With a 12 foot Grim Reaper as conductor and advertising panels asking "How would you spend £40,000,000,000" the vintage red bus will also stop in towns along the route to make the links between cuts in local services and the real costs of the Trident Replacement programme.

The cost for the replacement Trident missile programme has been estimated to be between £15 and 40 billion. The money likely to be spent on the replacement of Trident could be as much as £660 for every person in the United Kingdom and could cost the inhabitants of Greater Manchester over £1.5 billion. This money could help fund:


Trams not Trident : the £360 million shortfall in government funding for the Metrolink expansion.

or the £3.3 million debt of 10 Greater Manchester schools.

Nurses not Nukes : provide funds to keep Accident & Emergency or Maternity units open in Greater Manchester hospitals such as Hope hospital in Salford.

As well as breaching the UK's Non Proliferation Treaty obligations – replacing Trident would be a colossal waste of money and divert scarce resources from the real human security challenges of the 21st century. According to the International Court of Justice, using Trident missiles would be illegal under international law. Replacing Trident will breach the UK's Non Proliferation treaty (NPT) obligations.

The Manchester group will be part of the national Faslane 365 campaign, which started on the 1st October and is an audacious year long non-violent blockade of the Trident nuclear submarine base at Faslane, Scotland. Many different groups from all over the United Kingdom will each maintain a 48 hour blockade of the Faslane base as part of the rolling campaign of non-violent resistance to the replacement Trident missile programme being considered by the UK government.

In a recent Radio 4 interview on the subject of the UK replacing Trident, Hans Blix said :

" I've heard the minister for defence saying that the reason for it is that the world is uncertain, but the world is also uncertain for Spain, or Italy or many other states. If the UK prolongs the programme of Trident I don't think many people would be surprised, but I think that the UK would obtain a big note in the history of mankind if it phased out its nuclear weapons."

Local resident Jacqui Burke said:

"The Faslane 365 campaign will bring people to witness and impede the base where Britain's nuclear weapons are deployed, and demonstrate the range of serious concerns - from human rights to climate change - that people in the real world consider to be the real security challenges for the 21st century".

Contact (Manchester): Jacqui

Tel: 0161 273 8283

Mobile: 07719929380

Contact (Faslane : Tues-Weds)

Mbl: 07769944933

Email:  manchester365@googlemail.com

www.faslane365.org