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Greens launch Winchester branch
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| MEP Caroline Lucas |
THE GREEN Party has launched a branch in Winchester as it prepares to fight city council elections in May.
Green MEP Caroline Lucas who officially launched the branch after a public meeting at the Discoverey Centre on climate change yesterday (March 18) said: "It feels like now is the time."
The MEP for the South-East said many people thought voting for Green Party candidates in areas where they stood little chance of winning was a wasted vote.
But she said: "Voting Green does send a powerful message to other parties. It makes them sit up."
"Even if you get one green councillor on any council, next time there will be more elected because people will realise if you vote Green, you can get Green."
Ms Lucas was once the only Green councillor on Oxford County Council, campaigners at Winchester Discovery Centre heard. Now there are eight Green councillors in Oxford.
The MEP said: "Climate change is not primarily a technical or scientific or economic debate but more than anything a challenge of political will. It is not as though we don't know what to do to reduce climate change.
"The real question is will we build the political will fast enough or spend our time chasing every scientific report and risk going down in history as the species that monitored its own extinction rather than taking steps to stop it?"
The Green MEP said she liked the phrase "living lightly" to describe a zero-carbon lifestyle. She said it was about "treading lightly" instead of stamping on the planet.
She shared her vision for the future where streets belonged to people rather than cars, where more consumer goods were recycled, reused and repaired and people only worked for what they needed, leaving more time for friends and family.
The Green MEP said: "Martin Luther King left us not with a nightmare but with a dream. I think we have to get better at imagining that green dream so that we might inspire others as well as get better at living it ourselves."
Robert Hutchison, convenor of Winchester Action on Climate Change (WinACC), said there was "a big opportunity" but only "narrow window" in which to tackle climate change.
He said: "Climate change is everyone's issue. It is too important an issue to leave to politicians and ecologists."
The social movement to make the city greener was launched in October, the same month as it was named as having Britain's largest carbon footprint per person.
Aims include reducing the carbon footprint of the district by one third by 2015.
Mr Hutchison estimated between a 10 and 15 per cent reduction could be achieved simply by more home insulation.
Mike Chater, from Winchester Friends of the Earth, who chaired the meeting, said: "We need to engage more people on the most serious issue of our time."
The branch website is Winchestergreenparty.org.uk.
12:02pm Wednesday 19th March 2008
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CommentPosted by: Mike, Local on 12:32pm Thu 20 Mar 08
The Green Party doesn't own the Man-Made Climate Change issue any more. Everyone and his dog are onto this political bandwagon. However Caroline Lucas has no real answers - all she can mouth is just agitprop rhetoric.
We can all compute that if all 60 million people in the UK did exactly as she says she wants us to (even if that was technically, legally and politically possible) then the actions of 1 billion Chinese (and about the same number of other Asians) pursuing their reasonable dreams of material wellbeing will still destroy the planet.
I have personally explored the idea of further double glazing and Solar Heating for my home - but not only are these options very costly and suffer from a terrible payback but also I would not be allowed them anyway because my Council has zoned my street as a Conservation Area.
The World seems to be in deep trouble but the Green Party doesn't have the answers. Maybe this is why Caroline Lucas has diverted her rhetorical interests to foreign policy agitprop - i.e. recently calling for Tony Blair to be "indicted for War Crimes" in Iraq and Afghanistan. What childish rubbish.
The Green Party doesn't own the Man-Made Climate Change issue any more. Everyone and his dog are onto this political bandwagon. However Caroline Lucas has no real answers - all she can mouth is just agitprop rhetoric.
We can all compute that if all 60 million people in the UK did exactly as she says she wants us to (even if that was technically, legally and politically possible) then the actions of 1 billion Chinese (and about the same number of other Asians) pursuing their reasonable dreams of material wellbeing will still destroy the planet.
I have personally explored the idea of further double glazing and Solar Heating for my home - but not only are these options very costly and suffer from a terrible payback but also I would not be allowed them anyway because my Council has zoned my street as a Conservation Area.
The World seems to be in deep trouble but the Green Party doesn't have the answers. Maybe this is why Caroline Lucas has diverted her rhetorical interests to foreign policy agitprop - i.e. recently calling for Tony Blair to be "indicted for War Crimes" in Iraq and Afghanistan. What childish rubbish.
Posted by: John James Harris, Kingsclere Hampshire on 12:32pm Tue 8 Apr 08
I would like to attend the next meeting and join the Green Party ... Please mail me any relevant literature. Many Thanks
I would like to attend the next meeting and join the Green Party ... Please mail me any relevant literature. Many Thanks
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