Ellie Chowns, Green Party MP for North Herefordshire. CC image Wikipedia.
Responding to a warning from the UN Secretary General that the world has failed to limit global heating to 1.5C and his call on global leaders to urgently change course at the forthcoming COP30 climate summit in Brazil, Green Party MP Ellie Chowns said:
“It is vital we pay heed to the warnings by the UN Secretary General on the risks posed to the world of breaking through the 1.5C limit, set by the Paris Agreement ten years ago.
“As the birthplace of the industrial revolution, and its legacy of high carbon emissions, the UK has a special responsibility to be a global leader in the shift towards a green economy – and leading by example at home.
“It’s welcome that the PM is attending COP 30 and Keir Starmer must use his voice to demand action that closes the global emissions gap. He must also stand firm against the reckless and dangerous attempts to undermine climate action by Reform UK and the Conservatives. True climate leadership also means resisting pressure from the fossil fuel lobby.
“COP30 is taking place against a backdrop of continued financial support from governments for the fossil fuel industry. This includes an estimated £17.5 billion every year here in the UK.
“The government must also refuse permission for the giant Rosebank oilfield, which would create more emissions than the combined annual CO2 emissions of all 28 low-income countries in the world – the very countries that are bearing the brunt of climate breakdown.”
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.UK Conservative Party leader Kemi ‘not a genocide’ Badenoch explains her reality that the Earth is flat, the Moon is made of cheese and that she was born from
Unicorn horn dustOrcas discuss Donald Trump and the killer apes’ concept of democracy. Front Orca warns that Trump is crashing his country’s economy and that everything he does he does for the fantastically wealthy.
Out of touch: The Labour leadership show no sign of responding to public anger
WE will listen, we will learn the lessons. The boilerplate mantras have tripped easily off the tongue of Labour politicians since the catastrophic loss of Caerphilly in the Welsh Senedd by-election last week.
But do they mean it? The evidence is scant. Just this week we learn that ministers are preparing to relax regulations around “short-selling” — a fancy term for gambling by hedge funds, wherein they bet that the shares of a target company are going to fall.
This is an irredeemably useless activity from any social point of view, and Labour’s intention to indulge its practitioners is just another signal of its subordination to the City and neoliberalism in its most grotesque forms.
It speaks to the utter poverty of the government’s political imagination, and to Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s inability to think outside the box of conventional bourgeois economic strategy.
Was that what the thousands of lost Labour voters in Caerphilly were protesting about? Does the government actually imagine they were calling for easier treatment of hedge funds when they defected en masse to Plaid Cymru or Reform? Not even the most obliging Downing Street spin doctor could be persuaded to peddle such a line.
Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership is intensely relaxed about assaulting those least able to defend themselves – the very poorest and most vulnerable.Keir Starmer explains that he feels no shame or guilt benefitting personally from gifts from the rich and powerful while insisting on policies of severe austerity causing suffering and death.Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
CAMPAIGNERS encased statues of prominent social justice figures in prison bars today to challenge laws that criminalise protest.
Greenpeace activists imprisoned statues of Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi and Millicent Fawcett outside Westminster, to highlight how they would fall foul of the government’s anti-protest laws if they were protesting today.
A new analysis by the group found that out of all the arrests made under the Terrorism Act since it came into force 24 years ago, almost half (2,100 out of 4,322) occurred in the last four months, predominately targeting people protesting the ban on Palestine Action.
Since the group was proscribed on July 5, police have carried out mass arrests of activists silently holding signs against the ban.
Green Party leader Zack Polanski said: “Calling peaceful protesters ‘terrorists’ is one of the most blatantly ridiculous and dangerous things this government has done.
“Nelson Mandela was jailed for fighting apartheid, this lot would’ve called him a national security threat. When we criminalise protest, we don’t just attack activists. We attack democracy itself.”
EIGHT firms that recently donated to the Labour Party were awarded contracts worth close to £138 million within the first year of Sir Keir Starmer’s government, researchers revealed today.
Their report, for the Autonomy Institute think tank, found that the firms’ donations, totalling £580,000, were tiny compared with the multimillion-pound public contracts they received.
Among them were accounting firm PwC UK, which had donated £236,000 since 2022 and been awarded £67m in contracts, and business consultancy Baringa Partners, which had given £30,000 since last year and signed deals worth £35m.
The trend carries on from the previous Tory government. Looking at May 2015 until last July, the report identified 29 companies which had donated £11m to the Conservative Party and then received contracts worth £2.3 billion.
These included Covid testing firm Randox Laboratories, which took £132.4m in contracts after donating £44,000, and consultancy KPMG, which secured £236m in deals after donating £170,000.
The report found that since 2000, for every £1 donated by a “giver and taker” company, they were awarded £1,294 in public contracts.
It describes the relationship between donations and government contracts as a “cause of concern for democratic governance, raising questions for transparency, accountability, and public trust” and calls for a ban on public contracts for firms that have made donations over the last decade.
Keir Starmer commits to restore honesty and integrity to politics and whores out access to all areas of Number 10 to a huge donor.Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves wear the uniform of the rich and powerful. They have all had clothes bought for them by multi-millionaire Labour donor Lord Alli. CORRECTION: It appears that Rachel Reeves clothing was provided by Juliet Rosenfeld.
Zack Polanski, Zarah Sultana and Jeremy Corbyn offer hope for the British left | Ben Montgomery/Stringer / Leon Neal/Staff / Kristian Buus/Contributor / Getty Images / Composition by James Battershill
In choosing big business over ordinary people, the PM has sacrificed the heart of the Labour Party. So what next?
Labour’s political position is increasingly the reverse of the ‘for the many, not the few’ policy pursued under former leader Jeremy Corbyn. The party has embraced corporate capture and the main features of neoliberalism, albeit with incredibly poor timing, as the neoliberal economic model drives runaway wealth that increases dissent across much of the world.
It is no coincidence that, at the same time, when it should be coasting along on a huge parliamentary majority won less than 18 months ago, Labour has been plunged into political disarray and seen its lead disappear in the polls.
By cosying up to big business and failing to offer anything to substantially improve the lives of ordinary people up and down the country, Keir Starmer’s New-New Labour has seen a collapse in its general support and, more significantly, its membership.
The Labour Party has lost 300,000 of the 550,000 members it had in the Corbyn era. While it has been able to recoup the financial support offered by these ordinary members from a few big donors, it has in the process lost the heart of the party.
Many issues demonstrate this, but a few stand out. The government’s repeated refusal (now rumoured to be U-turned on at next month’s Budget) to lift the two-child benefit cap. Its flagship welfare bill (already U-turned on), which would have cut Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payments for millions of vulnerable people. The decision, announced in February of this year, to cut the foreign aid programme to increase military spending.
And then came perhaps the biggest problem of all for Starmer’s Labour: Gaza, where the UK government’s continuing support for Israel as it engages in genocide still beggars belief for many. There have been 32 mass demonstrations in London in the past two years, the most recent being one of the largest protests ever held in the UK. That level of political activity will continue, given Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu seems determined to avoid a peaceful outcome, and Starmer is unlikely to stand up to him or, by extension, the US.
Widespread dismay and depression on the backbenches may ebb and flow, but at this point, it feels like even a change of leadership may not be enough for a real change in fortune.
The government’s current predicament is the main reason why Westminster politics is so uncertain. Looking at the UK-wide parties, the far-right Reform UK is leading polls with vote shares that vary but are typically over 30%, having soaked up plenty of support as a substantial protest vote. If that persists through to the next general election in 2029, it will likely put Nigel Farage into Downing Street.
Labour’s support, meanwhile, is hovering at around 20%, the Tories more like 15% and the Liberal Democrats rather less.
And until three months ago, the Greens were still weak in polling terms – despite having made some progress since last year’s election – and millions on the left were still disenfranchised, having been disillusioned with Starmer’s Labour leadership.
Two things have changed; the first being Zack Polanski winning the Green Party leadership at the start of September. He has brought a more radical and left-wing perspective to the party, which has led to a jump in the polls and an 80% increase in new members. The Greens announced this week that its membership now stands at 126,000 – more than either the Conservatives or the Lib Dems.
The second change is in the fortunes of the new Your Party group, fronted by Corbyn and former Labour MP Zarah Sultana. While the party’s initial request for expressions of interest received a massive 800,000 responses – at which point it appeared likely to provide a serious challenge to Starmer’s Labour – it ran into internal disagreements six weeks ago that knocked it right back and led to a period of utter dismay and anger among supporters.
Those feelings have eased somewhat over the past two weeks, as Your Party has published draft versions of its constitution, standing orders and an organisational strategy, all of which are to be discussed and developed before being decided at a large national conference in Liverpool at the end of November. The documents, including a draft political statement, are open to all and will no doubt be subject to intense debate and plenty of disagreement, but they do appear to be a genuine attempt at accountability that is a very long way from the opacity of the Labour Party.
A typical meeting of supporters, of which there are hundreds around the country, still sees some of the anger of a few weeks ago, but now also more determination to see things through. If the new party can recapture the mood of three months ago – and particularly if it and the Greens are willing to work with one another – then there may be some hope for the disenfranchised left.
One of the most interesting aspects of these rapid political changes is the potential for the three figureheads of these two parties to have a substantial impact.
Zarah Sultana, with an often combative style, appeals particularly to younger and frustrated audiences, while Zack Polanski’s normal and measured approach is persistently disarming for Reform’s far-right politicians. Then there is Jeremy Corbyn, who is already a national figure known for a long-term commitment to a progressive agenda and a remarkable personal following.
These are very early days in a time of rapid political change. Reform is still on the up, but compared with just three months ago, there is now a lot more reason for hope on the left.
Keir Starmer explains that he feels no shame or guilt benefitting personally from gifts from the rich and powerful while insisting on policies of severe austerity causing suffering and death.Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership all feel a small part of Scunthorpe.Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.
Out of touch: The Labour leadership show no sign of responding to public anger
A view of, £5, £10, £20 and £50 bank notes
