North East Lancs Friends of the Earth

[Mitch]

Proposal of Environmental Bill of Rights soon to be posted here, plus news of this local group and their activities.

[michele cryer]

Thanks Mitch...Any help you need, just let me know..

[Mitch]

Cheers mate - I hear on the grapevine that Les may be coming your way soon to potentially put up some wallpaper in your front room!!! I have mentioned to him and he'll be coming your way soon!!

He'll fill you in on the latest news.

[michele cryer]

Hey! Wonderful Mitch...thanks a lot...I look forward to seeing these walls papered again! and hearing the latest on F.O.E

[Mitch]

Whoops, haven't had time to get back here on local Friends of the Earth group's activities, re: Environmental Bill of Rights - gadzooks!

In the meantime, did anyone see Brian Jackson's superb letter in the Nelson Leader last Friday with news on Pendle Borough Council (& Burnley Borough Council) grusome plans for development in the area - not with ideas to benefit local people, but with expensive cafes/bars/canal development which will inevitably have the effect of raising local house prices beyond the reach of local people, and how will we afford to visit these expensive new cafes and bars.

You can bet ya bottom dollar (hey mr Blinkin idiot Blair) that you'll be having local people from the community working in these places for a pittance - as they do in the new supermarkets and homebases planned by Better Burnley Brigade. Here's Brian's superb letter, it hits the spot completely!

Letters week ending 15 July 2005 (Nelson Leader)

"We need real communities
SO, Elevate has actually hired well-known TV muso and pundit Tony Wilson to help and advise them how to make Colne and other parts of Pendle "hip".

Presumably, this advice includes pulling down more useful buildings and putting up more tat, opening some expensive wine bars and restaurants, while, at the same time, forcing up house prices and council tax, so that current residents will be forced out to make way for more trendies from the city. How lovely (not)! It is time to dump Salivate, or whatever they call themselves, into the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, which they are so eager to gentrify.
Colne was ruined and, indeed, partly destroyed heritage-wise in the late 60s when big city-style ideas, including area clearance, demolition and nasty, tacky buildings arrived here.
They always try out things in the Sticks which have failed elsewhere, usually 20 years later - so here we go again.
During a recent television news broadcast, this well-known Professional Mancunian was shown in our borough representing Elevate.
It did not start well. Pendle was referred to as a town. Then Tony gave us his "vision" for the future of our towns, most notably Colne. Among the suggestions were designer allotment sheds, or "Chic Sheds", new restaurants and bars along the canal, and something called a "Fashion Tower", heaven help us.
Then came the usual put-down about cobbled back lanes and a "once great past" etc, etc. All that was missing were whippets, zinc baths, black puddings and clogs.
I have news for Tony and his bosses at Elevate. Some of us up here in the old mill towns like the place and are aware of our heritage and do our best to preserve it. We don't want some unsustainable, car-dependent, designer nightmare, thought up after one too many in the wine bar.
We need real communities with real people and real jobs and real houses we can afford, not incoming trendies."
BRIAN JACKSON
Friends of the Earth

[michele cryer]

Mitch, thanks so much for reprinting Brian's superb letter...I think this issue has been raised elsewhere on the site...a short time ago...I agree with Brian's sentiments and your own too...I would hate to see the Boroughs of Burnley and Pendle turned into some copycat of cities such as Manchester, full of trendies and yuppies...YUK!

BRING BACK THE HIPPIES!!!!!!! lol

[Mitch]

Environmental Bill of Rights

From North East Lancs Friends of the Earth (Burnley & District):

SUSTAINABILITY—THE NEEDS OF COMMUNITIES

The need to acknowledge the growing threat to our way of life is self-evident, Global warming is a fact and according to a leading Government Scientist, this is a bigger threat than terrorism.

However, there appears to be a lack of political will to
formulate real policies to tackle this problem.

We need a positive commitment for REAL SUSTAINABILITY and PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITY. We need an ENVIRONMENTAL BILL OF RIGHTS— a People’s Charter—to guarantee us REAL FOOD, PURE WATER AND CLEAN AIR.

Burnley & District Friends of the Earth are calling for:

A coalition for positive actions and cooperation—
a coalition for the millennium
A co-operative sharing Britain for realizing real sustainability based on NEED not greed
A roadmap for sustainable communities
Exposure of outside influence, eg. America and Europe
Cutting the cost of bureaucracy—replaced by a focus on local needs
Real Sustainable communities

Contacts for Burnley & District friends of the Earth:

Burnley & District Friends of the Earth, Avril Hesson, 245 Sycamore Avenue, Burnley, Lancs,
BB12 6BB. Tel: [phone]

Pendle Friends of the Earth, Brian Jackson, 5 Duke Street, Trawden, Colne, Lancs, BB8 8DA.

Rossendale Friends of the Earth, Leonae Gorman, 98 Mercer Crescent, Helmshore, Lancs,
BB4 4DX

Hyndburn & Ribble Valley Friends of the Earth, Ian Dixon, 45 Grange Street, Clayton Le Moors, Accrington, Lancs BB5 5PJ

"Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realize that we cannot eat money”, Black Elk.

Global Warming is Now a Weapon of Mass Destruction.

We need a Complementary Health Service

Will our children be able to sustain themselves in the future?

NO MORE NEGATIVE PROMISES

PUT BRITISH CITIZENS’ HEALTH FIRST

A POSITIVE COMMITMENT FOR SUSTAINABILITY AND
PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITY