So Kent Union has just published it’s Strategic Review 2008-12, I just had a quick go through it to see what they have planned for CC related issues. Here is what I picked out, sorry there are no page numbers on the report which is a pain so no references but hopefully you can find what you need. The report is available from the Kent Union website.

“Social, Ethical and Environmental issues” are one of the 4 main strategic themes which is really good. Specifically they have commited to achieve ISO 14000 by 2010 maybe some of the environment buffs might want to check it out and see what its all about! There are a couple of other certifications which they have committed to for various dates too.

Also they will be producing an annual social responsiblity report, looking forward to see how critical/analytical this will be, It could be a good basis for holding them to account though, bear in mind they have agreed to annual GHG reduction/use reporting and also now monthly and annual recycling reports the reports, this might be a place where they combine all that, who knows.

There will also be a dedicated staff post for supporting E & E work which is great but its not pegged for starting till 2012! They have also made an “ongoing” commitment to “stock as many Fairtrade products as possible”, there are deffinatly a load of simple places where they are failing here already (see coffee / vending machines).

There is clearly loads of stuff we would like the Union to do but also to focus them on getting the University to change! As an organisation the Union has a budget of 8mill and employ about 400 staff, so improving their social and environmental impact will make a huge impact, and if we can get them to keep up pressure on the University too that’s all the better.

So the Recycling Forum we talked about before Christmas is finally going to happen, sorry for the late notice but its on this Thursday the 24th Jan at 6.00PM in KLT3 (Venue - TBC). It should be a really good event, the guy who runs recycling on campus, from Kent Uni Estates will be there as well as Pete Mackintosh the Union Sabbatical officer who deals with recycling!

As well as that we are hoping lots of interested students will show up, invite your friends especially if they live on campus, and come with ideas, problems and your own experiences of using the recycling facilities on campus. To make it easier, there is a facebook event which you can discuss ideas and invite your friends to.

Don’t forget to invite your friends to the Forum at:
www.consciousconsumers.org.uk/recyclingforum

Hello,

As you may be aware Spokes East Kent Cycle Campaign have proposed and
supported plans for a riverside cycle route between Chartham and
Canterbury, and for a safer route for cyclists between Wincheap and
the rest of the city. Our efforts are now showing the signs of
fruition. A planning application (reference CA//07/01724) for these
new routes has recently been filed at Canterbury City Council, which
we encourage you to support by writing letters of approval. Letters
should be sent to:

Development Control

Military Road

Canterbury

CT1 1YW

Emails can also be sent to:

development.control@canterbury.gov.uk

with the subject line:

Comment on Planning Application CA//07/01724

If emailing, remember to include your postal address with your comments.

Your letters of support need to be received by Canterbury City Council
by Friday 18′th January.

The proposed riverside route between Chartham and Canterbury will
provide a safer and more pleasant route than the current one, which
shares part of the A28 and follows Cockering Road. The route is
planned to link up with the existing path of National Cycle Route 1
through the city via Whitehall Road.

The proposed link to Wincheap is via an existing tunnel under the
railway known as the “Horses & Goats” tunnel. This is situated behind
the gasometer on Wincheap Trading Estate. The proposed path will be
between the corner of Cotton Road and Jackson Road on the trading
estate, through the tunnel and out to the new housing development on
the site of the former telephone exchange. This will also link up with
the Chartham to Canterbury route described above.

Plans of the proposed routes can be seen via these links:

•  Chartham to Canterbury riverside walking and cycling route.
•  “Horses & Goats” tunnel to Wincheap.
•  Context of the proposed routes in the wider cycle network.

Thanks!

Gregory Williams

Rides Coordinator, Spokes

Kent ISoc with the help of FOSIS (The Federation of Student Islamic Societies) will be having the former Muslim chaplain of Guantanamo Bay, James Yusuf Yee come to the University of Kent to talk about the false accusations of spying and espionage made against him by the United States government after he voiced complaints about the treatment of prisoners. He will also be giving us a first hand insight into the mistreatment that the prisoners at Guantanamo face on a daily basis at the hands of US forces in the “War on Terror”.

The talk is entitled “Escape from Guantanamo”, it will be held in Keynes Lecture Theatre 1 from 7.30pm on the 30th of November. Yusuf would like to ask if people could make a donation, he would appreciate it immensely. He has gone through a very traumatic experience and has incurred a large amount of legal fees to clear his name, which he hopes this tour of Universities will help to cover, so please do donate if you can.

He has also published a book detailing his experiences at Guantanamo entitled “For God and Country”, which he will be willing to sign copies of after the talk. We will try to get some copies in to sell to anyone who is interested next week. We will confirm whether they will be available at a later stage.

Inspiration for this issue of Conscious Times came from the Burmese monks and pro-democracy activists who risked their lives to stand up and fight for change.

Political change beyond the ballot box can take many forms, so why do people feel powerless to make it happen? It’s true that ten people waving banners outside the offices of a multi-billion dollar corporation are unlikely to worry it. But is it that those ten are powerless, or just too few? What if there were a hundred, or a thousand? Enough to get media publicity already… Earlier this year I was camping outside Exxon Mobil’s headquarters in a twenty-four hour protest against the company’s spread of climate junk science which will affect us all. If one company’s practices affect 6 billion people, why can’t 6 billion peoples practices affect one company?

Why do we feel powerless in the face of hugely powerful global corporations? If their power comes from sales, then isn’t that power also ours? Collectively, consumers wield an almighty punch. Corporations just market products that people buy. Every time we buy their products, or refuse to, we send a message to the very top.

It’s true that everything you read here can be accused of being idealistic. But it cannot be branded impossible.

Tom Pursey

During the summer a friend of mine told me how he had read an article on Fairtrade. He said that the price hike paid by British consumers was far higher than the pay rise to the producer. Fair point, it’s true in some instances. However the rise in wages to farmers is only a small part of what Fairtrade means. Over the summer I was in East Africa and visited one of TeaDirect’s suppliers - Mabale tea co-operative in Uganda - to find out more about the process of Fairtrade beyond the fairer wage. Below are three key points about Fairtrade.

* For a company to get Fairtrade certification is an impressively strict process. First and foremost it must be a co-operative - meaning democracy, unionization - a voice for all workers. Some of the strict regulations regard issues such as financial transparency, health and safety, child and fair labour, discrimination, fair contracts and environmental protection.
* Another key feature of FT is the premium fund. In the Mombassa tea auction, Mabale will get a minimum (agreement set by the Fair Trade Foundation) of $1.65 per kg for their tea to be sold Fairtrade (world market prices in the summer were around $1.20. If the price for Fairtrade tea goes above $1.65 per kg then this surplus is called a Fairtrade Premium. At the moment Mabale has been getting around $1.85 per kilo from TeaDirect. So for every kg of tea sold at $1.85 in Mombassa, $0.20 will go into the Fairtrade Premium Fund that each co-operative manages. Over a period of time a sum of money will build up in the fund where the Fairtrade Premium Fund Committee at the factory will ten invest its sum into community projects. These projects don’t just benefit individual tea farmers, or their colleagues, they benefit whole communities. In Mabale the community have built roads, provide health care, immunization, HIV counseling, education, water sanitation and have built an entire mini village for the workers who live far away. Basic human needs!
* Lastly, on the global market prices for tea and similar commodities fluctuate between low and very low. Imagine being in the situation where you don’t know if you can get enough money to provide necessities for your children next month as the world market prices may have dropped again. As mentioned above, Fairtrade provides a minimum guaranteed price higher than the world market price. Stability is surely priceless.

Fairtrade is not charity. It is a viable alternative to unfair neo-liberal ‘free’ trade preached as the magical answer to all Third World woes. Fairtrade offers holistic social development.

Tom Pursey

In today’s world there are transnational corporations with more economic power than some countries, and international institutions that dictate policy to poor countries as if they were laboratories for new economic policies. Global elites lay down rules as if they were part of a game, one most of us will never understand, operating from glass-plated buildings most of us will never enter. The directors of multi-national corporations and international institutions wield ever more power; meanwhile, nationally elected representatives have less, impotent to govern the newly globalized world.

At the same time, resistance to globalization’s worst at the level of civil society has been fractured, bordered, less global.

Avaaz, meaning voice or song, is the poster child of a new type of activism for a new, global citizen. It allows global public opinion to be heard on the world stage using the most basic political action, a petition. On issues as wide ranging as climate change, Burma, Iraq, the Middle East and Darfur, Avaaz joins up the scattered dots of resistance by putting together petitions signed by millions of citizens. Although never be a replacement for local activism, the simple act of signing a petition enables us to join with literally millions of people across the globe and make our voice heard at the transnational level.

And it works. When the Foreign Secretary, David Milliband, gave his first Q&A session to Avaaz members, questions were collected over the Internet via the site. Petitions have been delivered to high levels of the UN, EU, the World Bank and government ministers. Global businesses and leaders cannot rely on badly organised or ill-informed civil society opposition any more. Avaaz, and other similar initiatives don’t take away from more traditional forms of activism. Instead they create a new space for action, for citizens to come together on a transnational level, vying with transnational corporations, international institutions and powerful governments, creating a new world super-power. Us.

Get active at www.avaaz.org
Jana Mills

John Katono was born in 1987 in Natete, central Uganda. He was deaf. His family could not afford to send him to a special school, so while his age-mates were in school he did odd jobs such as fetching water or wood for his family and neighbors to earn him a few coins.

In Uganda, neighbours can live very different lives, simply because of variations in wealth or background. Although in some parts of the country children receive government support, this does not include disability.

There are many children like Katono who get sidelined because of such disabilities. The Katono project was created to help individual children get some form of education or training in order to equip them to live as able individuals. The project is not only interested in children with disabilities but also in children who may simply come from extremely poor areas and disadvantaged backgrounds.

The Project is co-run by my mother and grandmother, Eva and Ruth Gashegu. They live in the same village as Katono, and could see that he was extremely bright. They began fundraising and looking for schools and institutes that could help him and children like him. The project only kicked off this summer. So far support has been found to sponsor Katono through a school for the deaf. The aim is to support another child though school.

Sadly, many people take education for granted. To be in the shoes of Katono, who sees it as a gift, offers a perspective that is shared by many, many more children, and highlights how lucky some of us have been. I am a Ugandan, as some of you reading this may be, that could have been anyone of us. Even those of you who are not from Uganda, it could have been us. Saying that out loud often makes me pause and just try to justify why it wasn’t. I never can.

Joanna Gara

This summer I joined a group of activists on the Gr8ChaosKaravaan, a journey by bicycle across Northern Europe. It began in Gent, Belgium on May 2nd and ended at Rostock. Thousands of protesters had there gathered for a week of action against the G8 summit that was held in the nearby resort of Heiligendamm.

Making the trip again, by coach and train now, after the trauma-like experiences and sensations of the ride, is like being under anaesthetic. Being a student at Kent seems like taking a numbing injection. Some of the riders kept going, on to Berlin, or down to the Ukraine for a No Borders camp. Some will not stop until the South China Sea, and others will not notice an end, and can’t remember the beginning. I admire them. They’re living in a reality more naked than anything most of us will experience, making a bid for total, ethical, freedom more profound than most of us imagine possible.

Very probably, only a few can succeed. The further they go chasing anarchist ideals, the more the possibilities thin out until each is alone, spinning on an ever thinner material existence, pedalling with their psychology. These guys can rest, being lucky westerners (across Europe are hundreds of activists locked up in asylum seeker detention centres for whom rest is a dream), and very probably most will use it.

They are political adventurers, voyagers to other possible worlds. Many of us, though, compromise, and need the anaesthetic against the incision of the mainstream. But eventually more of us may follow in their direction, if not exactly their route.

Mike Bover

Materials

* 1 reel of standard width electrical tape
* A 1 or 2 litre empty juice carton
* Stapler
* A reel of self adhesive Velcro
* Scissors

Method

1. Take the carton. Remove the top and bottom of the carton completely, cutting along the fold lines. You should be left with a flat rectangular carton open at both ends.
   
2. At the top end of the carton (nearest the logo) cut downwards EXACTLY along the fold lines at the four corners of the carton. The cut you make should be about 20% of the length of the cartoon overall. The cuts on each four corners should be exactly equal length.
   
   You can now cut away both side panels and the back, leaving a long flap at the front. You should be left with a flat rectangular carton open at both ends with the back and side panels 20% shorter than the front panel.
3. Take the electrical tape and start carefully applying it in long strips lengthways along the cut edges of the carton to stop fraying.
   
   Apply it so that the cut edges run down the middle of the tape so that when you fold the tape over the edges there be should an equal amount of electrical tape running along the inside and outside of the carton. Do this on all cut edges.
4. Now fold both of the (narrow) carton sides into the carton, but make sure there is no overlap. Now fold the whole thing across the middle so that the open ends meet each other BUT leaving the flap sticking out at the top. Now staple the inner part of the wallet together to stop it unfolding; this should keep it in the folded shape with two pockets to put things in.
   
   Cut a small section of self-adhesive Velcro about the size of a postage stamp and stick one side to the flap and the other side to the wallet, when you fold the flap over they should meet exactly and keep the wallet closed. For extra strength put a staple through the Velcro.

Watch out for a Blue Peter style video coming soon!

Patrick Clark