen’s Park on 26 June. An amateur video uploaded to YouTube [95] showed at least a dozen officers surrounding and beating Nobody, who was not armed and did not appear to resist. He suffered a broken nose and cheekbone, and was charged with assaulting police. These charges were eventually dropped, and a Special Investigations Unit investigation was opened into the incident. This investigation was closed without any charges laid, because the SIU was unable to identify the officers. They had covered their identification badges, police witnesses all claimed to be unable to identify them, and the arresting officer had written an invalid ID number on Nobody’s arrest record.

Police chief Bill Blair insisted that a “forensic examination” had proven the video was “tampered with,” removing proof that Nobody was an armed, violent criminal, but soon retracted this statement admitting he had no evidence to support it. Blair’s claims led to increased attention to the case, new witnesses coming forward, and a second video corroborating the first. On 30 November the SIU re-opened its investigation, obtained the co-operation of a police officer who witnessed the incident, and laid charges against Const. Babak Andalib-Goortani. The SIU has the names of other officers involved but has not yet laid charges against them.  [96][97][98][99][100][101][102]

Blair, PM Stephen Harper and the Toronto Police have been harshly criticized over the incident, with many commentators calling for Blair to resign.  [103][104][105]

Investigation and charges against police

Babak Andalib-Goortani

In 2013, Andalib-Goortani was convicted of assault with a weapon for his role in Nobody’s beating. [106] The trial judge, Ontario Court Justice Louise Botham, commented that “a police officer is not entitled to use unlimited force to affect an arrest.” [107] Botham, who was brought in to Toronto from Brampton to hear the case, subsequently sentenced Andalib-Goortani to 45 days in jail. [108] In her ruling, Botham indicated that the sentence was heavy influenced by video of Andalib-Goortani, along with a number of other officers whose disciplinary charges were dismissed, punching, kneeing, kicking, and striking the victim with a baton; stating that the period of incarceration was necessary to uphold the public’s faith in the justice system.  [108]

Less than 10 minutes after Botham announced the sentence in her Brampton courtroom, a Toronto court granted bail to Andalib-Goortani pending appeal. [109] While Andalib-Goortani awaited appeal of that assault conviction, another assault with a weapon charge, for a G20 attack on journalist/blogger Wyndham Bettencourt-McCarthy, was thrown out when the photograph taken a she was about to be hit with the baton, showing a riot-geared officer which another officer was ready to testify was Andalib-Goortani, was ruled inadmissible because the photo had been obtained through an anonymous website posting and the photographer could not be called to testify. [110][111][112]

Some 16 months after being sentenced to jail time and released on bail, Toronto Superior Court Justice Brian O’Marra overturned the sentence and, without providing reasons for his decision, instead ordered that Andalib-Goortani do 75 hours of community service with one year’s probation.  [113][114] In November 2015, retired Toronto judge Lee Ferrier, presiding over the Toronto Police Service’s disciplinary hearing of Andalib-Goortani, docked Andalib-Goortani five days pay for the incident, thus returning the officer to patrol the streets of Toronto. [115]

David ‘Mark’ Fenton

In 2014, Toronto Police Superintendent Mark Fenton, was charged with unlawful arrest and discreditable conduct in relation to the kettling incidents and faced a disciplinary hearing.  [116] Fenton was one of two major incident commanders, in charge of the Major Incident Command Centre during the summit, and was the one on duty when he ordered the kettling of protestors both at the Novotel on the Esplanade and at Queen and Spadina.  [117]

On August 25, 2015, more than five years after the Toronto G20 incidents leading to the charges, Fenton was found guilty of two counts of unlawful arrest and one count of discreditable conduct, disciplinary charges under the Police Act, in relation to the “kettling” of protestors and passers-by at the intersection of Queen Street and Spadina Avenue and at the Novotel hotel on the Esplanade. [118] In rendering judgment, retired Ontario judge John Hamilton explained that “Legitimate protesters … had the right not to be subject to arrest for making noise, chanting and sitting in the public street.”. [119] Hamilton indicated that he believed Fenton was committed to serving the public, but that he did not properly understand the constitutional right of the public to protest.[120] In addition to the unlawful arrest convictions, Hamilton deemed Fenton guilty of discreditable conduct resultant from keeping people corralled in the streets during a severe thunderstorm while his duty was to protect them from such harsh weather; however he found him not guilty of the same charge in relation to the Novotel because those unlawfully arrested did not suffer similar hardships. [120] Fenton was found not guilty on charges of unnecessary exercise of authority relating to the treatment of protestors after they were arrested and taken away because another officer of equal rank was in charge of the Prisoner Processing Centre; that officer was never charged. [121]

The sentencing hearing is expected to begin December 21, 2015 with penalty possibilities ranging from reprimand to dismissal.[122]

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Demonstrations and protests against the 2010 G-20 Toronto summit.

References

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  93. Jump up ^ “Police accused of displaying fake G20 weapons”. CBC News. 2010-06-30. Archived from the original on 2 July 2010. Retrieved 1 July 2010. 
  94. Jump up ^ “Police beat journalist covering G20: report”. CBC News. 2010-06-28. Retrieved 26 October 2010. 
  95. Jump up ^ http://youtube.com/watch?v=Hym0afc03pE
  96. Jump up ^ Poisson, Jayme (2010-11-29). “Blair blasts SIU over findings of ‘probable’ excessive force”. The Star (Toronto). Retrieved 23 December 2010. 
  97. Jump up ^ Poisson, Jayme (2010-12-03). “Chief Blair apologizes to G20 protester at centre of YouTube video”. The Star (Toronto). Retrieved 23 December 2010. 
  98. Jump up ^ DiManno, Rosie (2010-12-07). “A second look at G20 police assault”. The Star (Toronto). Retrieved 23 December 2010. 
  99. Jump up ^ Morrow, Adrian (2010-11-30). “Ontario police watchdog reopens G20 ‘Nobody’ arrest investigation – The Globe and Mail”. The Globe and Mail (Toronto). Archived from the original on 1 December 2010. Retrieved 23 December 2010. 
  100. Jump up ^ Poisson, Jayme (2010-12-22). “G20 officer tight-lipped at SIU appearance”. The Star (Toronto). Retrieved 23 December 2010. 
  101. Jump up ^ “SIU knows all 3 officers in alleged G20 assault”. CBC News. 2010-12-22. Retrieved 23 December 2010. 
  102. Jump up ^ Friesen, Joe (2010-11-30). “How a man named Nobody became the battered face of G20 protests”. The Globe and Mail (Toronto). Archived from the original on 22 January 2011. Retrieved 23 December 2010. 
  103. Jump up ^ http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2010/12/22/kelly-mcparland-torontos-shallow-cowardly-cops/
  104. Jump up ^ http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=53938
  105. Jump up ^ http://www.torontosun.com/news/columnists/joe_warmington/2010/12/21/16638186.html
  106. Jump up ^ Hasham, Alyshah (September 12, 2013). “G20 assault trial: Guilty verdict for officer who hit Adam Nobody”. Toronto Star. Retrieved October 20, 2013. 
  107. Jump up ^ “Toronto police officer Babak Andalib-Goortani found guilty of assault with weapon against G20 protester Adam Nobody”. National Post. September 12, 2013. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  108. ^ Jump up to: a b “G20 assault: Babak Andalib-Goortani gets 45-day sentence”. CBC News. December 9, 2013. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  109. Jump up ^ Shawn Jeffords (December 9, 2013). “Toronto cop sentenced to 45 days in jail for Adam Nobody assault”. Toronto Sun. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  110. Jump up ^ Colin Perkel, The Canadian Press (September 24, 2014). “Babak Andalib-Goortani, G20 Cop, Acquitted On 2nd Assault Charge”. Huffington Post. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  111. Jump up ^ Sarah Sweet (September 24, 2014). “Cop Acquitted on Charge of Assaulting Former Torontoist Contributor at G20 Protests — Photographic evidence ruled inadmissible.“. Torontoist. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  112. Jump up ^ “Babak Andalib-Goortani acquitted in 2nd G20 incident”. CBC News. September 24, 2014. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  113. Jump up ^ Alyshah Hasham (January 29, 2015). “No jail for Toronto police officer convicted of G20 assault”. Toronto Star. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  114. Jump up ^ “Judge lightens sentence of officer convicted of assaulting G20 protester”. The Globe and Mail. January 29, 2015. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  115. Jump up ^ Rosie DiManno (November 11, 2015). “Retired judge all but weeps for guilty G20 cop: DiManno”. Toronto Star. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  116. Jump up ^ Wendy Gillis (December 17, 2014). “‘Toronto deteriorated into a sense of lawlessness,’ says G20 police commander”. Toronto Star. 
  117. Jump up ^ Colin Perkel (January 8, 2013). “Misconduct case for Toronto police officer in G20 ‘kettling’ put over”. The Globe and Mail. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  118. Jump up ^ Wendy Gillis (August 25, 2015). “G20 commander apologizes after being convicted of misconduct”. Toronto Star. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  119. Jump up ^ Cara McKenna, The Canadian Press (August 25, 2015). “More than five years later, senior officer found guilty over mass arrests, ‘kettling’ at 2010 G20 protests”. National Post. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  120. ^ Jump up to: a b Cara McKenna, The Canadian Press (August 25, 2015). “T.O. cop found guilty on 3 charges stemming from G20 protests”. CP24. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  121. Jump up ^ “Senior police officer found guilty of 3 charges in G20 disciplinary hearing”. Red Deer Advocate. August 25, 2015. Retrieved November 19, 2015. 
  122. Jump up ^ Michele Mandel, Toronto Sun (August 25, 2015). “Senior G20 cop guilty on three charges”. Ottawa Sun. Retrieved November 19, 2015.

 

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Kettling

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kettling

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Riot police kettle protesters at the Camp for Climate action, part of the 2009 G-20 London summit protests

Kettling (also known as containment or corralling)[1] is a police tactic for controlling large crowds during demonstrations or protests. It involves the formation of large cordons of police officers who then move to contain a crowd within a limited area. Protesters are left only one choice of exit, determined by the police, or are completely prevented from leaving.

The tactic has proved controversial, not least because it has resulted in the detention of ordinary bystanders as well as protestors.[2] In March 2012 kettling was ruled lawful by the European Court of Human Rights following a legal challenge.[3]

Contents

[hide]

Tactics

The term “kettle” is a metaphor, likening the containment of protestors to the containment of heat and steam within a domestic kettle. Its modern English usage may come from “kessel” – literally a cauldron, or kettle in German – that describes an encircled army about to be annihilated by a superior force.[4] A cauldron is expected to be “boiling” with combat activity, the large enemy forces still quite able to offer “hot” resistance in the initial stages of encirclement, and so are to be contained, but not engaged directly.

To avoid allusions to military confrontation, kettling is sometimes described as “corralling,” likening the tactic to the enclosure of livestock. Although large groups are difficult to control, this can be done by concentrations of police. The tactic prevents the large group breaking into smaller splinters that have to be individually chased down, thus requiring the policing to break into multiple groups.[5] Once the kettle has been formed, the cordon is tightened, which may include the use of baton charges to restrict the territory occupied by the protesters. The cordon is then maintained for a number of hours: the ostensible aim is to leave would-be “violent” protesters too tired to do anything but want to go home.[6]

Kettling has been criticized for being an indiscriminate tactic which leads to the detention of law-abiding citizens and innocent bystanders.[7] In some cases protesters are reported to have been denied access to food, water and toilet facilities for long periods.[2] Further criticism has been made that in some instances the tactic has been used to foment disorder with the aim of changing the focus of public debate.[8] In some countries the tactic has led to legal challenges on the grounds of human rights violations.

Canada

On June 27, 2010, 200 persons, including protesters and bystanders, were kettled in Toronto at the intersection of Queen St. and Spadina Ave. during the G20 summit. Several hundred people were also kettled outside of the Novotel Hotel on the Esplanade and arrested.[9] The following year the Toronto Police Department swore to never use kettling again.[10]

On March 15, 2011, 250–300 protesters in Montreal were kettled on St-Denis just north of Mont Royal during the Annual March Against Police Brutality. Police used stun grenades, riot gear, and horses to kettle the crowd.[11]

On May 23, 2012, police in Montreal moved in on student protesters, kettling them and making 518 arrests — the largest number in one night since the demonstrations began weeks earlier. [12]

Denmark

Between 250 and 1000 non-violent protestors at the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen were kettled by police. A police spokesman said that the detainment was necessary to avoid disorder.[13]

Finland

Finnish anarchist demonstration Smash Asem was prevented from taking place when 200 riot police and hundreds of other police and Finnish Border Guard personnel kettled around 300 to 500 demonstrators and bystanders in front of Kiasma in downtown Helsinki for over 3 hours on 9 September 2006.[14]

France

On the Guillotière bridge In Lyon, on the 20 October 2010, a few hundred protestors were kettled for several hours. The next day in Place Bellecour, about 500 citizens and protestors defending public pension were kettled for six hours without food or water by both the police and the military. They were prevented from marching, and tear gas and water cannons were used.[15]

Germany

An early example of kettling was by German police in 1986. During a demonstration by anti-nuclear protestors at Heiligengeistfeld, Hamburg on 8 May, Hamburg Police cordoned approximately 800 people into a “kettle” for several hours.[16][17] German kettling tactics distinguish a stationary form of detention (Polizeikessel) and a mobile form, in which protestors are enclosed by a mobile police cordon while they march (Wanderkessel).[18] These types of police cordon were also regularly used in the UK before the tactic got refined at the N30 protest (see below), and dubbed a kettle.

Kettling has been challenged in the German courts on several occasions. The 1986 Hamburger Kessel was ruled unlawful by the administrative court of Hamburg. The district court found German police guilty of wrongful deprivation of personal liberty.

Following an anti-nuclear protest in 2002 in Hitzacker, Lower Saxony, a protestor took a case to court because she had been denied access to toilets when she was held within a police kettle. The district court found that she had been handled inhumanely and that the police had acted unlawfully.[19]

Madrid

On 16th May 2012, Acampada Sol called for a cacerolazo because the Spanish risk premium exceeded 500 points that day. The demonstrators were marching through Calle Alcalá when police forces surrounded them for more than 30 minutes; after the kettled protestors asked for solidarity through the Internet, several additional hundred people gathered outside of the kettle. Around 500 demonstrators waited seated on the pavement until the police forces finally removed the blockade, allowing them to leave the area and return to Puerta del Sol.[20]

United Kingdom

Parliament Square Disability Rights Demonstration,1995

The kettling tactic was used in the UK against disabled people during a Disability Rights Demonstration in Parliament Square, London October 1995. [21]

N30 anti-WTO demonstration, 1999

The kettling tactic was used in the UK at the N30 anti-WTO protest at Euston station, London (parallel to the shut-down of the meeting in Seattle) on November 30, 1999.[22] It was a development of previously used police cordoning tactics – the difference was the long length of time, constant impermeability and the small size of the kettle.

May Day 2001

The tactic was used in the UK by the London Metropolitan Police during the May Day riots of 2001 to contain demonstrators. However, the action also resulted in large numbers of bystanders as well as peaceful demonstrators being detained in Oxford Circus.[2]

G8 summit, 2005

Kettling was later used at protests against the 31st G8 summit, held in 2005.[23]

G20, 2009

Kettling was used once again during the 2009 G-20 London summit protests outside the Bank of England, as part of the police Territorial Support Group’s “Operation Glencoe”.[2] When police started to allow protesters to leave the kettle, they were photographed by Forward Intelligence Teams and told to give their names and addresses (which they are legally not required to do). Some refused to do so and were forced back into the kettle by police.[24] A number of complaints over the tactic were subsequently made to the Independent Police Complaints Commission.[25] Bob Broadhurst, the commanding officer during the protests, said that, “kettling was the best option” to counter the potential of widespread disruption by protesters”.[26]

On April 15, 2009, Scotland Yard ordered a review of these tactics. Criticism of the policing of demonstrations has been increasing, and amateur video footage which recorded two incidents of violent police behaviour, notably the death of Ian Tomlinson, brought police tactics into the media spotlight. The incidents were said by Sir Paul Stephenson, Metropolitan Police Commissioner, to be “clearly disturbing”,[27] and Stephenson ordered the review to consider whether the tactic is “appropriate and proportionate”.[27] The video footage also showed that police officers were concealing their shoulder identification numbers whilst on duty.[28]

An inquiry was held by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) into an incident during the G20 protests, in which a woman held in a kettle suffered injuries from police action and subsequently experienced a suspected miscarriage. The inquiry concluded in August 2009 that the Metropolitan Police should review its crowd control methods, including the tactic of kettling.[29]

Denis O’Connor, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary, said in a report concerning the policing of the G20 protests that some police commanders did not understand the House of Lords’ ruling regarding kettling. He also stated that containing protestors in a kettle was “inadequate” and belonged to a “different era” of policing. He did not suggest that kettling should be abandoned however, but said that the methods must be adapted so that peaceful protesters and bystanders are able to leave the kettle.[30] The report also commissioned a survey, conducted by MORI which found that the majority of the UK public do feel that the use of kettling is appropriate in some situations. Depending on the circumstances, between 10% and 20% of those questioned feel that it is never appropriate to contain people in this way.[31]

In April 2011, the High Court of Justice ruled that kettling on that occasion was illegal, and it set out new guidelines as to when police were permitted to kettle protesters.[32] This means that the police “may only take such preventive action as a last resort catering for situations about to descend into violence”.[33] Police would still legally be allowed to kettle if they had reason to believe that violence would break out.[original research?]

Student protests, 2010

Kettling was used during the 24 November 2010 student protest in London and in various other locations around the country. Guardian blogger Dave Hill thought the kettling was in retrospect “probably inevitable”, after the protest two weeks before had led to damage at the Conservative party headquarters.[34] In July 2011 three school children will challenge the use of kettling of children at this protest. They will seek a Judicial Review in the High Court, arguing it broke broke the laws of the European Convention on Human Rights, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Children Act 2004, mainly the right to protest and the safety of children.[35]

Kettling was used to contain student protesters in Parliament Square on 9 December 2010 and thereafter on Westminster Bridge.[36] Protesters were trapped in Trafalgar Square and other landmarks for up to nine hours. An anaesthetist from Aberdeen Royal Infirmary working as part of a field hospital said that there was a serious health and safety risk to people trapped in the kettle and some suffered crush injuries whilst others were nearly pushed off of Westminster Bridge into the freezing Thames, likening it to the Hillsborough disaster.[37]

Anti-Cuts protests, 2011

Kettling was again used at the March 2011 anti-cuts protest in London. Activists were given assurances by Metropolitan police that they would be shown to safety after the protest, which was described as non-violent and sensible. Once outside, the protesters were kettled, handcuffed and taken into custody.[38]

In 2012, kettling was deemed lawful, overturning a previous High Court ruling. The ruling was immediately criticised by protesters and their lawyers, who plan to take the matter to the Supreme Court.[39]

Legal challenges

Following the use of “kettling” during the May Day protest in 2001, two people who had been corralled by the police at Oxford Circus sued the Metropolitan Police for wrongful detention, alleging that it was in breach of the European Convention of Human Rights, and that they had been held without access to food, water or toilets.[40] The pair lost their court action in 2005,[41] and their appeal failed in 2007[42] when the Court of Appeal backed the High Court ruling.

In 2009, Austin v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis,[43] a ruling by the House of Lords, decided that the High Court was entitled to take into consideration the “purpose” of the deprivation of liberty before deciding if human rights laws applied at all.[44] Summing up, Lord Hope said:

“ There is room, even in the case of fundamental rights as to whose application no restriction or limitation is permitted by the Convention, for a pragmatic approach which takes full account of all the circumstances. ”
—Baron Hope of Craighead, quoted in The Guardian[45]

A plaintiff from the 2001 protest, along with three non-protesting members of the public who had been kettled by police, took an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, claiming that kettling violated Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights, the right to liberty and security. It was reported:

“ Austin, who the court accepted was a lawful and peaceful demonstrator prevented by her detention from collecting her child, is to take her case to the European Court of Human Rights. It is to be hoped the ECHR will look again at the question of whether the “balance” and “public safety” is all on the side of allowing the police to carry out long containments or whether such imprisonment does not after all breach fundamental rights. ”
—Louise Christian, The Guardian[45]

In March 2012 the Court ruled that kettling was lawful and that the Metropolitan Police were entitled to detain groups of people as “the least intrusive and most effective means to protect the public from violence”. On the issues related to the European Convention on Human Rights, the court ruled:[3]

“ Article 5 did not have to be construed in such a way as to make it impracticable for the police to fulfil their duties of maintaining order and protecting the public. ”
—Grand Chamber, European Court of Human Rights, Ruling, March 2012[3]

United States

Occupy Wall Street, 2011

In response to the Occupy Wall Street protests in New York City, police have used orange mesh snow fencing to contain crowds of protesters.[46][47]

See also

Look up kettling in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

References

  1. ^ Davenport, Justin (3 April 2009). “Police defend ‘corralling’ thousands of protesters for eight hours in City”. Evening Standard. http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23670983-details/Police+defend+%27corralling%27+thousands+of+protesters+for+eight+hours+in+City/article.do. Retrieved 2009-04-20.
  2. ^ a b c d Joyce, Julian (16 April 2009). “Police ‘kettle’ tactic feels the heat”. BBC News. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8000641.stm. Retrieved 18 April 2009.
  3. ^ a b c “European court says ‘kettling’ tactics in 2001 lawful”. BBC News. 15 March 2012. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17378700. Retrieved 15 March 2012.
  4. ^ Joyce, Julian (9 December 2010). “Police ‘kettle’ tactic feels the heat”. BBC. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11963274.
  5. ^ Campbell, Duncan (Friday 3 April 2009). “Did the handling of the G20 protests reveal the future of policing?”. The Guardian (London). http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/03/g20-protests-police-kettling. Retrieved 6 April 2009.
  6. ^ Whipple, Tom (April 3, 2009). [dead link] “Why did the police punish bystanders?”. The Times (London: News International). http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/G20/article6025481.ece[dead link]. Retrieved 6 April 2009.
  7. ^ Laville, Sandra; Campbell, Duncan (Friday 3 April 2009). “Baton charges and kettling”. London: Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/03/g20-protests-police-tactics. Retrieved 6 April 2009.
  8. ^ Hudson, Alastair (20 January 2011). “Defeated by violence and silence”. London: TSL Education. http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?storycode=414866.
  9. ^ Poisson, Jayme (29 June 2010). “‘Kettling’ police tactic controversial everywhere it was used”. The Toronto Star. http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/torontog20summit/article/829891–kettling-police-tactic-controversial-everywhere-it-was-used. Retrieved 1 July 2010.
  10. ^ Poisson, Jaume (22 June 2011). “Exclusive: Toronto police swear off G20 kettling tactic”. The Toronto Star. http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1012959–exclusive-toronto-police-swear-off-g20-kettling-tactic?bn=1. Retrieved 15 August 2011.
  11. ^ Poisson, Dario Ayala (15 March 2011). “‘Video: The annual Montreal demonstration against police brutality'”. The Montreal Gazette. http://www.montrealgazette.com/Video+annual+Montreal+demonstration+against+police+brutality/4445950/story.html. Retrieved 16 March 2011.
  12. ^ “‘Police kettle Montreal student protesters, arresting 518’ url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/story/2012/05/24/montreal-arrests-kettling.html?cmp=rss“.
  13. ^ Rawlinson, Kevin; Ben Ferguson (12 December 2009). “Anti-corporate demonstrators arrested”. London: The Independent. http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/anticorporate-demonstrators-arrested-1838760.html. Retrieved 13 December 2009.
  14. ^ “Smash Asem” (in Finnish). http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smash_ASEM.
  15. ^ “Témoignages sur la prison à ciel ouvert” (in French). rebellyon.info. 2010-10-22. http://rebellyon.info/Temoignages-sur-la-prison.html.
  16. ^ “Hamburg Heiligengeistfeld 8. Juni 1986” (in German). Nadir. http://www.nadir.org/nadir/initiativ/sanis/archiv/brokdorf/kap_06.htm. Retrieved 2009-04-19. “Polizeiterror gegen AKW-Gegner/innen – 800 Menschen einen Tag eingekesselt (Police terror against anti-nuclear activists – 800 people kettled in one day)”
  17. ^ See also Hamburger Kessel (Geman Wikipedia)
  18. ^ See also Polizeikessel and Wanderkessel (Geman Wikipedia)
  19. ^ “Gericht: Klo-Verbot ist menschenunwürdig (Court: Toilet ban is inhumane)“ (in German). castor.de (Elbe-Jeetzel-Zeitung). 2004-10-23. http://www.castor.de/presse/ejz/2004/oktober/23.html. Retrieved 2009-04-19. “Castor-Ankunft 2002: Frau musste Notdurft im Polizeikessel verrichten – Urteil: Polizei handelte rechtswidrig (Castor protest 2002: woman had to answer call of nature in police cordon – Judgement: Police acted unlawfully)“
  20. ^ “La cacerolada del 15-M, atrapada una hora entre antidisturbios en Alcalá Parliament Square (in Spanish)”. elpais.es. http://ccaa.elpais.com/ccaa/2012/05/16/madrid/1337197283_494179.html.
  21. ^ “Disability Rights Demonstration – Parliament Square, London October 1995”. flickr.com. http://www.flickr.com/photos/ruhuman/2672513253/in/pool-31355197@N00/.
  22. ^ “A brief history of “kettling””. Indymedia.org.uk. 2010-11-27. http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/11/468945.html. Retrieved 2010-12-13.
  23. ^ THE CARNIVAL CONTINUES… Lydia Molyneaux
  24. ^ Campbell, Duncan (April 2, 2009). “G20: Did police containment cause more trouble than it prevented?”. The Guardian (London). http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/02/g20-protests-police-kettling. Retrieved 20 April 2009.
  25. ^ Gill, Charlotte; Sears, Neil (2009-04-16). “Watchdog receives 145 complaints over G20 police as protester struck by officer demands compensation | Mail Online”. London: Dailymail.co.uk. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1170010/Watchdog-receives-145-complaints-G20-police-protester-struck-officer-demands-compensation.html. Retrieved 2009-05-29.
  26. ^ “‘Training concern’ for G20 police”. BBC News. 2009-05-19. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/8057685.stm. Retrieved 2009-05-29.
  27. ^ a b Murphy, Megan (Wednesday 15 April 2009)Police to review ‘kettling’ tactics The Financial Times. Retrieved 16 April 2009.
  28. ^ Bishopsgate police officer refuses to give ID number The Guardian Retrieved 9 May 2009
  29. ^ Fresco, Adam (2009-08-06). “Police must change protest tactics after suspected G20 miscarriage”. London: The Times. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6741319.ece. Retrieved 2009-08-06.
  30. ^ Lewis, Paul (7 July 2009). “G20 police chiefs were unclear on kettling law, report finds”. London: The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/jul/07/g20-policing-report-kettling. Retrieved 2009-07-08.
  31. ^ O’Connor, Denis, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary (7 July 2009). “Adapting to Protest”. Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary. http://www.hmic.gov.uk/sitecollectiondocuments/ppr/ppr_20090706.pdf. Retrieved 2009-07-08.
  32. ^ “Moos & Anor, R (on the application of) v Police of the Metropolis [2011] EWHC 957 (Admin) (14 April 2011)”. Bailii.org. 2011-03-24. http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2011/957.html. Retrieved 2011-04-14.
  33. ^ “UK court rules that kettling was illegal”. Boing Boing. http://www.boingboing.net/2011/04/14/uk-court-rules-that.html. Retrieved 2011-04-14.
  34. ^ Hill, Dave (25 November 2010). “Kettling questions”. London: Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/davehillblog/2010/nov/25/hasmetropolitan-police-whitehall-student-demonstration-kettling. Retrieved 2010-12-13.
  35. ^ “Kettling of children at tuition fees protest challenged”. BBC London. 7 June 2011. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-13679665. Retrieved 2011-06-10.
  36. ^ Julian Joyce, (December 9, 2010) Police ‘kettle’ tactic feels the heat BBC
  37. ^ Townsend, Mark; Malik, Shiv (19 December 2010). “Kettle tactics risk Hillsborough-style tragedy”. London: Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/dec/19/police-kettle-risk-crush-hillsborough. Retrieved 2011-04-10.
  38. ^ Shiv Malik, (March 2011) Cuts protesters claim police tricked them into mass arrest The Guardian
  39. ^ Owen Bowcott (19 January 2012). “Kettling protesters is lawful, appeal court rules”. The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/jan/19/kettling-protesters-lawful-appeal-court. Retrieved 20 January 2012.
  40. ^ “Police sued over May Day protest”. BBC News. 2002-04-28. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1956323.stm. Retrieved 2009-04-16.
  41. ^ “Pair lose protest damages claim”. BBC News. 2005-03-23. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4374853.stm. Retrieved 2009-04-16.
  42. ^ “Pair lose May Day protest claim”. BBC News. 2007-10-15. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7044948.stm. Retrieved 2009-04-16.
  43. ^ [2009] UKHL 5
  44. ^ “Judgments – Austin (FC) (Appellant) & another v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis (Respondent)”. House of Lords Appellate Committee. 2009-01-28. http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.com/pa/ld200809/ldjudgmt/jd090128/austin-1.htm. Retrieved 2009-04-16.
  45. ^ a b Christian, Louise (Thursday 2 April 2009) G20: Questions need to be asked about ‘kettling’ Guardian. Retrieved 13 April 2009.
  46. ^ http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2011/09/occupy-wall-street-movement-reports-80-arrested-today-in-protests/
  47. ^ Wells, Matt (25 September 2011). “Police crack down on ‘Occupy Wall Street’ protests”. The Guardian (London). http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/blog/2011/sep/25/occupywallstreet-occupy-wall-street-protests.

External links

2012-06-04 Video: Reporting Police Misconduct to the Police (U.S.). Implications for Canada if new laws allowing American police to operate in Canada get passed.

 Uncategorized  No Responses »
Jun 102012
 

21 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pz-b97NnAEw

While you’re watching, remember that the Canadian House of Commons is in the process of passing laws that will allow American Police to operate in Canada, under American law.

The number of hits on this video is growing rapidly.  At 9:40 am Prairie time on June 10th, 2012 it’s at 6,515.

2012-06-07 Time For Outrage on Behalf of the Planet, by Bill McKibben

 Climate, Freedom of Speech. (Remove some wrong postings from category)  No Responses »
Jun 092012
 

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/06/07-2#.T9Os8GGuzkw.facebook

Campaigners marched in Copenhagen under the banner “System Change, Not Climate Change.” On the eve of Rio+20, that message again will rise, but slogans and proposals and will mean nothing without the requisite power standing behind them.

 

Time For Outrage on Behalf of the Planet, by Bill McKibben

My solution is: get outraged.

Having written the first book about global warming 23 long years ago, I’ve watched the issue unfold across decades, continents, and ideologies. I’ve come to earth summits and conferences of the parties from Rio to Kyoto to Copenhagen, and many places in between.

All along, two things have been clear.

One, the scientists who warned us about climate change were absolutely correct—their only mistake, common among scientists, was in being too conservative. So far we’ve raised the temperature of the earth about one degree Celsius, and two decades ago it was hard to believe this would be enough to cause huge damage. But it was. We’ve clearly come out of the Holocene and into something else. Forty percent of the summer sea ice in the Arctic is gone; the ocean is 30 percent more acidic. There’s nothing theoretical about any of this any more. Since warm air holds more water vapor than cold, the atmosphere is about 4 percent wetter than it used to be, which has loaded the dice for drought and flood. In my home country, 2011 smashed the record for multibillion-dollar weather disasters—and we were hit nowhere near as badly as some. Thailand’s record flooding late in the year did damage equivalent to 18 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). That’s almost unbelievable. But it’s not just scientists who have been warning us. Insurance companies—the people in our economy who we ask to analyze risk—have been bellowing in their quiet, actuarial way for years. Here’s Munich Re, the world’s largest insurer, in their 2010 annual report: “The reinsurer has built up the world’s most comprehensive natural catastrophe database, which shows a marked increase in the number of weather-related events. For instance, globally, loss-related floods have more than tripled since 1980, and windstorm natural catastrophes more than doubled, with particularly heavy losses from Atlantic hurricanes. This rise cannot be explained without global warming.”

Two, we have much of the technological know-how we need to make the leap past fossil fuel. Munich Re again: “Whilst climate change cannot be stopped, it can be kept within manageable proportions, thus avoiding the possibility that climate change tipping points will be reached.”

We need politicians more afraid of voter outrage than they are of corporate retribution.

What does this mean in practice? Go to China where, yes, they’re emulating the West by putting up lots of coal-fired power plants. But they’re also busy building, say, solar hot-water heaters: 60 million arrays, providing hot water for 250 million Chinese, almost a quarter of the country—compared with less than 1 percent in America. I could list here a long tally of solutions (wind, geothermal, conservation, bicycles, trains, hybrid cars, tidal power, local food) and I could list an equally long tally of policies that everyone knows would help bring them quickly to pass: most important, of course, putting a stiff price on carbon to reflect the damage it does to the environment. That price signal would put markets to work in a serious way. It wouldn’t guarantee that we could head off climate change, because we’ve waited a very long time to get started, but it’s clearly our best chance.

So, if we have an emergency, and we have the tools to fight it, the only question is why we’re not doing so. And the answer, I think, is clear: it’s in the interest of some of the most powerful players on earth to prolong the status quo. Some of those players are countries, the ones with huge fossil-fuel reserves: recent research has demonstrated that the nations with the most coal, gas, and oil are the most recalcitrant in international negotiations.  And some of those players are companies: the fossil fuel industry is the most profitable enterprise in history, and it has proven more than willing to use its financial clout to block political action in the capitals that count.

If we are going to impose a stiff-enough price on carbon to keep those reserves in the ground (which we simply must do—physics and chemistry don’t allow us any other out) then we have to overcome the resistance of those companies and countries. We can’t outspend them, so we have to find different currencies in which to work: creativity, spirit, and passion. In other words, we have to build movements—creative, hopeful movements that can summon our love for the planet, but also angry, realistic movements willing to point out the ultimate rip-off under way, as a tiny number of people enrich themselves at the expense not only of the rest of us, but also at the expense of every generation yet to come, not to mention every other species.

As it happens, such movements are possible. We built one in the last year around the Keystone Pipeline, which would have run from the tar sands of Canada down to the Gulf of Mexico. The pipeline was a certifiably bad idea—burning the world’s tar sands alone would raise the planet’s temperature almost a half degree Celsius. (Burning all the coal will add, wait for it, 15 degrees.) And so people came together in huge numbers—we had the largest civil disobedience action in America in 30 years with 1,253 people arrested. We ringed the White House with people standing shoulder-to-shoulder, five deep. We inundated the Senate with 800,000 messages in 24 hours, the most concentrated burst of environmental activity in many years. And it kind of worked—though the battle rages on, the president at least decided to deny the permit for the pipeline.

Our campaign preceded, and then was dwarfed by, the wonderful Occupy movement, which raised specific issues, like the Keystone Pipeline, but mostly concentrated on larger questions of fairness. It showed a great depth of concern about inequality and corporate power, the very set of arrangements that have produced climate change. And it offered a number of solutions—getting money out of politics, above all—that would really help.

But talking endlessly about these solutions at international conferences is not going to produce them. They go against the power of the status quo, and hence they will be enacted only if we build movements strong enough to force them. We need politicians more afraid of voter outrage than they are of corporate retribution. And so—at 350.org, and many other places—we’ll go on trying to build that movement. We’ll focus on pipelines and coal mines, and on subsidies to the fossil fuel industry. We’ll demand fee-and-dividend systems that tax fossil fuel and give the proceeds to citizens. We’ll write and march and, when necessary, we’ll go to jail. And we need those who spend too much of their time at international conclaves to join us, when you can. We’ll never get the solutions we need—the solutions everyone has known about for two decades—unless we build the movement first.

© 2012 Solutions

Bill McKibben

Bill McKibben is Schumann Distinguished Scholar at Middlebury College and co-founder of 350.org. His most recent book is Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet.

 

 

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