In May, in between the Diamond Jubilee, the Bank Holidays, and the wait for the weather to improve, thousands of shareholders are gathering for the Annual General Meetings of the big banks.

These AGMs are a great chance for us to get the word out: move your money, move it now, and bank on something better.

The AGM circus kicked off at Barclays, where Bob Diamond’s massive $17m pay package was voted through, despite huge public anger. And it’s not the only bank paying huge bonuses, regardless of failure or success. And it’s not the only bank that caused the financial crisis of 2008, for which we’re all paying. They’re all at it, and they won’t change.

Customers aren’t invited to the big bank AGMs. But we don’t need to be. Nothing will change, until we use the only power we have – to vote with our feet, and move our money. There are plenty of alternatives so there’s no excuse: institutions like credit unions, cooperatives, building societies and banks with ethical investment policies like Triodos and Charity Bank, provide current accounts and savings accounts.

Move Your Money launched in February, and we’ve had a huge response. As well as widespread media interest in the alternatives, THOUSANDS of us have moved our money.  As Ed Mayo, Director of Cooperatives UK said: “This is THE campaign of our time” – a campaign calling for ordinary people around the UK to take the important yet simple step of moving their money away from a banking sector that destroyed our economy and into banks that care about the kinds of things you care about.

In the next few weeks, two banks are holding their AGM in Edinburgh – Lloyds TSB, owners of Halifax and Bank of Scotland, and RBS, owners of Natwest. This is a brilliant opportunity to make the most of the press attention around the AGMs and make a big impact to spread the word. If you’re moving your money, come along to your (ex-) bank’s AGM in Edinburgh, ready to cut up your card. The more exposure we can get for people who are standing up to the big banks, the bigger impact we all can make for a better banking sector. Check out the Facebook event or contact Move Your Money UK to find out more.

Amongst other things, Aarhus requires that access to justice in environmental matters is not ‘prohibitively expensive’. PEOs are one way of tackling the issue in providing some certainty and clarity in relation to liability for costs from an early stage.

When Lord Gill published his review, not a single cost order had been granted by the Scottish courts. Friends of the Earth Scotland were refused our application for a PEO a year earlier in a judicial review of the Scottish Executive’s decision to proceed with the M74 extension against the recommendation of the Reporter, and that refusal was part of our decision to withdraw the case.

A few years down the line, two PEOs have been awarded, first in McGinty v Scottish Ministers at £30,000 next in Roadsense & Walton v Scottish Ministers at £40,000, and now the Government is consulting on rules. Progress at last it would seem.

Or not. The Scottish Government has repeatedly stated that it is in compliance with Aarhus on costs because of the availability of Protective Expense Orders and legal aid. This is in spite of the fact that the only two PEOs issued have done little to remove the risk of prohibitive expense in those cases nor to provide any certainty for potential future litigants. And, given that most environmental cases tend to have a broader public interest, it is virtually impossible to access legal aid to fight them because regulations strongly imply the need for a private interest and require that SLAB refuse legal aid if others might be affected by the case (and therefore reasonably expected to contribute towards the cost).

In correspondence with the Public Petitions Committee in January 2011 the Government held that it complies with Aarhus and ‘no legal challenge made on the grounds of non-compliance has been successful’. Which is not surprising, given how difficult it is to actually attempt a challenge.

Under pressure from our Petition to the Scottish Parliament on Aarhus compliance and European Commission infraction proceedings, the Government has at last issued these proposals.

However, while the UK Ministry of Justice and the Northern Ireland Department of Justice are consulting on proposals for Protective Cost Orders in all public interest environmental cases, the Scottish rules are wittingly limited to cases under the Public Participation Directive (PPD).

This means the proposals would not even apply to a case like McGinty v Scottish Ministers, where the petitioner sought to challenge the decision to include a new coal fired power station at Hunterston in the National Planning Framework without adequate consultation, under the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive.

Leaving aside the problematic scope, the proposals in themselves are very unlikely to put compliance with the PPD beyond doubt, so there is a very real risk of continued legal action from the EC.

Under these rules litigants would face a potential liability of at least £35,000 should they lose a case, a sum that undoubtedly remains prohibitively expensive for many communities, let alone individuals. The Government’s own research shows that less well off communities are more likely to suffer from the impacts of bad environmental decision making.

There is no rational for the presumed level of cap being set at £5,000 (other than that is what the England and Wales propose), and the inclusion of an explicit cross cap means that individuals face the possibility of forking out tens of thousands of pounds even on winning a case.

Therefore, it is hard to accept the Government’s claim to take its broader obligations under Aarhus seriously. In particular the implication that the Taylor Review – which has no specific remit or expertise in this area – will sort out the rest of Aarhus related cost issues, appears to be deliberately misleading.

However, there is a small glimmer of hope in the SNP’s manifesto commitment to look into establishing environmental tribunals.

Aarhus requires the state to provide a more level playing field for individuals against public authorities or developers, often experienced repeat litigants with in-house (or money to pay for) legal representation. Aarhus also actively places a duty on citizens to “protect and improve the environment for the benefit of the present and future generations”. This is illustrative of the wider policy issues that drive environmental law and set it apart from other areas of public law, and explains why the Government is obliged to improve access to justice in this area.

With climate change now widely recognised as one of the most serious threats to humankind it is clear that the importance of decisions affecting our environment merit greater investment in systems of participation and review. The requirement for Scotland to comply with the Aarhus Convention offers the chance to rationalize and simplify recourse to justice in the complex framework of environmental legislation, and create world-class access to environmental justice to match our world class Climate Act.

Take action

Respond to the consultation by taking our e-action here. It only takes a minute!

Beth Stratford preparing for the move to a better bank.

Today is the first day of Move Your Money Month, during which thousands of people will be moving their money out of the big banks like RBS, Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds and Santander and into mutually owned, community-focused or ethically minded banks.

Research by Banktrack has shown that UK banks – including those which are now partly or wholly owned by the taxpayer – are among some of the biggest financers of climate change.  Since 2005, for example, Barclays, RBS and HSBC have between them pumped £27 billion of funding into the coal industry.

This is precisely the sort of financing which is locking us into long term dependence on fossil fuels (and helping to perpetuate human and labour rights abuses in coal extraction industries around the world).  If all coal-fired power plants which are scheduled to be built in the next 25 years come into operation, their lifetime CO2 emissions would be equal to those of all coal-burning activities since the beginning of industrialisation.

The good news is that if this is not the sort of thing you want your bank to be funding, there are other options. The Move Your Money website provides information on a wide range of alternative and more ethical financial providers, from well known names like Nationwide and the Co-operative Bank through to local credit unions and community development finance institutions.

They explain “Move Your Money isn’t about ‘bringing down’ the big banks (they can do that just fine by themselves, thankyou). This is about strengthening the alternatives and creating a more diverse system that works in the interest of wider society.”

What else can I do?

Moving your own money into a more ethical institution is a great start.  But what can we do to ensure that all banks behave more responsibly? How can we avoid future banking crises for which ordinary people have to pick up the tab?  How do we get banks supporting real local economies, instead of pumping money into speculative bubbles and environmentally destructive industries?

These are questions that economists and campaigners from across the UK will be gathering in Edinburgh to address at the Just Banking conference on April 19th and 20th.

Come and be part of the discussion.  Tickets are going fast so book now: www.justbanking.org.uk

Last Saturday we paid a visit to the people of Rosyth, Fife, and had a chat with them about one of Forth Energy’s proposed biomass powered plants which is planned to be built near the town’s port. Sheila Duffy, concerned resident of Rosyth and Friends of the Earth Scotland activist, invited us along to help her raise awareness.

Our purpose was to first of all inform people about the negative implications of the project, and second of all to encourage them to take action and write to their MSPs about the issue to persuade them to discuss it in Parliament. We came prepared with a letter addressed to the local MSPs, outlining the reasons why the project should be opposed: air pollution, threat on human health, climate change, global deforestation and the insignificant number of promised work opportunities.

It was a pretty cold day but luckily it was sunny enough to keep us focused on what we set out to do. We approach around 100 people and got 36 letters signed.

Local interest

Personally, I was surprised to find that most of the people in Rosyth had no idea there could be a biomass powered plant built just hundreds of yards away from their doorstep. However, the majority appeared interested in the matter and expressed their disagreement with Forth Energy’s polluting plan. Others were skeptical or needed to look deeper into the matter. We met a few that were in favour of the project, but only because it would bring lots of job opportunities for Rosyth. We tried to make them see the downside of the situation by referring to the impacts on the natural environment and on their own personal health and we hope we made them think again.

We will shortly send out the signed letters and we hope the members of the Scottish Parliament will realise the project’s flaws and call on Fergus Ewing to reject it, along with the other similar proposals in Grangemouth, Leith, and Dundee.

What you can do

Write to your MSP

Donate to our biomass campaign

But – take heed, readers, and take action: big biomass in Scotland a far cry from this romantic ideal. It is simply riding on the ‘clean and green’ image to try and attract heavy subsidies for renewable energy, which are currently up for review. Please get in touch with the Scottish Government soon to call for it to stop putting our money into this false solution.

Here are five myths about biomass that the Friends of the Earth Scotland team is working to dispell:

1. Biomass saves carbon dioxide emissions

Companies and governments who state that biomass produces less carbon dioxide than fossil fuels are doing their sums rather sneakily. They are conveniently failing to count a number of carbon inputs into the lifecycle of biomass from tree to smoke, including the emissions that occur from transporting the biomass around the world.

2. Biomass is efficient

Biomass power stations are around 25-30% efficient, with most of the energy lost as heat. This means that for every four trees burned, three are effectively ‘sacrificed’ in a cloud of smoke. Many argue that it would be better to make use of the heat produced by biomass power stations in what is known as ‘Combined Heat & Power’ (CHP) power stations. This is true – but unfortunately, companies are now trying to brand themselves as green by harnessing very minimal amounts of heat. To qualify as ‘CHP’ power stations, companies only have to achieve 35% efficiency levels.

3. Biomass is ‘sustainable’

The UK’s demand for bioenergy (biomass and liquid biofuels) is seeing large areas of land in the Global South bought up for profit. This is having an impact on people’s right to their land and to their food sovereignty. In fact, the UN has named the UK as the world’s third largest land grabbing country after China and Saudi Arabia! Biomass coming into Scotland will soon have to meet ‘sustainability criteria’ – but shockingly, the respect for human rights when harvesting biomass is not one of these criteria.

4. Biomass is forest-friendly

The world’s forests are dwindling year on year due to pressures from the paper and construction industries. Burning wood for energy adds a massive additional strain on global forests. If finance for biomass continues, the UK would need a whopping 60m tonnes of the stuff each year. Could we supply this from waste wood? The short answer is no – there are only 4.5m tonnes of waste wood being produced in the UK, which should arguably be recycled rather than being burned..

5. Biomass is clean

Burning biomass can produce toxic pollution, putting the public’s health at grave risk. Several areas within the UK are already in breach of EU recommended ‘safe’ standards for air pollution, including Dundee, Leith, and Grangemouth – where Forth Energy proposes to put its power stations.

The most sinister thing about biomass is that it is increasingly touted as the clean and green way that we can meet our renewable energy targets. We have plenty of potential for  true renewables like wind, wave, tidal, and solar in Scotland. Let’s make sure that by tackling climate change through renewables, we are doing people and planet a favour – not the opposite.

The Japanese earthquake and tsunami in March was followed by one of the worst nuclear disasters ever, when three reactors at the Fukushima nuclear plant went into meltdown. We are still unsure of the human, economic and ecological costs of Fukushima, but it’s already cost $210bn. At least this major disaster was a wake-up call or an expensive reminder to us all that nuclear energy isn’t the answer. Germany promptly brought forward their phasing out of nuclear power stations to 2022. Italy voted against new nuclear reactors, and the Swiss cabinet called for decommissioning the country’s nuclear reactors. One of our wishes for the New Year wishes is to see the Scottish and UK Governments follow suit by decommissioning Scotland’s nuclear reactors as quickly as possible, and dumping plans to build eight new reactors respectively.

So, if anything good has come out of 2011 it is the raised awareness of the need to invest in renewables. But even with a projected doubling of investment in renewable energy by 2020, it still won’t enough to get our emissions down to control climate change. In November, the International Energy Agency warned that the world is heading straight for “irreversible climate change” if action isn’t taken in the next five years.

This was the bleak outlook facing COP17, UN’s climate summit taking place in Durban, South Africa, in early December. Only the most optimistic soul could regard the Durban outcome as anything else than a setback. While the summit managed not to kill of the Kyoto protocol and avoid a total split between the rich carbon emitting countries and the poorer developing countries, the outcome was merely an agreement to work towards emissions cuts in the future. How many times have we heard that promise?

Sadly, it seems that Governments will spare no effort to bail out failing banks and rescue economies, but ignore the peril that the planet is in. Nnimmo Bassey, Chair of Friends of the Earth International, put it this way: “Without much stronger commitments for the next 5-10 years the Durban outcome will stay nothing more than smoke and mirrors – an illusion of ambition with no real targets or clear timelines.”

Closer to home for Friends of the Earth Scotland we saw a massive oil spill in the North Sea from the Shell Gannet Alpha platform about 180 km from Aberdeen. Shell held back information and underplayed the severity of the spill to the public until it became clear that this wouldn’t disappear by itself. We also spent a lot of time campaigning against the Royal Bank of Scotland, who, despite making a great effort of its green credentials in PR exercises and marketing, continue to fund climate wrecking developments around the world. In 2011 we learnt that RBS ranks seventh in the world when it comes to financing the global coal industry. We also fought for environmental justice, and successfully intervened in the UK supreme court that lead to a change in Scots law on who has the right to have a case heard in court and will allow organisations like ours to take cases in the public or wider interest.

Thank you for your support in 2011, and we look forwards to working for and with you in 2012. Happy New Year!

The Kyoto Protocol is still alive after Durban, but it isn’t well. Kyoto is the only existing international framework for legally-binding emissions reductions by rich industrialised countries, and has emerged significantly weakened from the Durban talks. The second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol has still not been formally agreed and would only cover the European Union and a handful of other developed countries.

Nnimmo Bassey, Chair of Friends of the Earth International, said: ”Developed countries, led by the United States, accelerated the demolition of the world’s international framework for fair and urgent climate action.  And developing countries have been bullied and forced into accepting an agreement that could be a suicide pill for the world.

“From the Horn of Africa to Thailand to Venezuela to the small island state of Tuvalu, hundreds of millions of people are bearing the brunt of the climate crisis they did not create.  The lack of progress in Durban means that we are even closer to a future  catastrophic four to six degrees Celsius of warming, which would condemn most of Africa and the small island states to climate catastrophe and devastate the lives and livelihoods of many millions more around the world.”

What we urgently needed from the climate talk was keeping the Kyoto Protocol alive by agreeing to a second commitment period. We needed sufficient targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. We needed a shift of the burden of climate action away from developing countries who are the least responsible for causing climate change. We needed a funded Green Climate Fund to help finance climate action in developing countries.

What we got was none of those. Bobby Peek of groundWork / Friends of the Earth South Africa described what we got instead:

“Developed country governments have connived to weaken the rules that require their countries to act on climate whilst strengthening the rules that allow their corporations to profit from the crisis.

“After bailing out the banks, rich countries at the climate talks refused to commit a single new dollar for climate finance for developing countries.  They insisted on allowing multinational corporations and global financial elites to directly access the Green Climate Fund, and pushed through the opening up of further possibilities for speculation via the dangerous carbon market bubble.  It is clear in whose interests this deal has been advanced, and it isn’t the 99% of people around the world.”

What you can do

News has reached us that RBS isn’t sponsoring the 2012 Climate Week, due to take place in March. RBS was a controversial sponsor of last year’s event, which many saw as an opportunity for the bank to gain some ill-deserved environmental credentials in the face of public criticism over its appalling record of fossil fuel finance.

Working with allies like People & Planet, WDM Scotland, Friends of the Earth Scotland and UK Tar Sands Network, we published a report at the start of last year’s Climate Week called Dirty Money – Corporate greenwash and RBS coal finance that highlighted the tension between RBS’ coal finance and its attempts at climate credibility.

The organisers of the event were embarrassed by headlines in the newspapers like Green groups boycott Climate Week over RBS and a number of high profile figures such as Alastair Mcgowan and Iain Banks signed a letter in the papers that flagged up RBS’ record in providing coal and tar sands-related finance. We coordinated a letter that was sent to all the hundreds of different groups signed up to take part in the event, and people who turned up for the Climate Week awards in Central London had to get past a throng of climate change protesters.

It’s a great result. Firstly, it prevents RBS from fending off mounting public pressure over its climate-trashing finance portfolio by saying, “how can we be the climate bad guys – we’re sponsoring Climate Week?” Secondly, it sends out a broader message to the organisers of such events that you shouldn’t undermine the efforts of campaigners and activists on particular corporations and issues by lining them up as sponsors for events that allow them to get PR credibility without addressing any of the more fundamental complaints against them. Is the sponsorship cash worth it when the coverage you get is more about the controversies than the event itself?

Its interesting to speculate on just who dumped who in this particular relationship. Did Climate Week-head Kevin Steele (who used to be head of People & Planet – one of the organisations protesting against it) decide that they could do without the bad publicity, or did RBS realise that they weren’t going to be able to get away with this sort of outrageous greenwash. Its important to note that although RBS are no longer involved, there are still some seriously iffy corporates involved, in particular EDF, who were recently convicted of carrying out industrial espionage on Greenpeace and are heavily involved in both coal and nuclear power.

The point of the campaign, of course, isn’t to prevent greenwash from taking place, its to divert the flow of investment away from dirty energy. But part of this is about trying to fight “the battle of the story” -  and its worth engaging with precisely because companies like RBS think its worth their time and money to construct their public image in this way. There are obvious parallels with another current stream of Platform work looking at the issue of oil sponsorship of the arts, in particular Tate’s 20 year plus relationship with BP.

Just next we are bringing out a new publication, Not if but when – Culture Beyond Oil that goes into the arguments in greater depth. Breaking the sponsorship link between Tate and BP will not alone prevent the devastating tar sands projects being inflicted across the Northern wildernesses of Canada. But by creating and informing a public debate that questions the legitimacy of these companies in being associated with respectable cultural institutions or environmental events, we can strengthen attempts to hold them accountable in other political and financial spheres.

The Hunterston case was brought by Marco McGinty, a bird-watcher from Largs who visits the site on an almost daily basis.  With the support from a number of NGOs, including Friends of the Earth Scotland, the local community and a solicitor called Frances McCArtney, Marco lodged a judicial review in September 2009 against the Scottish Government over the inclusion of Hunterston in the second National Planning Framework.

Last month, Lord Brailsford ruled against Marco McGinty. The case raises serious questions, not just with the Hunterston application, but with Scotland’s planning and justice system more generally.

Costs

The first is the sheer cost of taking forward a judicial review. Although he was unemployed at the time, Marco was refused legal aid. In addition, in Scotland the loser pays principle applies so you have to raise not only your own fees but those of the other side.  Despite being granted Scotland’s first ever protective expenses order, where the costs for the other sides fees were capped, the cap itself was set at £30.000. This meant having to raise his own fees plus £30.000 of the government’s fees.  In total he managed to raise about £80.000. Put simply, without the huge financial and kind support from a range of outside parties, it wouldn’t have been possible to take the case.

Standing

The second major problem, and one of the points on which Marco lost, was that of ‘title and interest’. In essence, since a 1915 ruling and until very recently, Scots law has been based on private property concepts and the need to demonstrate a legal relation. Because Marco lived five miles from the site and used it for recreational purposes the Judge ruled he didn’t have ‘a real and legitimate’ or ‘real and practical’ interest in bringing the case.

Mora

The third issue, and the other point on which Marco lost, was through a legal term called Mora.  In essence the Judge ruled that Marco had brought the petition too late and ought to have been aware of the National Planning Framework 2 in September 2008. He actually wasn’t aware of the development until a public meeting in July 2009. More specifically, he should have been aware of the document where Hunterston first appeared, entitled: “National Planning Framework 2: SEA (Strategic Environmental Assessment) Supplementary Assessment of the environmental effect of candidate national developments; Environmental Report, annex 2: Consultation Paper.” This paper wasn’t advertised anywhere in the local area and attracted only 26 responses.  For me, this issue boils down to that of consultation and where you put the blame. Do you place it on public authorities for failing to consult or do you put it on membes of the public for failing to know about matters affecting them?

Implications

So what next? An appeal has been lodged and is on hold awaiting an application for legal aid.  This could take some time. Promisingly since the judgement was made, Scots law has changed with regards to title and interest. This follows a Supreme Court judgement whereby, following a written intervention by Friends of the Earth Scotland, Lord Reed ruled that title and interest was rooted in private law concepts, which was having a damaging effect on public law in Scotland, and should be replaced with a broader understanding based around sufficient interest.

There are other things moving particularly in relation to costs including various government consultations and the European Court of Justice infractions against the UK Government’s compliance.

Better access to justice isn’t simply about opening up the floodgates and letting anyone and everyone object. Practice from other jurisdictions suggest that isn’t the case. It is about providing a credible threat of legal action if public authorities or developers don’t consult properly.  Better access to justice should mean better consultation.