Campaigners prepare to take direct action at Trident production site
jk | 30.06.2006 08:06 | Anti-militarism
Less than a week after Gordon Brown committed the government to retaining a British-manufactured nuclear weapon, a Defence Select Committee report has raised strong and searching questions about the need to replace Trident. Meanwhile, NVDA camapign group Block the Builders is preparing to take action at AWE Aldermaston - Britain's Trident production site - on 10 July.
Block the Builders
Press Release - 30 June 2006 - For immediate release
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Defence Select Committee Report
Campaigners prepare to take direct action at Trident production site
-------------------------------------
[first para in abstract]
The report - “The future of the UK’s Strategic Nuclear Deterrent: the strategic context” – which was officially published today, castigates the Ministry of Defence for having refused to participate in the Committee’s inquiry - held earlier this year - and calls for a genuine and meaningful debate on any future nuclear weapons system.
The report also calls on the government to inform the public of what decisions need to be made and when they must be taken and implemented.
In a Commons statement on Wednesday, Tony Blair confirmed that a decision on replacement would be taken this year, but ignored the question of whether there would be a parliamentary vote on the matter.
No time like the present
At AWE Aldermaston, work has already started on the £183m Orion laser facility, suggesting that the Committee’s fears - that unless there is a fully informed debate, “we could find that in practice taken the decision to keep the deterent” - are well-founded. The Aldermaston site is undergoing radical changes and more specialist warhead scientists and engineers are being recruited.
On 10 July campaigners will be returning to AWE for what has become an ongoing monthly blockade of construction traffic entering the site.
Joined by Green MEP Caroline Lucas and CND Chair Kate Hudson, blockaders intend to halt construction on the Orion laser site and demonstrate that while the government continues to stall the debate, the public are already making their voices heard.
Over the past four years, anti-nuclear campaigners have been warning that a massive investment and building programme at AWE Aldermaston suggests that, whatever the Defence Select Committee, parliament or the public may say, the government fully intends to retain a nuclear weapons system.
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NOTES
Blockade details: Monday 10 July, 7am. See
http://www.blockthebuilders.org.uk/action/
In a recent ICM poll, 81% of the British public said they believed that the decision on whether or not to replace Trident should be made by a vote in Parliament.
See http://www.aldermaston.net/news/article.php?id=60 for recent image of construction plant on the Orion site
Press Release - 30 June 2006 - For immediate release
-------------------------------------
Defence Select Committee Report
Campaigners prepare to take direct action at Trident production site
-------------------------------------
[first para in abstract]
The report - “The future of the UK’s Strategic Nuclear Deterrent: the strategic context” – which was officially published today, castigates the Ministry of Defence for having refused to participate in the Committee’s inquiry - held earlier this year - and calls for a genuine and meaningful debate on any future nuclear weapons system.
The report also calls on the government to inform the public of what decisions need to be made and when they must be taken and implemented.
In a Commons statement on Wednesday, Tony Blair confirmed that a decision on replacement would be taken this year, but ignored the question of whether there would be a parliamentary vote on the matter.
No time like the present
At AWE Aldermaston, work has already started on the £183m Orion laser facility, suggesting that the Committee’s fears - that unless there is a fully informed debate, “we could find that in practice taken the decision to keep the deterent” - are well-founded. The Aldermaston site is undergoing radical changes and more specialist warhead scientists and engineers are being recruited.
On 10 July campaigners will be returning to AWE for what has become an ongoing monthly blockade of construction traffic entering the site.
Joined by Green MEP Caroline Lucas and CND Chair Kate Hudson, blockaders intend to halt construction on the Orion laser site and demonstrate that while the government continues to stall the debate, the public are already making their voices heard.
Over the past four years, anti-nuclear campaigners have been warning that a massive investment and building programme at AWE Aldermaston suggests that, whatever the Defence Select Committee, parliament or the public may say, the government fully intends to retain a nuclear weapons system.
---------------------------------
NOTES
Blockade details: Monday 10 July, 7am. See
http://www.blockthebuilders.org.uk/action/ In a recent ICM poll, 81% of the British public said they believed that the decision on whether or not to replace Trident should be made by a vote in Parliament.
See
http://www.aldermaston.net/news/article.php?id=60 for recent image of construction plant on the Orion site
jk
e-mail:
btb@aldermaston.net
Homepage:
http://www.blockthebuilders.org.uk/action/
Comments
Hide the following 3 comments
blockade transport and other stuff
30.06.2006 11:18
...and if any radical, action-oriented women are at a loose end for the weekend immediately before the blockade, why not come to the women's action camp - two days of discussion, training and preparation. See
jk
Don't say pah
30.06.2006 17:32
Matt
Seriously
02.07.2006 10:36
What if people don't identify as men or women? Aldermaston have no policy on trans issue, whole chunks of our community are being left out. What if it's a woman trapped in a mans body? Or a man trapped in a woman's body? Who should be excluded then? The concept of having a space just for women would be fine if gender was that strict, but it isnt its fluid. I've met many "macho" bio-fems and many "feminine" bio-males there isnt one straight line for all of us to follow. Accepting that then; all aldermaston are doing is acting against people because of their biological form.
They must see that a pre-determined personality regarding biology is to a vast degree a farce and that excluding "men" will not help the cause. The only way to progress the gender cause for all (particularly women) is to include everyone and to smash gender binaries when we still accept that there are inherent differences between men and women then we will still give them both different treatment,
I'm all too aware of how patriarchy is fucking us up; but it doesn't just affect the lives of women; patriarchy ruins the lives of bio and self identified men and women and those of us who arent anything at all; and are just people. If a movement is excluding huge chunks of the community it can never truly hope to become a a truly liberatory movement.
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