The government launched its “consultation” today on how to privatise England’s forests. Here are a few first thoughts:

Photograph by Ivan Dervisevic

- The Public Bodies Bill is currently in the House of Lords and its current wording gives the government powers to sell off up to 100% of the English forests without any further involvement from Parliament.

- Even if this government is stopped from selling-off the forests this time, the Bill would allow any future government to do it at any time. Can we really trust every government in coming years to keep that promise?

The fact that the government is now going into spin overdrive, offering warm words, spin, and a few genuine concessions, shows that our campaign is beginning to work.

- So that proves we need to keep going – if even more of us get involved, we can win!

- The more of us that get involved in the campaign, the better the chances that we keep our precious forests safe for future generations.

Photograph by Chalkie_CC (Flickr)

- It’s good news that it looks like the government has made the concession of saying a small amount of the Public Forest Estate will at least not be sold off to private owners. But the reason so many of us have got involved in this campaign is because having 600,000 acres of publicly owned woodland all across England is a precious thing – we want to see all of that protected, not just a few famous sites while the rest is sold off.

- The best way to protect all our forests is to keep them in public hands — that’s why we will keep campaigning.

The public wants our forests kept in public hands for future generations – yet the government is only asking for our views on how to privatise it.

- The opinion poll last weekend, which 38 Degrees members clubbed together to pay for, showed that 84% of the public want the forest kept in public hands – so why isn’t the government offering this as an option?

- 1/4 million people from all around the UK have signed a petition against the forests being sold off.

- The government is pushing through changes to the law to enable privatisation, and has already embarked on selling off 15% of our woods.

If you haven’t yet passed on the petition to your friends and family, please help to spread the word and be part of the campaign to save our forests. Together, we’re going to keep the pressure up with rallies, letters to MPs, adverts and local meetings until the government abandons their plans and agree to keep our forests safe in public ownership.

Please share your comments/ideas below.

38 Degrees’ campaign against the proposed sell off of English forests is getting bigger and stronger. Together we are building a huge petition and coming up with other ideas to stop this proposal becoming reality.

There are now local campaigns springing up all around the county like Hands Off Our Forest (HOOF – a campaign to keep the Forest of Dean in public ownership),  the Save the Sherwood Forest campaign and the Save Haldon Forest group. We’ve invited the newest, the Save the Lake District forest group, to share why they think its so important to stop the sell off of English forests. Their blog is below:

Last week we launched a new campaign to Save the Lake District’s Forests from the threat of being sold off by the Government.

The campaign is being organised by Paul Townsend, a former parish councilor, who lives at Satterthwaite near Grizedale.  He says: “If the Government goes ahead with these plans we won’t have the same kind of access to these forests that we enjoy today. New owners wouldn’t have to allow entry to mountain bikers or horse riders and they’d be able to put up fences and close car parks to make it more difficult for walkers to gain access.

“The Forestry Commission does a lot of work to maintain and improve habitats for a wide range of different species – including ospreys, red squirrels and red kites.  A new owner wouldn’t  have an obligation to continue this valuable work.”

Lord Clark of Windermere, a former Chairman of the Forestry Commission who now chairs the All Party Group on Forestry, is backing the campaign.  He says: “I do not believe any Government has the right to sell off our public forests.  We hold these magnificent green spaces in trust for our children.  Once they’ve gone we will not get them back.”

To find out more and get involved go to: www.savelakelandsforests.org.uk

Photograph by 38 Degrees

Wow what a delivery! 38 Degrees’ petition to stop Nocton mega-dairy was today delivered to the local Council. The 53,223 member voices were causing quite a stir. Press were buzzing around outside the front of the Council building at 1:30pm. BBC Look North, Lincolnshire Echo and Lincs FM were all keen to get their own story of the delivery.

Photograph by 38 Degrees

Members and supporters of the mega-dairy petition turned out in force as well. Which was great! We all found ourselves being jostled around by various camera crews, photographers and radio stations.The hand over itself took place inside the Council building to members of the planning department.

Photograph by 38 Degrees

The size of the petition and the press interest today has really turned up the heat on the Council who must be really feeling the pressure. Not rejecting these cow factory farm plans against such strong opposition will be very hard. The petition has a massive number of signatures, but is this just the tip of the iceberg? How many more people heard about these plans via the radio on their way home from work or saw it on the News this afternoon whilst having lunch?

Have you heard any coverage on the new or radio today? It’d be great to hear your thoughts, you can easily leave comment below.

The rest of the pictures will be uploaded onto the 38 Degrees flickr page soon. Here is the press coverage:

http://www.thisislincolnshire.co.uk/news/Super-dairy-consultation-period-comes-close/article-3089813-detail/article.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-12162701

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jan/11/lincolnshire-mega-dairy?CMP=twt_fd

http://www.lincsfm.co.uk/pages/landing?66000-Sign-Petition-Against-Nocton-Super=1&blockID=388917&feedID=4105

http://www.fwi.co.uk/Articles/2011/01/10/124993/Avalanche-of-objections-to-Lincolnshire-super-dairy.htm

http://www.thisisbusiness-eastmidlands.co.uk/foodandbeverage/64-031-signatures-super-dairy/article-3080075-detail/article.html

http://www.farmersguardian.com/home/hot-topics/super-dairies/thousands-oppose-lincs-super-dairy/36425.article

http://www.caffo.co.uk/

Tomorrow is a big day for the “stop Nocton mega-dairy campaign” . It’s the last day of the planning consultation on plans to build the UK’s first cow factory farm.

Since the campaign launched tens of thousands of 38 Degrees members have worked together to persuade one company to drop out and raised enough money, from all of us chipping in, to put ads in the local paper piling pressure on the companies that are still backing the plans for the mega-dairy.

Photograph by Dirk-Jan Kraan (Flickr)

The petition now has over 50,000 signatures and over 6,000 of us have sent personal messages to the Council. Together we’re letting the Council know that these plans are bad for cows, bad for climate change and bad for other farmers.

Tuesday 11th January is the last day we can raise our concerns. It would be great if we could get a few of us there to support the petition hand in. Do you want to come along? If so here is the time and place to meet:

Delivery of the petition is taking place at 1:15pm
We’re meeting outside North Kesteven District Council offices, 33 East Gate, Sleaford, Lincolnshire, NG34 7EF
Map: http://bit.ly/gWrcba

Sign the petition here: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/page/s/factoryfarm

This campaign is creating lots of press interest. This article was posted up on the Lincolnshire Echo website this morning:
http://www.thisislincolnshire.co.uk/news/64-031-signatures-super-dairy/article-3080075-detail/article.html

Our Save our Forests petition is growing really fast. Over 30,000 people have signed it in less than a week.

We’re proving that the public don’t want our forests sold off. If enough of us get involved in this campaign, we can make the government back down.

Our number one priority this week has to be to make sure that the petition keeps on growing. People power is our best bet for stopping the forest sell-off. The more of us there are involved, the more likely we are to win.

But what else should we be getting ready to do? 38 Degrees works because thousands and thousands of us work together. So we need to start discussing what else we should be doing together on this campaign.

For a serious sell-off of the England’s forests to go ahead, the government would need to get the law changed. That means they need MPs to vote for their plans. So what can we do together to push MPs to promise to protect our forests? Would you be prepared to write to your MP, or pay them a visit? Should we be targeting some MPs more than others? Which ones?

The government, and the private companies that would profit from any sale, will probably try to run a slick PR operation to persuade the public there is nothing to worry about. What should we be doing to raise awareness and spread the word? Should we be raising money to produce adverts? Should we all be putting posters in our windows or bumper stickers on our cars? How about all writing letters to a local papers warning about the plans? Organising local events to get the press involved?

These are just some initial ideas to get the conversation going. Please add your own by commenting on this post.

UPDATE: since this post was put up, both the Welsh and Scottish governments have expressed their opposition to selling off the forests. It looks like, since forestry is a devolved matter, for now at least the main threat is to forests in England. We’ve updated this post accordingly.

Tomorrow Parliament will be voting on a new energy bill. Over the past few weeks thousands of us have been emailing our MPs to demand they vote for important changes to this bill. Now we’ve got 24 hours to increase the pressure even more.

We’re committed to helping fight climate change by reducing the UK’s carbon emissions. But if the new laws are passed in their current form, a new generation of ‘cleaner’ coal-fired power stations will be built without any limits being set on their emissions. Not only that, but we’ll be subsidising these power stations to the tune of millions of pounds.

That’s why we’ve been putting pressure on MPs to include an Emissions Performance Standard in the Bill.  This will make sure that when energy companies build these new power stations, they have to meet proper standards.   If we act together now, we can make a big difference in helping the UK meet its emissions targets.

Tell your MP to vote for a cleaner energy bill here: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/cleaner-energy-bill

38 Degrees members have just taken part in the UK’s first ever mass phone call with a government minister, with Ed Miliband, Minister for Energy and Climate Change. 1000s of us chose the questions together, and 38 Degrees members put them to Ed Miliband direct – sending a clear message that we want him to fight for a good deal at the climate talks in Copenhagen.

Next week, he’ll be sitting around the negotiating table with our words ringing in his ears.

You can hear a recording of the whole call here: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/live

Now we need to keep up the pressure. Callers found common ground with Ed Miliband on the urgent importance of tackling climate change and we recognised good progress in some important areas. But there were other areas where we wanted him to go further -  for example on the scale of emissions cuts needed by 2020, on phasing out dirty coal power stations, and on money to help developing countries tackle climate change.  During the Copenhagen summit we can work together as a rapid response team, to pile on the pressure for a fair, ambitious and binding deal at Copenhagen. Click here to get involved with our Copenhagen rapid response plans: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/copenhagen-swarm

No government minister has ever been part of a call like this before. It was a credit to the Minister that he was willing to engage, but it happened because by campaigning together we’ve got the government’s attention. Everyone who took part – the people who asked the questions, those who commented online and everyone who voted in our question poll were all part of it: it’s yet more proof that people power works.

Together, we asked Ed Miliband the kind of searching questions that made sure he understands that there are millions of people who want him to fight for a good deal at the talks. Obviously not everyone got to ask their question, but we made sure Mr Miliband left with a copy of every single suggested question to read later.

Thanks for being involved.