Nottingham protest against cut to Educational Maintenance Allowance [plus link to Central TV video] – and update about next demo on Saturday 15th.

Nottingham students against fees and cuts inside Vodaphone during EMA protest on 11th Jan 2011
Nottingham students against fees and cuts inside Vodaphone during EMA protest on 11th Jan 2011

Update 13/1/11 – another EMA demonstration is going ahead Saturday – Market Square at 12 noon until 2pm : http://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=119710288094364

See inspiring photos from todays protest against the cut to Educational Maintenance Allowance that will affect 16-18 year olds, that can be found on the Nottingham Students Against Fees and Cuts (NSAFC) website: http://nsafc.wordpress.com/2011/01/11/ema-demo/.

The protest was supported by university students and also focused on the increase of fees to £9000 a year due to begin 2012 that was passed in the House of Lords in December.

More photos can be found on Nottingham Indymedia: http://nottingham.indymedia.org.uk/articles/875

Central TV footage: http://www.itv.com/central-east/student-protests98684/

Also today, the courts jailed Edward Woollard, the 18 year old student who dropped a fire extinguisher from the roof of the Tory HQ, for 32 months for the public order offence of ‘Violent Disorder’: http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2011/01/471869.html. Many other cases are due from the same day. For their support see Stop the hunt on the Millbank protestors (Facebook) and We need unity – defend the Millbank protestors. Also (support statement immediately after protest): Sign this statement to stand with the Millbank protesters against victimisation!

Clearly if you are going down to the next demo it’s a good idea to have some legal knowledge. If you don’t have local legal support on your coach, the ‘Bust Card’ of the Legal Defence and Monitoring Group in London is a very good resource worth taking with you. LDMG are very experienced with police repression, coming as they did out of the anti-Poll Tax ‘Trafalgar Square Defence Campaign’, whose http://www.ldmg.org.uk/ members of have recently supported the anti-fees demos and occupations.

PRESS RELEASE – Notts SOS ‘Combating the Cuts: Planning for Action’ conference on Saturday 15th January 2011

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 11/01/11

COMBATING THE CUTS: PLANNING FOR ACTION

The anti-public spending cuts campaign, Notts Save Our Services, is holding a one day event on Saturday, 15th. January at Dunkirk and Old Lenton Community Centre. We are bringing together a wide range of providers and users of vital services. The aim is to develop effective, challenging ways of opposing and obstructing the Coalition Government’s assault upon both the public and voluntary sectors.

Brainstorming groups will focus on areas such as local government, education, benefits/pensions, health services, military spending, etc.. The conference runs from 10.30 to 16.00 with food and refreshments available. All opponents of the public spending cuts are welcome and further details are available on our website https://nottssos.org.uk

For more information contact Ross Longhurst on 0115 837 7937.

Additional info for participants – please follow this link: http://wp.me/p15Eeo-gx

Notts Cuts Watch #12 and Diary Dates for weeks beginning 10th & 17th Jan 2011

New year, new cuts. After an unplanned two week break, Notts Cuts Watch is back with a rundown of the cuts and resistance in Nottinghamshire since Christmas. Read Notts Cuts Watch #12 (covering last week Jan 3th-9th 2011): http://nottingham.indymedia.org.uk/articles/859

Here are forthcoming events this week and next – follow links for details:

Monday 10th Jan – the first Notts SOS meeting of the year, at the ICC/YMCA. All welcome. Full venue details.

Tuesday 11th Jan – Nottingham protest against the cut of Educational Support Allowance.

Tuesday 11th Jan – Anarchists Against the Cuts meeting.

Saturday 15th Jan – COMBATING THE CUTS: PLANNING FOR ACTION! – come to the first Notts SOS conference & get involved!

Tuesday 18th January – Mansfield Notts SOS group next meets at 7pm on Tuesday 18th January at the Gas Club, off Lime Tree Place (At the bottom of Ratcliffe Gate). Mansfield Group of Notts SOS are planning a demonstration against the cuts in Mansfield in Mid February – more information soon. Come along if you want to help organise and build for a demo in Mansfield to fight the cuts.

Thursday 20th Jan – Beeston & Chilwell Defend Library Services meeting.

Thursday 20th Jan – Save Gedling School – Phoenix pub at 6.30. The fight to save Gedling school continues.

Thursday 20th Jan – Racism, Cuts and the Right – Nottingham Unity meeting.

Forests and allotments – selling ’em off or raising prices in Nottingham and Notts

National Forests, including Sherwood Forest in Notts and allotments across Nottingham City are one very vunerable focus of national government and local authority plans to ‘reduce the deficit’ by either privatising assets or making us pay vastly more to use them.

Last week it was highlighted in the press that Sherwood Forest in Notts is to be included in the sell off of Forestry Commission land as part of the forthcoming Public Bodies Bill – there have been previous reports but the Bill is due in parliament within the next few weeks. National campaigning exists http://www.38degrees.org.uk/page/content/save-our-forests-campaign and especially in Gloucestershire about the Forest of Dean seel off, but a vibrant local campaign will be needed here to stop Sherwood Forest being sold off. A national protest rally was held earlier in the month with more than 3,000 people and a petition of over 110,000 pledging to defend “the people’s” trees from what is likely to be a corporate land grab:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jan/03/forest-of-dean-protesters-woodland. What more can be done here in Nottingham and Notts?

Furthermore Nottingham City Council is holding a consultation of changes to allotment tenancies, rent levels and plot allocation. They claim that the review “aims to encourage more people to get involved with growing food in Nottingham.” In fact, the changes would involve the trebling of rents for allotments in Nottingham. More details on Nottingham Indymedia: http://nottingham.indymedia.org.uk/articles/854
 and http://nottingham.indymedia.org.uk/articles/889

Save Our Forests Campaign – want to get involved?

The government is planning a massive sell off of our national forests. They could be auctioned and fenced off, run down, logged or turned into golf courses and holiday villages.

We can’t let that happen. We need to stop these plans now. National treasures like The Forest of Dean, Sherwood Forest and The New Forest could be sold off. Once they are gone, they will be lost forever.

There has been significant media coverage of the risks to the public forests and a huge “Save Our Forests” petition at www.38degrees.org.uk/save-our-forests has attracted nearly 130,000 signatures and is growing all the time – please sign it.

Local campaigns have also been set up to fight the sell off in Cannock Chase and the Forest of Dean; but there isn’t much time. The Public Bodies Bill, the legislation that will enable this to happen, is due in parliament in the coming weeks.

Please contact us if you want to get involved in a Save Sherwood Forest Campaign and let us have your ideas about what we can do. You can also visit the Facebook group site: Save Sherwood Forest !!! ( FoSF ). Also on Facebook: What is the issue about the forest sell off — what is happening and why does it matter? And who cares?

More background info from Climate Alliance…

Public Bodies Bill
The Public Bodies bill, of which the ‘modernisation of forestry legislation’ is a part of, is going through the House of Lords at the moment and will then move to the Commons. So anyone who is in contact with their MP or wants to be on this issue, has time to call or write to your MP and raise your concerns/opposition/request for amendments to the bill. The link below takes you to the status of the bill & a short explanation of it, plus you can sign up to email updates which alert you whenever there’s progress/activity on the bill.
http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2010-11/publicbodieshl.html

Natural Environment White paper
This white paper is still open to to grassroots consultation, responses can be submitted until the end of January.
http://ww2.defra.gov.uk/environment/natural/whitepaper/

Parliament briefing updated 23rd Nov 2010: The Forestry Commission and the sale of public forests in England
http://www.parliament.uk/briefingpapers/commons/lib/research/briefings/SNSC-05734.pdfThis document provides historical & current background info on the sale of the public forest estate, plus a number of other links to info sources.

Forestry in England: A new strategic approach (apparently!)
http://ww2.defra.gov.uk/news/2010/10/29/forestry/
Letter to MPs from DEFRA to clarify position on public forest sale.

Forestry commission: Modernising forestry legislation
http://www.forestry.gov.uk/forestry/INFD-7T9B67
The Forestry Commission’s position on the government proposals

More general comment & analysis

London School of Economics – Detrimental consequences of sell-off:
http://tiny.cc/ybm2g

Jonathon Porritt blog:
http://www.jonathonporritt.com/pages/2010/11/forests_on_the_front_line.html

Tax Breaks on forestry investment:

http://www.moneyobserver.com/issue/features/pros-and-cons-forestry-investing

http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2011/01/07/forestry-commission-sale-is-a-massive-tax-planning-bonanza-for-the-rich/

http://www.stepjournal.org/journal_archive/2010/step_journal_april_2010/top_tips.aspx

“It takes the biscuit” – local action against VAT increase on 3rd Jan 2011

A digestive biscuitOn Monday 3rd January 2011 a group of activists gave out biscuits and leaflets in Nottingham and launched a website Takes the biscuit saying,

VAT
Value Added Tax (VAT) is a particularly unfair form of taxation. Poor people pay more as a percentage of their income than the rich.

VAT Increase
On Tuesday January 4th, the VAT rate goes up to 20%. This is part of the coalition government’s “deficit reduction” plans and was announced in George Osborne’s “emergency budget.”

Broken Promises
Nobody voted for an increase in VAT. During campaigning before the General Election, David Cameron said, “We have absolutely no plans to raise VAT.” The LibDems actively campaigned against a VAT increase, accusing the Tories of hiding a secret “VAT Bombshell.”

The Cuts
“The cuts” are a way of making ordinary people pay for the economic crisis caused by the bankers. When the banks got into difficulty, the British state stepped in to prop them up, but at huge cost. In order to make up this money, the government is now attempting to pass this cost onto ordinary people by cutting services, laying-off staff, increasing charges, inflating tuition fees and raising VAT.

Not Necessary
We believe that these cuts are unnecessary an attack on our communities. In fact some leading mainstream economists agree including the Guardian’s Larry Elliott and Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz who have both warned that the severity of cuts being pushed by the coalition could kill off the economic recovery and push us back into a recession.

Government of Millionaires
The current government is made up of millionaires and public schoolboys who don’t understand the lives of ordinary people. When the new cabinet was announced in May, it emerged that 18 of the 23 full-time cabinet members were millionaires.

The Chancellor George Osborne is a prime example. Born Gideon Oliver Osborne, he is a former public schoolboy, attended Oxford, stands to inherit the Baronetcy of Osborne and is worth an estimated £4million.

Fighting Back
We have seen groups emerging across the country to resist the cuts. In Nottingham, Notts Save Our Services has been launched to try and coordinate local campaigns. By linking up the cuts against different cuts (to education, health, welfare, social care and much more) we can put more pressure on the government than we could working separately. The campaign to reduce (and perhaps ultimately abolish) VAT is another strand of this campaign.

Biscuits
The biscuit theme was intended as a way of making a fairly boring issue (VAT) at least vaguely interesting.

We chose biscuits because of the bizarre laws which mean that biscuits are subject to VAT, but cakes are not. In a relatively well-known case, McVities went to court in order to prove that Jaffa Cakes were indeed cakes and hence exempt.

Fighting Academies in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire – Broxtowe meeting Thursday 6 January 2011

Broxtowe Anti Academies Alliance is meeting in Beeston tomorrow night (Thursday 6 January 2011) at 8pm.

The Alliance was set up by a group of parents, teachers and school governors last year in opposition to George Spencer School becoming an academy and we have continued to campaign locally. A second Anti Academies Alliance has recently started up in Rushcliffe, but as far as we are aware, these are the only active campaigns (outside the teaching unions) in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire.

If anyone is interested in setting up an anti academy campaign in the city or county and wants to come along to our meeting to discuss how we can support you, please email broxtowe [at] antiacademies.org.uk and we can let you know the venue of the meeting.

Contact: Andrea Oates, Broxtowe Anti Academies Alliance, Email: broxtowe [at] antiacademies.org.uk

Also – according to Executive board minutes 21 December.Nottingham City Council is looking at Northgate Primary and nursery school joining up with Djanogly as a 3-19 years academy.

Say No to Fire Cuts – Save Carlton’s Firefighters

Government budget cutbacks to Nottinghamshire Fire & Rescue could have devastating consequences for residents of Carlton, Netherfield, Colwick and surrounding districts if plans go ahead to remove one of two Fire Engines and the loss of more than 20 Firefighter jobs from the just-completed £3.5m Fire Station at Carlton.

A website and FaceBook group has been set up to highlight these cuts to local fire cover and to highlight the strength of public feeling against these measures.

See the website at http://www.savecarltonretained.co.uk for more information on the forthcoming campaign and sign the petition today!

Please pass on this FaceBook group to anyone in the area today. Your help is urgently required!

“Say No to Fire Cuts and Support your local Firefighters”

Notts Cuts Watch #11 [plus videos of recent Anti Cuts, Corporate Tax & Student Fees demos]

Notts Cuts Watch #11, from Notts Indymedia, covers cuts and anti-cuts news in the period from Monday 20th until Sunday 26th December 2010.

Even as Christmas approached, the cutting of public services in Nottinghamshire continued. The festivities have taken the sails out of the resistance to these attacks, but I’m sure it will be back with a vengeance in the new year. (On which note, make sure you put the Combating the Cuts event on January 15th in your diary.) Until then, why not spend some of the post-Christmas lull reading up on exactly what’s being cut? Knowledge is power and all that.

Continues here: http://nottingham.indymedia.org.uk/articles/831

Also on Notts Indymedia, a video of our recent Anti Cuts, Corporate Tax & Student Fees demo involving a walk-through of Boots:
http://nottingham.indymedia.org.uk/videos/832

More Nottingham video here from demos on the 18th Dec 2010: http://ukuncut.org.uk/actions/149

Skip to content