Together with local members of Friends of the Earth and the Oxfam Campaigns Group, we are organising an informal evening of short films, friendly discussion, and African-inspired refreshments on the eve of the next round of UN Climate Talks, this year in Durban, South Africa.

The evening will be a chance to learn more about the issues around climate change, in particular about its effect on the developing world, and an opportunity to put your concerns on climate change to local politicians.

Everyone is welcome!

Tuesday 29th November 2011, 8pm at Fleetville Community Centre on Royal Road, off Hatfield Road, AL1 4LQ, opposite the Morrisons supermarket car park entrance [map].

Over the next four weeks, George Osborne will be starring in his very own online comedy series, The Real George Osborne.

The 14 episode series – four every week for the next four weeks – will follow his hilarious attempts to gain popularity beyond the Tory heartlands and connect with ordinary people. He will also be taking to Twitter (@MrGeorgeOsborne) and writing regularly on his very own blog.

We need your help to get through to George Osborne to regulate the food speculation. Have a look at the videos, sign up to the action and spread the word to others!

Visit  http://therealgeorgeosborne.com/

Read more »

Our next monthly meeting will be on Tuesday 20th December, 7.30pm, at Joy’s.

As has become a tradition for this time of year, the meeting will include an entertaining review of the year that was, and there might be some festive nibbles too!

Newcomers are always welcome. Contact us if you would like to come.

The St Albans group attended the Africa Demands Climate Justice talk in Milton Keynes last Monday 3rd Oct.

Bandile Mdlalose from South Africa spoke passionately and informatively on what Climate Justice means to the poor in Africa. “Climate Change is impacting us now. It is not just in the future. We are already marginalised. We do not need more top down solutions that will not help us. We need action from the bottom up. We ask for your Solidarity in bringing Climate Justice for the poor.”

The Milton Keynes talk was the first in a series across the UK.

You can read more about the tour here and you can view video interviews with two of the speakers below.

On Sunday 3rd July, like last year, we participated in the St Albans Festival of Life, an annual event organised by St Albans City and District Council’s Sustainability Unit.

The idea is for the festival to be a celebration of the positive contribution that community groups are making towards the protection of the environment, the health of local residents, the arts and sport.

Between 12 noon and 4pm, St Peter’s Street in the centre of St Albans came alive with a wide variety of local clubs, societies and groups explaining and showing what they do, and encouraging other people to join in.

Throughout the afternoon, some 60 market stalls put on an entertaining and colourful programme of displays, demonstrations and interactive games and activities for all the family to take part in. And all for free.

It was a good event with a steady stream of interest on our stall. We met a lot of people and were able to talk to them about our campaigns. They seemed to enjoy our food quiz and the favourite-food drawing board was popular with the children. We made a few new contacts with other local groups and got more people signed up to to our email list.

Many thanks to everyone for their help to make the day a success.

Some more pictures here

On Weds 27th April, Jeff went to Oaklands College, our local Further Education college, to give a talk about WDM and our campaigns, to a group of A-level Citizenship students.

We had been invited by the Coordinator for “Government and Politics/Citizenship A Levels” at the college.

After a general introduction giving a brief history of the World Development Movement (WDM), Jeff explained the current issues we are dealing with in WDM and how we do that.

Feedback obtained afterwards indicated that students had found the lecture very interesting and that it complemented and reinforced their studies on the subject matter.

Points the students remembered, as reported on their website (in their own words):

• It is important to end speculative food markets and ensure that those responsible for climate problems should pay their debts to the developing nations suffering the effects.
• WDM are also concerned with the banking system adhering to environmental and human rights conditions throughout their trading.
• WDM exists in the political arena and thus is not a charity.
• WDM works to deal with the root cause of poverty and injustice rather than simply addressing the symptoms.
• Campaigning through letters to MPs and world leaders can still be still effective.
• Peaceful protest is important; and lobbying and raising awareness of an issue using marketing tactics.

On Saturday 16 April our local WDM group did our bit to try and raise the awareness of  the good people of St Albans of the big banks’ involvement in food speculation, which is fuelling record high food prices.

One of the biggest UK-based banks in this respect is Barclays Capital, the investment arm of the high street bank Barclays.

As Barclays’ AGM is on 27 April in London, WDM has designated April as a month of action on Barclays, to help build pressure on the need to rein in excessive speculation on food prices.

None of us like food price rises but for people in developing countries, where most of a household’s income is typically spent on basic food products, the effect of increasing food prices is far more serious and dramatic.

So we went into town and positioned ourselves outside the Barclays branch in St Albans to get the message across.

With our Barclays’ eagle, bowler hats, banner and placards, we certainly got people’s attention!  

Note: you can click an a picture to see a bigger version.

A group from St Albans WDM went  to the March.

The economic agenda that is driving the savage cuts in the UK is the same agenda that has led to increased poverty in the global south over the last few decades.

For over 40 years WDM has been calling for an alternative economic agenda and highlighting that the current system is unjust and impacts on the poor the most.

WDM’s experience of the failing of a cuts approach is crucial to the current situation in the UK – we can clearly show that cuts don’t work. 

Stopping the cuts juggernaut is not only critical for the UK, it will also have an impact on the global south because the government will not be able to push policies that have failed here on to the rest of the world.

 

 
  
More photos of WDM taking part in the March

On Saturday 5th March 2011, our WDM group ran a Fairtrade market stall on St Albans market, as part of Fairtrade Fortnight.

This year’s theme for Fairtrade Fortnight was “Show Off Your Label“, with a particular emphasis on Fairtrade cotton. 

One of the many ways to show off about Fairtrade this year was to paint, draw or sew a piece of Fairtrade cotton bunting to express what Fairtrade means to you. 

Our WDM group had a session with a local Rainbow pack to decorate the bunting and more bunting was available on the stall for children to paint. Afterwards we sent our bunting to the Fairtrade Foundation who will stitch them all together in an attempt to break the world record for the longest continual piece of bunting!

Hopefully, the media attention this generates will help tell more people about how Fairtrade cotton protects the livelihoods of cotton farmers in West Africa and India.

Click here for Martin’s photos of the event.