Critical Mass

Yesterday I took part in Cardiff's recently launched Critical Mass, where a group of cyclists reclaim the streets for whatever reason the feel is appropriate.

I've wanted to take part in one of these for years and was very excited when I heard there was going to be one in Cardiff. Personally, I did it to raise awareness of cyclists rights, that roads are our space too, and cyclists lead the way in sustainable transport despite poor local policy.

Here is a photo of us midway through the ride, I'm not sure who took it so I will credit the Facebook group:
http://bit.ly/cxY9jj



I must say I was totally shocked by the intolerance and aggression of some motorists along the route. 'Holding the line' at the back of the group felt very scary and one driver rammed the cyclist next to me, bending his rear wheel. Lots of angry words were exchanged. Just round the corner, a white van drove over the pavement and into our group, accelerating so fast that the cyclists in front had to almost bail out of the way - otherwise they would have been hit. To top it off, the driver got out of the vehicle brandishing some sort of weapon (I'm not sure exactly what) and nearly attacked one of the participants.

I got some abuse myself toward the end, the car behind me threatening to run me down and shouting dismissively when told he would end up in jail if he did that. Luckily we were approaching red lights which meant the driver could do little, and the police turned up at that point, telling us to leave a clear route because the aggressive response of drivers had nearly caused an accident.

This is a brave act the participants do each month, and I'm grateful to the people who made me feel more comfortable when I was on the front line.

We ended the cycle on the next road and some others spent a long time talking with the police, making sure the dangerous driving we'd seen was reported.
After quite an unnerving experience we decanted to the microbeer festival in Riverside for a more relaxed afternoon!
It is crazy how people will behave when they have an engine in front of them....

A Victory for Students

I heard from the Students' Union a few days ago that Cardiff Council is set to launch a liscensing policy for Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs) in Cathays from this summer!

This is fantastic news, students in Cardiff have had to put up with sub-par housing for too long and this is a big step towards changing this. From Next academic year, my understanding is that landlords will have to have their property inspected to ensure it meets minimum standards before it can be let.

I've heard terrible stories from some friends about their houses, one person being forced to begin legal proceedings against their landlord but having to back down due to the enormous financial consequences that would be thrown their way by more expensive lawyers from the other side! I'm not a stranger to slow repairs myself, having to wait 2 months for a hole in my kitchen ceiling to be fixed!

The root of the problem is of course far too few rights and a lack of regulation in the whole private rented sector. I hope that this scheme is speedily extended into Roath, another highly student populated area before eventually being applied to the whole city.

And a massive congratulations to Ed Dolding, the Student Union's Campaigns Officer, who has worked hard for this. This is not the only thing he has achieved this year, but this on its own would be an unusually brilliant record for a sabbatical officer!

UK Border Agency Protest

This post is a bit late after the event, but I promised a local activist I would do something!

You may well be aware of what's been happening in the UK Borders Agency in Cardiff - allegations of institutionalised racism of the most dispicable kind. One officer allegedly told child soldiers to lie on the floor and 'show how they shot at people'.

I didn't make it to the demonstration the other week but was very pleased by the attendance, over 200 people turning up to express their anger with borders policy in this country. What has changed is that far more refugees turned up this time, a brave act if you are waiting for your application to be dealt with. It's fantastic to see such a widespread community reaction to what is going on, and I promise I will attend the next demostration and make every effort to keep going until the Government has responded properly to the demands of Refugee Voice Wales and others.

I won't write anything more because everything that needs to be said has been done already by the excellent post on the No Borders website.

(Just to point out - The Green Party does not have a policy to open our borders completely but we certainly advocate a much, much fairer system and better treatment of refugees).

But to conclude: I wholeheartedly support the demands made by Refugee Voice Wales, we certainly cannot deport anyone whilst this is going on!

Assembly Referendum

News breaks today that next week the Assembly will be asked to vote in favour of a referendum on giving itself full lawmaking powers. This is something I've wanted to see as long as I can remember.

I'm excited to see that the momentum seems to have built since Carwyn Jones has taken the post of First Minister. I may well go to the public gallery myself to watch the debate on Tuesday, it's going to be a heated one with the Lib Dems and Tories threatening to abstain unless a referendum on the same day as the next Assembly Election is ruled out.

The referendum definitely shouldn't be on the same day as the election, it raises several questions. How could the Assembly actually take on these powers straight after the election and will the various bureaucracies be ready? Should parties have to talk about the referendum as well as their policies?

It seems rather muddy to me. We should have the referendum soon after the General Election, hopefully this autumn, so there's plenty of time to get everything ready before the next Assembly Election to make sure the new term hits the ground running and delivers real change, and protects Wales from the ravages of the Tories.

But on the 2 partes making it an issue for this vote, right now, doesn't make sense. It takes forever for Westminster to do anything for the Assembly, so it makes no sense to argue over this now. Get the vote passes, get the order back from Parliament and then we can decide the date.

Hope for Cardiff Rare Books Collection

I attended Cardiff University Senate today in my capacity as a student member. On the agenda was the effort by the University to aquire thousands of rare books, some dating back to the 15th century from city Council archives.

Some time ago the Council decided that in their efforts to make a quick buck, this collection of books which includes a rare Shakespeare collection and early bibles was an easy target and decided they would be auctioned to pay for the new library.

I was very worried by this, but have today found out that the University is working very hard to take the collection off their Council's hands for a fair price and keep it in Cardiff where it belongs.

I asked a question regarding access to the collection by the general public, and was told that anyone would be welcome to see the books subject to appointment and supervision, like the other rare collections they hold.

All in all, this seems a better outcome than flogging them to all corners of the world or leaving them to gather dust in Council archives.

I was also approached by a member of the University and Colleges Union regarding the ongoing campaign for the University to adopt an Ethical Investment policy. Good to see the Union is on our side, and am looking forward to the meeting next week on the subject.

Selling crisis? Or solving it in the background?

I've been involved in some way in environmental politics for 5 and a half years now, but in the last few months my perspective has changed measurably and now I feel rather lost as to how I feel the movement and the Greens should progress.

I was very unusual when I joined the Green Party aged 16. I had never been involved in campaigning before and was not a member of any NGOs or other activities that members tend to come from. I had been concerned about the 'greenhouse effect' for some time but was at this getting interested in politics proper. I had looked through the Lib Dems and Plaid Cymru for a home but after seeing Jean Lambert on the TV and reading more about the Green Party decided that it's policies just made sense and actually attempted to tackle the roots of the problems our society faces.

My first active involvement after going to a few local meetings was delivering leaflets for our candidate in the 2005 general election - I can't remember a single thing it said. I also ran the mock election campaign in my school (my friend was the candidate). Our strategy was a clumsy poster with a list of about 10 policies that addressed everything.

I think the main issues I was interested in aside from climate change was promoting local business and Iraq and top up fees. I don't know if I thought very hard about how we should engage voters or what issues we should talk to them about. I had known for a long time than I was left wing but hadn't thought about what issues we should focus on in getting the votes in, as opposed to just expect people to see the truth and vote for it.

There were no elections in 2006 in Wales and I went off to university in Exeter. The following spring we were working on the Assembly Elections back home which I only really delivered leaflets for again. The freepost leaflet was a crass depiction of "Caerleon-on-sea" etc and I think I began to realize that this is not how you get people elected.

I also stood myself for the first time for the Council in Exeter. I wrote a paragraph to go on an election leaflet that advocated congestion charging and I don't think much else. I was very happy to beat the Labour candidate and get 3rd place because a lot of my friends at uni voted for me. Sadly the incumbent Lib Dem councilor lost her seat by one vote to the Tories, a few people said I 'helped' split the 'liberal' vote, which may have had some truth in it considering how shocked she was to lose.

By the time 2008 came around with the onset of the financial crisis I had developed a more concrete vision of social justice and thought that the Green Party should shut up totally about climate change and take the ground vacated by old Labour. We would get in on a social justice mandate and sort out the climate on the side. I heartily approved of Sian Berry's focus on the cost of living.

That's what I thought we should stick to for most of this year: renationalising select industries that were being inefficient in their need for profit, solve the recession by creating green jobs and sort out climate change. Climate change was almost an excuse to restructure society in an updated democratic socialist direction. We didn't need to convince the public that acting against it was an emergency because we'd win their support by making their lives better.

Then I started an internship with Stop Climate Chaos, the main UK climate coalition consisting of hundreds of NGOs and community organizations. This non-partisan territory was new to me and I was looking forward to seeing what it was like doing climate change without the politics. As I hoped, it put me on a path to reconnecting with the emotional trauma that an awareness of climate change brings, not just a fact that is part of an ideological arsenal for elections. I actually remembered in my HEART that hundreds of thousands of people are dying every year because of climate change and countless more in hardship because of it. Mobilizing for The Wave became a desperate outcome rather than wearily turning up to the annual demo that got smaller each year. This demonstration would matter and we had to put the pressure on for a fair and ambitious deal at Copenhagen. I lost much of the cynicism towards the establishment I had because of the emotional need to do something. Copenhagen was the last chance.

When I went to People's and Planet's annual gathering in November I broke down while watching a film about the tar sands. This was the most I'd ever *felt* it.

Despite being responsible for 50 students going to London in December, I didn't turn up myself. I'd booked for a music festival before I even knew about it. Part of me missed being there but I'm glad in hindsight I didn't since it would have sent me further on the rollercoaster.

I believed the line I was parroting that it was US, the people who would decide whether Copenhagen counted, not the politicians. I had to go there myself, and be part of the people's movement that was going to take back the power. I wanted to get there and stay for the length of the talks, be part of the temporary anarchist communities that we set up and perhaps even be at the brunt of the police. Being very low on funds and not having enough time to hitch, I settled on going with Friend's of the Earth for 2 days proper in the city and a lot of hours on a bus.

The main activity was the 100,000 strong march towards the Bella Center on the Saturday calling for justice and for the rich nations to give up the pursuit of profit at all costs. For the first time I felt the people around me were not angry enough, that this marching was a charade and wasn't going to do anything. We got as far as a big road somewhere near the centre and a big stage where some people were making speeches. It was bitterly freezing.

We spend the following day at Klimaforum, or the People's summit which was far more up my street, discussing how WE confront the climate crisis. The Global Greens session was inspiring and made me feel like ordinary activists may actually see as as a proper wing of the movement rather than an obscure far left project.

I came home, slowly preparing myself for what was going to be an agreement with inadequate targets with offsetting rendering it useless. We didn't even get that, we got virtually no money for developing countries and no targets, just a scientifically dubious commitment to a 2 degree ceiling on emissions. I said to myself that its time to brush the politicians aside and sort this our for ourselves, but I'm not I'd thought exactly what that meant, how were we to do it? I could feel my politics radicalizing more.

For most of the holiday I sank into a vacant self-centered daze, thinking very little and trying to forget about climate change. I some how came to the conclusion that my assumption about not mentioning climate change couldn't be more wrong. How are we to sort it out of if it's just not a priority for most people? How can we make the controversial decisions even in government if the population is not signed up? But if we're not going to get into power soon do we need to use our platform to agitate popular action on the climate?

The Green Party is doing exactly what I said about sweeping the politicians aside. We are ordinary people desperate to take action on this issue, we will be electing our first MPs in 5 months but how will they take the issue on?

I wasn't sure what kind of conclusion I would come to when I started writing this: do we campaign for election against climate change or the excesses of capitalism? The people of the south need us in the north to get our leaders to get their heads of their arses and be fair, this issue is now very emotional to me and not just that it all makes sense. Can we get anywhere by raging on about climate change? What do we do?

Full speed ahead for further full Assembly powers

We should have a referendum on full law making powers for the Assembly to take place as soon as practicable. We need them so that Wales can drive ahead with fresh ideas to tackle the recession and green the economy.

The current system of piecemeal powers is overly convoluted and means that Assembly spends more time trying to acquire powers than exercising them.The Assembly Government should spend its time supporting people and small business in such a deep recession rather than jumping through hoops for the sake of Westminster’s mistrust in the ability of Wales to govern itself.

Jobs losses and the debate over further powers are tightly bound together. The people of Wales need action on the green jobs needed to get through the recession and move our economy in a low carbon direction. With the General Election looming, and the threat of Tory rule, such measures look remote, but Wales can insulate itself from the ravages of the Tories by exercising full law making powers.

In the words of David Cameron, you can’t fit a cigarette paper between the 3 main parties, the difference is that the Tories’ commitment to public spending cuts is dogmatic, it’s vital that Wales votes to stand on its own feet and reject Tory rule.

Voting for full powers will not completely protect Wales from cuts, the Assembly does not have the power to vary income tax or borrow money as a Council does. This means that cuts in public spending will be passed on whoever is in power in Cardiff Bay, the battle is over deciding where the cuts go and rejecting the inevitable attacks on vulnerable groups and marketisation of our public services.

The Assembly should be an effective, confident institution so it can deliver the jobs we need. Let’s slash carbon, not jobs and public services.