Campaigners take part in a Stop Rosebank emergency protest outside the U.K. Government building in Edinburgh, after the controversial Equinor Rosebank North Sea oil field was given the go-ahead Wednesday, September 27, 2023. (Photo: Jane Barlow/PA Images via Getty Images)
ROSEBANK owner Equinor have once again posted billions in profits – to the fury of climate campaigners.
The Norwegian fossil giant – which has the controlling stake in the huge oil field development in the North Sea – posted profits of £6.6 billion for the past three months.
Environmental campaigners said the firm was adding “insult to injury” with its huge profits as parts of Scotland continue to suffer from extreme weather caused by climate breakdown.
Last week, Storm Babet caused flooding that hit towns across north-east Scotland, with some evacuated residents in Angus told they would not be back in their homes by Christmas.
In September, the UK Government gave the green light for the Rosebank development to go ahead, despite fury from campaigners and across the political spectrum.
The field, which lies north-west of Shetland, contains up to 350 million barrels of oil and is expected to be in operation for decades.
Palestinians inspect the damage following an Israeli airstrike on the El-Remal aera in Gaza City on October 9, 2023. Israel continued to battle Hamas fighters on October 10 and massed tens of thousands of troops and heavy armour around the Gaza Strip after vowing a massive blow over the Palestinian militants’ surprise attack. Photo by Naaman Omar apaimages. licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer call for ‘humanitarian pauses’ … but not a ceasefire
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said that temporary breaks or “specific pauses” in the violence could allow British nationals and hostages to be freed and aid to be supplied to the Gaza Strip.
But the government has continued to back Israel’s “right to defend itself,” and resist calls for a ceasefire.
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[Zionist] Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who has also resisted calls to support a ceasefire, said on Wednesday evening that the amount of aid and essential utilities going into Gaza was “completely insufficient.”
In a statement, he called for supplies to be “urgently ramped up” and added that “we support humanitarian pauses.”
However, Palestine Solidarity Campaign director Ben Jamal hit out at Sir Keir, telling him to “stop playing games with people’s lives.”
He wrote on social media platform X: “Aid cannot be safely delivered without a ceasefire. Nor can infrastructure be repaired which is necessary for life.
“If you care about the lives of innocent Palestinians, then call for a ceasefire now or you remain complicit.”
Refugee charity Care4Calais is seeking to sue the government for ‘segregating’ asylum seekers at RAF Wethersfield
Suella Braverman faces a fresh legal challenge over the government’s treatment of asylum seekers held at a former RAF base that has been compared to “a military-style prison camp”.
Refugee charity Care4Calais is seeking to sue the government over its policy of warehousing asylum seekers at RAF Wethersfield, which it claims amounts to a form of “segregation” and “quasi detention”.
The legal challenge comes weeks after asylum seekers at Wethersfield – a remote, 800-acre site in Essex, ringed by security fences, guards and CCTV – told openDemocracy they had been “locked up” in solitary confinement for complaining of depression.
In a private press briefing attended by openDemocracy today, Care4Calais said it is bringing the legal challenge after hearing testimonies from its clients living at the barracks.
A pre-action protocol letter issued by lawyers representing the charity accuses the home secretary of failing to fulfil her obligations of “ensuring an adequate standard of living and health for asylum seekers” under the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999.
The letter states that “measures short of 24-hour physical confinement, where they substantively deprive a person of their liberty, may amount to detention at common law.”
Ali*, 24, who escaped the Taliban earlier this year, told openDemocracy that staff at Wethersfield locked him up in a room for two days after he complained that being held there was causing him to be depressed. “They’ve done this to me twice,” he said, adding that it has “happened to other people too”.
He continued: “If they go and tell [staff] they don’t feel well or they have depression… they lock them in a room for 48 hours and make them quarantine – and they’re not allowed out.
“Wethersfield is like a prison. It doesn’t feel like we’re in any kind of home or hotel room – we’ve just been thrown into a military-style prison camp.”
Two other men living at the barracks told this website of “prison-like conditions” that are affecting their mental health.
Braverman is accused of separating “asylum seekers, all or most of whom are non-British, and many of whom are also from ethnic minorities or non-white, from the wider UK population”.
Care4Calais’ legal challenge also raises the absence of an effective screening process for asylum seekers due to be accommodated at Wethersfield.
Survivors of torture and modern slavery, or those who suffer from serious mental health conditions, are routinely sent to the barracks, the charity said, but are transferred to hotels when their cases are individually raised in individual pre-action protocol letters.
In its press briefing today, Care4Calais said this has happened up to 20 times in the past few months.
Wethersfield is already the subject of a legal challenge from Braintree District Council, which objects to the Home Office’s plans to expand the site’s capacity. A High Court case brought by the council on 31 October will also hear evidence about the inappropriate use of the RAF base Scampton in Lincolnshire – which is due to open in weeks and house up to 2,000 men.
The government has until 7 November to respond to the letter, before proceedings for a full judicial review are initiated.
JSO Wellington Arch action 25 Oct 23. Image Denise Laura Baker.
Three Just Stop Oil supporters have painted the Wellington Arch near Hyde Park Corner to demand the UK government immediately halt all new oil and gas projects and to call on the public to march in London from 29th October.
At approximately 10:15 this morning, three Just Stop Oil supporters set off smoke flares and sprayed orange paint on the Wellington Arch, using fire extinguishers. They then displayed banners reading ‘Just Stop Oil’ and waited for police to arrive and arrest them.
One of those taking action this morning is Joshua Lane, 26, an engineer from Sheffield. He said:
“I am compelled to take action due to the severity, and sheer emergency we find ourselves in today. Future generations live in uncertainty, and we are given false promises time after time by endless pantomime governments. Humanity faces the biggest crisis in history, and yet the government continuously ignores the facts, and only thinks of themselves and the billionaire oil barons they serve. One thing that cannot be ignored is the power of ordinary people, and our voices are only continuing to grow louder.”
Also taking action today was Joe Hogan, 40, from Hertfordshire. He said:
“We are out of time; we have to act now. Not tomorrow, not next year, not 2050; NOW. But our government continues with business-as-usual, burning our futures to enrich their friends, while enacting draconian legislation to stamp out dissent. I refuse to be cowed. Traditional, managed, sanitised forms of protest have done nothing; the only way forward is through sustained, disruptive civil resistance. That’s why I will be marching in London from the 29th October and you should too. Sign up at juststopoil.org“
JSO at Wellington Arch 25 Oct 23. Image Denise Laura Baker
Today’s action comes as extreme weather continues to disrupt the UK, killing at least seven and leaving hundreds homeless after around 1,250 properties have flooded in England. The environment agency has issued more than 300 flood alerts and a new wave of heavy rain could bring flooding and disruption to much of London and southern England according to a fresh Met Office weather warning.
The Green Party MP has said the PM can use the King’s Speech to reverse the damage he’s caused on UK climate and nature policy
Green Party MP Caroline Lucas has written to the prime minister Rishi Sunak setting out five pieces of legislation the government ought to introduce to address the climate and nature emergencies, Left Foot Forward can exclusively report. The letter, seen by Left Foot Forward, was sent in advance of the state opening of parliament on November 7, when the government is expected to set out its legislative agenda through a King’s Speech.
In her letter, Lucas wrote: “This year has already been one of climate extremes – September smashed through previous records and was a staggering 1.75 degrees hotter than pre-industrial levels, causing profound alarm to both scientists and citizens. We have seen climate impacts, from deadly flooding in Libya, to the Cerberus heatwave in Europe and the devastating wildfires in Maui and, as it stands, 2023 is on track to be the hottest year on record.”
She went on to argue that the government must “take this opportunity to reclaim the UK’s climate leadership and set out a bold legislative agenda that responds to the urgency of the climate and nature emergency”.
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Lucas told Left Foot Forward: “In just 12 short months in the job, Rishi Sunak has set a torch to the UK’s climate agenda – approving new morally obscene fossil fuel projects, ditching vital regulations to improve energy efficiency, and dragging the climate into a dangerous culture war. The King’s Speech is a critical opportunity for the Prime Minister to start reversing this damage and tackling the climate and nature emergencies head-on – our country and our planet can’t wait.”
